this n that

Here are some happenings around our house (in no particular order)....



Seth had a little accident. He was chasing the neighbor girls around their yard, and ran right into a tree! Poor guy! He really got banged up. He also insisted on having a bandaid for each wound. (I particularly like the 'stache bandaid!)




We had a "pink" birthday party for Mia (can you tell?). She loved it! We decorated cupcakes, got dressed up, painted our fingernails, and played games. What more could 4 year old girls want?



Halloween...
getting ready to go trick or treating.


With cousin Bethany at Grandma's annual Halloween party.


Carving pumpkins





This little guy is now all over the place....I can hardly keep up with him.



Mia on her first day of preschool.



Angie, Seth and I after hiking the Y. Scott likes to hike the Y every year on the day of the first game.



Family hike up Big Cottonwood Canyon. The leaves were amazing. The pictures never quite do the colors justice.




Seth's first soccer season!



At Gardner Village with great friends!



Seth all geared up to cheer the cougars on to victory.


That is what has been going on in our lives over the last little while.

California Pictures

Sorry it has taken me so long to post these pictures. They are in no specific order. Maybe I'll organize them when I get a moment later...until then, here they are!

A little family time

Well, I thought I would post a few happenings in our lives lately.

First of all, we moved! We moved from a ward and dear friends that we have grown to LOVE. We miss them all dearly. They have truly touched our lives and made us want to be better people. I feel so blessed to have crossed paths with them. I know that is where we needed to be to first experience parenthood. We had such great examples to learn from and observe.

We look forward to meeting new people and developing new friendships in our new home. It is fun and exciting for our little family to have a new 'beginning' in our lives. We have already met so many kind people. It has truly made me appreciate people going out of their way to come over and introduce themselves. I know that it is often not easy to approach someone new and introduce yourself, but I have realized how unselfish and kind it is.

Well, we are currently on a family vacation in California. It has been WONDERFUL! It has been priceless to have time together as a family. Life has been so busy and chaotic with the move, I feel we have really missed out on quality time together. We have played and laughed and truly savored this time together. We have visited two different beaches, Disneyland, and Sea World. I will remember:

Seth LOVING the beach. His favorite thing was to collect all the seaweed that washed up on shore. He even had to bring two slimy pieces back to our condo with us. Gross! He is a boy, what do you expect?

Mia screaming through the entire mini rollercoaster in ToonTown. After she told me "screaming just means you really like it, mom!" Well, she sure fooled me!

Seth riding Star Tours as many times as he possibly could. He was also picked to be trained at the Jedi Training Camp. He had a grin from ear to ear as he stood up there and received his jedi robe. He was able to have a lightsaber fight with Darth Vader...honestly, a dream come true.

Grady taking his first solo steps in the condo from the coffee table to the couch!!!

Mia saying, "Really, Grad, really????" as he climbed all over her at the beach.

Mia saying "Brrrrd! Brrrrrd!" when she was cold at the beach.

Grad taking advantage of every moment out of the stroller to crawl around and find garbage with his little pinchers.

Those are just a few of our fun moments that I don't want to forget. Despite all the commercialism and possibly some overstimulation in Disney-mania (it is CRAZY!), it has been a great trip. It has just made me remember how truly precious this time is with the kids. Often I let SO many things getting in the way of just stopping and enjoying these precious little souls that I have the opportunity to love. I often wish that the kids were old enough to do this or that. But right now, I just want time to stop so I can cuddle them and nuzzle them while they will still let me.

A Birthday Party It Was

Here is the Star Wars Birthday Gang! We had a Star Wars birthday party for Seth today. It was great. The kids came all dressed up and had a great time. The weather even cooperated with us. We started out with a Jedi Training Camp in the backyard. They ran through the obstacle course several times. Then we came inside for Galactic Pizza and Yoda Sodas. We played some more games before presents. The big finale was 'Destroying the Death Star' pinata. I think the kids all had a good time. And we had one happy Jedi (see below!).

Since I haven't posted in FOREVER I decided to add some fun pictures I found today. Here is Mia's "excited" face. She does several faces...but I think this is my favorite. She is such a little ham!

Here is Grady enjoying his solids!

This boy LOVES the bathtub. It is so fun to watch him splashing all over!

This is when you know your kids got a hold of the camera!

Back to School

I love this picture of Seth and Mia in the backyard. They love their little table....and they are both hamming it up!!!

So, this is Seth's first day of preschool....broken arm and all. Story: He was playing outside on the monkey bars and fell down. I happened to run in the house to get Grady at the precise moment of the fall. He came in the house crying. I looked down at his arm and it was obviously broken (I won't go into the gory details). I told him that we needed to go to the hospital so they could fix his arm. He wailed even louder and said, "But mom, I don't want them to cut off my arm!" Oh...I almost started to cry as I quickly reassured him that they wouldn't cut off his arm. So, like a good mom, I remained calm as I loaded all the kids in the car and headed to the hospital. (It just so happened that this is the very weekend Scott was in Dallas for his annual guy trip to a BYU Game.) I pulled up to St. Mark's Emergency Room and ran inside to see if I should stay there or go to Primary's. They assured me that I could bring him in. So, I carried Seth in and laid him down in the waiting room. Then ran out to get Mia and Grady and brought them in also. Then ran back outside to park the car. PHEW!

Well, after all the commotion, poor little Seth was all tuckered out to the point that he was almost non-responsive. The doctor started getting extremely worried that he may have hit his head and have potential bleeding in his brain. They ordered a CT Scan. At this point they informed me that they were transferring him to Primary's either by life flight or by ambulance depending on the results of the CT Scan. I started to get a little nervous, because I still had the other two kids that I wouldn't be able to bring along. It also just so happened that Scott's parents and my parents were also out of town and I had a new cell phone that had NONE of my numbers in it! So I started calling anyone whose numbers I could remember. No answers. I called my dad and he gave me the phone number of my sisters' in-laws. I called them and as soon as Starr answered the phone, I broke down and started to cry (a not so good mom moment). I explained the situation and she said they would be right there to get Mia and Grady.

After that, everything turned out great. The CT Scan showed no bleeding. Rick and Starr (my angels!) came and picked up Mia and Grady. I rode with Seth to Primary's by ambulance. They reset his arm and splinted it. He was SO brave. He hardly cried at all and was more worried about making sure that I paused Return of the Jedi than he was about them resetting his arm (they sedated him and he didn't want to miss a moment of his movie). So, here he is....ready for school with a broken right arm! He has been doing great coloring and writing with his left hand. I am so grateful that everything turned out great. It was pretty scary for me for a little bit there.

Here are the kids getting ready to take Seth to preschool!

Grader-Raider

Seth and Mia have lovingly adopted the nickname 'Grader-Raider' for our new little guy. It is so fun to watch them talk and laugh with Grady. They are so cute with him.

Here are some updated photos of our newest little guy:




Check out these cheeks! We knew from looking at these cheeks on our ultrasound at 37 weeks, that this was no ordinary size baby!





I came home to this Kodak moment the other day. Oh, precious!

Happy 4th of July!

On the 4th of July eve, we enjoyed a barbecue with the Trujillo clan...including Isaac, Kels and new baby Adlee in town for the holiday!


Here is Grady, Harper and Adlee accompanied by their dads.

Grady's introduction to his new cousin Adlee.

Seth enjoying his sparkler.

Kels and me at the Murray Days parade.


Mia hamming it up at the parade.

Mia and Grandma Bell







Seth all tuckered out from holiday fun.