January

What can you say about January, honestly the worst month of the year.  This year it rained nonstop in January, which was amazing because of how badly we needed the rain, but hard too because we are so used to being able to play outside. And to top it all off we had three weeks for Christmas Break and most of it fell after Christmas.  So that was really fun trying to figure out what to do with the kids until January 11 in the rain.  Luckily we made it through and it even wasn't as bad as I was worried it would be.  We didn't actually do anything super exciting but we still had fun being together.

 Aunt Judy and Uncle Jim gave the kids their own gift cards to Chick-fil-a for Christmas so we took them and they thought it was pretty cool that they got to order their own meals rather than having to share which is what we always do. They even had enough money to get a milkshake too!

 Clara officially decided that she was too big for high chairs which is always fun. haha!!

 I had had about enough of Annie being home with me.  She has been so hard and difficult and I just needed a break from her so even though money was tight we decided to put her in Miss Patty's Place for the rest of the school year and it ended up being one of the best decisions I ever made. Almost over night she became like a different kid. She was happy and not crazy!  Best money I ever spent!!

 The one good thing about breaks from school is having the bigger kids home, so they can help with the little kids.  Clara really loves her Ziz!!

What do you do when you are stuck inside? Have lots of movie nights.  Clara was loving her some popcorn.

Jane's Baptism

My friend Amy took these amazing pictures of Jane for her baptism. It was so fun to go with Janie and take them. She is such a sweet girl and it was so fun to watch her get her pictures taken. She was so excited to be baptized and she was so excited to have her new dress. I helped her pick out and design what she wanted. She was so excited about it and I think it turned out really good. It was hard to pick just a few of the pictures of Jane because they were all so beautiful!  It ended up being perfect too because we had had so much rain I was so worried that there wouldn't be a day for us to get the pictures done but there ended up being the perfect day to do it, even if the ground was really wet!

It was a very special day for Janie. I'm so glad that Kevin is able to baptize the kids.  It is so special for them that he gets to do it.

It was really special that both sets of grandparents were able to be here for Jane's special day. I'm so grateful for this eternal family that I have and I am so proud of Jane for having the desire to be baptized and make those covenants.

All About Jane-8 Years

My cute Janie girl is 8! When we did her baptism pictures my friend Amy wanted to take pictures of Jane and I for a class she was taking, which was so awesome to get some amazing pictures of Jane and I together.
Jane is such a sweet special girl.  She is in sceond grade now. Its crazy to me that she is so old.  She was always my baby lady and she was only 18 months old when we moved to California. And now she is 8!  I have always said that Janie is my easiest going kid and that is still true.  I really appreciate how easy she is to be around. One interesting thing about her that she has recently picked up is that she has become quite chatty lately.  She used to be very quiet, but now she loves to chat with me about all kinds of stuff. It really is quite fun to see this new side to her. 

We recently changed bedrooms because the room situation wasn't working out that well and now Jane is sharing a room with Annie.  She has been the sweetest big sister to Annie and Annie  absolutely adores Jane.  She wants to be just like Jane and Jane is always so patient and kind to her.  Jane also really loves to be with her big sisters and likes to do anything with them.  One other thing about Jane is that she is a little lazy. She tries to get out of doing things and she seems to manage to disappear when no one is looking and seems to get out of helping because of this!

Right now Jane isn't really into anything in particular. She is still really into doing arts and crafts. She loves to color and create and just about anything that involves cutting and coloring and gluing. I think she may have the most artistic talent so far of the kids as well. 

She loves oranges and loves anything orange flavored. She still is so nice to me and always tells me how I make the best meals. She isn't picky but she isn't the best eater either. She kind of eats like a bird most of the time, but every once in a while I will make a meal and she will have thirds of it!

 I just love Janie's easy going nature!  Even if she isn't very easy going about her clothes!  I guess she has to have something right! I am so glad we have our sweet Janie girl in our family! She is the best and I love

J

Jane's Birthday

 Jane's birthday fell during Christmas Break for us this year, so that meant no school for her, but it also meant she got to have a special lunch date with mom and Dad and no one else since Lizzy was home to babysit the little ones.  It was such a fun thing to do that we decided that its our new tradition to take the kids out for their birthday and if it falls during school then we will check them out of school. the kids are pretty excited about it.  Jane and I went and picked up Kevin and we went to our favorite pizza place Trademark and she even got her own pizza!The kids have recently decided that for the most part they would rather pick out their stuff then have us do it and wrap it, so I took Janie shopping after lunch and she got a bunch of little things that she wanted like a stuffed pig Pua from the movie Moana and I got her a special little dessert at Raleys. I think she ended up really enjoying her special day.  One funny thing though is that when we got home Nellie was freaking out and kept saying, "I'm very jealous right now!"  haha!

 The next Sunday I made her birthday cake so that Grandma and Grandpa and Judy and Jim could come over.  Janie is a huge fan of oranges so she had asked for an orange cake. I looked and looked online for a recipe that sounded good and nothing was sounding that good so I decided to make up my own.  I even learned how to candy orange slices only to realize that no one liked them and they are not something I would do again.  Oh well, I guess they worked well for the decoration. The cake itself was really good though. I have learned over the years that I can make pretty much anything better than I can find it elsewhere.

Grandma and Grandpa got Jane a spirograph, which was the perfect thing for our little artist.