Little Boys

Since we have moved to Michigan, our whole family has made a friends with another family, The Johnsons. Our kids love getting together with the Johnsons and have asked since the second week we moved here when the next time will be that we see them (we see them at least once a week). Being so far away from aunts and uncles and cousins, the Johnsons have helped us fill that void, and they literally feel like family to us. We really love them!

Perhaps the most interesting friendship that has developed

is that friendship between Jacob and Griffin (or Fiffen as Jacob used to call him). Those two have always had such a fun time together. By themselves, they are two normal boys, but when they get together, there can be some significant trouble. For example, when they were really about 2, we would have to listen very carefully when they went upstairs. They loved to fill up my tub with water, put their hand in front of the spigot so water would spray all over the bathroom, and then climb in, shoes, clothes and all. This, fortunately, was good clean fun. We had a lot of dirty fun too.

For example, one time, Griffin and Jacob took a permanent magic marker to my bathroom, and they inevitably would make a mess with toys (this I can't blame entirely on them, their older siblings played and still play a very large part in these messes). Perhaps the most memorable mess was on Alden's birthday last year when they took three full bottles of maple syrup and squirted them all over my kitchen. This momma was not a happy camper. I called Michael in hysterics. He came home and didn't know if he should comfort me or Griffin, both of us were still crying from the incident (Griffin was crying because I was screaming so loudly, and I was crying because it took me three times of scrubbing the floor on my hands and knees to get rid of the stick). Alisha and I hoped that the boys were approaching maturity from these messes, but as a Valentine's Day treat for the Johnson family, Jacob and Griffin drew all over nearly every level of their house. Interestingly, the basement was a map complete with hieroglyphics and arrows showing one where to go. Griffin's drawings were certainly more complex than Jacob's, but both made quite a mess on their walls. Alisha and I scrubbed for quite sometime, and in the end, she and Ryan painted their basement (I felt really bad about that).

Nonetheless, I thought all of this was bad. I thought

Jacob might be my toughest boy. After all, for my 38th birthday, Jacob ran into the wall and cut his head open so badly that he had to have stitches, and literally, 31 days later, he ran into our couch and should have probably had another set of stitches above his eyebrow (they glued it instead). Together with Griffin, I thought no little boy could be more crazy. However, after reading previous posts of when Hyrum was little, I remembered that little

Jacob, even coupled with Griffin, is no match for our little Hyrum. Although Hyrum can still be a handful at times, he is nothing like he used to be. I laughed and laughed as I read about him hauling buckets of water out of the tub to ruin our kitchen ceiling (now it's funny), I chuckled when he made a "storm" in the basement from cooking something way too long in the microwave downstairs, and I couldn't imagine how we paid for all the cereal he dumped in various parts of the house when he was little. I remembered how every day, Hyrum made extreme messes and taught me the importance of responding to his requests immediately!

Today I was reminded of all that when he was making himself a quesadia. He wanted to make it himself, so with a big porcelain plate, he carefully climbed upon to the kitchen

counter top, went from a crouching position to a standing one, balanced carefully over the microwave, and then put his plate in.  When it was finished, he took his hot plate out and was about to complete the whole process in reverse. To save him from death, I took the plate from him so that he could jump down, and I then cut up his dinner. He asked if I would cook him a piece of toast, which I did. About three minutes later, he said urgently, "MOM!!! My toast!!! It's burning! Come quick!" I jumped up from eating my oatmeal (Michael wasn't home for dinner tonight, so our dinner was shall we say hodge podge) and ran over to the toaster oven. When I got there, Hyrum lamented, "You're killing me, Mom!!!" That boy! For some reason, that whole interchange reminded me of my post when Hyrum fell from the football stadium seats and how for a brief minute I thought I lost my mischievous yet remarkable blessing from God. I truly feel so grateful for him. Though he may lose his temper from time to time (he's too much like his momma) and be irritably independent and stubborn, I wouldn't trade him for anything. I love him with all my heart and will be sure to thank God tonight for blessing me with him and his special brothers. What a blessing it is to have these four wonderful boys!

Growing UP

I can't believe that Alden will turn 12 this month. He is kind of past that cutsy stage where he is always saying things that are so cute and fun and make us laugh. He does make us laugh. He loves to tell jokes and has a very fun sense of humor (it is much like Michael's, which may be scary to a few of you). He is really growing up. He is conscientious, caring and helpful. He never complains when I ask him to help me. He is always willing to do anything I ask from simply running upstairs and grabbing my cell phone to doing the arduous task of cleaning the basement. He seriously does not complain. I can't say how much I appreciate his happy and willing disposition. I feel like I am the luckiest mom in the world to have him as my oldest son. I truly am blessed.

Something Hyrum will hate me for in the future

Back in March, Diane and Doug decided that for their kids' spring break, they would leave the 70 degree weather in Hurricane, Utah, and come and visit us in the snow covered tundra of Michigan (they were able to see a lot more snow in one day than they had probably seen the entire winter--Doug even got to try out our snow blower). We had the BEST time with them!!! They arrived late, late Saturday night (some might call 2 AM Sunday morning) and stayed until the following Friday. We loved every minute of their visit. The boys were in heaven having their cousins here to play with them 24 hours a day, and they adored baby Airika (who really isn't too much of a baby anymore--she just turned 3).

I personally relished having my sister here and so appreciated all the projects that she and Doug did around my house (we painted my vaulted ceiling entryway and living room, and Doug installed lights and ceiling fan in my 18 food ceiling). I so appreciated them coming and was so sad to have them leave.

On Monday night, we thought it would be fun to go bowling for Family Home Evening. We had such a fun time, and the kids enjoyed riding with their cousins in the way back home. Michael and I ended up with Bridger and Hyrum in our car. Michael stepped out of the car to gas up, while I sat and listened to Bridger and Hyrum's conversation. It went something like this:

Bridger: I really need some new DS games.

Hyrum: Well, actually, you don't need DS games; you just want new DS games. Wants and needs are two different things. And actually.... electronics are kind of a bad thing.

Bridger: No, they aren't.

Hyrum: Yes, they are. When you play electronics you can get distracted, and when you're distracted, sometimes you can poop your pants....at least that is what happens to me and my brother Thobe.

I actually didn't hear the rest of the conversation because I was laughing so hard. Typically, this little insight that Hyrum shared hasn't been a laughing matter for me. However, hearing this explained in such a fashion really made me laugh. At least he is aware of the problem...right?

Vocabulary

Thobe is quite the kid. He turns a whopping decade this month, which seems almost unfathomable to me. The kid is crazy smart too. He always amazes me. I have had the pleasure of homeschooling him for the past two years and have loved being able to gain an understanding of his strengths.

Perhaps his strongest academic ability is his vocabulary. He is always saying things that surprise us and make us ask him where he learned that word. A couple of days ago, we were in the car, and he said, "Mom, I have a plurality of green puffles in Club Penguin." I asked if he said he had a plurality of puffles, and he said that was indeed what he had said. 

I said, "Thobe, what does plurality mean?"

"Well," he replied, "it is not the majority, like over 50%, but I have more green puffles than any other type of puffle."

Admittedly, I'm not sure that I could have used the word plurality correctly, and even if I could, I don't know if I could have defined it as well as he did. He's pretty amazing.

Robbers and Teddy Bears

Jacob in his robber shirt posing with Ruffy Junior

Jacob is 4 years old, and I can hardly believe how quickly the time has passed. He is seriously so cute and adorable and makes us laugh every single day. I really can't get over how cute he is. He loves to play and be silly. He is always asking me if he is my silliest kid. Despite that, he is also very snuggly, tender and loving.

To illustrate, a few weeks ago, Michael was lying on the couch, curled up in a blanket. Jacob came up to Michael and climbed in the covers with him. In his gentle, cuddly and awfully sweet voice, he suggested, "Papi, you be the daddy, and I'll be the teddy bear." He then nestled himself right into his Papi's arms and snuggled away.

Jacob is also very thoughtful. He will often say things that surprise us. For example, he and I were driving back from school when Jacob asked me, "Mom why do robbers like money so much?" 

This caught me off guard. I told him that they probably aren't happy and that they think that money will buy them things, which they think will make them happy. I told him, "But you know Jacob, money can't buy happiness." 

Jacob was quiet for a minute, and then announced, "Mom, I'm kind of like the robbers." 

I was surprised by this announcement and said, "Oh really, why is that?"

Jacob confidently added, "Because we both love money."

Apparently Jacob's priorities are not quite where I thought they were.

Regrets

I want to pick up on writing my blog again. I hate that I haven't really written here for several years. My boys do the most amazing, remarkable cute things that I don't want to forget. Years ago, I found that blogging was a good way for me to keep track of what they have done, but with the birth of my Jacob (which was nearly 5 years ago--uggh), I just haven't seemed to do nearly as well of a job. That being said, I can't change the past, I can only change the future. I really am going to try to write the cute things my boys do. They are growing up before my eyes, and I just don't want to forget this tender and wonderful time of my life. Enough said.

Periods and Exclamation Points

The past month has been quite an adventure for our family. All our school details will come in a subsequent post, but Thobe and I have been doing homeschool this year, which has allowed me to spend a lot of time with my sweet boy and has really allowed me to see how amazing he is.

Because we are always together, Thobe gets to go a lot of places with me. We have Jacob with us most of the time too, which has been really fun to watch them play together as well. The other day, I went visiting teaching. I was telling the people I was visiting with how I sometimes feel like I have two families. I have Alden and Thobe who are calm and easy going and really obedient. Then I have Hyrum and Jacob who, well...., aren't. I explained how they push me more than the older two ever did and have so much energy. If they decide that they do not want to be obedient, they aren't. Sitting through church, though easier than it used to be, is still difficult, and they often get into things that they should not get into. I also noted to my friends how even though Hyrum and Jacob are hard sometimes, they are also extremely loving and sweet. I said, "I guess, Hyrum and Jacob just put an exclamation point at the end of everything they do."

My friends smiled and made a passing comment or two. Thobe then piped in, "Yeah, Alden and I...we just put a period at the end of everything."

I really couldn't have said it better myself.

"Mom, You Are My Brother"

Jacob loves his brothers. He misses them when they are away from him and mimics everything they do. He adores them. The word "brother" means more than another boy born to the same parents to Jacob, but it also means a very close friend.

This more distinct definition first became apparant to me when we went out to Utah. Michael bought the boys an insane amount of Superfriends videos for the boys to watch in the car. They seriously watched at least 15 hours worth of Superfriends videos on long voyage--I should make a post about our super fun trip in late July early August. Anyway, when we got in the van to drive up to Michael's sister's house in Northern Utah from Southern Utah, Jacob yelled, "I want to watch Superman and Brudders." Michael and I got a laugh out of that and thought it was sweet that he considers his brothers to be friends.

Just the other day, we went to Costco. We were waiting for our friends to do something at the customer service desk. Jacob was sitting in the cart and reached out and hugged my arm tight to his body. In the snuggliest, sweetest, sincerest voice, he whispered, "Mom, you are my brudder. I wub you."

He is my sweet brudder too. I sure love that little guy.

Thobe's Baptism and Our Family Visit

June has been a wonderful month for our family. At the beginning of June, my sister Kristi and her family came to visit us. We have had such a wonderful time with them. I have loved being able to spend so much time with my sister and her family, and our kids have relished every minute that they've spent together. She has some pretty incredible kids. I love them all so much!

On June 14th, Alden and Thobe finished school. They were happy to be done, and I was too. I feel bad that I never was able to get fully organized with school this year. I hope that next year will be better.

The week the boys finished school, Michael went to Mexico City on business, and the next week, Alden went to basketball camp in Toledo and spent the week with Grandpa and Abuelita. He was sad to leave his cousins but had a great time with his grandparents. While he was gone, the rest of my family arrived. Laura and Israel and their new baby Learsia came to our house on Tuesday. I was so excited to meet my newest niece. She is so adorable! My brother-in-law, Doug, my brother John, his wife Lindsay, and their two kids, Joseph and Kaili, arrived on Wednesday, and that evening my mom and sister Diane arrived with Diane and Doug's kids, Davin, James, Bridger, Joshua, and Airika. They drove here and were happy to be done with the car. We were happy for them to be here. Early the next morning, my dad and sister Emily arrived on a red-eye flight. When Alden got home from basketball camp, everyone started chanting his name. He felt like a happy superstar who was completely surrounded with the love of his family. On Thursday afternoon, my sister Amy and her husband Jeremy arrived from Oklahoma. It was so wonderful having everyone there.

Prior to everyone's arrival, we bought a play structure on Craigslist and paid someone to put it together for us. In the process he broke his thumb and was unable to complete the job. Fortunately, John and Doug were here, and with the help of my dad, Israel and Jeremy, they replaced some bad wood and rebuilt us an awesome playstructure. The kids had such a wonderful time playing on that thing.

On Sunday, we went to Toledo for Thobe's baptism. We scheduled it in Toledo with the hope that Michael's great grandmother would be able to come. Unfortunately, she fell and broke her hip earlier that week, so she wasn't able to be there. We had so many people that were there though. We loved seeing so many people that are dear to us and appreciated everyone's efforts to be there.

Thobe's baptism was wonderful. I am so proud of my sweet boy. I love him so much. I created a video for him. The link is as follows:

Thobe's baptism video

After the baptism, Amy and Jeremy drove home, and little by little, everyone else left. The boys loved having all their cousins with them to go to their cub scout day camp.

When most of my family was gone, Michelle and Eric came and stayed with us for a few days. We had so much fun with them too.

How grateful I am for family! I love them all so very much!!!! Thank you everyone for coming and being with us. We love you!

Happy Birthday for Alden and Thobe!

May is a crazy month for our family. Not only are we gearing up for the last few weeks of school, but Alden and Thobe both have a birthday. They had great birthdays this year.

Alden turned a whopping 10 years old. I can't believe I have a boy who is 10! On his birthday, we did a birthday treasure hunt in the morning before school, Michael took him and Thobe to Burger King for breakfast and met him for lunch at school with a Subway pizza. That night we met Warren and Chris in Monroe, Michigan to celebrate Alden and his abuelita's birthdays. We had such a great time. On Saturday, Alden had a Ninjago birthday party complete with a crazy obstacle course designed by Alden and Michael. They had such a great time!

Thobe's birthday was equally as exciting. Thobe turned 8 years old. I can't believe that he is that old. He's so excited about getting baptized and being older. We also did a treasure hunt for him before he left for school, and he also went out to breakfast with Michael and Alden, and had a Subway pizza delivered to him by his Papi. That evening we took Thobe's best friend Broderick Johnson with us to the Rain Forest Cafe for dinner and then went to Jeepers for an evening of roller coasters, bumper cars, and other fun rides. He had such a great day. He was especially excited about the eagle cake that I made him.

A Top Ten List

On April 25, 2012, we closed on our house in Lima.  I was fortunate to have the opportunity to walk by myself through my dear house one last time and say goodbye.  It was quite an emotional experience for me.  I heard the faint whisper happy boys playing in the basement, the patter of little bare feet playfully running around the circle, and little voices singing Primary songs in various places in the house.  I felt the love of my family and some of our most treasured friends that we made during the four years that we lived in Lima.  When I walked in the kitchen, I could still see the towels that Michael used to clean up the "rain" that Hyrum had made by throwing out buckets of water from the upstairs' bathtub.  When I walked in the boys' room, I heard Thobe's sweet two year old voice exclaim, "My Buckeye Room!"  The memories were palpable, as I walked through the house where I truly felt God had opened the windows of heaven upon us and gave us more blessings than we had room enough to receive.  I can honestly say that while I am very relieved not to have two houses, deep in my heart, I wished that we could some day go back to Lima and live in that same house.

When we first moved to Lima, I listed the top ten reasons that one should visit Lima, Ohio. While most of them were silly reasons, I want to end this chapter of my life by writing another top ten list--the top ten things I will miss about my old house. Keep in mind that this is simply the ten things that I will miss about my house--I could probably list 100 things that I would miss about Lima, certainly with our sweet friends that we made there being at the top of my list.

#1: Our Strawberry Patch. When we first moved to our house, the ground in the front of the house was covered with ivy. I worked so hard to pull it all up and off of the house (when I was working on this project, Alden came out and said, "Mom, why do we have Naomi growing all over our house--Alden has a cousin named Ivy who has a sister named Naomi). After all the ivy was gone, I wanted something else there, so we planted two strawberry plants. They grew and grew and grew. We loved going outside and picking a bunch of strawberries to add to our cereal.

#2: The clematis on my mailbox. While this picture was taken before it bloomed, every year in May, the clematis around my mailbox would explode with beautiful, purple flowers. I loved driving up to my driveway and seeing the beauty of it. I will definitely miss that!

#3: Our big open basement/TV room/toy room. I loved our basement. It had a ton of space and room to roam around. It also had a nice computer desk and built in cabintry. Our family spent countless hours downstairs entertaining, playing, and talking. I am very excited to have a finished basement at our new house.

#4: Our magic closet lights. In the coat closets in the entry way and also in our kitchen pantry, we had magic lights. When you opened the door, the light came on; when you closed it, it turned off. I loved that I never had to fumble for the light when I was cooking or putting groceries away. It went on and off automatically.

#5: The laundry shoot. Perhaps the thing I miss the most about my old house is the laundry shoot. I never had to worry about hampers or piles of dirty clothes in the bedrooms. All my dirty laundry was stored in the wall. Whenever we had dirty clothes upstairs, we just dropped them down the laundry shoot that went straight to the laundry room. I never had to carry a pile of dirty clothes downstairs. I did often wish for a lift of some sort that would allow me to pull my clean clothes upstairs.

#6: My new stove and double oven. While I will admit that I like my current gas range and built into the wall double ovens slightly better, I loved my double oven and range that I bought the November before we moved. If I ever by another range, I will buy one just like this.

#7:  My backyard deck. I loved being able to plant flowers and vegetables that I would hang on the deck in various places. I loved our apple trees and the trelace that we were going to use to plant grapes or kiwis. It was such a great backyard.

#8: Our simple swing set. I will so miss seeing the kids play out back for hours on our swingset. There were four swings for our four boys. I loved it when all four of them would be back there swinging having a wonderful time together. We should probably get a swingset here.

#9: Our big wooded backyard. I loved having a woods in our backyard. I loved seeing it bloom in the spring and watching the leaves fall in autumn. The kids never played in the forest, but it was a beautiful, peaceful thing to watch while eating breakfast or making dinner. I will miss that.

#10: Thobe's (and Alden's) Buckeye room. While I didn't know the first thing about Ohio State before I met Michael, that room particular room will forever remind me of being the thing that was the final selling point on the house. When two year old Thobe said, "Ahh, my Buckeye room," we knew we had to buy the house that we were already sold on.

The Tortise and the Hare

Thobe is an amazing kid. He is always saying and doing things that catch me off guard. From the time he's been very young, he has made some very interesting, humorous, and mature connections. For example when he was 5 years old, we were in the grocery store. He read a magazine that was featuring someone from The Biggest Loser. He read the words "Biggest Loser" aloud, and then laughed and said, "Hey, Mom, did you ever hear of the smallest winner?

The past two days have been no exception to Thobe's ability to play on words and make quick calculations. This morning when I woke the boys up, Alden bolted out of bed, as usual, and Thobe slowly stirred and moaned that to indicate that he wasn't interested in getting out of bed, also as usual. I persisted, racking my brain for some motivation to get him moving. I said, "Hey, Thobe, you only have 20 days left of school. Get up and enjoy one of your last days of school." He tiredly looked at me from the corner of his nearly closed eye and tiredly mumbled, "We have 180 days of school, so this must mean that today is my 160th day. Is that right, Mom?" I was impressed.

Last night, he made a comment that both shocked and amused Michael and me. Earlier that day, we we were driving through our friends' neighborhood and saw a turtle walking down the middle of the road. We stopped in the middle of the road and made sure all the kids saw the turtle. We all gave our appropriate Oooos and ahhhs, the boys told us some fact they knew about turtles that I didn't know (they are really into animals right now, especially dinosaurs), and then we drove on. Later that evening we were driving home. A rabbit ran out in front of us, and Michael said, "Don't let me run over you, Little Bunny." The boys all strained their necks to try and see the rabbit. Alden said he saw it, and then Thobe said, "I saw the tortise, but I didn't see the hare." He then giggled, and Michael and I laughed out loud. I would have never thought to say something like that, but he did. That's what he does. He's growing up so fast!

False Accusations

In my pre-kid life, I never knew that being a mom would be so full of surprises. I didn't imagine that having grimy little hands grab my ears and hair as a goopey yogurt face slopped a messy kiss on my lips could bring me so much joy. I never imagined that a small fever in a little body would keep me up all night with worry. I didn't know that hearing a kid use the bathroom without any prompting would feel me with pure elation, nor did I ever imagine that I would consider myself a broken record on a daily basis. Motherhood is certainly full of surprises. You would think after a decade of being a mom that I would no longer be caught off guard with the things my kids say or do, but this week I was especially humored and surprised by the accusations of Jacob and Alden.

In our house, we love fresh fruit. A particular favorite of mine, Thobe and Jacob are blueberries. I think everyone likes them a lot, but to Jacob, Thobe, and I blueberries are like manna from heaven. When I saw a pint of blueberries at Kroger this week, I was torn. I really wanted some blueberries, but at $3.98 a pint, I was not all that hipped on buying them. My taste buds won out, and I put a pint in the cart. Because of the other blueberry lovers that live in my house, I carefully hid the costly blueberries in the fridge. I knew as soon as they were opened that they would be gone. The day arrived when I pulled them out of the fridge and sprinkled a few on my cereal. Jacob caught me in the act and said, "Oooo, stwaberries! I wike stwaberries." Reluctantly, I sat him up on the bar and let him eat some.

After eating nearly the entire pint, he got down and started to play. I noticed that there might be enough for my cereal the next morning, and quietly put them in the fridge. Several minutes later, Jacob climbed up to the bar and said, "Where are my stwaberries? Where are they?" I asked him what he needed and told him that we don't have any strawberries. He narrowed his sparkly blue eyes and said, "You stole my stwaberries, Mommy. Give me back my stwaberries!" Poor little Jacob has a thief for a mommy.

Alden's accusation made me laugh equally as hard. Our entire neighborhood (and perhaps township) turned on their sprinklers this week; consequently, we have had little to no water pressure. I talked to my neighbor and discovered that we simply need to change our filters and our water pressure would improve. Last night I tried to figure out how to do it, but couldn't so I went upstairs. I soon realized that my kids needed baths before bed, so I told them to go and get in the bathtub. I heard a bunch of commotion, and then the kids came running down stairs. "Mom," they yelled, "We have no water." I had forgotten to turn the water back on when I was trying to change the filter. Trying to solve the problem with all the wisdom of a ten year old, Alden came downstairs and said in a hushed town, "Mom, when is the last time you payed the water bill?" I don't know how he was aware of this, but he did know his stuff. I assured him that I had paid the bill, and he was relieved.

Questions

Hyrum is my most inquisitive kid so far. Alden and Thobe took the world at face value; Hyrum does not. Why did God want me to be a boy, Mom? Why are my eyes brown? Why did Papi marry you? When will Gefil come back alive (Gefil is Michael's grandfather who recently passed away). After a litney of questions, Hyrum often says, "I have a lot of questions, Mom."

His question today really made me laugh. In the middle of a barage of questions, Hyrum asked, "Mom, when are Grandpa and A-Leeta (Hyrum's way of saying abuelita in Spanish) going to have kids?" I usually try not to laugh at his questions, but I just imagined Hyrum being frustrated that his grandparents had failed to produce children for him to play with. I told him that they already had kids. "Really?" he asked. "Where are they?"

"Well," I responded, "Papi is one of Abuelita and Grandpa's kids.

"Oh yeah," he replied, as if he had just remembered. "Who else is Grandpa and A-Leeta's kid?"

I reminded him that his aunt Michelle is also one of their children. He was satisfied with that and wondered if his grandparents had any more kids. I told him that they only had two kids. Hyrum pulled his silly Hyrum face and then said, "Mom when are Grandpa and Aleeta going to have a brother for Papi?"

I need to call my in-laws and tell them that according to Hyrum that they've got some unexpected work to do. Now that Chris is retiring, maybe they'll have the time.

Four White Walls

When we got to our new house, I must admit that I didn't have an immediate connection with it. For the first few months of living in Michigan, I was a bit overwhelmed. Most of the walls were white, and the with the exception of the kitchen, all the walls that weren't white I hated. I am not sure if I just missed my old house (I loved our house in Lima--I really felt and still do that it was sacred to our family--it was one of the gifts God gave to us when he opened the windows of heaven upon our family and gave us more than we had ever hoped to receive), or if the way the house was decorated just made me feel kind of yucky.

Graciously, John and Alicia Christiansen came and visited and helped me paint the lime green dining room a nice neutral tan color and the pinkish piano room a deep red. Interestingly, that made the house feel a lot more like my own house--we began to connect. Michael and my bedroom was a cool blue color. While blue, even a light blue, is one of my favorite colors, it did not work in my bedroom. While Michael was in Tennessee on a business trip, I took the left over paint from the rooms downstairs, and painted one red wall and the three remaining walls the tan color. It really added to the room, and it matched our bedspread, which probably was part of the reason that the blue looked so horrible. Again, our new house seemed more like our house, and while my old house will always hold a special place in my heart, I felt less attached to it.

About a month ago, I also decided to paint Alden and Thobe's room and Hyrum and Jacob's room. We had decided on a Star War's theme for the older boys' room and a sports' theme for the younger boys. I had so much fun doing this. The boys loved their rooms. My first attempt at the Star Wars room ended up being a purplish gray. When Michael saw it, he refused to let it stay that way. He told me that we would have to change it. Alden and Thobe told him they liked it and that they should get the final say because it is their room. Michael had no problem over ruling that. Later that day, I went and bought a bluish gray that was even better than I could have imagined. It was so much fun transforming that room into something better than the four white walls afforded us. Of course we also added a border and a clone fat head, along with Thobe's baldy and baldy mirror. It will be even better when we install a clone wars ceiling fan and bedding, but for right now, we love it! I also think Hyrum and Jacob's room turned out great too.

All of this has got me thinking about life in general. Really in each state of our lives, we meet up with four white walls. Sometimes we arrive in a situation that is not ideal or that is not what we wanted it to be. In all honesty, there have been several times in the past few months when I have wished for my old life in Lima. However, I've been given four white walls that I can make to become what I want them to be and hopefully what God wants them to be. So much of life is just making our situations the best we can make them. We really are the master of our own happiness. I hope that I can always live my life today and make it be the best that it can be.

The Winning Ticket

Jacob is always into doing whatever his brothers are doing. He loves copying them and following them around the house. He is a bit of tease with them as well, but I think for the most part, everyone enjoys having Jacob shadow them around the house.

Jacob and Hyrum have a very interesting relationship. They are the best of friends, but they are also very competitive with each other. If Hyrum says he's tired, Jacob says, "No, I'm tired." There are many arguments over simply who is going to say what and who gets which toys. I always find myself shaking my head when it comes to prayer time, and the two boys start arguing about who is going to say the prayer. Many Pentacostal-like prayers are offered at our house where we have two boys offering different prayers at the same time.

So this competive edge that exists in our house, especially between Hyrum and Jacob, sets the stage for my post. Just last weekend, I finally got through the last remaining boxes in our garage. In the box, I found one of the bags that I used to take to church that was equipped with items that I might need to keep Jacob quiet. One of those items was a green sippy cup that I bought and threw in there and then never used. I threw the cup out of the bag and left it on the countertop. The next day, Jacob discovered the cup and excitedly brought it to me to put something in it for him to drink. I unscrewed the lid, handed him the cup, and told him I would put water in it as soon as I finished folding that load of laundry (if I don't fold the laundry immediately, it doesn't get done for many days). Jacob took the cup and started to walk away. Before leaving the laundry room, Jacob stopped dead in his tracks. He carefully lifted the lid of the cup and pulled out the instructions to care for the cup. A shreak of pleasure erupted from his little body.

"Look at that, Mom! Look at that!" he exclaimed. "I won! I won!"

Who would have thought that simple care instructions for a sippy cup could make someone's day that much better?

A Quick Catch-Up

It has been way too long since I last typed on my blog. I have a lot of excuses, and I wish I could say that I have been writing a lot in my journal to off set the lack of record keeping that I have done for my family. Unfortunately, I cannot. I feel sad that so much of the last two years of my life and my children's life will likely be forgotten. I can only try to do better. To capture some of the craziness, I will highlight a few of our family's recent adventures over the past year.

Since I last wrote, our life has gone crazy! We were very content with our life in Lima; we loved it. We certainly had a challenge here and there, but life was predictable and wonderful. In May (almost of year ago--good grief) I rode with our good friends, Ron and Ronda Tucker to stake conference in Perrysburg, Ohio. I remember Ronda distinctly asking me, "So do you think you'll be in Lima for a long time?" I told her that we love Lima and would be happy to stay for a very long time, but that our philosophy has always been that we would willingly go wherever it was that Heavenly Father wanted us to go. I guess God heard me and decided to try us and see if that truly was our philosophy. The next week, Michael had two different people contact him about new job possibilities. He basically told them that he was happy with his current situation, but with a little coaxing, they both convinced him to interview with their companies. By the end of May, Michael had two very tempting job offers. One was in Auburn Hills, Michigan, for a parts supplier of Fiat and the other was in Tulsa, Oklahoma working with on of his best friends from business school. Both offers were very attractive, and they were both a huge career move for Michael. After a lot of praying and deliberating, we decided that staying close to family would be the best thing for our family, and that God wanted us to go to Michigan, so we began getting our house ready to sell and looking for a new house to buy. The worst part was telling our friends that we were leaving. We had made so many wonderful friends in Lima; it broke our hearts to tell them goodbye.

Needless to say, our summer was a blur. We did make it out to Utah for a visit, while Michael was trained for his new job in Italy. The rest of the time we packed, cleaned, and searched for a new house. It was completely crazy!

The boys started school in Michigan on September 4th, which was also the day that the movers met me at our new house. I wouldn't recommend this to anyone. I still feel disorganized with school stuff. Hopefully next year will be better :).

I felt like most of the fall was spent in and out of doctor's offices. The school nurse thought Thobe might be having absence seizures, so in addition to making two house payments, I think we also paid the house payments of several doctors each month. We saw a neurologist, a urologist, several psychologists and pediatricians, and he had an MRI. It was determined that Thobe has ADHD (something that we already knew that he had). The good news was that Michael and I realized that Thobe would be best served by simply taking no medication and have worked with the school to come up with ways to help Thobe be successful. He is a wonderful, bright boy! We just need him to learn to do his worksheets and writing assignments at school. I think we're on the right track though.

We went to Utah for Christmas and had a great time. We were even able to see my sister Amy get married to Jeremy Black, one of her very best friends from her childhood.

Over the past year, we have had a lot of fun watching BYU sports and have even traveled to places where they have played out in this area of the country (is Mississippi considered this area of the country?). We got rid of our satellite when we moved and have loved not paying an expensive Direct TV bill each month and being creative with how Michael can still watch sports, and the kids can still watch their favorite shows. It's been great!

We also have enjoyed the blessing of making new friends, especially the Johnson family. I really feel like God has answered our prayers by blessing us with them. I remember before we moved, I prayed that our kids would be blessed with good friends that would be a good example to them and that they could be an example to. We have experienced them being good examples to each other on many different occasions already. The Johnsons have four kids that are the same ages as our kids, and they share same interests. The similarities that they have with our family are a little spooky to be honest (Ryan and Michael are both Buckeye and Cougar fans, Alisha and I are 10 days a part and are both moms--need I say more?, Alden and Corwin both love dinosaurs and Star Wars, Thobe and Broderick both love Army and playing games, Hyrum and Elise are both easy going and love to just play, and Griffin and Jacob are probably the best friends of all--they are both mischievous and are always overjoyed to see each other). They have been a great blessing to our family.

We really loved having a spring break this year. The boys got 10 days off of school, so we went down to Oklahoma to meet Aunt Emily and Davin and James and visit Aunt Amy and the boys' new Uncle Jeremy. We had such a great trip! We stopped and saw Bob Gibson and his family in Kansas on our way home, and then also stopped in Nauvoo for a few hours. We had such a great time!

Of course, I am neglecting all the cute things the boys said and did. That is the sad part to me. They are all growing like weeds. I'm so proud of the choices they are making and the people they are becoming. I really am proud to be the mom of four wonderful boys. What a great blessing they are to me!

For a video and picture summary of 2011, you can watch that at http://vimeo.com/33864516

Good Guys, Bad Guys, and Buckeyes

So Jacob is so darn cute right now. I love this stage where he is constantly saying and doing and learning new things everyday. One of his recent distinctions is between good guys, bad guys, and buckeyes, as shown in the following video. I need to keep on my blog because I could write something adorable and new that he says every day.

Hyrum-isms

So Hyrum has really started to turn a new page. With the exception of last week (I'm not sure what has gone on), I think he is finally potty trained and is far more obedient than he's ever been before. Hyrum has decided that he's 4 years old rather than 3 (even though he's been 4 since November) and actually tries to do what I ask him to do rather than trying to do the opposite.

Hyrum has been especially funny though. We never know exactly what he might say, which always makes me laugh. For example, I have habit of calling my kids silly names. I'm always calling the kids Sugar, Pumpkin Eater, Sweety Peety, Booga (that's Jacob's nickname), and who knows what. Whenever I call Hyrum, Sugar, for example, he looks at me with a rather concerned eye, and says, "I'm not Sugar, Mom. I'm Hyrum. I'm a boy, REMEMBER!!!!" as though I had forgotten.

For the last 15 years or so, my favorite color has been blue. However, Hyrum is very gender specific, and blue, according to Hyrum, cannot be a girl's favorite color. So whenever he asks what my favorite color is, and I say blue, he gets very annoyed. "No, Mom, your favorite colors are pink and purple, remember? What is your favorite color, Mom?" If I'm dumb enough to say that it is blue again, he gets very annoyed (sometimes he even tells me that I'm annoying him). "No, Mom, your favorite color is pink and purple. Blue is not a girl's color" (how he knows this I don't know). Then he asks me even more insistently, "WHAT is your favorite color?" When I finally tell him that my favorite colors are pink and purple, he exclaims excitedly, "Yes, Mom, that is CORRECT!"

He also is very insistent when we are riding in the car, listening to music, that if a boy is singing that I can't sing too because I am a girl and "that song is just for boys. Don't sing, MOM!!!"

He has really enjoyed going to his new school. He calls it his orange school because it is in fact orange. He really misses his brown school though. Just the other day, he realized he wasn't going back to his brown school. This realization made him very sad. We went and visited his old teachers, and I hope that helped. His transition was very sudden, which I think was a little hard him. He's done great though in his new school. He now writes his name, is constantly pointing out letters, and is extremely technically savvy. He can figure out how things like computers and my new cell phone work as well or better than I can. It's a little scary how he can figure this all out.

Hyrum is very observant. Michael was seeing how a football game on the internet looked on our TV since we just cancelled our satellite. As it inevitably happens in a football game, a ref threw a flag. "Ooops," yelled Hyrum, "a banana peel!!!" He's so funny and crazy.

Invoking a Higher Power

So the other day, Thobe and I went on a rather long drive to take a treat to his Primary teacher for his birthday. The boundaries for our ward at church are very broad. I would say that members from our ward may live up to an hour and half away from each other. We are fortunate in that we only live 12 minutes from our driveway to the church parking lot and are centrally located in our ward boundaries for the most part. Anyway, when I entered the address to Thobe's teacher's house into our GPS, I was surprised to see that the drive was 20 minutes longer than the 25 minutes that I already anticipated. "Oh well," I thought, "Thobe and I will enjoy some mommy Thobe time. So we started out.

Thobe and I had a very pleasant conversation as we drove. He told me a lot about his made up superheros, U.S.A. Face, Al Qida Face, and U.S.A. Face's pet, Baldy (Baldy is a Bald Eagle, Thobe's favorite animal). I heard lots of interesting situations where U.S.A. Face beat Al Qida Face and learned all about U.S.A Faces favorite colors (red, white and blue) and U.S.A. Face's birthday (the fourth of July, ironically the same birthday as our nation and Thobe's Grandpa Monday). As we were driving, Thobe noticed that our GPS's speedometer was turning red (this is our GPS's handy feature to remind me that I'm speeding).

"Mom, you are speeding. You need to slow down," Thobe insisted.

"It's okay, Thobe. I'm just going 59 mph rather than 55; I don't think we'll get a ticket going a little over."

"But Mom, if we speed we could get in a wreck and die. You NEED to stop speeding! We don't want to die!" he demanded.

Feeling frustrating that we would never get there and being the fabulous mother that I am, I told him that we were really going to be fine.

"I'm going to say a prayer. Heavenly Father, We thank Thee for this day. We thank thee for our family. Please protect us. Please bless that we'll stop speeding." And then he ended his prayer.

I didn't speed for the rest of the trip.