winding down

So now the school year is winding down. William had his end of year program last week and still has one more week left of school (I am not sure why his is going longer cause everyone else is already out). The first graders sang "A You're Adorable" and it was...adorable. We were running late and Russ had to meet us there from work, but I am so glad we made it on time because the look on his face when he found us in the audience told me that it meant a lot to him.

The also sang America the beautiful and I may have gotten a little choked up.

Then they sang your a grand old flag last and then it was time for dessert.

Poor Joseph is just so cute that his siblings can't keep their hands off him.

I tried to get a picture with William but the punk kept making faces.

It was funny for awhile but then I told him he wouldn't get any dessert if he didn't make a normal face. 

He got some Jello and shared it too.

William has done really well in school this year. I am pretty proud of him.

A perfect day

I got onto blogger one day to find a draft post that I had titled, "A perfect day". Before reading it all I could remember about the day that as I was rocking Joseph to sleep I was thinking about the day and realized that it had been perfect and I quickly sat down at the computer and typed up all the things that had happened that day. I didn't post it because it was a (very) rough draft. And drafts, by the way, are not something I do very often. When I sit down to blog I upload the pictures, type up what happened, and post. That is all the time and energy I can muster for this blog right now in my life. Which is fine, it just means there are a lot of grammatical mistakes. I hope you will forgive me for those. I don't have a lot of time to blog, but I think it is important to record our lives so it do it. So here I am sitting down to edit it (a bit) and make sure it makes sense, and share what I considered a perfect day (this day happened on a Monday which is Russ day off).

Gracie woke up early (around 4?) with a fever and joined us in our bed. When William woke up he got breakfast for he and Gracie and Joseph slept late so I got to sleep a little while. I got up and made William's lunch for his field trip and drew a pirate ship on the brown paper bag. Russ told me that he would get teased for that and I said, "no he won't, it's awesome". And guess what? William thought it was awesome. I know my boy. Russ took William to school while I read scriptures and prayed. Gracie got to watch Enchanted and Joseph played by my feet while I did a blog post I had been meaning to do for over a week. Russ came home and trimmed the bushes and mowed the front lawn while Joseph played outside with the water table and I finished styling our book shelves (a job I started that weekend and really wanted to finish so we wouldn't have to keep living in the mess).

before

during

afters

 Then we all showered and got ready to go to LoLo's for lunch with Connie and Lindsey. The food was delicious and the company was better.

 After we picked up William from school and when we got home he wanted to watch Fantastic Mr. Fox. Russ went to put Joseph down for a nap (and I knew he would fall asleep while rocking him) and Gracie wasn't feeling well again so I laid down with her and fell asleep while stroking her hair. I woke up when I heard Russ coming out of Joseph's room and told him to go and lay down with Gracie while I listed a couple of dresses on Etsy. Gracie and Joseph both woke up just as William's movie ended and so I took the boys to Costco and Gracie stayed home with Russ so he could mow the back yard. Costco was nice and quick and we ate and everyone was happy. When we got home Gracie was asleep again and Russ was in his swimming shorts waiting for us by the pool. William jumped in and swam around and Gracie slowly got in and only swam for a little bit, but I really think it helped her temperature down. Then I held her wrapped in a towel while Russ vacuumed the pool and Joseph toddled around. Then I brought he kids in and got them in jammies and gave Joseph a bottle then we came out and had a short family home evening where we talked about the importance of trust and honesty. And we sang songs which Joseph loved. Then we drank v8 fusion for our treat and then brushed teeth. Then we all read scriptures together and said family prayers and then Russ tucked the little ones in while I read Harry Potter to William. And then I scratched William's back while I read some blogs on my phone. After I sent him to bed I came out to find Russ listening to Conference talks and I looked for a project I wanted to start working on (I didn't find it) and decided to go rock Joseph who had been fussing off and on this whole time. He is used to having a bottle right before he goes to sleep and we are trying to change that. I went in and picked him up and even though he was mad he laid his head on my shoulder and fell asleep as I bounced and swayed him around the room and he held on to my shirt. I looked at Gracie and William both sleep soundly (even though Joseph had just been yelling in their room) and realized it had been a wonderful day. So I came out and typed this up and I can hear Russ cleaning up the kitchen as I do this. I now I am going to go and get him and take him to bed and thank my Heavenly Father for perfect days like this, cause not all days are like this, but when they are it makes the harder days easier to take.

I went into the kitchen to get Russ and he was making summer porridge for he and William's breakfast and he wanted to pick some blackberries for it. So he and I went outside and picked blackberries and since it was so nice we laid outside on the cool grass and talked about what a great day we had and what a great life we have. I am not sure what made this day so great. Maybe the fact that I got so much done, ate out, and took a nap? I think it has a lot to do with my attitude. I have been trying to have a good attitude and it really does make all the difference in the world.

wasn't sure if I was happy or sad

The other morning William decided to give himself a trim. I was just walking through the house and see him in the bathroom and he says, "look mom" with scissors in his hands and hair all over the floor around him. Luckily I was able to fix it without much work (his hair is kinda a mess right now anyway). That got me thinking that I needed to trim Gracie's hair. I had been asking her if we could cut her hair short for awhile (because it was getting so matted in the back and she never wanted to let me do it), but she wanted to keep it long. Well when I told her I was going to trim her hair she said, " I want you to cut it to here" and pointed to her chin. 

I must have asked her if she was sure 15 times. I think I was really asking myself because when her hair was done it really was quite beautiful, but it was rarely done.

Here we are half way through.

I cut it using the curly girl method, curl by curl. It went well, but it was kinda hard to tell because it looked very hacked while you are cutting it. It is hard to tell what it will look like until after it is washed.

This is what Joseph did while I was cutting, until he decided to go into the bathroom to brush his teeth (one of his favorite activities).

Here she is once we were done and then we headed to the bathroom to get some water and conditioner in it and this is what we found...

Who does this kid think he is? He had never done that before. Leave it to him to wait until he knows I am completely distracted by something to try and stunt like this. He really is smart like that.

This is how it looks now. It is cute. Sometimes it doesn't curl very well, but it is soooo much easier to do. She of course looks adorable and seems to like it.

But how could I not be a little sad to say good bye to curls like that?

Cinco de Mayo

 Since my good friends Lauren and Lindsey were in town we decided to have a Cinco de Mayo party and it was way cool.

Lauren decided to make churros, and then deep fried a bunch of stuff like twinkies for Russ. He was in fat mans heaven.

There was delicious food and great decorations because Jenny B let me barrow the decorations from June's birthday party and they were perfect (although I didn't get a good picture of any of them). And Jenny made an awesome pinata.

Josephs favorite little girl was there.

This might be my favorite picture of the evening.

 Then it was time for the pinata (thanks Jenny for taking all the pictures).

Abe made the first real wound.

I did nothing to it because I was scared it would hit me. Apparently I don't really like to be blindfolded. 

Then Spencer went at it with his fists.

It was very entertaining to watch, to say the least. There was a roundhouse kick involved. 

Giant pinatas should be a must at every party. Especially when they have awesome candy in them. Thanks again Bradfords. 

Cowgirl Ballet

Gracie had another dance recital and it was as cute as ever. She did most of the dance which is much better than before. It just shows that she is growing up.

here she is with "her girls"

She was late coming on to the stage for the warm ups and didn't know where to go and it threw her off. So she just stood there the whole time.

Us waiting backstage.

This was her favorite part of the dance and rightly so.

Connie brought her some roses, but I did't get a picture of them. We were in a hurry to get home because we were hosting a party at our house the same night and we were late:/ Good thing Connie was there to let people in:)