Every boy needs a dog and goodbye Elder Chezik!

We have had Simon now for two weeks. He is fitting into the family very well :) He's lived his whole life in a cage, so it doesn't bother him to be crated when we have to leave to run errands or at night. He's only had a few accidents and is doing really well in the housetraining area. I am loving the vacuum cleaning aspect of having a dog! I can actually go more than one meal without having to vacuum the floor!!! Kylie has enjoyed that aspect as well and was caught the other night sneaking pieces of zucchini and squash from dinner to Simon rather than eating it. Rob's favorite part is going on walks. Every night he picks one of the kids and takes that child and Simon on a walk. Sometimes the whole family goes. There really aren't many rainy nights down here or snowy/sleety nights (even in the winter), so I think it's easier than it would have been had we gotten a dog when we were still living in New England.

Simon is definately a people dog, which is a a good thing as he doesn't get much alone time in this house. He occasionally retreats under my desk to take a break from the kids. It isn't long before one of them comes looking for him. Megan loves curling up with him when he takes naps ~


Although Megan had done a wonderful job taking care of Simon and spending time with him, Jack spends nearly every waking moment with Simon. He plays in Simon's crate and pretends to be a dog ~




He follows Simon around the house and plays with him when Simon lies down ~


When Simon goes in his crate, Jack happily joins him (no, the door is not locked, Jack just pulled it shut) ~


Jack loves to drag Simon around the house with him. He grabs Simon's collar and Simon, always a good sport, tags along at Jack's side. (Jack dressed himself that morning - he is wearing two shirts, both of which are much too big for him, two pairs of shorts - one of his, one of Beth's - shoes on the wrong feet, as usual, and a baseball hat that he insisted on wearing - he is very into baseball hats and shoes at the moment) ~




Jack loves to share everything with Simon and happily drags him outside by the collar (saying "side, side, Si-nigh" - which translates to "outside, outside, Simon") when I ask Simon if he needs to go outside. He loves to help feed Simon and laughs when Simon knocks into the cup he carries the dog food in, knocking some to the floor. Every snack Jack eats he shares with Simon. We are teaching Simon to sit, and Jack enthusiastically encourages him by saying "SIT", then rewarding Simon when he does.

The cats are adjusting to Simon. Harlequin just stays upstairs and since Simon stays downstairs, he doesn't have much to do with the dog. Max mostly ignores Simon, occasionally retreating to the stairs when Simon is being playful. Cricket on the other hand is enjoying Simon immensely. Cricket takes after his predecessor (we had another cat named Cricket, who Cricket looks much like and is the same breed as - American Bombay) and loves to tease. He had been teasing Max, who would get very annoyed by it, but has decided it is more fun to tease Simon. One of his favorite things to do is to sit on the climber in the playroom. Simon has trouble getting up the slide and Cricket just sits up there smirking at him as Simon goes crazy trying to make it up. When Simon does finally make it up, Cricket swats at him and chases him back down. Cricket is definately the alpha in that relationship.

Enough about the dog :)

A picture of Kylie, Jack and Megan being a train - they wrapped their stuffed snake around the three of them and ran around and around the dining room table and the kitchen island ~


Jack fell asleep on my lap the other night. He almost never does that anymore, so I had to get a picture. I cannot believe my baby will be two next week! I went to a baby shower for a friend last night and got to hold her baby, who is the same size Jack was when he was born. I had not realized quite how big Jack had gotten :(


On a completely different topic, one of the missionaries that had been serving in our area for the last several months got transferred this week to a new area. We loved having Elder Chezik here and will miss him! Right before he left he got to cash in on a bargain he made with Rob. Rob told Elder Chezik that he would give Elder Chezik a hug if Elder Chezik got a baptism. Elder Chezik did, so he got his hug :)


Rob with Elder Chezik and his companion, Elder Potter ~

Rob and Meg's birthday dinner, butterfly hatching and misc.

Last Wednesday we had our family dinner to celebrate Rob and Megan's birthdays. We grilled hot dogs, seasoned chicken sausages, and California burgers. Christy came over and Megan got to open all her family presents (although she had already opened her card from Grandma and Grandpa so she could use the money in it to help buy the dog crate - she was so excited that she got to help buy it!).

From Christy and Ron she got a High School Musical backpack - perfect!


Nona and Papa sent her five china teacups that had been found in my great aunt's house after her death - we think they belonged to my grandfather's mother! Megan was thrilled! She is always asking questions about her ancestors and it was really neat to get a present like that.


Molly and Brian sent a carefully selected Webkinz. Webkinz (for those without small children) are stuffed animals that come with a code. You log into the Webkinz website, enter the code, and you can create a virtual world with a virtual copy of your stuffed animal. There are games you can play that help you to earn kinzcash, which can then be used to purchase virtual food, clothes or furnishings. Molly and Brian picked a dog webkinz that Megan named Oreo.


Molly and Brian also sent presents for the other kids and a game for all of them to share. Very dog themed :) Perfect!


Rob picked out the cake and chose a Snickers ice cream cake. It was delicious, but did not lend itself to the insertion of candles. I managed to put in a three and and four for Rob and seven plus one for good luck for Megan. Granted the whole top of the cake was sort of broken, but it still tasted good! Beth fell asleep during dinner on Christy's lap.






Jack comes up with the funniest outfits! I tried to just put the overalls on, but he INSISTED on a shirt as well. He then put his sandals on himself (on the wrong feet), found an old hat of the girls and Megan's pink glasses. He marched downstairs and found one of Megan's black High School Musical gloves, which he immediately donned. Then he marched off to the play kitchen to cook :) He graciously came out of the toy house so I could take his picture.


This morning Jack and I discovered a butterfly hatching from a chrysalis in our backyard. I strongly suggested to Jack that he NOT attack the butterfly and ran inside for my camera :)




Random funny story from this week ~
The other night we had Megan take Simon out into the backyard before we put him to bed. Kylie waited by the door, giving us updates. Megan announced "he's gone number one and number two!" and Kylie relayed the message. Rob told them to keep him outside for a little while longer to make sure he was done. Kylie yelled out the door to Megan "wait till he's gone number three and four!" The elders were over, talking to Rob. They laughed so hard they couldn't talk for several minutes :)

The Greatest Show On Earth!!!

This year we gave Megan the choice between a birthday party or bringing a friend to the circus. She chose the circus. We got tickets to Ringling Bros and Barnum & Bailey's circus for the day after her birthday, which happened to be last Saturday. Fortunately Kylie got out of the hospital in time to make it, so we loaded everyone in the car and went and picked up Megan's BFF (best friend forever), Paula. We actually managed to find the back way into the venue (which we had been to in June for the Andrea Bocelli concert) and found cheap parking. Six tickets can get expensive, so I had gotten really cheap ones, but we could see really well even though we were up on the second level of seats. Rob and I each took an end and sat the five kids in between us. We forgot to bring the camera, but I tried to snap a picture with my cell phone at the beginning. Kylie's making a weird face because she's making her seat go up and down ~


The kids loved the show. My favorite part was watching Jack dance to the music :) It was a fairly long show though and sometimes the kids had problems seeing over the heads of the people in front of us. At one point I had Kylie, Jack and Beth sitting on my lap. By the end of the show, both Beth and Jack had surrendered to dreamland. Kylie had sweetly agreed to sit on Daddy's lap rather than mine, so at least I only had Jack and Beth to hold :) It's a good thing I'm so tall as having longer legs really helps when you have multiple kids on your lap!


As we stepped outside after the circus we felt the wind pick up and saw the black cloud cover and ran for the car. We made it as the first raindrops started to fall. We told Megan she could decide where she wanted to go for dinner. She picked Mimi's Cafe. The kids behaved really well through dinner, although we got some apprehensive looks when we entered with five small children. Megan chose chicken gumbo soup and salad with fruit, which kind of surprised us as it seemed sort of an adult choice. I guess she's growing up!

Megan had already opened her family presents on Wednesday when we had Christy over for dinner (hmmm . . . need to post about that - forgot to) and she had gotten her present from us when we brought Simon home the week before and took her to buy his stuff. Paula got her a Barbie - Dog Show Barbie I think? It came with three small dogs and a course for the dogs to perform on. It was perfect considering her present from us and the performing dogs at the circus!

When Having Your Kids Like Veggies is a Bad Thing

Friday was Megan's birthday, but it was fairly low key as most of our plans were for Saturday. We let her pick what she wanted for dinner, which was grilled cheese sandwiches, shrimp and green beans. Kylie was quiet through dinner and didn't eat almost anything. We finally asked her if she felt ok. Meg piped up "Kylie ate mushrooms from the backyard!" All of our kids love mushrooms, but we have told them repeatedly not to eat ones from the ground. We try and make sure to pick any before the kids see them, but we occasionally miss one or two. Kylie found a patch and ate two whole mushrooms. We called the nurse hotline for our pediatrician and they told us to call poison control. Poison control told me to take her to the children's hospital and that they were calling ahead to let them know we were coming.

I called Brittney and drove over to get her so Rob and I could both go. As I'm driving to get Brittney, I called a friend and she sent her husband over to our house to help Rob give Kylie a blessing (in our church priesthood holders have the ability to give blessings of healing or comfort). Two other friends offered to watch the other kids, but we didn't know how long it would take, so we thought it would be better to have the kids at our house with Brittney.

I drove the car while Rob took care of Kylie, who by this time was throwing up about every three minutes. We hit a horrible rain storm, but made it to the hospital. By the time we got there, Kylie was drifting in and out of consciousness. When we entered the ER, they took one look at Kylie and brought us into the back immediately - I didn't even get time to check her in. They got us into one of the ER rooms and Kylie lost consciousness. They got an IV into her and included some medication to hopefully stop the vomiting. At least it was easy to put the IV in as Kylie wasn't reacting to anything at that point! The doctor told us it was good that she started vomiting so soon as that helped to get the toxins out of her system quickly. The toxins from poisonous mushrooms can cause the liver to shut down if they are not expelled. They checked her liver and fortunately there was no damage. We asked how long it we should expect to be at the hospital so we could give Brittney a time frame. The doctor said at least 24 hours. We called Christy.

Christy dropped what she was doing and drove over to our house. At some point Kylie drifted from unconsciousness into sleep, which made us feel better. The medicine worked and she stopped vomiting, which surprised the doctor as considering the intensity of her reaction to the mushrooms. They told us they were admitting us to the hospital. Rob and I had not packed for an overnight stay. We decided that I would stay and he would drive home. His shirt was fairly dirty as he had taken care of Kylie in the car and carried her into the hospital and there are medications he takes for hypoglycemia that we hadn't brought, so it made sense to send him home. I also didn't think I could handle being away from Kylie and even though Rob felt the same way, he graciously let me be the one to stay.

Kylie opened her eyes shortly after Rob left and asked a few questions. They took us up to our room, which Kylie really liked. For a hospital, it was amazingly homey. It was a children's hospital and all the walls were painted cheerful colors and there were murals and interesting pictures. Kylie's favorite was a tv screen mounted into the wall with a virtual fish tank playing on the screen. We called home and let Kylie talk to Megan as Megan was fairly worried about her. Kylie finally got to sleep after being re-hooked up to multiple monitors. I spent much of the night next to her in the recliner, which was not very comfortable, because she kept getting scared.

She woke around 4am and was thrilled to get to drink gatorade (red, one of her favorite colors) and eat a lunchable (she picked ham). We watched a bit of tv and then went back to sleep. Since she was doing so well, the doctor woke her up at 10am, had her eat breakfast and told us we could take her home! Christy came to pick us up (Rob has some issues with directions - we really need a gps) and we made it home in time to shower and get ready for the circus that afternoon! But that is another post . . .

My Little Miss Megan is Seven!!!

Seven years ago today my first baby was born :) We had waited five years for her to show up and she was such a blessing!

We found out she was on her way around Valentine's day. We had started fertility treatments the previous year, then the doctors discovered a tumor the size of a grapefruit in one of my ovaries and everything had to be put on hold for a while. I had surgery to remove it and the doctors told us to wait for six months and then come back to start the fertility treatments again. They had told us that our chances of being able to conceive at all were very low, so we were talking about adoption, but wanted to try the treatments first. We went back in after six months. The doctor did an ultrasound to insure that everything was ok and I didn't have any more cysts. The screen was turned away from me, but Rob could see it. The ultrasound stated and the doctor swore. Rob started crying and I was a bit freaked out. Then the doctor said "there's a BIG baby in here!" We were 16 weeks pregnant. Everyone in the room was in tears :)

Megan took her time getting here. I dilated to 3cms by 36 weeks and the OB kept saying "we'll make the appt for next week, but I don't think you're going to make it!" They finally decided to induce me at 41 weeks. Christy was home from college and staying with us. She and I went out to Olive Garden the night before my induction. Rob, Christy and I headed off to the hospital the next morning. By the time I was settled in and hooked up to the monitors, they discovered that I was already having contractions and was now at 4cms. We discovered that we had forgotten several things at home and since the doctor assured us that it would be a long day - she said probably 18 hours at least - we sent Rob home to pick up what we had forgotten and to take a nap. An hour later the contractions were 2 minutes apart and the nurse told Christy to call Rob if he wanted to be there for the birth. Rob came flying back to the hospital. Around 2pm the doctor came in to see how I was doing. She checked and barked "squeeze your legs together! I've got to get everything ready!" Less than 15 minutes later Megan had arrived. We had not completely decided on a name yet. When she was born my first thought was that she should be named Kylie, but Rob quietly said "no, that's Megan" and he was right :) I remember being wheeled down the hall from the delivery room to my hospital room with Megan in my arms and wondering how people could still be functioning as if the world was the same - it had changed so much for me :)

I love you Miss Megan! You are such a blessing in our lives and I am so glad you joined us seven years ago!

Megan at six weeks old - people who think babies can't smile until they are older never met Megan :)


One year old - Go Red Sox!!!


Two years old - such a good big sister!


Playing dress up with Kylie shortly after our move to TX - age 3 ~


More dress up - age 4 ~


Holding her new baby brother - age 5 ~


In her birthday ensemble from Aunt Molly - age 6 ~


Piggy back ride for Jack - age 7 ~

Boys are from Mars . . .

On Monday while playing outside I noticed a chrysalis hanging from the tip of our garden hose. I called the kids over to look at it. Then lower on the hose we noticed a caterpillar starting to create a chrysalis. Very cool! So I ran inside for the camera. I took a picture of the completed chrysalis, but just as I went to snap a picture of the caterpillar, Jack came running up and knocked it off the hose with a shovel. While I appreciated his desire to protect me, I tried to explain to him that he did not need to kill everything that moved. Ten minutes later he came over to me with this stuff all over his hands. He had squashed the chrysalis. *sigh* Boys are so different! The girls and I had a wonderful conversation about how caterpillars become butterflies, then they went off leaving the chrysalis and caterpillar alone. Jack's instinct was to attack one and take the other one apart.


We have spent a lot more time playing outside since Simon's arrival. Granted that may be due in part to the odd change in weather (the temperatures have dropped dramatically this week because of storms we've had), but I think it's mostly because of Simon. There have been several changes due to Simon. The downstairs is staying cleaner as the kids learn that toys and stuffed animals left on the floor might get chewed, we've gone on family walks almost every day, the kids' sleep schedule is almost back to where it needs to be for school as they have been waking up early to see the dog and then crashing at night because they are tired from running around in the yard. Rob and I are thinking this is a good thing :)

Simon has gotten a bit more enthusiastic as the days go by and he is not taken back to the vet he was boarded at. He LOVES playing outside and just running around, rolling in the grass, or chasing bugs. He is making friends with the dogs next door and they run up and down along the fence playing with each other. He is still pretty well behaved for a puppy and only had a few accidents the first day or two - mostly due to Rob's or my inexperience at dealing with dogs (not leaving him out long enough or not letting him out without kids hanging onto his collar). He thinks the cats are great and would love to play with them, however they do not share his enthusiasm and spend their time shooting us dirty looks and hanging out where Simon can't get them. Megan is really doing a great job of taking care of him. She makes sure he gets fed, takes things away when he gets a hold of things he shouldn't, refills his water dish, and sleeps next to his crate at night on a little mat. She even makes sure the back yard stays cleaned up. Her sense of responsibility really amazes me. She definately deserves her dog!



Kylie pushed Beth on the swings the other day. I thought it was sweet and snapped a picture :)


The kids have been so active lately, they are really tired at night. Last night after their bath, Jack and Beth fell asleep watching tv. Notice Jack's shoes (on the wrong feet) - he LOVES wearing shoes and puts them on himself.


On a completely different note, remember the haircut I gave Rob a few weeks ago? Well after the fact I was told that the missionaries had told Rob if they had five baptisms, he needed to get a military haircut. He got that haircut just a few weeks after the fifth baptism - lol :) I swear I had no idea :) Rob has actually decided he likes having short hair. It's much easier to take care of. I don't think we will go quite that short again, but I think his hair is going to stay on the short side.

Happy belated birthday Rob!

My amazing and wonderful husband's birthday was yesterday :) He took the day off work and we tried to have a day doing just what he wanted to do. We slept in (although he let me sleep in later then him) and took the morning easy, then got stuff crossed off our to-do list. We cleaned out the minivan (which really, really needed it!), took our old paint cans to the place that disposes of them, and stopped by Whole Foods. We don't have a Whole Foods market near us, and even though we like our little farmer market store, Whole Foods has a bigger selection, so it's nice to go sometimes. We got pizza for dinner (with whole wheat crust) and an all natural version of Dr. Pepper. He didn't get much for his birthday as his present was the Andrea Bocelli concert we attended last month, but I got him a little hand held version of Guitar Hero - a Wii game he enjoys (but we don't have a Wii, hence the hand held version).

In his honor, I include various conversations I overheard between him and the kids the other day when he was playing "dinosaurs" with them ~

Rob:Don't eat ponies. Ponies are our friends. Even though they don't fulfill any useful role, we should respect them for taking up space and resources.

Meg:Ponies are for dinosaurs to eat.

Rob:You are all savages!

Kylie:Don't call me a savage!

Meg:Why did you call my daughter a savage?

Rob:Because that's what you are - you are all savages!



Rob:Look, here is a giant pink cup. I will drink of it's knowledge.

Kylie:Hey, that's my cup.

Meg:Whip, whip, whip (as her dinosaur pretends to beat Rob's)

Rob:You are just a little dinosaur - you can't be whipping people.

Meg:Well, that is my job.

Rob:You must have little dinosaur syndrome.



Rob:Don't resort to violence to solve things. That's not right. Everyone should love each other. Can't we all just get along?



Meg:If you do not like horses, then tell your mom you are going to die.

Rob:What?!? Good grief!

Kylie:tell you mommy you are getting a whooping



Rob:My name is Spiny. I take the middle of the road on everything. I have no backbone.



Meg:Is somebody coming over to your house for dinner? Because we have a really big horse that is bigger than the dollhouse.