Easter Outfits

My Mom and Dad give all the grandkids Easter outfits every year. Very generous and very appreciated!! The clothes were a hit this time around. Here's our attempt at some pictures before we went to church.

Look at this cheeser in his new tie! We had a hard time getting this kid to hold still and smile. I finally had to tell him that he would get no fruit snacks or toys during Sacrament meeting if he didn't smile for the camera. Another one of those "Mother-of-the-Year" moments, but hey, it worked!



Lucy absolutely LOVES her dress.




I love that chubby face!




I had to include this one because of the look on Lucy's face. Ben-O is about 18 pounds now-a-days. Lucy only weighs about 45, so that's quite a load.




Thanks, Mom and Dad! We love and miss you!

Graham's Extreme Makeover

I decided it was time for Grahammer Pants to get a haircut. I actually really like it long, but I just can't figure out how to tell the barber to cut it. Every time I went in to have it trimmed, he came out with a total 80's bowl cut thing happening. I also realized it was time for the chop-a-roo when he was crying every morning when I had to brush it. I can only deal with one hair-styling drama queen and Lucy has a strong hold on that title.

Here are the before shots:






Here's our handsome guy post makeover. (He has some trouble making eye contact with the camera.) He looks so different to me. I love that I can actually see his beautiful blue eyes now. I think he looks a little younger, too......and I like that!



This kid is such a crack up. His latest thing is that he loves to play "games". Whenever we're in the car, we have to be engaged in at least one. Here's a list of them with a brief explanation:

I Spy: You've all played it, I'm sure. Graham gets a little confused sometimes. He'll say, "I spy with my little eye, something GREEN!" (By the way, he always spies something green...always. The boy loves green.) So, you'll be guessing green things and then he'll start guessing green things, too. "Is it the grass?" Wait a minute....I thought it was your turn. It makes Lucy really mad.

Knock-Knock: I'm sure many of you have your fill of knock-knock jokes, too. I love that I can get a laugh out of this kid no matter what I say. Sometimes I find myself pausing, trying to get creative or legitimately funny and then I realize that he prefers the nonsense. On the way to the store a couple days ago I had just given my punch line and Graham said, "HA! HA! That's a good one, Mom!" He sounded so grown-up...I laughed out loud.

Guess What/That's What: You wouldn't think this game would be very entertaining, but Graham can go for quite a while. He says, "Guess what?" You're supposed to say, "What?" He says, "That's what". Then you switch roles. Repeated over and over and over again. Occasionally, I'll spice it up with a "Chicken butt" which is a no-fail laugh inducer. Other times, I'll say "I love you" instead of "That's what". He likes that one, too.

If Graham is ever in a grumpy mood or we need to distract him from something (he usually cries if we don't have water in the car and he's "SO THIRSTY"), all we have to do is suggest one of these games and we're golden.

One of his favorite times to play is when he's going to the bathroom. He demands that I sit down while he's taking care of business and play "I Spy".

I don't know what I would do without my little man keeping me company all day. He definitely makes my life so much brighter. His little laugh is so contagious and comes so easily.

Brotherly Love

9 Years.....SHEESH!

On the ninth, Jason and I celebrated our 9th year of wedded bliss. Our fabulous friend, Erin, watched all three of the kiddos so we could go out. We tried Thai food for the first time. I really liked it, but Jason.....not so much.

I made a little book to give to Jason. I used a bunch of pictures from when we were dating and first married. Here's a few jems that I thought I would share.



This is at an Institute dance that we went to. I can't remember what the theme was or why we are wearing those hats.



This was at USU Homecoming 2000. Don't we look young!



This was the night we got engaged. I'm sad that this is the only picture I have to remember this happy day.



I think this was the Halloween after we got married. We're supposed to be roads. We dressed up for a ward party that we went to with some friends. I remember having to explain our costumes a lot.

I feel very blessed to be married to my sweetheart, Jason. He does so much for me and makes my life easier and happier. Life, in general, overwhelms me more than I'd like to admit, but he helps me not to take life to seriously. I am a lucky woman.

Weekend in LA

A couple weekends ago we partied it up in Los Angeles. We started it off with a trip to the LA Temple. We stayed overnight at the Temple Apartments that they have on the grounds. It's $40 a night and it made for a very enjoyable trip. I went to the 7:30 pm session while Jason got the kids settled and then he got up and went to the 6:30 am session while I got the kids ready for the day.

After Jason was done, we walked with the kids around the temple grounds and talked. As you can see, Graham was pretty ticked he couldn't go in.



It was so fun to see all of the beautiful flowers in bloom the first week of March. I absolutely love living in Southern California!



With Jason's deployment and then Benjamin's birth, it had been a while since Jason and I had last been to the temple. We left feeling renewed and motivated to keep up our goal to visit every month.



After the temple, we met our good friends, the Rendulics, for lunch and a trip to the Museum of Natural History. To be honest, I wasn't too sure how the museum thing was going to go over with a 3 and 6 year-old, but it was fabulous! What made it even better was that it was free for all active duty military and their families! Score! That saved us 24 buckaroos!



Lucy enjoyed learning about the dinosaurs and was fascinated by the rock collection. It was fun listening to her get excited about her favorites. Graham loved the lizards and just running around the exhibits (although he wasn't too crazy). Ben was a champ the whole weekend! He spent a lot of time in his car seat and gave us very little lip.

The Rendulics have two little kiddos that we have so much fun with. Here's Graham with Logan. These two are crack-ups. They are either the best of friends or bitter enemies. Today they were having a great time and always looking for one another.



We will definetly hit the museum again in the future. We had a great time!

Monday we hit Disneyland! Lucy had school off, so Jason got out of work and we were on our way. We have season passes, so come see us and we'll go!! I didn't take any pictures.....just refer back to our pictures from our Disney trip in October. Subtract the Grunigs, imagine me a bit thinner, then add Benny and you've got a good summary of our day.

One of our recent Family Home Evenings....

We've been having some issues with the kiddos talking very unkindly to one another lately. Lots of fighting and too many "I hate you's" are thrown around, so I decided to have one of our Family Home Evenings focus on how we should speak in our home.

I showed a couple pictures of the Savior and talked about his life. There are a few pictures of him as a boy and so I showed them and asked if they thought Jesus screamed and yelled when he didn't get his own way. I asked about what they thought he did when someone made him mad or got in his way. We discussed that for a bit. Then we talked about how it makes us feel when someone says, "I hate you!" or "Get away from me!" , etc., etc.



So, then I pulled out these little jars with our pictures on them. Each jar represents that person. I talked about how we are in charge of filling each other's "jars" with kind words. Kind words were starbursts, mean words are rocks. So, if Graham screams at Lucy, then Lucy gets a rock in her jar. We're going to evaluate the starburst-to-rock ratio each week and chat about that. Maybe there will be a prize or fun outing if the ratio is to my liking.

That evening it was pretty funny. I kept hearing Lucy say things like, "You're the best brother ever, Graham!" Graham would say the same thing back and then they'd both look at me expectedly. That has died down a little each day, but it's been nice to hear them talk a little better to one another. The only times it has backfired is when I have lost my cool (very rare occasion, of course) and Lucy steps in with, "Now you have to give me a rock!" You can imagine the reaction she received. Not among my finer parenting moments.



After the lesson we made these little guys. This treat sort of evolved. I was originally trying to think of a way to make mouths, being how we were focusing on paying attention to what words come out of them. Lucy wasn't impressed with my initial attempts, so these little monsters came to be. She still wasn't too impressed. She ended up just doing her own thing.



I got the jist of this lesson from a website I found a long time ago. It's nataliesfhespot.blogspot.com. It's a good resource for lessons for families with young kids. She has a lot of simple lessons that I'm able to add to or take from and make my own. It's my "go-to" place on Monday afternoon when I don't know what we're going to do.