Tagged

Linsi tagged me, and I don't usually fill out these things but my husband is out of town and I am bored, so I decided to!

10 years ago...
I had just turned 16 years old and was head over heals for a guy named Brandon Bronson =). I was very excited that he asked me to prom on my 16th birthday. Here is a picture of prom for entertainment purposes.
5 things on my to do list....
1. Hold my cute new nephew again =)
2. Go to Target, Costco and King Soopers
3. Finish putting together a family journal activity for activity days on Thursday.
4. Make thank you cards for my long list of thank yous that I keep on putting off sending.
5. A zillion loads of laundry (notice how it is last on the list? That's how much I love doing laundry.

7 things I love today...
1. My sweet husband who has been in Utah since last Thursday, and is stuck in Rock Springs and can't get home. I miss him!
2. My cute kiddos, who love sleepovers in my bed.
3. A loving mother who always knows the right thing to say. (Like I am not a bad mom just because I totally failed at the whole binky situation).
4. My precious new nephew Carter (and his sweet brother mason too)
5. Cindy is coming to visit on Friday!
6. Good friends who help out in a bind.
7.Levi's speech therapist, who is so sweet with him, and makes him feel so special.

If I won a billion dollars...
I would pay off our debt, go on a huge family vacation, buy new houses for all of our family, and put Brandon through medical school, (which is what he always says he would do if money was no issue.)

Thanks for the Tag Linsi. Now I tag anyone who's bored!

I LOVE being an aunt!

We are so excited to welcome Carter Hudson Ford into the family. He was born to Kristalyn, David and Mason on March 28th, and is so precious. I am so proud of Kristalyn. She had a very scary, fast delivery through an emergency c-section. I am sure she will write more details once she is home and settled.
I was able to go up and see Kristalyn, David and the baby yesterday, and then again today. I just couldn't get enough of him. He is the sweetest little guy, and has the cutest cry!
Tori loved him so much. She kept patting his head and wanted to hold him so bad. Kristalyn was so nice to let her =)
Here is Levi carrying the monkey he brought for Mason, and the baby cow he brought for Carter. (Don't ask about the binky. We are going through a slight relapse.)
We are so happy for Kristalyn, David and Mason. Congratulations!!

PICTURES!!

I finally can post pictures now. Thank you so much Cindy for the camera! Ever since I got it I have taken pictures like crazy. I finally got around to posting some. I didn't notice until I loaded them all onto the computer that the date is wrong. I fixed it though. Enjoy!

A Day at the Zoo

This is week is Spring Break. On Monday we decided to go to the zoo. Kristalyn, Mason, my mom, Michael, Katie, the kids and I, and our friends Penny and Maddy all went. It was the perfect day to go, because it was so nice outside. The kids always have fun going to the zoo. Here are some cute pictures of our day. The first one is of Tori comparing her hand print with the Lions paws. Levi and Mason loved the animals. They would always run to the wall and put their head right up under the railing. It was so cute. They would just sit there and stare at the animals. We just took our time going through everything. That is the great thing about having a zoo membership. You don't have to feel rushed to see everything.
Here are my kiddos. You can't tell, but they are in front of the giraffe exhibit. Before we got to the zoo I asked Tori what her favorite animal was. Without even thinking she said, "the giraffes, just like Cindy."
We had two wagons to pull around all the kiddos in. Wagons are the perfect thing to bring to the zoo, because the kids are always wanting to get out and look at the animals, and it makes it so convenient.

Here is Katie with my kids in front of the polar bear exhibit. Levi and Mason were fascinated by the water. They stared at it forever! IT was so funny, because the bears weren't even in there!
I love this picture of Levi. He just sat there for the longest time with his head in his hands staring at this animal. (I can't remember which animal it was).
Here are Alexis and Tori. They both insisted on wearing skirts and flip flops. I am glad it was nice outside!
Alexis loved looking at the map and trying to figure out how to get places. Here she is trying to find where the elephants are.

WE can't go to the zoo without a ride on the Carousel and the train!

It was a fun day at the zoo. I am sure we will be going back a lot this summer.

Easter!

Easter is so much fun when you have little kids. Our kids were so excited to see if the Easter Bunny came. Here they are sitting on the top step waiting. I thought this was a silly picture. Here is Alexis reading everyone the letter that the Easter Bunny left. She read it all by herself. You can see in the back round that Levi wasn't about to wait for her to finish reading it before he got started hunting for eggs.

Here they all are checking out their loot. Here is Alexis getting an egg that she spotted on top of the picture. Alexis was so excited to fill her basket with eggs and candy. We had to remind her a few times to slow down and let Tori and Levi catch up =).
Tori was very excited when she spotted an egg on top of the shelf in the kitchen.
Here is Levi collecting eggs for his basket.
Daddy and Alexis
Mommy and Levi.

Here are the kids in their Easter clothes. Nana bought them their outfits from a store called Fairy Tales. The felt like princesses and got compliments all day. Levi was being a Ham for the camera. All day he kept pointing to himself and saying, "me daddy!".
After Church we went over to Grandma and Grandpas for Easter dinner. It was yummy. Especially my moms homemade roles! Grandma bought some Easter play dough for the kids to play with. It kept them occupied for a long time!
I was in the front room talking to my mom, and I looked into my dad's office and saw this:
I know it's a little blurry, but I thought it was so cute! My dad was doing a little bit of work, and Tori wanted to be in there with him. What a wonderful day we had. We are so grateful for all of our many blessings.

My Birthday

I had a great Birthday this year. On Friday night Brandon and I went out to eat with our good friends Ben and Stacy. We don't get to see them nearly enough, so it was so much fun to catch up with them. They will be welcoming their first baby this July (it's a boy!). We are so happy for them. Saturday was my actual Birthday. All growing up on our Birthdays my mom would always have a Birthday table set up when we woke up. It would have a birthday table cloth, our cake, and presents. It always made me feel so special, so it is something that I have continued to do for our kids. I was very happy to wake up to my own birthday table, set up by Brandon. That morning I went shopping for some new clothes at Kohls, because my mom and Brandon's mom both gave me gift certificates. I was so excited to find out they were having a huge sale, so I got a ton of cute stuff. The rest of the day Brandon, and the kids and I just hung around the house watching movies. We watched, Enchanted (love it), the new Nancy Drew movie (so cute), and Mr. Magorians Wonder Emporium (could have been better.) It was so much fun to just hang out with my family. After the movies the kids and Brandon "secretly" went into the kitchen and a few minutes later they came walking in carrying my cake and singing Happy Birthday. They were so cute, I had to snap a picture.

The kids all wanted to help me blow out the candles.
Now onto my favorite present. I have been working on our "2007 Family Yearbook" for months and months. I finished it about a month ago, but because of all the pages it turned out to be pretty expensive. I told Brandon that is all I wanted for my birthday. It came a few days before my Birthday and it was torture not being able to open it. It was well worth the wait though. It turned out better then I could have ever imagined! For anyone who is interested, the website that I made it on is http://picaboo.com/. This is year I am going a different route and doing a blog book through http://www.blurb.com/.
After that I can decide which one I like best. I am so excited with how it turned out. Here are a few pictures of it:

All in all it was a great Birthday!

Mischief Maker

I know that several of my last posts have included some trouble that Levi has gotten into. This one is no different. This morning I was getting ready in the bathroom, so Brandon went to use the kids bathroom. He came back in and told me that floating in the toilet was, Tori's electric Dora toothbrush, the kids brand new toothpaste, and a Polly pocket. A few minutes later I went into their bathroom. When Brandon had gone in there, he didn't have his glasses on, so he didn't notice the toothpaste smeared all over the rug, step stool, counter and sink. Now the strange thing about this is, I really don't know when it happened. Last night I put the kids to bed, then went downstairs to work on cards. When I came upstairs I checked on everyone and found them sleeping just as I had left them...or so it seemed. This morning when Levi woke up, the front of his hair had a sticky type substance in it. If I had not given him a bath the night before I may have just thought it was hair gel left over from yesterday. Taking a closer look, and sniff, proved that it was indeed the toothpaste that we found smeared everywhere and then floating in the toilet. So it seems that after I put him to sleep, he made sure I was downstairs and out of sight. He then proceeded to sneak out of bed, have a little fun in the bathroom, then when he was done, climbed right back in bed and fell asleep. What a sneaky little boy!
By the way my sister, Cindy mailed me her old digital camera and I got it today! Hallelujah! So now I can start putting some pictures up with my stories. Although, I really hope that I won't be posting any more of Levi's messes. =)

Side Note

I just had to add on one funny story to the last post. I am the activity leader for the 8 and 9 year old girls at church. I was holding the door open one day for the girls and my friend and her daughter came walking in. My friend was laughing. It was her daughter's first time coming, and as they were getting out of the car her daughter had said, "mom, how old is everyone that comes here?" Her mom said, "8 and 9 years old." Her daughter then responded, "Well that girl holding the door open looks at least 11!" She then had to tell her daughter that I was the leader, not one of the other girls coming to activity days, and I was far older then 11 years old.

You're HOW old?

OK, it is a know fact that I look and sound younger then I really am. I have had to grin and bear several .."you are way too young to have kids", type comments over the years, or my favorite, "Is your mom there", comments on the phone. When Alexis was in preschool, a little girl that was in her class's mom informed me that her daughter had told her that Alexis had a "kid mom". She thought this was hilarious, and so did I...kind of. At Alexis's brownie Christmas party one of the girls in Alexis's brownie troop leaned over to her and whispered, "your mommy looks too young to be a mom." The same little girl came with her mom to pick up girl scout cookies at our house. As I was talking to her mom, she wandered into the kitchen where Brandon and the kids were eating dinner. After they left Brandon informed me that she had said to him, "Did you know that Alexis's mom is a teenager?". He in turn said, "Well did you know that I am Alexis's dad?" She responded, "Yes, but Alexis's mom is a teenager." When he told me this I was a little perturbed. I thought he should have said something along the lines of, well listen here missy, she is not a teenager and don't you forget it! He then had to remind me that that kind of comment was a little teenager like. Anyways, today I think beats them all. Brandon and I took Alexis to the doctor (She is getting evaluated for ADD, but that is a whole other story.) Brandon and Alexis went right over and started watching the movie that was playing in the waiting room. I went up to the counter to check her in. I said something like, I am here with Alexis Bronson to see Dr. Girardeau. She said, "Are you Alexis?".....................um no. Now this wouldn't be so bad if this was a family office, where people of all ages are seen, but it is strictly a pediatricians office. So that would have to make me a child to go there right? *sigh* I just have to keep telling myself that I will appreciate looking younger when I am really old. For now I will try not to get too annoyed.

Pictureless Posts

Well as of this morning, the camera is still not working. I didn't realize how addicted I am to my camera, until Levi walked into my bedroom this morning covered from head to toe in peanut butter. I left the peanut butter on the counter this morning, and he figured out how to open it. I had just opened the jar this morning, and when I got to it more then half of it was gone. I immediately ran to get my camera only to find that it was still not working. It sure makes a messy child and a huge mess to clean up more bearable if you have cute pictures to blog about later. Now I just had to clean up the mess and Levi, and imagine the cute pictures I could have gotten.

Play Date

Today Alexis had a little girl in her class over to play. This was the first time this particular girl has been over to our house. ( I will refer to her as "K"). They were in Alexis's room playing, and I was on the computer in my room. All of a sudden "K" was standing right next to me looking at me in an odd way. This is how our conversation went:

K- "My dad told me that once a wife killed her own husband"
Me- "Really? That is terrible!"
K- (looking around nervously) "Where is your husband?"
Me- (trying not to laugh) "He's at work, he will be home soon."
K- (looking very relieved) "Oh, OK!"

I had to laugh after she left the room. I am not quite sure how that came up in a conversation with her dad, but it obviously affected her quite a bit! I am constantly amazed at what kids come up with these days!

As a side note, Today I walked in the kitchen to find Levi playing in the sink. In the sink, floating in a pan that had soap and water in it, was my camera. It is drying out right now. I am praying that it still works, but not getting my hopes up =(

Dress Shopping

I am not quite sure how I feel about the current styles. Mostly the baby doll shirts and dresses. I have stayed away from these because I think they look like maternity shirts and dresses! The last thing I want is to look pregnant, when I am not! Well, today I ventured out to look for a new dress for my birthday. Most of the dresses were this new style that I do not like. I decided to give in since they looked pretty cute, so I picked out a couple and headed off to the dressing room. I tried on the first one, and was looking at myself in the mirror, thinking, hey maybe this isn't as bad as I thought! Well, any doubts I had were confirmed, as Levi looked up at me, started to giggle, pointed at my stomach and said baby! ...Sigh. Needless to say, back to the rack they all went, and the search continues.