AND SHE WRITES!

Here it is! Siena's first written letter! She has shown little to no interest in writing actual letters. She has been doing the scribbling on the line and "signing" her signature but no "letters". Her wonderful daycare teacher and now preschool teacher, Miss Rubi, actually got her to write the letter "E". I couldn't be more proud. In fact, I almost cried. I'm still not ready to blog about how big my girls are. That will make me cry. I just stared at Cara playing today and realized that she's not a baby. I HAD a baby when Siena was her same size.

Anyway, here are Siena's letter E's. The first one is all traced E's. The second is one traced E and the rest are her!

Youth Conference Fun

Guest post by Mommy:

It feels like it's been awhile since I've done a guest post and honestly I would love to do this guest post about how my girlies have been changing but that feels so overwhelming. I went to Youth Conference with my ward (my church for those of you unfamiliar with LDS lingo) and came back and Siena looked all stretched out, you know...taller and skinnier. I felt like Cara was talking even more and in more complete sentences! So I think because I am exhausted I will just give a quick shout out to the reason I am exhausted. Our ward youth conference. I am the first counselor in the Young Women Presidency and I have enjoyed my calling but now I LOVE IT. Originally I wasn't going to be able to stay the whole conference and was going to have to bail on Friday night but I changed my mind and stayed for everything and I was not sorry.

Our youth conference was simple. We traveled to Salt Lake City and stayed in the houses of our YW President's aunt and uncles. We played games (LOTS of games), ate food, did a couple quick cope course activities, went on a tour of the Humanitarian Center of the LDS church, hiked Ensign Peak, learned ballroom dancing, and played some more. Oh! And went swimming (duh that was the one activity I was in charge of!) We had so much fun and I love the youth in my ward. We are small in numbers and so nobody was ever excluded and everyone jumped in. I laughed with them and talked about life with them and genuinely grew to LOVE these kids individually. I mean, we played FOUR SQUARE. I think the last time I did that was in 6th grade! I also played soccer in flip flops and scored the WINNING goal. I had a wonderful time and of course I missed my little family but I wouldn't trade this weekend for anything.






So one of my favorite parts of this was that I got to do several things that I hadn't gotten to do before in SLC (despite the fact that I've lived there more than once.) I had never been to the Humanitarian Center or to Ensign Peak. And as a special bonus because our car had a little bit of time, I went inside the State Capitol Building. It was beautiful and engendered respect for the laws of our nation. Such a treat.

A sneak into Zion

Yesterday Grandma invited me to go over to Zion National Park and bring Mommy and Cara along. Grandpa and Uncle Eric were going to Kayak the upper part of the Virgin River and Aunt Becca was going to leave their truck for them so we all went! (Well Daddy didn't but let's just say Daddy is now 4 lbs away from his goal weight and he's not happy about it...no one wants to lose 5 lbs in 2 days the way he did.)

We rode the bus and hiked up Court of the Patriarchs and up to the rock that cries (Weeping Rock) and had lots of fun...perfect for us little girlies. We even got to eat at Oscar's. So much fun.

Fun Conversation

This took place today. I think my Daddy shouldn't use cough medicine anymore.

Mommy misses a phone call from Daddy. Mommy finishes what she's doing and calls him back. It's 3:30 pm.

Daddy: Hello..
Mommy: Hey, what's up?
Daddy: Oh you know workin'.
Mommy: What did you need?
Daddy: Oh, do you know where Gabby is?
Mommy: What do you mean?
Daddy: Well she's not in the backyard.
Mommy: Oh she's not...dang. How did she get out? Are you sure?
Daddy: Yeah. She's not back there.
Mommy: Well I don't know. I've been gone since 8:30 this morning.
Daddy: Hmmm. I don't know where she is.
Mommy: Did I let her outside? I don't remember letting her outside. Maybe she's inside. Did you let her out back?
Daddy: No.
Mommy: Um wait...did you let her out of her kennel even?
Daddy: Didn't you? Wait. Did you?
Mommy: NO! Pete I didn't. And you didn't. SHE'S STILL IN HER KENNEL IN THE GARAGE. She's been there since last night!
Daddy: Oh no! Okay I'll go take care of it.
Mommy: Ack! She could be dead! Or at the very least has peed or pooed in her kennel! Keep me on the phone so I know she's okay.
Daddy: Oh Gabby..hey little girl. We're sorry. Yeah she's fine...and she's dry and it doesn't smell like poop.
Mommy: Oh good. How embarrassing. I feel so bad. Well I'm on my way home. See you both soon.

In Daddy's defense, he hadn't taken the "good" cough medicine since 4 am but he was in quite the cloud until almost during that conversation!

Ehhh

So apparently May hasn't been a great month for Mommy, me, and blogging. We only have a pithy 6 entries..okay now 7...and I think we had 10 one other month! Sorry. We'll try better in June.

We just got back from a trip up north SLC over Memorial Day. We went for the weather. HAHAHAHA! Sniff. Sorry. Just a little joke. Unfortunately, the camera battery died the moment Mommy turned it on so we don't have any pictures. Although it just occurred to Mommy that Aunt Rachel took some fun ones at the zoo. Of course we went to the zoo! We went twice! Despite the rainy, cold weather. Saturday was great because Romney and Chase and Emma got to join us (Mommy and Aunt Rachel kept having flash back of Disneyland). Monday it was just Mommy and us girls. It snowed on Sunday night at the zoo so it was pretty dang cold. However it was a very fun trip full of cousins and down time. Mommy and Daddy even went for a run together with us in the bike trailer/stroller. That's a first.

I really loved the zoo except for one thing. They had dinosaurs. Life size dinosaurs that moved and made noise and two that even sprayed. I hated them. We worked on saying "poo poo dinosaur I'm not afraid of you" but I still didn't want anything to do with them. Except the one you could sit on and take pictures of. I was okay with that. Go figure.

We will not let this post go without pictures however. Here are pictures that Mommy got from Aunt Rachel from our Disneyland trip. The group shot at night in front of the castle which I think is beautiful, me in my bell dress, the little girlies (or ducklings it felt like), and us with our silly parents. Oh and the cute Mommas who took us. Aren't they beautiful?

The Boys

Hey that's a title we don't get to do very often! We're all about girls at our house but last weekend Daddy's friends came down for a visit! They even brought friends for Mommy too.

Uncle Greg and his wife, Marcela, came and Uncle Braden and his wife, Steph, came. Mommy and Daddy seemed to enjoy their company very much. Daddy went on a bike ride with "the boys" and very much appreciated the increase in testosterone around the house. Funny enough, they looked like triplets though.



Mommy and Daddy even took them over and let them hang out in Grandma and Grandpa's big jacuzzi.


(Mommy is very proud that she actually got a shot of everybody looking at the camera and not involving food. That's a favorite activity of "the boys". Cooking. 99% of the time outdoors.)

Thanks for a great weekend everyone. I wasn't scared a bit. I even sat on Steph's lap and talked to Greg and Braden!

Disneyland Romney Style

Mommy would like to start this post by taking a quick minute to say that she needed this dang vacation to her happy place. Things have not perked up after her birthday at all! Daddy needed a root canal and a crown, we found out our a/c might need to be replaced and then the next morning our garage door broke and wouldn't let us out. Disneyland was soooooo much appreciated. She also wants to thank Aunt Whitley and Aunt Rachel for EVERYTHING!

Now just as a warning, we downloaded 125 images from our camera. We've cut it down to 109 but Aunt Rachel and Aunt Whitley both have pictures that we don't have yet that we really want to post (i.e. a big group shot and pictures of all the cousins in a row). Yeeeaaaah....Mommy is currently trying to figure out how to do one of those mosaic things so you don't just freak out from photo overload. Maybe 3 posts will be warranted.

We started out a Disney journey by leaving our house at 5:45 am Saturday morning. We were the tagalongs on this trip. Aunt Rachel and Uncle Troy planned it and then Mommy just jumped on board! Uncle Troy had only one day at Disneyland and that was Saturday so we were hoping to get to the park at around noon. Which we accomplished! It being a Saturday the park was busy and the lines tended to be a little long but I think we all had fun. Our first ride was Astro Orbitors (which are MY favorite) and then Buzz. A few of us got to meet the Fairies while the bigger kids went on the Matterhorn (Mommy decided not to force me into it on our first day at the park...wasn't that nice of her?)

Okay I just thought of a good way to do this. Highlights instead of play by play! Words and photos in one epic post! (We might just even give you a break after this and not post for a whole week!)

Saturday:
Word Highlights: Watching Mommy start to hyperventilate as she could almost smell Disneyland from the freeway. Meeting the Fairies. Cara being excited about the rides and begging to go on them. Uncle Troy and Aunt Rachel's faces as Mommy and Daddy took them on California Screamin' for the first time (don't worry they did it two adults at a time and always had adult supervision for us kids!) That first water fall on the first ride of Pirates (that's Mommy's!) Head hitting the pillow after a 20 hour day.

Photo Highlights:



Sunday:
Word Highlights: Spending lazy time with the Adam Romney clan and the Rachel (Romney) Preslar clan at the same time in Uncle Adam and Aunt Whitley's beautiful house. Three separate walks in their gorgeous neighborhood (twice to the beautiful cemetery...this one is Mommy's highlight!) Lots of dress ups and squeals and romping on the part of all the kids. Well no dress ups for the boys. Aunt Whitley's DELICIOUS food. DELICIOUS. Oh and naps for the adults. That was heavenly. The wonderful red puffy air ball that I could get inside and be pushed around.

Photo Highlights:



Monday:
Word Highlights: Having all six little girls at the park...(this might not be so much of a highlight for the three Mommys). Our first time playing on Tom Sawyer's island which is now "The Pirates Lair". Getting to drive the cars on Autopia, twice! First ride on Dumbo ever and first ride on Alice in Wonderland and the teacups (my new favorite) and then getting our picture taken in front of the castle. Oh and riding the Matterhorn with Lainie and Romney. Even though Lainie and I were WAY more nervous than the veteran, Romney. Oh and dinner at the Pizza Port. We were STARVING. We also met the princesses this morning!

Photo Highlights:









Tuesday:
Word Highlights: This isn't so much as a "high"light as a "low"light: Freezing misty rain all morning...it was really bad. Luckily it stopped at around 12:30pm. Ticking Peter Pan, the carousels at both parks, and Finding Nemo off our ride list. Mommy taking Aunt Rachel on Tower of Terror (Mommy's favorite ride) for the first time. The Pixar Animation Studio experience. Doing Midway Mania (the Toy Story ride in California Adventure) for the first time. We did this TWICE and loved it. The World of Color show. (Okay I put my hands over my ears and slept through it and Cara just slept through it but everyone else says it was awesome.)

Photo Highlights:





We left on Wednesday morning and said goodbye. There are awesome pictures of all us little cousins but those are the ones on Aunt Whitley's camera. You'll have to wait for another post for those. :) We had a fantastic time. Oh we were pretty warn out. Mommy wants to show you one more mosaic collage (can you tell she's excited about this new feature she's discovered?) It's all the cute sleeping pictures!