A Star in the Making

Last night was the first night of filming for Katy. I took her to an audition on Tuesday night for a role. The film makers were looking for a 1 year old for a small independent film. I found it on craigslist and so I packed up the kids on Tuesday night and went down to Provo. Chris, the guy in charge of most things, loved Katy and so did the girl who was the main character. Needless to say they did end up calling on Tuesday night letting us know that Katy got the part. These film makers are making this short film part of their "Reel" and are submitting it to Sundance!! I am gonna be praying that it gets accepted!! I need any good excuse to go up to Park City in the winter!!!

The first night of filming was fun. It was a night shoot since they needed Katy to be asleep in her carseat. She loved the guy with the camera in the backseat with her and fell asleep just like she was supposed to do. When they got back from the first round, Katy of course woke up and wanted out of her seat, but knowing my kid if I did that she would never go back in it again. I left her there while the director looked at films.

The two main people took Katy for a long car ride to get her to sleep again. It took a good half hour, but they just kept singing and driving and there she went to la la land for the night. The end scenes were filmed fast since my kid was doing what she was acting how they wanted. A sleeping baby!!

We ended up being done at about 11:30 pm and it was a fun experience. We are back on Saturday and part of Sunday too. I am hoping that we get most of it done on Saturday so Sunday won't be so long. I will take some pics of everything on Saturday and Sunday and get them up for all of you to see. Don't worry I will get everyone copies of this short film so everyone can see the star!!

Oh yeah.....Hannah was so happy that Katy got the part b/c now she gets to go with her Dad to the Football game on Saturday instead of me!!! I will just watch the game on tv and let them have a fun Daddy Daughter Date.

Katy.....

I have been so crazy busy with my oldest two that I think Katy has been a little ignored on the blog. She has had some crazy things going on too. Her world got turned upside down a few weeks ago when we moved her crib out of our room and into the little room beside our bathroom. Granted there is just one wall between us now, it was not fun for her that first night. She has worked through it and now magically sleeps from about 8:30/9 pm to right around 5 am in the morning! I never thought that this day would come. It works out great since that is about the time that Steve goes to work out in the morning! I don't mind her in bed with me for the last few hours of the morning. I need a snuggle bug for a little while. Plus Katy is still nursing a little bit too, so she wants to eat around 5 anyway!!

Katy has gotten to be so cute too! I mean she has always been cute but it is getting even better. She laughs all the time and thinks that things are funny. Her vocabulary is exploding every day!! In fact the other day she asked her dad "Open door, please." I mean what 14 month old says 3 word sentences?!?!? Oh yeah, I already have one of those. Her name is Ruby!! We hear her cheer for BYU, howl like the dogs, say yippie, and every sound effect you can think of, mommy, daddy, Hannah, dog, cat, door, book, please, thank you, and more. It is crazy! I can't believe that I am getting another early talker. But nothing at this point suprises me anymore.

Here is a cute story about Katy from yesterday. It was nap time for Katy when we got home from taking Hannah to school. Katy was a little mad yesterday when she woke up which is not the norm for her. I get her quiet and bring her into the living room. Ruby was playing on the couch and Katy thought that was alright, but then she noticed that Hannah was not here. She wandered all over the house saying "Hannah" and was just about in tears. I think this was the first time that she has realized that Hannah wasn't home b/c she was at school. It made me so sad, but it was so neat to see Hannah get out of school for the first day and watch at how happy Katy was that her Hannah was back!! It is going to be interesting with how the rest of the year goes. I am getting the feeling that she is not going to like this much that Hannah is gone all day to go to school.

These pictures are from yesterday when Katy was playing with the blinds. I know kids are not supposed to do that but it was so cute that she was playing peek a boo with me!! They are only little once right?!?! And being the baby she gets away with more than the others.

Jennie....this one is for you! I am never going to have kids out of car seats!! And for the rest of you. See how my kids in the back seat love eachother and Ruby is still picking her nose!!

First Day of School

It is here finally, but wait did I really want my baby girl to go to school?!?!? As I drove Hannah over to school today I had the crazy thoughts run through my head of excitement and sadness. Did I do a good job in the last 5 years so she is ready for this day? WOW! Is Ruby gonna have some fun with me and Katy in the afternoon? This is the end of her being home with me!! What am I gonna do now?? Is today going to be easier on me since we did do preschool last year? Is Hannah going to be nice at school and make some new friends??

Well I lived and all is well. We got there a little early and of course the camera would not work for me. I really need a new one!! Hint, Hint...my birthday is coming up soon!! Steve got there and managed to get it to work for a few pictures. Hannah was just excited to go to school again. She was up early and already in her dress and asking how much longer until she goes to school. I love my little girl.

We found her class room and waited for school to start. She had no problem saying "Good bye!" and was off to play in the kindgergarden playground. That was it. No tears or any type of emotion that she even wanted to stay with Mom and Dad. Bye to my baby and have a good day! Guess I got myself all worked up for nothing. That is what Hannah does to me. All grown up and is off flying by herself.

The Cast in All Its Glory

Yesterday was a fun day for me to trying to get to Primary Children's. I am wishing to just forget my morning of Ruby biting Katy and thinking it was funny, hot sauce in the mouth, screaming children, a shower for me (all while I was praying the kids didn't eat anything in the bathroom), getting the dogs put away, Katy taking a dip in the dog pool (right after I got her dressed!!), and there was more but those are the highlights of what I am wishing to forget.

So Ruby and I finally make it up to the other side of the valley for her appointment. I have never seen an office full of kids with broken arms and legs, but I guess that is what I should have expected by going to the fracture clinic. Of course we had a wait, but it was finally our turn. Ruby was a little scared but nothing too much. First thing they asked Ruby was what color cast would she like?? She of course saw the colors for casts and wanted what color other than Cougar Blue!! So Cougar Blue is what she got!!

The doctor was really nice and even took another set of x-rays too. Ruby loved that she got to wear a little zebra looking skirt for them. This time x-rays were kinda fun. I guess that is what you get at a hospital that specializes in kids. It took just a minute for the doctor to come in and let me know that the break was actually a little good. The broken part set just right so no surgery in our case. Ruby will have her hard case on for 3 weeks and then we go back to see how things are going. I think this hard cast is going to be great until she learns that it can be a weapon!!

So here are the cast pictures in all it's glory!! Hope that you enjoy!! Now I just wonder what it is going to look like in 3 weeks after Ruby is Ruby.

Sling pics

Here is the link for the pictures of Ruby's Sling. For some strange reason it was not letting me upload her pics. Hope you enjoy.

I never would have thought......

That I would be the first one of my friends whose kid broke an arm!! And yes most of you are probably thinking of the right kid......RUBY!!! I guess in a way I am not really suprized at all. She did some funky jump thing on Saturday and messed up her arm. Of course these things happen in the afternoon on a Saturday b/c they can't happen during a normal time. All those mom's who know that's true say Aye.....

So I packed Ruby up in the car after I tried to see if she had just popped her elbow out again. Nope wasn't that at all. She cried and screamed at me for even turning her wrist. I called the doctor to ask them what I needed to do. We really wanted to stay out of the ER since we have a HUGE co-pay. **Side note: Kinda sad that insurance is so expensive that when my kid gets hurt I am trying to find anyway to not take her to the hospital!!** The doctor on call was super nice and tried to do everything she could over the phone, but she came to the conclusion with me that we needed to take her in. So I head down to the road to one of the instacares, since that is way cheaper than the ER but they still have everything you need. Even an X-RAY MACHINE!!!

So we get there and it doesn't take long to get back since there was just one person in front of us to be seen. I tell the doctor about what happened and how I really would love an x-ray done just to make sure. He gives me a spill about how her range of motion looks good and it doesn't bother her as he moves her arms around. Point number 2 is that kids getting x-rays at that young it could cause cancer and all this other mumbo jumbo. He also did a lot of ortho stuff so he knew it was not broken. So off we go after $40!!! with being told to just give her some motrin and if she still isn't moving her arm by the end of the day on Sunday to bring her back and then we can have some x-rays done.

Well yesterday morning Ruby was still in a lot of pain, so I whipped out my sewing machine and made up a sling for Ruby. Yes this is the reason that we were 45 minutes late to church. Making a sling, me needing a shower, and still having to get all the girls ready for church doesn't help in getting there on time. Not to mention but we did get up at 8:15 am. Ruby picked out some cool Hello Kitty fabric that I had in the scrap pile and I went to work!! I hate to sew on Sunday, but that is what needed to be done. A few minues later and wha-la a sling in little kid size for Ruby and off to church we go.

Ruby still was not feeling good today, so I haul her and Katy (who didn't sleep all night long) off with my only healthy child, Hannah. Katy has a double ear infection again. Oh I wish we had the money to get the poor girl tubes, since she needs them so bad, but that brings me back to my earlier comment about not wanting to take my kid to the ER. We just deal with the shot of meds and go back in two days for another shot. It makes her mad, but I would rather do that than 10 days of forcing my kid to take some nasty medicine twice a day.

Back to Ruby....the doctor looks at her arm and it is really tender by her wrist and her elbow. He said that if it is broke by her wrist they can cast it in the office but anything by her elbow we have to see an ortho doc and go up to Primary Children's. We are told to go to the hospital to get some x-rays done. I was glad that Cody was on lunch break, so he came along with me to help with the other girls while we went back. Ruby did good in getting her x-rays, but was in a lot of pain as we took the last set that they needed.

I get lunch for the kids and get back to the doctor's office so Cody could pick up the bug. While I am driving there I am on the phone with the doctor's office, I talk to the nurse to tell her that they have already sent over the results and of course I have to be on hold. As I am pulling into the parking lot, I don't get the nurse I get the doctor on the phone. He asks me where I am at in the SL valley. I told him I was in the parking lot and he promptly told me that I needed to get in there ASAP to stablize my child's arm. He was afraid that there could be permate damage to her arm if we didn't get it stablized soon. Now this is Ruby's left arm that she uses for everything. Eating, writing, throwing, and more. It's kinda scarry to hear a panic in your doctor's voice about this. I guess that my child had broke her arm a little above her elbow and that it is the worst fracture that a child can get. We were told that she will be having an appointment at the fracture clinic with an ortho doc and that lucky me will be going up to visit them a lot in the next little while. Her doctor got her into a spint that will keep everything stable until we can get in to the clinic in the next few days and he loved my sling that I made for Ruby.

**Side note: The doctor wants me to make 15-20 slings for the office and they are going to BUY them from me!!! He wants me to keep making them so that the little kids can have some cool looking slings that actually fit instead of them having to work up something that will work!! That was the sliver lining in my day!!**

So here we go with a broken arm and who would have guessed?!?!? I will be taking lots of pictures soon and get them up. It should be a really fun week for all of us.

PS. Yes I did call the instacare to put in a complaint about the smart doctor that would not take an x-ray of Ruby's arm!!!

So I have been Quiet for way too long.....

Okay how can I not write a post after what happened last night to Nastia, Shawn, Alicia, and the rest of the US Women's gymnastic Team!!! I never thought that I would lose faith in a sport that I love, but after what has happened at the Olympics this year I am not so sure any more. The scoring is crazy and the US is getting "ripped off" (in the words of Bela). I didn't know we would all be competing against kids that were babies!! Was I the only one who thought they looked more like 12 or 13 rather than 16?!?!? There are at least 5 or 6 reports of some team members that are way under that magic 16 year age mark to be able to compete.
On to event finals....Vault Disappointment.....Big time for Alicia!!! How can someone who falls and lands on her knees still get a 15 as a score?!? Steve and I watched all those other girls that fell get around a 14 and where does she end up?? In 3rd place with a fall to her knees and poor Alicia misses out on a Bronze metal that should be hers!! This is just crazyness!!! I know every one is saying that the other girl had a higher start value and she did do awesome on her first vault, but people she landed on her knees!!!
**To Alicia Sacramone....Girl you did awesome!! You rock and honey I cried with you too!! Heck even Steve had some choice words! Please don't feel bad b/c all of us know where you should have been!!**

Bars Finals.....Hello!! You have a tie and you don't give out 2 Gold Metals?!?!?! Where does that come into play??? Poor Nastia who has the same score but ends up with a silver instead of a gold?!?!?! What are these people thinking??? It is pretty bad that on NBCOlympics.com that they have a whole article explaining how the whole tie breaker works.

Tie break #1: The routine's execution score.

Liukin and He remained tied with scores of 9.025.

Tie break #2: Drop the next lowest B-score, average the three remaining scores.

When this tie break is implemented, He has a higher B-score than Liukin, so she is awarded the gold medal. You can also look at the deductions -- He had fewer deductions.
I thought that figure skating was bad about scores and all but come on people why do people feel they have to cheat?? Let's have another games where people play by the rules and judges are not out for our girls (b/c to me that is how it has looked from the start!!)

Okay...I will be quiet for now.....I have been on my soap box long enough...I do have more to write about but my kids won't let me!!

Ward Camp Out Night

This past weekend there was a ward camp out in AF canyon. We did not spend the night, since I didn't think we had all the parts to the tent and I know well enough that if we would have told the girls we were spending the night and all the parts to the tent were not there it would not have been a good thing. So instead we hung out for a few hours and went home when everyone got tired!! The girls had some fun eating hamburgers, making their own shirts, and climbing up the hill! All in all it was a good night and we will for sure plan on staying over night next year.
Steve holding Ruby in his hand.
Katy exploring the woods.
Hannah with her friends and Ruby wanting to join in the fun.
Katy being cute once again.
Ruby doing what she does best! Eating away!! I am so glad that I have one good eater!
My cutie by the little stream near camp. Isn't she so cute!

I still can't believe that I took a picture that was this good of Katy!!!
There is the hill that the kids climbed!! They are way up there at the top.
Ruby practicing her gymnastic moves!!

Tale of the garden.....

WOW!! The garden really has been plentiful for the year. I am still not sure why we are supposed to have a garden, but it sure is fun to get some good fruits and veggies from it now. There are still tons of morning glory in our yard and next year I would love to do something like this.....
But for now we are doing great and watching our fall stuff come into season. We have watermelon, acorn squash, and giant pumpkins (like the 500 lb. kind) all growing away!! It should be a great harvest in just a few short months. I can't wait!!There is a pumpkin and watermellon!!

Here is one of my acorn squashes!!!
There is a baby acorn squash!
The start of my huge pumpkin! Well we hope it will get huge!!

The Mud Bath

Last night was so much fun for us. It was one of those moments that you just have to say wow kids will be kids. My kids last night decided that they needed to be mud monsters. Well that is what Ruby told me anyway. She even had some cool sound effects too!! Steve and I came to the conclusion that they were at the spa with their mud bath and all. Too bad they forgot their cucumber slices for their eyes!!!

Wow what a Night!

So last night was crazy for me! :)

Alicia is working really hard to sell some baby stuff that we no longer need, so long hours in the evenings tagging things, putting things on hangers, etc has given me the opportunity to spend some time with the girls which has been a lot of fun. Ruby is probably the smartest 2 year old I have ever met. They watched Baby Einstein last night and she not only repeated everything she heard, but she pronounced everything exactly the way it should sound every time! She amazes me!

Anyway, that was not the crazy part. In fact, Ruby didn't even wake up last night until about 8:30pm from her nap, so she ended up going with Alicia to get things packed to set up this morning and they were out until almost 1am!

So I got to spend a lot of time with Katy and Hannah. We read some books at first and Hannah decided that she wanted to draw pictures so she got this black marker and drew herself on a horse. I was actually pretty impressed at the drawing. She is very imaginative and loves artwork in any fashion. So it is fun to see her develop that talent. Daddy used to draw too, so it is fun to see some of those skills pass on to her!

Anyway, Katy was stirring in the bedroom, so I went and grabbed her and brought her out so that I could change her diaper. I had to get some wipes in the other room so I went to do that and get the diaper ready and let Katy watch Hannah (or maybe the other way around?)

Well I decided to get some dinner started on the way so I made some pasta for the girls and got it on the pot and cooking and came back to get the deed done when lo and behold I had a black baby in the room! Hannah decided that her artwork needed to be transferred to Katy's entire body and face! She even wrote her entire name on her back! How in the world did she have time to do that, much less get Katy to stay still long enough to make that happen? So, needless to say, dinner was just about ready, so I had them eat first. Katy ate a ton of food, and Hannah had her fair share too, so that was good that they ate (since they pick and choose the nights they are going to eat anyway).

I took Katy into the bathroom to get her cleaned up a little and I turned around and Hannah was stark naked! She wanted to get in the bathtub to help clean Katy off (did I sense remorse here on her part?)

So I got them in the bath and turned it on and asked Hannah to watch Katy so I could get her some panties and the diaper for Katy and get jammies so they could get ready for bed at that point (it was around 7:30pm, so before Ruby woke up).

I leave the room for maybe 3-4 minutes and gather all the necessary items and suddenly I hear some tremendous screaming in the bathroom from Katy. I rush in and sure enough, Hannah has completely covered Katy in soap, and Katy has tons of soap in her eyes (I can't even see her face at this point) which are completely shut due to pain! UGH!

So for almost an hour, I tried washing her eyes out and getting her to calm down. She was not a happy camper, and of course Hannah in the meantime decided to use the soap and Alicia's Mary Kay items to decorate the bathroom (I mean, why would she NOT do this?).

Do you think I should just expect these things to happen instead of having them be a complete shock to me?

During all this raucous, Ruby wakes up and wants to eat. So I get her what was left of the noodles and of course she doesn't eat at all, she just really wanted a drink of milk. She began to cry because "mommy" wasn't home and cried until about 9pm, and she got started right after I got Katy calmed down! Anyway, Baby Einstein was a life saver last night. They all calmed down, Ruby did her "repeat everything" thing and sang "Old MacDonald had a farm" and they all were very calm. After that we all read several books and said prayers and off to bed! Ruby of course was not tired, so she came downstairs to spend time with me while I comforted Katy until Alicia got home from her first round of work before taking Ruby out last night.

WOW.

All I can say is I need more practice with 3 at once. Even two can be crazy with how "imaginative" Hannah can be! How does Alicia do this all day? I really wanted to clean up the house last night, but there was no way that was happening!

Final Summer Swim Meet

So Long to Summer days now that swim team is officially over. The last swim meet was yesterday afternoon and Hannah did awesome!! She chose to swim backstroke, butterfly, and freestyle again! It was also the meet for high point also. High point is an individual competition in swimming that you get points for what place you finish in.

Backstroke was up first again! Hannah did great in her first event. She just kept kicking and went as fast as her little feet would let her go. Hannah still only wears a size 8 in shoes (most 3 year olds have feet that big). She did run into the lane line once but did not pull on it. This time she did not flip over either so that means her time counted!!!
Results: 6th Place Time: 43.47
Improvement of 11.66 seconds from the first meet of the year!! That is a lot of time in swimming!

Butterfly was 2nd again and yes she got DQed again, but we knew that before she even swam it! There is a cute story to this one again though. Hannah's lane to swim in this time was lane 5! Ahhh....the lane with the drain! I was proud since she did jump in and swim, but what did she do?? She swam freestyle to hurry up and get away from the drain and then she started butterfly!! It was so funny. One of those stories that we will have to remind her of when she is older and swims across the whole pool!!

Freestyle was up last again. Hannah had to swim in lane 6 this time. The drain thing again, so at least we knew she would swim fast at the start! I was proud that she just dove on in and go going! She did so much better at her start and finish. It was all over after that short swim of hers. A whole summer worth of going to the pool every day for practice. That went by way too fast!!
Results: 5th Place Time: 45.17
Improvement of 4.78 seconds. She started at the first meet with a 49.92

High Point results: Hannah was able to swim her way to 7th place for High Point! That means she beat out 3 girls in her age group since there were 10 of them swimming this summer! Not bad for being the baby of the babies!! Next year we will have to try and crack the top 5!!

Way to go Hannah we all love you so much!! And now on to tryouts at the end of the month for year around swimming!!

Post #99

WOW!! I am one post away from #100. It doesn't seem like I have been blogging long enough to hit post #100. I am sure it is going to be filled with lots of family updates since we have a very busy week ahead of us.

Monday
- bike ride sometime today to get bread and milk for the week
- Hannah's last swim practice for summer swim team! (Hello it is over already!!!)
- Family home evening of course

Tuesday
- Hannah's last swim meet of the summer! It is trophy night so hopefully she will do even more awesome than last time!! They give out trophys to the top ten girls of her age group so thank goodness there are only 9 of them so Hannah will get a trophy for sure!!

Wednesday
- I have to go work my shift at the JBF sale setting stuff up down in Provo (This is that HUGE kids clothes sale that Mandee and I have been getting ready for weeks now)

Thursday
- Pack up all my kids and the kids clothes so that I can take them back down to Provo for the drop off for JBF

Friday
- Get everything ready for the Ward Campout! Everyone knows that list....the tent, air mattress, pillows, a blanket or two, the shade pop up thing, food, etc, etc.
- Go camping!!!

Saturday
- Get everyone home in one piece and hopefully not left anything up in the canyon while we were camping
- Go pick up my stuff that did not sell from JBF and then wait for my check to come in the mail.

It is going to be a fun filled week for my family!! I can't wait to take all of the pictures and let everyone know what we are up to.

Sleeping in Strange Places

Today I thought that since I was doing so much reading this weekend of Breaking Dawn, I might be able to take a quick nap. I snuggled up on my wonderful King Sized bed and took a nap. I heard somewhere in my dreams that Steve put the kids to sleep. All was good Hannah and Ruby were upstairs asleep and Katy was out with Steve. I wake up a little while later to come out to the living room and I ask Steve: Where is Katy? He replied: Wasn't she in there with you?

Off for a search of the house and where did we find Katy??? Asleep on the floor of the bathroom with her bear. This bear goes everywhere Katy sleeps. I guess when you are the baby you need someone to hold onto!! I guess that she needed to show us that she is a big girl and go to sleep by herself, but I really wish that it was in her bed instead.