Some Past-Due Bragging

I have neglected to blog about an important accomplishment for me. Last Christmas, Joe got me a sewing machine along with sewing lessons with an amazing friend of mine in Sacramento. My goal was to learn how to operate a sewing machine. We managed to work in our lessons between busy schedules and two little girls very eager to "help". By the end, I had made two skirts and two pairs of leggings for said girls. I also made a petticoat for Elizabeth. I wasn't able to finish Natalie's since I somehow managed to break my sewing machine. It's still awaiting repairs.

The skirts have gotten good use, though. They are perfect for dancing and twirling:

Baby Jesus to the Rescue!

Every December, when we pull out the Christmas decorations, I remember how much I love our Little People Nativity Set. The kids love having a Nativity set they can play with and I love the cute little figures.

Every December, when Joseph becomes an evil villain bent on defeating the Baby Jesus with his superior supernatural abilities, I wonder if a little sacrilege at Christmastime is OK.

Here's Mary commandeering a jet to make their escape into Egypt...
(can't forget the donkey!)

The Great Pyramids

5 Years Old

My Natalie turned 5 a couple weeks ago. It's still hard to believe. She had quite the birthday week. Let's just say this won't be the norm so hopefully she won't be disappointed next year.

It started out at preschool the day before her birthday. She got to make an "All About Me" poster and bring in some of her favorite things from home to show her class.

Here she is with her teacher, Mrs. Chae, showing her poster:

On it she wrote that she wants to be a paleontologist when she grows up. Her favorite place in the world is McDonald's, and she wishes for a dog.

We also brought some cupcakes for her birthday snack:

On her actual birthday we didn't do too much. She got to pick what to have for breakfast and dinner. She was invited to a friend's birthday party so she got to go to that. After the birthday dinner we blew out some candles on a leftover preschool cupcake and she opened a couple presents from us. She did get her big present that day--a new bike! She spent most of the day riding it (no pictures of that, for some reason).

Happy to get a slinky from Elizabeth
(slinky #3 for us--we'll see how long it lasts)

I love Nate's face in this one:

Joe wrote her a really sweet card

He was reading it out loud to her and got about half-way through when she lost interest and wanted to play with her new stuff. We had to laugh. I guess she's still pretty little. Someday she will appreciate that card! I was holding back tears listening to it.

Me and the birthday girl

Proof that I do exist--at least I'm in pictures on special occasions.

The Saturday following her birthday, she had a party. We let Elizabeth have her first real friend party when she was 5 so we did the same for Natalie. Unfortunately this one got a little out of control. It's my own fault. The problem with moving to a new place and having a party is that she doesn't really have any close friends here yet, just a lot of people she knows and has played with a few times. We didn't want to leave anyone out. Plus, I thought there would be a lot of people that might not be able to make it because of the holidays. Not so! We ended up with 19 kids (including our own) at our house! It was a little crazy. Luckily we had some parents stay and help. I don't know how we were thinking we could do it by ourselves. The kids were all great and didn't fight or run screaming around the house or anything, it was just the sheer number and the fact that 4-5 year-olds still need help with things.

Anyway, Natalie wanted a Looney Tunes party. I found some game ideas online inspired by Wiley E. Coyote. In one, you tie a long piece of string to something in your yard. You thread the other end through a straw that is taped to a blown-up balloon tied off with a clothes pin. When you un-clip the clothes pin, the force of the air leaving the balloon sends it across the string. It was pretty fun and we had races. Unfortunately it took us awhile to figure out the best way to help the kids do it successfully. We also made these little catapults and shot marshmallows all over the place. They liked that. We finished it off with a large tweety pinata that wouldn't break. :)

Here's her tweety cake:

The bad thing with having that many kids come was the obscene amount of presents:

I thought that picture was funny because of the looks on our faces. Natalie was very excited to get Squinkies. She loves tiny little toys so those are right up her alley.

We were too busy at the party to get any pictures, sadly, but I may add more later if I get some from friends.

Now, some thoughts on Natalie right now... She is such a sweet girl. She is so kind to her sister and brother. The other day we were watching a movie that had an intense part. Nate started getting upset and Natalie just hugged him and rubbed his head (she loves doing that) and he just sat there letting her. It was the cutest thing. He idolizes Natalie and is always asking her to watch him do things.

She LOVES preschool. I'm glad that I signed her up. She is a friend to everyone and is always yelling out bye to everyone she sees. There's a little boy in her class who doesn't speak much English and she likes to tell me when she has sat by him or played with him in school. She goes out of her way to be nice.

She has mastered the monkey bars and loves to climb. She went on a field trip to a gym and had so much fun:

She loved when they pulled her up high with these ropes:

She loves the art projects they do.
Here's her pilgrim and indian outifts for Thanksgiving:

A cute one just for fun:

She is becoming quite the awesome reader. I guess she always has been. She is very proud of the fact that she can read chapter books now like Lizzy.

We still have our struggles, she and I. The tantrums that I mentioned back here are still going pretty strong. I think it's my fault. I've been mostly just trying to ignore them and I've decided recently that I shouldn't be allowing that kind of behavior. A couple days ago she slammed her door again and I made her close it correctly 30 times. I think it was more fun for her than an actual punishment. Maybe I should have done 50... Anyway, at least she hasn't slammed it again since. It's funny how kids sometimes seem to really want limits. I'm sensing that with her about this.

She is getting big. She had a dentist appointment this week. She didn't even remember the last one she had, it had been so long. We have dental insurance now! Anyway, I ended up sending the girls to our dentist and not a pediatric one. I was worried about how she would do but she did awesome! I couldn't really go back with her since I had the other kids with me so she marched right on back. I could hear bits and pieces of what went on and Natalie was just being so chatty and not even shy at all (she is usually really shy around adults). When I went back to look at her x-rays, the dentist (who I love) was just going on and on about how she was his best patient of the day. And--no cavities! Hooray!

We love our Natalie. Sometimes I go back and watch videos from when she was this age:
And then I want that adorable little toddler with the stutter back. But... I honestly can't wait to see the girl/woman she'll turn into.

Done--Finally!

I am so behind. Here's an attempt to catch up....

We found out the weekend before Thanksgiving that JOE PASSED THE BAR! We had been fretting about this for 4 months. It's kind of impossible to describe the relief we felt. We all crowded around the computer to check the results. We were all excited and cheering when we found out. Nate got carried away in the excitement and yelled, "Daddy win! Daddy win!"

Joe opted out of an official swearing-in ceremony and just gave his oath to a notary public right in his office and then dropped his bar registration card in the mail. Apparently, you are officially an attorney from the postmarked date on the card. So, he dropped it in the mail and became an attorney. Weird.

It is so nice to be completely done with the law school/bar experience. We are so proud of Daddy!

Here, There and Everywhere

I've been feeling a little nostalgic lately and thought I'd make some lists:

Things I miss about Sacramento:
-The people. Such good people. I miss our friends and neighbors. Some have moved away to other places, too--of course they are included in this. We love all of you!
-The paths that we could run/walk on. The river. Such a beautiful place to run and I never had to worry about streets or cars.
-The quiet. We live on a pretty busy street now so there is noise. I love where we are but I just miss the quiet sometimes.
-The kids have talked about how they miss our climbing tree. I miss it, too.
-WinCo. How do I love thee, WinCo? Let me count the ways... Boxes of Smart Start for $2.60, cheese for less than $3/lb, cheap bulk bin items, I could go on and on but I'll spare you that. I just get depressed grocery shopping here sometimes. Luckily, the produce is super cheap here. That has been nice.

Things I love about here:
-The weather. It really is nice.
-The people. We love our new ward (church congregation) and have met many nice neighbors who we're hoping to get to know even better.
-The schools. I really like Elizabeth's school and Natalie's preschool. They are great.
-Our backyard. It is wonderful. We love the fruit trees! They are starting to get ripe and we can't wait for more oranges/lemons/tangerines. Plus we just planted some vegetable seedlings in the garden space. We're hoping they actually live. We don't know anything about fall/winter gardening here. Who am I kidding--we don't really know anything about gardening in general.
-The good, cheap produce (see above)
-Everything is close. I can get to any store I'd want to go to in less than like 20 minutes and most are less than 10 minutes.
-Streets lined with yellow ginko trees. I thought it was so beautiful that I took a picture while driving. This doesn't even do it justice:

Sports

Nate loves balls and he loves playing sports. We really haven't done much to encourage it except provide the materials. In fact, I feel bad that I haven't done more for all my kids. Not that I want to push them into sports. I just feel like Joe and I, being the reasonably athletic people that we are, should at least give them a base in different sports so they have more confidence if they do decide to pursue something. Plus it's just fun to play sports together as a family. I feel like I had all that built in since I had an athletic older brother to try to keep up with, and I was thankful for it.

Anyway, here are some video clips of Nate. This first one was taken a few months back. Please excuse the lack of pants and the saggy diaper. That's the beauty of backyards, I guess. :)

Soccer...


Nate's favorite sport right now is probably golf. He loves hitting balls around the backyard and can do it for quite a long time...


He recently started playing with his basketball hoop, too, which we just moved into his room. I'm always impressed with how he'll miss shot after shot without getting frustrated. He gets so excited when he makes one, though, and says "I did it!"

You'll have to forgive Joe for turning the camera part-way through this one...

Halloween

We had a busy Halloween. Most of it was spent at the school/preschool for costume parades and Halloween parties. Sadly, I forgot to bring a camera to Elizabeth's parade. It would have been next to impossible to get a picture anyway since there were so many parents crowded around. I was impressed with the teachers' costumes. All the grades did themes and they were really creative.

Natalie's class did a little parade around the school.

Here they are heading out:

Nate insisted on holding Natalie's hand the whole time and it was sure cute:

After school I tried to think of something we could do to kill time that wouldn't involve eating all of the candy they had already acquired at school. So, we dressed up like mummies...

Getting out is the best part:

Elizabeth even wanted her face wrapped:

Then, in the evening we went trick-or-treating with some friends in their neighborhood. It was fun and I was impressed with the kids' stamina.

This guy refused to let anyone hold his candy for him:

It got really heavy, too, because people kept tossing huge handfuls of candy into his pumpkin.

Who can resist a chubby little monkey at their door?
Not many, it seems. :)

Unfortunately we didn't get pictures of the costumes until the night was over. That's why Elizabeth's wings are falling off and the fabric covering the design on Natalie's shirt had ripped off. Still, they are pretty cute...

A bat, a ping pong player, a monkey and a cat

I was the boring one who didn't dress up. Joe really doesn't like Halloween and balks whenever I try to suggest dressing up. So, I thought it was poetic justice when we found out that his firm is really big on Halloween and everyone has to dress up. His team went with this ping pong players theme (Joe even thought of the team name: The Intimmigrators--ha!). Unfortunately, he wouldn't let me post a hilarious video of him participating in the pie-eating contest. If you visit us, we'll let you watch the video. That's some good incentive, right? :)

I had to add this in....

My friend Janelle took this awesome picture:I just love that face.

September/October

Why I am so bad at blogging lately? I'm not sure. I hope to be better. It has been kind of a crazy stretch for us lately, but really--when is it ever not crazy?

Here's a bunch of recent happenings in the lives of the Atkin family...

I signed the two little 'uns up for a community art class. They loved it and it was fun to watch them. It was even worth all the glitter covering my house for a few weeks there. They just had different tables set up and the kids could do whatever they wanted.

Some of their creations:

Nate especially loved the play dough station that was up every week:

We met at my parents' house again on Conference Sunday. The day wouldn't be complete without some Grandpa-wrestling time:

My mom and dad both just turned 60!
We made them some books with 60 memories from their children and grandchildren.

They were a hit!

An afternoon at the local spray-ground:

We're definitely loving the weather here!

Two weekends ago we had a beach trip. We opted for a colder one this time that supposedly had good tide pools. They didn't disappoint! Unfortunately I forgot to bring sweaters for everyone. It was pretty cold. This is a picture I took as I shivered under a beach towel:

The cold didn't stop those four from exploring.

Some the critters:

This one loves to dig:

Secret reading hiding place:

Fun at the park

(I'm looking through these pictures and realizing that my kids basically wear the same clothes over and over. I just need to get rid of the rest of their clothes, I guess. Sheesh.)

I got to go on Natalie's preschool field trip to a local farm.
She fed some chickens, ate fresh tomatoes, and picked out a pumpkin.

I can't believe that it's almost Halloween. The rest of the year is going to fly by. We are starting to settle in more here. Eventually I'll get the pictures up on the wall. Question: How is it that a person can just hang things up in haphazard ways, or arrange random items on a shelf and make it look really beautiful? This is a skill I do NOT possess, and it's frustrating to me. So, I just leave things in a box in our front room. Joe really loves this habit of mine. :)

I am having exercise troubles lately: namely, I am not exercising at all. We had a scary incident lately, that I don't want to go into on here, that made me realize that I probably shouldn't be running in the dark in the mornings by myself. This makes me sad because I really love to run early in the mornings. I don't love getting up, but I love how it makes me feel. Now I don't know what to do so I am doing nothing. This has negatively affected many aspects of my life (it's amazing how crucial exercise is to my well-being). So--what does a girl do who doesn't like running on treadmills, doesn't really enjoy running with other people (I do like it every once in awhile, but I mostly like to be alone with my music/conference talks in the morning--I'm a loner I guess) yet who needs exercise to function? Run with the kids in the stroller? That is so hard these days (they are heavy!) and I've gotten lazy after getting used to running by myself. Videos? Joe and I have thrown around the idea of P90x. Should we do it? I would love any ideas/recommendations. I know what you're thinking---just suck it up and do something, Ashley! And you would be right.

Thanks for listening, blog.