Word Puzzle

So can you read this:

HiGis

The girls came into work with me for a little bit today and Lainee immediately grabbed the whiteboard markers and starts wiriting things on Scott's whiteboard.  As she started writing we both look up and saw that she wrote an H, and then the i, "Hi" when she added the Gis, I thought she was just writing random letters,  Scott on the otherhand asked her what she spelled and she says in her oh so cute voice, "Hi Guys!!!!!"  So totally funny, Love 1st grade phonetics!!!

A new laughable line of Lainee's and a hopeful boy with a homeless brother.

So yesterday I was walking into the Grocery Store with shoeless Lainee in tow, and you know the times when your kids are talking and you are "uh-huh"ing and "yes"ing to them but really you are going through the gocery list in your mind because your forgot your paper grocery list at home.  Well needless to say it came to that point in the conversation where I was like "what???, what is she talking about and I was completely stupified at what she was telling me."  So I asked her to repeat herself, only I came up with a comepletely clever and wonderful way of asking so it seemed as if I was really listening to the whole conversation!!  She then began her story again, and just to speed it up a little she was telling me that Justin Bieber had gone to this girl's house because she said she was in love with him.  So I looked at Lainee a little confused and said, "I thought Justin was with Selena Gomez?"  "Mmmmoooooommmm", she said with an exasperated lilt, "They broke up, it has been all over the news, how did you not know this....."  "Well my little 6 year old sweetie, who goes to bed at 8:30 well before the news, I guess I am just behind the times!"  At this point in time I notice that there was a man walking beside us who heard this whole conversation, he just started laughing, and walked down the aisle next to the one we were heading down (I am sure to save me the embarassment of having to explain to him why I did not know this little factoid)!!! Gotta love Lainee!!!

Also last night Scott and I were talking to the kids and we were telling them that over the course of the next few months we would be changing their sleeping arrangements, largely due to the fact that Bradley and Zachary either are friends and want to talk and talk and laugh all night or they are enemies and want to fight and argue and punch each other all night, so we are going to be doing some remodeling and hopefully when all is said and done we will live in a house of peace and tranquility where all the inhabitants talk nicely to each other, use good manners, always keep their bedrooms nice and tidy, and most importantly go to bed when they are suppose to!!!!  Hey, it will happen you just watch!!!  Okay so fast forward to after dinner and a little before bed time, I walk into the boys' bedroom and I see Zachary with a basket of stuff and 3 drawers worth of treasures (*cough* crap *cough*) being sorted and carefully organized back into the drawers they just came out of.  So I asked him what he was doing, he didn't even look up at me or acknowledge that I was standing there, he just simply pointed at his treasures and said "I am going through my stuff and throwing away all the garbage and re-organzing my drawers, and putting my p.j.'s away." "Oh," I said.  "What is this basket for?"  "That is Bradley's stuff, I am moving him out!!!"  I kinda laughed because of the finality in which he spoke was funny.  So I had to re-iterate the fact that it was going to take more than a day, or week, or maybe even month, for us to be ready enough for Bradley to actually "move" out to his own room.  "Don't worry mom, I know, I am just going to be prepared for it whenever it happens!" Well okay then, that's that, I guess, I really hope Bradley doesn't mind being homeless for a while because I have a feeling that Zachary will have him all packed and ready to leave the nest by tonight!  :)

Journals

I love Journals, but if you ask me if I keep one the answer would be no, well not in the generic way anyway, I think through my Scrapbooking and Blogging I am doing my best to let people see me as well as capture moments that in the future we can look back on and say "oh yeah, I remember that", but through the years my absolute most favorite journals are that of my kids, the kind that at the end of the school year they bring home and you get to read all the things that mattered to them throughout their school year.  This being said I was cleaning up today and came across one of those said journals that I was not even aware existed and even though there are not many entries I found myself enthralled with this kids writing skills and the little things that he found interesting in 3rd grade.  I know I have mentioned before how Zachary has a big heart but he is very reluctant to share it, and when I get glimpses of his true self I cherish them all the more, that being said there is one entry that I just had to share, it just made my night!!!

Zach's Journal Entry
4/29/2011

things to do before I die!
-have a party
-go to collage
-get maried in the temple!
-have three kids
-make a pinyata
-invent something with Zane.
-be an acitect
-live in Arizona
-learn how to drive
-get a library card
-be rich
-learn Japanese
-learn Spanish
-learn German
-see lemony snickets grave
-make another pinyata
-have a sallery
-get a pet Dog named Cosmo
-win the lottry
-make a crayon
-fix my watch

If you don't know Zachary very well this sums him up perfectly, as I am typing this I find myself tearing up because I love him so much, he is such a complex person to some people but the few of us that really know him can't help but light up everytime we are with him because he makes the world a little brighter, He is on the path to greatness and I thank my Heavenly Father daily for this little man who is still not too big to show his mom he loves her!! 

A TEEN!!!

So today is Bradley's birthday and how old is he you may wonder:

13

Thirteen, that means he is officially a teenager (run, scream, cry, that is what I did this morning) and I am not very happy about it, It has literally flown by, I remember when he was young and sometimes I would look at him and wonder what he would look like when he was older, I remember when he was learning how to talk and wondering what our conversations would be like when he was older, also when he was in school and learning to read I wondered whether he would love books like me and want to read constantly, I wondered if he would need braces or glasses or if he would play a sport or be in drama or choir or band.  And now it seems like it all just happened at lightning speed, he is an incredibly handsome young man, I love the randomness of talking with him and he comes up with such out of the blue things to talk about, he doesn't particularly love to read (but I am still holding out hope), he most likely will not need braces and his smile is awesome, he has good eye-sight like his Dad, he is a mean soccer player and is playing on a team that ranges from 12-17 year olds and is doing fantastic, he wants to play football; mostly because he went to his first High School Football game with his friends and thought it was cool.  I think he would be awesome in drama because he has always been very dramatic, but he doesn't like to preform in front of people (again holding out hope for this one), he loves to belt out on Glee Karaoke with me and he did take piano for 5 years but now wants to do something like the school newspaper.  All these things that I wondered while he was younger now I get to see, I also get see the wonderful man he is becoming, his kind heart, his compassionate soul and his hands ready to serve.  Although these last 13 years have flown by I am grateful for every last one of them, But most importantly I am grateful to be Bradley's Mom, he may already be asserting his "teen" ways and thinks I don't know anything and everything I do is horrible and mean, but I know deep down (sometimes really, really deep) that he loves his family and that he is who he is today because of the things we have taught him and the love we have shown him.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY B-RAD!!!!

WE LOVE YOU!!!

I guess we will keep you after all!!!

What the........

Seriously

This came in the mail a few days ago and I just sat there dumb-founded, how much money do you need to spend at Cabelas in a year in order to qualify to have them send you their catalog in HARDBACK!?!?

Scott, you have some explaining to do....



Angel Kisses

I was school shopping yesterday with Bradley and got one of the cutest calls, I saw that it was my sister Erin and as soon as I said "Hello", I not only heard my sister but I could hear this cute little voice saying, "Hi, hi, hi" This voice belonging to my little niece Alesa can always bring a smile to my face, She was so excited to be talking that she would hardly let Erin and I talk, it brought back all the memories I had of her sweetness when Zachary and I went to Maryland in April of this year to help Erin and Andrew after they had their 2nd child, Baby Van.

Alesa has this way of loving you with her whole being, she wants nothing more than to just be near you and tell you everything that pops into her little mind, she has a thirst for life and enjoys it to the fullest, she is at that age where everything she does and everything she says is so cute and funny!! (I can say that because I am the aunt and not the parent:)  Zachary and I got to MD after Alesa was asleep and so we had to settle for just seeing Van, I know hard huh, cuddling and smelling a newborn is as close to heaven as I think you can get and Baby Van was such a darling, it took no time at all for Zachary and I to fall in love with that little guy.  But nothing could have prepared us for the absolute cuteness of Alesa's excitement of seeing her Yacky the next morning, she was beyond excited and as soon as our bedroom door was open she zoomed in, crazy hair and all and was jumping on Yacky's bed and singing about how Yacky was here and then she climbed up on my bed and was telling me all about her "dam-ma" (grandma) jammies, my mom had made her some PJ's and sent them to her for her birthday and she was so excited to show them off.  She was also soooo excited to show off her little brother Van, so showed us where he slept, his blankets, his diapers, his binky, you know all the neccessities.  Ahhhhh, I love those two!!

I think one of the best things about being a parent is seeing relationships form and friendship grow, for some reason Alesa really attached herself to Zachary (Yacky) when we went to MD last summer, and then when Erin and Andrew came out for Christmas they just had a ball with each other, and their love for each other just continued to grow this week, Some of my favorites were having Alesa "teach" Yacky stuff, like how to eat a popsicle or kick a ball or color with chalk and he just being patient and learning from her.  Also having Alesa put Yacky to bed (with her routine); get a 1 monkey, put on a blanket, read a book, and kiss forehead, both cheeks, nose, chin and lips then say night, night!!  He would just lay there with an "I can't believe I am doing this, I am not a baby" look on his face but he went along with it because he cares about her so much.  I think one of the things Zachary loved the most was listening to how Alesa pronounced his name and when she would "whistle" for him, she would cup her hand to her mouth and yell "whoo, whoooooo, Yaaaccckkyyy whoo, who" seriously cutest thing ever.  My favorite Yacky/Alesa moment though was one morning I was sitting outside with the two of them and Zachary was sitting beside me and I noticed he had a few freckles on his nose, as I was telling him about my discovery Alesa came over to see what we were discussing, she was looking at the freckles and I asked her if she knew what they were, when she said "No", I told her that they were "angel kisses", so she immediately bent over and kissed Zachary right on the tip of his nose after Zachary looked over and said in the sweetest voice, "Well; now I have one more."  Oh my Gosh I could have cried, it was such a tender moment, I reached right over and hugged him so tight I am sure he thought I had gone mad, but for Zachary the boy who never puts his emotions on his sleeve, I love the fact that this little girl can bring out this very sensitive, very hidden part of his personality.  He has one of the biggest hearts I know, but he keeps it locked up and hidden, so when I get to see this side of him, I cherish it all the more.  Thank you Baby Van for being born so Yacky and Aunt Menie could come and visit you and Thank you Alesa for being a great hostess!!!  We love you all!!!

(Road Trip 2010 in Ocean City, MD - Zachary is feeding Alesa applesauce and she is playing with his belly button, blossoming of a beautiful friendship.)

(Baltimore Aquarium - Awesome place, and Alesa looooveees fishies)

(Alesa putting Yacky down for a nap!!!)

(Ohhhh, cute picture alert!!!)

(Alesa and Yacky playing some B-ball, I am pretty sure there is a story about how that ball came to be at the Wheeler residence and I am almost certain that Taci was involved, hummmm.............)

(The two of them were watching a movie and Alesa stood there and rubbed Zachary's hair for about 15 min. or longer, it was sooooo super cute!!!)

(Look he is saying "I love you Aunt Melanie, you are my FAVORITE!!!)

(Giving Van some Love and it looks like Van is trying to give it back, hahaha!!!)

('Lesa Lovin' now that is some good stuff!!!)

AMIGOS!!!

Sadly this will most likely be my last post about Mexico :(

But you know that I have TONS more pictures, so if you want to get the full effect, just come on over and I can go picture by picture, moment by moment, and sing and dance too!!! (okay I won't dance)

Melanie and Misty :)

Scott and Ray; they have been friends since pre-school, they really are more like brothers than friends and I think it is really neat that their friendship has been able to endure all these years!!! 

Super heroes!!!

I love the wave in the background!!!  Don't they look awesome though!!!

Going on vacation with friends is the way to do it!!!  I loved every minute of this vacation, we played, we laughed, we cried (mostly from laughter), we shared stories and created memories (only enough memories to last us til the next vacation, wink, wink;)

Thanks Ray and Misty for making our vacation a blast, can't wait til next year!!!

Just as a p.s. don't my legs look awesome and seriously toned!!!

Cassie - again you should be proud of me!!!

:)