Portland and Washington

Well, these were supposed to go at the end. But what better way to start a post than with this handsome little man!

I decided last minute to go with my parents to Portland/Washington for the weekend for a family reunion/Auntie Edie's 90th birthday and to hang out with Jason and Courtney. I am SOOOO glad I did! It was so great. i took jackson with me and we had a great time. it was only a little over 48 hours, but we packed a lot in. I was actually supposed to come home sunday evening, but we were having such a great time, my mom changed my flight and I cam home monday morning.

We got in late friday night. So we spent saturday hanging out in the morning at Jason and Courtneys. They are the best hosts. I should say everyone else was hanging out. I slept all morning. Jackson didn't sleep at all the first night, so at 7am my mom took him for me and I got to sleep for 3 hours. It was heavenly! Then we headed down to Vancouver to the Farmers Market! We finally made it there after a few stops to some shops that were going out of business. One was a high end baby store! The ergo carrier was less than what I was trying to pay on craigslist and it was brand new!! I love good deals. The Market was very fun. Great food and lots of fun vendors to walk around and look at. The guys met up with us there after doing guy stuff (shooting). And we went to dinner at Joes Crab Shack right on the columbian river. It was beautiful. We sat outside and admired the setting and all the boats! And enjoyed YUMMY CRAB!

Sunday we headed to Lake Oswego after Sacrament Meeting to go to Auntie Edie's party! She looked beautiful! She is the most upbeat, positive, happy person. I think i have seen Auntie Edie probably 12 times my whole life, but she makes you feel like you have been best friends for life. She is one of those people that makes you feel so important. She remembers everything about you and is always so happy to see you! I hope I can be as amazing as her and look as good as her when I am 90. She is definitely the glue that keeps the family together. It was great to see my dad get together with his cousins who he hasn't see since he was a kid. I got to meet some relatives I had never met. And it was so fun to get caught up with the Norris girls. We had some fun vacations with them as a family when we were young. After the party, we stopped by Bryn and Sue's in Portland and met their new little girl Beatrice. It is always good to see family. I am so grateful my grandma smith and grandma hester instilled the importance of family into all of us from the very beginning.

We headed back to the Bodily's for some awesome food! (Sounds funny to write "the bodily's" when it isn't my parents. Jason and Taylor are the only boys with the last name bodily in our family. And Jason is about to have his fourth, and final, girl. So the pressure is on for Taylor and Carly to have a boy so this branch of the family tree doesn't totally die!) We had halibut and salmon from the alaska trip. It was so good!

Courtney was so great to take pictures of Jackson in her studio that evening.

Here are some of my favorite. She is amazing.

Ben was awesome, as always, at home. He even taught my sunday school class for me and the house was clean when I got home. What a guy! It was a great trip and I am so glad I got to go. Thanks Mom!

Beach Boardwalk

We Won!!

We are over the moon excited about our winnings!! We won the "basket" (which is more like an entire table) of fruits and vegetables and goodies at the fremont farmers market today!
We loved the farmers market before, and now we love it even more! For anyone that hasn't been there, it is on the street between Taco Bell and the train station on fremont blvd, until 1pm every saturday. My girls love the "outing". They sometimes have a band playing. They have great kettle corn (which was also included in the winnings) and awesome cheesecake brownies- the girls get to split one brownie and eat it on the lawn and then snack on the great strawberries. But best of all, ALL of their produce is way cheaper than the grocery store, grown locally, pretty much all organic...and even better is that they have samples of all of it out on the tables. So my kids will try all kinds of different fruits and then we can buy what we like. I highly recommend it!
Check out all the great stuff! courtesy of ben's iphon and blogger app.





(Thanks Ben for making friends with Neil!)

Pictures

I have been really horrible about getting pictures of Livy and Jackson. But I am determined to be better about it. One night when Ben was gone last week, I was getting into bed and I started looking at all the framed pictures on my dresser. The ones of Livy are when she was 6 or 7 months old. I started really looking at her and trying to remember her at that age. And I felt like I couldn't. Thankfully I have a great friend, Donna. She is so amazing with my kids. (Again, one of the many benefits of coaching. Meeting awesome people.) When Livy was young, she watched Brooke and Livy a lot. Her and her girls watched them for 9 days when we went on a cruise. And she took lots of pictures of them. I am so thankful. Because that night when I felt like I couldn't really remember livy, I went to the family room and I pulled out two small albums that Donna had given me. They were all the pictures she had taken of my girls. I loved it.
But it also made me think about my ability to keep a "journal" or "baby book" of my kids. So I am more determined to get regular pictures-even if they aren't that great and put them in an album. It is not going to be a beautiful scrapbooked album. Just an album that I can slide an 8x10 into and put the date and age of my kids. That is something I can do.
So I started today. I went and got pictures at JCPenney (love the 3.99 coupons and free sitting fee). It was such an enjoyable experience compared to 10 months ago with just livy and jackson. Last time we went Livy cried the whole time and we didn't get one picture. Jackson (he was only 6 weeks old) as always was a champ, not crying, but no smiling either. This time the kids did great, for the first round of all three of them together. But, the photographer didn't get one good picture of all three of them...but I didn't care. At least I have an 8x10 to put in that album. Brooke and Jackson were awesome, but Livy wouldn't do any of her just by herself. But she has some pretty cute "cheesy" smiles when it was all three kids. I'm patting myself on the back for getting them all there. They all looked adorable. And I am not worrying about the fact that there isn't one of them all looking and smiling. (Instead I ordered one small picture of all three of them and I am going to put it together and write...this is real life. We rarely get all of them being good at the same time.)

Music to My Ears

Hallelujah! Jackson is really BABBLING. I know it doesn't sound like much, but i am really grateful that he has started making some sort of sounds besides rasberries and crying and a few mmmmms here and there. Deep down I always knew he would be fine, but sometimes i still worried. And he started crawling last week and stands on his own for about 10 seconds. Hooray!

Livy

Livy is getting REALLY, REALLY cute. We are starting to see a light at the end of the tunnel with her crying antics and lots of tantrums. They still happen, a lot, but not quite as frequent.

Some of my favorite sayings from her lately are-

"Mom, you ont to play mobbles wit me?" She asks at least 4 times an hour. And I am trying really hard to do it at least twice a day.

"Mom, yook at my iding pace." translation: Mom, look at my hiding place.

"I win."

"Book (and sometimes it is more like: Ook), yook at me. Yook at ME!"

"I want a tippy tup." (Sippy cup) And then she laughed at herself and said, "I talded it a tippy tup." (But she always calls it a tippy tup.)

She looks so, so, so adorable with her hair cut! It even makes her tantrums look even cuter. I'll have to post pictures sometime.

Chapters of our lives...

One of my most favorite chapters of my life has officially closed, at least for now. And its hard sometimes. Its nice sometimes. But mostly, its a little strange. Yesterday was the start of volleyball tryouts at Washington. It was SUPER nice not being stressed out about planning tryouts, scheduling the gym, finalizing tournament stuff, counting gear, fixing nets, finding babysitters, making sure i don't kill the girls in conditioning because most of them didn't work out very hard over the summer, dealing with parents, answering more questions, explainging rules to parents, trying to find a balance between kids that give excuses and kids that really have a valid excuse, finding more babysitters, kicking other kids out of the gym, locking up, giving punishments so kids will work hard, etc. And although it was a relief not stressing over those things and more, it is really hard to know that I won't be the one to help high school girls gain confidence by accomplishing HARD things (believe me, a lot of my practices are HARD.) It is hard that i won't be getting thank yous from parents telling me I helped change their girls life by showing them attention and kindness. Its hard to not be teaching girls volleyball skills and seeing such a amazing improvement over such a small amount of time.

It makes me sad to think about all the awesome relationships I have built from volleyball and all the great friends and people you interact with on a daily basis and to know that i won't have all those interactions anymore. And it is really hard to not be doing something you know you are really good at. Because, lets just face it, the title of mom doesn't get you a lot of accolades and certificates, or even thank yous most of the time. But, as hard as it is-I know this is the right thing for me. I really don't know how I could've done it. I definitely don't know how I did it last year.

And maybe i'll get to coach my girls or boy later on down the road. For now, I know that my kids and my husband need my time. Even if coaching volleyball is a really hard thing to give up.

Brooke's First Talk

Brooke gave her first talk in primary today. She was so cute up there. She insisted that she wanted her dad to help her. (Thankfully he got back from Alaska last night to help her). They asked her to speak about a Miracle Jesus performed while He was on the earth. So I asked her what her favorite miracle was that Jesus performed. She said very matter of factly, "When Jesus Parted the red sea for Moses and when He turned the water to blood." I was a little impressed adn a little bit shocked. Then I explained that we needed to talk about a story of Jesus when he was on the earth. She very quickly said, "My favorite story is about John the Baptist and Jesus." I probed her with a few questions about that, then I said lets think of some other stories of the miracles Jesus did while he lived on the earth. I got out the New Testament reader (it was great for her to see the pictures, too) and we went through all the stories of Jesus healing the sick, raising the dead, healing the blind, and many, many more. She picked out her favorite as Jesus feeding 5,000 with 5 loaves of bread and 2 fish. It was a great oppurtunity for us to get into the scriptures other than bedtime reading. And I was really impressed with all she knew about each story. I am truly grateful for awesome primary teachers and leaders that help teach my children the important role of our Savior, Jesus Christ.
This was her talk, or what she was going to say. A few times, when Ben would tell her what to say-she turned her head and would whisper to him, "I don't want to say that part." She is definitely a girl that knows what she wants.
Jesus performed many miracles while He was on the earth. One of my favorite stories of Jesus was when He fed 5,000 men with only 5 loaves of bread and 2 fish. This story is in Matthew 14. A lot of people followed Jesus out to a desert that was far away from houses and villages. Jesus healed many of the people that were sick that followed Him. He loved them and taught them. When it was time to eat, they did not have food. There was only a little bread and fish. Jesus looked to Heaven and blessed and broke the bread. Even after everyone ate, there was still 12 baskets of food left. This miracle shows us that Jesus can help us when we need him.

Outings

We went to shadow cliffs today. It was WONDERFUL! It was not crowded at all. The kids stayed in the water for four straight hours. I took Emma and Kora with us. Livy and Kora were like 2 peas in a pod building sand castles. I wish i had had a camera to capture how cute they were from playing in the sand together, sitting on their towel sharing food and holding each other's hand in the water. Markus, Zack, Brooke and Emma played in the water the ENTIRE time. (and brooke's face got sunburned for the first time this summer....it is really red. I feel so bad.) Jackson slept for a couple hours and was again the best baby even when he wasn't sleeping. And Kori and I just hung out and talked! The weather was awesome, not too hot, not too cold!! Man, I love days like that.

After we dropped off Emma and Kora at their homes I headed to the post office to send some packages I had been trying to send. I had actually been to the post office three days in a row to try to send them, but becasue of kid mishaps and cutting it too close to the time before it closed, i was unsuccessful. So i was determined to get them off today. And I did, but for the five minutes we were there the kids were crazy. hanging on doors. trying to open doors that were locked. crying about wanting to color on all the papers...man oh man, it was crazy. On my way out, this sweet black lady looks at me -as I was trying to cajole Livy from having to try and close the door that is closing automatically (slowly) with the handicap button that was pressed, calling to Brooke not to run across the street and then telling her not to tease her sister (after she comes back from the street and instantly starts tugging and teasing LIvy) all the while trying to hold this tank of a baby who is wiggling so much in my arms with a wallet and keys in the other hand- and she says, "Can you just imagine, my mom had four girls. Wow I don't know how she did it." I smiled and tried to chuckle. AH.

I don't know why I agreed, but brooke was begging to go to the library, so we headed over to the library. Now let me just preface, that I have kind of boy-cotted the main library for a while because I feel like my kids get so excited and run everywhere and it always seems that we have a mishap of somesort, and most of all-all the ladies that I have come into contact there are totally rude. So we always go to the niles library. Lyla is so nice, it is one room and they always help you with things. The downfall is that it is only open on tuesdays and today was wednesday.

As soon as we walked into the doors Brooke starts running and livy starts yelling after her that she wants to win and is crying about it. This is in the entry way of all stone and this curved/circular ceiling that echoes so bad! (If I was smart i would've grabbed the girls and headed out-but I want to promote reading... and the girls were excited about getting new DVDs). I try to jog after the livy and grab her hand and try to cover her mouth to get her to stop screaming and call after brooke to come back immediately. I have a little talk to them about absolutely NO RUNNING in the library. And then Livy needs to go to the bathroom. (and i was too lazy to get the stroller out of the car.great. holding jackson, while helping livy go to the bathroom. no wonder why my back is killing.) we finally finish in the bathroom, but only after brooke left the restroom and i had to leave livy yelling on the toilet to tell her to come back and after we had to dry our hands with every single air dryer.
We go through the doors to the front desk and livy finds a "hiding place" between the middle desk and the glass doors and insists that i come back to look at it (again stone floors and a 2 year old with a loud voice.) I finally give her the reassurance that it is a cool hiding place and start going again. We head to the childrens area down a long hall and of course the girls start running to the dvd collection. After 5 minutes of fighting over which 5 dvds they are taking home-I make an executive decision of which movies we will take home(which of course neither one is happy about). We get to the book area pick out a few books, of course with some fight that they both want 5 more books and both of them want to hold jackson at the same time and both of them want to carry the dvds....of course, never in a library voice.
We start back down the long hallway to check out, and of course livy starts running. Brooke is calling after her that we aren't supposed to run, but livy doesn't listen and goes past the check out desk and calling to brooke that she is going to win (they both are always wanting to be first to everything lately.) Brooke seizes the oppurtunity to really "win" and turns and starts to run out the "in" entrance. I am balancing jackson and 10 books trying to think of how to gets brookes attention to not go out the entrance with th e dvds in her hand we haven't checked out yet (all i need is the alarms going off) and get livy to come back from down the wrong hallway in the split second that Brooke slips. Hands go flailing, shoe goes flying, you hear dvds crashing. I am just cringing inside hoping Brooke isn't hurt too bad, but really hoping that she doesn't start her blood curdling, dramatic scream...I calmly set my books down on the counter go over and help brooke up (after a nice man has already started collecting all the dvds and a nice librarian (imagine that one) is trying to help her up.) I give her a hug and try to press her face into my stomach a little bit because she hasn't taken much of a breath from the crying and I am still on the cringing awaiting her scream. Thankfully the cry isn't too loud. I check to make sure she is okay, thank the man for the dvds, scan quickly for where Livy has gone and then not-so-nicely ask brooke what i told her at the very beginning of the trip into the library...NO RUNNING! We walk around the middle desk to where i left the books. Livy thankfully follows. And start checking out books. Brooke has stopped crying (thankfully she didn't get too hurt-becasue it looked pretty bad when she went down.), but now her and livy are arguing over who gets to put the books and dvds under the scanner and pushing each other to stand on the stool. And of course they are speaking in the soft library tones, right. :) And all the while jackson is just taking it all in, man he is a great kid-but my back is killing me and my arm is ready to fall off from how heavy he is by this point.
After a few times helping me with the check out process, I yip at livy and brooke to step back and let me finish. I am just wanting to get out of there so quickly. Well as soon as Livy stepped away from the desk, I wanted to retract that last statement. She starts calling to brooke to come to her hiding place she found on the way in and then gets distracted as she walks through the sensors by how cool they look , to her they are the perfect ladders and trys climbing up them. Ahh-again, I yip at her to get down. And immediately brooke sticks her arm out and hits Livy and says "you're it." ARE YOU KIDDING ME? and livy starts running. I yell at them to stop (at least this yell is a soft yell.) and try to quickly finish the check out process. And wouldn't you know it as I walk through those sensors balancing jackson on one hip, 10 books in the other and trying to put my library card back in my pocket...that dang alarm goes off. I have to tell brooke and livy to come back, because they have already RUN out the doors. The lady rescans them, quickly-thankfully. And we finally head out the door. And of course livy runs out the door and starts running the opposite direction.
We finally get to the car- and I give them the worst lecture about how we will never get to go back to the library again. Poor Brooke is almost in tears, I think she still was a little hurt from the fall, and needed a little extra love from me when I picked her up-but didn't get it and is now feeling bad about not following the rules (she is my rule follower) and of course livy is totally oblivious to the fact that I am ticked at her. Brooke sadly tells me that she wishes daddy were here and i answer back in a short-sarcastic voice, "Me, too." Livy asks for some snack and I snap back with a NO. And now we have a screamer in the car. Jackson, all the while is just chilin' (and breaking my back).
We get in the car and we are not even to the first stop light and Brooke is asleep. Now I feel really bad because I realize she is so exhausted. And Livy is still crying, but she can't remember why....

But I reminded myself that Shadow cliffs was a great day. The post office and library outings were only an hour of that day.

Teeth

Jackson's teeth finally broke through!!! HURRAY! All four on the top! I actually noticed it at the Zoo while I was changing his diaper. Poor thing has been a horrible sleeper ever since we started traveling July 1st. I kept trying to let him cry it out the last 5 days we have been home...but he wasn't having it. And my heart just melts when that little guy cries. And now i feel bad because i think it was his teeth bothering him. So here's to hoping that he will start sleeping better now!

We had a great day at the zoo! Brooke loved hanging out with Makenzie, Kora and Maddie and Lizzie. And livy loves to tag along with all the big kids.

I took the girls and jackson for frozen yogurt this afternoon for bribery. They had to be good at the post office, and they were. It was so fun to have a mommy date with all of them and not feel rushed anywhere. They laughed and made jackson laugh and made "creations" out of their cones and ice cream. We had the whole place to ourselves and just enjoyed it. It was a good day! Even with a few tantrums.

Hair Cuts or Hairs cut....whichever you prefer

All three of us girls got our hair cut today. It was about time. Mine was totally dead. It hadn't been cut for 18 months. Katie came to the house and it was great. Although i think she got a kick out of the chaos. It was one of those mornings...we'll put it lightly. Lots of crying, lots of whining and a little too much drama for any normal person.
Brooke cut off about 7 inches. It is just above her shoulders. She kept saying, "Mom, I want it just like Hazel's hair." I convinced her to go longer than Hazels, just because I wanted to be able to put it in a pony tail.
It was Livy's big day for her 1st hair cut. She wanted Brooke to go first. I could tell she was a little apprehensive, but I thought that by seeing Brooke love it so much would put her at ease. Well I definitely thought wrong. She screamed and cried and didn't want anything to do with it. She finally gave into the bribe of having a HUGE bottle lollipop (I actually stole it from brooke. It was the ONLY piece of candy we had...) and she had to sit on my lap the whole time. And even then she wasn't happy. So i didn't get any video of it (Ben has the regular camera in alaska, so i only have video). She looks soooo cute with her little "bob" and wispy bangs. And I love feeling like my hair is healthy!
And-it is so awesome to have someone come to the house and do all of us at once!