This week...

We've had a busy and crazy week. Or maybe we've had a busy week and crazy kids...For Felicity we had Parent/Teacher Conferences, she's doing good except fr her handwriting still needs to improve, she writes too fast(yup, we can still blame that on genes, especially because her little cousin Taylor that's in kindergarten got the same assessment at her conference). Her spelling and reading have jumped and she's doing great. She also has a new best friend (Bethany)to play with her and Emmalee, lots of gigging from those three. Caleb got to go back to his ABC class, he hasn't been since before Christmas, and he missed it. They made rabbit ears to wear (brought to you by the letter R), and he wore them the rest of the day and most of Thursday, too (even to the doctors office and around town). Joseph still loves the word bing-bong, and has also found a new best friend, who's name, funny enough, is Hyrum (Bethany's little brother). They were born about a week apart and have mutual affection for loud noises and hot chocolate. Seth is growing rapidly, we're comparing him to bigger bags of flour now. His next drs appointment is in a few weeks, I can't wait to see how big he really is. He's the happiest little guy I've ever seen, even when Joseph tackles him he smiles. Most of the time. He still sleeps through the night about half the time, bless his bald little head. Farris and I are doing great, too. Farris went to the dentist and has no plans to go back for six more months, hurrah. And I went to the doctors to make sure I didn't have Strep throat and I just had a yucky cold, which I'm almost over now. We helped my sister get a washer/dryer set up in her apartment and visited with her and mom and dad. Grandpa gloated over Seth the whole time, and mom enjoyed watching the antics. All is right with the world, except Felicity loudly protesting the picking up of her room. So all is normal in the world.

New word

There's a new favorite word around our house: bing-bong. This morning Joseph informed all of us that he was the only one who could say bing-bong. Ok. Now his brother and sister think it's hilarious to say it while he screeches "no! that's my word!" Life with kids is interesting. You never know what the day will bring.

Yucky cold

I have a yucky, horrid cold. Yes, I am complaining and wouldn't mind any sympathy you can send my way. But if you call on the phone, just remember that the strange graveley voice on the line is me. A telemarketer called yesterday and when I said "Hello?" he said (in that artificially bright and happy telemarketer voice) "Hi, can I speak to the lady of the house?" And when I said "This is she...," he paused for a second and then hung up. I guess he thought I was pulling his chain. Which is ok, because I hate that phrase "the lady of the house." Maybe it's my sore throat and runny nose speaking, but it's really a dumb and outdated phrase. Speaking of telemarketers not understanding the situation they phoned into, one called my parents house a few years ago. When my Dad answered, the telemarketer asked to speak to his mom. My Dad just said, "She's not here right now" and hung up, it was completely the truth, Grandma passed away when I was 6 years old. So these poor telemarketers are getting my Dad's young sounding voice and my preteen-boy-who's-trying-to-speak without-losing-control-of-his-voice voice, and that is why at the end of this post, which is probably a little nuttier than usual because I am fatigued, achy, scratchy in the throat and all the other stuff, I implore all of you to get some kind of training or college education so you never have to become a telemarketer.

Felicity's tooth

I'm about a week behind, but I need to post about a first in our family--Felicity lost her first tooth! She has been waiting and waiting to lose a tooth and was so excited when she could finally feel some wiggling in her teeth. She had all these plans (we were supposed to get her a special tooth box that she could keep it in, she would get to put her name on the Tooth Wall in her classroom, and of course, the Tooth Fairy would come for a visit), but one night she was eating popcorn...and when she finished her tooth was gone. She was disappointed until I told her that the Tooth Fairy would still be able to come, and then she forgot all about swallowing her first tooth. Now she's got the cute little gap that so many first graders have and she's waiting for the next tooth to fall.

Christmas

Yeah, I'm a little late on this, but I have a good excuse. I wanted to post pictures on here because Farris surprised me with a digital camera (well, he got it for the family, but we--and he--knows who it is really for) for Christmas. So I took all these great shots, and now I can't get our computer to recognize the camera to download them. I've been working on it and no success, so I'll write now and download later. Or I'll just go to walmart and get them put on a disk. Anyway...
Christmas was wonderful. We finally had Christmas eve/morning at our own house instead of our parents, and as much as we missed having grandparents around, we enjoyed starting our own traditions. On Christmas eve we read the Christmas story from the Bible from this great picture book with Joseph Brindley's paintings, it's called "When Jesus was born in Bethlehem" and is beautiful. We also got a great idea from the friend magazine where you each think of a gift to give Jesus, in other words, something that you can do to show Him your love and appreciation. Felicity decided she would help mom, Caleb will be reverent during prayers and FHE, Joseph will be potty trained (ok, we helped him with that), and Seth will grow big and strong (ditto). Farris and I decided to work on speaking gently and kindly to the kids (yeah, that means not yelling). We got Christmas Eve pajamas for the kids to wear and they went to sleep pretty well considering. Then we got to play Santa for the first time! In the morning, Farris and I were the first awake. We wanted to have breakfast eaten and everyone dressed before stockings and presents. The kids loved their stocking stuff(Felicity was disappointed that Seth got the largest stocking, she had wanted it) and then we had fun watching the kids open presents. Joseph stopped to play after each one, especially the balls. After presents we got looking out the window to nice weather and thought that we should probably try to make it to Idaho right then instead of waiting 'til the next day. We agreed to meet Farris' sister and brother and their families in Ogden and caravan with them, and we threw everything together as fast as possible. We only forgot a few things and we remembered each kid, so not too bad. After we got to Ogden, we decided to wait for the next morning any way, and spent the night there. The next day we called to see if the interstate was open about every hour, and finally at 4:00 we decided the interstate was never going to open and we had better go around the other way. Again, the rushing and throwing things together and eventually we went through Pocatello to get to Burley. Luckily the roads weren't bad and we all made it. We spent the next week going between family's. We also managed a session in the Twin Falls temple(yea!) and watched our kids have loads of fun with cousins. We finally headed home on new years day so we could get ready for Seth's blessing. All in all, a very good Christmas and hope it was for you, too!

Validation

This isa really sweet video someone from my ward sent around. It's 15 minutes long, but is very good.
Validation - Short Film (16 min)

Joseph, again

I'm going to post about Christmas and Seth's blessing later when I have time (with pictures from our new camera!). I've only got a minute now, but I have to tell this story about Joseph while it's still fresh in my mind. We just got back from shoveling outside and Joseph had wet in his snow pants, so I pulled everything off and sent him to get clean underwear on while I fed Seth. He came out a couple minutes later with clean underwear on... I guess I could say sideways? He had put his legs through one leg hole and the hole where waists normally go, and somehow he fit his waist in a leg hole. Hmmm, to have a waist as small as my thigh, wow. More on Chrismtas later.