Spring Has SPRUNG!

Payton and Mom at the zoo!

McKenzie, pretty in PinK. (She is now clapping)

Payton with Dad at the Primary hunt.

Coloring Easter Eggs

We just got back from Montana for a quick little SpRinG break. Mckay helped his DaD with a few taxes during his break. It was a good refresher before he starts work this Summer. It was nice to see the family again. Now we are home and trying to get back into the swing of school. We are both excited that the end is finally in sight. Now if we could just get through these last few classes! (I say we but I really mean Mckay...although it seems like it is a family effort). The kids did surprisingly well for the 9 to 10 hour trip. It helps that McKenzie still sleeps in the car and Payton has a portable DVD player!

Just a quick recap on our EAsTeR fun: We took the kids to the ZOO for an Easter Egg Hunt and to see the fun animals, with some friends (Lane, Liz, and their kids). Then we also went to a Primary Easter Egg Hunt and a family hunt as well. That totals 3 Easter Egg Hunts for Payton, so you can bet that he really got the hang of it. By the end he was literally running to grab armfuls of eggs/candy and dumping it into his bucket. This year McKenzie was too young to hunt but she sure enjoyed the outdoors. He got a loot, now the challange of supervising his intake of sweets. I think the "Out of sight, out of mind" theory works well. Mckay and I were asked to speak in church on Easter Sunday, so we invited my family to come to our ward to watch the kids while we spoke, and to hear us if they wanted! We also had a nice dinner together at our apartment. It was actually good to give a talk on Easter because we were able to focus on the real reason for celebration. So between preparing talks we colored eggs. Payton had such a fun time peeking at the eggs as they were changing colors. Then he decorated them with stickers. We had a whole sheet of various stickers, but for some reason he only wanted the boyish stickers such as: balls, animals, cars, etc. He didn't care for the flowers and such, so I threw a few on for McKenzie and me.

It is nice to see the grass getting GreeN but it is still a little cool for shorts, hopefully not much longer...I'm ready!

Two PEAS In A PoD!

Payton and McKenzie are becoming quite good little buddies. I have been noticing how much McKenzie watches her older brother. She tries to play with his toys and for the most part, Payton is really good at sharing with her (although there are some toys that he just can't bring himself to let her play with at times). She is now CrAWLinG well and can get to his toys, food, etc. so I am sure that there are bound to be a few arguments that will need some supervision in the days to come, but for now things are going well. McKenzie watches Payton dance to music in the car, he seems to be her little entertainer and advocate. There are also times that I have to tell Payton to be a little softer with her but for the most part they are so cute together. The other day I was using one of those ball syringe nose things to get some gunk out of her little nose, Payton was very concerned and upset with me doing this to her (I tried to tell him that she can not blow her nose like he can). He seemed to be protecting her and tried to get me to stop. This is a little bit of one of our conversations:
Me: "Do you want me to suck out your nose?"
Payton: "No!!!" (as he covers his nose and backs away)
Me: "Do you want me to suck out Kenzie's nose?"
Payton: "No!"
Me: "Do you want me to suck out daddy's nose?"
Payton: "Yes!" (with a little sly grin on his face)
Me: "Do you want me to suck out my nose?"
Payton: same reaction as above!
Aparently he could care less if Mckay or I got our nose cleaned out the hard way, but McKenzie needs his big brother protection.


Today I had to make a grocery run and I got a few blocks away from the house when I noticed that I had forgotten my bank card. I told Payton that I needed to go back home to get my "money". Mckay and I have been giving him a little money here or there to put in his PiGGy bank, so eventually he could buy a toy when he earned enough money (I know this may be a little over his head, at this age he still thinks money grows on trees, but we are hoping this will help him understand a little better). Anyway when Mckay gave him money a few weeks ago he told him this money was to save for his mission. Not thinking much more Payton put it is his PiG. But today when I had to return to get "money", Payton replied, "Money, for a mission?" I sure hope that he will continue with this eagerness to save for a mission, I know that he will be a great missionary one day. (Just not too soon, I am enjoying him at all these precious stages as he grows and matures each day.)

aLL beCauSE twO PeoPLe feLL iN LOVE

Today Mckay and I hit our 4 year mark. Let me tell you, it has been the best years of my life. I can't believe how fast these few years have came and gone. I am sure that we were still in the Salt Lake Temple at this exact moment. I can remember feeling so in LOVE that day and thinking that... "It can't get any better than this". Boy was I wrong, Mckay makes me so happy.

Today is Mckay's busy day at school, he will be gone from 3:15 until about 9:15, so we decided to celebrate our anniversary on Friday. My mom is going to watch the kids while just the two of us have an all day daTe (Thanks Mom!). Mckay has always made me want to be a better person, he meets all of the qualities that I dreamt my MR. RigHT would have. I often think about my life with my sweetheart as well as our two beautiful children, and I have to stop and ask myself, "Why am I so Lucky?" Thank you Mckay, for choosing me, and for always working so hard for our little family. I truely did marry my BEST FRIEND! I LoVE you with all of my HeaRT Mckay.

P.S I am not sure why our photo turned out like that, but you get the picture!

EaR TRouBBle

What a week! While reading all of your blogs lately about children who have been sick and to the doctors, I had been feeling lucky that mine had missed the bug that seems to be going around. I thought that way tOO soon. Payton woke up a few times one night complaining about his ears. This got me thinking that he must have an ear infection because he never just makes up pain in the middle of the night. With the weekend approaching I thought it would be a good idea to take him in the see if he really did have an infection...sure enough, along with his runny nose and cough, he had an ear infection. He hated the doctor looking at his ears and later cleaning them out to even see into one of them (it ended up bleeding later). Poor little guy. Well you can bet that just two days later little McKenzie had the runny nose/fever/cough. Then she started waking up and crying several times at night like she was in pain and began occasionally tugging at her ear. On Saterday we took her in and found out that she too has the dreaded ear infection. Luckly they are both sleeping much better and on the mend. I feel so bad when they aren't feeling well, although I do like to CuDDle with them, which seems to be what they wanted too.



Payton is such a sweet little boy but he also know how to push his luck. With the week mostly consisting of taking care my sick children...the dishes were starting to pile up and the house needed some cleaning. I am also the secretary in the primary and I needed to decorate the theme board for this month. After I completed it with pictures of the Savior and Easter fun, I set it aside so I could take it to church the next day. I went upstairs for not even 2 minutes when I heard Mckay from downstairs say "Oh Oh, Payton", this did not sound good, so I make my way (RAN) downstairs to find that Payton had been enjoying my decorated board. He had torn off the picures and I had to start over. Just my luck, I actually got something accomplished this week, at the expense of attending to the house and nOw, even that had to be fixed again. Thanks to Payton it actually turned out better then the original draft. His solution to everything that breaks lately is to: "Buy a new one". Oh if only things were that easy buddy! I am glad to say that all is well, the dishes and house did end up getting clean, and I really love being a mom to two cute kids.