15 on Friday

It has been forever since I have done an update on what we have been up to.  So this might get kind of long.  This winter has been a bit of a struggle for me.  This is the first time I've been a SAHM while living in cold winter area.  When I had Leila in Utah I was working so it forced me to get out of the house and interact with other people.  And then we lived in Nevada and I had beautiful mild winters with plenty of sunshine.  Now going days and days without sunshine and being stuck inside the house with little kids has been hard.  I've struggled to have the motivation to do much.  I've kept the house pretty clean but doing anything extra or doing any kind of home improvements or crafts just has not happened.  And I've had no desire to bundle the kids up and find things to do outside our home.  We've all been suffering from cabin fever and maybe a little depression.  Most days all I want to do is lay around watching shows on Netflix, thankfully my kids don't allow me to do that .  So now that there is a little update on me, her is what is happening with the rest of the family

1.  Greydon tries so hard to be helpful with Asher.  The other day I found him feeding Asher applesauce.  Greydon told me Asher was just begging for it so he fed it to him and that it was OK because he had a rag in case he spilled it on the floor.  Applesauce was all over Asher and all over the floor but it was hard to be mad because he really was just trying to help.  In another instance of trying to be nice to his brother Greydon opened a bottle of nail polish for Asher.  Leila had taken my nail polish (without permission) to put in her little Caboodle she got for her birthday.  She left the box in her closet.  Greydon and Asher were playing in the closet and Greydon told us that Asher was begging for him to open the nail polish.  Well being the helpful brother Greydon opened it and Asher dumped the entire bottle all over the carpet.  I should have taken a picture but I was too upset and working frantically to clean it up.  The carpet now has faint yellow stains and will probably need to be replaced at some point.  

2.  My kids love the library, there is a train table, a Lego table, a car mat, puzzles, coloring pages and computers.  We usually end up at the library several times a month just so we can get out of the house during the winter.  

 3.  For Valentine's Day Leila needed to make a box to take to school, we had fun searching the Internet and Pinterest for ideas.  Leila picked this owl and it ended up being pretty easy and cute.  She also gave out little owl valentines to all her friends and teachers.  After school we made heart shaped red velvet cupcakes and then had heart shaped pizza and chocolate covered strawberries for dinner.  Paul brought home Valentine's treats for all the kids.

 4.  At the beginning of February Leila school had a family fun night.  They had different games and activities all over the school, pizza and frozen yogurt in the cafeteria and bounce houses and slides in the gym.

5.  Also at the beginning of February my parents came to town.  It was so nice to have some company and some extra sets of hands to help with things around the house.  The kids loved building towers with Pop and then knocking them down.  Leila and Greydon made sugar cookies one afternoon with Nana.   And I enjoyed having their help with some projects and fixing things around our house.  I can now look and my bulletin board and not be frustrated with it because it is no longer crooked. We spent most of our time just hanging out at home and they watched our kids while Paul and I got a much needed date night.

 6.  We still have gymnastics every Monday.  Leila is the one standing on the yellow balance beam.  She still loves going to gymnastics and wishes it was more than one day a week.  

 7.  I thought this sunrise was beautiful and maybe I was loving it because I was just so happy to see the sun.

 8.  We have had several big snow storms here.  School has been canceled a couple times or they have gotten out early.  One day Paul got home early, as in before 5 pm ( I think this is the first time it has ever happened since he started residency).  He took the kids outside to build a snowman, have a snow ball fight and sled down the deck.

9.  It has been really nice to find my kids playing nicely together.  I love when they just start playing a game together and there is no fighting and they include everyone.  It doesn't happen every day and usually doesn't last very long but its sure nice when it does.  

 On this day they were playing train and they even took turns being the conductor and and caboose. 

 Leila loves to practice her reading and I usually find her reading to one of her brothers

And this never happen, taking a bath all together.  They usually complain that there isn't enough room or they are fighting over toys but on this morning they somehow all got along.  

10.  The boys got sick with a nasty cold, they had goopy eyes, coughs, fevers and stuffy noses.  They both ended up having ear infections and pink eye.  Thank goodness for antibiotics, they were back to themselves in just a couple days.

11. I was able to attend Leila's music class and was quite impressed.  Their music teacher was amazing. She is exposing them to all kinds of music and composers.  She is working on rhythm and beat and teaching them to match pitch.  This class was much more advanced than any music class I took in elementary school.

12.  Just trying to enjoy the sunshine, even though there was lots of snow on the ground and it was only 32 degrees we had to get some Vitamin D.

13.  Last weekend Robyn invited us to their house for a visit and to attend a gymnastics meet.  We got to their house right before dinner and Robyn made us a delicious dinner of skinny pancakes.  We then head over to the meet.  The kids ended up loving it, even Greydon had fun.  Leila says her favorite thing was the uneven bars, she really liked when they got to stand on the bars.  That night after we got the kids to bed, Robyn and I stayed up way too late talking.  But it was so good to talk with a close friend who understands this whole medical training process.  The next morning we played around their house and the kids played in the snow.  We had to head home around lunch time so we could babysit some friend's kids.  It was such a fun visit and just what me and the kids needed.  

14.  Paul has had some really busy months lately, he has been on general surgery for the past two months and right now he is on trauma surgery.  He loves it but it is a lot of hours.  He leaves the house by 4:30 every morning and is never home before 6 pm, he gets 4 days off a month and they are always 2 days together, so basically he always has two weekends off a month.  

15.  Right now Paul is in Washington DC visiting his sister, actually his whole family is there. I don't want to share too much about this on my blog but last November Paul's sister was diagnosed with stage 4 cancer.  All I can say is cancer sucks and is so not fair.  But I am so thankful for our knowledge of the gospel and eternal families.