Hannah - 2 months

Wow! This has been a quick two months! Hannah is 2 months old and is still just so wonderful! She is still a calm, happy little baby that loves to quietly watch what is going on around her. She had her check up this week and she weighs 10 lbs. 12 oz. and is 22 1/4 inches long. That puts her at the 50th percentile for both as well as a 50th percentile head size. She had shots and was so sad for a few hours after that. Every time she'd kick her legs, she'd remember her pain and start to cry. She cried more in those few hours than she had in her whole life. Thankfully by that evening, she was back to her happy, calm self.

I absolutely love the newborn phase. She's started to smile when we talk to her. She gets up just once a night, nurses and goes right back down. She's so great about napping in her carseat when I'm driving the other kids to their activities. It's been so much fun to have Hannah in our family!

Lindsey's 7th Birthday

Our sweet Lindsey turned 7 this week! (Her birthday is on the 25th, so I'm a couple of days late...but we've celebrated it all week.)

Lindsey is such a sweet little girl and we love her so much. She is kind-hearted, sensitive, beautiful and a ray of sunshine in our lives.

She was born exactly 2 weeks after September 11th. I remember thinking that even in a world full of problems and heartache, Heavenly Father sends little rays of sunshine to brighten our days.

We started celebrating Lindsey's birthday the night before. She had soccer practice and then for her birthday dinner, we went to Wendy's with Beth & Jeff and the Rasmussen's. (That was at her lazy mother's suggestion). On her birthday, she woke up early and just couldn't wait until after school to open her gifts. She got an Easy Bake oven and has been baking away ever since.

We had her birthday party today and it was so fun! We did a cooking party. The kids arrived and we put aprons and chef hats on them. (There were 12 kids - although 1/3 of that were Bowen kids). Then we let them roll out dough for homemade pizzas. While those cooked, we played a couple of games and then the kids got to eat their creations. We were almost ready for cake and icecream when one of the little chefs started coughing and then threw up. That cleared the kitchen rather quickly, so we just let Lindsey open her gifts. She was thrilled and we all had a great time! Lindsey has great friends!

We love you Lindsey! Thank you for being such a great part of our family! You are beautiful in every way!

Ethan, Jack, Hailey, Kate, Emily, Lindsey & Brynlee

Lindsey's choice of cake -big gloppy Care Bear cupcakes from Sam's Club.

These were the invitations for the party - recipe card attached to a wooden spoon

All of Lindsey's co-chefs!

The kids each got a dough ball on a piece of wax paper and used their own rolling pins.

Chef Jack

Chef Lindsey

Jack playing Blindfold the Chef game. The kids had 1 minute to get as many marshmellows into the empty bowl. (Fun game, but the marshmellows got really sticky).

Here is the apron cake I made for the party.

This was my favorite part - the goody bags! These were so much fun to make! I borrowed the stamps and stamped the girls with the measuring cups and the boys had a little chef hat. Then inside, I found little mini cookbooks and some candy.

Grandpa Sorenson's visit

We were so lucky this weekend and we got to have my dad with us for a couple of days. He had a business trip to South Carolina and was able to arrange a long layover and come see us. We picked him up at the Cincinnati airport on Saturday afternoon and then had to take him back yesterday afternoon.

It was so great to have him here! The kids, especially Kate, loved every minute! The first night he was here, we were eating dinner and Kate started stroking him arm and said "I'm so glad you're here." A little while later she asked him if he would take a bath with her. When that answer was a no, she later asked if she could sleep in the bed with grandpa. She just couldn't get enough! The first words out of her mouth in the morning was "Where's Grandpa?" I'm so glad that they are such good little buddies.

We love you dad so much! Thank you for coming and spoiling us! You're the best!

Kate, Grandpa & Hannah (You'll notice the wetness of his shirt - that was Hannah's spit up)

Grandpa & Kate coloring. I love how Kate is looking at him - she's willing to do whatever he thinks is best!

My dad treated the kids and I to Texas Roadhouse (Jon was at work) and we had a blast! It's one of our favorites - thank you dad!

Hannah's blessing

Yesterday was Hannah's blessing and it was a wonderful day! My dad was able to be here (I'll post about his visit) and the day was beautiful. Hannah wore the same dress that Emily, Lindsey & Kate wore and looked so cute. She had a dirty diaper & was hungry when Jon took her to give her the blessing, but she was great. She was sucking on her binkie and didn't make a peep. Jon gave her a beautiful blessing! (One of our friends, who was in the circle, told me later that it was one of just a few he had been in where the men didn't start bouncing the baby. Hannah just laid there and looked around).



We love you Hannah! You are beautiful in every way and are so grateful that you're in our family!


My dad with his grandkids.

This is not a good picture of Hannah, but I thought Jon & I looked pretty good.

I made this quilt for Hannah and my dad brought it with him. It had been at the quilter's and so I hurreid and put the binding on. I literally finished it minutes before company came over.

One tired little baby!

Apple Picking

One of our favorite fall activities in Ohio is picking apples! This was 7th year going out to Lynd Fruit Farm to pick apples. We usually go twice and get enough apples to last for a long time. The apples are actually good all the way through the spring - yummy!

Last Saturday, a fun group of us mom's went out with the kids. We left the husbands home watching the BYU football game (one of the few televised out here) and we made the drive. I've trained the kids well because all I had to do this year was hand them a bag and say "Go pick me some good apples." The apples are so big that it didn't take very long and we were done. It's so fun to have fall here!

Does this look like an entire Primary? It's actually the kids of 4 families (Bowen's, Rasmussen's, Larson's & Acker's). Baby Thomas Larson is the only one not there.

An exhausting BYU win!

The Power is Back On!

I've actually had a good reason the last few days for not adding anything to the blog - we've been without power! We had a normal Sunday morning and the kids and I went to Church (Jon got home a little bit before we left after working all night). It was sunny and warm and everything seemed completely normal.

The topic of Sacrament Meeting was being temporally & spiritually prepared. Then during the 3rd hour, the lights went out. I didn't think anything of it - other than it was windy outside. I gathered the kids and we went to the van. It was really windy and someone told us that a big branch had fallen on his truck and it had broken the windshield. It was only getting worse, so we headed home. Just a little way down the road, good size branches were hitting the van and we stopped at a stoplight and could feel it swaying. I was really nervous, but had to the brave one. Emily burst into tears. So, I said "I have to drive, Emily is upset, Lindsey - pray!" So, she did and the rest of the ride home wasn't as bad. It was still very scary and I was so happy to get home. We did have to take a detour because the road we normally turn on was completely blocked by a huge tree. It ended up being just a huge windstorm (with just a tiny bit of rain), compliments of Hurricane Ike.


Our house still had power when we got home and Jon had woken up and put dinner in the oven. Within 10 minutes of getting home though, the power went out. We were lucky in that the dinner had actually cooked long enough to be done. We ate and gave the kids a bath and then played games. There was a nice cool breeze as we were putting the kids to bed. Jack thanked Heavenly Father in his prayers that we could tell what time it was on daddy's watch. Then Jon went back to work.


Monday morning came with still no power. It was a perfect day - high of 70 degrees - and the kids had a really fun time playing at the park and sawing branches off trees. Monday night, we used the grill to cook some hamburger and once again, we gave the kids a bath, put them to bed to a nice breeze and then Jon went to work.


Tuesday morning came and at exactly 6:00 a.m. - the power came back on! Yeah! So, it ended up being about 38 hours without power. We lost some of our food, but we were so very blessed with running water, food to eat, and beautiful weather. The kids haven't had school yet this week (including tomorrow) because there are still a lot of people without power and some of the schools in the district don't have it yet either.


It has made us realize the things that we need to get a little bit more of - spare batteries, non-scented candles (the combination of summer melon & pumpkin spice was a little nauseating), some cash, and at least a 1/2 tank of gas in the cars at all times. We're very grateful for clean clothes, clean dishes and the food out of the garbage disposal tonight! There are still over 200,000 people in Ohio without power, so we feel so lucky.

This tree was in front of the apartment complex next door. I couldn't get Kate to lift her head up. (Jon noticed that at the bend was an old hose that someone put next to the tree when it was probably first planted, so it became the weak spot in the tree.)

On Monday night after dinner, Jon handed each kid a container of icecream from the freezer. By then it was basically soup, but the kids had a great time eating it.

Preschoolers

We love preschool at our house! Jack started preschool last Friday and will be going 4 days a week. He loves it and always has such a great time. It's at a Presbyterian Church, but about 1/2 the kids are Mormons. It's fun that Jack gets to go to preschool with so many of his little friends.

Kate keeps a busy schedule herself. She started a preschool swap this morning and had a great time. It's 6 little girls and so there will be lots of pink, purple and pixies, I'm sure. On Tuesdays, she's in a Music and Movement class at the library and Wednesdays she has a dance class. Friday afternoons she'll also do a gymnastics class with Jack.


Hannah is just as sweet as ever! She is so sweet, calm and beautiful. She goes to bed around 10:00 and usually sleeps until 3:00 and then until about 7:00. What a gal!

Jack on his first day of preschool

Kate on her first day of preschool (the Dora backpack that she has one is her favorite toys right now. That backpack has gone with us to more places than Jon).

Hannah along for the ride. I love how she's hanging on.

Nice Compliments

It's a very entertaining thing to take 5 kids anywhere and to see the looks people give and the questions they ask. I can't count the number of times people have asked "Are they all yours?" or "Are you going to have any more?" (I laugh at this one because I think they feel like even though it's none of their business, since I'm crazy enough to have 5 kids, I must not mind them having no tact). I think it's funny to see the reaction of people. Some give sympathetic looks, some give looks of disgust and some just smile.

This week I received two nice compliments. I was at Sam's Club one morning with Jack, Kate & Hannah. There was a really cute older couple and they were looking at the kids, commenting on their eyes and she looked at me and said "You are really blessed." I told her that I totally agreed - I am!

Then today, Jon is at work, so the kids and I cleaned the house, had gone to soccer practice, were at Home Depot (building football stands for paper football) and were headed to the grocery store after that. The kids were hammering and using screwdrivers to make their projects and I was helping them when they needed it. The Home Depot worker came over and said "Wow, you're a well-oiled machine." I can't say that anyone has ever referred to me as a machine before! It was such a sweet comment though and I told her I appreciated her saying that. When you have 5 great kids like I do, it's easy!

Here's to all of us giving out more compliments to each other - they really do make other's feel good!

Fun Project

I have done a few of these for family members and wanted to share this fun idea. I got this idea from my friend Becky, who, when she moved from her last ward, her friends put it together for her. It was titled "100 things we love about Becky." It was so, so cute! They had come up with 100 things they admired, loved, remembered about her and put it on a 12x12 paper and then framed it.

So, several Christmas' ago, I did one for each of my parents and siblings. It was really fun and memorable to think of 100 things for each person.

When my sister Becky left a few weeks ago, I wanted to make her something that would help her remember our summer together and that wouldn't take too much time (as I don't have much of that these days), so I made her "100 Things We Will Never Forget About the Summer of 2008!" It was a blast to think about all the fun times we had, places she took the kids and things we laughed over. I think I came up with the 100 things in about 5 minutes! The pictures below aren't that great, but hopefully you can get a general sense of what it looked like. I was thinking that making them at the end of each year would be fun too (100 things we'll remember about 2008, etc.) would be a fun take-off of it too. Anyway....yeah, for another completed project!! (Now onto the uncompleted projects of the day, like laundry, cooking, cleaning, etc.)