Joy

We watched the Anderson kids the other night. Ruth got to practice her big sister hold. Both of the kids LOVE Hazel.

We've truly been very happy recently. There has been lots of laughter and happiness. I think a lot of that has to do with being a lot better at living the gospel. We love doing family home evening, prayers have become very important when we're sad, and I don't know HOW I would have explained death to Ruth without the knowledge of the resurrection. (This was one of the most touching mommy moments I have had to date.)

The other day Ruth was very concerned about death. So I explained that we'll all get to live together again, and that we'll be resurrected which means your spirit will be reunited with your body. She was SO relieved to know she wouldn't have to leave mommy and daddy. And was thrilled to realize that we would ALL (yes, including Aunt Tia) live with Heavenly Father if we made good choices. I really don't know I went from being totally overwhelmed with her as a newborn to answering profound gospel questions, when did she grow up?

In lighter subjects, we had a blast at Hop-2-It this week. Will surprised me at how much he has developed since we went last time. He's a regular climber just like Ruth. His language also continues to explode, he's working on more and more 2 word sentences. I'm so proud!

We've been looking for a dog for over a month. We've been visiting the animal shelter several times every week looking for the perfect pooch. We ended up going to a breeder in Boise to get our beautiful La Fille au Cheveau du'La (The Girl with the Flaxen Hair...a Debussy song). She's a 3 month old Golden Retriever, who we call La Fille. She's ADORABLE. And I mostly get all the positives and none of the negatives of owning a puppy since she's Brad's! Brad takes her out to pee, feeds her, walks her, takes her to work, etc. She's the perfect puppy too. She lays around when we're relaxing and is excited to play when we go out back. The timing this time around is impeccable, we're all happy to have her around, and not stressed out like we were with the first dog two years ago.

Mostly Brad

I love my hubby so much. And I am so grateful for his amazing talents. He plays the piano wonderfully and is getting better everyday. It's wonderful to have our home filled with beautiful music, not to mention that the kids love dancing to it.

This week I am especially grateful for his Mr. Fix-it talents. When we were first married I was VERY skeptical of these skills. When he offered to fix his dad's truck the first summer we were married I almost scoffed. The repair was suppose to cost over $700. Brad did it with random stuff he found in his grandpa Nelson's shed (we lived in their house that summer while they were in Oregon on a mission). I was pretty impressed. But I digress. I am now usually unimpressed when Brad fixes things, because in the end I know that he'll be able to do it. (Which has come in extremely handy since buying our house.)

This week he fixed the suburban. The light that showed which gear you were switching into and showed your mileage went out...like more than a month ago. Everywhere Brad looked it was going to cost at least $200 to get that fixed. So what did Brad do? He pulled the console behind the steering wheel out, took it to a mechanic/doo-hicky store, found the pieces he needed to re-solder, and fixed our car for $1.25! It's pretty ridiculous how just being willing to try, along with a natural talent for fixing stuff and having the internet to do research, can save you TONS of money.

In other news we've decided that Ruth is going to be an artist and gymnast, Will is going to be a baseball pitcher and drummer, and #3 is going to be a Tae Bo instructor/Kung Fu master. I have been feeling very run-down/tired again. I had about 3 weeks of feeling energetic and good this pregnancy, but it has also been the most mild as far as other symptoms go so I try not to complain. Luckily it's getting warm-ish already and the kids play great, so I can just sit and avoid doing dishes when I need to! Oh, and heart-burn is back.

Mostly Me

I've entered the 3rd trimester! I can't believe how fast the second flew by. And with the 3rd trimester came my craving for sandwiches stuffed with tons of veggies. (With Will I couldn't get enough sprouts on a sandwich.) Tonight we had BLT's and the whole time I was eating mine I was thinking, "Why did I put bacon on this?" I've also been downing PB&J's like none other.

Speaking of sandwiches stuffed with veggies, yesterday I made homemade pitas to go with our gyro sandwiches. Oh yum. Fresh pockety bread stuffed with roasted red pepper hummus, tomato, lettuce, cucumber, grilled red onion and feta. Again while I was eating I was thinking, "Why did I put this gyro meat on here?" I just ate another pita as a pre-bedtime snack minus the meat, SO good.

And in other baking news I also made a strawberry rhubarb pie, all from scratch! Ha! I was nervous about the crust but it tasted good. Brad is a serious pie man, so it's fun to finally be comfortable enough in the baking world to make stuff he actually likes...because no, he doesn't like cookies or cake.

Sunday was GORGEOUS and 60 degrees so we went on a walk through the park. Picture thanks to Ruth:

While out there we saw two owls sitting in a tree, it was very cool.

And here are some of the crafts Ruth has been working on these days. She loves to get her craft on!

And in Will news: we've been looking at drawings of what baby sister looks like in the womb that shows the woman's belly too. So last night Will pointed to my belly and said "baby!" Then he lifted my shirt and was digging around trying to find baby, it was pretty funny.

Now what

On Sunday Ruth was chosen to pick a song to sing in primary. The chorister said, 'What is your favorite song?' Ruth answered, 'Um, I think probably Star Wars!' I have no idea where she got that idea from. She settled for 'Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam.'

In other Sunday approved activities, Will has gotten good at praying and sings the last word of phrases in the songs he knows. Very cute.

Pregnancy Blunders and Will

I've had two cooking blunders this pregnancy. The first ended in lots of tears. The second just made me laugh:

Several weeks ago I decided to make chicken and rice, the easy kind you just pour rice in the baking dish, covered in cream-of-chicken and topped with frozen chicken and then popped in the oven for a couple hours. EASY-PEASY. Except I put the chicken directly on top of the rice and THEN poured the cream-of-chicken on top. When my timer went off I was so happy that dinner was easy and ready. I went to dish up and realized all of the BROWN rice under the chicken (which was most of it) was nearly raw still and just started bawling. Luckily it was inexpensive and I later used the cooked chicken in really yummy pad thai.

This morning I was making French toast for breakfast-the kids' favorite breakfast. I wasn't paying much attention when I was grabbing spice out of the cupboard to add to the eggs. I realized my blunder once the first piece was cooking and suddenly the kitchen smelled like CUMIN! Ugh. Pregnancy + 8am + cumin = nauseous! I started over and this time made sure I used cinnamon in the eggs. Oh, and it was delicious.

I've realized recently that I haven't been very good at being excited about Will's milestones. Mostly because I'm not shocked by what he can do. With Ruth everything was amazing because I'd never experienced a child's growth and progress. But with Will I know what to expect and have thus been less enthusiastic...and feel bad. So here is some more stuff about Will that we love:

I love that he says, "so-so" for sorry.

I love the way he jumps around and grunts, he's so boyish.

His pouty face makes me laugh.

I love that he and Ruth are different. I have been a little confused because I've been trying to discipline and interact with him the same way I have with Ruth and he doesn't respond the same way. Then I realized it's great, he's his own person! I love that he takes his time when eating treats...he'll seriously take ten minutes to savor 5 fruit snacks.

I love how loving he is; he loves to give kisses.

I love that he loves his sister, he wants to be just like her. Some of the most recent thing he's picked up from her include pretending to be a cat, and saying "1, 2, 3" and naming any letter he sees as "E." Also he calls most colors either blue or green.

He is also amazing at throwing. I told Brad that he'd been throwing everything within sight and Brad said we should just tell him he's not allowed to throw things anymore. The next day Will threw a ball from across the room to Brad. Brad then changed his mind about not allowing throwing because he doesn't want to jeopardize Will's amazing pitching career.

I love that instead of saying "YEE-ha!" like a cowboy he says "hee-HA" like a donkey.

In Ruth news, she saw Sesame Street for the first time today. She has renamed everyone in the family: Brad is Grover, I am Big Bird, Ruth is Cookie Monster, Will is Count Dracula and baby sister is Sesame Street! She's actually called us these names all afternoon, we'll see how long this lasts.

Shadows and Baby Names

I asked Will what we should call baby Sister. He looked at me for a minute then put his hand up to his ear and said, "HI BABY!" like he was calling her on the phone. Made me laugh!

Our new ritual before bed is shadow dancing. Brad moves the arm chair out of the way, then turns the flash light or strobe light (on his phone) on and the kids have a blast dancing and watching their shadows walk across the wall and ceiling.

As of Today

Will found his pockets and is now strutting around like cool guy Jones.

Nesting

I have already had a few nesting spurts. The first one hit me as an organization bug just a few days after we found out baby 3 was a girl. I cleaned out all of our closets, reorganized the kids upcoming summer clothes, and gathered/sorted all of Ruth's old clothes for sister.

The second attack happened a few weeks ago when I got Brad to relocate our basement bedroom up to the main floor, buy new bedding, a dresser and a matching ceiling fan.

Ruth's new favorite game is to create a nest out of all the blankets and pillows from all over the house.

Valentines Day

This is the best Valentine's Day I can remember (except maybe for the one where my dad made a scavenger hunt through the house and at the end we all found Ande's mints, that was fun!).

We started the day with heart shaped (homemade) cinnamon pancakes with heart shaped strawberries and syrup YUUUUM. Ruth and Will were both great helpers getting breakfast on the table and gobbled up their food. This was a special breakfast for two reasons: 1) We never have pancakes, Ruth has had them maybe once (mostly because Brad doesn't really like them). 2) This was the first time we have celebrated a "holiday" with seasonal breakfast (this is the first time Ruth was really aware of the holiday).

In celebration of Valentine's Day we had a family home evening last night about the Savior's love. The kids really liked the activity; they took turns picking puzzle pieces that had scriptures or primary songs about love that then uncovered a picture about Jesus. We asked Ruth how she could show her love to her brother and she said, "By watching shows with him!" So maybe the lesson didn't really sink in, but it was fun and we ended the night with Baskin Robbins.

Recently and Pictures We Missed

Recently, people have been telling me that Ruth has such a huge, fun personality and that she makes them laugh. She has been very interested in dinosaurs ever since visiting Ben over Christmas. She has learned all of the alphabet, upper and lower case letters. We're working on tracing, writing her name, numbers and reading.

Recently, Will has been making tons of messes and jibbering up a storm. These days he LOVES bath time, has perfected his pouty face, and is very interested in dinosaurs and monsters! He knows lots of words, his favorites are "again, please, monsters, and butt (belly button)." He is learning patience, what it means to clean up toys properly and loves trying to count along with Ruth when she's counting.

Both kids are very excited for baby sister to arrive. Names Ruth has come up for sister include, Mario, Luigi, Fancy Nancy, Daisy and Jane.

Brad continues to work at the Days Inn, and we are all looking forward to the Days Inn conference at the beginning of April in Las Vegas. Brad's Hotel will receive a Chairman's award for quality and performance. We're staying at the Luxor so Ruth is constantly talking about the triangle hotel. I'm excited for the warm weather, spending time in the pool and taking kids to the children's museum there. We're also definitely looking forward to the yummy food that is there.

I am doing pretty well. Nausea has subsided. Heartburn has arrived. And the emotional roller-coaster has recommenced. The last week has been rough emotionally, I either cry or scream about everything so that's been fun for my family!

Eating snow with Grandma Paula

Playing in flour

Dad's picture on the merry-go-round during Christmas

lights in the south hills, and yeah there was a camel!

Will enjoying the new ride

Christmas Update

Fixing Grandpa's train, what good lookin' guys!

We decided pretty last minute that we would head to Santa Fe for Christmas this year. Tia called and invited/guilt tripped (haha) us into coming and staying with them - it was SO much fun! The drive down wasn't even bad. It took like 9 hours the first day, a stop in Cortez for the night and then another 6 hours through the snow to Santa Fe. But the reason this 15 hour trip was not miserable with a toddler, pre-schooler and pregnant woman is because 1) we had movies the whole way there and 2) we had elbow room in our new, used suburban.

This was such a pleasant vacation and we got to see the whole Laws family minus the Nevins' (they all got sick on their attempt to get to Santa Fe, SAD!) Ruth had a blast playing with her big girl cousins. Will had a blast playing with all the boy toys like trains and dinosaurs. We all had fun eating out (especially at Los Amigos, seriously the best steak enchiladas EVER), going to movies, shopping, and playing at the children'

s museum. I didn't get pictures of everyone, but here are a bunch of my kids and some of their cousins in random activities throughout the week:

Will and Declan on the way to the park

The girls, minus Lydia, after the children's museum face painting

Dress up at the children's museum

Carosel ride for all, thanks Grandpa!

Playing in the wonderful snow (it finally started snowing TODAY in Twin)

Because we were gone for Christmas, we received packages once we got home (thanks everybody). But because of that Ruth thought that Christmas was going to last forever. Here is her last present opening:

Baby #3

It's a GIRL! Ruth is very excited and wants to name her baby sister Mario.

I was unsure all along about whether this was a boy or a girl because this pregnancy felt different than with Ruth or Will. I decided in the past few weeks that I thought it was a girl. That's mostly because Ruth was dying for a sister and every time I asked Will if he was getting a brother he'd say no. We're all very excited. Now the name game begins!

Today

Today Ruth told me she wanted to dress up like the temple for Halloween.
When I told Ruth we were going to have Fanta with lunch she said, Fanta! Fanta is like Santa!

SLC trip and Funnies

Brad had his annual budget meeting in SLC a week ago. Highlights from this trip include: going to Ruth's diner (amazing steak special), seeing the lights at temple square, the Christmas show we went to with Brad's company (super fun and funny) (thanks Kelsey for making that possible for us), and visiting with my old roomie Meg. Ruth seriously fell in love with Meg and is still talking about how fun it was to see her at Ikea.

Ruth likes to watch Dora, who often says, "Come one, vamanos!" So Ruth now runs around saying, "Come on, dominoes!"

We just bought a used suburban (which we love) and Ruth 1) called it a limosine when we first showed it to her and 2) now says whenever we drive around in it, "Mom, our suburban is totally freakin' awesome!"

My Kids, All 3 of Them

Ruth and Will have been playing SO well together, it has been making this pregnancy much easier for me. Today I built them this fort to play in. They climbed in there and I could hear Ruth expounding the mysteries of toddler-dom to Will. They she paused and said, "Ya know buddy, I really love you." Best mommy moment in a while.

Another great mommy moment was about a week ago. Ruth was saying bedtime prayers and said, "Please bless the new baby that won't be here for a long time."

Speaking of the "new baby," it's due date is May 31st, which will officially give us a spring holiday season with Brad and Will's birthdays, along with our anniversary. Baby 3 (or XI as Tia is calling it, since it will be Paula and Asa's eleventh grandchild) is now 15 weeks along and other than all day nausea without puking, has been the easiest pregnancy. XI has definitely had the largest impact on my taste buds, everything tastes weird. Cravings that have come and gone include tuna, bologna (which is very normal for my pregnancies), anything carbonated and eggs. For a couple weeks I was eating about 3 eggs a day and not a whole lot else because of nausea. The past few days I've woken up and felt great so I'm hoping that the whole morning sickness thing is gone with the first trimester.

Last week we had a check up day. Ruth is in the 25% for height and weight and Will is in the 75% for height...which explains why everywhere we go people are asking if they are twins! The doctor said Ruth is clearly very intelligent, based on her use of language. Apparently 3 year olds are only expected to speak in 3 and 4 word sentences and know ONE color. If that's the case we are definitely excelling in that area. She has fallen in love with coloring and is quickly learning the alphabet and their sounds. Will is also working hard on language development. Everyday he tries out new words, but right now my favorite thing he says is "Roosh" (Ruth). He clearly adores his sister and loves being involved in everything she does. He has also started to love reading and we'll sit and read book after book. He's also very affectionate, but be careful. If you ask for a hug he's gonna give you a kiss on the lips!

I love my kiddos and can't wait to have XI here to love too. We find out if XI is a boy or a girl on January 17th, I'll be 21 weeks then so we should know for sure!