Latest Projects

I recently got another calling at church. This will be my third calling, but it is probably my favorite. I am on the committee that plans our monthly Relief Society meetings. I have kind of been in charge of making the posters and invitations for each activity. This is what I have done so far.....

We had a cookie exchange in December so I made large Gingerbread Girls for the posters.

In January we did a night in Italy theme. I decided to make the posters to reflect the Italian flag with a plate on it. Mangia! Mangia! means Eat! Eat! We had a sister teach us how to make Biscotti and homemade noodles. We had an Italian themed potluck dinner. And we made tiles with vinyl lettering that said Mangia! Mangia! to display in our homes.

Our activity for February is a Spa Night theme. I made face masks for the invitations. I made 50 of them and let me tell you I spent way too much time on this one. Next time I plan on making something a little more simple. (says the perfectionist who always goes the extra 10th mile)

I am excited for our March activity because we are having a Super Saturday craft event. We are calling it "Souper Saturday" and will be serving soup as the lunch. We will be doing a lot of different crafts. The one I was in charge of was a wreath. It was a nice excuse for me to make a wreath for my door for Valentine's day. Its made out of felt. It was so easy and fun to make.

Good Morning Cuddles!

These pictures were taken right after the boys woke up. They still have those tired eyes. Can I just say that they melt my heart!!

Lately I have had so many moments where I just stand in the background watching them play together and it makes me smile. Xavier is so sweet and patient with Gavin even when he's being grumpy. Gavin adores his big brother. One morning in particular the boys were sitting on Xavier's bed. Xavier was rockin' out with his guitar and Gavin was flipping through the pages of a book. Gavin had a huge smile on his face and was bobbing his head up and down to Xavier's jam. They were both giggling. It was so neat to witness that moment of brotherly bonding. As a mother it is so great to see their relationship thrive. I'm so glad they have each other.

On another note, the reason I took these pictures is because it reminded me of something I used to do as a little girl. When it got cold in the winter, I used to always sit on the heaters in my house with a blanket over me. There were many times when I fell asleep on my bedroom floor by the heater or even the hard kitchen floor. I would even study for exams in the corner of our living room with a blanket over the heater anticipating the warmth and comfort it would bring.

Now my boys do the same thing. It makes me laugh every time I see Xavier and Gavin curled up over one of our heating vents. I definitely know the simple joy it is to feel the warm air blowing through those vents.

The boys trying to give me silly faces.

Good morning cuddles are so nice. A lazy morning was definitely enjoyed by me and the boys.

D&R Fun

Having the Donadieu family visit for two weeks was a REAL treat! I now know what a house of 5 boys feels like, well 7 with the grown-ups. It was fabulous. They all got along so great and had so much fun.

Porter and Xavier had a blast sword fighting and light saber dueling. Playing with their Beyblades, Pokemon cards, and Bakugan's filled many hours of time. Xavier and Porter even shared the blow up mattress the entire time and loved having a buddy to do everything with.

Gavin L-O-V-E-D baby Miles. He couldn't get enough of him. Every time he woke up he went right to our room to see Miles. He would kiss him, giggle at him and want to sit right next to him every chance he got. It was pretty cool that there was someone smaller than Gavin in the house for a change. One of the handful of words he says is "Baby".

We had to see some Christmas lights while Noah and Kendra were in town. It was no Temple Square, but it was fun to see all the lights as we drove through the park. We were able to sit in our warm car and enjoy the lights. Double bonus.

Cinderella's carriage

The Wizard of Oz. My favorite.

We got to ring in the New Year together. It was fun to incorporate some of the Donadieu's traditions. We made their special green sherbet, vanilla ice cream, and ginger ale New Year's drink. We ate Chinese food for dinner. And we celebrated in style. The boys had a blast making as much noise as possible.

The Chinese spread!

I even whipped up some homemade play dough for the kiddos to play with one afternoon.

The boys had a ball squishing, mashing, rolling, and molding their creations.

4 energetic boys were sitting in one spot for an extended period of time. Play dough, I thank you!

Wing night! We had to be nastalgic and eat at a favorite East Lansing spot. Buffalo Wild Wings.

We ate and ate and ate. The treadmill will be calling my name after this eating fest. (New Year's Resolution number 1)

Naked Noodle Night. Since my boys are the messiest eaters, they always eat pasta and red sauce without their shirts on. I started calling it Naked Noodle Night. Don't worry, the grown ups kept their clothes on. We're keeping this G rated folks. We had a noodle night while the Donadieu's visited.

Yum!

No-sauce-noodles for Porter please.

Looks like Ronan is in a food coma. Noodles are the best.

My fantastic eater. Gavin's got a talent for eating food. He probably eats as much as Xavier or more. Noodle night is no exception. He ate like a champ.

The mommies wrestling with the little ones.

Eating a dinner in peace. What is that?

Gavin loving the baby or trying to suck his brain power.

If he could talk maybe I would know the true answer.

Our attempt at getting five active boys to smile for the camera. After many years of trying to get a good picture of all the boys, this is not too shabby. 3 out of 5 are looking directly at the camera.

Our top 10 most memorable moments during their visit:

10. Zip dying and having to replace the fish twice in two days without Xavier knowing it.

9. Noah introducing us to an awesome cheesesteak place near his home in Stroudsburg.

8. Crafting, crafting, and more crafting with miss Kendra!

7. Spending a fantastic winter day at the Zoo.

6. For Noah and Kendra- eating American food again.

5. Ronan discovering that Buzz and Woody's head do not fit in the toilet bowl, but they had a nice swim!

4. Wrapping Christmas presents late into the night and partly into the morning, anticipating the excitement of 5 bright eyed boys.

3. Getting a babysitter so the grown-ups could go out on a double date. Waiting an hour and a half at Texas Roadhouse, only to have to be seated in two different areas and walking out because of such terrible service. Inhaling food at Zoup so we wouldn't miss the second showing of Sherlock Holmes. We had some great laughs at our Mis-Adventures and we were glad we weren't on a "first date".

2. Noah trying to dry Porter's pajama bottoms in the middle of the night Christmas Eve. The fastest solution, putting them in the microwave. Needless to say there were singe spots on Porter's pj's and they smelled like they had been lit on fire. Ha ha ha!

1. Spending time with awesome friends!

The Cat in the Hat Re-enactment

February has been the month of sickness in our household. Poor little Gavin has had one thing after the other. Xavier has had a cough that has been lingering since his last cold in the middle of December. We have been going to the doctor a lot and besides school and soccer for Xavier, we have been home way more than usual. The boys have been great sports and I found them sitting in front of the window one day watching the rain fall.

When I saw the two sitting there the words from Cat in the Hat popped into my head

"The sun did not shine. It was too wet to play. So we sat in the house All that cold, cold, wet day.
I sat there with (Gavin), we sat there we two. And I said, “How I wish we had something to do!” Too wet to go out and too cold to play ball. So we sat in the house. We did nothing at all. So all we could do was to Sit! Sit! Sit! Sit! And we did not like it. Not one little bit."

I'm so glad they have each other, especially on days like this when they can't be outside or play with their friends. They have each other. They will always be the best of friends. (at least that is my hope and dream)

Noodle Art

Crummy weather means crafting for the Richardson's. My mom sent a craft idea to make noodle snowflakes and other noodle crafts like noodle airplanes. We thought a bad weather day was the perfect opportunity to bring out the pasta. We made one snowflake and decided to use our creative juices to think of other things we could make with the noodles.

Snowflake

Person

Butterfly

Xavier's robot

Airplane

While we made our pasta creations Gavin played in a big bowl filled with pasta shapes. It made for a great sensory tub. He filled, poured, scooped, dumped, and stirred the pasta. He was happy as a lark.

CTR Pretzels

Daddy was in Palm Springs this week for a business conference. He may have been having fun in the California sun. That didn't stop us from having our own fun at home. Our Family Home Evening activity was making CTR pretzels. The boys loved helping make the dough and loved eating them even more. What better way to make an impression on the kids to remember to choose the right than with a hands-on activity involving food?

We had a little bit of extra dough to make mini pretzels too. Mmmm! MMMM!

18 months old

Gavin is 18 months old this month!

18 Words and phrases that describe Gavin:

Engaged in mischievous causes always! Mama's boy Silly

Happy Cuddly Ferocious Appetite Active

Curious Copy-cat Admires his big brother Determined

Stubborn Vocal Charming

Loving Handsome Social Enjoys music & dance

Bonus: Extremely Observant

Gavin loves to wear all of my hats. If I try to take this purple hat off of his head and replace it with his hat he screams every time. He wears this purple hat out in public. I'm not afraid to allow my kids to express their fashion preferences.

The most exciting milestone for Gavin this month is that he gets to go to Nursery. He is the only boy. I think he enjoys being around all the ladies.

Gavin is starting to favor big trucks, fire trucks, and race cars. He still enjoys playing with any ball he can find. He LOVES music, especially the Rio soundtrack and the songs from Alvin and the Chipmunks. He even has his own little dancing style. It's so fun to see him bob his head up and down and move his body whenever music comes on.

He is perfectly content putting things inside jars, boxes, bowls, and cups. For example, he scribbles a little bit, but he'd rather take the crayons out of the box and put them in the box. Take them out of the box. Put them in the box.

Gavin is in a copy cat phase. He loves following Xavier around the house trying to do everything he does. He imitates sounds and actions.

Gavin is also quite busy in every way. I pretty much can't take my eyes off of him for a second or he's dancing on the kitchen table, climbing on the big bed in his room to stand in the windowsill, climbing on the kitchen counter, or pushing chairs around the house to get to something he wants that he's not supposed to have. I've got poison control on speed-dial because I've had to call 4 times already. (He's eaten toothpaste, tried to drink mop water, and attempted to taste icy hot) Baby proofing is a constant process in our house. I move things higher and then he figures out how to get higher. Pretty soon things can't get much higher.

All in all Gavin is a joy to have around. He loves to have fun and laugh and brings so much joy into our home.

"If they are crabby, put them in water"

My friend posted this on facebook and I just love it! Especially the part about water changing a crabby kid into a happy kid. Proof is in the pictures.

B-U-B-B-L-E-S

(+)

WATER

= 2 Happy Boys!