The Official Announcement

Some of you already know, but for those of you who don't....we are expecting our 3rd baby! It's exciting, but scary all at the same time. My due date is May 31st, my doctor's due date is June 1st. I told him that I know that it's only one day difference, but it sounds a whole heck of a lot worse than May 31st. He said with my history he'll be delivering the baby at least a week early, so it'll still be a May baby, but I'm still sticking with May 31st as my due date. As you can probably tell from the picture above, I am hoping and giving out vibes that the baby will be a girl, and also an angel baby. Let's be honest...with a little baby on the way and with big baby Granty, it's gonna be a little bit of a challenge. So this baby really doesn't have a choice but to be an angel baby. I'm hoping Heavenly Father and I are on the same page on that one. So Mikkele and I want a girl, but Jeremy wants a boy. Really all I want is a healthy baby, with no complications...that's not too much to ask for, right???
Something else that is exciting is that 3 of my best friends are pregnant also, and we are all due within a month and a half of each other. Jenny is due at the beginning of May, Tina the middle of May, then me at the end, and Michelle F. the middle of June. It's kinda crazy, but it will be fun to have kids the same age. They all happen to be 3 of my 4 babysitters also. So I guess Grant and Mikkele have some sort of a vibe that is released when they are watched. So if you are wanting to get pregnant, just let me know and I'll bring the kids over. :)
I guess we are still not out of the woods as far as the "scary" time of pregnancy goes, but I'm past the time when I have miscarried in the past. So hopefully everything will continue to go well and the time will pass quickly.

Silly Granty

***WARNING: Some germaphobes may get grossed out by this post.

This morning Grant woke up at 6:50. Not too bad, especially for sleeping in his bed all night. So I got him up, fed him, and then hoped that he would go back to sleep so I could go back to sleep. It's Saturday, let's sleep in. Anyway he wasn't having it. So we got up and went in to the computer to mess around. What else is there to do that early on a Saturday morning??? Well after a little while I went in to use the bathroom and laid him on the floor. After I was done I left him in there and returned to the computer. For some reason he really likes to lay on the bathroom floor. I know it's a little weird and a little gross, but if he's happy, I'm happy. So after a little while of him being in there, Mikkele went in to check on him and found this....He had fallen asleep! That little punk won't go back to sleep when I want him to, but he'll go when he's good and ready and after I'm fully awake and can't go back to sleep. Silly Granty. It bought me about 45 min to an hour of being able to use both of my arms. Too bad I didn't get anything productive done.

***New post on Mikkele's blog. If you're not invited to see her blog and would like to let me know.

8 things...

My sister keeps tagging me, then wondering why my tag's aren't done. Well mostly because they're dumb, Alisha. But I will do this one for you. Hopefully this will satisfy you.
8 Shows I like to watch...

1. The Office
2. ER
3. Trading Spaces
4. Lingo
5. American Idol
6. So You Think You Can Dance
7. Big Brother
8. The Amazing Race

I know I watch way too much reality TV. They just don't make any good regular shows anymore. At least in my opinion.

8 Restaurants I Like...

1. Joe Banditos
2. Cracker Barrell
3. Cafe Rio
4. Magleby's Fresh
5. Chuck-A-Rama, Upchuck-A-Rama, Chuck-A-Grandma, however you say it...it's a favorite because you can please just about everyone.
6. PF Chang's
7. Village Baker
8. Chin Wah

8 Things that happened yesterday...in no particular order

1. Found out that I have to get a new furnace :(
2. Watched a crap load of kids.
3. Forgot to pick up one of the kids from school until 40 min after...blaming this one on the shock of the furnace.
4. Washed and dried some laundry...note it hasn't been folded yet, maybe that'll happen today.
5. Went to Costco with 5 children. Tina came also, so it wasn't that bad of an adult to kid ratio.
6. The dishes.
7. Made eggrolls and fried rice for dinner. It was delicious I might add.
8. Went to bed early. :)

8 I things I'm looking forward to...

1. Going to TX in a couple weeks!
2. The good food we'll be enjoying while in TX.
3. The good weather we'll be enjoying while in TX. Hopefully.
4. The conversation Alisha and I will get to have with our little brother while driving to TX. This will be fun. :) Are you nervous Adam???
5. The end of may.
6. Dinner party with the Woods and Brownings tomorrow night.
7. Winter to be over, even though it's just starting
8. My grandparents coming home in a year.

8 things on my wish list...

1. Winter to be over, even though it's just beginning. I know I just said that, but I really do wish it was summer. Although it's more more reasons than just the weather. :)
2. People to stop playing Christmas music before Thanksgiving. People...are you not thankful for anything???
3. My parents to move back to UT-not gonna happen, but it's a wish list right. :)
4. The end of May to come quickly.
5. To have healthy winter.
6. Furnaces didn't cost so much.
7. Grant able to run around and play like a normal 3 1/2 year old.
8. To be done working. I love what I do, but wish I could not work and still get paid.

And there you have it. It actually took WAY more thought than I was really wanting to give this morning.

I tag...anyone who wants to do it. That way there's no pressure.

Halloween 2008

We had a busy, but fun Halloween this year. Thursday night I guilt tripped Mikkele into staying home from a party to carve pumpkins with me. I know...I'm a horrible, selfish mother. But if we didn't carve them that night it just wasn't gonna get done, and what's a Halloween without carving pumpkins??? So she stayed home and carved them with me. I think she still had fun and didn't think about the party too much. She did a really good job gutting the pumpkins this year. She did hers and Grant's. Even though she made some faces, she was having fun. She decided she wanted to do a more complicated pumpkin this year. She got all the holes poked around the stencil, but when it came to carving she had a little bit of a tough time. So I finished carving hers while she carved Grant's. Her tongue cracks me up. It is always sticking out when she is concentrating on something. I guess she's our little Michael Jordan.

Here are the finished products. Grant and Mikkele's are on the top and mine is the puking pumpkin on the bottom.

Mikkele got to her ditch her uniform and wear her costume to school on Friday.

They had a party at school. She was excited to be a fairy because her teacher, Mrs. Beagles, and her BFF, Rietta were also fairy's.

In Springville they do trick-or-treating on Main Street. All the local businesses in "downtown" Springville give out candy and it brings out quite the crowd. Luckily we got there early and didn't have to wait in too many lines.

This witch is a teacher's aid at their school. She also works at one of the shops on Main St and the kids were excited to see her.

Skyler, Mikkele, Tienna, Katelyn, Rietta, Gunner, and Grant with their loot after trick-or-treating on Main St. Gunner was so funny. His face totally fit the role of Eeore. He wasn't so thrilled to be there.After Main St., Mikkele had her music class to go to. They also had a party. After music class we went to our ward trunk-or-treat. Mikkele went around to all the cars, then came back and took Grant around. He is loving trying all the candy. We gave him a sucker and he thought he was pretty funny when he bit down on the stick and wouldn't open. He is such a tease. Mikkele turned his hat sideways so he is a G-funk train conductor here.

Mikkele the fairy and Grant the train conductor at the trunk-or-treat.

After the trunk-or-treat we met up with Jeremy's family for his mom's birthday dinner at Sizzler. She gets to share her birthday with Halloween. Mikkele commented that she wishes her birthday was on Halloween, but I think Dorene would tell you differently. Happy Birthday Dorene! Dillon and Connor both dressed up as Indiana Jones, or as Dillon says "Dr. Jones". I couldn't get a picture of Connor looking at the camera. His hat won that battle.

We had a fun, busy Halloween. Mikkele is already planning her costume for next year. We'll see if she changes her mind.

A Weekend With Xixi and Coco

Last weekend we went out to Roosevelt to see my sister Alisha (aka: Xixi pronounced she-she). It has been almost 3 1/2 years since I have been out to see her. I know I'm a slacker, but have you seen the weather for the Basin in the winter? -20 and I don't agree, so it only allows a few months of which I can go visit. (That's my lame excuse.) Anyway...we had a fun visit with her oh and her husband Albert (aka: Coco) too when he decided to stick around. Here are some of the fun things we did. We had to get creative, it is Roosevelt mind you. Warning...there are a TON of pictures.We made haunted candy houses.
During the process.

The finished product. (which is now partially eaten away)

Alisha had some 2x4 pieces of wood that we asked Albert to cut into 3 inch pieces. So what does he do??? He cuts them into all different sizes. We were kind of irritated at first that he couldn't follow simple instructions, but then we decided that different sizes could be cute. Mikkele and I did Halloween blocks, and Alisha did Thanksgiving. We used Alisha's cricut machine to cut out the vinyl letters. Yet another reason why I love cricut machines.
Mikkele's finished product.

My finished product. My straight edge of my K is a pumpkin man. Kinda hard to tell from far away. Oh and there is a spider on the S block.

Alisha and Grant posing with her blocks. Can you see her turkey on her L? He was pretty cute.

We went to a corn maze in Bluebell, UT. It was about 30 minutes or so outside Roosevelt. I didn't even know that we had a Bluebell, UT. Anyway Mikkele had fun with all the different activities that they had. Can I just mention that I HATE corn mazes? And after going with Grant it just gave me another reason to not like them. He screamed throughout the entire maze. I should have gotten a picture of it, but I didn't because Alisha had the camera. And this is what I found on my camera after I got home.

Good

Sassy

Scary. We have issues in our family about making crazy faces when the camera is pointed in our direction. She may be sorry that it was my camera that she was taking pictures of herself with though. Did you know I would post these pictures Lish?

Mikkele measuring up next to the pumpkin.


Mikkele took Grant on a cow train ride. I think this was one of the only time he didn't really fuss while we were there.

She also took him down this slide made of PVC pipes.


They had this barrel thing that the kids could get inside and then get tumbled around in and get dizzy. Mikkele thought it was fun.

They had this barn filled with corn. Kinda like a ball pit, but no balls, just corn. Talk about the germs in that thing. YUK. And yes she thought she needed to lay down in it and make a corn angel!?!?

They also had this sling shot thing that you had apples and tried to shoot them at targets. She didn't hit the target, but had fun trying.

Oh and you can't forget the Moki dog. Moki had fun giving Mikkele and Grant kisses. He is a funny dog. I bought him a hot dog costume for him to wear on Halloween. We didn't get any pics of him wearing it, but it was really cute on him. I'm sure Alisha will have pictures on her blog within the next couple weeks of it.
And finally you may wondering why we call Alisha, Xixi and Albert, Coco. Well here's the story...when Mikkele was little she couldn't say Alisha very well. She said She-sha. Well when Albert and Alisha started dating he said that it was similar to Xixi (she-she) in Portugese which means "urine". So she is Aunt Xixi. And you can probably guess what Coco means...POOP.
And there you have it.
Thanks to Xixi and Coco for a great time! We'll try to make it out there before 3 1/2 years goes by again.

Mommy Daughter Date

Jeremy and I decided that Mikkele needed to have some one-on-one time with her mommy. She is such a good little girl. Often times she gets put on the back burner because of Grant's needs, but she is so good about it. She very rarely complains that Grant gets more attention than she does. So I told her that we were gonna go out on Saturday and she needed to pick what she wanted to do. She decided that she wanted to go to the Aquarium up in Sandy. So Saturday afternoon we left Granty with Jeremy to have some boy time and headed up to Sandy. We stopped and had lunch at Chick-fil-A first and then went to the aquarium. We saw a lot of really cool fish and sea life.

The octopus was pretty active. It was cool to see it move around and how long the tentacles were when they were fully stretched out.

The jellyfish were one of the main things Mikkele wanted to see.

Just a really big, weird looking fish.

Typically Mikkele is kinda a scardie cat about touching things. But she broke out of her shell and touched a few things while we were there.

This is her best shark face. She is such a funny girl.

She has always been scared of touching stingrays. She finally touched one after 8 years of trying to talk her into it. What an accomplishment.
We had a lot of fun spending time together just the two of us.

Grant

Grant has been really cute lately. When I am on the phone with Jeremy he knows and starts to say "A Dada, A Dada" until he gets to talk to him. Once I put the phone up to his ear this is what happens....

A few other things he's been doing lately...
*The other night I thought I heard Jeremy's truck pull up so I told Mikkele to go see if D-A-D was home. Grant then proceeds to say "A Dada, A Dada" I asked him how he knows what D-A-D spells and he just got a big smile on his face. He really does know what's going on and is a lot smarter than we give him credit for.
*He has started to drink out of a sippy cup. This is a HUGE accomplishment for him. It's not perfected to the point that we can switch from bottle to sippy, but I know it's not too far off.
*He learned a new word....Ya.
Mom: Do you want to go take a bath?
Grant: Ya
Mom: Do you want to take a nap?
Grant: Ya
Mom: Do you want something to eat?
Grant: Ya
You get the point. It's really cute. It takes months to sometimes see new things, but I am grateful for those little accomplishments. However minor they are a huge milestone for him.

The Anniversary Trip

For our 10th anniversary we wanted to get away on a trip somewhere. We had a lot of thoughts that ranged from a cruise, to lots of states between California and New York, etc. After doing a bunch a research on the internet, we decided on IDAHO. I know it sounds kinda funny, why would we choose Idaho out of all the places we could go, but we did and we had a great time. We went to the Twin Falls area. Why Twin Falls do you ask..well if you get on their chamber of commerce website their motto is "In the middle of everything". And they seriously are. There is so much to do within the city and about an hour and a half radius, and we only covered a small portion. Thursday we just hung around the city for a bit. The bridge that you cross to go into the city is a big attraction to base jumpers.

So we were able to watch some crazy people jump off the bridge and land on the ground below. These are some nice "professional" pictures taken of us on the bridge looking down and with the bridge in the background. They have a golf course in the bottom of the gorge that we heard is a great course for those golf enthusiasts.

Thursday and Friday night we stayed at a place called Miracle Hot Springs. We stayed in these things called geo domes. Have you ever gone camping and wished that you could bring your bed with you?

Well this is basically what it was, luxury camping. Inside the go dome were tile floors, and a queen sized bed. But outside our room was a picnic table, fire pit, etc. all the things you need for camping. The hot springs were awesome. It was so nice to get in the pools at night after a long day. They had one pool that was about 93 degrees, and they had another pool that was about 103 degrees, and they had private pools also that were probably somewhere in the middle. I didn't get any pics of the pools, whoops, so if you want to see what the pools were like click on the link above. One really random thing about this place was they had 3 live alligators.
Friday morning the grounds keeper was in their pin mowing their grass. This made Dean, the male alligator, a little upset. It was definitely interesting to watch. The females didn't care about what was going on so we didn't get to see much of them. They stayed under the water.

Friday we did a bunch of exploring. The first place we went to was called Mammoth cave. It was about 1/2 mile long path through the cave. It was pretty cool.

A few miles up the road was another cave called Indian Ice Cave. This cave has a floor of ice that is 25 feet deep. We didn't think it was as cool as a cave. It was a lot shorter and guided, so we couldn't really explore what we wanted ourselves. The pictures below are the pathway to the entrance of the cave, and then some of the ice on the bottom of the cave floor.

After those 2 caves we went to the Crater's of the Moon National Monument. It is a huge lava field that was formed forever ago. The lava flow caused a bunch of lava tubes which are now caves. We took a guided tour through one of the caves called Indian Tunnel. It was pretty big, and had a lot of ceiling collapses so you didn't need a flashlight.

After the guided tour we decided to go through some of the other caves close by. The next one was called Boy Scout Cave. This cave was pitch black inside so we had to take flashlights. The entrance of this cave was quite a bit trickier than the stairs that we took into the other one. Once we got in it opened up big, but then we noticed that the ceiling got really low up ahead. We thought about going back, but continued on. We had to army crawl through most of this part. We were definitely not prepared for this type of cave exploring. Our hand, knees, heads, elbow, etc. were very sore. We had a lot of laughs as we were crawling slowly through the small space. You can see in the picture of Jeremy the small space that we had to fit through. It was fun, but we decided that we were done with the spelunking after that.

This is a picture of some of the lava fields. They stretch for 60 miles north to south. It's crazy. There's that awesome professional photographer again. She followed us everywhere.

Saturday we went to a place called Thousand Springs. They just happened to be having an arts, crafts, and blues festival that day as well. We walked around the booths for a while, had some lunch, listened to some music, and then went on a canoe ride. This was hilarious. Jeremy has a slight fear of the water and doesn't always feel safe around it. So as we're taking off he starts freaking out that we're gonna tip over. The only reason he felt like we were gonna tip was because he was panicking. Once he calmed down a bit and got his bearings we did just fine, for the most part. We did decide that we would not make a good team for the Amazing Race.

The canoe ride took about an hour. We went around the island that they were having the festival on. Throughout the ride we were able to get pictures of the different springs that are in the area. It was really pretty. These falls go year round because they are springs. The other falls that Twin Falls is famous for weren't flowing because they are mostly from snow runoff, so it was fun to see these falls. We did make it back alive to the docking area with only a few mishaps of paddling us into some of the shrubbery on the sides of the river, mostly when I would stop to take a picture and stopped paddling. Jeremy took most of the mishaps since he was at the front. He he he.

That night we decided to lay low and went to a movie. We saw Eagle Eye. It was pretty good. On the way back home we stopped by the new Twin Falls Temple. It was really pretty all lit up at night.

That night we stayed at this cute little cabin. It was pretty simple with just a bed, a bunk bed and a small desk. I didn't feel well that night and went to bed early so we didn't get to sit outside on the cute porch swing like we wanted to.

We had a great time. We did miss the kids though. We kept saying we wished the kids were here and how much they would have loved the things that we did. So we might just have to make another trip back up in the spring. The falls will be going at that time with the snow runoff.
Thanks to my mom for coming up from TX to watch the kids. She is such an amazing grandma and the kids love her to pieces. The night before she went back home Mikkele had a bit of a melt down because she didn't want grandma to go back home. I explained that she needed to go back home and take care of papa now that she had been at our house for almost 2 weeks. I told her we would take some pictures the next morning before she left so she had something to look at when she got sad. So here is one of the pics that we took of grandma and the kids. Thanks mom! We love you and miss you!