talking time Graduation!

Talking Time is this little program that the Davis district has available for kids with phonetics and pronunciation.
Julia was having some problems placing her tongue due to her under bite, so we started her up in the program on March.
She scored really low at her initial test, so the teachers had some concern.
I am happy to say that after only four months in the program she has graduated from it.
She can say all of the early developmental sounds as well as some later ones. Her teachers were so impressed to see this kind of progress in a student. They said that it usually take kids 1 to 2 years to gain all the knowledge they need to start making the right sounds, but this little girl tried her hardest and did it.
The only person that is going to be sad about not going to talking time any more is Josh.
This was like a little preschool to him, and even though nobody actually taught him, he made his way around the room listening and repeating sounds and every now and then he got to play a game and do a craft.

I am so thankful to these dedicated ladies that give it their best to try to teach these kids.
Teacher Lisa and teacher Sandy have been a blessing for little Julia. It is definitely because of them that my sweet girl can speak better.

Tea Parté

November tends to be an easy month for us, so I decided to spice things up by taking the kids to a tea party.
On November 6Th Pottery Barn through a tea party for the girls and they got to bring a doll along. The invitation said it was a princess tea party, so Julia decided to dress up and match her Cinderella doll.
We had a wonderful time. The kids had some cookies and apple juice, read stories: pinkalicious and Nancy Fancy, which will be added into our story book collection soon, made a craft and they also gave them cute tiaras to wear during the party.
Josh and Andrew had no choice but to come along. That’s what you get when you have an older sister, although you won’t hear any complaining from Josh. He sneaked on the table during snacks and got himself a cookie and a can of juice. When the food was gone he went back on playing with the trains they had on the boy’s side of the store.
Andrew was a good baby like always. As long as he has his bottle and a clean diaper he is a happy camper.

October 31st

Happy Halloween!

From:
Snow White, The red Dragon and our Little Monkey



The Monday before Halloween we spent our evening carving our pumpkins as a family. Of course Spencer and I did all the dirty and hard work, while the kids just got to pick their favorite styles for them. They did get to decorate some pumpkin with paint. Through the week, the kids and I also made some crafts to decorate our front room with and some spooky treats to eat.









Halloween was a crazy day as usual. Lots of stuff to do and places to visit


Our first stop was Macey’s . The kids got to trick or treat throughout the store and also got balloons (their favorites) and decorated their own Halloween cookies.
After that, we dashed to grandma and grandpa Smith’s house and had some pictures and treats of course.




Then we dashed to Toys R Us. I’ve made it our tradition to be part of their Halloween parade. It is so cute to see the kiddos walking around the store with their customs led by Geoffrey.
This time they got an adorable trick-or-treat bag, Nick Jr. candy and a Chugginton movie (Josh loves trains)

After that we took a break and went home and have lunch, took a little nap and at 4:00 we were ready to go again.
Our local Wal-Mart had a scavenger Hunt for candy. You had to go to different departments and figure it out which ones were giving the candy away. The kids loved it, but Spencer was not too pleased about this stop.


After this we came back for trunk or treat at our church and so did the storm.
We toughed the storm out and we trunk-or-treated on the rain. Thankfully I had brought umbrellas for the kids but no protection for me, so I was completely wet when this was over.
Poor A.D was kept in his stroller the whole time, just a few people got to pick inside the stroller and see how cute he was on his little monkey costume.

...........But wait we were not done yet.

After the rain cleared up and we warmed up with some hot chocolate and doughnuts, a beautiful rainbow appeared, so we decided to keep going.
I had told the kids to keep an eye out for their favorite decorated houses and we could go see them on Halloween. We picked 5 and went trick-or- treating on them.

Their favorite houses were the ones with inflatable toys, smoke machines and really spooky decorations.These kids are tough!



Julia went trick-or-treating all by herself. I was following her on my car and making sure she was safe.
Spencer and I forget how little she still is. That night seeing her walk from house to house with her big coat on and a bag of candy so heavy she had to drag it on the floor, made me remember that she is only 4 years old.
I was so proud of her. She would check with me to see which house she could go next and then politely ask for candy and thank for it.

Here is their loot:

and the very proud owners of 5 lbs of candy

We finally called the night good at 7:00. We came home had some hot soup, watch the Shrek and Monster vs. Aliens Halloween episodes on channel 5 and after that it was time for a nice deserving warm bath.Hope you had a great Halloween day

….X-mas here I come

4 big Months

Another month has come and gone for this little boy. He is now 4 big months and changing daily.
His personality is definitely making an appearance.

These are things I most adore about this boy:

-Loves to snuggle and cuddle. I melt every time I can hold him and feel his love for me.
-He waits for me with a smile on bed when I go to pick him up in the morning
-He recognizes my voice. If he wants me and he can hear me close by he would let you know.
-His sweet spirit. I can watch him sleep for the longest times. His faces is always so peaceful and has a cute little smile
-the love that he is already showing for his siblings. He adores Julia and gets excited and starts kicking whenever he sees her. Josh, it’s a work in progress, let’s just say he is still trying to figure him out, but he would smile at him when he hugs him.

Things that I am concern about:

-This boy is growing too fast! He still the smallest of my babies, but he is so smart and attentive that he appears to me older and I am not sure I like that
-He eats and eats and eats non-stop all day. I can’t even nurse him anymore for I don't think I would be able to get anything done around the house.

His favorite things to do:

-Watch TV on the floor with Julia and Josh on the floor.
-Grab things and use his little tiny fingers

-Play with his mobile toy
-EAT
-Snuggle mommy
-Baths at night. He knows they are coming and gets really excited.
-growl s when he is happy and having fun-car rides. They stop him from crying in a heart beat.

October happenings

No wonder I couldn't catch my breath this month. It's been one thing after the other, but I guess that's the life of a mom right?

We had a Family Pinewood Derby Race on Friday October 22Th. Our ward handed in some kits to each family to build your own car but we didn’t have any time to build ours, so we brought in two of the kid’s favorite toy cars to race.

Of course we had no chance competing against magnetic cars, RC cars and air propelled cars but overall we had a great time. Not to mention they provided dinner so I didn’t have to cook.

The next day we drove up to Cornish to visit Spencer's grandma. It was her birthday and she wanted to have all her family there.

It was an intense ride, the kids were wonderful, what wasn't so great was driving on a rain storm through the canyon. The ending of the storm was neat though. You could see the final rain drops mingled on top of the mountains with the last bits of sun rays.

Our visit to G'ma Smith was great. We visit with her and she was finally able to meet our A.D. These pictures are priceless.

October

What a better way to start the month of October, other than going to the Syracuse Pumpkin Walk.
We almost didn't make it, because I had to go all by myself since Spencer had to work all three nights that the Walk was open, but how can you deny a free activity to your Kids

Here we are ready to go, all dressed up in our Halloween customs, for you can't go to a pumpkin walk without them, there's just no fun in that.

I am glad to say that we chose the right day and the right time to go to the Walk. Thursday was the best day to go to the walk, it was the only day without rain, and I guess everyone though the same way because as we were going home we so the line being 4 times longer than when we first got there.

As always the Walk was great. Very organized and there were lots of great ant very elaborated carvings and some fun figures to see. My favorite personally two pumpkins with the pictures of the Prophet Joseph Smith and Thomas Monson.

It took us an hour to get through the walk, because we had to stop and have our pictures taken with our favorite carved pumpkins.

At the end of the walk the kids received a treat from the city. We also got some free chili so we were all set for the night

Here are Josh's favorite ones: pork chop from Toy story, Mickey Mouse(of course), Cars and the face from the movie Were the Wild Things Are

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Julia's Favorite: princesses of course. Snow white, Cinderella and the Prince, A Character from Toy Story 3, ballerina mouse and The Rose from Beauty and The Beast