Lego Party

Our girls have always wanted some Legos of their own, and we’ve always lamented the fact that that Lego doesn’t make any really cool sets geared to girls. I scored a great deal on some Toy Story Legos around Christmastime and thought that they might fit the bill. We busted them out last night and let the girls buy them. (They have been sitting on their birthday money for much too long; we need them to be poor again so they’ll be motivated to work.)

Emily and Elise each paid half for the Toy Story train set. They were surprisingly cooperative about splitting up the parts to build and both of them came away thinking it was fair. They absolutely loved having a set of their own to build. The mini-figures in that set are easily the cutest Lego pieces I have ever seen. I kind of want some of my own.


Abby bought the little Toy Story army man set. I helped her through it step by step, but she built the whole thing by herself. She was amazingly good at following instructions. The best part was listening to her play with the little army guys after it was all built. As Ben said, “It’s just like when she plays with her Polly Pockets.” She made up all kinds of dialogue for them. My favorite was when she would yell out, “Hey, you guys” (in a long, drawn-out, singsong way) and “To the rescue!”


Ben kept himself busy by rebuilding his Burrows set and being the resident Lego expert when his sisters needed help. It was an absolutely fabulous way to spend a Friday night.

My New Best Friend

It’s no secret that Emily is not a morning person. She needs her sleep, and waking her up is not a task for the faint of heart. A couple of weeks ago, I saw a SlickDeal on an alarm clock and thought maybe we should give it a try. That alarm clock is my new best friend! I don’t know why I didn’t think of it before. It has revolutionized mornings at our house. By the time Emily makes it upstairs, she is past the uber-grumpy, stomping, growling, “just let me sleep!” phase and is almost even pleasant. It just may be the best $7 I’ve ever spent.

Ben's Turn

It was Ben’s turn to go skiing with his dad last Thursday. The snow didn’t look so great at Wolf Mountain, so they decided to try out Powder Mountain instead. Ben did great and picked up right where he left off two years ago. Both Nate and Ben had a fun time, but there is an obvious drop in the level of enthusiasm from your first ski trip to your fourth (for the teacher as well as the student). I guess that is true with pretty much anything. Nate did love that he got to ski unattached to a kid 99% of the time. That was nice. The most excited Ben got when he was telling me about their night was when he got to the part about the moose that was crossing the road right in front of them. Seeing that moose and a cool hobbit door next to someone’s house were definite highlights of his ski trip.


Ben only fell three or four times all night, so this video isn’t entirely representative. I just love his little spin before his fall and the way he laughs while he is sliding down the hill. (When I tried to trim it, the audio wouldn’t work, so I just uploaded the whole thing. Try to ignore the first seven and the last ten seconds.)

Emily's First Ski Trip

The learn-to-ski plan in this house is for Nate to take every kid skiing for the first time when they are seven. Emily was seven last winter, but they ended up not going due to scheduling and generally crappy ski weather. Nate promised her that they would go this year. Thursday night he took her up to Wolf Mountain for their first lesson. They had a wonderful time together. After teaching Ben (who is renowned for his stubbornness when learning something new), Nate was accustomed to a slow learning curve. Emily surprised him and took to it like a natural. They went down the hill a couple of times with her right in front of him holding onto his poles. After that, Nate acted as her brake with a strap tied around her waist. Within a couple of runs she pretty much had her turns down pat, so he only held onto the strap right at the first part of the hill (which is a little steeper). The last two runs of the night, they took off her “edgie wedgies” and she made it down the hill all on her own. Nate said that the best part of the night was just to hear her say, time after time, “This is really fun!” She wasn’t expecting to like it so much. Other than getting soaked through the first half of night (when the falling snow was melting on contact), they had a really great time. Nate loved that he actually got to ski a little without being tethered to a kid all night. They both came home just beaming. Emily kept telling me “Mom, you really should try it. It is so much fun!” I have tried it, and I’m not a big fan. It’s all good. I’m fine if I’m the only non-snow-skier in this house and I’m glad that all of our kids will get this one-on-one time with their dad.

Ben Ten

Ben turned ten on Wednesday. He kept referring to this week as his birthday week. “But Mom, I shouldn’t have to do homework; it’s my birthday week.” “Do I have to clean my room, you know, on my birthday week?” I kept telling him that he gets a birthday, not a birthday week, but we did kind of stretch it out over a few days.

We started the celebration on Tuesday with Ben’s birthday dinner. He picked Firehouse Pizzeria again this year. It was scrummy! We had the place pretty much to ourselves (no more kids-eat-free Tuesdays at the Centerville Firehouse). We played U.S.A. Brain Quest on the way down and back. The kids loved it. It was fun to see how much they know. Ben’s ability to store random facts in that little brain of his continues to amaze me.

Ben was surprisingly okay with his birthday being on a school day this year. He took Airheads for his birthday treat. He called home at lunch time because he couldn’t bite his food. He had a major orthodontic adjustment on Monday and I forgot to give him ibuprofen in the morning. I felt lots of mom guilt that he was going hungry on his birthday because of my mistake. The good news is that Wednesdays are early out days. Nate came home early so Ben could open his presents. We gave him The Burrows Lego set, Life on blu-ray, and the Sensei Wu keychain that came free with our Lego order. He got the Quidditch Match Lego set and Harry Potter glasses from Grandma Reatha and a gift card from Grandpa and Grandma N. He loved everything. He told his sisters “Just so you know, birthdays just keep getting better!” It was great. He invited a few friends over to play in the afternoon and spent the evening building his new Lego sets and watching an episode of Life. The only disappointment was his cake. For some reason he thought that I would put a Lego set on top like I did with his Indiana Jones cake, so his expectations were a little high. He got over it. I, for one, think it turned out really cute, and it was delicious to boot (Ben and I share a love of lemon cake).




We took the kids to the aquarium on Friday. I was not very excited when Ben picked that for his birthday activity. The last time we went was a couple of years ago and I wasn’t all that impressed. Luckily, they have made some major improvements since then and it was much more interesting and enjoyable this time around. We loved the new South American addition and learned all kinds of fun facts. It turned out to be a fabulous family day.

It's Cold Outside

Yesterday morning it was 56 degrees in our house. I pushed every button and flipped every switch I could find to try to get our furnace to turn on, but nothing worked. It’s not fun to get out of a warm bed and get dressed and ready for the day when it is that chilly. It’s even less fun to get four kids out of warm beds and dressed and ready for the day when they are all complaining about how cold it is. But, we managed. I called Nate, and he called our favorite service center to get a diagnosis. The good news is that our furnace is fine; it was just the thermostat that wasn’t working. After Nate assured me that they were low-voltage wires, I used my best MacGyver skills and re-routed the wires to bypass the thermostat. I did a happy dance when I heard the furnace kick on. I kept singing that My Turn on Earth song about opposition all day in my head. Nothing makes you appreciate a working heater more than a few hours without one.

I’m pretty much done with winter. I like the whole four seasons thing, but once Christmas is over I don’t really see the point of snow or cold. It is too cold to do anything. I haven’t really left the house in the last week except to take the kids to school. I feel like I am just hibernating and waiting for spring to come. At least I can hibernate in a warm house.

New Year's Resolutions

I’m a big fan of New Year’s resolutions. I’m not always so great at keeping them, but I figure even if I work at something for the first two weeks of the year, it is better than nothing. Last year my resolution was to shower and put make-up on every day. I knew from the outset that every day was asking too much, but I did lots better than I had in the past. It wasn’t really just a hygiene goal (I never felt like I was stinky before, I just didn’t look cute). It was a mood goal. There is a strong correlation between how I look and how I feel/act. I am a happier, more productive, nicer person if I get out of my pajamas before 10 a.m. and get ready to face the world. So, that is going to be my carryover resolution for this year. We’ll see if I can do better than last year. (Right now it is 10:45 and I’m sitting on my bed in my pajamas with a ponytail and no makeup, but I’m kind of taking today off of real life; I’ll start tomorrow.) :)

I have lots of other goals for this year . . . improve family scripture study, make weekly menu plans, be a calmer parent (aka stop yelling) . . . but my main goal is to stress less. I feel stressed out a lot (A LOT). I stress about things I need to do. I stress about things I have already done. I stress about things that I should have already done but I haven’t gotten to yet. I stress about my kids. I stress about money (oddly, not about having enough, but using every bit that we do have to the max by getting the best deal possible on anything I buy). The list goes on and on. My mind is constantly ticking with to-do lists and “I should have done” lists and I’m kind of driving myself nuts (not to mention driving my quality husband nuts). So, my new plan is to stop thinking about everything so much and just do it. More importantly, I’m going to work on not looking back once it is done. No more regrets. My new philosophy is going to be live and learn and MOVE ON.

Luckily I live with a perfect role model for this attitude. Nate doesn’t worry. Ever. If there is something that needs to be done, he just does it. He doesn’t worry about it for a week first. Even better, he has a remarkable ability to get over things. I’m still twitching because I forgot to sign into ebates before I ordered some Legos today so I lost $3. Things like that (or 100 times worse) don’t even register with Nate and he would never be thinking about them two hours later. I’m going to do my very best this year to follow his lead and just CHILLAX (that was for you Babe).

My first step on this “worry less, do more” journey is that I’m going to finish Emily’s birthday party post today. I wrote it up on September 11th, but I never got around to putting pictures with it. It has been nagging at the back of my brain ever since. I know that no one really cares if I do it or not, but it still bugs me that I haven’t. So, as my first resolution baby step, I’m going to stop thinking about it and just do it. Healthy, right?


Done! See how easy that was. :)

Backyard Visitor

We had a deer visit the vacant lot behind our house on New Year’s Day. The kids were super excited about seeing wildlife in our own backyard. We were bummed that our gate wasn’t open so she could come even closer. After she moved away from it, Nate tried to sneak over and open the gate. It’s a bit tricky to sneak up on a deer across crunchy snow. She seemed okay with him being out there until he gave the gate a big shove to push it open. She bolted. We left the gate open just in case she wanders back this way.

Year in Pictures

Christmas Guest Post

*** I’m sticking with my “relax and enjoy” plan, and blogging about the holiday seemed like way too much effort. So, my quality husband volunteered to do it for me. I think he likes the less-stressed me.


We enjoyed a really great Christmas this year. Our traditional Christmas Eve festivities began earlier than we have in years past, each of us picking a different Christmas movie or Christmas special to watch and feasting on yummy finger foods. We finished up just in time to put the kids to bed at about 10:00. They were all very excited for Santa to come.


Christmas morning began at a blissful 7:30 or so. Ben had been up since 4 a.m. but he was a good rule follower, staying in his room reading the new book that Santa had left on his bed. He did admit to coming out of his room one time to go to the bathroom. Nevertheless, he was very serious about not looking at the presents by the tree, demonstrating to us how he put his hands up on one side of his face to block him from seeing in that direction.

The other kids were excited to start, so we roused Abby from sleep and went into the family room. The kids all seemed very pleased with the booty from their stockings, and the Santa gifts were all well-received. Ben got a Razor scooter like the one his sisters got for their birthdays; Emily got some Crayola drawing software for her to do cool drawings on the computer; Elise, after asking Santa for ‘Magic’, got a fun little magic kit for her to learn to do some tricks; Abby’s wish for a kitty was fulfilled in a fluffy white FurReal walking kitty.





Since Ben was pretty sure that he was getting the huge Lego Hogwarts Castle™ from Mom & Dad this year, I was fully expecting him to be champing at the bit to open it. He really surprised us by patiently waiting for all of the other presents to be opened (especially since the girls had lots more presents to open since they didn’t have any expensive items on their lists). He didn’t even ask one time about the castle, until it was the only present left under the tree. With so much going on between family games, meals, and other presents, he didn’t finish putting it together until Sunday afternoon.


Other highlights from our gift-giving and receiving: The kids’ gifts to each other were a big hit. Ben gave Elise a puppy pillow pet which she had been coveting every time we went into a store for the last month; Emily gave Ben Lego Freeing Dobby™; Elise got a Rapunzel Polly Pocket for Abby which she has carried around ever since; Abby gave Emily a cool shrink art kit. Malinda and I gave and got several things that we had purchased over the previous month (a GPS for our trip next summer, a laminator, The Complete Calvin & Hobbes (my favorite!), and a new camera to replace our 5-year-old point and shoot). The only surprise was that I found a great set of hardcover Jane Austen novels (her favorite!) for Malinda on a good deal, and she loved them. We also got a can of Flarp noise putty (courtesy of a co-worker of mine). The kids all think it is hilarious and they have each played with it a dozen times since Christmas morning.

This turned out to be a big family game year. All told, we ended up with 9 new family board/card games (Disney Scene It, Ticket to Ride, Quiddler, Five Crowns, Kerplunk, Apples to Apples, Play that Tune, Lego Harry Potter Hogwarts Game, and Mouse Trap), and 3 new games for the Wii (Mario Party 8, Ultimate I Spy, and Scooby Doo First Frights). We have had lots of fun playing them over the last week. Our favorite so far is Ticket to Ride.

Since Christmas we’ve enjoyed a lot of family time, playing games, watching movies, and visiting with some extended family. I had to work Wednesday and Thursday, but Malinda took the kids out to visit their cousins for the day on Wednesday, and then Thursday night we went to Matt & Jenny’s new house for dinner with their family. So far, it’s been a fabulous Christmas vacation.