Stitches were what the doctor ordered, after he saw the gash with oozing blood on Bennett's lip.

Monday afternoon Bennett and Jacks were playing "camping" with their blankets on the dinning room chairs.
Bennett was piling blankets on the chair then dangling his legs and arms on opposite sides. Finally he decided that was all the fun he could handle and slowly slid off the chair with blankets clutched in his arms. It looked very comical until he grabbed his mouth and started crying. I walked over, pulled his hand away, and almost passed out. I called Matt to tell him we were headed down to the hospital to get stitches. He thought I was overreacting, until he saw Bennett for himself.
As they prepared Bennett for a shot to knock him out, he was wondering if he was there to get his Ethan out of his tummy. The sad thing about that statement is he is convinced he has a baby in his tummy that is going to come out. He has named him after his favorite cousin, Ethan. I keep trying to tell him that only mommy has a baby in her tummy, but he won't listen.
They knocked him out and gave him 4 stitches. I accidently looked and got very dizzy and woozy. I had to sit down quickly unless I wanted to make a spectical out of myself by passing out. Matt just rolled his eyes, he thinks I'm weak. The meds were suppose to ware off in 10 to 20 minutes, unfortunately it was nap time so he slept for about another hour. Jacks also took a nap. He was reclined in his stroller that was resting on my legs. I even thought about laying my head down and taking a nap.
Finally we were able to wake him up enough for him to take a sip of juice and walk (I mean wobble)around the room.

Yesterday he woke up from him nap and threw up all over me. He wasn't able to keep anything down for the rest of the night, so I'm not sure if he is just really sensitive to the drug or if he now has the flu. Either way it has been very quiet around the house the past couple of days.
Last night all he wanted to do was take a bath. So we kept filling the tub up with hot water, he would stay in for about 5 minutes. Then 30 minutes later would want another bath. I'll have to take him to get his stitches out by Saturday, but they look like they are healing very well, probably because he hasn't been talking much.

Sledding

Yesterday we went sledding. Can you believe that! Arizona is such a disappointment to me. I came here looking for sun and warmth and what do I get? A big fat snow storm.
But sledding was fun. We went up to Sunrise where the ski hill is and found a little hill for the boys to go on. Unfortunetly there was so much powder that the sled didn't sled very well. Also, it was so cold and the wind was blowing, but that didn't stop the boys. They had a blast.

Since the sled didn't go very well Matt decided to pull the boys behind the Trailblazer. I know, we're brilliant parents. But we did it safely - I promise. And the boys enjoyed it (that's all that matters, right?)
(It doesn't look they they are having that much fun in the above picture. But I promise - they were. This must have been taken in between smiling and laughing)

Jacks most favorite part was laying down and enjoying a snack. He's not to hard to please.

Evil Squirrels

The squirrels here FREAK me out. Doesn't it look evil? It is! This place is infested with them! When I first moved here, one ran out in front of my car. I wasn't sure what it was at first, a fox maybe? I didn't know. They are surprisingly big. A little while later I had an unfortunate encouter with one. I was in the car and it was sitting on a fence post, but it surely looked as if it could come right through the window with no problem since it was nashing its razor sharp teeth at me. Don't think about looking them in the eye. Their eyes are red and beady. They stare back at you as if you could be their next meal or like the would enjoy attacking you just for the sport of it. A shiver runs down my spine everytime I encounter one.

Disclaimer!

Okay, so HB and I had a little disagreement on the whole which twin is it issue. There is a picture of Grace, Felicity, and Ethan. HB says that Felicity is by Ethans left hand and Grace is by Ethans right hand. That is true. She is looking at it from the prospective of Ethan. But when I wrote that Grace is on the left and Felicity is on the right, I was looking at it through the eyes of the viewer.
Wow! I'm glad I cleared that up.
Plus, Michelle - I do know that I labeled Grace as being in most of the slideshow pictures when some were Felicity. First of all, the pictures were really small and I couldn't see their faces when I downloaded them. Second, Grace is just much faster to type.
There! Are you two happy now?!

Pictures

I decided to post the best picture first. Jacks was a lost cause in all of them.

Ethan is so hilarious. He is usually so photogenic. We couldn't figure out what was wrong. Most of the pictures we have of this night are of him pouting.

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving was N-O-I-S-E-Y!
With four 3 yr old and a 2 yr old, there was absolutely no quiet. But I was so glad everyone drove all the way down here for Thanksgving.
Thursday morning we woke up to snow. It snow all morning long. Matt and Rob took Ben, Ella, Ethan, and Bennett sleding.

Apparently they had fun even though Ethan came home with a big scratch down his nose from a wipe out on the sled. (For those of you who can't figure it out - Grace is on the left and Felicity is on the right.





Thanksgiving dinner was delicious as always. It was so yummy in fact that we ignored the 4 toddlers running circles around the table, screaming to the top of their lungs.
(Sorry Michelle, I had to include the picture)

On Friday night before everyone left we decided to try and get some pictures of all the kids. Can we say total chaos! Jacks cried, Ben and Ella were whipping the other kids up into a frenzy, Ethan (for some unknown reason) sullked, and Bennett contorted his face in all sorts of ridiculous poses. It was 20 minutes of shear madness. We did get a couple semi-decent ones, but I don't think we'll be trying that again for a VERY long time.

Snow? Really?

Last night the most dreadful thing happened. It snowed! How miserable am I? When you move to Arizona you have certain expectations, the first one being - NO SNOW!



When the boys woke up, they immediately wanted to go have some fun. Jacks found his new favorite desert while out playing. He sat on the ground licking the snow as Matt and Bennett made a small snowman.

Luck for me, the snow pretty much melted away by evening. Bennett was really disappointed when he woke up from his nap and he realized his snowman had melted down.

On a totally different subject, we took the boys to Madagascar (I'm not sure how to spell that one) We had a great time, mostly due to the fact that we took Jacks car seat into the theater and strapped him down. He was forced to watch the entire thing. He had nowhere else to go. Bennett sat on my lap with a big bag of popcorn, an ICEE, and chocolate - he was set. I felt bad about the small popcorn mess we made until the lights turned on. The millions of kids that had inhabited the theater had created a HUGE mess. I felt really bad for the 3 boys who were standing at the entrance with brooms, waiting to come in and clean.

Halloween

We started out the night before by carving our pumpkins. Bennett had been so excited about the whole thing, until it came time to pull all the goop out, he plugged his nose saying, "Oh, gross. I can't do that." What a whimp!

On Halloween we went to the ward Trunk-or-Treat. There were a ton of people there. I don't think half of them were even in our ward. Bennett and Jacks made the rounds to the cars. Bennett didn't really seem all that thrilled, I think it was because he wasn't actually knocking on any doors. For a couple of days before "The Big Night" he would dress up in his dragon costume, take his pumpkin bucket with him, and practice knocking on our door saying "trick-or-treat" one time when Matt opened the door, he actually put candy in the bucket. Bennett stared down at it with pure amazement. I don't think he got the whole trick-or-treat thing until that moment. After an hour, we headed home to take the boys around our neighborhood. The first house we went to Bennett and Jacks climbed the stairs, knocked on the door, got the candy, turned around, and Bennett exclaimed, "It worked!" That started the whole frenzy for him. He kept saying "another house, another house" After an hour, with Jacks finally hungry, tired, and crying. And Bennett cold and ready to rip into his candy, we headed home and turned on our own lights.

There were so many people out. Good thing I had been warned before hand that our neighborhood would get hit hard. I was prepared with a ton of candy, however, it almost wasn't enough. Bennett was probably even more excited to hand out candy than he was to get it. The highlight of the night for him was when he raced and answered the door by himself, only to have a bunch of girls jump out at him yelling "Boo!" They felt bad, until they saw he had a big grin and kept exclaiming "You scared me! You scared me!" Laughing the whole time. Of course after that we didn't get him to bed until after 10pm he was hopping around and so excited.

It was a great Halloween for all of us. Matt and I really enjoyed seeing Bennett so excited about the night. Next year is going to be even better once Jacks finally gets it and is just as excited.

Don't Taunt The Buffalos!

Its's been 3 weeks and I know everyone has been wondering if I fell of the face of the planet (At least I hope you've noticed my absence). The 1 and only exciting thing that's happened during those 3 weeks is our trip to Idaho.
We drove all afternoon and night arriving to HB's apartment at 2 am on Saturday. Of course we were so exhausted, but HB and I beening true gabbers stayed up for another hour.
Later on Satuday Heather was so good to Matt and I by letting us ditch our kids on her and go to the BYU football game with Michelle, Rob, Ben, & Ella. The most exciting part of the game for me was the hot chocolate Matt bought me in the souveneir mug and when Michelle, Ella, & I went down to the BYU store to do a little unnecessary shopping. Matt says the most exciting moment for him was when I got in a fight with the man sitting in front of us. It wasn't really a fight...we just had some words...but Matt acted as if I had brawled and thrown punches at him.

Unfortunetly right after we took this mug shot, my camera died so I couldn't get any pics of Ben & Ella who looked adorable all bundled up. By the by, it was really cold.


On Monday we went to Yellowstone with Matt's 2 brothers Tyler & Glen, along with their families. Katie, Tyler, and Braeden rode with us. We had so much fun together. I'm definatly going to miss our annual christmas tree hunt with Katie & Tyler this year.

We saw a lot of elk, and some buffalo. For some unrational reason, toward the end of our trip, Matt & Tyler thought it would be fun to make this big ol' buffalo mad. They yelled, honked, and Tyler even got out of the car and threw a snowball at it. Don't ask me why. I still can't figure their logic of fun out. Good thing the buffalo thought they were as big of idiots as Katie & I did and ignored them. After they had their fun, we all had to try and explain to Braeden and Bennett why we don't go around taunting big animals.

The rest of the week Matt when hunting. He drew out on elk. I don't have any pics of the elk he shot. He's a little embarrassed that he got so trigger happy. Opening morning he shot the first elk he saw, which was a rag horn, and 30 seconds later a massive six point stepped out of the bushes and started at him, almost taunting him to become a poacher.

I on the other hand did some much needed shopping. Made a baby quilt, helped my mom with some receiving blankets, and forced her to make me a diaper bag. That project didn't get done, but I plan on nagging her everyday til it's completed.

We had such a great time and wish we could have stayed longer.

The ride home was long and borning. Matt brought back another car so we drove seperatly. That was the longest 12 hours of my life. The scenery consisted of dirt, sage brush, and more dirt. I have to say, if your looking for a great scenic drive, that's not the way to go. Anyway, that was our trip...now I can't wait for Thanksgiving when everyone comes here.

BOYS

What's with boys and bugs? Are they really that interesting? Hmm, I just don't see it.
This morning I gave the boys each small bowl of goldfish crackers. Jacks dumped both his and Bennetts' on the floor. Bennett started yelling at him "No, no! Jacks. No, no." The he asked me to help him pick them up. As I dropped down beside them to clean up Bennett had the following conversation with himself:
Bennett: "Jacks go away!"
"Bennett, you want to go to your room?"
"No"
"Be nice then"
"Okay"
All was mumbled under his breath...I guess he really is listening to me... just chooses to ignore.