April 2009: Owen, Butterflies, and Lorikeets

If you ever want to be grateful for the children God has sent you, be a chaperone on a 1st grade field trip ... seriously! Although Owen did have his moments at the Wild Animal Park in which I may have disagreed with this initial statement - like when I thought he was missing at the lion exhibit, heart attack - we had a fun time together.

My favorite was the fairy tale-like Butterfly Jungle in which you could walk amidst these graceful floating creatures. The electric-blue butterfly was by far the most incredible and elusive to photograph. Owen liked feeding the Lorikeets, I however was not quite a fan. Holding out gooey food for a bird to land on me to slirp up was not my idea of fun, just a great perk of being a chaperone. At least the bird didn't lick my arm like it did Owen's teacher who spilled some on herself. I did love that Owen has so excited to have me with him. I will hold on to that as long as I can.

Owen enjoyed feeding the deer. He opted to not get some of the food that the WAP provides to feed the deer, but thought the deer would enjoy a nice green leaf instead.

The bus driver was not much better than last year's field trip. You can read all about how much I loved that bus ride here. This is what I don't understand. If you are a bus driver by profession isn't it at the top of your job description to know how to get to and from the destination. Both times I have gone as a chaperone the bus driver has gone the wrong way and had to back track. Just a thought:-)

April 2009: George Washington, John Adams ...

How many of you can name all of the American Presidents? In order? I can say that Owen and Eyan can! Growing up we learned our Presidents by a song called "The President's Club" on the CD "Singin' Smart". Our country and its history are top priorities with my Mom and consequently we learn about all sorts of things I am guessing most families didn't.

This past year Owen has become fascinated with learning all the states, their capitals, and where they are located in on the map. His favorite game is a board game called "The States Game". To tell you the truth I'm not sure what the actual name of the game is. Anytime my Mom tried to get us to play it growing up there was a lot of moaning and groaning. Owen LOVES it, he is fantastic at it. From there he loves learning about the Presidents through books, little games given out in the Wendy's Kids Meal, and his lamintated meal placemat I bought at Wal-Mart which tells gives details about each President. President Obama along with all of the other Presidents join us at the kitchen table for each meal:-)

When my mom gave Owen the "Singin' Smart" CD it was a huge hit! How many times have I heard the song I'm not sure. Eyan, amazing with songs as mentioned in my previous post, joined right along in memorizing all of the United States Presidents (most of them with recognizable versions of their actual name:-) ). So when Talent Show time came around for our church my mom volunteered herself and O and E to sing their song. I thought, yeah right you're going to get them to sing in front of all those people. After bribing them with ice cream, my mom convinced them to do it. I couldn't believe it, I was such a proud Mommy, the boys did a phenomenal job. Another lady recorded it so I'm trying to get a copy.

Here are some cute photos of them: practicing in a room beforehand, my Mom announcing their song, and their darling performance on stage in the spotlight!

April 2009: My baby is 2! - Happy Birthday Tate:-)

I can't believe my little baby is 2. Tate is growing so fast, trying his best to keep up with his older brothers. He says fun, new things all the time. Our favorite thing he says is "Awesome that!" or "Awesome this!". He is hilarious when he yells this when he gets really excited about something - like a car-carrying semi on the freeway, an enormous bug, yummy treats in my purse, etc. It makes me laugh everytime I hear him. Liz, Kelli, and I named our Rockband Band "Awesome That!" as a tribute.

He loved his cake we had for him on his actual birthday eventhough we had already celebrated it at our Birthday Bash. Tate loves Pompa. My Dad honks each time he passes our house on his way home from work or other various times (not on the way to work however-my Dad has left for work to LA at 4 AM for over 15 years!) So now anytime Tate hears honking he says "Pompa" so matter of factly. Here he is in his beloved boots again. I love watching him eat when I'm not scared to death he's going to choke. He is a shover - rarely is food eatten in bites, its all shoved in his mouth by the palm of his hand. I was actually proud of him for attempting to use his fork for his piece of cake eventhough his bite was the whole piece:-).

Anyone who has been around Tate knows he is a real character, quite the personality. And he is so darn cute. He has now decided that since he can climb out of his crib he would like to be out of it at 5:45 AM!!!. In my groggy in between sleep and awake I hear a little voice about an inch away from my face, "Mommy up", "I wake up Mommy", "Beckfest Mommy", "Mommy up" and pulls the covers off of me and yanks on my arm. Its a good thing he's so cute!

June 2009: We Are the World

Well today Owen asked me, "Who is Michael Jackson?" so I felt it was my duty as a child of the 80s to show my boys who Michael Jackson was. I have had such a fun time watching some of those music videos and listening to some songs that remind me so much of growing up. My favorite Michael Jackson song has to be "Billie Jean". I loved this little clip. It just made me think of many family room dances sessions featuring my brother Luke!



Another song that I just loved as a young girl was "We Are the World". I recorded it from the radio, probably KIIS FM, to a cassette tape and listened to it over and over on my little boombox with 2 speakers and a rectangular handle. I loved watching this clip and seeing all these 80s singers-I LOVED Cyndi Lauper:-)



We love dancing at our house! My kids have some awesome moves. Owen's already practicing the pelvic thrust, a mini-Luke in the making. I was happy to share Michael Jackson with them today.

Playing Catch Up - February and March 2009

I realized after finally downloading my photos from my camera onto a computer, that I hadn't really posted photos since February. Well of course there was a good reason for that, not actually having a computer to download pictures to makes posting them very difficult. Well here I am trying to play catch up with our family's life that went on without a computer!:-)

February 2009: Mom's Birthday

February 2009: Owen's I-pod Valentines

February 2009: Visit from Grammy and Grandpa Johnson

March 2009: Family Birthday Bash

March 2009: Melinda & Isaiah Come Visit

March 2009: Eyan's 4th Birthday

March 2009: Eyan's 4th Birthday

Our little Eyan turned 4! Although we celebrated his birthday at our big family birthday bash, we still wanted to have a little get together on his actual birthday. We was thrilled to eat his favorite thing, cupcakes. And orange his favorite color! A very talented young woman that goes to our church has a little catering business and she made these darling cupcakes for Eyan. His little smile is so contagious. We are so grateful to have him in our family.

He was so excited to get a big boy bike and couldn't wait to try it out!

March 2009: Melinda & Isaiah Come Visit

We were so happy that Melinda and little Isaiah could come visit us from Texas. Mike and I met Melinda and her husband Jason right after we were married. They became our best friends after much convincing:-) and luckily we have been able to keep our friendship strong eventhough we have lived so far apart for so many years. Melinda and Jason were blessed with little Isaiah and I was so happy to be able to meet him and hold him. He is such an adorable and good natured baby. What a blessing indeed! Poor little guy though, he was a little mauled by my children. I'm not sure he knew what to do with them. We hope we will be able to see them all again soon.

March 2009: Family Birthday Bash

Our family has so many birthdays in March and April its crazy. We celebrated Savvy's first birthday and then had a weekend birthday bash for the rest of us who's birthdays are all with 3 1/2 weeks: Luke, Me, Dad, Eyan, Mike, and Tate! Friday on my actual birthday we headed to Disneyland. I made all us birthday folk birthday lanyards, quite fitting for Disneyland. I made fun little boutonnieres for the rest of our party. We had a blast together but missed the Fergies.

Saturday we had a birthday party at my Mom's. Mom & Dad rented a jumper house with a slide. It was so much fun. The kids were in there for hours! Ok, the adults were too. I loved it; those things are a great workout. I love this photo of Nes, awesome kick! Of course we had lunch, cake, and ice cream! So much fun.

February 2009: Visit from Grammy & Grandpa Johnson

We are lucky to live close to such desirable places that family come here often. This time it was Mike's parents. They came out to the house and were really able to see the boys in action. They were hyper to say the least! Later that week we were able to spend some time at Disneyland with them. Eyan became Grammy's little shadow and talked her ear off. It was really cute. Then of course over to Mimi's Cafe for dinner, their favorite place to eat. The boys always know if Grammy and Grandpa are in town, its a meal at Mimi's Cafe:-)

February 2009: Owen's I-pod Valentines

Owen and I had a blast making these darling I-pod valentines out of Sweethearts boxes and Reese's peanut butter cups. We got the idea from one of my favorites magazines, Family Fun. Owen did most of the work, which was a prerequisite to me agreeing to making them. They turned out so fun and were quite the hit. Liz loved the idea so much, she and Michelle made these up at BYU! Owen dreams of having his own I-pod and has even borrowed Mike's while riding his bike in the back-so funny to see him with headphones on- I'm sure I'll see it far too often in the future.