Summer Days

I know I have been terrible at posting but I have to blame it on Eric. He has been in Hawaii for the last 2 weeks for his Drill time and has taken our laptop with him. It is so much easier for me to upload pictures with our computer than with my moms.
Doesn't he look like a little angel here? Yeah right! He's actually a holy TERROR!! We love him though. Last night we were sitting on the porch swing and he said, "MOMMA! I spy a rainbow with my binoculars!!" He was holding up his hands as imaginary binoculars and looking at the rainbow in the horizon. Then he proceded to tell me all the other things he could see with his binoculars.
Now this is the little angel! Grandma Sharlene brought this dress back from Cancun for Neelah. Isn't is so cute!!
Here we have a rare moment where Finn is playing with Neelah. Actually, they happen often but I never catch them on camera. Neelah LOVES her big brother and he can always make her smile!

Fun in the Bath

At first, Finn didn't know how he felt about sharing the bath with his sister but he quickly decided it was fun.
He is such a good big brother. He insists on giving Neelah kisses and hugs before bedtime. He is really good at entertaining her when she is fussing.
I love this kid!! Seeing pictures like this make me forget what a MONSTER he is on days like today. Church is always a struggle...with it being right in nap time and all. But when I see my son like this....he is an ANGEL and all I want to do is kiss him forever.
This one is post-bath. Finn found a pair of Mr Potatoe Head glasses and walked around telling all of us "I see you!!"

London Bridges!

Here are the kiddies prior to getting all wet. Finn, Reagan and Felicity all posed for Ya Ya but none of the pics were perfect. Trying to get "nice" smiles from the kids at the same time is near impossible.
I started out watering the flowers but at 7pm last night it was still at least 85 degrees. Finn wanted to play London Bridges and so we did. The kids had a blast and were all soaken wet!
Then the wind started to blow so we wrapped them in towels and turned the water off.
Finn can't decide if he is cold or what.

Independance Day!

Yes, we did allow Finn to play with fire...sparklers, that is. He loved them and really surprized me with not being scared of them. We had Grandpa Rick and Grandma Sharlene along with aunt Amanda over for a little BBQ action and fireworks. After the big wedding day, a chill night was REALLY nice!
This one is a little fuzzy but it shows just how much Finn loved the sparklers!

The Burgoynes come to visit!!

Our friends from Hawaii came and stayed with us on Friday night. It was great to have their "aloha spirit" in our home again. We love Nate and Heidi and their girls. The kids played so well together, well...when Finn wasn't hogging his toys! Kezia (sorry guys, I may have spelled her name wrong :) anyway, she LOVED Maile! Finn shared his Thomas bed with his friends and didn't put up too much of a fight about having to sleep on the floor in our room. At first, it was cool to have a little bed on the floor but when he realized that he was actually going to have to sleep there, he got a little concerned. The picture above is Finn, Maile, Kezia and Ivey. Thanks guys for your friendship and fun!!
Here we all are from L to R: Kezia, Heidi, Ivey, Nate, Me, Neelah, Eric and Finn with Maile on the floor.

More Pictures #2

Poor McKinney...she didn't want to have any more pictures taken.
Here are the princesses...Riley and Neelah.
This is a shot of Neelah today. We are all recovering from the big wedding day. I know you are all going to see this post first before the post where I explained that it was April and Nate's wedding. That is the one thing I don't like about this blogger...

Wedding Pictures.

Our sleeping Angel...what a princess! Grandma Sharlene bought these darling dresses for all the little girls.
McKinney, April and Nate at the luncheon.
Finn spent most of the time at the luncheon underneath the table reading his Thomas book. It was a LONG day!
The Family
The WHOLE family!! Finn was screaming the entire time!

April and Nate's wedding!!

This picture doesn't do justice to the amount of cupcakes we made for the wedding. Alisa came up with the unique idea of having cupcakes instead of a huge wedding cake. She and I made Honey Lavendar and Citrus Rose cupcakes. She is such the chef!
The kitchen afterward...aprox 2am the day of the wedding.
Jeff and Amy and Neelah at the temple
Here is the finished product...the cupcake cake!
The big day has come and gone. July 3rd...Eric's grandpa Miland's birthday and April and Nate's anniversary. They were married in the Bountiful temple and then had a luncheon at the Joseph Smith Memorial Bldg. Everything was beautiful! Here are some of the pics.

Proof

Here we are...Maile looks like a good mom. But you can see by the photo that she really does like to use the puppies as pillows. Fortunatly for this one, she is just snuggling this time. Anyone want to pay $550 for a Beagle, let me know!!

the days and weeks fly by...

So the past week has been a crazy one. With the puppies here we have a whole new lifestyle. For one, we can't leave for more than 2 hrs. We will periodically go in to check on them and Maile will be laying on them as if they were her own fluffy squealing pillow. Crazy dog. Finn has really been a handfull lately, poor kid needs more attention. I am doing some housekeeping of my blog tonight while I listen to the sad cries of Neelah. I know some of you will think me cruel for letting my 3 month old cry herself to sleep. Alas, there is nothing more liberating than putting your child down for the night and not feeling as if you have to cater to their sleep cycles. Eric and I are tired of her waking up crying after 20 min of being in a dead sleep.

Later...
So Neelah only cried for 40 min. It was heartwrenching! I almost couldn't handle it. Hopefully tomorrow isn't as long, hopefully she catches on quick!

Pics of the kids

These 2 pics are the ones I had blown up for Eric for Father's Day. Aren't they precious?
Here is Neelah hanging out in her play yard. She really is getting into batting at the toys and laughing at the music.
This is a shot I got last week while visiting Great-Grandma Lois. Neelah made her day by talking and smiling for her. Grandma even had other residents come in from the halls to see her great grandkids. She was pretty proud.

PUPPIES!!!

Not much time today to report on all the details but here is the readers digest version:
Maile went into labor on Saturday afternoon...contractions but not too strong or regular. Same thing all day Sunday until about 8pm. That would be when we saw the water bag coming out. So, after that happens, you are supposed to have a puppy delivered within 2 hrs or so. No puppy for us. At about 1:30am we took her to the vet and got x-rays. There were 5 puppies in there just waiting to meet the world. The vet gave her 2 shots of oxytocin to help her contract more efficiently. He said that if she didn't have pups by morning, we would have to have a c-section.

5:30 am came and still no puppies. We called the vet and told them we would be in as soon as the Dr arrived-about 7:30am. Eric said he was going to go lay down for about an hour before we left. We were both up all night with Maile. 10 min after he walked out, Maile was pacing and pushing. I lifted up her tail and there was a puppy head! I had to help her deliver the first 2 but then she did the delivering herself. She wasn't too into cleaning the pups up so we did that work. But by the last one, she did everything herself. I guess she was just exhausted or something....!

We have 4 boys and 1 girl. They are all darling and I will keep updates coming. Maile is doing great at being a mom.

Fathers Day 2007

Of course Finn had to help unwrap Dad's present!


The T-shirt says "coolest dad". This pose testifies that he thinks he is... :)

Udders

My grandparents will appreciate this blog because they had a dairy farm for most of their lives.

So our dog Maile, is pregnant. Every day her nipples get bigger and hang lower and lower to the ground. We are still about 9 days away from puppies. Today, Finn was just cuddling with Maile in the front room and so I went over to spend some quality time with them both. It is so rare these days that I wanted to take full advantage. So there we are, all lying on the carpet. Finn is gently patting Maile's tummy and he touches her HUGE nipples and asks me what they are. How do you say "doggy boobies" to a 2 year old? That is what Eric calls them. Anyway, I told him that they were where Maile's puppies were going to get their milk. We have recently explained to him where milk comes from (cows). So I was trying to correlate milk coming from a cows udders to Maile's engorged breasts without having to come up with an actual term. ( we don't like to use the word boobs with Finn because of a recent Sunday where he sat in Sacrament meeting and poked me and yelled "boob!") After the explanation I offered, he seemed satisfied and just told me over and over again that her puppies were going to come out of her tummy and drink her doggy milk.

Skip ahead to after naps. We are sitting on the couch and he is eating an apple while listening to his songs. I am sitting next to him, feeding Neelah. All of a sudden he looks over at me and says, "those are mommy's udders!"

My son just referenced me to a cow...not like I don't feel like one everyday of my life!

Janae's graduation!

Here they are folks, the proud parents of the graduate! We went to a celebratory dinner at the Old Spaghetti Factory and it was very YUMMY! Rick, Janae and Sharlene. What an important day for Janae...we didn't know if it would come.
The only one not in the picture is Neelah. She is asleep in the stroller behind me. How does everyone like Finn in this picture? Starting from the right: April, Nate, Sharlene, Rick, Janae, Alex, Amanda, Finn, Eric and I.
Eric entertained himself during the rediculously boring ceremony by making Neelah giggle. Yep! She giggles! We love it.

Me trying to be a photographer...

I tried to get some shots of Neelah with her head up but she wasn't cooperating.
I love this one where she is smiling...she is such a smiley baby, just like Finn
Cute, cute cute!! Nanny made this for Neelah. (Nanny is my best friend Brinn's mom, Michelle)
Love my kiddies!!

Random Saturday Pics

For any of you who don't know, this is our dog Maile. She is 3 years old and purebread beagle. She is also pregnant.

Yes, I did say PREGNANT. Since purchasing her we always said that we were going to breed 1 litter and then get her fixed. It has taken us this long to do it. She is due to have puppies somewhere around the second week of June. Beagles gestation is anywhere from 58-63 days long. Wow, wouldn't that be great!!

If anyone knows anyone who would like to buy one of the puppies, let us know.
She is starting to look a little like a cow with udders...especially from a back view.
And here is Neelah today. In trying to get her to wake up we thought that if we just un-bundled her and laid her flat on her back that would do the trick. We were sadly mistaken. Girlfreind just wants to sleep for hours in the afternoons. The only problem with that is that then she is awake until 11pm. "Silly Neelah" Finn would say.