::leap day::

Happy Leap Day!!!







We celebrated (inspiration here) with some froggy cupcakes, reading a little history on leap day, and writing down a few things about ourselves to put into a time capsule (most likely a shoebox) to open on the next leap day (in 2016), oh and also taking a little group photo to stick in there too. It was a little crazy to think of how old we will all be in 4 years. Avie will be 4 (almost 5!), Bubb will be 7, Port will be 9 (going on 10!), and Chloe will be 12. How crazy is that?? We won't even talk about how old Matt and I will be.

::Coopish::

Coopish is almost exactly like Portish, but with a few differences. It's SO funny! A lot of it he doesn't even say anymore because the big kids have corrected him, or he's corrected himself. But I thought I better get it down before I forget.

oil: "boil"

shelf: "shelth"
myself: "meself" then "myselth"

flip-flops: "fliplops"

use: "nuse"

computer: "greepeetuh"

iron: "ireen"

Chloe: "Kiss"

Baby Ava: "BeeAva" then "BeeBeeAva"

kitchen: "chicken"

belly button: "boodinah"

tootie: "toodilah"

four wheeler: "whidiloo"

chocolate milk: "hot chockameeo" then just "hot chocolate mile"

chocolate chips: "hot chocolate chips"

dinosaur: "dine-wih-suh"

Diego: "Digeigo"

Max and Ruby: "Woobymac"

Cheerios: "Chuh-yoes"
Cookie Monster: "kihkie wizzin"
marshmallows: "smahmullows"
fingers: "fuhguhns"
your: "zuh"
use: "nuse"
picture: "picki-chah"
Tahoe: "Hahoe"
iPod: called it the "tiny bit iPad"
Amberlee: "Amblee"
diapers: "da-buhs" then "die-puhs"
camera: "cramma"
pancakes: "pampakes"
Woody: "Woodity"
Mario: "Mahdio"
Luigi: "Leegie"

He calls his blue and brown blanket a "mummah."

He calls his little slip-on skimmers "big boy shoes."
He didn't (and on some words still doesn't) say his "r's", so those words end in "uh" sounds.

Some of this he said, some he still says. I hope I'll add to the list as he says new words. I love (LOVE) how he talks! It's so funny, and so then we all say things the same way he does. It makes me a little sad when he starts to say things the right way, or when the big kids correct him.

We love him. He's so much fun.

::it's all about love::

We had a fun valentine's day. The kids had their class parties and got lots of treats, and then they shared with Bubb when they got home (Bubb kinda likes candy). Then we stayed in. We cooked a heart-y dinner, exchanged valentines, and just had a lovely evening.

Our Valentine's Day in pictures...











xoxo.

::pay day::

So we made it through our first 2 weeks of our "jobs," all the way to pay day! And a happy day it was! The kids were so excited to get their money and go spend it (after their 10% to tithing, of course). We tried to explain to them that they'll get more money in another 2 weeks and they can get something bigger and better (like a Wii game or save for a 3DS or something), but it seemed to fall of deaf ears. It was burnin' a hole in their pockets already, and they'd only had it for a few minutes!
'


So here's our system...

Chloe and Port each have 10 jobs worth 10 cents each (so they can make $1/day.) If they do their job with a happy heart, they can double their money (20 cents) and possibly make $2 for they day and even possibly make $20 for the 2 weeks! Awesome, right? They really did pretty well. Bubb only has 5 jobs 'cause he's little. They didn't quite make the full $20, but they did pretty good :] Chloe bought some Poke'mon cards (it's some kind of "thing" with the kids in school) and had money left over. Port bought Mario Kart for the Wii (he had some left over Christmas money), and we split the cost with him since he wouldn't be the only one to play it :) , and he had some money left over. Bubb got a blue car that makes LOTS of noise and even drives by itself (he had some leftover Christmas money too), and had some money left over. We were big on them having money left over.

Glad to have 'em on the payroll.
:]

::lakers game::

Last Saturday, we, along with Jared and Sarah, took our tickets from Santa and went to the Lakers/Jazz game in Salt Lake.  First we went to Z-Tejas for dinner.  Oh!  It was goooood!  And there were TONS of Lakers fans in there, so that was kind of fun :]

 The game was not s'good.  The Lakers lost.  Matt and J made sure to zip up their jackets over their Lakers shirts after the loss.  That's alright, it was a fun night.  I hear their road record is turrible.  TURRIBLE!

(The only photo of the night.  Pre-game.  I was all ready to get a photo of Matt and I with the court down behind us, and realized the memory card was NOT in the camera!  My specialty.  So I was left with my phone, and one not very good picture.)

In other news...

What's new this week?  Not a whole lot with us.  We've all just been tickin' along.  The kids are good.  Parent/teacher conferences went great.  Chloe and Port are doing awesome.  Their teachers say they are super proud of them and think they're awesome.  We agree :]  Bubb gets to go to a preschool open house in a few weeks, and he's so excited about that.  He thinks it's awesome that he's going to go to preschool (I'm a little nervous about it).  And the teeny girl might be teething.  I'm not sure.  She doesn't have any teeth at all (they've all been late teethers), but she's been kind of clingy, a little warm, super drooly (which actually isn't abnormal for her), but she's been really tired and cries a lot.  I don't know, I guess she could be trying to get sick, but I think I felt a bump when I stuck my little finger in there for a quick second before she knew what I was doing.   I guess we'll see.

::sledding or bust::

Our Saturdays, sadly, are usually pretty boring.  They end up being lazy days filled with a little bit of Wii time, movies, coloring, you know, stuff like that.  Sometimes we go out to dinner, but not too often.  Last week I decided that we've had enough lazy Saturdays!  We needed to do something fun.  So I told the kids that next Saturday we would do something fun.  They wanted to know what, but I didn't know yet, so I just told them I didn't know, but something fun.  Sometime during the week, sledding was decided.

The weather was perfect!  The snow was not.

Since we have NO snow here in Perry, we thought Mantua (which is a higher elevation) would be a good bet for some sledding.  We went to the "sledding hill" up there, and it was a rock hard hill of chunks of ice.  Bad idea.  We tried it (with me on the back and the three kids on the front) and it.was.scary!  If any of us had fallen off, somebody would've gotten hurt!  The snow wasn't soft at all!  So then we told Matt he maybe oughtta pull us behind his 4 wheeler.  Well, all the fields up there were pretty much melted, and we weren't too sure about the terrain, so Grandma & Papa Snowman's backyard was where we ended up.  It was SO fun!  I rode with Chloe for a while, and Matt whipped us around the yard (he might have flung me off into the pine trees), and it was just plain fun.  The little boys were less excited about the ride.  Coop rathered to ride on the 4 wheeler with Dada, and Port liked Matt to pull him on the sled by hand.  And Ave just stayed inside with Grandma :)

It didn't go according to plan, but it was fun.




In other news...

The kids started their "jobs" this week.  Matt and I have talked on and off about doing that with them for a while (jobs and allowances).  I was never excited about it because I didn't want to feel like I couldn't do it (I know that sounds ridiculous-even as I'm typing it I realize that), I thought they were too little, and I didn't want them to have to pay for everything with their own money from then on like when I was little (when I started getting an allowance, I had to pay for everything I wanted with my own money-treats, friends birthday party presents, everything!  I just don't think that's fair or realistic.  Anyway, we came up with some age appropriate jobs, and....this week was the week.   So far it's working out pretty well.  Even Coop's makin' some money!  They're excited to get their work done (make their beds, clean up their dirty clothes, show good manners (Porter!), read, etc), and they LOVE that they can make money and even double their money.  They get paid double if they do their jobs with a happy heart and with nobody having to ask them to do it.  It's kind of fun to go over their charts with them at night before bed.  We put little stickers on them, and they get excited when we add up their money for the day.

Also...

We have parent/teacher conferences this week (today and tomorrow) for Chloe and Porter.  I love to go and hear all about how they're doing in school.  I don't love that I get to take all 4 littles with me by myself because my appointment times are before Matt gets home from work.  So that's where I'm off to in a few minutes.  Chloe's is today.  Hopefully the other kids (Bubb) are good.

One more thing...
I talked to my dad today.  We talked about different things, and he mentioned that he was going to Alaska in June with my Grandpa to go Salmon fishing.  That's one thing that comes to mind when I think of my grandpa-fishing.  I think it's precious that they're going on this trip-just the two of them.  I wish I could go to see him enjoy his trip (I have no interest in fishing of Alaska-other than Barrow, but that's a whole other story), but I'd just love to watch him fish and love it!  Dad said Grampa's always talked about going, and has never been.  He's going to be 80 this year, and he's finally going to Alaska to go fishing.  I love it.