WHAT!

Summer is almost over! How can that be? I remember worrying how I was going to manage it all. It hasn't been too bad at all. Now I am trying to figure out how to get all the stuff done for school already!
So what have we done this summer? Hmmm, I wish I could say that we have spent hours at the pool, but with Brynn and Cannen that is way out of the question! Those two wouldn't survive for 5 minutes! They are both way too fast, have no recognition of the word danger and go in opposite directions!! So we have been splashing around in the kiddie pool out back.
Ryan's mom got us a bouncer that has come in mighty handy on a hot humid afternoon. We just push all of the furniture out of the way and blow it up in the middle of the room. It's a great way to blow off some energy.
Aden is missing school and can't wait to go back.
Brynn is getting so big.
Cannen is starting to say all sorts of cute "I want to squish him" sort of stuff.
Ryan has been working hard and studying for the LSAT.
I have been working part time and just got called into the RS pres. as the 2nd counselor again--I guess I didn't get it right the first time!
Other that that things are same old around here. I am ready for some sort of change.... Do you ever get bored with life? Not that I am unhappy or discontent, just ready for some thing exciting to happen....

Milestones

Today was Aden's big day! He is officially out of Kindergarten and now on to what he calls the "big kid stuff." I took him to a book store on Saturday to get ready for some summer reading. he informed me that picture books are not cool anymore. It is all about chapter books now. He picked out a Scooby Doo to start with and we will go back ever week for a new one.

As for the graduation ceremony-Aden was pretty stoic through the whole thing. Not sure what that kid is thinking we didn't get any pictures of him smiling until the end when he had his certificate and I forced him to smile. He can be pretty serious. He walked across the stage with his hand in his pocket. I guess he is practicing for a GQ shoot. He was very handsome and we sure do love this little big guy. Here are some pic to mark the day.
P.S. I think that was the only time I have ever seen a pledge to a state before!--After the pledge of allegience, the kids then said a pledge to the Texas state flag. These Texans sure are full of pride!

Memorial Day

Here I am a few days late as usual. We took our annual totally unplanned trip to the beach on Memorial Day. The kids had fun,fun fun! I am glad we took Grandma and Aunt Kristin because there is no way we could have kept Brynn and Cannen together! They were all over the place.

This kid is forever running everywhere. Always in a hurry!

He is not shy. He is "borrowing" another family's diggin tools.
Of course he was not interested in the bucket full of sand toys I brought!

Who needs a spa? Aden had is very own mud bath here on the beach. Brynn is such a water baby. I don't think she got out of the water for 2 whole hours.

I had to force her out to get out kicking and screaming.

This is our after beach barbecue at grandmas. Cannen threw all of his food all over the table. Then he happened to look at my plate and noticed something extra tasty! Who wants a burger when you can have a T-bone? Love the sly look on is face---I see at all the time. He thinks he is pretty sneaky...



Enjoying the spoils! We sure love our cute kiddos! Hope everyone else had a great holiday and is all geared up for summer fun!!!!!!!!!

Giveaways!!

My friend is fabulously talented and is doing some giveaways on her blog....
www.theivanovskys.blogspot.com

SK8 or Die!

So Ryan and I had a date night last Friday. You know the typical go to dinner sort of thing. Afterwards we were wanting to do something a little different and the night was still young, so Ryan suggested roller skating. What! Any of you that know me very well-know that I am what I call a "heavy footed person". I am not a good dancer, ice skater etc. Anything requiring grace or fancy footwork looks and feels awkward to me. I'm not too swift on my feet and putting wheels under them-not such a good idea. I was never any good at it when I was a kid. Ryan on the other hand is pretty much opposite of me. He is a great dancer and used to rollerblade all over the place. He has been asking me to go for awhile now to Sk8town. I agreed. Lets just say we wasted 14 bucks and had a good laugh as did the rest of the speeding skaters. I am pretty sure that any moving I did was with my hands clenched to the 1976 shag carpet walls. Anytime I let go, my legs ended up "splitting". Too bad we didn't have a camera-you could have had a good laugh.

3-D

Aden got to go and see Monsters Vs. Aliens in 3-D with his aunt Kristin. He had a great time and we had fun playing with his 3-D glasses. They are pretty cool . I was expecting the good old red/blue glasses, if that gives you any idea of how long it has been since I have seen anything in 3-D!!!! Peace out.

Man am I a lazy blogger or what. Honestly, I forget I even have a blog most days, even though I check everyone else out all the time. I just told an old friend about my blog on Facebook and realized I hadn't written anything for some time now. Writing seems like too much brain work by the time I get around to it (kids in bed, house clean, etc.). My brain seems to have been shrinking lately. I have to admit I have been having some deep thoughts though. I should do better at putting them down, since I forget so quickly.- I would tell them to you now, but I've already forgoten... That will be my new goal.
Nothing really new around here. Ryan has been working like crazy and is headed to Mexico next week. I have been teasing him about finding a Latina and setting up house on the beach somewhere. I just hope the trip is without event. He has been to South America 2 times. Once with me once with work and both times ended up in a sticky situation that had to be resolved with a little $$$ if ya know what I mean.
Aden is loving school and doing great. He is a wiz with his spelling, often getting 108% (they have bonus words and a sentence).
Brynn is making progress. I think that Cannen is giving her a little motivation at home. She is very jealous and since they are on the same development level in a lot of areas, she is becoming competitive. Poor Cannen also becomes her punching bag! I'm thinking he is either going to grow as the most patient sweet guy or have a huge chip on his shoulders!
I am trying to get back to running more regularly and fiddling with the idea of trying a triathlon. They are very popular here.

Update

Results for Angelmans Syndrome=negative.
Still looking for some answers....

LOVE

A little late, but it's still love! Here are some Valentine's hugs and kisses from our house....

Ryan's mom surprised us with balloons, treats and a yummy fruit pizza, which I am sure I ate the majority of! Hope you all had a good one.

WHAT THEN?????

So I called the Dr. to see if Brynn's test result for Retts came back . After the girl helping me put me on hold for 5 min three different times, I started to think, Oh it must have come back positive and she doesn't know how to tell me. I wanted to say, "look- this isn't a surprise to us or anything so just spit it out already." So you can imagine the confusion as she said, there seems to be no abnormality present based on the test result. -Hugh????!!! So here I am thinking that finally we were going to get answers, you know have a tangible real live name for what Brynn has. Nope back to square one. Her aid at school suggested Angelmans Syndrome. So of course I spent hours reading about it. And of course she seems to fit the criteria pretty darn well. That is the frustration-so many symptoms over lap for all of these conditions. I just called the Dr. and asked the nurse to ask the Dr. to order the test so we can have it done before her next appointment in March. I figure why bother going if there just going to tell me what the girl on the phone just did. These appointments and tests aren't cheap ya know!
So I'll keep you posted. We already feel like she is a little angel, so maybe it is Angelmans syndrome :)

Good Times

We have a streaker at our house. This little kido loves to be in the buff. He is so quick too. I get him all undressed in the morning and he is off before I can get a clean diaper on him. He seems to think he is unreachable on the top of this slide. It is the first place he runs to when he is trying to get away from me!

All smiles! More smiles! We had blood drawn last week to test Brynn for Retts Syndrome. It takes 6-8 weeks for results. We learned the waiting game a long time ago, so it doesn't seem like that long. I had a friend that was totally shocked when I told her we had to wait 6 weeks to get Bryn into a neurologist. I told her I was happy to get her in that quick. When I first called her geneticist, they told me it was one year wait and to just let them call me! I can handle 6-8 weeks!

I was so happy we found this robot. Or should I say Santa found this robot. Apparently it was on Aden's list but we didn't find out about it until the week of Christmas. He had made a list in his class and was telling me he was worried Santa wouldn't get it. I had no idea he ever wanted a robot. I am sure if he did not get one, he would have figured the whole Santa thing out. I already had to tell him there is no tooth fairy. After he lost his first tooth, he was freaking out because he didn't want the tooth fairy ( a strange man with a beard, according to him) to come into his room in the middle of the night and he refused to go to bed. I am sure I could of come up with a creative way around the truth, but I must have been too tired at the time, so I just told him it was me to get him to be already! I was surprised after that he didn't suspect anything with Santa.

Cute boy. He had a fun morning!

Ryan took most of Christmas a New Years week's off. It was nice to have him home. It really helped out tremendously. I am not sure how I will manage this summer with all the kids home all day. It is quite the feat with Brynn and Cannen. They have such a love/hate relationship. I am sure we will be at the YMCA lots!!!

LOTS OF PICTURES!

OK so these are in reverse order of occurrence. This is Cannens 1st B-Day. We were flying in on his actual birthday, so we celebrated on Sunday afternoon. He was a fan of the chocolate cake. He paid no attention to our laughing at him. He was in his own chocolate reality!

He knew exactly what to do when it came to the presents! Christmas should be fun.

Aden with his cousins at the cabin in UT. He was sad to say goodbye. They had so much fun and played so good together. Much better than when he was a toddler and bit the same cousin about 20 times when we visited 4 or so years ago!!!

It actually snowed while we were there. Aden said a prayer for snow at dinner time and a few hours later it snowed. Unfortunately. I didn't get any pics of him playing in it. My mom was giggling as she told me how Aden exclaimed he was going to make his first snow angel. Then he laid down in the sand box and started flapping his arms. What a funny head!

Thanksgiving at the cabin. I was pretty busy taking care of the little ones, so this is the only picture I got of the whole event. It was fun and yummy. You know all that good stuff.

Our visit to temple square. Nothing says nativity like a spiderman pose, don't ya think!

Up on the observation deck of the Church Office Bldg. Ryan kept freaking out when the kids would run to the window. It is a little weird being up that high.

Strike a pose Brynn.

Ahhhhh

BYU vs UTAH with the Mendenhalls
They were red, we were blue.


THE END

WHY IS THAT?

So we are leaving for our trip to UT tomorrow. SO it goes without saying, I have lots to do. So Why do Brynn and Cannen pick today to refuse naps?????
They are both sitting in thier cribs yapping away. I have too much to catch up on before we go. You know the drill. I want all of the laundry and bedding clean before we go, all the bathrooms scrubbed, the fridge cleaned out, because who wants to come home to a mess. Then the packing-clothes, gifts, airplane bags with busy stuff for the kids. It is crazy and near impossible to get anything at all done with Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum pulling everything out right behind me. So wish me luck. We'll be gone for a week. Can't wait. Aden woke up at 5:oo this morning because he thought we were leaving today. He is so excited to go to my parents cabin. I asked why and he said because there are guns (b.b.) and video games and fire. Sounds like a 6 year olds dream come true. I'll take some pictures, so you can get a feel for what it is like. The cabin is huge, but gets pretty crowded when you put 60 or so people in it!!!!
p.s. Burnside's, what happend to your blog??

Happy B-Day Brynn E.

She is now 4! Is it just me or does time go faster and faster the more kids you have ands the older they get? This last year seems to have gone the fastest for sure! Brynn has made some great progress. We are so excited for accomplishments. Her teacher informed me that she can now open the door to leave the classroom by herself. While we are all so proud of her for this, I know the teachers are going to have fun keeping her distracted and in the classroom! She has her first field trip with the school next week to Old McDonald's farm. I am anxious to see how she does. I have no doubt she will have tons of fun as she LOVES to be outside. I just know she will be all over the place.

We are getting excited to go the UT for Thanksgiving. Aden is hoping for snow once again. I hope it works out for him, seeing as we only get to visit every other year or so.

Cannen is battling a touch on pneumonia right now. Poor kido has to do albuterol with a nebulizer and he hates it. He fight and fights until he realizes he doesn't have a choice and then he just sits there and hums while I song him primary songs. I can't believe he'll be one next month!

Brynn had fun "blowing" out her candles. We practiced and she almost got it, but then decided she was going to lick the wick instead, so I hurried and blew it out for her. We had pumpkin cobbler--yummy!

Hope everyone has fun and stays safe on Halloween! Over and out.

Pics

Ahhh. They really do love each other!

Entertaining ourselves without electricity. I remember doing these little "shows" when I was a kid. Aden thought it was so funny. Mostly he just giggled.

Aden's hurricane Party. He turned 6 on the 17th . We still didn't have power. Luckily Ryan scored some blue crisco covered cupcakes at the grocery store. Yum-can't be too picky when the pickins are slim, right? We also found a Burger King open 15 miles or so away. It wasn't the Chuck E Cheese party we were planning, but it turned out OK and he didn't seem the least bit disappointed. He is such a fun, sweet kido.

Just a taste of what was going on here. This Ryan's moms house. The pictures don't really give you the full effect. You have to multiply what you are seeing to every house in almost every neighborhood. It was a mess. Things are still not completely cleaned up.

These guys had 2 trees inside there house.

Once again. This is the only time we have been happy that all the trees were taken down to build our neighborhood.

All in all we are doing great. We are getting excited for our upcoming trip to UT for Thanksgiving. It will be here before ya know it. Nothing else too exciting going down.

Sweet Silence

Silence for the first time in 2 weeks. No humming of generators permeating the neighborhood. Just quiet. Love it. We have power as of 2:00 this afternoon. We are enjoying the A/C! I have some pics of some of the destruction here. Ryan's mom's street looked liked a war zone and is still far from being back to normal. We never thought we would be happy that we did not have trees. We live in a new neighborhood where the builder just happened to wipe out the forest and for that we are grateful, just this once. I think trees were the main weapon of destruction in our area. Trees everywhere. Across the street, in houses, ripping up entire yards. These are huge trees. 100 footers. I'll post pictures ASAP. Right now we are enjoying the quiet. Thanks for the good thoughts!

Our Status

As a quick note, we're are ok after the storm. There has been, however, quite a bit of destruction in our area and it will be sometime before things are cleaned up. Our biggest issue is not having electricity, thank goodness for wireless connections!! Anyhow, we look forward to things getting back to normal.

THE END OF THE WORLD!

Or so it would seem at Walmart this morning. I went to pick up diapers and encountered the chaos that is ensuing. It was the same three years ago with Rita. People running around with carts full of water and Progresso Soup. Thank goodness for food storage! I have to admit the feeling of mass panic is a bit contagious though. I grabbed a case of the very quickly disappearing water as well.
There are a bunch of counties issuing mandatory evacuations. We are not in that category. We are inland enough that our major concerns are winds. We are expected to get 75-100 mph winds in our area. There is also the worry of flooding if the storm "rests" too long in our area dumping rain. Our power lines are underground so we are hoping power outage for us will be minimal. Anyways we are ready to leave if we have to. The 72 hours kits will be in the car ready to roll.
We evacuated for the last storm that was projected to come our way (Rita). But only because we got a call from our High Priest group leader telling us that the Stake President wanted anyone who could leave to go. It was crazy on the roads. I think it was a "practice round". And sent the message to be prepared to all of us!
Hope everyone else is experiencing some nice weather in their own neck of the woods. I heard is was nice and cool in UT. Lucky ducks.

Pics

Aden meeting his classmates

Brynn back to class.

Cannen at the Aqaurium. Love the chubby cheek smiles!

My two monkeys at the Aquarium.

A rare pic to have them both smiling while in the stroller. Typically one of them is pulling on the others hair or scratching faces!

Big Day

Today was the first day of school!!! I know that I haven't been the best of mommies when it comes to blogging important events, but I didn't want to miss this one. Even thought it is way past my bed time and my eyes are getting heavy I had to mark the day we sent our big boy out into the world. We have pics but our computer has been on the fritz, so I'll get them on here as soon as I can.
So Aden loved, loved. loved school. I was so relieved seeing as this was our conversation last week:
A: "where are we going on Monday?" (a game he plays he'll ask me for plans for a week at a time)
Me: "Your going to school!"
A: "What about the next day?"
Me: "Your going to school again!!"
A: looking worried " And the next day?"
Me: heehee "To school!"
A: " I don't want to go every day!"
Me: "Don't worry you only have like 20 or more years to go my son."

So I was happy to hear that he actually wants to go everyday now. I asked if his teacher was nice and he said no,she is really cool.

Brynn has a new teacher this year too. I was happy that she walked right in and let the teacher help her and everything. She is usually so nervous and cries when things are not in her routine.

Off to bed for momma. The bus comes at 7:05 for Brynn!