I LOVE THE 80's

Yes, our highly anticipated(by me) 80's party finally happened and we had a totally trippin' time. I regret that many of you couldn't make it, but we will do it again some time and the rest of you BETTER come. Words can't describe the "FRESH" people that showed up to party, so I will have to just share some pics.The food was incredible, I loved the bacon wrapped Jalapeno's and cream cheese. YUM!! Thanks to whoever brought those.


This shot is of many of the sexy chicas that wanted to strike a pose. A few of the others were in the kitchen having some chili.








Next, we had the 80's bride and the 80's prom Queen struttin' their stuff.














Eileen and Tony, the High School sweethearts, showed up with matching hickies they worked on prior to coming to the party. Then, there was Tasha with her brooch and "Talking Heads" style shoulder pads.












I want to give a shout out to my friend Trent who was our freakin' awesome DJ for the night. I even learned how to scratch( yes, I literally scratched up Trent's vinyl records). I thought I did pretty good until, of course he told me to go away.

Then there's the 80's snow boarder that showed up with Cindy. Isn't he FINE!
















Allie brought her Back to the Future Michael J. Fox look alike. Except he didn't show us his Calvin Klein's.


Michelle and Adam did some serious booty shakin' and Adam showed off his SHORT SHORTS.


Stephanie's date was this fine rocker dude that I've never seen before.

Notice the Fresh Prince of Firestone with Sam who went all out to carve lines in hair for the evening.

Ben did manage to capture a few grainy videos with his Blackberry.
So, I apologize for the crappy quality...but I bet the dancers are grateful for the grainy images!
Notice Adam in the last video... his footloose kicking lasted about three seconds when he realized he was being recorded. That's alright we got ya anyway. Good Times.

Toilet Training gone Awry!!

Easier said than done. I tried the Allie Thornbrue method of potty training Carter James two nights ago. We set up a stock pot, put a liner in it and a potty seat on top of that in the kitchen. Carter sat on it for 2 seconds, said, "psssss.....all done" got up and ran away. Well a few minutes later, he wanted to be funny and put the seat on his head and wandered around the house making funny faces.

About a minute after that, he ran over to me frantically crying because he'd gotten his head stuck IN THE TOILET SEAT!!Im not talkin' on the crown of his head. I mean totally through and around his neck stuck!!!( Sorry we have no pics of that...too much drama going on)How he did that?? Who knows. Carter finds a way to do all kinds of crazy stuff.

The other two boys tried yanking it in all directions as I yelled for Ben to come and help us. I admit, I was yelling and laughing out loud at the same time. I then said, "Do I need to call the Fire Dept?" Ben finally got nervous...shooed us all away and gently squeezed his head and ears out of the toilet seat. After a big hug from mommy, and a deep breath Carter finally said, "Potty seat stuck my head no more."

So Long Summer

Since we completely and totally busted our digital camera by dropping it one time too many, I can only resort to pictures taken last month.

Funny how some beautiful things on this earth take absolutely no effort at all. This sunflower plant was a volunteer under my bird feeder last summer and this summer, the flowers returned more beautifully than the first time. I had to cut them so I could admire them in my kitchen before they died. Tonight, we will get our first frost of the season. So long summer, hello warm soup, beautiful leaves and crispy cool nights. I love Autumn.

Carterism's

Now that Ethan is in Kindergarten, I don't have as much time to hear his creative comments and views on life. And given that Carter is speaking more and more each day, he comes up with the funniest things. The other day for example, he told me that he wanted a p-p butter sandwich.

Yesterday, as I was getting ready to go to a church broadcast for women, Cater was in the bathroom with me when I started to touch up my nail polish and he said "I have some?" Okay, I said. I pulled out a light pink nail polish and painted his toe nails. He was so proud and left the bathroom running telling me he was going to "show daddy!"

A few minutes later, he returned as I had just put on my bra. He proceeded to point to my chest and said "pop those?" I said, "Pop what?" He said, "Pop those balloons." So, even my two year old has my number with my padded bras.

Time to Catch up

As you can all tell by my previous post, I was out of commission for a little while and I was lucky to just function as a mother during the day, so I could hardly keep up with my families antics.

Last week Ben took Ethan to a BYU football game and had a great time in some cool box seats. The cougars defeated UCLA 59-0. They were happy to go and spend some quality time with Ben's sisters Sara and Annalise and his brother Robert and soon to be brother in law, Kimball.

This past weekend, we enjoyed a quick visit from our Iowa friends Laura and Jordan Graff a their four boys Taylor, Aaron,Ethan and Joseph.

My boys enjoyed ditching school and we took them all to the Denver zoo and the Downtown Aquarium. Unfortunately for me, I forgot to take my camera to the zoo, so you will have to settle for pictures of the boys brushing their teeth together. Haa Haa.

What A Pain in the Chest!

I took Claudia to the ER on Friday. Since Monday she'd been having pains in her chest and back, along with a headache. She's also been pretty fatigued. When you call the dr. to get an appointment because you're having chest pain, they won't make an appointment, but tell you to go to the ER. So I left work and took her to the hospital in Loveland. The got us into a room right away and did a bunch of tests and asked a bunch of questions.

Finally we were able to go home after about 4 hours. The ruled out anything serious--no heart attack or blood clot issues. The dr. said he didn't have a diagnosis for sure, but that the two most likely conditions were pluracy and west nile virus. In both cases, you can only treat the pain, etc. and wait for it to pass. The most likely of the two is pluracy, which is an inflammation of the plura lining between the lungs and the ribs, and can take 4-6 weeks to clear up. The dr. thinks it may have been caused by the minerals in the hot springs pools we were in last weekend in Glenwood Springs.

So she's just taking some pain killers and hoping it will go away soon. She feels various levels of pain when she breathes and moves, so just about all the time. Although it is uncomfortable for her when the drugs wear off, at least it's not a serious life threatening condition.

Ben

Happy Birthday to Alec!!!

Just over nine years ago today...my due date for having our first baby came and went and my jumbo child had no desire to come out into the world. My stomach grew bigger and bigger and still no baby. When I was six days overdue, I went to the doctor where I clearly remember him giving me an ultrasound and telling me that his head was measuring that of a 10 lb. baby...but that the ultrasounds aren't always accurate. Then I recall the Dr. squeezing my belly and saying..."It feels like a 9 pounder to me."

Wow, we thought... 9 pounds is huge. I weighed 8 lbs. at birth and Ben was only 6 lbs. So, of course we were overwhelmed, but up to the challenge. The next day, Sept. 3 1999, my labor was induced with some serious drugs. I remember the day like it was yesterday when I was awakened in the middle of the night with the most excruciating pains I had ever felt in my whole life. After 4 hours of pushing and no success, the doctor prepped me for a c-section. That afternoon I said a prayer in my heart that I would live through the tiresome and painful event.

Just before the c-section, we gave it one last effort to have the baby. The doctor wedged him out with the help of a vacuum and forceps. When his jumbo body was placed on my chest, I felt this slippery enormous child for a brief moment before he was whisked away to be weighed and measured. Again, I remember the language like it was yesterday. Upon placing my boy on the weight scale the nurse laughed and said, " 11.7 lbs. ...You didn't have a baby!...you had a Toddler! Haa!! Haa!!" Recovery from that delivery was nothing to laugh about. Trust me.

Nevertheless, I really believe that high birth weight helped him to have excellent health and be a very mature baby (if there is such a thing). We called him Bubba for the first few years... not because he was chubby, but because he was huge. Our Bishop joked that it was due to being born in Iowa. "Iowa just grows them big," he said. I think it was due to the "Teacher potlucks" I was enjoying every Friday near the end of the school year when I taught first grade.

We had the privilege of having Alec to ourselves for 4 years before Ethan was born and enjoyed every minute of it. Now of course, we enjoy all three of them but we especially enjoy how well the all get along and what a great job Alec does of caring for his little brothers. We love you Bubba!