Our Sweet Andrew

Yes, he is cute and furry but who knew owning a guinea pig could be so expensive. A few weeks back he was scratching like crazy so we took him into the vet. Turns out he had ring worm (I know, totally gross). We put him on all the medicine and after two trips to the vet we thought we were in the clear.

Last night while we were giving him his medicine he literally jumped out of my hands. He landed on the ground squealing and couldn't use his back legs. We didn't know what to do other than take him to the emergency animal clinic. I felt so horrible considering I am the one who dropped him. Abbie was the only kid awake and since it is technically her pet she was very emotional. We explained to her that he may have broken his back and she needed to say her goodbye's. We went through the whole goodbye process and Abbie was consoling him letting him know that heaven will be better than here anyway. I took him to the vet at 9:30 at night. Of corse they were very busy there with sick and hurt animals so I didn't get home until almost 12:00 p.m. That was a killer in itself. I'm getting too old to not be getting my beauty sleep. Turns out that by the time the vet saw Andrew he was using his legs and fine. If I only would have waited until morning. He is now on a very expensive pain medicine and is doing well. It's a good thing we like Andrew because after $600 and three trips to the vet in six weeks he better like his home here with us.

Settled

I had a funny realization yesterday. As I was talking to Micah on the phone chatting about our busy weekend plans I realized something. I was going over what we needed to do to prepare this weekend. Two friend BBQ's at our home, tending for two families while they go to ward temple night (us not going only because I am blessed enough to have a friend I switch babysitting with and went earlier in the week), Avery's friend pool b-day party, and not to mention that I am teaching a combined lesson with all the YW on Sunday and I needed time to prepare for. Micah simply took a deep breath and said "I think we must be settled." After many months of saying "we just moved here" which it really hasn't been THAT long I think we are finally feeling good about where we are. We still miss our family and friends more than anything, but it feels good to be "settled." Crazy to think about all we have been through the past year. Glad to have made new friends, and especially glad to be able to head home and visit old ones. We are blessed!

Avery Turns Seven

It's still hard for me to believe that my "Sweet Aves" is actually seven years old. She started out her birthday week (yes, it was all week....we celebrated a lot) with her Grandma and Grandpa Chidester and Aunt Penny who came for a short visit. It was a really hot weekend so we swam and stayed in as much as possible. By request she had pizza and cheesecake for her birthday celebrations while they were in town.

We decided to celebrate Fathers Day a few weeks early by heading over to PF Changs while my parents were in town. After we waited 1/2 an hour after our reservation time to be seated, then an hour for our food it turned out to be not such a great experience. I only share this next tid bit because of Avery's comment after the fact. While we were waiting for our dessert we were all just talking when Avery got the most disgusted look on her face. Micah burst out laughing and we couldn't figure out what had happened. Turns out that a scantily dressed lady in a tube top was using her hands while talking and her fingers managed to pull her tube top right off. She hurriedly put it back on and staggered out of the restaurant after having a little bit too much to drink. Avery leaned over to me and said "that was the worst birthday present ever." So sad that she had to see that, but her comment was too funny. We made up for it the next night by going to Lake Las Vegas for ice cream. It was so fun to see the live bands there and have some yummy gelato.

On Avery's actual birthday she was thrilled that I brought her McDonalds for lunch and ate with her in the court yard of the school. She had a great day at school wearing her birthday crown and receiving a lot of extra attention for the day.

After school we spent the hot afternoon in the pool (hence in all of her birthday pictures they are all freshly showered and in their PJ's.) After dad got home and swam for awhile we had Avery's birthday dinner. It is always interesting what each of my kids pick for their birthday dinner. They can pick whatever they want and Avery picked ham with potatoes and gravy. We gladly made that for her and enjoyed dinner together as a family.

Party Girls!

She was happy to receive this big, pink package from her Grammie and Gramps Phillips. She could hardly wait for dinner to be over to open it.

This was a candid shot of Aliza's face while Avery opened her gifts. It was so cute to catch her expression of excitement.

She had asked for Webkins and Zhu Zhu pets for her birthday. She received this cute poodle webkins from Abbie.

In fact she was so ecstatic about her Zhu Zhu pets that the next few pictures had to be taken with her Zhu Zhu pets. These little guys are definitely a big hit at our house. We haven't had any until her birthday. All of my girls are really enjoying them.

And I have to mention her poor melting cake. Avery had this cake idea from a Strawberry Shortcake cook book that she wanted me to copy. It was a white cake with one red heart on the top. I spent all day making strawberry freezer jam for the middle of this lovely cake (as the recipe called for) and then our house was so hot I couldn't keep it from melting the frosting. After I finally had to stick it in the fridge it looked kind of sad. After all that hard work no one really ate the cake. Couldn't blame them......but I went through a lot of work to just throw the cake away. Boo hoo I know!

We let Avery choose what kind of party this year she would like with her friends. We offered to take her anywhere. Bowling, movies, pedicures, and all sorts of other ideas. All she really wanted to do was swim. I was a little nervous about having other kids over to swim so we stuck to only letting her invite 3 friends. With those friends and their siblings that came along we had just the right amount of kids for a fun time. I regret not getting a good picture of the whole group.

We swam, ate pizza, played a few games, swam more, and then had cake and ice cream cones. It was a perfect little party for her. In the picture above they are playing Duck, Duck, Splash.

We played pool ring toss and a game that I found online called Dolphin Swim.

Basically, it was a race to see who could use their nose to get a ball to the other side of the pool. Sounds simple enough, but it was tricky. You could use your arms to swim, but not touch the ball. I was really fun to watch the balls going all over the pool not necessarily in the right direction. It was definitely not easy to do.

Avery had a great day and like I said before I just can't believe that she is seven years old already. My kids are growing up way too fast.

Talent Show

Abbie and Avery were lucky enough to participate in their school talent show today. This was unlike any elementary school talent show we have ever seen. First they tried out in their classroom where the students voted two people from each class to try out for a group of teachers. Then they had a try out for the teachers where only 15 out of the school were able to perform in the actual talent show. I was lucky enough to be there for the try outs and some of these students were amazing. It takes a lot of guts to get up there and perform in front of your peers. I'm glad that I was not in charge of picking the final performers. The teachers liked both Abbie and Avery and knowing that they were sisters asked if they could do a duet. At first Abbie was not thrilled with the idea, but as soon as we informed her that if they performed together that would leave one more spot open for another performer she gladly agreed.

We quickly threw this little number together. Considering that the girls just barely started playing their violins again after the move they did alright. I recorded this yesterday at their last practice because I knew that I wouldn't have a great seat at the actual performance. I'm so glad I did record it the day before because the cafeteria was crowded. They did three performances in one day to squeeze all the classes in. They had students doing everything in the show from announcers to stage crew. It was so much fun to watch the final show. Abbie and Avery did a great job and we are very proud of them.

More Home Improvements

This past week we were able to have a company come and fix the outside of our home. We had a lot of stucco damage due to sprinklers spraying on the house and the previous owners did a lot of stucco repair themselves that didn't look the greatest. After we received a notice from the home owners association for the stucco damage we decided that we just needed to bite the bullet and have it completely repaired and painted. These are the before pictures. (It was trash day, so the bags of garbage are not a usual installment.)

These are the after pictures below. I wished after the fact that I would have taken pictures of the stucco damage but of course I didn't. We decided to go with darker colors which we liked.

Although we hated to spend the money on painting the outside of our home, it has made a big difference.

More home improvements to come......

We are so glad that our great friends from home were able to come visit us last week. The Hackett family were some of our best friends in Utah. They lived right behind us and we miss them terribly since the move. My kids were best friends with their kids, and not to mention I miss having such a great adult friend practically in my back yard to chat with every day.

They arrived around 9:00p.m. on a Wednesday night. The kids were so excited that I don't think we actually went to sleep until somewhere between 12-1:00a.m. Our kids have never been up so late before. Luckily for school the next day it was "take your daughter to work day" which meant that both Abbie and Avery's teachers were fine with letting them take a day off form school considering that half the class would be gone anyway.

We made their day here a full one. We hit the strip to see the lion exhibit, M&M world, and the Coke store. Unfortunately the weather didn't cooperate very well. It was a cold and rainy day while they were here. We still made the best of it.

It was kind of fun that so many characters were out that day. If you notice Avery is no where to be found in either the coke bear or m&m picture. She still does not like anyone or anything dressed up. She stays clear whenever they are around.

We had to hit the souvenir shops along the way. Too funny!!!

Aliza had to give them a try too.

Then we headed over to the big fish tank at the Silverton hotel. It really is amazing to just sit and watch all these cool fish. Poor Ethan here in the picture above was the only boy. If I counted right there were nine girls to the one boy. Poor guy!

They have a cute little mermaid show at the fish tank that the little ones just love. This was our second time doing it and my girls just love it. She basically just swims around in the water and interacts with the kids outside of the tank. Kind of cheesy according to me but like I mentioned before the kids love it.

After our adventures on the strip we headed back to the house to swim. It really was cold outside but that never phases kids. There was no way that I was getting in that cold water. This is Aliza's idea of swimming at the pool. She grabbed herself a book and would rather just watch most of the time.

Once the hot tub warmed up they had a great time. They were still jumping into the cold pool water too though. Crazy kids.

This is Avery's best friend Ellie. When we lived in Utah they spent most of their days together. They were getting ready to jump in the pool together. We really loved having them visit. Hopefully they will come again sometime soon.

Fun Projects

A few weeks ago we made a few changes....

I do love my new laundry room with all of it's cabinets and sink. It's much bigger than our last home and I can't forget to mention our kids favorite feature the "laundry chute." Micah and I have had the same washer for almost 11 years now. It finally started not working well along with our dryer that really didn't dry very efficiently anymore. It was time to change things up a little bit.

This is our new laundry room below. The blue on the walls did turn out a bit brighter than I had originally planned (and the picture flash makes it look brighter also), but we still like it. With the white cabinets above the blue and white appliances you really don't see that much blue anyway. This new washer and dryer pair are FANTASTIC. You can fit so much in these babies. Our clothes actually come out dry too. Imagine that!

We also had an empty dining room that now holds a table that actually fits our entire family with room to spare. With us having black furniture in the same room as the table we opted for a dark wood table to match the floors and black seats to match the other furniture in the room. When they were delivering the table they dropped a chair on the cement which I sent back. By next week we should have eight chairs for around the table. I'm sure all the home decorating stores in the area will be seeing me soon to find a new centerpiece. :)

We are working hard with a list of home improvement projects a mile long. More pictures will be coming soon.