Biiiiiig Day

I guess I thought when Emerson lost his first front tooth during church on Sunday, (he pulled it out and was waving it at Brooks who was passing the sacrament at the time) that SUNDAY would be our "biggest day" of the week.......

turns out I was wrong..............

This week our friends offered a small bike they didn't need anymore. Of COURSE I accepted because we still had the training wheels from another bike that Brooks ran over (the Yeti knows no mercy). Royce was thrilled but I told him Daddy would put the training wheels on when he got home from work. Well, he couldn't wait, so he hopped on the thing and literally taught himself how to ride it. I was sitting inside and looked out the window and saw him go up the neighbors hill-y driveway and used that momentum to start pedaling and away he went.

I really can't even put into words how proud he is of himself and how his smile will NOT leave his face.

I took a video of him too right after I saw him out the window

Since then the kid rarely leaves the bike. He is always asking Bronson or Camden to race, or practicing skidding his brakes. Bronson taught him how to stand up and ride it and also ride one-handed. Great. This kid knows no fear.

First thing he said when he walked out of his room this morning....

"I go outside to ride my bike....Papi (Bronson) race me?" and then he went. I had to BEG him to come in to eat breakfast.

Here's the thing though......IRIS doesn't know how to ride a bike w/o training wheels. 

I think when she saw her 3 yr old brother riding around she decided it was time to make herself learn (either that, or the older brother's teasing how her little brother beat her may have something to do with it).

She still rides more tentative then Royce and is actually aware of other people/animals on the road (unlike Royce) but she did it.

6 kids riding bikes out front now.....CRAZY

It's kinda like a Smith parade on our road everyday!!!!

Lucky lucky neighbors.

Creature Power

(If you do NOT watch Wild Kratts, this post title wouldn't make sense. Those who DO watch Wild Kratts, I'm sorry that song is in your head now. W-w-w-w-wild Kratts W-w-w-w-wild Kratts)

My kids loves creatures and that's always been obvious but juuuuuuuuust in case anyone had any questions as to HOW much, just look at Royce's face with his frog.

We particularly favor the frogs that are camouflage in little sister's hair so she jumps with shock when she starts feeling something move on her head. 

 First things first:

Step 1) find frogs

Step 2) kiss them

 Hmmmm, if the kiss doesn't work for YOU then proceed to the next step.

Step 3)  Play Matchmaker

If nothing magical happens just opt for:

Step 4) playing in the wading pool with them.........

because THAT my friends, is ALWAYS magical.

Oh, and here is Aleeya's frog "Exclamation" since he has an upside down exclamation mark on his neck.

We (as in the kids) like catching the mini snakes too. I personally like it that it entertains them for hours outside.

And they especially like catching turtles too.......

But the zoo wouldn't let us take it home with us........weird, I know.

I have issues

I haven't been sleeping too much. 

Not because of my baby......no sir-ee.....this champ has miraculously started sleeping through the night (9-6:30) at 5 weeks old. I didn't even go through the whole "training" thing. Phew.

The reason I haven't been sleeping as much as I COULD be is because of my other passion..... books.

The day after my parents left I dove into a book my mother gave me about a mom of 8 trying to solve a mystery......(I'm not sure why she would think of ME when she gave me that. :) Since it was summer break, (it's the time of year I enjoy "light reads") and my kids were getting piles of books, I started pulling out some of my books and well...... It's 23 days into summer and I just finished my 10th book.

I know, I have issues.

I read at the gym on lame cardio machines, sometimes while I nurse, during their nap/quiet times but mostly at night in bed. Normally I wouldn't get this much reading done but Brooks has been working nights and isn't home to tell me to "Step away from the book Melissa.....I mean it". I have a reeeeeally hard time putting down a book until I feel some resolve. It's like stopping a movie in the middle to finish it another time. I DON'T THINK SO!!!!

 Here's my book list so far starting with the book my mom gave me:

Desperate Measures
Abish
Daniel and Nephi
The Postcard (this is fiction/novel set in the Amish community my friend let me borrow. I loved the clean, faith-based nature of it that I put the sequel on hold.  After that the library kept sending me Amish book suggestions and I can't put them down, so the rest of the books on the list are Amish-community-based books. I love the scriptures and I love learning about people that also love them. Fascinating culture. Aaaaaaand I still have 4 more on hold at the library for me. Have I mentioned I have issues?)
The Crossroad
The Memory Jar
A Gift of Grace
A Promise of Hope 
Courting Cate
Adoring Addie

And because none of the reading above could be possible without my sleeping beauty, I want to introduce you to the many faces of Everly.

Her silly face

Her Aaaaaand-I'm-not-so-sure-about-this-family face

Her YES!-Mom's-eating-chocolate-which-means-in-12-hours-I'll-get-some face

Her this-is-hilarious-that-you-think-I-will-keep-my-dress-clean-during-church face

Her sneaky I-am-planning-to-puke-on-Bronson-as-soon-as-he-picks-me-up face

Her no-one-told-me-I-was-being-sent-to-a-family-that-has-a-100%-record-of-getting-thrush face

(well, or her I-vant-to-eat-your-blood face)

 And here's her smile she gives me when I think of picking up a book

 And Everly wins over the book every time...............every. single. time.

Oh the memories

It's fun to see so many of the memories I had with my parents as a youngin' be experienced by my kids with my parents.............Wow, that sentence was really weird. But you get the idea.

I really don't know a better "This Little Piggie" voice in all of human-dom then my dad's. You can't HELP but smile...

 Growing up there was also a lot of singing w/ accompaniment by my dad. This was Mom singing Happy Birthday to Iris while dancing in place with her birthday card. I think my girls are starting to see why their mom is how she is......... ;)

 Aaaaaaaaaaand the elevator. Just make SURE you do NOT press the pincher button. My rear-end definitely felt it's fair share of the pincher button.

 My mom......

 Of course mom is smiling in the picture above because that is BEFORE we went outside to play kickball with the kids and lost. My mom is a more gracious loser then I am for the record. Dad was the permanent pitcher....for both teams. No one could top his curve balls.

 My mother had 8 children and has well over 30 grandkids and still will sit and stare/admire/gawk over my babies. I love that. Pretty sure Everly has a big head now thanks to my mom. 

 Grams looooooves babies.

 Swimming......that would sum up their visit too. I drove over to their hotel every morning with the younger kids and we swam and swam. Iris said her favorite thing she did with Grampy in his whole visit was race him back and forth (and back and forth........repeated three times) down the pool. My dad is a trooper.

 Mom, who was also a lifeguard/swim-lady got my kids to love the water and even got Royce trusting in his lifejacket.........FINALLY. (We've been swimming many times since their visit and I can't get Royce OUT of the pool!!!! Gee, thanks mom) I just love this picture of Royce's huge grin jumping to Grams.

 (that picture was CLEARLY taken BEFORE her shoulders got burned to the color of red peppers....baked red peppers)

Another afternoon I brought the older kids over to swim and Mom and Dad came up with (once again) a genius idea. They cashed in a dollar for 100 pennies and threw them all over the pool and told the kids to dive for them. The one with the most obviously wins.........of course you wouldn't think we would just dive for the FUN of it!!! There MUST be a winner. (And Emerson was it) Here are their penny cups waiting to be counted.

I think Grampy really liked that game too because he could just sit on the side with Royce and watch the action.

Their last night here we took them walking around our favorite trails.

 I do love the trails but as an added bonus I ALSO love the fact that the kids don't have to "be ready". In fact, Royce can even dress himself and I ALLOW it to work......ya know, the whole button-shirt on backwards, shorts inside out with tag showing and no shoe thing......It's weird but that fashion hasn't caught on here yet. (But we will continue to try)

 Not the BEST show of frogs that night since we only caught 9 during that walk but nevertheless and notwithstanding they STILL get excited over them.

Thanks Mom and Dad for coming out! I sure love you.

IRIS IS 5!!!!!

Iris' birthday party was a huge hit......starting with a magic show. 

What are they laughing so hard at?

My dad.....her Grampy, gives the BEST magic shows. 

(and he gave this exact show on MY 5th birthday too)

 For the finale he makes "magic cookies" with the "help" of Iris. As Grampy put the ingredients in the pan to make the cookies Iris was NOT impressed......TOOTHPASTE?!?!?! (her face in these pictures kill me)

 SHOE POLISH?! 

FRESH (and dead) BUGS?!?!!? It was more then she could handle.

 Of course the watermelon cookies turned out delicious after being cooked in the fire that flew out of the pan. 

Next it was Iris' cake-time (I try to go for the OVER-SUGAR-LOAD effect at birthday parties). 

She wanted brownies with the ice cream on top (softened, spread on top of cooled brownies then thrown back in the freezer to harden back up). The ice cream she picked was Moosetracks and it turned out visually interesting since.....um......Sven (the reindeer) was on top of her cake.....ew

She loves Frozen and Pokemon.........so she got both on her cake. She just sat and admired it and I knew she (BEYOND) loved it since she stopped talking. Very few.....and I mean VERY FEW things make Iris stop talking. 

(I have NO idea where she gets that from...)

Then it was pinata time..........because they hadn't had enough sugar yet.

She wanted Olaf as her pinata which was nice she picked the shape of 3 balloons stuck together, so it made it easy for me.

 We couldn't find our bat so we opted for a broom this time. My dad volunteered to hold the pinata (or did I volunteer HIM?......I can't remember). Iris went to whack it first and mis-calculated the length of the broom since we are used to bats. Her first contact in her swing was NOT the pinata.......it was Grampy's knees.

TAKE THAT!!!

 The whole group with all their loot.

 We sure love our little chatter-box, peacemaking Iris.

Happy 5th, sweet princess.

The Big Day

 My parents also flew out in time for BOTH sets of grandparents to be here on this BIG DAY!!!!

Everly's Baby Blessing and Emerson's Baptism

Angel-girl in her dress

Family picture before Emerson's baptism

Which of COURSE I had to weed through the pictures to find one where we all look "normal" to get the above picture and not so much.........well..........this kind of stuff....

But heck....even Iris and Camden's photobombing was a WHOLE lot better then the family picture from Bronson's baptism (2011) when everyone looked PAINED to be there.

But back to Emerson's day.........

The priesthood men with the little-man-of-the-hour, Emerson.

 Smith grandparents

 Degn grandparents

Dad had to run in to finish practicing the special musical number that Aleeya and Iris were going to sing. I love this picture because it reminds me of singing along with my dad when I was younger.

After basking in that sweet memory-filled-feeling, I walked out in the hallway to see Emerson like this.....

For a kid who NEVER wears shoes, I found it funny I had to remind him he didn't need to wear them to be baptized!!!!

Emerson asked RA to baptize him. I just love this picture!

 And this...... (I just couldn't crop Kellyn's sweet face out of this picture)

Both grandmas gave talks and Aleeya and Iris sang.....(well, ALEEYA sang....Iris was there for her mumbling-background effect we like to have for duets)

Emerson was baptized and then received the gift of the Holy Ghost by the laying on of hands (by those who held the Priesthood to do so......summary here in a previous blog post)

(Yes, I was sneaky to snap one with my phone right before Brooks started the prayer)

We were so grateful for all our friends of our church and friends not in our church who decided to come!

And those shoes I had to get him to take off before he was baptized?.......well, they were QUICKLY kicked off right after.........along with all of his brother's shoes too.