You know your kids have watched too much TV when...

A couple of nights ago as I was tucking the kids in bed, we shared a sweet, and then hilarious moment. (They insist that it's NOT FUNNY. It's serious.) As I gave Bennett a kiss, he told me he was glad that I was his Mom. Awwwww... Owen echoed his sentiment, and I told them how much I love being their Mom too. The rest of the conversation went like this:

Bennett: "I'm so glad Dad is my Dad too, and that I have a family. It would be so sad if we didn't have our family, wouldn't it, Mom?"

Me: "It really would be sad."

Owen: "Yes, but if you don't have a family or anything, you can just push the button on Life Alert and someone will help you."

Me: "What?"

Owen: "It's called Life Alert, and you can push the button if you don't have any family around to help you and you need some help."

Me: Hysterical laughter.

Bennett and Owen: "Mom, stop laughing! It's true! It's real! We've seen the commercial!"

Island Park Weekend

Last weekend we had such a great time in beautiful, snowy Idaho with my family. It was gorgeous, and snowed almost the whole time. (Except for the day Jason and I went skiing; how lucky is that?!) The kids probably had the best time of all with uninterrupted cousin/ Grandma time. I am posting a whole bunch of photos of the trip knowing that at least one of my readers will care to see them. :)

On our way home, we stopped by Rexburg to see the absolutely gorgeous new temple there, as well as to investigate whether or not Craigo's Pizza still had the amazing breadsticks Jason remembers from his college days at Ricks. Indeed, they are still there. Delish!

Owen and Olivia

Owen and Olivia (that sounds like a great children's book title, doesn't it??) went to their second tumbling class this morning. They are soooooo cute! I am highly impressed with their skills! Julie and I watch from the viewing area above, feeding Jake and Evelyn snacks and trying to keep them from falling off the bleachers. After class all the kids run wild on the mats and trampolines. Jake cannot wait to do tumbling like his brother!

Why I Need a Housekeeper...

Cleaning your house while your kids are still growing up is like shoveling the walk before it stops snowing. ~Phyllis Diller

Upon hearing loud and raucous laughter from the kids' room, I walked upstairs to find them dancing around with underwear on their heads, and Jake pulling everything out of drawers and off shelves. Really, though, who could help but laugh out loud??? And at least the underwear was clean! I think.

Ski Night at the Beav!

I realize I'm getting a little carried away with the slideshows, but I'm just experimenting a little. Hopefully you won't get too dizzy looking at my last couple of entries!!

Winter Outing...

We are getting ready to go stay at the Green Canyon Yurt in a few weeks, and wanted to see how far the kids (Bennett in particular) could/would hike. Fortunately, he did great! We had a great time enjoying some sunshine up on the bench above North Logan. It was beautiful!

Little Jake

Our little Jake is constantly cracking us up.  He has the biggest blue eyes, and most expressive face ever.  Jason's sister, Leslie, suggested that we make a collage of all Jake's funny faces.  I wanted to try out this new slideshow website, and thought I'd try a collection of photos of our little entertainer, Jake to see how it works.  Enjoy!

Let it snow!

We were so lucky to have Gramma Linda come stay at our house for a few days! We ordered lots of snow to fall during her visit.

Jake's first snow-skating experience. He loved it!

Snow wrestling!

Brrrrrrr. Daddy is a good sport. Mommy would be less enthused by this treatment.

This really could be my favorite family photo of all time. Look at all those legs!

Christmas Day sunset.

Lee and I took the boys sledding on Christmas Day at the church by my parents' house. I remember sledding here as a kid; it's the best!

"WHEEEEEEEE!" Another sledding trip with Uncle Lee! This time to Old Main Hill.

Jason's tow-rope service.

Trying out the new Christmas snowboard on Old Main Hill yesterday. The boys did GREAT!

Holly Jolly Christmas!

Jake (and Uncle Jerry) had fun pulling the kids through the fields at the McCracken Family party one coooooold night before Christmas!

A special visitor came later! (Notice Jake's absence.) Ho ho ho!

Jason spent a good portion of Christmas Eve making his hot and sweet beef jerky.

Mmmmmmm. Our house was the house of teriyaki ALL DAY.

We had a picture-perfect Christmas Eve this year in Logan! It snowed for hours.

Everyone's favorite Christmas Eve tradition at our house: FONDUE!!! Yummy! We eat until we are completely ill.

Chocolate cheers!

Poor Owen slept right through the fondue party, despite many attempts to wake him up, and awoke around 11:30 p.m. for some cold cereal.

Hope everyone had a magical holiday!

Snips and snails and puppy dog tails...

(What the heck are snips?  Anyway...)

IT'S A BOY!!!!!!!!!

Sorry to keep you waiting, Jami!  Yes, we had Bennett open the envelope on Christmas Eve.  We closed our eyes, and he read the news to us, "BOY!  It's a BOY!  B-O-Y, BOY!"  We all screamed and did a happy dance.  It was so fun!!!

Hope everyone had a Merry Christmas!  Of course I'll post some Christmas photos soon.

Out of the mouth of a babe.

I love Bennett. He cracks me up! We have had a few funny conversations and incidents over the last little while, and I wanted to share them.

First, when I went to volunteer in Bennett's classroom this week, his teacher pulled me aside and said, "I need to ask you about something Bennett told the class yesterday." Oh, man. I could only imagine what might be coming.

She said, "Bennett told us all that his Grandma taught Elvis how to dance." She thought it was the funniest thing she'd heard in a long time, and called all her children all over the country to tell them.

I explained to her that he didn't pull that out of thin air. We were actually listening to Elvis' Christmas album, and as my mom danced around the room singing, my sister-in-law, Kate, told all the kids that Grandma taught Elvis how to dance.

Moral of that story: Be careful what we tell Bennett. It will undoubtedly be shared with his entire class, both at school and church. Fortunately for us, this story was fairly harmless.

Second: We went for a little evening Christmas shopping trip at Fred Meyer a.k.a. Smiths Marketplace the other night. The boys were hungry, as they had declined to eat much of my tasty enchilada dinner earlier in the evening. They thought it was too mysterious. So, just North of Fred Meyer is a McDonald's, which was all lit up and looking festive. When Bennett saw it he said from the back, "I really want a cheeseburger!" (Don't we all? I thought.) I answered him, "Bennett, we just had dinner," to which he answered, "I know! I want it for dessert!" I laughed so hard for so long. He didn't think it was funny at all.

Third, inside Fred Meyer, Bennett and Owen needed to use the restroom. I waited outside for them with our cart of stuff and Jake. I insisted, much to their chagrin, that they go into the women's bathroom so I could come and check on them.

"WHY?" Bennett demanded, "I know how to use the stand-up kind in the boys' bathroom!"

"Because," I answered, "I don't know if there is a creepy guy in there, and I want to be able to come check on you."

Off they went to the girls' room, grumbling all the way. When they came out, Bennett informed me, "Mom, you thought there would be a creepy guy, but there was a CREEPY GIRL! She looked inside Owen's stall at him!"

I asked, "Was his door closed?"

"No."

"What did she say?"

"She said, oh, sorry!! But still, it was creepy."

BABY

Yesterday we went to the hospital for the big ultrasound! My Mom came up to watch the kids while we went. They love her so much! So do I.

Ultrasounds are so cool. It was so much fun to see that little guy in there! He was moving all over for us, waving, and opening and closing his mouth like he was chewing gum. So we debated about whether or not to find out the baby's sex there or have the technician write it down on a piece of paper to be opened on Christmas. Jason had been the one who wanted to wait to find out, but once we were there thought we should find out right away. The technician actually convinced us to wait because it would be more fun. Or, she said we could rip open the envelope as soon as we left! So we decided to wait another week, and she took some pictures and wrote down baby's sex for us.

However, you notice I am referring to the baby as "he." That's because both Jason and I thought we caught a glimpse of some boy-ness, and the tech kept referring to the baby as he. Sometimes she would catch herself and say, "See his.... the little tongue?" So I don't know if she was doing it on purpose or if she really kept slipping, but we're thinking BOY! We may be in for a shock on Christmas morning, but I'm feeling very at home with the idea of another boy. I have all along. We were mainly so happy to see that things looked normal and healthy and that we are right on schedule for a May 10th birth. It's such a miracle, and we feel so fortunate. It was and will be a great Christmas present.

Sorry to friends and family who called yesterday and today dying to know. My favorite call was from Jaime. The first thing she said on the phone after exchanging hellos was, "SO????" Ha ha! She's so cute! Sorry to make you wait, Jaimes! Stay tuned, everyone!