My computer is being really retarded and slow so I’m done trying to edit this and just posting this as is.

This is an old picture in outfits Beky brought back for the kids when we she went to Hawaii with Kennedy but I love it and thought it went with the Hawaiin theme of this post.  Such happy babies, and pretty darn cute if I may say so.

When the grandkids turn 8 and get baptized Matt’s parents take them to Hawaii.  Quinn and her cousin Emory who is 6 months younger than her went back in June (I know – I’m WAY behind in posting this).  These are some of the pictures Quinn took.

These fish were in a pond in the mall and Quinn took a lot of pictures of them, she was very interested in them.

Cousins

The world’s biggest hawaiin shirt with Grandpa, Grandma and Emory.

This is one of the men from the Polynesian Cultural Center.

The girls had books to collect stamps from different people around the Polynesian Cultural Center.  This was one the stamp booths.

They went to a Luau.  Here the guys are uncovering and removing the pig from the pit.

Dancing at the Polynesian Culture Center

So here’s another glimpse back in time.  I’m so bad at keeping this updated.  I know – I’m so fired!  So lets pick up where we left off-

2009′s 4th of July was much less dramatic than 2008.  No emergency room visits or motorcycle crashes.  We did have a milestone event though, drum roll please . . .

Jaxon lost his first tooth!

(He’s since lost the one next to it.)  We went to the annual breakfast of pancakes, sausage and orange juice followed by short patriotic program at Matt’s parents house.  Things were winding up (ignore the time stamp on the picture) and we were getting ready to head home for the next party of the day when Bubba brought me his tooth that had just come out.  He was so proud!  My baby boy isn’t such a little guy any more.

Fast forward an hourish or so to the bbq at the Wallace’s.  Upon an earlier visit to their home we decided they had a great setup for backyard bbq’s and invited them to be guests at a bbq at their house. They provided the grill and we brought the meats.  We did classic burgers and dogs of course but I also tried a shrimp recipe that I was told was really good.  Yeah for me – since I don’t like seafood and didn’t try it or know for sure if it would turn out ok.

After lunch we set up the pinata we had brought since the 4th is Matt’s birthday.

Madison knocked the pinata off the rope during her turn so Matt had to re-hang it before we could continue.

Then we let Bubba and Quinn have a go at it.

We saved the last turn for the birthday boy, Matt.  After he broke it open we let the kids at the candy.  That thing was way loaded, especially for only 4 kids being there.

After all the hitting Jaxon decided it was time for the pinata to have some fun.

So he took it for a ride on Mae-mae’s bike.

Then Mike, Mike and Matt broke out the croquet set for some fun out in the heat while us girls stayed inside to chat.

Once things started getting a little later we headed back over to Matt’s parent’s house to go with them to a neighbor’s barbecue and fireworks show.

After even more food and letting the kids do sparklers and the popper things we settle in to watch the show.

Then it was back home dragging sleepy kids upstairs to get ready and into bed.  It was a good day though.  Lots of fun celebrating the freedoms we enjoy in this great country.

I know I have a ton of stuff to catch up on still from the last few months but I decided to do some current stuff and sprinkle in some updates as I go.

This weekend we took the kids to another Portland Beaver’s AAA Baseball game.  They were much better this time than last time.  Unfortunately the Beaver’s lost 1 to 0 to the Omaha Royals but it was still a good game.  Bubba got to practice his umpire calls from the stands.  I wonder if Matt gets tired of us asking him for ruling clarifications.  If so he’s a good sport about it and doesn’t show it.

We like to get the cups of frozen lemonade.  Here Matt is showing it off.  I have some pictures of him eating it too but I decided to be nice and not post them since he really isn’t a fan of having his picture taken, he did good to pose for this one.

The girls

After the game the kids got to go down on the field and run around the bases like the players.  From a photography stand I wish they would have spaced the kids out more so the parents could get pictures of THEIR kids running instead of a mass of little ones but the kids had fun so oh well.

Quinn is off and running on her way to second.

Jaxon is off trying to catch up to her.  Check out that long stride.

Here they are on their way to third base.  Bubba has made up some ground on Quinn but I think he was racing more than her, she was more jogging around the bases.

Running home for the score.  I love how Quinn’s hair is flapping up as she runs.

Jaxon crosses the plate . . .  He’s safe!  (To get the full experience you have to picture Bubba’s arms flapping out as he does the sign for safe.)

Quinn was already talking about how fun it was before she made it all the way up from the dugout.

Maybe next time I’ll purposely have them be towards the end of the line so I can get pictures with fewer random children . . . hmmm,  we’ll see. 

In June, while Quinn was in Hawaii, I took Bubba to a Lowe’s kids workshop and he got to build a pirate ship.  It was fun to watch him.  He got a kid size apron and a name tag and he used a mini hammer and wore goggles part of the time.  I was taking pictures of him working at first then he asked me to help him and I just realized I didn’t get a picture of the final completed ship.  Since it’s been home he’s painted it.  The ship even has a plank that pulls out to send someone overboard then retracts for ocean cruising.  The kid workshops are pretty cool, and they’re free.  You should check them out if you haven’t been to one yet.  And when he was done he got a patch to iron on his apron to show all the workshops he completes.

Ready for construction

Hard at work

The goggles were making it hard for him to see so he took them off.

In May Matt had a baseball game to umpire so I brought the kids with me to the monthly get together for recipe club.  They were outside jumping on the host’s trampoline when I heard Jaxon say Quinn hit her head.   I saw her holding her head and at first I was thinking she didn’t want everyone to see her crying then she moved her hand and I saw a river of blood pouring from her eye.  I rushed out to her and ushered her in to get a rag to stop the bleeding.  I tried to remain calm by telling myself that head wounds bleed really bad.  Because it was on her eye and it looked a little deep I wanted to have it checked out.  I called Matt before he left for work and my friend took Jaxon home to wait with Matt while I took Quinn to the emergency room.  We spent about fourish hours in the ER and she got 5 stitches on her left eyelid.  These pictures were taken with my phone on my camera which is not the best so please overlook the low quality.

Getting the numbing stuff injected into her eyelid so the stitches wouldn’t hurt was probably the worst part of the ER trip.  Quinn was trembling and squeezing my hand so hard.  She would curl her fingers so her nails would dig into my hand and I would try to relax her hand but she would just dig her nails back in again.  (She thinks this part of the story is entertaining when I retell it.)

This is after the stitches were put in.  I had originally guessed 9 stitches during conversation trying to distract Quinn during cleaning and numbing of the eye.  Quinn had guessed 5, I told her we’d see and  . . . . . surprise!  She guessed right.  5 stitches total.

This was when we were paying the copay on our way out.  She was tired and I had been playing with her hair while everything else was going on so she kinda has crazy/bed head.

The next day I stopped in to see her at school and have lunch with her.  She was told to stay out of the sun for about a week to minimize scarring so she played in the classroom during recess.  This picture she is inside her class’ big cardboard space ship they had been working on during their space unit.

The next week we had to go back to the doctor to get the stitches taken out.  The first one or two were okay, didn’t hurt too bad.  The scab had grown over the last few stitches so the nurse had to pull on it a little more to get those out which Quinn didn’t like.  Jaxon went with us for this adventure and during the first one he ran out of the room, he coudn’t stand to watch the nurse take them out.  I think it was mostly because he didn’t want to see Quinn hurting.  The nurse let Quinn keep the stitches in a test tube.  They look like little bugs.  Quinn was all excited to take them to school to show everyone when she was buzz group leader.

So way back in March Nana got Bubba some shamrock socks for St. Patrick’s Day.  They’re a little big but he loves it because he likes to pull them all the way up like baseball socks because everything becomes something baseball related with this boy lately.

What better time to wear fun socks then when unloading the dishwasher?

He was trying to tell me to take the picture when his swing was “here”

Here’s his batting stance . . .

and here’s the swing.

For Mother’s day this year Matt was going to take the kids and get pictures of the 3 of them together for me but then he thought about the fact that after seeing them I’d want to get updated family pictures.  Since he HATES having his picture taken he opted to skip the ones of him and the kids and we just did family pictures.  They turned out so good, I’m so happy with them.  I still need to get them framed and hung but at least I have them taken.  I did look at one store for some frames but I didn’t see any I liked that were the right size for the prints.  Oh darn, I have to go shopping again. There were some really cute ones of just the kids but since I can get those two to the portrait studio a lot easier than I can get Matt there I opted to buy the ones with my adorable husband instead.

This is the one I got a 10 x 13 of.   I love how it looks like Bubba is jumping up in the middle of us.

I liked this one too so we ended up getting two family pictures.

My two favorite most adorable boys.  Go ASU!

Quinn is so photogenic.  I LOVE this picture of the two of them.  It turned out so cute!

While we were waiting for the kids to get posed on our backs and around us we were just being us.  After being married for almost 9 years now I still love him more and more each day.

Boys + baseball = fun times.  Jaxon is so obsessed with sports.  Currently he’s all about the baseball.  He loves to set up his bases around the house.  Usually home plate is in front of the door, first base in the kitchen, second in the dining room and third in the living room.  Last weekend after Matt got home from umpiring a baseball game Jaxon set up the bases and they got to playing.  I of course grabbed the camera to capture the fun.  They stayed up after bedtime playing, hence the pj’s.  It was so cute to watch father and son playing together I didn’t have the heart to make them stop for bed, especially since it was a weekend night and there wasn’t anything Jaxon needed to be up early for the next day.

Quinn was passed out in the living room chair and totally missed the fun.

Jaxon and Matt played as all-in-one teams, with the help of ghost runners of course.  They would keep track of balls and strikes and outs.

A nice hit by Bubba.

Then he switched to a right handed player. For a southpaw he actually hits pretty well this way.

Tagged for the out.

Jaxon goes for the windup.

And Matt gets a nice hit of his own.

I have some good videos but they aren’t uploading right so I can’t share them right now.

Last weekend the kids spent the night at Nana & Papa’s house Friday night so Matt and I could have a date night.  I love spending time with him.    So Saturday I met up with my mom and the kids when my dad was getting off work and we all went together to the home & garden show.  They had the shamwow’s there from TV, they called the something different though.  I made the comment of “you’re gonna love my nuts!” like the guy says on tv but the group I was with didn’t get it.  Matt totally would have laughed with me if he were there.  Anyway.  So at first it seemed like it was gonna be a long day cuz Bubba kept hanging on me and begging me to carry him.  He weighs like 50 pounds and the section we were in had the fake fireplaces and heater and stuff so it was hot and I didn’t want a hot little monkey on me.  It was fine balance between letting him hang/climb on me and not burning up versus not having him and his heat all up on me and keeping him close by.  This is one of the things I found to occupy him for a moment.  He’s such a ham and loves to pose for pictures.

Eventually we wandered to the part that was for the kids.  They LOVED the fire house the fire department had there.  They watched a little video and got some good fire planning info from the fireman then went upstairs and when the fire alarm went off they got to climb out the window and down the ladder and meet up at the mailbox which had stickers and erasers in it.  The kids also got to plant a green pepper seed and play hands on at the science booth.

Quinn so proud of her planting.

Jaxon adding dirt to his pot.

I found a book on square foot gardening that was inspiring.  I’ve been wanting to plant a garden for a while I’ve known for a long time I* should* have one but I didn’t really think that was feasible on with our little backyard.  After seeing the examples in the booth at the show and reading the book (and of course looking at several people’s gardens online) I feel like I’ll actually be able to do this.  The below picture is just an example of the concept from someone’s website.  Once I get mine up and going I’ll post pictures of it.

I decided to take advantage of being home from work due to snow to update our blog.  I looked at my last post and wondered out loud “What’s happened since the 5th?” and Bubba sitting close by answered with a sigh “nothing”.  He’s a funny little man.  I don’t know how he comes up with so many little one-liner phrases.  Sometimes I wish he had a recorder on him at all times to capture some of them.  So I don’t have pictures of what we’ve done lately but here’s the run down anyway.
Bubba got a haircut from Matt leaving a fuzzy bathroom to be cleaned.  His hair had gotten so shaggy and long.  Its crazy how different he looks with short hair.
Matt got strep throat really bad.  His tonsils swelled up and he could hardly talk.  He was on antibiotics for 2 weeks which is longer that I typically see prescriptions for.  He was quarantined to the bedroom for about a week total to keep the kids from getting it.  Thankfully I seem to be fairly resistant to strep as he’s had it a few times since we’ve been married and despite the close quarters and caring for him I’ve yet to catch it.  *Knock on wood*
Quinn is wicked excited to be on her new unit at school.  They finished up their geography unit and had a share night where we toured her classroom and she told us all about land formations and showed off  her paper mache globe.  Now she’s working on her main street unit.  The kids all have different business and despite being the last person to choose she wound up with the pharmacy as she’d been hoping for.  I’m willing to bet it has just a *tad* to do with me working in a pharmacy.  It’ll be fun to take a walk down her main street when this unit is done.
I’ve just been working and doin house stuff like cleaning and cooking.  I got a new class at church.  I went from CTR 7 back to CTR 5 like I had when I was originally called to primary in this ward a year and a half ago.  They’re so fun, just out of sunbeams and still so excited about everything.  They love to talk and share their thoughts and ideas.
So that’s us so far for the month.  Bubba’s birthday is coming up next month so hopefully a more exciting and photo-ful post is to come.