last day of school!

Brigham's gap-tooth smile-- isn't he adorable?



Joseph's response to my question bout how he feels about school being out. Hmm, thumbs down, but a huge smile on his face?



Quilt. Don't look too closely at the placement of the various squares.



Closer view



Hello there, Snakey!



He's not sure about being captured by humans.



Now he's REALLY ticked off! He really hated my camera and kept striking at it.


Hi everyone,
Yes, I'm still here! I just haven't been on top of things enough to be able to update this week. Mosey loves the computer and he seems to monopolize it during the day, and at night, I'm just too tired!

We had a fun week. Last Saturday the boys found a garter snake in the backyard. They kept it Saturday and Sunday, and wanted to keep it longer, but it is hard to keep garter snakes because their normal diet is small amphibians, and it's hard to provide all the nutrients they need in more accessible pet foods. They really loved that snake, though, and have been asking all week if they can get a snake. Um, no. Now is NOT the time for another pet! And while the boys loved the snake, I'm just not really a snake person. I don't hate them, I'm not really afraid, I just don't *like* them.

I think I was kind of sick over the weekend. Or having residual symptoms from the spinal tap, I just had the worst headaches Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, which my usual headache remedies wouldn't touch. Sunday morning it was so bad, I was actually feeling nauseated, so I stayed home from church. Seems to be better now, thank goodness.

Monday was Memorial Day. In the morning I took the boys to see Prince Caspian (the new Narnia movie). We LOVED it! Joseph didn't want to go at first because he wanted to see Indiana Jones, but I made him go, and afterwards his words were, "That was the BEST movie EVER!" :-)
I loved it too. It was fabulous. The boys have just finished a "castle" unit at school, learning about castle life and knights and everything, so this movie played right into that. Brigham is so funny, during the intense scenes, when the music is loud and intense, I would look over and he would be standing up, kind of bouncing on his feet and sort of singing/shouting "Dun dun, dun dun, dun dun," sounding like the soundtrack to Jaws. He was just so engrossed, he couldn't help but contribute to the intensity himself.

We got a medium popcorn and sprite, which was so huge it was enough for me and the three boys. In fact, more than enough. Mosey probably drank more of the Sprite than anyone else (Mosey can drink more than most adults), and sure enough, 3/4 through the movie, he had to go pee. I did NOT want to take him. First of all, I didn't want to leave the movie! Second, walking is just hard, and I knew I had to make it all the way out of the theater myself, and didn't want to push it by traipsing to and from the restroom. So I did a completely uncivilized and digusting thing. I told him to pee in the empty drink cup. Mosey of course thought it was hilarious, and I didn't have to leave my seat! I think 4 years old it sort of pushing it for antics like that. But I don't think anyone saw, and even if they did, I guess they just have a good story to tell now. He ended up having to go AGAIN before the end of the movie, and by the time he was done, that huge cup was probably halfway filled again. At the end of the movie, Brigham picked up the cup, but I grabbed it back from him and told him he couldn't drink it. He asked me why, and I sort of hissed at him, "Because there's pee in it!" People were filing out of the theater around us, and of course Brigham practically yells, "What? Why is there PEE in the cup??" So I'm trying to shush him, saying I'll tell him later, and surreptitiously throw the cup away, trying to make sure it remains upright in the trash can. So anyway, that's pretty disgusting. What kind of kids am I raising anyway? :-)

We had some friends from the ward over in the afternoon for a barbecue. The kids all stayed out in the pool almost non-stop from 3:00 PM until 7:45 PM. The boys LOVE the pool. They come home from school, go straight out back and pretty much get straight into the pool and stay out there until I make them get out.

This was the last week of school for the boys. On Thursday they had a "Beach Day." They stayed outside pretty much the whole day, playing water games and eating lunch. They've been bringing home all their artwork and school work and supplies. Hard to believe this year is over! They'll be home in about 40 minutes and that's it for 1st grade! I sent them to school with a disposable camera so they can take pictures of their friends and teachers.

Joseph helped me make a necklace and bracelet for his teacher, and I made a baby quilt for Brigham's teacher (she's having a baby in July). Brigham had a vision for the quilt, and I tried to reproduce it as well as I could. He came with me to the store and helped pick out all the material. It's the first time I have made a pieced quilt. Not intricately pieced, just squares. It was really fun, but lots of work. You have to buy and wash all the fabrics, iron them, cut out the squares, sew the squares together, iron again, and then assemble the quilt. And I'm a little neurotic about stuff and I had to sit down and mathematically figure out how to arrange all the color squares so that I didn't end up with two of the same fabric on the same row, or have too many of the same color clustered together. And even then, I still messed up. I didn't think about rotating the quilt 90 degrees, but when I did, I suddenly had a few rows with 2 squares of the same fabric. Oh well! Next time I'll do better. My sister-in-law Angee makes the cutest baby quilts, and she told me she doesn't duplicate any fabric squares! Wow! My quilt was 6 across and 8 down, so 48 squares. As it was, I had 7 types of red, 7 types of blue, and 6 types of white (July baby, so a red, white, and blue quilt). So I had at least 2 or 3 squares of the same fabric. It was fun, we'll see if I can go back to my regular tied quilts after doing a pieced quilt.

On Wednesday night, the Priests and Laurels from our ward came and painted our deck! Can you believe that? They did a great job. We used a latex-based stain and it looks great. Now it's all set for our party tomorrow morning. I think tomorrow will be fun, it's supposed to be HOT, so I think I'm going to have to stay inside most of the time.

Joseph got invited to ANOTHER party at Inflatable Wonderland, and I just couldn't take the inequity anymore, so I called the mom and told her about Brigham and asked if he could go too, and she said of course he could. So I told him this morning that he was invited to Dalton's party too! He just stood there silently for a minute so I asked him if he was excited, and he said, "I'm so excited, I can't even talk!!!" So he's going to get to a party this year after all.

Oh yeah, Brigham lost one of his top front teeth. Did I tell you Joseph lost his other top front tooth a couple weeks ago? It got really loose after being head-butted by Mosey, and fell out in a few days. He lost another one of the teeth on the side, so he had three missing across the top. He was pretty cute and funny looking. His two front teeth are starting to come in now. He's going to look so grown up! So anyway, Brigham was feeling a little down about not losing any of his top front teeth. Then last week Joseph "accidentally-on-purpose" paid it forward and punched Brigham in the mouth. Brigham was crying and very upset, until he realized that the punch knocked one of his front teeth loose. Then the tears magically stopped, and he actually started saying, "Thank you for punching me in the mouth, Joseph!" Funny boy. So he was really hoping it would fall out before school was out so he could show off his missing space to his friends. I guess a missing top front tooth gets comes with major bragging rights in the first grade. Destiny was smiling on him, and he lost it as he was eating his cereal on Wednesday morning. So now he has a gap-toothed smile too! He's so cute.

Have a great weekend everyone. I was asked to give the closing prayer at Stake Conference on Sunday. I'm a little nervous, but a prayer isn't too stressful I guess. Plus, we get reserved seats at the front of the chapel so we don't have to get there 30 minutes early.

Welcome home BENJAMIN! It was SO great to hear your voice last night. I hope you're catching up on some sleep!