New Year's

New Years was a three day affair.  It was fun to see cousins, celebrate Mariah's new engagement, play games, eat food, watch movies, and just plain chat.  New Years Eve was us, Jer's parents and Marg's family.  The next day was all of us plus the Hansens.  The day after that we were able to see James Morisse too.  That was fun to see what a sweet and well spoken guy he's turning into.

The Shinkansen

We got to meet Aubrey's baby too.  She's so sweet!  

Sam and Eli had a lot to say.  They paced for hours, even out in the rain.  I'm glad that they can talk to each other and I'm hoping that they can help each other towards Christ.

 

St Patrick's Weekend

A couple of Saturday's ago, the Brasher's were in town.  I always get a picture of the Samuels.  This time they did a selfie.... Hello Samuels.

Sam heard about Josie getting adopted and immediately started work on this crocheted blanket. He finished it at the baby blessing.  Proud of your work Sam and even more proud of your sweet and serving heart.

My parents dropped off St Patrick's Day donuts while we were out and about.  The kids loved them and I loved that they still think about me even as a middle aged momma.

This is my burn.... We were late for Evelyn's ballroom performance and I'm supposed to eat before 7pm.  I tried to open the pressure cooker before it was done venting.  It's only a first degree and I have an aloe plant for just such occassions.  It hurt horribly the first night but it's been fine since then. Now it's about a third of the size and is a brown color instead of red.

Sam's new soccer season.  Their team won and Sam played hard.  Enzo joined his team and I'm pretty excited.  Enzo is Sam's friend, Ian's, cousin that's here for a year or two to learn English.  They've been getting to know each other at church and school.... now they're on the same team.  That will be fun.

Seth also had his first game.  He was stoked that their team also won. He likes to play defense and accidentally blocked the ball with his face this time.  He exclaimed, "I blocked the ball with my face!  Like Scott Sterling!"

We cleaned out our game/puzzle closet.  In one day, Evelyn did three 500 piece puzzles and Seth did a 100 piece one that he'd forgotten that he had.  They got stuck on a more challenging one that's still sitting on the kitchen table a couple days later.  Maybe I'll help out on that one.

 

Cute finds

Emily was moving into a new place and found this adorableness.  Jeremy, Amy and Emily all showing off how they can stand on one foot with their skates.

This is one of Jim's mission pictures.  It's so fun.  When Aubrey and Corbin were married, we were sitting in the sealing room waiting for Margaret (her plane had been cancelled and then delayed... the wedding after Aubrey's had been delayed too so they said we could wait as Marg drove down from the airport).  A man came over from Corbin's side and sat really close to Jim and took his hand.  It turns out that he was one of Jim's mission friends from years ago that went on a second mission to Japan and served with Corbin.  That was such a fun surprise.

Emma had her baby too.  We took advantage of the Brasher's being down to come say hi.

Jim's mission friend.

 

My kids are cuddlers

My kids are very cute cuddlers.  I love it. 

Sam and Evelyn at Logan's birthday party.

Seth listening to Audible and playing with the babies.

Sam is very good with the cats that don't like to be picked up.

"Seth where did you go?"

Sam doing homework.  I think he was reading and she climbed up on him.

Seth's favorite cat is Syl.  She likes cuddling with him but doesn't like being caught first.  Once he picks her up, she settles right in with him.

Evelyn was talking to me and this baby wanted some cuddles. 

Seth was keeping one of the babies safe.  Two of them have been climbing alot and the third one wanted to be up on the couch too.  Seth put her up and then read them books to make sure the third one wasn't going to fall.

 

All the other stuff

Ada's finished Biology project.

Since babies faces aren't all clear... this was meal time the other day.  They're all teething so they all like to be pretty close.

Jer had his first ever trip in an ambulance. Wed, Jer got hurt somehow.  He did a run, went sledding, and did some work in our bathroom putting the cabinets in place.  Between everything, he tore several muscles in his thigh.  The pain is in three places which then radiates down to his knee and up his hips and back.  We were trying to have him rest it.  My marvelous parents took him to the instacare on Thursday because I had daycare. They gave him meds for aggravated nerves.  Friday was okay, Saturday not so okay.  Saturday night, we watched a movie to keep it low key and still spend time with the kids.  About midnight we got the kids to bed and about 12:30 I tried to get Jer up and into bed.  He couldn't stand or sit.  We ended up laying him on the floor and propping him up as best we could.  By 1 am it had gotten worse, and Jer was shaking like he had Parkinson's. Jer asked me to call 911, so I did. I got Ada up to watch for the ambulance and got back down to Jer.  Ada said that they parked in our neighbor's driveway and knocked on their door.  Ada had to go outside and wave them over to us. 5 giant men came down, gave Jer an IV, took his vitals, got him on the stretcher and into the ambulance.  I conferenced with Ada, packed a bag and followed. They did x-rays to make sure nothing was broken and tested some stuff for his nerves.  They diagnosed with him torn muscles in his thigh.  They put him on a muscle relaxer and pain meds and sent us home at 6 am.  We stopped at the pharmacy for some lidocaine patches, grabbed breakfast and I basically dragged Jer into the house.  Sunday our sacrament program was based around the choir song we've been working on for the last two months... So I slept for 3 hours and the kids and I went to church for Sacrament.... then we came home and crashed.  

Sam was practicing the flute and Ada walked by and turned on the treadmill on her way by.  She said she was getting him ready for marching band. He just finished practicing and Jer kept joking that any time he made a mistake we would turn up the treadmill.

 

Everything else going on

So Sam got a concussion on Monday too.  He came home from school and told me he was really tired and had a big knot on his head.  He was in his weight lifting class and the assisted pull up machine flipped him on his head when he bent over to pick something off the floor.  3 concussions are better than 2.

Sam found his first diary.  I don't know how old he was when he wrote this, but it's pretty funny.

My amazing and selfless parents came to teach us how to tile.  Because of my accident the night before, they did a lot of the cutting and the staging.  They knew it was going to be hard on their bodies and they did it anyways.  I sure love them.

Seth and his reading buddy, Tigress.

Ada and I at church, fuzzy and slap happy because of our concussions.

Ada holding the baby while I used the bathroom.

Evelyn and her acrobatics buddy.

Sam making our Thanksgiving Apple pies.

Seth's Thanksgiving Play.  I have more pictures so I'll write about that one with those.

Evelyn's violin club presentation.