Family Fun

Mostly pictures here. Oh, and videos.

On Friday, my work had a carnival. Here are some pics of Amy on a pony ride there. There was also a camel and some petting animals. Amy and Noel petted a chicken and a rabbit.

On Saturday we had a family BBQ and play in honor of my Mom's birthday. We had various games. In this one, Amy is having a race to try to get all the gumballs from one bottle to the other.

This week from Monday to Wednesday is "Armstrong Days" at Aunt Burnsie's house (Bonnie's sister). Shelly (Burns' sister-in-law) came over with her horse and gave the kids rides. Amy and Eliza L.O.V.E.D. it, as you can see. Noel was just rather scared, though about an hour after we had all gone in she told me she wanted to ride the horse. Just took her a little while to muster the courage. :)

 (I love this one of Eliza!)

And to finish off, here are a couple randoms.

 It was my turn to paint nails. Fun!

Eliza has been playing this game where if you ask "Who ______?" e.g. "Who loves Eliza?" She will raise her hand to say "me!" We think she's adorable.

And that's a good post for now.

Pics of our littles

Some more pics, just for fun.

 Noel with Shaving Cream. I was shaving and she wanted some on her face too. I said "Okay!"

 Eliza... after a typical meal.

We went and saw "Seussical the Musical." Such a great show. 

 Cue wedding video... Somehow the girls have decided wearing undies on their head is fun!

And the finale here are a few pics of Eliza being her "automatic" adorable self.

We've taken to calling her "automatic" because even if she's crying, if you smile at her, she'll stop crying to smile back, then start crying again. She just can't help it -- it's automatic.

Eliza Birthday Pics

Some Cake

Her First Ice Cream - Ben & Jerry's (of course!)

Something I Value

I know this can be touchy, and I don't mean to offend and hope no one feels the need to defend. I just want to say that I appreciated this post:

http://ellenpatton.blogspot.com/2012/06/dishing-out-advice.html

I have great memories of road trips and want to build relationships in my family. I love the idea of great trips with fun activities and games. I think it can be possible.

On Learning to Write

Amy has a cold. Yesterday she lost her voice. So Matt taught her the word "hoarse". This morning I was impressed that she remembered the word. She thinks it's a funny word for the funny thing that happened to her voice. So I explained that it's spelled differently than "horse" (her favorite animal.) She asked me to show her the different spellings.

That led to getting the whiteboard out. I wrote the words and mentioned that they are homophones. She drew pictures, and we talked about them. Then she decided she wanted me to write words on the whiteboard. She wanted to identify the letters. Then she wanted to practice writing the letters. Now I write a word, and she copies it on a paper on a clipboard. She's loving it, and she's totally in charge of this activity.

Can I just say that this is better for me than making Amy copy and trace each letter a billion times to write perfectly? (That's how I remember it at school; that may be a little exaggerated.) That's not meant to offend anyone who likes that method. I'm just saying that I like Amy's enthusiasm for learning writing right this minute which may go away next minute, and I like doing it this way instead of drilling each letter lots of times.

Thanks for the Love to Eliza

I loved the comments. I especially wanted to say thanks to my sweet cousin, Aly, who doesn't know Eliza because she lives in Texas who still wanted to say she loves her. That's just how Aly is - so loving to everyone. We love you too!

Happy Birthday Eliza

Today is Eliza's birthday! We're excited to celebrate (in a low key way like saying happy birthday a million times to her.)

Here are things I like about Eliza Ruby:
she grunts and growls - especially when she laughs
she smiles at my sister EVERY TIME Laurel smiles at her
she's always been a happy baby
she has begun babbling and I think it is SO CUTE
she likes to play games - especially tickling games
she used to shake her head back and forth to hide to let us know she wanted to play peek-a-boo
she loves to cruise and has taken one step (and immediately fallen), she's practicing standing with no hands
she loves cherries
she LOVES baths and bathrooms - sometimes this is dangerous
she loves stairs (I don't actually love the last two facts about her, but we manage)
she likes people
I get told at church ALL THE TIME and sometime by people I don't really know how cute she is
she likes to smile and wave
we call her Lize Lize
she has an adorable face

For Eliza's birthday, if you know her, will you share something you like about her? I'll record it in her journal.

Happy Birthday Best Baby!

Special Father's Day Surprise - Amy Style

I asked Amy what we should do since it's Father's Day. (I love asking Amy open-ended questions; you NEVER know what she'll say. I was thinking about being especially nice to Daddy.)

Amy suggested we play hide and seek and only let HIM be the counter. (Now, that's love. :)  She said we could all hide in a special place together, the best hiding place. Do you want to know what that place is? (Don't tell Daddy.)

Disappear.

Happy Father's Day!

Happy Father's Day everyone! Especially from me to Matt, my dad, and to Matt's dads.

As far as fathering goes, my favorite thing about Matt is that he just keeps getting better and better at it. How these girls adore their daddy!

Speaking of girls adoring their daddies, I have always felt that way about mine. I was a daddy's girl as a kid, and I don't think I ever grew out of it. I still LOVE any time I get to hang out with my dad. It's a little different as an adult. I still love to play games with him. Now I am also grateful for interesting and enlightening conversation, for his approval of me and my choices, for the things he teaches me and the things he has always taught me. For example, I always credit my dad as the source of my determination to have daily worship habits for myself and to help them along in my family - dad's unwavering consistent example taught me that.

I am thankful for Matt having two wonderful dads. I always feel grateful to anyone who helps my children. And how grateful I feel for loving parents who taught and helped prepare my husband to be a wonderful person, husband and father! The main lesson I have learned from all of Matt's parents since becoming a part of the family is generosity. I have realized from them what a wonderful thing that is to develop and have so appreciated all the generosity shown to us.

I love you to all these wonderful dads!

Amy said

Jesus is the biggest, nicest super hero.

BFFs

After a rough night with some disobedience, anger, remorse, and apologies we finished the evening with snuggles in bed. I asked Amy, "Can we be friends again?" She got really sincere and said, "Forever? I want to be friends forever." Melted my heart. I want to be friends with Amy forever too. I am so glad we can reconnect even after some rough spots in a day. (At one point today she also told me that she was feeling bad because she knows she made bad choices.) I'm pretty impressed with that sweet girl who just wants to be good.)

I've Been Vindicated

A week ago I locked myself (and kids) out of my house because I lost my keys. I felt a little silly about having lost keys (again) and for not thinking ahead to be able to get in my house. Everything turned out fine. Today I found my keys. In a bag full of toys. The girls have been packing lately and carrying around bags of random items. Sometimes they just carry them around for no apparent purpose. Other times they go on trips or field trips. So we had a talk about whether those things were keys or toys. I wasn't mad because I was just glad it wasn't my fault.

Easter

Means, among other things, dresses. See?

Free Cone Day 2012

We had a fun Free Cone day. Bonnie let me sleep in but then it was pretty late so we started to hustle a bit... but not too much! We met Burns and did a kid swap for the rest of the ride up. When we arrived there was hardly a line - it didn't even go out the door of the small shop.

We decided to do this in rounds to hopefully maximize our capacity of ice cream intake. I ate 6 scoops the first round, Bonnie ate 4, and I think the kids had two or three. As Burns had to go pick up other kids from school we said goodbye and, for a break, we walked up to the new City Creek Center mall for lunch. We may have gotten distracted by some water on the way. :)

Our lunch break took a few hours and was wonderful. It was so nice not to feel rushed for anything. When we got back it was getting a bit chilly and we would often stand in the sun to eat our ice creams. I ate 6 more scoops for a total of 12 and Bonnie ate two more for a total of 6. The kids each had a couple more as well.

We had a wonderful fun family time. I love B&J Free cone day!

P.S. This one is of my cups, Bonnies cups, and some of the kids' cups just before tossing it all. A pretty impressive pile!

We have funny kids

I wish I was better at recording the funny things our girls say -- they crack us up.

Today for FHE we went to the cemetery by our house where Grandma Amy Armstrong (Amy Parks' name sake) is buried. We went to her grave and spoke about how our bodies are buried and later our spirits will come back into our bodies and that Grandma Amy and Grandpa Ned's bodies would come back to life. Amy was very smart about knowing the word resurrection and Noel knew that all of the people whose bodies were in all of the cemetery would be resurrected. Our girls know such important stuff; we're very proud of them.

In the car on the way home, Amy and Noel had the greatest conversation which I don't remember word for word, but which I will try to give you a feel for nonethless. The Orem cemetery is located up on a hill at the corner of the city and has a wonderful view of Orem. We mentioned this. Noel then started saying that we have an Orem in our house. Then I think Amy said something like "is it Kansas?" and Noel answered "No, it's a Trafal-a-ga. We have a Trafal-a-ga in our house." (Trafalga is a family fun center we've gone to with them.) And they went on and on about this idea of having these things "in our house."

At home we had a song and prayer and show and tell. Noel for some reason has had a fascination with Amy's underwear lately and always chooses a pair of them for her show and tell. During General Conference this weekend, she and Amy got a bit carried away, watch!

 Anyway, after show and tell, Amy performed a special musical number. She sang "Latter-day Prophets" while holding the "Gospel Art Book" and she pointed to each one of the Prophets correctly as she sang their names. We were so impressed with her! (Hmm, gotta get that one on video too.)

After that we had activity. Now Bonnie and I openly admit that we are pretty poor at celebrating holidays. In fact, we're really quite bad at it. So while for many the following activity is typical and fun, for us this was totally awesome! We dyed Easter Eggs!

L.O.V.E. this picture of Noel!

And the final result!

From Left to Right: Daddy's, Mommy's, Amy's, Noel's, Eliza's

Good family times.