First Christmas in Vegas

Let me warn all my fellow bloggers out there (psst...I'm talkin' to you, Mom). If you don't blog right away, your phone might mysteriously delete half of your pictures leaving you with fragmented thoughts and memories. Sigh. We'll work through this together. 

What we do have is a new cousin to join the boy party. Hey, hey, hey, Baby Kade!

This is where things are tragically missing. I was able to go out to Washington D.C. for Jeff's graduation but the following two pictures are the only ones that survived my phone's vanishing act. 

I was so grateful to get the chance to go out and see where Jeff had been spending his time. It was super rewarding to see him graduate and to cheer him on. I was so proud of him and the hard work he put in to complete his training. Go, Jeff!

Next thing my phone is choosing to remember is our December trip to the Bellagio where we took this picture that was our closest attempt at a Christmas card this year. 

We are closer to Grandma and Grandpa Excell now! We were able to go visit for their annual Christmas Tea and Recital. 

Maybe my phone was trying to help me forget all the painting I did in the first two months of living in our new house. Our whole house was painted in eggshell finish. EGGSHELL. Have you ever been in an eggshell finished house? Filled with four boys? It's the worst. Anywhere my boys touched left a grease mark that couldn't be wiped off. One week in the house and the bottom third of our walls were visibly nasty. It had to go and it had to go fast. 

I made a goal to paint two walls every day and became a woman on a mission. Before too long we had a beautiful semi-gloss grey house that I'm fully giddy over. I'm happy to say 3 months later the house is almost done. I've just got a few closets left to finish and then I can officially say I've painted every inch of an entire house. Bleh!

I kept saying our house didn't feel like home yet because we hadn't made any memories in it. Christmas helped with that! We were thrown right into the biggest memory making holiday which helped our new house feel like home. 

We were loving playing outside at a park without so much as a jacket on Christmas Eve. We could get used to this!

I broke away from painting the house to paint a few sugar cookies for Santa.

We were finally starting to get settled in our new home, but would Santa find us in Vegas? And if he did, would he be able to fill our stockings if we didn't have a chimney for him to climb down? To be continued!

Empire-or Something Like That

Cousins came to visit over UEA and we spent the day at Cross E. Ranch. 

Entering month 3 of Jeff's training was the home stretch! We made a chain to celebrate Jeff's return!

Month three also brought our first and only holiday we'd have to celebrate sans a father figure. Luke Skywalker knows how that feels. Life without a father. Okay, so maybe that was a rough way to transition into announcing that we went for a Star Wars theme yet again this Halloween. Only trouble is, two boys were dead set on being Storm Troopers while the other two were dead set on being penguins. If you know me like I know you do, you know I had to "force(?)" a theme out of our costume choices. 

After a morning of stewing, I realized there are...what I at the time believed were called...Empire Penguins. Boo yeah! "The Empire" is about to strike a Halloween near you. 

Only trouble is I didn't realize until AFTER my Instagram post announcing our "Empire" theme that the penguins are actually called "Emperor" Penguins, but whatevs. Close enough.

I used all my lonely nights sewing endless black and white costumes. 

Lincoln LOVED his costume. And he made sure to announce to EVERYONE that he was not just a penguin, but a misinformed "Empire Penguin."

We stopped by my old high school for a trunk or treat with the Bess Bunch.

It was a good Halloween!

Getting Through Month Two

Jeff's training was 3 months long. The first month I was a rockstar. Incredible. The kids were great. I was a champ. All was well. Then Jeff came home and everything changed. Once we shipped him off again, we were all so discouraged. The kids were mad because they only got to see Jeff for .25 seconds. I was mad because ditto and also because his training wasn't even halfway over so it felt like we still had a long ways to go. And finally, seeing him reminded me of how much easier it is to have help, so it made it all the harder to do everything on my own again after that. Plus we had the stress of needing to find a house, and preparing to move, and everything hit me in month two. 

Which is when good friends stepped in and got me through. Starting with a concert Kenz went to with me. We ate pizza and cookies and enjoyed a warm summer evening out at Antelope Island which was just the thing I needed to recover from my stress. 

Just as I was wishing there was somebody to take care of me as I tried to take care of all four of my boys, Teresa stepped in to invite me over for dinner, and she was always there to help out during school functions and weekday juggling. She saved me!

The boys participated in a jog-a-thon at school.

 They did it all for the snow cones.

 Teresa joined me on a Saturday hike. We caught the leaves at the perfect time of year. The setting and the kids were all cooperative for this weekend excursion.

Of all the things I did by myself, when I look back at pictures of General Conference weekend,that's the thing that seems the most laborious though I don't remember it actually being burdensome at all. I made the traditional ebelskivers. I kept 4 kids entertained for all sessions, and I even provided a few activities to keep them busy. Go me!

Carson made this cute bead creation of the prophet while listening to conference. 

My favorite conference tradition is to do "conference magic." I sit down with the boys and have them come up with 2-3 questions they want answered during conference. We write them down and then listen for our answers. So far we have found an answer for all the questions we've ever asked. That's the magic!

The boys wanted to walk to church one Sunday. On the way home, there is always a stream of cars which gets annoying when it comes time to cross the street to get to our house. We started up the road and there was a break in the cars so I told the boys to hurry and run across while we had the chance. Eli, taking a very stubborn stance, announced, "MOM! I will NOT cross the street here! That's called JAYWALKING! That's BREAKING THE LAW!"

I rolled my eyes at his self-righteousness and tried to convince him he had to take his moment while he had it to get across the street. Eli walked backwards towards the corner so that he could cross the street in the appropriate spot. I stopped to wait for him to catch up to us and as he approached, he proudly held up the necklace he made at church, which clearly stated what he had learned about that day-"We believe in obeying the law."

Pictures are deceiving as it appears we already have a baby daddy back in the picture. But don't be deceived. Month two was a drag!

Like maniacs, we met up in Las Vegas, where we would be moving, to, oh you know, buy a house in a day. It seemed like our only option! I didn't want to rent because I hate moving and Eli has basically gone to a new school every year of his life, so I just felt like we needed to somewhat settle somewhere. I was sure we would find some clarity once we were in Vegas and the perfect house would present itself so that we could confidently put an offer in, leaving us househunting for the entire duration of Jeff's quick visit home.

 The boys quickly learned about the perk of living in Las Vegas-swimming in October!

After a one-day marathon of house hunting, we found it. I wouldn't call it love at first sight, but after seeing all our other options and then coming back to this one, we finally knew we had a keeper. We felt good about the house, put an offer in, and by nothing short of a miracle, everything went perfectly smoothly so we were all ready to move in right as Jeff finished training. Prayers are answered!

One month of training left to go and then we'd call this place home!

Back to Blogging with Back to School

My kids are in school. Like everyone's kids. And like everyone's kids, mine also posed for pictures to mark the start of their 3rd and 1st grade adventures at Adelaide Elementary School. 

The adorable wannabes.

After I joked on Instagram that I deserve a medal for surviving summer, a friend (with a 3D printer) showed up at my house hours later to present to me the most hilarious medal I have ever won.

Also medal worthy was the time I got 8 kids ready in time for school all by myself.

A family party at Andy and Amanda's house meant free rides on the lawnmower for those who stayed late enough for the after party.

Lincoln and Holland are basically twins who can marry each other so that's cute.

Hey look! He smiles when I tell him to. That won't last long.

With Jeff gone, these were my extreme efforts to bring order and organization to an otherwise completely chaotic bunch of boys.

Before long we were already preparing for Jeff's first visit home. Carson spent every night leading up to his arrival drawing pictures of the big day.

This is Jeff tucking Carson in at night.

A trip to the donut shop. 

Carson's visions came true when Jeff was momentarily ours again!

We even got donuts to fulfill all of Carson's adorable drawings.

We got Jeff for 24 hours before shipping him back to his training. It wasn't long enough!