General Conference

A few weeks ago my mother-in-law handed me a packet of pages and said these are for general conference. Later, when I had the chance to look at it more closely it was filled with ideas on keeping kids entertained and helping them get at least a little bit out of it. So, these are not my original ideas but with conference coming so quickly, I thought I'd share.

Getting ready for Conf:

-Show pictures of people who might talk and practice saying their names
-Teach the kids a little background of the apostles/1st presidency (We did this tonight and with little kids it would be better to break it up into 2 lessons)
-Teach the kids about King Benjamin.
-Make a conference kit.

During Conference:

-Make it a special day (fav breakfasts, etc)
-Be excited yourself (Yay! We get to hear from our prophet!)
-Conf. Bingo
-Crafts
-Beads
-Don't make them watch all 4 sessions

I've printed off pictures of each of the Apostles and 1st presidency and will make them into a key chain. When they find the picture of the one that is speaking they'll get a piece of candy or some little prize (like a sticker/tattoo or other small thing).

We also did the FHE mentioned above where you give some background. It was fun to see how cool they thought it was that Elder Holland is from St. George where we used to live and that several played sports at the U of U where the kids go see lots of games with Grandma and Grandpa. We also practiced saying their names. It did get a little long, so like I said before break it up into 2 lessons or do a few everyday before conference. If you want the stuff ready to print, let me know and I can email it you.

Happy Conference!

Updates

My other blogs have been updated. Finally.

Top 10

I've seen a lot of lists lately on other peoples blogs, so I decided to give my own top 10 random things you may or may not know about me.

1. I think about people a lot. People I know right now, people and those from way back in the day.
2. I can't go to sleep in the car on road trips or around town no matter how tired I am. (clarification-when I'm a passenger.)
3. My first date was on my 16th birthday.
4. I would much rather own a truck than a sports car. (Instead I own neither-I have the misfortune of driving a minivan. :) )
5. My favorite class in 9th grade was geometry with Mr. Schuster.
6. Speaking of teachers, my all-time favorite teacher was Mrs. Coons-11th and 12th grade honors English.
7. When I first moved to St. George, I was fascinated by all the color and thought for a moment I was living in a rainbow. (A little cheesey, but true.)
8. No one in my immediate family can be grumpy around me too long. (It's my one mommy-super power.)
9. I expect my kids (ages 6 and almost 4) to make their own beds and put their own clothes away. As long as it gets done, I'm not too picky about how it looks. That will come later.
10. Favorite place I've been and would love to go back (sans kids)-New York City.

I'll take that...

Sophie, my Soph loves to talk on the phone. Even in play she is just full of grins and giggles while chatting away. This a happy Soph chatting it up with Grandma Laurie. Her side of the conversation went something like this:

Al-lo (hello)

grin and giggle

some cute jibber-jabber

more grins and giggles

a slew of words she can say now (of course prompted by mom and day) including: No way! Where binky? I no no (I don't know). and- luv oo

lots of giggling and grinning

bye-bye.

You want to talk to your own mother? Not a chance! Sophie will fight hard for the phone. It's so fun to listen to her happy chatter though!

Hoppy Easter!

Easter was a blast. Lyndsi and McKay were both up by 7 a.m. asking if they could see if the Easter bunny had come. After some stories with mom (trying to buy over-worked dad a few more minutes of sleep), we finally got to check out what happened during the night. The Bunny thought the baskets were hid well enough, especially Lyndsi's, but no. Lyndsi found hers first, but had fun helping the other kids find theirs. The candy was a huge hit, but I've been impressed that they didn't gorge themselves on it all at once. In fact, their is still candy hanging around and it's almost Wednesday!

Other great fun included coloring eggs the night before, an Easter dinner with Grandma Kristine and Grandpa DeWayne (more to come on that on the food blog later), and a huge egg hunt for just the 3 of them.

We had a lot of fun, but it's nice to be done with all the "candy" holidays for awhile. I'm looking forward now to a spring and summer full of delicious picnic foods! Yum!

Eventful weekend!

Whew. I'm glad it's the start of a new week! This last weekend was great fun, but exhausting. It seems like we ran from event to event. First off, I had my sisters-in-law double baby shower. (I will have 3 nieces this spring! Yay!!) My assignments were games and a party favor (by force-meaning I just told them I was going to do it). This is a first baby for both girls. It was so cute to watch them struggle along in their 8th/9th month of pregnancy. Let me tell you, I'm glad I'm not pregnant right now! Karamie and Lisa and Sally-I feel your pain and discomfort!














My cute onesie cookie party favors. Thanks Tiff for the help! (For the how-to on these check out Homemade by Jill to the right there)














Angie, Lisa, Karamie, and Melissa-I really wish I could've cropped this one, but I couldn't get my photo program to open. Bummer.














In other exciting news, Sunday brought a change in the Kearns 8th ward bishopric (my home ward). My dad (center) is the new bishop! He is flanked on either side by Gary Kidd (2nd Couns. on the left) and Mike Larabee (on the right). Yes-Kim and Sherrie's dads. I'm so excited for my dad and know he'll do a great job. It was a little funny to hear him called "Bishop" though!

Yesterday we not only got to enjoy being Irish for a day, but we also had the "luck o' the Irish" and ended up with 4 free Jazz tickets! We took the kids downtown for dinner and the game. It was everyone's first NBA game (except me). Even little Sophie got into it. She was clapping and cheering and dancing almost the whole time.

Perfect Timing

There are too few moments in life that come together perfectly making life more like a movie than, well, life. Today, McKay and I were driving home and he was instructing me on when to change the radio station. We happened upon "U Can't Touch This" (MC Hammer-I know-weird). We're jammin along and as we come up to a red light, across the intersection, 3 burly construction workers strut across the crosswalk in perfect rhythm to the music like it was their own personal stage, evenly spaced enough to make even the toughest dance teacher proud. Honestly, I expected then to suddenly stop and start dancing in the middle of the street, in sync with each other. I was a little disappointed when they finished crossing the street without so much as doing the running man. Sigh. Well, it was an almost perfect moment!

My life's Season

**Warning**If you are attending Enrichment tonight in the 6th ward-spoilers ahead.

Tonight's theme for our ward's Enrichment night is "The Seasons of Our Lives." I'll give you an unnecessary guess who got asked to talk on her "season." Yep. Me. I'm supposed to share the challenges and joys of where I'm at in life. Actually, that sounds kind of fun. So, lucky you, you get to read the notes that may or may not get shared tonight.

Challenges:
1. Babysitting-I always seem to need it!
2. Hormones-will they ever stabilize? (I’m trying to get pregnant, I’m pregnant, I just had a baby. Sheesh!)
3. Crave adult friendship/attention from more than just the eternal bread winner
4. Overwhelming. No clue how to teach kindergarten at home or organize the house during a pink tornado or take care of myself and needs (hey hon-who’s that cute girl standing next to you at the temple)
5. Always distracted. Now where was I?

Joys
1. Compliments nonstop (who cares the giver has on a striped shirt, camo pants, 2 pairs of underwear and his shoes are on the wrong feet? Hey! He noticed I got my hair and/or makeup done and got dressed!)
2. Lots of gifts-rocks, weeds, bugs, post-it notes w/ scribbles-all given in love.
3. Daily reminders for scheduling FHE, Easter, Halloween and Christmas (not to mention the next trip Disneyland so they can ride their favorite rides-Splash Mountain and the Matterhorn .i.e.-all the rides they were terrified of the first go-round.)

4. Humor. Where else can you find 3 live-in comedians? (Case in point- read any entry that involves McKay)

5. “Expert Advice”- I was the first one on both sides to have a baby and therefore am now an authority on child rearing and psychology-at least to the four of them (only 1 child currently resides on this planet between the four of them-at least for a few more weeks)
6 Life lessons-Constantly being taught by my 3 monkeys.
7 Cameras-no one complains about their picture being taken-quite they opposite-they all come running to see who can pull the silliest faces.
8 Having a husband who recognizes my need to be away from the kids and knows I can handle it to go on a little weekend getaway-even if he has to spend a day working there.
9 Hey-50 is the new 30 so I have another 20+ years of enjoying my birthdays!

Dances

I have been so sick the last couple of days. Due to lack of ability to breathe, I woke up a little early this morning (ok-and due to Daylight savings-did you remember to "spring" ahead?). I was blog surfing. My friend Melissa Ash had this video posted on her website. Now, I know several of you have only heard of the great "Jiggy Jeff" and have not had the privilege of seeing his talents live. This isn't Jeff, but I feel it's a great representation of him. I'm afraid some of you may see a little of yourselves in this as well. :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MJ6y_RuTUu0

Baby Stuff

A good friend of mine from St. George just had a baby last month after years and years of trying. I was so excited and made her these cute things. I think I may have gotten a little carried away, but it was a lot of fun and totally worth it. (sorry about the quality-working on getting a new camera) For the shoes, bibs, and burp cloth patterns, check out the "Homemade By Jill" link to the right.

What am I going to do with that kid? :)

I was just chatting with McKay and told him I couldn't read him a story just now because it was time for mommy to exercise. He told me that he wanted to exercise because he wanted big, big muscles and that he didn't have any yet. Not wanting him to be in the way of my workout (i.e. getting hurt on the treadmill), I told him when he gets big like a daddy he'll have really big muscles. His reply? "Yeah, when i get big like a daddy I can workout naked!"

Umm.....

After digging a little deeper, I realized he meant without a shirt on. I then informed him that while some boys exercise without shirts, they always where shorts.

What can I say? The kid keeps me laughing!

In Full Swing

It's that time of year again. I believe as of tonight I am an official tax widow. I guess that's not too bad considering it's already March. We have a lot of home improvement projects planned, but if I can't do them, some of them will have to go on hold for a couple of months. Say, how hard is it to replace the bathroom faucet??

I did start painting the house tonight. We decided it would be the easiest way to clean up McKay's "art." A whole pencil box of crayons was dumped in the trash and the only other crayons are way up out of reach (hopefully). All writing instruments are now used under careful supervision.

Tax season isn't so hard now that we live in the land of the north. It's still cold outside here versus St. George where I was ready to go dig in the dirt by now. It gives me a few more weeks to work on my projects without Jeff getting in the way. (Like some of the home improvement ones) I'm hoping to tackle the kitchen and get it organized. My 1970's split is suffering from severe lack of storage space, so I'm thinking it's about time to organize, purge, and whatever else you do. :)

Aren't random thoughts great? I think they're my favorite posts to read. I"m just sorry they don't flow better, but I'm tired and am not willing to wake up enough to try. :) Until I have something better to post, here is my cute Sophie and her "make mine a double" day. She came into my room and showed me this and laughed and laughed about it. And I thought we were closer to getting rid of that thing.