Aren't they such sweet angels?

JUST LOOK HOW CUTE THEY ARE!  

Tanner and Brook are always cracking me up.

Well that is the side that they TRICK you into falling in love with, 

because, I promise you, if they weren't so darn cute and amazing, 

I would be dumping them off at the zoo!

Here is the kind of stuff that Tanner and Brooklyne like to do.  If you turn your back for just a few minutes they turn into little DEVILS!  

Today I had an appointment to go to and since Donald is out of town, I was lucky enough to have "grandma Linda" watch the kids while I was gone.  When I came home Linda yelled up to me, "you're going to kill me."  I came downstairs to find all the VHS videos all over the family room.  I found all our PS2 video games in the mix, half of them opened with the discs missing.  I started to help clean up the mess right away and the phone rang.  I ran to get it, only to discover the OFFICE ransacked.  Donald is going to be fuming mad because he has been working on all our medical bills and spent over 8 hours last week organizing and going thru things.  All of that is on the ground, along with much, much more.  Then as I was leaving the office I stopped to just check the storage rooms.  They had torn up a bunch of toilet paper and pulled out a bunch of stuff, but luckily had not broken any of the glass bottles and were unsuccessful in opening the jar of honey.

Linda felt horrible about what happened.  She was on the phone taking care of an appointment when my pair of EVIL DOERS decided to cause a crime scene of great magnitude.  After my initial shock of the situation, I just laughed.  I just kept looking at how much WORST it could have been (like if they had been able to get the freshness seal off of the honey - YIKES)  I just laughed and laughed and laughed.  So after being home for about 20 minutes, I decided to grab my camera and at least take pictures of it.
 

(what doesn't kill you makes you stronger - right?)

Trenton gets baptized

Trent has reached the ripe old age of 8 and had a fantastic birthday weekend.  We had 4 grandparents staying with us which made our house 24/7 full of excitement.  

On Thursday night, Trent came down with 103 fever so on Friday he did not get to go to school, did not get to take birthday cupcakes for his class, and we cancelled his birthday football game for Saturday afternoon.  His consolation prize was that he got to play outside all day long even though he was sick.  By Friday afternoon he was fever free.  He says it was a birthday present because he got to miss a day of school and play outside with his grandpas.  

Saturday, Trent's actual birthday, was fairly laid back and low key.  I made chicken and dumplings for dinner and we had sprinkle birthday cake.

Sunday was kind of crazy.  We had baked french toast for breakfast and hurried off to our satellite broad casted Stake Conference.  Because we are in a rather small ward, we were able to plan and arrange our own baptism, however, we share our facilities with a branch that is about 40 miles away.  They had planned a baptism for right after Stake Conference and had a full program of their own. They had their baptism first, but the little young man was terrified of the water.  Donald ended up needing to assist in his baptism so good thing there were more clothes in the closet for him to wear.  We were finally able to get Trent's baptism going after 1 p.m.  We had a full program with 2 musical numbers.  I gave the baptism talk, my mom played the piano, Grandpa Jim gave the talk on the Holy Ghost, and the primary kids and missionaries sang scripture power.  It was a great baptism.  Trent was nearly bursting from the seems with excitement.  he could not sit still nor could he stop smiling.

After his baptism we had a few families over for some lunch.  I made pulled pork sandwiches, baked beans, chips and cookies.  I was thrilled that everything was finally over and I could finally relax.

It really was an awesome day and experience.  Trent also got his very own nice set of scriptures.  He is trying to read in them every day and now has marking pencils to mark things that make him feel good.  He is such a good kid and I am so proud of him.  It really is hard to believe that he is already 8 years old, I still remember all the baby days.

some little girls get gum stuck in their hair, but Brooklyne . . .

 . . . gets a train stuck in her hair!

Don't ask, because frankly, I don't know!

(by the way, I will be blogging about Trent's baptism, 

I just haven't gotten around to it yet.  call me lazy!)

. . . well I guess it's time

 . . . to do the laundry.

Tanner got his shirt wet doing who knows what, and felt he needed to do some laundry.  Brook of course, since she is the trusty side kick, was glad to assist in the washing and drying chore.  So when I caught my little helpers and was just laughing uncontrollably, Tanner had such a concerned and heart broken look on his face.  "WHATTTT?  it was all wet!"  So he filled the washer full of water with nothing in it.  Then when I was trying to get him to exit the laundry room, he ran back to get his WET pj shirt from the drier!  

What a good boy he is - just taking matters in his own hands!

Our family makes resolutions

On New Years Day we went around the table and had everyone give 3 goals they want to complete in the year 2009.

Daddy:  1.  get out of all credit card debt.  2. get a new job and move us.    3.  finish the kids fort/club house

Mommy:  1. be more wise when spending money - focus on saving not spending.  2.  increase my faith and lean more on faith not logic.  3.  lose 5-10 lbs. and keep it off all year by eating smart and exercising often.

Trent:  1.  make a system to keep track of all my money.   2.  collect at least 50 Nerf guns for waring.  3.  to be in the newspaper again - this time for soccer or baseball.

Kolby:  1.  to be as good of a reader as Trent and to write good too.  2.  to use his money to buy presents for people.  3.  to be in the newspaper like Trent.

Tanner:  1. blah blah blah Thomas train, blah blah ya.  2.  blah blah mom eat food blah blah blah.  3.  my school blah sister blah blah blah ok.  

(my goals for Tanner for the year would be: 1.  to be able to speak where mom can at least understand 85% of what is said.  2. to keep the hands out of the mouth a lot more.  3.  to not throw so many fits.)

Brooklyne : uh oh mama.  --- ya that was about it.

(my goals for Brooklyne this year would be:  1.  to learn how to use words - at least 100 words.  2.  to be potty trained.  3.  to play fairy princesses with mommy.)