My Hero

I would like to welcome Zoe Ann Swant to the world. On Wednesday, June 24th she finally made her apperance to all of her fans.

Soon after my sister in law found out she was pregnant, she told me that my brother and her would like me to be in the room during delivery. During the course of her pregnancy I jokinly told her that I would give her privacy and stay at her head. That is not how it went and to be honest I am grateful for many reasons. Watching a baby come into this world is NOTHING like bringing one into the world. I realized I took for granted all 4 times I went through this process. Beyond that I feel that my sister in law (and all those other women out there that have to push for more than a few times and labor for hours on end) are more of a woman than I could ever be. She showed such strenength and bravery. She truley is my hero. We held her legs as she continued to push for 3 hours. When Zoe finally came out it was a miracle before all of our eyes. We have been given the most amazing and powerful gift. The gift to bring life in to this world. This is one of those experiences that I hope I never forget. Not because it was amazing, but because it reminds me how lucky I am that I chose to be a woman and to have children. How lucky I am that my Heavenly Father gave me the abilty to bring life into this world. How wonderful it is to be a mom and the great responsibilty that comes with these souls that have been entrusted to us. How how very lucky I am that I married a man that does not take his part of the responsibity lightly.

Zoe is one lucky little girl. She has two of the most wonderful parents and the most amazing extended family that will love her more than she will ever know.

To my brother and his wife...thank you for allowing me to be apart of your special day. I love you both and I am so proud of you.

 

End of the year

We had our end of the year assembly on Monday. Each class has a little song to perform in between the awards given out certain children. I tried to tape Zach and Allison's class, but hers came out a little fuzzy. Bummer, but you can hear the cute song!

Zach's class did a class play about the solar system and this was one of their songs.

Allison received the principal's award for outstanding academics. We are so very proud of her!

Thie year our district had a fitness club and encouraged all kids to participate. Zach was all over this! They logged how many miles each child ran. Allison ran 75 (for the year) and Zach 79. They each got a medal. Great job guys! Keep up the good work!

Middle of the night

Last night, at 2:37 am to be exact, I was woken by my 4 1/2 year old. He was standing by my bed completely dressed for the day. He was wanting to watch a movie. It took me a minute to get my barrings. I had to tell him it was still night night time and he had to go back to bed. I then lay back down to go back to sleep and I hear sobbing from the other room. He had gone into the toy room and laid himself on the couch and was just sobbing. (He is definitely my most sensitive child) I then go back in there (trying really hard not to wake myself completely up, because I will then lay in bed for hours trying to go back to sleep) to see what is the matter. He says he is so sad because he just wants to watch a movie. Sometimes as a mom your heart just melts. I tell him that if he goes back to bed he can watch one first thing when the sun comes up. That seemed to slow down the crying enough to get him quietly back to bed.

Thank heaven for little children.

Pack meeting

I am so lucky to have a wonderful cubmaster in many ways. First, beacuse I am over the scouting program and she makes my job VERY easy and second, because my son is a wolf. The theme for the month was a camping we will go. She wanted to have a campfire at a home to roast marshmellows for smores when the meeting was over. We volunteered our backyard. Other than the smoke blowing in our faces, it was a fun night for the boys and parents.

Open house part 2

Matthew goes to a different school, so his open house was a week later. I got on the road and realized I forgot my camera. So, I turned the car around to get it. We get to the school, park at the bottom of a very big and steep hill, walk to the the class and UGH I forgot my camera in the car!!! I wasn't going back. So, this is when we got back in the car. He was very proud of the book he made.

Open house

I just love to go to open house. The way the rooms are decorated, to the cute projects, and the looks on the kids faces when they get to show mom and dad all of it is just priceless. Here are a few pics of some of the projects.

Desert silhouette

Report on the President

Life cycle of a frog

Being a forest ranger. So cute!!!

End of baseball season

Warning: I have bragging rights because I am the mom.

This year our baseball team had very good comradery (sp.?) and some skill. We had boys that were good, but it was hard for us to "get our act together". So, we were in second to last place. Nobody cared, not even the boys. We all had such a good time.

Then....the league had a tournament. First we played the team in third place. Side note, very rarely could we even hold the score. At the end of games the score board would often say 10-2, 18-5, even once it was something like 20-2. Never us with the winning score. Okay so the game comes and I am thinking, YEA last baseball game of the season. NOT, we won!!! So, on to the next game a few days later. Same thought playing the second place team. Never in a million years are we going to win, but we did!!! Okay so now we are in the championship game. Parents and kids are just so stoked! We start off in the lead, then they tie it up. We keep it like that for 3 innings...and then, they make 5 runs. Our last time up to bat we make 2 runs and then game is called. We ended up in second place. Not bad for a bottom ranked team, huh!? I must say I am so proud of our team. The only bad thing was they lined both teams up and presented the other team with their first place trophies and we were to get ours at our party. Our boys were so sad. They thought they would not be getting any at all. Over all it was GREAT season. GO RED SOX!!!

YEA!!! The much anticipated trophy!

Trying to catch up

Here is a bunch of random things that I have been meaning to post, but just not enough time to do it. The first is about a month ago Craig and the kids finished laying our sod. Yes, if you remember back he laid the bulk of it 1 1/2 years ago. He thought he bought enough to go around the basketball court and soon found out he was short. So, we sat there looking at it thinking maybe we don't want grass there, but what else do you do with it? I finally said I could not go another summer with the kids plying in that mud. So, being the good husband that he is he got up very early one Sat. morning (he is NOT a morning person) went to Home Depot and bought it! By the time I made it to the kitchen this is what I found.

He put all the kids to work pulling weeds. He suddenly remembered how he was always pulling weeds or doing yard work when he was a kid and decided our kids were not going to get off that easy!

This is Allison's first grade rain forest mobile. We had one for Zach two years ago and I knew this one was coming. I had all year to think about it! For those of you who know me well, you know that I do not have a creative bone in my body. I am a copy cat. I got smart this year at open house...I took pictures of all the others to give me ideas for when Matthew hits first grade! Anyway I was very proud of how it turned out. Definetly a step up from Zach's.

Just a cute picture of Spencer and his friend Lawson. They would play peek-a-boo like this at the baseball games.

birthday pics

Here are just some random birthday pictures. He LOVES Dora and Diego. So, it was only fitting that he have a Diego cake. I had just finished writting on it, "Happy 2nd birthday" and Zach says mom he isn't 2 he is 3. That just proves I am in denile of him getting any older. SO ofcourse I had to do my best to scrap off the writting and fix it.

My baby turns 3

First of all...of course the pics do not post in order!

Yesterday my baby boy turned 3. Each year it is getting harder and harder to accept him growing up. He is just the cutest thing and we couldn't have had a better surprise! Spencer really makes each day fun (challenging too), but mostly fun. He always says the cutest things. We just love that we stopped on a good note.

Here are some things that he can do at the age of 3:
He recognizes the letter "S" on everything and says, "That's my name!"
He still doesn't care if he has poo in his pants
He loves to learn
He can tell you the sound every letter of the alphabet makes
He can count to 13
He loves to play baseball and ride his bikes
He loves to do EVERYTHING the big kids are doing and refuses to hear he is to little

Here are the 3 things I love the most about him:
1.I love how he grabs my face and kisses me over and over
2.I love that he can melt me with his dimples
3.I love he is very confident in all that he does

Spencer 1 hour old

2nd birthday He was born on my grandma's birthday. Another special surprise. Grandma says that makes him her baby!

3rd birthday

1st birthday

FHE fun

Last night for family home evening we talked about being prepared. We told the kids that their was a fire and we had to be out of our house in 10 min. They had to get everything they felt they needed and that was important to them. Check out Matthew in the background. After the 10 min. was up we all compred what we had and if it was important or not. Everyone, but Matthew grabbed their pillows. He wanted to go back and get it. Of course dad said no it has already burned. Poor Matthew thoght it was real and was so upset!

Do you see everything Zach grabbed? He was persistant that he would be able to carry ALL of it!