Happy Birthday Claire

Originally uploaded by Hendricks_NY

This is my spring birthday Catch up. Our baby turned 1!! This year flew by so fast. We were so excited to let her dig into her cake. The kids came up with the idea for the lady bug cake. I was prepared for a mess only she touched it once and then wouldn’t touch it again. She is not found of how certain things feel. She is our only child that didn’t dig right in.

She doesn’t like the feel of grass either. We took her out to get a birthday picture and she lifted her legs and fussed. We had to put her in a chair.  With this discovery we learned that when we are working outside all we have to do is just put her on a blanket with some toys.  She goes to the edge, touches the grass and stays on the blanket.  This works well because she hates her play pin and it is hard to get things done while chasing a 1 year old.  Another way to keep her in place is by putting a laundry basket of container by her.  She will empty it and then climb inside and stay there for 20-30 minutes before she is done. It is pretty cute.  Yesterday she pushed the container into the grass then climbed inside.  She was so proud of herself for escaping the blanket but after a few minutes got upset because she couldn’t get out without getting in the grass.

Another thing she likes to do is scream, which has led to a new nickname, screamy. It is not really a cry she just likes to scream. Maybe being the youngest with all this noise as led to this, I don’t know. We just know some days it is not very cute. All the screaming aside we love our little girl. She decided she could walk and does it most of the time now. I love her wobbly little walk. Now she just needs to learn how to stand up in the middle of the floor. At this point I think my days of her staying on the blanket outside will be over.

This is a little late but Mason turned 14! They are growing up so fast. I am having a hard time believing he will be in high school next year. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!! I still see him as my sweet 3 year old boy. (unfortunately he doesn’t smell the same). We love Mason. He will always be my little boy even though before long he will be taller then me.

March is busy, busy with birthdays. Alexandra turned 9. She is such a sweet heart. She will always be one of our babies. I was happy she choose cheese cake for her birthday. Between her birthday and mine I think I gained 10 lbs just from the cakes. She is doing great in school and even scored 100 on her bench mark test. She has also become a big help around the house. I need lots of help since I am off my feet so much. She is becoming quiet the little cook in the kitchen. I will have her making dinner by herself in no time.

I am once again way behind. I have given up on catching up. Last month we did hit a milestone. We now have a 16 year old.  This also means that Chris was able to get his learners permit. AHHHHHH!!! They do things a little different here as far as drivers licenses. You can’t get your permit until you are 16 then you have to drive with an adult and take a driving course before you can get your license at 17. There are so many kids here that don’t even get their license until they are 18. It is not the right of passage for some as it was where I grew up. I got my license right when I turned 16 and I was out on the roads. (Sounds scary now that I have my own 16 year old.) I am also learning why parents shouldn’t teach their kids to drive. I let Chris drive home last night. (My hands still hurt from gripping the handle on the dash) Alex thought she was going to die. We are looking in to driving schools. I told him that I will let him drive more after he takes a driving course. I don’t think I was prepared for this stage of life and it only goes down hill from here. Mason just had to inform me that it will be his turn in 2 years. All I can say is AHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!

Stephanie is making me write this. She is also making me write that I have only one more year until I am over the hill. Yay.

Now that the formalities are out of the way, we had some Halloween fun outside of making fun of my age. We only carved 8 pumpkins this year, they seemed to be hard to come by, and expensive (thanks, Adam Smith). We did get one free thanks to Sarah’s fine performance in the 5th grade pumpkin run (she got 2nd place). But the kids had fun nonetheless. Everyone but Chris and Claire went out trick-or-treating.

Chris sat motionless on the front porch with a bucket of candy in his lap and waited for unsuspecting suckers. They would come up in groups and he’d let a couple of them get candy, then scare them. They would all debate if he was real or a dummy (we have our own opinion some days), and some even poked him. In the end, he was the winner and scared everyone. One lady wouldn’t even come back up on the porch to get candy for her kid. She made her husband go up.  (Click the photo to embiggen)

Kate had a blast. She walked the whole way, and everyone loves to give more candy to a cute little witch. So it worked out good for me. And she is Daddy’s girl, so she likes Reese’s as much as I do. They all came home with tons of candy, and Mason had a fit when we had everyone put their candy into the community bucket. Now he can explain socialism to his social studies class.

I treated everyone to a birthday prime rib that I grilled, along with some twice-baked potatoes and Gulliver’s creamed corn. Stephanie even made me my favorite 12-layer cookie cake. I scared the kids with my hillbilly costume. Mainly with the teeth. Kate wouldn’t let me kiss her with them in. We had a fun Halloween.

Click here for the whole set of Halloween and birthday pictures up on our Flickr site.

Sarah turned 11 (almost a teen) and had a happy birthday. She got the vest she has been asking for since last year, a hoodie, and a set of Legos, since the boys are not very sharing with theirs. She also got a watch and some games (both board and electronic) so she was thrilled.

Click here to see a set of her birthday photos on our Flickr page.

Since she is our last I have not encouraged this. She is just as independant as Kate so there is no holder her back. The kids think it is the cutest thing when she gets on her hand and knees and rocks. They try to help her crawl, only she falls forward on her face. I try to keep them from teaching her to crawl. She will do it soon enough on her own. She already rolls all over the place. Chris and I have also decided it is time she learns to comfort herself. It has been hard to leave her in her bed crying. I would sit and hold her all night. I know I will be better off in a few months if she learns to go to sleep on her own now. I just snuggle her all day long to make up for not holding her all evening. She also has two teeth. I tried to get a picture but the camera was too close, she kept trying to grab it. She likes to use them too. I am not to fond of that, but she is very cute.  To see more pictures of Claire crawling click here.

It came too quick for me. I wasn’t ready to send them back yet. They were excited to go back (that is, everyone but Mason). They all had a good day and are already getting back into the school routine. Allie even told me she is loving 3rd grade, which I find funny since it has only been one day. Kate was excited to start her first day of school. She drew the funniest self portraits. I will try and post it on another day. Now I have to look forward to early morning seminary starting next week. It will take me a few weeks to adjust to getting up at 5:30.

There is just no way I can catch up on our blog now that I am so far behind.  We took hundreds of pictures and had a million exciting things this summer but I will save all that for a future photo album.  We did have a great summer.  It was not long enough.  We were tired and so glad to come home yet we were also very sad to leave our family.  The kids had so much fun with their cousins and grandparents.  I was also  able to catch up with some old friends that I haven’t seen in years.  It makes me homesick for family and friends out west.  Claire started rolling over and moving all over the place. There will be no holding her back. Our kids are growing up too fast. So now I am going to start over with what is up with our family today. We celebrated Kate’s 3rd birthday. It is hard to imagine where the time has gone. We try to spend every moment enjoying them, still the time seems to go quicker and quicker. We had a fun day with her.  She got a special lunch with us and special time with her brothers and sisters. Thanks to technology and my husband both grandparent’s got to join in on the festivities. Kate loved opening her gifts and finally getting to eat her teddy bear cake. When it came time to pick which part of the cake she wanted, she chose the entire head.  After biting each ear and the nose off she just laughed wickedly and hacked it to pieces.  We spent the remainder of the evening entertaining her with some of her gifts.  She is such a cutie, and we can’t imagine life without her.  Next week the kids go back to school, I am going to do school with Kate twice a week and hopefully we will be able to settle into a routine. (Ha Ha I think it gets crazy once again.) If you would like to see more picks from Kate’s birthday click here.