What a Wonderful 2007!

We are trying to get back to the swing of things here in Michigan. I can't say that I am anxious to get back to the EST schedule. I love that the boys are sleeping in past 9am. Bedtime isn't even that much later than usual. We'll have to shape up by Wednesday since that's Lathan's first day back to school.

We had a wonderful time over the Christmas holiday. There are so many cute photos to tell the story, so I will leave it at that and let you look for yourself. Some of you may have noticed that I didn't post any pics to highlight our 2007 yet, but I will do it this week - I promise.

These are pics from Golden Gate Park in San Francisco.



Lathan finally got to go fishing with Uncle Peter.

At Dito's place in SF

A fun-filled day at SF Discovery Museum!

Jay just hangin'. Notice Lathan's name in the background (he realized he didn't have enough room to put his full name, so he improvised and put "Lathi." Do they teach preschool kids that at school?





An man making art out of rocks, bricks, etc. and teaching Lathan how to do it.

The boys "swimming" w/ the shark. The beach was so much fun and SO beautiful that day!


Jay flying high! Finally, Christmas Day!!!

Christmas at home in MI. Arriving at the airport BEFORE our flight and the boys were already tired.

I saved my favorite video for last... ENJOY!

We hope your Christmas was awesome and we hope for an even better New Year!
HAPPY 2008!!!

Dave's Take

Hello Michigan.....Goodbye California.

Anyway, we had a wonderful Christmas and enjoyed our time with family and friends. Due to our limited time we apologize to anyone that we didn't get to visit with. With both Griselda's and my families in town there was a lot of catching up to do. Of course you are all more than welcome to make the trip out to Detroit for a fun filled reunion......hehehehe. Not many takers I presume.

Jeydan just hasn't been the same since our trip. He is much more active. Always wants to be standing. Always trying to grab something, do something, say something. He is just a cute chubby little boy and not so much a baby anymore.

Kaelan is doing great making it now more than two weeks without any night time accidents. This includes the three days that he has slept in until 10 am since getting back from California. I think that towards the end that he was starting to get quite attached to Kathryn and loved her attention and kitty.

Lathan is rapidly becoming a great counter and constantly working on his spelling. Lathan's dream came true when he was able to go fishing with uncle Peter. Unfortunately they were able to catch anything; however, Lathan got a chance to reel in the bait a couple of times.

The boys all love their presents and were very sad that they had to come home from California. They all loved their aunts and uncles and especially loved playing with the cars at Nana's and Pop's house. They also got to visit the Discovery Center north of San Francisco with Dito and Lucy and truthfuly could have spent the whole day their at any one of the exhibits.

Griselda had a wonderful Christmas as well. She didn't get much sleep in California because Jeydan got his internal clock so messed up that he was waking up every two hours having to be fed. Luckily she got to go to the beach for a beautiful sunny day of pick me up and sun exposure. It was a December Detroit dream come true.

I too had a great Christmas. I don't know how people travel with multiple small children. If you get to the airport too early they are crabby and all over the place in the airplane. If you get there too late you are high tailing it through the airport trying to make your flight. Neither of which make for a fun five hour plus flight. Griselda got me a lot of stuff to help me work out especially in the cold. I got a heart rate monitor, apple ipod shuffle, winter bicycle gloves, and cleats for running in the ice. I think that she is trying to tell me to exercise or something.

Anyway, the holidays have been kind to us. I hope that everyone else had fun this holiday season.

Dave

Week of December 10th

Two things...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JEREMY!!! We hope you have a wonderful birthday. It's a perfect birthday day for us, even though no one here has a birthday until February. Why you ask?

It's a SNOW DAY! We woke up to about a foot of snow everywhere, so the bishopric canceled church for today. That's rare. It's a mixed thing because I do enjoy church, but I am loving a whole day just for family. It actually a 2-day weekend!

We woke up this morning and shoveled the walkways and driveway. I pushed all the snow off the trampoline so it wouldn't have all that weight. That was much more difficult than I anticipated because we have the mesh fence that surrounds it, so I had only one little doorway to push all the snow out. A surprise workout for a Sunday morning. We have a fire going now and I am loving a relaxing day without having to get dressed up for church.

This past week was full of late nights as David mentioned earlier, but now I think I'm over the "hump" of Christmas planning. I just have to worry about a few more things before we head off to Cali for Christmas break. The week was pretty mellow, but the boys did get to participate in a service activity with the Primary at a local retirement community. They sang songs and ate lots of cookies. At one point Lathan gave me a scowl and said that "Only Primaries can sit and sing songs." He wasn't too happy about Kaelan sitting in and joining in on the merry Christmas carols.

This weekend has been full of fun activities. Friday Dave and I were able to go to a fancy Christmas party put on by the hospital. We went out to dinner with some friends beforehand and were mostly unable to eat all the delicious desserts they had because we were so full. We did take home lots as they provided to-go boxes to fill with their yummy treats. Then on Saturday we went to Cheeseburger in Paradise for a dinner with my co-workers at the gym. It was just a couple of the swim instructors, not the entire gym staff or anything. We brought the whole gang since we left them with the babysitter the night before. They loved it and did very well considering how long we were there. They are very well behaved when fries are in front of them.

Today since we have so much extra time as a family, we decided to open some presents as it is very "Christmasy" with the snow and Dad being home and all. We opened Dito & Lucy's backpacks for the kids. We will be brining those along on our flight to Cali. They love them and do not part with them easily. We also opened our books from Nana & Pop. We love them, thank you! We hope to bring those along as well. We realize the only way we could break them out on the flight is if we drug our children, though. Wishful thinking. Finally, we opened the hand puppets from the grandparents also. They love them (see picture). Thank you guys for your thoughtfulness. We are stopping there with the presents until our return (though I must say it was difficult to stop).

Later tonight I will be posting the "Best of" highlights for 2007. It will be just pictures mostly. We look forward to hearing from you and have a wonderful New Year!!!
Hot chocolate got the best of Kaelan after the snow fun. Lathan has a slight sugar high from the hot chocolate and chocolate advent calendar we've been using, so he couldn't stand still.



Love to you all,
griselda

Dave's Take

It is snowing outside right now. There is probably about 1/2 a foot of snow on the ground. Yesterday I finally raked up all the leaves in the yard. A harder job than it sounds because once leaves get wet they get matted down and then they freeze and it is like chipping ice off the lawn. Not a pleasant experience. To make matters worse, it was below thirty degrees and started to snow at the time. It sucked. Last time I procrastinate.......well ......

Jeydan is still the same little giant. He finally started to occasionally sleep through the night this week. Unfortunately, Griselda was working hard at getting Christmas cards and presents finished and was up at all hours anyway. Too bad.

Kaelan is our little old man. He is soo pensive and quiet....ok maybe not SO quiet but at least he is pensive. Well, at least he appears pensive. He ALWAYS bites his fingers while eating at least once a day. He just loves his food. Keeps chomping away. Then, BAM, biting and crying. So sad but soooo funny at the same time. His greatest accomplishment is making it through the night with a dry pull up diaper. Some times he is great sometimes not so great.

We made Lathan learn how to count to twenty this week. He has always been very good with letters and can sign his own name if asked, but he has always struggled a little with numbers. At his school his friends all stay until after lunch but lathan goes home right before lunch.We made Lathan a deal that if he could count to twenty he would be able to stay for lunch one day. After two weeks and really no interest on Lathan's part, he came home, rattled off the 1-20 count and said that he wanted to eat lunch with his "buddies."

Griselda has had a few late nights this week to say the least. She is constantly doing something. Cleaning the house so the baby sitter doesn't see our mess. Searching online for the perfect gift. Trying to cook dinner so the boys are fed. This weekend she finally got to sleep in (still sleeping right now in fact), got to go out with her work friends last night for dinner, and also got to get dressed up and go to my company's Christmas party. A little reprieve in a tumultuous pre-vacation melee.

I am the same old Dave. Working plenty. Sleeping little. Enjoying the family and job. Excited to go home. Anxious for warmer weather. Awaiting the day when I can move from Michigan and get a real job.

Hope that you are enjoying your holidays. Enjoy whatever vacation you can. Look for further updates in a week or two.

I'm going back to Cali, Cali, Cali....I am going back to Cali.......

Dave

Dave's Take 12/9/ 07

So, there has been some exciting news in the Michigan Skeehan family. Thanks to Griselda's hard work and long hours searching on the internet she found tickets to California for something significantly more reasonable than what has been offered in the past. To make a long story short, we are flying to California for a few days this Christmas holiday. We will be leaving on the 20th and flying home late on the 25th. Everyone is very excited.

Lathan is probably the most excited. First, he gets to see Nana and Pops, our new names for Grandma and Grandpa. Second, he gets to see uncle Peter. He has been praying for about two years now that uncle Peter will take him fishing. I think that we will have to set up a day in Santa Cruz so that Lathan can fish off of the warf.

Kaelan is Kaelan. A little bruiser. Still picks on Lathan occasionally with his hitting and throwing. Lathan gets tired of it after a while and yells at him but for the most part those two play very well. Kaelan is starting to get a little disappointed everyday when Griselda drops Lathan off at school. He is dying to go with him and keeps insisting that he needs to go with Lathan to school. Griselda is starting to agree with him.

Jeydan is still eating, sleeping, and growing like a weed. Still one of our biggest boys yet. True to the Skeehan boy mold, he has no interest in crawling, hates belly time, and would rather stand or walk wherever he needs to go (not that he is walking yet.) Anyway, he is a big boy. Loves to eat people's hair, including Lathan and Kaelan's.

Griselda is on a natural high right now. She has been looking all over online for two things which she managed to find this week at incredible deals. The airline tickets you already know about. The other thing is a dress. She has been searching for new dresses for a while. She went to Nordstrom Rack last week and found some cute ones but took most of them back after the in house modeling episode. She then went online and ordered a bunch. They arrived Friday. She tried them on. She liked a few but then the size or length wasn't quite right. Anyway, she ordered four dresses and kept one. We took the rest back to Nordstrom yesterday. Afterwards we happened to stop in Macy's found a dress far better than any she had tried on for exactly the same price. Then she found one that she had liked from Nordstrom but return because she couldn't justify the price. Now she found the same dress in Macy's for half the online price. So she ran to the register and found out that both dresses were another 60% off. She was jumping up and down like a cheerleader at a football game. Smiling from ear to ear. Then she got to go out with her girlfriends last night for dinner and had a blast. She is definitely in good spirits in spite of the gloomy Michigan weather.

I am still doing the same thing. Hot lights and cold steel pretty much is my job description now. Looking forward to finishing this residency year and being the top dog next year. Better hours, more cases, and more control.

Anyway, this is our last post probably for this year. We will be seeing a bunch of you at Christmas. Our Christmas cards should be going out soon. Love to you all and Happy Holidays!

Dave, Griselda, and the Boys

Finally some new photos and stuff

Kaelan after several swigs of hot cocoa. I had to get in the picture to assist Santa.

Jay with Dave's headlamp. The boys at the end of our Thanksgiving weekend.

Kaelan sick at Judy's house. Kaelan wearing Dad's shirts after puking on his own clothes.

Jay with Jacie giving his bro some love.

I wanted to post some new photos of our Thanksgiving holiday and stuff, but don't really have time to elaborate about my week. It was busy in mostly a good way, but hectic nonetheless.

Our holiday was great. We went to a good friend's house and loved the food and company. Couldn't really ask for more, except maybe a few more deals on Black Friday. We did well, though. Poor Kaelan was sick that morning and Dave was a sport and looked after him while he puked. In the interim he wasn't suffering too bad as he spent the majority of the time playing video games with his buddy and allowing Lathan to participate in the not-for-little-kids ultra-violent game. Now all my precious baby wants to do is shoot to kill for fun. Let's just say that Mama wasn't pleased with this decision; but he did take care of Kaelan. You win some, you lose some, right?

This past week the kids and I hit the local city center to celebrate the Christmas season and to see Santa while David was moonlighting. It was so cold! Luckily we saw some friends because every one of the boys was crying (the shriek-scream crying, too) - all for different reasons. Jay wanted to nurse AND his hands were ice-cold. Lathan was upset because his hot chocolate got knocked over and Kaelan wanted a refill on his hot chocolate. I couldn't satisfy any of those needs because we were waiting for Santa outside with no hot chocolate and it was too bitter cold for Jay to nurse. Once we made it inside in the line, my friends took the two big boys and I nursed Jay in the back. It was quite the scene.

We had Steven's parents come over for dinner on Friday and let the boys play. It was fun for everyone, but always awkward with tired babies. Dave knew how hard I had worked without him around for the whole week, so he let me try on dresses at the local Nordstrom Rack for fun. I bought David's gift while I was out, too. It was a great afternoon. David gets muchos creditos for getting invited to a Red Wings game with his buddies and turning it down (of his own volition because I said it was fine) while I was out for "me" time because he felt that I was solo-parenting enough as it was. What a guy (thanks Bill and Lynda!).

Today was rough with the boys overspent in many ways. I fell asleep in the cushy chair nursing Jay and didn't notice anything apparently for about 40 minutes. Dave said he read the whole Friend Magazine to the boys right there next to me and I never flinched. I had several epiphanies this evening that I wanted to share, but so much for my brain function. I can't remember not even one right now. Perhaps some other time. We were happy to catch the Christmas Devotional tonight, even amongst squirmy, impatient children. It was lovely.

I am so excited to have our Christmas cards sent out this week. You will be hearing from me if I don't have a current address. Please email me if you know I don't. Love to you all,

-griselda

Dave's Take

Winter is definitely here in Michigan. We finally got our first ice , and snow storm, although a small one, and then today came out of church to a pretty heavy down pour. There is an old saying in Michigan that if you don't like the weather just wait a minute or two because it will change. Anyway....

Jeydan is growing up pretty quick. Still loves his baby food. Can't stand any belly time. Wants to be held as much as possible. And is now starting to tilt his head to the side whenever he is trying to flirt with someone.

Kaelan is our problem child right now, although Lathan is not too far behind. These two are masterminds at disobeying recently. You say to not do something and the next thing that you know, one or both of them is/are doing exactly what you don't want them to do. Hopefully it is just a phase but man is there going to be some purchasing of big wooden spoons to start carrying around the house, if you know what I mean. The bigger the spoon the better the spank is the philosophy that my mom used to have.

Griselda is doing great. She is about to lose it on the boys though. If they don't shape up I feel that they are going to get a glimpse first hand what kind of passion and anger a latina girl can bring to the table.

I am doing great. Trying to get into shape. It is a lot harder than I seem to remember. I got to spend a lot of time with the boys this weekend and was able to let Griselda get out and shop a little. Griselda has decided to wrap any package that comes to our house right now. That means that I have no idea what package has come and which package hasn't because Griselda wont share that kind of info with me. Should make for a pretty fun Christmas. Wish that you all could be here, but we understand that Christmas in Detroit isn't exactly what people would picture the ideal Christmas as being. Anyway, your loss.

Hope everyone is doing great.

Love,

Dave

Quick Update

Two things.

First and foremost, Happy Birthday Peter! Hope that you are having fun and not feeling too old.

Second, we have had some difficulty uploading videos and so no new videos tonight. Expect Griselda's blog in the next few days. She just has too much going on.

Dave

Dave's Take

So, one more week gone by....just a year and 7.25 months to go until I am officially graduated and entering the work force. Not that I am counting or anything.

Anyway, this was a great week. Baby J now is getting two more of his top teeth in bringing the total to 6 (4 on top, 2 on bottom). He continues to grow like a normal baby does except that he is incredibly heavy. He is really starting to down his baby food and doesn't like to watch others eat unless he is eating also. Still no crawling. I think that we are destined to have no babies that crawl. Everyone just starts walking. Crazy if you ask me.

Kaelan still stutters when he gets really excited often causing me to do my rendition of a rain main impersonation. Griselda hates it and smacks me everytime. His vocabulary is growing every time he is out interacting with other people. So much so, that every once in a while he will say something that will stop you in your tracks and make you take a double take. Doing great with the whole potty training thing. He is still wearing pull ups at night but has managed to keep them dry for the whole week. Pretty exciting.

Lathan is Lathan. Growing up right in front of our eyes. Loves school. Helpful around the house. Unfortunately, not aware of how much bigger than Kaelan he is and occasionally Kaelan finds out the hard way.

Griselda is working out and getting back into shape. Currently she is at ward conference meetings and left me alone with the boys. Something that she still does with a little hesitation. Man does she love our kids; however, the two older boys were at each others throats all day yesterday, so she went out and took some time off last night. She was suprised that I even offered it to her. So she got to go out to dinner without a husband or children. She said that she didn't know what to do with herself. She could eat a lot or a little, fast or slow, all without any consequences of abandoning her children. She said that it was a little sliver of heaven and just what she needed.

I am doing great. Griselda let me go to the church activity....ie. watching the BYU Utah football game. What a boring game. It only got exciting in the last half of the 4th quarter. Utah goes up and then throws the game away on a HUGE coverage mistake, a couple of questionable calls, and a good BYU running game. Oh well. Every dog has its day. I was the only Utah fan there and got a lot of flack for my celebration of the Utah touchdown once BYU came back to win it. Anyway, I have to run. Look for Griselda's blog later on.

Dave

My Take

So, I was on call this weekend but got next weekend off. Had a couple of great cases go to the OR so I ended up winning for two reasons: thanksgiving off and good OR cases.

Nothing really new and exciting happening here in michigan. It finally decided to get cold. Still waiting for all the leaves to fall of the tree so that we can clean it all up. Jeydan is growing like a weed. Really taking to the baby food. He got his top teeth over this weekend. Lathan and Kaelan got to go to one of the inflatable fun parks and had a blast. Made for a really fun afternoon and a crabby night. I ended up falling asleep with the boys while watching ratatollule or however it is spelled. We are pretty excited for thanksgiving. The holidays are always alot of fun. Hopefully everyone has time to spend with family and friends this holiday season. Wish everyone could be here. Maybe we will have to move a little closer with our next move.

Dave

Week of November 12th

This week was not too out of the ordinary. We went about our lives as usual with nothing that really sticks out. Monday was my teaching day. I was exhausted that day and took almost a 2 hour nap. The boys treated me that day, for sure.

Tuesday was a beautiful Fall day. A friend from Lathan's school mentioned that she would probably head to the park since it was so nice. So the boys and I went and ate lunch, then played at the park. It really was a beautiful day. So wonderful. It reminded me so much of CA. Once we arrived home, we all napped as it was a draining afternoon, playing so hard and all. Since it was Tuesday, it was swimming day and the boys were unwilling to give up the swimming since it was already planned. I already had my fill of recreation, but I thought since they were up for it, they would sleep really well that night and they could fine tune their swimming skills. It was a lot of fun. Lathan surprises me every time we go with how much more confident and skilled he is in the water. He actually swims now. I don't think he could really go for more than 10 yards, but he's doing awesome. This is the same boy who didn't want to put his face in hardly six months ago. At the end of our fun, it was a trying experience for me because the boys were miserably tired. They wouldn't cooperate since they wanted me to everything for them. Then Lathan was very contentious and wanted to pick a fight with everyone. He does that when he's tired (a lot like Abuelo, I think). So I told him I think I'm done with swimming for a little bit. The boys got to bed late and we forgot the fun we had with all the drama afterward, but I was glad to see the boys tired from having a full day of fun.

Wednesday was my night with the Young Women. We made a huge dish of green bean casserole for the missionaries (since they told us that was their favorite) to help them feel a little more at home for Thanksgiving. They still had some left when I asked them today. I'm telling you we made A LOT. That was interesting because once we made it, only then did it dawn on me that we still needed to get it to the missionaries; but how? Well, they met me at home. Thankfully I didn't have to do a wild goose chase to find their place - that was for the next night.

Thursday I had to visit two YW families with the Stake YW President to prepare for Ward Conference this coming week. We really had only one night we could both do it, so the families were nice enough to let us visit on such short notice. For the first house, the address we had in the directory was wrong. It was missing a crucial number. The house had 5 digits and my address had 4, so we knew we were on the right street, we just didn't know which house. After some frustrating cell phone issues, I was able to get Dave to help me from home in finding them. We visited, then were already 30 minutes late for the 2nd house. On top of that, I took some wrong turn and ended up VERY far from where I needed to be. We arrived there fine, but an hour late. I felt horrible. We couldn't stay long because I had to nurse Jay. I was beat after the stress of driving at night in a total unfamiliar place with really an almost stranger as a companion. She was nice and patient, but I felt like a doofus.

Friday we had a nice time with Dave's coworker's house celebrating Thanksgiving with the work posse. The food was delicious. We were smart this year and brought our own alcohol-free bubbly to join in the fun. I didn't cook anything, just bought rolls from the fancy grocery store and warmed them in the oven - perfect. We fed the boys before we left so we wouldn't have to force them to eat strange dishes (like green-bean casserole). We had a good time. The good thing about being there was another resident called the house saying he couldn't make it because his toddler was puking and he actually needed to trade weekends since he was on call the next day and was stuck since his wife was working (a dentist) and he couldn't drop a sick kid off at the babysitters. Dave turned to me and asked if he could switch and I immediately said no (I wasn't prepared to lose Dave for the weekend); but then I remembered he was working Thanksgiving weekend (Sat-Sun). So I said, oh yes, please, if he'll take that weekend, please switch. The man was desperate and switched. So Yay!!! Sad that I lost him this weekend, but happy to have a 4-day weekend next week. That is awesome. I really think that was divine intervention because later I thought how miserable it would have been to pull off Ward Conference weekend w/o David. I have to be there 1.75 hours early for the meeting before church and then present my part (with kids, no less) then survive church, and then stay 1 hour after church for the Stake YW leaders to have a meeting with me (with kids, also). I would have to make lunch AND dinner on that schedule. That would be a total of about 6 hours at church with no beds for nap, no food to really munch on and ALL my bags that I have to lug around to fulfill my duties. I think I would have to pre-pack and drop off the night before. Sadly, I am thankful for the sick toddler.
Saturday we went to a toys-for-tots party hosted by a family from Lathan's school. The boys had a great time. It was nice to get out and get our wiggles out. David met us there and we went to REI from there for fun to look at their sales.

Today was miserable with no David (and there were no meetings!) and all the kids. Thankfully, Jay is cute enough that when I need help, people are willing to hold him while we do a potty run. We made it home in one piece, but we were exhausted. So the boys all went down a little earlier than usual. This next week will be nice - only two days before the weekend for us!! Woo-hoo!! I didn't think I would like vacation this much once I started having school-age children. It's different when you have to do the driving, I guess.

We would love hear from you. I LOVE the comments (thanks Judy!), so comment away!

FYI: I tried uploading some funny videos of our week, but the blog was having issues. I'll save them for next time.

-griselda

Week of November 5th

So these are my cutest boys on a typical Sunday morning. They couldn't resist their little bro and his adorable juiciness.



This is Kaelan sharing his "manta" with his little bro, who is also quite the fan of his own little "manta." Thanks Nana.

This is our clan messing around at home and the friend next to Lathan is Steven. Many of you may be familiar with Lathan's best bud from school, Steven. This is them together on the last day of school last year after their "Harlequin" musical performance - hence their effeminate garb.
ere we have Baby J eating one of his first vegetable meals about 2 weeks ago.
This is Kaelan dancing in the pool with Dad at the Hilton in Niagara Falls.Lathan doing fun drills at soccer over the summer.
JJ getting lots of love this morning before church.

Ok, so now that you've seen the pictures, I'll give you my week rundown. Everything has settled tremendously since most of my duties for church are completed for the year, so my letters will be rather boring. A good thing in my opinion.

I still teach swimming on Mondays, so once that was out of the way (along with a decent workout, thankfully) I went about my day as usual. I knew that I was having a meeting w/ my church cohorts that next day, so I aimed to clean the downstairs fairly well. We stayed up WAY TOO LATE cleaning a stack of many papers. It was worth it, but very draining. I went to bed at 2:30 am. I knew I was going to have a madhouse the next day, so I wanted some order on my end.

This past Tuesday was election day, so all the schools were closed. That allowed me to host 6 additional kids (older and younger) that day. I lost my breath when I saw the basement. Toys were EVERYWHERE and some were even disassembled. It was worse than a tornado. I almost felt like crying because I didn't know where to start. We at least had a great meeting, but the cleanup was anything but. Lathan helped me after I picked him up from school and he kept asking me why the "babies" left such a mess. I said I didn't know why; but perhaps they were not taught to clean up after themselves. I told him he better clean up after himself when visiting friends. It was a good teaching moment because he did not like cleaning up a mess he didn't create. Because he was my helper, he earned $2. He has been asking to do chores around the house in addition to what is required because he wants to earn money. I thought this was a bit greedy at first; but then he mentioned that he wanted to give all his money to the Wells of Love at school. This is a project where the kids donate money to other kids in Africa who are in need of clean water. The money helps build suitable wells for them. How sweet, especially for a 4 year old. So he earned his money on the cleanup. I was having a fabric cutting "party" at my house the next day for a Super Saturday craft thing at the church and Lathan kindly reminded me to tell the babies to clean up when they finish playing. Noted.


Wednesday I cut fabric for a cute handbag I was going to finish at the Super Saturday (SS). Once I completed that I went about my day as usual, going to a YW mutual activity that night.

Thursdays I now teach in the evening at the gym. That was a difficult day because getting kids onto my teaching schedule for the evening after naps, but before dinner is never a pleasant task. They survived, but I found myself struggling with what felt like flu-like symptoms. I managed and even eked out a decent workout afterward.

Friday was awesome 'cause well, it was Friday. Saturday I accomplished many cute crafts and was able to have several hours of me time in the process. It was a welcome change and a nice break for me. Saturday night we went out to a friend's house for pizza and games. That was a lot of fun, too. We never go out it seems, and even more infrequent is socializing with friends on a weekend. We hit them both this time! What a great time for us.

Today was fun and funny. We had a ward council meeting that Dave and I had to attend, so the kids came with and it was a little overwhelming; so I said my piece, then took off to take care of kids. JJ exploded out of his diaper in all directions in his cute - coordinating no less - clothes. All I could salvage was the sweater vest; so he wore a sweat suit one piece and then I added the sweater vest to make it more church appropriate. It was quite the mismatch spectacle for me. We came home, had a good friend, whose husband is in China, for dinner. The kids had a very good time, but then kid-exhaustion set in from our long day today and we all said goodnight. Dave in the meantime left to help a fellow ward member clean out his basement. This man is 97 years old and lived in his basement with his dog and neither left to do their business (but at least the man had is own toilet). It was so bad they called on all priesthood holders to give a helping hand to finish the cleanup today. A funny story from tonight: as we were getting ready for bedtime, Lathan and Kaelan were commenting how long their hair was when Dad added that his hair was long too. The kids laughed and disagreed, so Dave said jokingly, "where did it go, then?" Lathan came back with his most honest response, "It all went to your chest, Daddy." We laughed for a while over that one.

We hope you had a fun week, too. We want to hear from you!
Love,
Griselda