Happy Day

We are having a wonderfully relaxing Sunday here...we had muffins, peaches and chocolate milk for breakfast, some geese just flew by honking, Sean Jason and Kyle are getting some pre-church jitters out by playing football in the snow and building snowmen, Riley's taking a nap...does it get better?

My mom made me, Kyle and Riley these CUTE hats! Kyle and I wear ours all the time. Riley will wear his for about 5 minutes, which is quite impressive actually. Thanks mom!!!

They really are best friends.

This one cracks me up. Such funny boys we have. I love how Kyle wants to do whatever the 'big boys' are doing.

My AWESOME friend Katie threw me a 'better late than never' 30th birthday party for my 31st and we had such a great time! Check out her amazing cake. This was the first time she ever made fondant and it was so cute! Inside was a mint chocolate layer cake. Yummy!

These are my super fun friends. Thanks everyone!

The pre-party celebration was me, Kirstin and Katie night skiing. I LOVED it!!! I am so lucky to have such great friends.

So the next week, I had to have Katie teach me how to make fondant and this is what we created. Sweet, huh? Inside was a vanilla cake with lemon curd and buttercream frosting. Not bad!

Riley's sucker after a haircut. I think he is looking so much like Sean did.

A Few Snapshots of Life

We haven't fallen off the map, we've just been enjoying the BEST holiday season ever! It was very relaxed and fun. Here is an update on the past couple of months...

We took family pictures. We set up a tripod in the field, put our camera on timer, and got some great shots.

Halloween...Kyle was a "bad" pirate, Jason was GI Joe Snake Eyes, Riley was a pirate (till it got cold and then he was a fleece zebra), and Sean was a ninja.

Decorating our homemade gingerbread house. Yummy!

Ben and I celebrated 11 fantastic years together! I feel so lucky every day!

We built a snow igloo in the backyard. It is still standing!

Jason took Ben duck hunting. Kyle was as excited as they were.

Christmas Eve sliding on the ice at the lake.

Christmas Day...

Riley had no problem understanding what all the fun was about. Of course, he had as much fun with the packaging as he did with the presents.

Kyle's face here says it all.

Kyle and Riley playing with their Book of Mormon action figures from Elder Grandpa and Sister Grandma serving a mission in Hawaii.

Jason, our big Broncos fan, got a Broncos jersey, Broncos poster and even a Broncos ornament.

Sean sporting his much-desired football helmet and pads. So tough!

Latest and Greatest

It's been a little while since I blogged. Here's a few pictures (maybe a lot of pictures)...

This is what Sean and Jason do after school every day. They do their homework and chores, then play football until dinner. Life is good!

This is Riley and his best buddy Ryan. Don't they look like they could be brothers?

My high school had an alumni night that, of course, I couldn't pass up. All of my sisters and I went to it and had a blast. Yeah, we still got it:)

Ben was able to speak at a BIM conference in San Francisco, so I went with him and we had a great time. This is us on the Golden Gate Bridge.

This restaurant was SOOOOOO good, we went there both nights that we were in SF. The seafood was amazing. Their Scoma's boat was docked right by the restaurant! We might need to take another trip there just for the food:)

My family was able to spend some unexpected time together in Colorado. My grandma was really sick so my parents took a 2 week break from their mission to help her and it happened to be at the same time as my cousins wedding which all of us siblings were going to anyways. It was a fun time together! And my grandma is doing so much better.

Our boys got to play football with their grandpa...it doesn't get much better than that.

Jason was able to go to a BYU football game with Ben. This pretty much sums up the greatness of it all.

This is Kyle with his cousins playing on the 4 wheeler in the garage. Vrroom!

This is Riley with his cousin Lizzy. They followed each other up these steps.

This needs a little explanation... Jason and I went to Pumpkinland for his field trip. He and I got really lost in the corn maze and finally cut through the corn because we couldn't find how to get out. I think this bothered him a little. I was just happy to get out. The next week I took Jason, Kyle and Riley with our friends back to Pumpkinland and Kyle helped Jason find the way out. It was very exciting! I love Jason's face in this picture. It's kind-of how I feel now that I have finished posting this blog:)

Riley Turns 1!!!

This is a little late, but our little guy turned ONE!!!! Wow! Time goes by so fast.

Riley Thomas May is the sweetest, happiest boy. He loves cars, trucks, motorcycles, 4 wheelers, basically anything with wheels. When he sees something with wheels, he makes car sounds with his lips, it is so cute! He is talking a bit now and says a few words, he is taking a couple of wobbly steps and he smiles a lot. He laughs most when his brothers and entertaining him, especially Jason. He loves to be outside and eat dirt. We love his smile and his curly hair.

This is the best cake any of our kids has ever had on their birthday. Our neice, Erica, babysat on Riley's birthday and I came home to this. She is awesome!



Riley chose to go to McDonald's for his birthday dinner. (Okay, we all like our fries and chicken nuggets)


Did I mention that Erica's cake tasted good? Check out Riley's grin.

I know that someday we will cut his hair, but it might be a while... How cute is that!?

This Is How We Roll

We might do things a little differently than most. Today we could have done many things, but we chose to spear carp at our neighbors pond and nude ditch boogie board (a sport Kyle invented today. Yes, he's the only one who participated).

Potty training continues...the May way:)

Jason has been tearin' it up on the soccer field. (he's #7)

Sean is finally getting to play flag football. He had his first game this week and I thought he and Ben were both going to burst with excitement. (Sean's in the green)

MOTO MADNESS!!!!

Moto Madness was a camping trip put together by Ben's brother (great job Andy!). We went out to the desert in the middle of nowhere that had a bunch of ATV and motorcyle trails. We went with Andy's family and Holly's family and Drew and we all had a great, fun, dusty, dirty, hot, wonderful time. I think the boy to girl ratio was something like 3:1, but it's okay 'cause I have a sweet pink helmet:) Some even caught a few fish in the tiny stream. We had 3 four wheelers and 9 motorcycles and they didn't sit still very often. WOW! We're hoping to make this a frequent tradition!

Kyle, Riley and I takin' it easy...

Jason, Ben and Riley chillin' by the fire...

Our late night tin foil dinners and s'mores...YUMMY!...

Some of our super fun cousins...

Our Ritz Carlton on wheels...

Sean and Kyle going for a ride with their cousin...

Riley can now army crawl, crawl on all fours, go up and down our 2 office stairs and pull himself up on just about anything. We are so proud! Look how big he's getting!



Kyle can make his own bologna sandwich. All I have to do is open the bologna for him and he's good to go! This is his own recipe...bread, bologna, mayo, ketchup, BBQ sauce and mustard. Mmmmm?

Potty Training With 4 Kids

If you are looking for a "How To Potty Train With 4 Kids" this is NOT the blog for you! If you don't like reading about poop, this is also NOT the blog for you.

Do you ever have an experience that seems really bad at the time, but then later you think, 'oh that wasn't so bad?' This is NOT one of those! It really was that bad.

It all started when I was reading my friend's (you know who you are Kristy) blog and she posted this super cute potty training chart and said how she used gum to reward her son (who is Kyle's age) for pooping in the toilet. I think to myself, Great Idea! Which it is, if you do it right and have time to pay attention to your child. But I did not. Here's the story...

Yesterday we are at WalMart and I see the gum and I let Kyle pick out some gum for potty training. He is excited about this because he has not been allowed to have gum since he smeared it (very artlike) all over the window in the back of our car. So he picks strawberry and we spend yesterday and today making little comments like, "When you go poop in the toilet you can have strawberry gum." So today Kyle goes over to the couch and plays quietly. This means he is going to poop. So I ask if he wants strawberry gum. He says yes! This is progress for us. We go to the bathroom, but I am in the middle of making lunch and Riley needs me and I have to find Sean and Jason so I leave him there. I kind of forget about it. Later we have lunch. Then he is over playing quietly at the couch again. I quickly go over and ask if he wants strawberry gum. He just looks at me. I ask him if he pooped. Again, he just looks at me. I go to check his diaper and find that he DOESN'T HAVE ONE ON!!!!! I kind of forgot to put one on after he tried to poop earlier. He must have just put his own pants back on, which again is progress for us. Luckily his pants are hand-me-down elastic leg pants so we are contained a bit. Did I mention that Kyle has had a stomach bug for 4 days? So a dozen or so wipes and a bath and a really gross scrubbing of some hand-me-down pants that were too good to throw away later I can write this post. And yes, it was worse than I am describing here.

I think we will be waiting until the big boys are actually in school and I can focus on Kyle before we start potty training. Or I'll just wait until I potty train Kyle and Riley together:) What's a couple more years of diapers? At least I know what to expect.