I never want to go back to Star Valley again

Dear Mom,

So I'm not going to rehash the whole experience for everyone else to read about because I'm too lazy. But mom after that whole ticket problem we spent the next two hours trying to fix the lights on the trailer and we couldn't get them to work so we ended up having to unload everything from the trailer put it on our car and we finally left. It doesn't sound like a huge ordeal but we were so done by the end of that night. We pulled into Rexburg at about 11 and we were sure happy to be home.

Little Jon has been talking about uncle Paco all day today which is weird because we never really talk about Paco so I don't know where he's picking this up from but it's pretty funny. All day long he's been asking to call Paco.

Nathaniel bruises like I imagine Hannah did. I mean really it's almost like if you look at him wrong he has a bruise. He's been falling down a lot recently and therefore getting very bruised. It's the worst on his forehead. He will hit something and immediately this gross purple bruise will pop up. They go away relatively quickly but man that first hour, he looks scary.

Bed Time

Dear Mom,

We had a little bit of a scary experience today. I was cleaning out the storage room and Little Jon came up behind me and tried to grab a jar of baby food. It was pretty high for him so it fell... On his face and then dropped to the ground and shattered. He got a pretty nice bruise on his face. The best part was cleaning up all the applesauce covered glass on the uneven ground that is our basement.

I did finish organizing our storage room so now our house has been completely spring cleaned! You can't go anywhere in my house and have it not be organized and me know where everything is! I'm pretty excited tomorrow I will clean out the fireplace and then I will really be done!

I am really struggling with bed time right now. Tonight after dinner and baths usually I would do the dishes and clean up the kitchen but tonight I thought I would play with the kids instead give them some good attention and then maybe bed time would go more smoothly. I knew that tonight was Jonathan's big night for finals and he would be up late so I needed to take care of bed time myself. We got home and I put Nathaniel down and then watched tv with Little Jon for a little bit to make sure Nathaniel was really asleep before I took Little Jon in. Little Jon seemed tired so I tried to take him to his bed but he was really mad, maybe that should've been my first sign. Maybe I should've kept him up a little longer but his nap was early so I figured he should be tired. I put him in bed and laid down with him however he started to throw off all of his pillows, spit in my face and hit me. He refused to stay laying down in his bed to so after everything I could think of (I mean this kid didn't even protest when I told him I was leaving, which is weird for him) I reluctantly went and asked Jonathan for help. I felt awful because I knew he was working on a huge final but I didn't know what else to do, nothing I was doing was going to work. Joanna went in and within 5 minutes had him in his room quiet, probably asleep. I feel like part oft eh problem is when Little Jon isn't listening I go get Jonathan which just teaches him that Jonathan is the final word but I don't know what else to do. Do I just spend an hour repeatedly putting him back in bed? I really wish I was better at this. It makes me really mad that I can't do the bedtime routine successfully. I wonder if because Jonathan is gone during the day whenever he is home and spending time with them, like end time, they want to optimize their time with them and not make him mad but because I am with them all day it's nothing special, I don't know. Any suggestions are welcome I feel totally lost. 

SLY

Proud

Dear Mom,

Today I'm very proud of myself. Today I cleaned the entire house all before dinner. The thing that's really impressive about this is that I cleaned the bathrooms today, and I didn't leave them until very last. 

I really enjoyed general conference. I know you haven't seen or heard it yet but I made a really important realization. I realized that my priorities are not in the right place. I need to be focusing more on my spirituality. There was a quote that said something to the effect of the only important things that need to happen in the home are prayer scripture study and weekly family home evening everything else can wait.  I also realized I need to make sure that I am studying my scriptures every day and that is more important than having a clean home, that is going to be something I'm really going to have to work on because I really like having a clean home. We still miss you like crazy and can't wait until we can talk to you again.

SLY

My Husband is like a Pregnancy Bloodhound

Dear Mom,

Did you know your first born son can detect a pregnant woman from a mile away at least? Seriously wether it's me, other women, characters on TV shows or whatever he always knows when someone is pregnant, it's almost freaky. He always knows I am pregnant before I do and not only that he always knows the genders of our babies!!!! I don't get it. He either has a dream or he just knows but he is ALWAYS right. Which kinda sucks for  him since he likes to be suprized about that kind of stuff. He knew we were havin a girl when we went into the ultrasound and he never told me. I even asked him do you have any inklings about the gender and he looked me in the eye and said no. That punk. Anyway I thought you would like to know these fun little talents your son has.

SLY

Sugar Spice and Everything Nice

Dear Mom,

We are so excited to be expecting a baby girl!  as you know I've wrestled back-and-forth trying to decide whether or not I wanted to figure out the gender of this baby. All the way until the ultrasound I was still was pretty undecided.  We went in and I said don't tell me anything and I'll see how I feel. As I watch the ultrasound we start to feel very confident that we were having a girl and I realized that if I left the ultrasound not knowing for sure, meaning expecting a girl and then we ended up having a boy that might be really hard for me. So at the very end I said I think it's a girl, is it? And the ultrasound tech smiled, looked at me and said yes. Jonathan of course already knew like he always does with our kids so whatever. And now all of our future kids and be suprizes and he will certainly like that. 

Injuries

Dear Mom,

Injuries have been abounding in our house recently. Nathaniel learned the unfortunate lesson that the oven is hot. I was pulling something out of the oven and I had the rack out and Nathaniel came up and wrapped his little fingers right around it. He definitely learned his lesson though because a couple days later he was walking towards me and I opened the oven and he turned and ran the other way.

I dropped a piece of one of my foot a couple days ago it really hurts.

Yesterday was a bad day. Little Jon is going through this phase where he really likes to push over his brother and hit him in the head with toys. The problem is that Nathaniel cries for just about anything so it's hard to know when he's really hurt and when he's just been touched. Little Jon bit him yesterday and in fact it drew blood but he bit him right on his burn so I think it just barely broke open some tender skin either way I felt really bad. Little Jon was acting up especially bad yesterday and I think it was because I didn't take time to play with him yesterday. I'm been trying really hard to make sure I take time out of every day to sit down and play with my kids because I feel like that's something I'm not very good at and it's very important. It also snowed here the last couple of days so Little Jon has not been able to go outside which also I think it had an impact on his mood. Hopefully things look up.

New Feel

So I am going to get back into blogging. My in laws just moved to the Philippines and so with the time difference and lack of phone time I have decided to use my blog to keep them updated. I am as close to my mother in law as I am to my own mother so this might get a little personal but whatever, it also just might be the mundane updates of my daily life. I also secretly hope that this turns into this super sweet record of my life.

Dear Mom,

I miss talking to you on the phone but I have to admit it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. It isn't until I hear your voice surfing those rare calls that I realize how much I miss you so I guess it's really good we don't talk often. I think this will be good for our family though. It will help us grow up a little and be a little more independent. Anyways enough of the mushy here is the update on us. 

JT is doing well but it's the week before finals so we are starting all the huge projects, thankfully though almost all of his classes are done so during the day he works in homework and then goes to work. 

I'm doing fine my sciatica must have been a strained muscle because other than the occasional discomfort it is mostly gone. I still cry when I watch... Well pretty much anything. We are watching the end of ice age right now and it's a good thing I am focusing on this or I would be a wreck. 

Little Jon just keeps growing and learning. He now loves to put his own socks on and take his clothes off. He also discovered a teddy bear that was actually a gift from one of sam's girlfriends and I took cause it was soft and I have kids anyway Little Jon loves it! He carries it around with him and he tucks it into bed, it's quite adorable

You can't tell but he is wearing a pair if JT's socks that he put on all by himself. Bed time is mostly a success I would say 80% of the time Little Jon stays in his big boy bed. The thing I don't get is how JT is so much better at it than I am. I will spend 30 minutes trying to put them in bed, will get frustrated and JT will come in and tell Little Jon one thing, put him back in bed and then he stays there. When the inverse happens it still takes me at least 10 minutes to get him to stay put. I wish I knew what was so different that he does, oh well.

We have all recovered from sickness, except Nathaniel he can't seem to kick it. I took him in to make sure it wasn't whooping cough or RSV. Good news is he doesn't have those but the doc said he thought he might have the starts of an ear infection. He have us an antibiotic which Nathaniel finished yesterday but he  doesn't seem to be getting better. He is super cranky and not sleeping well. Last night JT sent me to bed while he quickly cleaned up the basement and made sure the boys stayed asleep. Well both boys ended up waking up and JT finally got Little Jon asleep but Nathaniel was still antsy. He ended up spending the whole night rocking Nathaniel and neither one slept well. I woke up to JT bringing Nathaniel into our room and I said I would take him to which JT replied he won't go back to sleep its 620. I felt awful. Anyway hopefully he will sleep well tonight and that will help. 

Little Jon also has this cute new habit where he likes to push Nathaniel over, it's awesome. 

Anyway we love and miss you and we can't wait to see pictures of your new house!