Rodeo Parade and Rodeo

This year we were invited to be on my company's float in the rodeo parade. The theme was Bring Your Wild Bunch so we made cardboard cutouts that looked like various bugs and animals. And we had a cow (the son of one of my coworkers) sitting at the back. Of course everyone thought it was the Chick-fil-a cow so the kids watching would get super excited. Oh and we had to dress like rodeo clowns. I don't think I will share those pictures here...... :) It was fun for me and Hailey. She got the pageant wave down pat by the end! Emma didn't smile because she was a little scared to be riding on this trailer with no real seat or stability like a car and Eli and Kayla apparently didn't realize just what they had signed up for to begin with! It has to be said that it was their idea to do it! I was asked, I asked them and they both got very excited, said yes and promptly got to work on their costumes.

We were given tickets to the rodeo by one of my coworkers that plays a big role in the rodeo even taking place here. I had taken Kayla and Eli only once before and they were both too young to really remember it. They have also changed venue's since then so it is much easier to see the whole thing now. For some reason this town decided to have our rodeo indoors in an arena for a few years but changed it to an outdoor stadium. Which makes a lot more sense! Anyways, I took my 4 kids plus my neighbor's 12 yr old son who was visiting from Houston, TX for the summer. The kid lives in Houston and his dad has never taken him to the rodeo! I couldn't get over it! But I was glad to help him experience his first rodeo! Oh and I didn't mention that our seats were in the front row next to the shoots for bull riding. The kids all had a great time and loved seeing the fireworks at the very end (we didn't get any on the 4th because of budget cuts). It rained on us for a few minutes but the majority of the seating is covered so the little girls and I just moved back a bit. The big kids didn't care that they were getting wet! and the funny thing was that at one point Hailey was on my lap to where she could see the crowd on the opposite side of the arena and started doing her little pageant wave!

Hailey's well baby & birth mark check-up

Yesterday was the appt for the birth mark check-up in Denver. The Dr. said it isn't as red as it was when he first saw her back in November which is a good sign. That basically means there isn't as much blood flowing to it. And for those who don't remember, this birth mark is formed by a bunch of little capillaries (hence the blood flow, heat and color). I had noticed that it doesn't feel quite so hot to the touch like it did for a while. Other than that, there have not been any changes which is good in that it isn't growing. They did go ahead and get another picture of it just to have some comparisons but I don't take her back til she is 2.

Today was her 1 yr well baby check-up. Of course she has a clean bill of health. Which I am very thankful and blessed for that! My baby girl weighs 26 lbs still! She hasn't gained any weight over the last 3 months. So it looks like she is going to do what Emma did and stop gaining weight and start gaining inches in height. She was 29" long too. Now that she is walking she is loosing her awesome chub thighs though!

Manitou Arcade

I had today off so I took the kids to Manitou to the coolest arcade this afternoon! It's still called the Penny Arcade even though the price is far from that. But what makes it so cool is that they have some super old games and some brand new games. They have this bank of "rides" that I swear are some of the same that I used to ride in when I was little. Like the helicopter that goes up and down...I'm pretty sure I rode that in King Soopers! And they have a "boardwalk" that all of these rides are on with a little creek that runs below it. Of course that kind of freaked out the kids a little bit!

Happy 1st Birthday Hailey Sophia!

WOW....just wow. I cannot believe my baby girl is 1 yr old already. This past year has flown by! Hailey is such a sweet baby girl and loves to come cuddle with me. She is very much a mama's girl. She is funny when it comes to people that are strangers to her. Sometimes she will be fine and be their friend but most of the time if they so much as look at her she will start bawling. With the exception of my friend next door. She loves her and is always actually happy to see her! The girl didn't start getting mobile til she was around 10 months old. That was when she started crawling. Then she took a few steps on her first birthday but waited for a few days to really try again. Now, she is full on walking and it is too cute. She has a small vocabulary. The words she can say are mama, da (for dada), mma (for Emma), lijah (for Eli), lala (for Kayla), no no, hi, dat (for that). She will point to everything and say "dat" so we find ourselves explaining everything in sight. She now has 9 teeth and her favorite food to chew with those teeth is cheese. Any form and kind of cheese.

We decided not to have a birthday party for her this year because there was too much going on around that same time. So we just celebrated as a family with pizza and cake. Kayla baked and decorated Hailey's cake and it was yummy! My dad, step-mom and little brother came over for a bit to give Hailey her present and watch her open it. So in all it was a pretty relaxed day for all of us.

Still alive!

I knew it had been a while since I had posted last but I didn't realize just how long! Sorry about that! So here is a quick update (no pics because they are on my computer and I am doing this from JR's).

Kayla is all done with school. She now gets to move on to 8th grade. She is switching schools for 2 reasons. The first being that her old school closed it's doors for good on May 28th. The district has been shrinking since the 70's and had to take some drastic measures over the next few years to clean it up a bit. Her school was in an old building with A/C in only 1 room (the computer room for obvious reasons) and they felt other facilities were in better condition so hers was one to go! The other reason for her switch is because she decided she wanted to be in the IB program which is housed in one of the other middle schools within our district. This is a challenging program compared to the one she was in these last couple of years but she says she is up for it!

Eli is done with school too. Fortunately his school was one that was spared as they were cutting several elementary schools. They will actually be taking on most of the students from one of the schools that closed on May 22nd. He is now a 4th grader! Holy cow time flies! He is very glad it is summer because it means he gets to spend most of his time outside. He didn't get to do soccer this year because we totally missed the deadline...and then some...on signing him up. So he is waiting until fall to do that. Which he seemed fine with so maybe he was already ready for a break!

Emma is still a 2 yr old through and through. She can go from sweet to typical terrible two at the drop of a hat! Her favorite thing to do lately is play with her brother. She can't seem to get enough of him. Even though she fights with him alot! :) Even tonight, she was invited to spend the night with Nana and then backed out at the last minute because she wanted to see Eli. The other thing she likes to do is play outside. She has made friends with the little girl next door and always asks for her. Trouble is, the girl lives with her dad so she isn't always with her mom and Emma just doesn't understand that!

Hailey is huge! The last time she was weighed she was 25 lbs! Not fun to carry around for long periods let me tell you. She finally started crawling about 3 weeks ago and is now already pulling herself to a stand. She will get brave and cruise along a piece of furniture on occasion but that doesn't happen often. Tonight she was standing up holding onto me and would let go for several seconds and just stand there. I think she thought she was pretty cool because she kept doing it over and over. So I suppose it won't be long before she is walking too! Yikes! She can say mama, dada, Elijah (which sounds kind of like e-da-da). She will try to say Emma but it usually comes out mama and we are trying to teach her to say lala for Kayla. She waves goodbye and will clap her hands when you say "yay Hailey". She is starting to get cuddly. She will lay her head on my chest and I hug her and say "Oh sweet Hailey, I love you" and rock her back and forth. She says some gibberish after I do that and I think it's her version of "I love you". It's too cute! I love this time when you get to watch them develop a personality. She is a happy go lucky baby (most of the time) and will give you the cheesiest grin! I will have to try to get it on camera at some point because it makes me laugh every time.

Anyways, that's all I can think of at this point. I'm quite sure there is lots more....it may or may not make it onto here! We will see! At some point I will try to get some pictures on here too! :)

Where's Hailey?!

First of all, she has finally started saying Nana and mama! Of course she said Nana first though! Which made Nana happy! So we started taking this little video trying to get her to say mama and Nana on it. She ended up playing her version of peek-a-boo though. It is too darn cute to not share with everyone! She has been playing this game with us for months where we could cover her with her blanket or whatever else we had and say "where's Hailey?" and she would pull it down so she could see us. It has now evolved into her pulling her chubby hand up to her face and usually only gets it as high as her mouth. But she will sometimes get it up to cover one eye while she peeks at you with the other. The when she pulls it down we say "there she is!" and she gets excited to do it all over again.

This is my first attempt at doing a video on the blog so hopefully I do it right!

Oh yeah and pay no attention to Emma yelling at the dog at the end of the video! :)

Updates on the family

Long time no blog! It's been longer than I realized since I had posted anything on here. Sorry about that! :) I don't seem to have much computer time at night these days. Anyways, here are some random updates for you.

Kayla made the honor roll at school this semester. We went to the awards ceremony at her school a few weeks ago to see her get it. She also just had her science fair last week. Her project was pretty cool. She would have the person sit at her desk and give them a sheet of various math problems, and while you were doing that she was also playing different songs and telling you the name of the song. Afterwards, you had to name the songs in order. Basically it was testing multi-tasking. And guess who did better?! The younger ones! The adults didn't do so well at that!


Elijah has been working at mastering his Lego Star Wars game on his DS. :) He hasn't had a whole lot of exciting things going on. Our main focus with him right now is organization and mastering his routine. He is an extremely smart kid, just lacks what he needs to help him along!

Emma is...well what can I say....Emma. She is deep in the throes of being 2 for sure! The things that come of that girls mouth sometimes either causes our jaw to drop on the floor or we double over in laughter. Like, for instance, when she told Kayla and I that boogers don't taste good, food tastes good! Very wise little girl. :) She went through a short period of time while she was sick getting out of bed every night several times a night until she would finally crash out. Thankfully that was short lived! She is doing great potty training. We still put her in a diaper at night and sometimes at nap time too. She also has to be in a diaper if we are going to be in public doing anything that will distract her. She tends to forget to go potty and she has a fear of big toilets. So we are working on that part with her!

Hailey has come leaps and bounds over the last month. She can now roll over front to back and back to front. She had mastered back to front long before the other direction. Which is strange because going front to back is way easier! She can sit up on her own for quite some time before she topples over. She babbles a lot now too. Her first "word" already was dada. Of course! And I swear it has sounded like she said Elijah and Kayla at some point too! We recently started feeding her baby food again. Oh and she had her very first ear infection last month...not fun! Her weight is...drum roll please...22 lbs! My mom had her at the UPS store recently and the lady behind the counter didn't believe she really weighed that much. So she put her on the scale there and sure enough that was her weight!

And now she's rollin

Hailey finally did it! She rolled all the way over - back to front - today. Several times even! The first time she did it I was sitting there watching her but it took me a minute to realize what she had just done. She hasn't gone the other direction yet so she can't quite get all over the living room like that. But I do think she is getting a kick out of doing it now.

The funny thing is that I don't think I was truly ready for movement from her. That signifies a whole new stage....mobility. It was nice to have her somewhat stationary (she could wiggle her way all over the place on her back) so that I could lay her in the middle of the living room and not have to worry about her getting into anything. This is just one step closer to trouble! And I tell you, I am terrified of the terror her and Emma are going to create! :)

6 Months

WOW Hailey is already 6 months old. These last 6 months feel like they have just flown by! It seems like I was just dealing with a somewhat stressful, scary pregnancy! And now I have this cute, chubby, attention demanding baby. And by attention demanding I don't just mean the usual feed me, hold me, change my diaper and put me to bed baby. Oh no! She is the 4th....which means she has to make sure we all know she is here and won't let us forget it! She is by far my fussiest baby and knows how to let you know she needs attention. It took us a bit but we figured her out and she figured us out. We also got to learn alot about birth marks and how they work. Of course that will be a learning event for us for a while to come. She is so different from the other 3 kids. Right down to her slight head of blond hair. I think she will end up with Hazel eyes like JR and Kayla because they aren't as blue as they used to be.

She has 1 tooth and the 2nd well on it's way. You can see it just trying to break through the gums. She has only rolled over once so far from her back to her front. And she got stuck on her arm so it wasn't quite complete. But honestly, the longer it takes her to be mobile that happier I am! I fear the day her and Emma team up against me! :) She loves to stand up though. The girl has some strong legs! One of her favorite toys is a rattle that we put in her stocking. She will lay there and talk to it for quite a while. Then it manages to slide down her arm and away it goes! She also loves to chew on baby dolls and well anything that will fit in her mouth really. We started to give her baby food but didn't get past sweet potatoes. She really wasn't interested in it so we didn't push it. Saves on a mess and on the wallet for sure! Despite the chub, she has a small appetite compared to the other 3 when they were that age. And speaking of chub, she had her 6 month well baby check up and she weighs 20lbs 12oz! And she is 27 3/4" long! She is pretty much the size of a 1 yr old! I can't wait to see who my tallest kid is going to be. I wouldn't be surprised if she is the one!

Christmas '08

This year, Christmas actually seemed a little more relaxed than years past. Not exactly sure why since we still did the same routine. We open presents and have breakfast here at home and then sometime in the afternoon we head to Nana's house for more presents and dinner. My dad lives close to her so we usually go to his house to visit after dinner. Naturally, the kids had a blast and got lots of cool things. Emma is getting more into opening things and was trying to help Hailey with her stuff too. Anyways, here are a few pictures from the day.

The tree after Santa's visit

The stockings were laid out on the couch with care...we have a chimney but it is downstairs and we don't use that area!

Kayla's ultimate present....a gift certificate for Tangles Salon and Day Spa to get her hair done by my friend Sue

One of Eli's ultimate gifts from Darlin...it has this little alien with a UFO that sounds like the Jetsons vehicles!

Eli's ultimate, ultimate gift...a Nintendo DS. This is the first game system we have purchased for any of the kids!

Emma with her baby doll from Santa. Whenever you would ask her what Santa was going to bring her, the response was always "Santa's gonna bring me a baby doll"! So naturally that was what he had to do! The funny thing was that I went out one night to buy this thing and promptly showed JR and the big kids because I thought it was too darn cute. Eli is getting to the age now where he isn't sure if he believes in Santa or not. So he immediately looks up at me when she opens this thing and says something about me getting it but how can it be from Santa! Oops! And the really funny thing about this doll is that it says 5 different cheers and my 12 yr old has all of them memorized and moves to go along with them! I swear Kayla plays with this doll way more than Emma!

Hailey with her cool Peek-a-blocks from Darlin

Eli with his Nerf Vulcan from Nana....he also has a Nerf bow (he calls it his big, bad bow) so I have seriously been dealing with not just Eli playing with this thing....his father has been playing too! They love to have wars with them and we all get stuck in the middle! I even got ambushed one day by JR when I came in the front door.

One last little gift from Santa! This was at the end of the day when we finally got home from Nana's. Hailey under the tree with a portion of loot collected throughout the day!

She has a tooth!

We had our company Christmas party last Thurs at the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo. It was the coolest place for the party and everyone agreed that it was the best one they have had yet! Our zoo lights up a portion of the exhibits and you can go in and feed the giraffes while you are there. It does get rather cold because it is on a mountain though! Anyways, I have a friend that we swap babysitting with primarily during this time of year for shopping and parties. So she was gracious enough to come to my house at 5 so we could get to the party on time and she had to make friends with Hailey. You see, Hailey isn't friends with just anyone....the baby cries if she doesn't want you talking to her. Which is what she tends to do with my friend. So she fed her some dinner and then Hailey was cool with her. However, we got a call shortly before 8...seems Hailey was crying and she was crying good. And this wasn't your average "I'm tired and want to be rocked to sleep" types of cries. Nope, it was a cry of pain. And since my friend has 3 kids of her own then I trust her instincts! So we came home early not only to check on Hailey but to relieve my friend from a crying baby.

Friday afternoon when I am picking Hailey up from Nana's house......she has a tooth! So apparently her crying was because that tooth was finally breaking through the surface. And of course I had to call my friend to let her know what the problem was and not to take the crying personal! :)

Still here!

So when I said not to be surprised if you don't see a post from in a bit....I didn't mean this long! Not that there haven't been blogging moments over these last 2 weeks. I just didn't do it! And because I didn't do it or even make a note on what I wanted to blog, it is all stuck in the back of the brain and it isn't coming forward. So in the meantime, I will share some cute pics with you.

Eli and Hailey sportin' the beanie caps

So sweet! She loves to cuddle!

This was Eli's bed when he was little. We had it out so that grandpa could come get it and take to my nephew Joey. My step-sister is hoping it will help motivate him to sleep in his own bed! Emma decided it would be fun to drive the car so I put Hailey's seat (it is meant for newborn to toddlers) in it and gave her Eli's wheel pillow....and away she went!

Hailey participating in her much loathed tummy time. Emma hated it too! But it's gotta be done if the girl is ever going to learn how to roll over! I know you can't really see it but I would like to point out that the blanket she is on was Kayla's when she was born!

Turkey hands

Kayla decided that it would be fun to trace her and her siblings hands yesterday to make a bunch of turkeys and make a cute little sign for Thanksgiving. She traced everyone's hands and had them color their own turkey. Well everyone but Hailey anyways. Kayla colored hers for her. Then she made up a little sign to stick them on and hang on our front door. It turned out really cute!

Hailey's birthmark

Today was Hailey's appt with the dermatologist up at The Children's Hospital in Denver. First of all, that place was HUGE! It's actually part of a gigantic campus of University Hospital so it takes up quite a bit of land. When you walk in the front door it's a bit like being in the food court of a mall or airport. Yeah, like the airport. Between the parking garage and entrances to the cars constantly pulling up to the front door to pick up or drop off someone or some family. So it was a little overwhelming in a sense when you walk in but I was immediately greeted by a lady asking what I was needing and pointing me to the correct desk to go to so that I could check in and get my parking validated so that I didn't have to pay for it. Then she sent us on our merry way to the 2nd floor where there are several specialists and their offices. They have this system of letters corresponding to each specialty and each letter has it's own waiting area. What's funny is as I am typing this it makes me think of one of those surreal movies where everything is controlled by robots and very exact. But it didn't actually feel that way! Anyways, they called us back almost immediately after we sat down. There were 2 nurses to check us in and get vitals and they were both very gracious. The nurse that took us back to the room actually pushed the stroller for me and asked where I wanted it parked. And then the best part, just before she left the room she asked me if there was anything I needed her to get or do so that I could be totally comfortable! WOW! For all the doctor offices I have been in I have never had that kind of service! And this is just for skin! I can only imagine how great they are with some of the patients in the scarier areas! Since this is a university hospital, we actually had a resident come in first to take a look at her. And then the regular doc came in. He was great too! So I guess it's safe to say that I have a great feeling about this place and Hailey going here.

So the diagnosis is that we are just going to leave it be. They took a picture of it to put in her file so that they have a baseline and can just watch it. I have to take her back when she is 1 yr old so they can see what it is or isn't doing at that point. They don't like to mess with birthmarks unless they absolutely have to. Those scenarios are if it is going to start forcing her eye shut or threatening the structure of her face. And once it has "gone away" if there is anything left in there, they may do something to get rid of that. So for now, we just wait. I am glad to at least have someone in this field to keep an eye on it in the long run but I am also glad that they don't just take these things off without thinking long term and what this thing is all about. I can see why my pediatrician recommended this office even though it is a drive!

Carrots!

Hailey got to try carrots for the first time. She isn't giving us the classic reaction to ANY food! But she is still cute and Kayla snapped a couple cute pictures of her with carrot all over her mouth so I still have to share. Call me crazy, but I love this part about babies, introducing new foods and slowly transitioning from bottle to solid food.

She's rockin.....but not rollin

One of Hailey's favorite thing to do these days is sit up on my lap and rock. It is too funny to watch her do it. She has figured out how to make herself lean forward and push backward. At first I thought she was doing it on accident! That is about all the movement you get out of that baby right now though! She isn't even close to rolling over. Which, really, I am ok with. I have 3 mobile children. To have the 4th stay put in one spot is a great thing for now! :)

Cereal

The Dr. gave us the go ahead to start feeding Hailey solids. So, as usual, we started with rice cereal. She doesn't get super excited about it but she seems to know what to do with it because very little ends up getting pushed back out of her mouth. Soon we will get to add the fun foods aka yellow/orange veggies. Those are the ones that my kids always loved!

Helmets and snowsuits

The guy across the street from us is in the process of doing a huge move and selling a ton of stuff in a garage sale. Yes people, it was that warm around here. There were garage sales happening last weekend! Anyways, he is a motorcyclist and must have had a spare helmet or two. Eli spent the entire weekend helping them with their garage sale and periodically came home with things they had given him. One of the things was a helmet. I walked into the living room to find him watching TV like this.......
And this is Hailey in her new winter coat/suit. I love putting babies in these things because they just look so darn cute in them! After I put it on her she kind of gave me this look like I was crazy for doing that to her.

Leaves!

Today was yet another gorgeous day here in beautiful Colorado! According to my computer the high was 72. Remember, this is Nov 2nd! The only way you can even tell it's fall around here is because the yards and now streets are starting to fill up with leaves. So the kids decided to make the most of it and went outside to play in the leaves. I swear this is the only time of year you will find kids everywhere WILLING to do some yard work! The kids would rake the leaves into a pile and then jump into them or throw them at each other. I think I will be picking leaves out of Emma's hair days! And you should have seen the tub at bath time! I don't know where she was hiding them!

Kayla jumping in

Emma "jumping" in. She is a little too short to jump so it was more like a run.

Eli jumping in. I LOVE this picture. It shows his care-free nature and the smile on his face is priceless.

Eli, Cassidy (lives next door), Kailey (lives across the street and I'm not entirely sure I spelled her name right!), Emma, Kayla and Hailey. The were taking a candy break here!

While this nice weather was good for Halloween and this whole weekend....enough already! We need snow!

Happy Halloween!

So despite the fact that I live in Colorado, have lived in Colorado for almost 31 yrs now (I was around 5 mo old when my family moved here) I just didn't feel like it was truly Halloween in Colorado. You see, Halloween to me always meant that it was either snowing, had been snowing or there was still ice on the ground from a snow fall a couple of days prior. Heck for years we would have had a snow fall by my birthday on the 18th! This year, we haven't even had a single snowflake hit the ground yet! Weird, very weird. As a matter of fact, it was so nice last night that JR and I only had to wear sweatshirts (matching I might add!) and the kids were fine without having to have layers on underneath the costumes! And typically, here in Colorado, we have to plan costumes for getting at least one warm layer under whatever you wear!

We usually trick-or-treat down our street and then one other street to the east of us. Don't know how we started going to the east except for maybe that you have to tackle a hill, albeit a small one, to go that direction and we didn't want to bother! Anyways, we obviously had Hailey in the stroller because I wasn't too interested in carrying her in the Bjorn. I debated on whether Emma should even participate since is only 2 and won't be eating most of the candy she gets. But I figured since she was able to say "trick-or-treat" and "thank you" that she could go ahead and do it. We started her out in her stroller but as soon as she got out at the first house, she didn't get back in! I think she walked about 3/4 of a mile once all was said and done! And we didn't even do both sides of the other street because it was so late! Of course, Kayla and Eli could have kept going. But every year we go to Nana's house so she can see the kids all dressed up.

Eli's costume from the front view.

And then the side view. That is a green glow stick in the jar to make it look like his head is in formaldehyde. However, it fell out a couple of houses down the street so it was in his candy bag the rest of the time.

Here are all 4 of them all dressed up and ready to start walking! Or riding! Kayla is dressed up as one of those High Voltage boxes, Eli is a man carrying his head in a jar, Emma is a dalmation and Hailey is Tigger.

This was some hard work for Hailey! She had to take a nap after a while!

All in all, it was a good night. Nice weather. Happy kids. Well until the end of the night and Emma was up past 8! JR did have to run back home halfway through to poke some more holes in Eli's costume because it was fogging up from him breathing!