A Perfect Day

Forgot to post this sooner:

On Monday, John and the school kids had the day off. We decided it was the perfect opportunity for family together time. That usually means leaving the house. I scoured the internet in the morning before doing chores to find fun family things to do in Utah. I found this Gateway Discovery Children's Museum in the Gateway mall in down town SLC.  The website said nothing about price, so I thought it was some free mall thing. That seemed like a good plan, but I thought it might be too young for the older kids. We decided to head to the zoo around lunch time and then go to the gateway mall. On the way to the zoo, it really started to rain. I turned around and headed to the Gateway mall.

The Children's Gateway Discovery Museum is not some small thing. It is a pretty big, fun , expensive kids museum. Usually at these places I buy a family pass because they quickly pay for themselves. But this place charges $20 extra dollars per kid past one child. So we paid for the day, and the lady at the desk got us in for $20 less. It was really fun. We were there for several hours. They had this neat toy store, and farm, and house and construction site. The kids loved playing there. (It was hard to keep track of six kids and one baby, but John and I managed to be patient and calm, and laughed at the all the disappearing kids instead of despairing.) That was the main floor. Upstairs they had all these neat puzzle and building things. The older kids loved building these parachute things and seeing them fly through these glass boxes that had air blowing up through them. Rachel really enjoyed the craft room and Anya spent at least an hour with some puzzles. There were also some fun giant legos, a helicopter, a news station, and magnets. John and I enjoyed playing with the kids all day.

When the kids were in the helicopter I heard Johnny say, "They took out all of the guns!" It is a life-flight helicopter.

When we finished we let Ruth and Kate go to Claire's. Then we went to Applebees for dinner. My kids were the best they have EVER been in a restaraunt. No one ran around. Nothing got spilled. No one cried about the food they got. No one complained about waiting for the food. No one had a fight or even a slight disagreement. Everyone shared nicely. We had fun chatting and joking. We got two desserts to share and no one took more than they should. It wasn't real life-- but it was.

We got home in time for the olympics.  I even got all of the chores done before we left so we came home to a nicely clean house. Monday was a perfect day!!!

Rachel's Song

This morning I heard Rachel singing as she spun in graceful circles, "I just want Adam to talk to me and play me. I do not want him to jump on me."

New Rule

For me: I will not get on the computer in the morning until I have brushed my kids teeth.

Comment Moderation

Well, I really hate filling out those little word verification boxes, and I always feel a little nervous leaving a comment that has to be checked by the author, but I had some one leave a link to a porn site on my blog in some Asian language. I didn't know about it because I don't open links unless I am sure of what they are, but I do not want people who read my blog being redirected to something so horrible and degrading. So I put on comment moderation. I really like getting comments and making "friends" through the blog world, so please continue to leave comments. I will not delete comments from friends and family and other good people. I just do not want bad spam coming through things I publish.

Congratulations Johnny!!

After a year and a half of daily scriptures study, Johnny has finished reading the entire Book of Mormon at 8 years old.

Recent Pictures

 

Rachel the amazing 3 year old  engineer. She loves building with blocks.

 

Anya helping to make dinner.

 

Adam's paper trap. He said that if some one started walking down the stairs they would slip and crash and he would catch them.

 

Saturday Morning Family Time :()

 

Love those baby smiles!!!

More Funny Things

So kids are always saying and doing funny or cute things, and this is where I like to keep track of them.  I have racked my tired brain this morning so I could write down one thing from each kid this week.

1. Ruth picked out these cutsie pastel puppy valentines cards for her 6th grade class. She seemed very excited about them in the store. But when She began to fill them out, Ruth was definitely distressed. She looked down at her neatly sorted cards and her class list and very forlornly and said, "Mom!!! I can NOT give any of these cards to the boys in my class!" John very definitely agreed.
2. So after last week, we made this week a computer game free week. Kate said, "That is okay, Mom because we just took the time that we normally play computer games and watched lots of great TV shows!" (That is somewhat true, but they also read more books and played outside more.)
3. Okay, so little boys are weird. The nine year old boys in our primary class are always pointing finger guns and making shooting noises. My sons are no different. After school every day for about a half hour Johnny karate kicks the air, the couches, his sisters, Adam, the piano, whatever until I tell him to get Kell and go outside to play. On the same note, Adam throws his body around like a bomb and makes exploding noises as he crashes to the floor.
4. Aunt Rebecca took photos of the 4 little kids on Tuesday. She asked Adam what his favorite thing to do was and he replied, "Clean my room with my brother, Johnny." (I wonder what they are doing down there?)
5. At every meal Rachel sits down, groans and says, "Oh, I hate that kind of food." But it is every meal no matter what we are eating. I should maybe try Rachel's diet?
6. Anya loves, loves, loves pacifiers and it has recently taken a turn for the worst. Instead of just having a pacifier in her mouth, Anya is not happy unless she has one pacifier in her mouth, and one pacifier in her hand.
7. I've noticed that when Joseph starts to get upset he starts spitting. When I washed his face yesterday, he looked me directly in the eye and spat.  I guess he doesn't like getting his face washed :).