Kater Tot

Kate, there is no doubt that your are already loved by many.  By just seeing all of the family members who came to your blessing you can tell.  What a wonderful day it was yesterday.  We all gathered together in the Relief Society room for your blessing.  You and I were one of the last to enter the room and when we came in I was nearly overcome by the spirit I felt there.  Every seat in the room was filled. We are so lucky to be a part of 2 really awesome families.

After your daddy gave you a really special blessing, we all went into the gym to have brunch.  You loved being held by everyone and we all loved being able to visit with one another.  You looked like an angel in your pretty white dress.

Just thinking about you being our youngest makes me think of myself.  I too was the caboose.  Luckily, I had tons of sisters just like you to look up to.  There have been many times that I have looked up to my sisters (and 1 brother) and have followed in their footsteps.  I am so lucky that they were such good examples for me.  I pray that your older sisters will be an example to you as well.  Just last week I called up my sister (Aunt Karen) to ask for some parenting advice.  After a few words of wisdom she said, "Jen, you know you now have more kids than I do!"  And to that I replied, "It doesn't matter, you are my older sister and I will always look up to you for advice.  You will always be an expert in my eyes just because you have gone before me."  I hope you always remember in life that you have many people to go to for help, starting with your sisters!  We love you, our little Kater Tot!

Count your blessings!

Baby Blessing number four is coming tomorrow.  As with each blessing, traditions are all around.  My favorite, of course, is going to pick out the dress with my mom and dad.  I don't want any more kids, but I would sure take this opportunity to spend such a special day with them over and over again.  Last Saturday our day started out by visiting the dress shop.  My mom and I looked together at countless beautiful dresses, setting aside the ones that could possibly be "the one".  Neeley and Kayla loved looking at all of the pretty dresses and voiced their opinions as well.  Once we picked out a select few we tried on our favorite to see if it was just right.  I couldn't help but think of another time in my girls lives when we will be trying a special white dress.  I think it will feel a bit like that day!  Kate looked so precious in it so we knew it was the one!  It gives me a nostalgic feeling just thinking about it.

After picking out the dress, we went to lunch together.  It was so nice to sit and visit with Mom and Dad.  I know that their lives are winding down and it makes me just want to hold on to each and every moment I get to spend with them.  

On the way home, the girls and I were talking about their blessing dresses.  I told them all about the days we went to pick out their special dresses.  They asked what we were going to do with them and I said that we could keep them and they could have their daughters wear them on their special blessing day.  It brought a tear to my eyes when they both stopped me and said that their daughters couldn't wear those dresses because they had to have the special time of picking out the dresses with me.  I guess you just can't stop a tradition, especially one as special as this.

Thanks Mom and Dad for a lovely day!  I love you both!

Evidence that I am a bad mom!

You are about to witness pure, unaltered evidence that I am a horribly bad mom.  I mean, what mom could send their kid to school looking like this?  How could any mom force her child to continue with a hair style when her child is weeping, whaling, gnashing her teeth at how horrible it is?  Just look at how revolting this hair is!  Neeley could not possibly be expected to leave the house with such a do.  What mother does this?  What mother would spend time curling a girls hair?  Come on, that is just awful.  It is a wonder we got Neeley out of the house this morning with such disgusting hair!!








This do, on the other hand, was OK for Neeley to be seen out in public with. I will never get it. And just think, I have 3 more lovely girls to do hair for!

Resurrecting!

Our house is going healthy.  In an effort to help me with my weight loss progression, I have decide to resurrect my  personal story about weight loss blog.    If you are interested in following along, please feel free.

Sweet Bliss!

Although you may be Daddy's little buddy by day (the only girl in the house that will watch football with Dad!), you have been my little buddy at night!  All of my other girls have been sleeping through the night by week 9, but not you.  You have been holding out, enjoying one more feeding during the middle of the night.  If you know me, you know that I need at least 8 hours of sleep during the night to survive.  I am very serious about sleep and the sleep my kids get so this was nearly throwing me over the edge.  Until this week of course.  You have finally decided that it is ok to sleep through the night.  I can't tell you how blissful it was the first night when I woke up and realized that you were still sleeping.  Now we are on day 6 of you sleeping all night and so I can finally believe that it is here to stay.  I love being able to feed you at 10 p.m. and not see you again until at least 7 a.m.  Now we just need to work on dropping that 10 o'clock feeding and we can have date night without a third wheel!!  So, even though it did take you until week 14 to sleep all night, I am thankful it is here!  Sleep well little one, because heaven knows I will!!!

Head Over Heals!

Neeley and Kayla have loved tumbling this year.  We couldn't wait to see what they had learned at their winter display.  Kayla was so proud when she started out marching down the mat with her candy cane stick.  That is until she poked herself in the eye with it and refused to do any more.  Luckily Neeley's class performed after Kayla's and by then Kayla got brave enough to try out a few tricks for us.  We were surprised to see how much Neeley has improved and loved seeing her be so confident out there.  We are proud of them both for all of their hard work.  And a special thanks to Grandma and Grandpa Greyhair and Grandma and Grandpa Marlene and Bruce for their support!

Baking Fun!

Thanks to Aunt Janell for giving us this fun cookie baking set for Christmas.  The girls loved digging in and helping to make some delicious cookies.  If it were up to them, they would be on the counter every day baking with me.  I think they take after Grandma Marlene!

Giddy Up Good Sport!

Being the only man in a house full of girls, Jeremy is really a good sport.  The girls love his tickles and have been known to tackle him a time or two.  Thanks Daddy for loving us even if we are a pack of girls!!

Life without Chocolate!

Is there such a thing???  Life without chocolate???   After 6 weeks of screaming the nights away, we decided to take Kate to the doctor.  He suggested that I try going completely off of any dairy products - cheese, milk, butter.  But he also said I had to stay away from anything that had a milk based product in it like casein, whey, lactase, ghee and the list goes on.  So for the last 2 months I have abandoned all milk based products, which by the way, is not so easy to do.  Milk is in everything.  In most packaged items and bread  but also in surprising things like my favorite soy based sausage, lunch meats or Jolly Rancher candies.  I find myself reading every label and get really excited when I find something I can eat.  Kate also does not like nuts, onions and some soy based proteins.  So that leaves me with a lots of limitations when it comes to quick proteins. 

 I have been trying to balance my proteins with my sugars so I can keep my metabolism going and lose weight but I am having a hard time with on the go snacks.  I used to grab a cheese stick, some low sugar yogurt, a protein shake or a few nuts.  Now I feel like I have to cook a chicken breast and carry it around with me.  I have been trying to keep a pot of bean soup  around for a quick meal and hummus for snacks but that is getting old. 

Since the formula she would have to go on is so expensive, I would really like to continue nursing.  So I have 3 more months to go before I can try to introduce milk back into my diet.  If anyone out there has any suggestions for good fast snacks that include protein but exclude milk, I could use some ideas! 

So in the mean time we are going to keep loving our little angel who has been a completely different baby since we lost the milk.    And this cute picture of Kate in her pink and CHOCOLATE brown is the closest we will come to chocolate for a while.  Yes life does go on without chocolate.

Best Buds!

We love having built in best buds.  Kayla and Cade love playing together.  It is fun to hear them talk to each other when they call each other "Sweetie".  They can play for hours, get into mischief together and help one another play DS games.  We have even heard rumours of them getting married one day.

Lilah and Austin have a love hate relationship.  They like to chase each other around and steal toys from each other. Today when I caught them holding hands, I thought it was so cute!