I love these kids.

I love that Hayes asked to cuddle with me tonight.

I love that Kamri wanted to have her friend play at our house because she "wanted to play with my friend but be with my mom, too"

I love that Lyla comes up and grabs my leg every once in awhile with a smile, just to make sure I'm there.

I love watching my kids grow more independent, but it's also nice to know I'm there taking care of them for a reason. Sometimes they just need their mom.

(now just remind me of this as Lyla is screaming when I leave her with a babysitter tomorrow)

Watched Ann Romney's speech at the RNC while eating dinner with the kids. She did a great job!

First Day of First Grade

 Hayes started asking when he could leave for school an hour & a half before school started. He was excited!  It was a bit weird having him gone all day and Kamri was a bit bored but I think she'll be okay with it once preschool starts.

His report when he got home at first was "school was good" but at dinner we got more out of him. He said he went to library and he gets to check out one book each week, two kids cried, he went to the lunchroom twice-one of the times for the principal to speak but he couldn't remember what he said because he talked for a long time. 

Kamri wanted to come with me to drop Hayes off. I tried to leave Lyla home with Bracken but she wouldn't have it. She was standing by the door screaming as we buckled up so Bracken came along too to sit with the girls while I walked Hayes to class.  Lyla was smiling big because we just switched her to forward facing but I just missed it in the picture and no time for another one--we were running later than I wanted to be--like usual.


My favorite line today was when we were reading The Book of Mormon tonight we were reading about King Noah & Abinadi.  We asked Hayes what Noah did to Abinadi: "He fired him!"   (Abinadi was a prophet and King Noah ordered him to be killed by fire because of his teachings).

7 years

7 years ago today Bracken and I got married!

We didn't do much to celebrate today but we've loved having so much time together this summer. I'm going to miss having him around during the day when he starts work in a week.

I'm grateful for such a great husband. We have a lot of great times and he helps me roll through the challenges that are thrown at us.

My favorite part of the day today was dinner. Bracken and I had a lot of laughs over negotiating with Hayes and Kamri about eating their dinner. (yes, I realize there is something wrong with that. They should just be grateful and eat it. But such is life. They both finished all their dinner though, a rarity)
At one point Kamri told us she was so stuffed she couldn't move so obviously she couldn't eat her chicken. Then a minute later she was sitting on the couch. When I asked how she got to the couch without being able to move she straight-faced answered "magic!"
She ended up finishing her chicken once she saw that Hayes got Oreos when he finished.

And I didn't forget Lyla. She finished her dinner long before any of us and then sat and made noises into her cup. Then downed her Oreo with big smiles. I did create one non-picky kid. It's pretty amazing.

House Hunting

We looked at a few houses today, we won't buy one for a few more months but we thought we'd start looking to find exactly what we want.  There were a few houses we liked but nothing we're running to snatch up just yet.

If you could build/buy or change one thing about your house, what would it be? I want wood floors but that isn't something that HAS to be in the house since we can put in wood down the road.  We took the kids with us and one of the houses had a pool.  Hayes & Kamri were sold! They were disappointed when we told them we were looking for a house that did not have a pool.  Room in the backyard to put one in later...great, but I do not want one with this many little kids.  Unless they come up with some sort of electric fence to put around the pool but that doesn't sound too safe either.

Vacation is Over

As we were driving home from Lake Powell yesterday Kamri asked us what we had tomorrow.  Bracken and I told her we had lots of unpacking and cleaning of the house.  She responded matter-of-fact-ly, with a bit of a whine "Why do we have to clean the house?! We aren't going on another vacation!" Apparently, we used the reason of going out of town as motivation for them to clean a little too often this summer.  It's true though, no more vacations.

 We did buckle down and clean the house, and grocery shopped. Bracken cleaned our car that had a major case of "trip car". Then ran some errands to apply to take the Utah bar exam. The kids and I went to Hayes's school to meet his teacher.  Turns out his teacher won't be there until the second day of school, so I guess he'll meet her then! After dinner we cleaned up in time to watch "Flushed Away" before the kids went to bed.

and now to back post all of the last week and our Lake Powell trip...