Braxton's baptism -



Braxton was baptized November 5, 2011 at the Green Valley Stake Center, St. George Utah.   He had to be baptized 2 times because his wrist poked out of the water just a little.  We love you Braxton and are so proud of you!

Lunch time - it was too cold for the park, so we ate at our house

Grandma/Grandpa Smith & Grandma/Grandpa Webb

Grandma Smith makes her grandkids their own porcelain doll dressed like something they like for their 8th birthday.  Braxton was super surprised and excited that Gma made him a doll dressed as Carl Edwards, Braxton's favorite NASCAR driver.  Gma and Gpa Smith also gave Braxton a Baptism book and a new set of scriptures with a case.  Gma and Gpa Webb also gave Braxton a special Baptism book. Gma has her eyes closed again!!

Halloween Carnival Pics 2011



Minnie standing on one foot




Buzz has some BIG muscles!



Cute lil duck!

Professional pictures taken by 98 east photography at the DRMC Child Development Center Halloween carnival.

Our spunky 9 month old!

Kason turned 9 months the day before Halloween:

~ He's up 1.4 lbs in the past 2 months...now a whopping 15.9 lbs! Dr. Nygaard is ok with him still lingering in the 1 % since he is so active, and crawling up the stairs, happy and healthy, and eating well despite what the scales say.

~ 4 teeth and the 5th is on the way.

~ Will eat little pieces of bread, baby puffs, and Cherrios, although most of it goes in his chair or the floor.  Mom shared some strawberry jello with him last night and he liked it.

~ Giggles so hard when mom plays and sings "I'm a little teapot" with him.

~ Tanner can make him laugh so hard, that I bet he pees his pants every time!! :)

~ Hair is getting darker so you can actually tell he has some.  Enough hair on the back and sides of his head to comb with your fingers.

~ Makes sounds that almost sound like 'mama'
~ Has a bit of a temper, especially in the middle of the night, when he's not getting what he wants...to play!

~ Dramatically gags when eating peas, but has learned to tolerate green beans.
~ Has apparently made known where he stands in Coke vs Pepsi.  Maybe when he turns 1, he can graduate with mom back up to the good stuff - caffeine induced Diet Coke! That's my boy!! :)

October....Birthday, Carnivals, parties, Halloween.....

 The last couple weeks of October was crazy busy, I'm glad we made it through!  It began with Braxton's 8th birthday party, (see a few posts below) then on to Josh's 2nd fun birthday bash.  Next up began all the Halloween fun....This year Braxton chose to be a baseball player and wore his baseball uniform, Tanner was Buzz lighter, Camrie was Minnie Mouse, and Kason was a cute little duck.  Mom & Dad seem to wear the same costumes every year...they dress up as a nurse and an X-ray tech! (they don't get points for originality!) The kids started off with a super fun carnival at DRMC's child development center.  They all played games, won prizes, had their pictures taken, ate treats, got their faces painted, and had a great time seeing all their friends and teachers in their costumes. Mom was working, but had time to run over and join in the fun. While our amazing Dad was wrangling 3 little kids and trying to reason with a hysterically screaming Camrie over a barking dog across the street from the Center, Kason wiggled right out of  Dad's arms and toppled right  down onto Flood Street.  Thankfully, he was ok thanks to the extra padding of his cute little yellow duck costume.  A couple days later we went to Braxton's carnival out to Country Kid's Daycare.  Again, more games, more treats, and lots of fun.  Then it was time for our Ward Trunk or Treat down to the church.  Mom was gone with her sisters and Gma for the weekend in SLC, so once again Dad managed to feed the hungry tribe of children, hand out candy, and make sure the kids made it to every trunk....(we are so lucky to have our dad!) Finally, it was HALLOWEEN!!!  Dad ended up having to work in Hurricane until 9 pm, so it was mom's turn to have all 4 kids for the evening.  We went up to our ward neighborhood and joined in the swarm of kids flooding the streets and doorsteps.  We approached one very ominous looking house with adults with painted faces making cackling noises, I watched Camrie thinking there's no way she's going to go, but she followed her brothers in and came out screaming that she was going home!  I assured her she was fine and that we had lots more houses to visit.  The next house was very calm and Camrie came back to me saying, "Mom, look I was sooo brave!" and from that house on, Camrie was 'so brave Mom!'  She even went up to a house and yelled "Trick or treat, now give me some treats!" so we had to have a little reminder that we still have to be polite.  The night was great and we even got a couple trick or treaters at our house house which I was not prepared for because we never get them on our street other than Josh,  so I just shared some of the kids' treats out of their pumpkins!  I better mention our Halloween dinner, we ate again with just candles, and had 'Ratloaf.'  Meatloaf shaped to look like a rat with carrot and apple slices shaped like ears and eyes, pieces of broken raw spaghetti noodles for whiskers, and a 1/2 cooked spaghetti for a tail.  He actually turned out pretty cute for a rat, and tasted good too.  The kids loved the whole Halloween thing this year, and I can say we got our money's worth out of the costumes! Pics from the DRMC carnival are on dad's camera but I did get Tanner & Camrie's faces with my phone. The rest of the pics are from the Country Kids carnival:

Tanner & Camrie refused to wash their faces after the carnival at the DRMC C.D.  Center

Donut eating contest at Country Kids

Kason had fun playing in the infant room while the older 3 decorated their treat bags at Country Kids

Halloween twister

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!

HAPPY 8th BIRTHDAY BRAXTON!!



present time!

Monkey in the middle...football style

Can you throw the football through the hoop?

Hmmmm...I wonder what he's wishing for?

This year Braxton wanted a football cake, so we went with the football theme, and had a fun party with about 9 of his friends from school at the 'spinning park'. Last week Troy saw the mom of a little girl who was Braxton's very best friend in Kindergarten at the InstaCare, and invited Haley to come to Braxton's party and we were so glad to see her.  Braxton asks about her a lot and has missed her.  Braxton also had his first missionary opportunity to invite a couple boys who are just starting to come to church and are in his primary class to his party, they were so excited to come and also brought their 9 year old sister.  We played some sports themed games had cake and ice cream and opened presents.   Boys...I tell you this 'boy' thing is all new to me since I grew up in an all-girl family.  Funny how a simple game of 'monkey in the middle' with a football turns into an all out game of dodge ball and somehow morphs into a game of tackle football!   I always imagine a nice calm party where mom is in control and the kids just flow from one game to the next....well I have a lot to learn and get used to from here on out! Really, the kids were great and they all had a fun time, a little rough...but that just goes without saying.  Braxton loved it and had an awesome day. I bought an Ipod classic off eBay and downloaded his playlist off my Ipods.  He has been using mine and an old Ipod of Troy's that the battery only lasted 30 sec and it had to be plugged in all the time, so he was way excited to get a new one. He also got a couple new footballs, some transformer things, and a cockroach looking thing that walks around (why would anyone make a toy to look like a roach??) I so can't believe he is 8! Where has the past 5 years gone? He grown up so fast the past couple years, and his such a great helper to me.

Braxton will be baptized the first Saturday of November, and unfortunately we've had some drama to deal with which has caused him more stress than excitement,  but now that it has settled down, he is getting very excited and has been preparing for his little interview with the Bishop.  I do have to add that I'm very proud of how Braxton handled and dealt with the "drama," he really is a sweet boy who just wants to make everyone happy, but most of all he realizes that this is HIS special day and he is getting old enough to think for himself and make some of HIS own choices.  It's high time someone else grew up a little bit too! just sayin...  HAPPY BIRTHDAY BRAXTON...We love you!

Fun at the park

I love October in St. George! On the way home from work and picking the kids up, I decided we needed a little park time so we stopped at the park down the street from home and enjoyed the weather for an hour.  The kids had a great time, and so did I ( and I'm usually not one of those 'park mom's either) Usually Camrie won't even play and cries if you make her go down the slide, so why even bother when I have a baby in one arm, and Camrie in the other...it's kinda hard to like to go to the park! But before I even realized it, she was going down the slide by herself, and not just the little slide, but the tall twisty one! and then climbing up the rails and loving it.  This time, she cried when it was time to go home!

"Dad, who is that in our tub?"

I went back to work today and am completely exhausted beyond belief, so I came home a little early tonight and took advantage of our jetted tub to ease my tired aching body.  I thought it's been awhile since I used one of my most favorite chocolate facial mud masks and that it would help me relax even more.  I dolloped the chocolate on, turned on the jets,  threw in a bath bomb, closed my eyes, and sunk down into the hot water.  I may or may not have even dozed for just a few minutes, and thought I'd heard little feet pitter-patter on the tile floor a few times, but nobody was ever there.  Tanner and Camrie were in bed, and Troy was finishing watching the baseball game while rocking Kason to sleep. The rest of the story is from Troy: he says he came up to put Kason in bed and check on the other 2, but noticed that Tanner wasn't in his bed, so he walked into Camrie's room and she was gone too.  All of a sudden behind him, he hears Camrie's very serious and concerned voice ask, "Dad I don't think that is our mom in the tub asleep...." Tanner then says "Dad why does Mom have brown paint all over her face?"  I heard Troy bust up laughing and it took quite a bit of coaxing to get Camrie to come into the bathroom to see that it really was me sleeping in the tub with my face all painted brown.  The look on her's and Tanner's face was priceless! Troy says the best part was the look on Camrie's face when she first told him about the other momma in the tub, too bad we didn't have a picture of it!  Camrie kept asking me "is that you mom? why are you hiding and sleeping in the tub, I couldn't find you?" All the while, Troy is laughing hysterically and saying, "you've got to get out of the tub and blog this right now!"  So when I washed off the mask, Camrie happily exclaimed,  "our mom is back, our mom is back... where've you been hiding mom?"  Oh man, the things our kids do and say....next time I need a little escape time from kids, I'll just put on my mud mask, and be completely oblivious to them all!!