Signs of Spring.

Oh, how I love this time of year. Love it. LOVE it!!! So much, that I am off my medication and have hardly even noticed it because I am so happy about this weather!!! We have been to the pool twice already and plan to go a bazillion times more before October. St. George seriously rocks this time of year. It really rocks most of the year, but it is perfect right now! And going to the pool with great friends makes it even better. The kids will play outside by THEMSELVES which is even better. YAY! Oh, I'm happy.

My talented cousin....

My talented, beautiful cousin McKenzi took these pictures of the kids for me the other day! It wasn't too bad actually. I opted out for no family photo this year, due to the fact thatI didn't want to deal with the stress of having all of us ready and trying to smile. Plus, Brent and I really haven't "grown up" all that much! Anyway, I didn't end up beating them so I consider the shoot a success! Here are some pics of my little monsters. Very adorable little monsters....

UGH.

SO! It has been a couple of weeks since I have updated everyone on my wonderful, unstressful, blissful life. I know that everyone has been DYING! and when I say dying, I mean stalking me, like every twenty minutes just to see if I have updated it. Well, wait no longer!!! I am here to blog my little heart out because frankly, I can!

The first sentence of my blog was supposed to be sarcastic (if you didn't get it in the tone I was using) but really, life hasn't been all that bad lately! Brent is home more (I still haven't decided if it is a good thing or not yet), the kids are sleeping again. Gavin stays in his new bed for the most part except for waking up at seven freaking o'clock in the morning, and I don't have to work. So I seriously can't complain about my life. I could complain about how many times a day I have had to vacuum recently in regards to smashed fruit loops, fruity pebbles, Christmas tree remains and every day grub, but really- I don't want to bore you and make your head hit the keyboard from falling asleep!

OK, enough of my ramblings. First on the list! (drumroll). Soccer.

Makenna FINALLY had her last soccer game on Saturday the 21st. Now, don't get me wrong. It was cute and fun to watch her play, but towards the end of the season, there was whining and crying that went along with it. And unfortunately, I am not that patient of a mom so I was threating Santa and everything under the sun to get her out there. Once she got out there, she ran (watching her shadow the entire time) and would sometimes chase the ball. She was really good however when she did get the ball. Her all-time highest score was FIVE goals. Three for her team and two for the other. We were just proud of her even though she is a little bit directionally challenged. :) She got a KICKIN' (get it KICKS soccer? oh never mind) trophy that she loves and places randomly throughout the house. The soccer was definitely worth the investment. FYI...

Gavin. Dear sweet Gavin. Or should I say, used to be sweet Gavin. I don't know what has gotten into him lately (well, I'm sure it has a lot to do with his father and the fact that he is a little boy) but man this kid goes. And goes and goes and goes.... and then just does naughty things for the heck of it. And then sounds so dang adorable when he says "sorry" after jumping on Makenna's head or throwing all of his food or something like that. And it is even cuter when he runs to the naughty chair as he laughs the whole way. I am not sure what kind of punishment is going to work for the kid. I don't think beating will even work. I will figure it out. He does really well with his accidents and stuff so I can't complaing too much. Even when he comes in at seven in the morning (I know that doesn't sound early to a lot of people, HEATHER) but I find that my best beauty rest is between 5:00 AM and 9:00 AM. Now, really, I don't sleep in the late. Just look at my broken out face and you will believe me! ANYWAY! The other night, I mean morning, Gavin came in around 7:15 and Brent lifted him in bed with us so we could turn on the TV (aren't we awesome parents!) and he decided to lay on my head and look at me and say "HELLO!" It was hilarious. Even that early in the morning. The only frustrating this was, I had FIFTEEN more minutes until my alarm went off for church. I would have pushed the snooze button twice and then been up. Now you wonder why we barely make it to church on time! Anyway, Gavs is awesome and cute and naughty. We love him though.

Thanksgiving rocked. We ate diner at my Grandma Hukill's three nights in a row which made it even better! Mexican on Wed., Thanksgiving fixings on Thursday, and the turky noodle gravy over potatoes on Friday (my fave). The kids were good. There were only 26 of us there, so it was a smaller crowd than normal. Dessert was the best though! She makes the best pies ever. I'm not even that much of a pie person, but they were delish. We went over to Brent's aunts house for more dessert and stuffed our faces there! It was a good day.

Our lights are up (thank you B), the tree is decorated (thanks Kenna) and now I just have to do the shopping (UGH). OK, thanks for indulging my thoughts... if you are still around to read them- if not, you probably have a nice checkered board forehead!

Pumpkin Time

I, along with Bonnie do not like Halloween. My reasons are a little bit more different than hers but still- don't like it at all! So on Halloween I thought I wouldn't deprive my kids from everything of Halloween so we painted pumpkins (our pumpkins were to small to carve). I didn't get a picture of the final product. Oh well, I'm a crappy mom.





Halloween night (or 5:00) Brent and I decided to take the kids trick-or-treating early because it was the only time that Brent could actually spend with the kids. We made it to four whole houses before Makenna got grounded from it. She got the candy and said "I don't like this kind!" And then threw the candy in the rocks/plants. I was MORTIFIED. I am so sorry Kelly again. I am raising a brat! Obviously she didn't understand that trick-or-treating isn't for her, but for her parents. Gavin loved it and ate all four pieces of candy before we got home... oh and the awesome sticky hands (thanks Dahls). I don't even have pictures of the kids (like I said, I'm a crappy mom), but Kenna decided to be Snow White again and Gavin didn't want to get out of his cowboy getup so he wore his church clothes he was wearing from the baptism and I stuck his boots and hat on and that was it...

Oh! And Brent is finally home again. He has sat tonight for an hour and it is driving him CA-RAY-ZEE!!! I love it. He even took his clothes off (TMI?!) and put on some shorts which is saying a lot! Welcome home babe!

Early morning conversation

It was my turn to do the pre-school carpool this morning and this is the conversation I heard. I was laughing my head off. And just so you know... Makenna wasn't in on this conversation. Just the boys in the car!

R to P: My dad is bigger than your dad.
P: My dad is bigger than your dad.
P: Your MOM is bigger than my mom! (no joke he said that)
R: My mom is bigger than your mom!
J: My mom has BIG arms!
J: My dad has bigger arms!
R: My dad is bigger than my mom.
R: My dad is BIG.
P: So is my dad.

I thought it was HILARIOUS.... and I didn't think kids actually had this sort of conversation! I guess I was wrong!

Martin Halloween Party

We had the annual Martin Halloween party this past Monday, and once again thanks to Gloria, Jill and Kengie it was a blast! I was assigned to bring one of the desserts and I thought they turned out pretty cute...


I decided for Brent and I that we weren't going to dress up this year. I wasn't really in the mood, plus I ran out of time and didn't know what we would be. So, I ended up being an ornery mom and Brent was Brent!!! The kids were cute though!

At the beginning of the month Makenna wanted to be Kate Hudson (thanks grandma!) but she wanted to wear Cinderella's dress.... then she changed her mind to Sleeping Beauty (which I didn't mind since she had the dress) and then she decided she wanted to be Ariel (which we didn't have). Luckily at the last minute she changed her mind once again (can you tell she is a girl?!) and finally decided to be Snow White (which thankfully we had the dress for).... Gavin told me he wanted to be a cowboy really bad, so we borrowed all of Bonnie's boys stuff (thanks Bon!) and he was set!

A kids dream...

BIG, GIANT POPSICLES.

Gateway Discovery Museum

Last week when we went to Salt Lake, Janalyn and I decided to take the kids to the Children's Museum. Let me just tell you, they LOVED it! Gavin (who usually is a whiny little fart in public) wandered around and got into everything!!! It was so cute to see him walk around and play with all the ball tubes, play on the "farm" and such. Kenna's favorite part was the miniature house they had. She could have stayed in there for hours. If you are ever up that way, I would definitely suggest going to take the children.

Gearing up for the day!

Balls?!

Playing Mary had a Little Lamb

I love men in uniform! :)

Animals on the farm

Buddies on the lifeflight helicopter

Easter Day

Let's just say, I am glad this day is OVER! Here is the run down.

I had a 44 oz. Diet Pepsi at 10:00 on Saturday night. Let's just say, not a good idea. I tossed and turned probably until at least 2:00 AM. At 3:30 AM Makenna decided to wake up so I went and crawled in bed with her to see if I would sleep better. I woke up at 5:00 and went back to my own bed.

The morning was not good. I couldn't find Gavin's pants, Kenna didn't want to get dressed, Brent had a wrinkled shirt, and I just didn't feel cute. Sacrament was a DISASTER. I'm sorry Melissa that you guys had to sit behind us. I had to do everything not to swear at Makenna because she whined the WHOLE time. I couldn't even color my nursery lesson in peace! :) Brent had Gavin and by the end of sacrament all three of them were in the hall and I was trying to breathe. Nursery kids were sad.... and the whining continued until bedtime tonight. I don't know if it was because I was just ornery the whole time, but I almost went to the gas station to get ANOTHER 44 oz. Diet Pepsi just to make myself feel better but I refrained.

This is the only picture I really got of the kids and it explains the day...

Freezing picnic

We had the annual Staheli Family picnic up at my Grandpa's farm this weekend. It was fun, but as usual the weather was very funky. In the past 26 years we have been doing this, I remember it being nice and warm, ummmmm..... probably four times. No joke. I swear it is always either, raining, snowing, just bitter cold, or so windy we are eating sand in our dutch oven potatoes instead of salt and pepper. It is always fun though and we are glad we get to do it.

This year was no exception with the weather. It was SO freaking cold. Gavin was in a sweatshirt and a heavy coat, Kenna was in her snowboarding coat and beanie and gloves, I was in a winter coat and Brent was in a jacket and froze his little tush off. We had a campfire and four canopy's to protect us from the rain. If it wasn't raining, it was windy and cold. It didn't stop the kids from having a blast and doing the Easter egg hunt. There were a lot of kids there and even more Easter eggs. I'm not sure how many eggs were hid (I don't think anyone did) but Makenna found 50 candy-filled eggs and Gavin had six. Almost all of the other kids had WAY more than 50 so they made out well. Thanks Grandpa for letting us come up there again!