a day at the park...

We walked over to the park today and had a picnic. It was just a lover-ly day. Cuties!

happy 2nd birthday lily...

Lily turned two years old today! What a big girl she is already, it's crazy. She got lots of girly things to accessorize with, a fun doggie in a purse, a neat music player and book, and of course her favorite, play doh! Her other favorite thing lately is for me to polish her nails. She walks around holding out her hands and feet saying "polish, polish" all the time. I LOVE IT! She is such a sweet girl, so happy and makes me crack up all the time. She hardly throws a tantrum, and when she does it's so cute you can't be mad. She is learning new things and talking more and more each day. I am enjoying every minute of her growing up.

We had a small get together with family for dinner and cake/ice cream. I made her a Wall-E cake. She really loves the movie Wall-e. Cute story - one day while we were in the car, out of nowhere, she yells at the top of her voice, "Waaaaalllll-eeee.......Eeeeeeevvvvvvaaaaa". So cute! We love you so much little girl!

I love the video of her blowing out the candles. You can tell she was overwhelmed by everyone singing, she didn't really get what was going on. I could watch this over and over.

baby smiles (almost!)...

Evan is doing a lot of the cute whole face "almost" smiles. So far this is the best I've been able to catch on camera. What a sweetie, love him!

6 weeks old...

Well Evan is 6 weeks old! I can hardly believe it. I swear he weighs 12 pounds now. He is starting to smile and it is so cute. I love the whole face smiles and baby coos. It goes so fast!

when mom's away...

I spent the day yesterday with some of my friends from high school that came to visit. I was gone most of the afternoon until late last night. Since I didn't get home until quite late, John was up early getting the kids ready for church. He even did Lily's hair. He doesn't do a bad job actually. We were running late, so I let Lily jump on my lap in the car instead of sticking her in her seat, so I got a close up look of her ponytails. There was a big lump of hair seeming to be coming out right in the back of one of the ponies. So I took it out - and it looked like a big chunk had been cut right in the middle of the back of her head. Who do you think did it? Was it Lily? Or was it Zane?

Oh you know my kids too well! Of course it was Zane! Yesterday morning, Zane and I had gone to get our haircut at the salon. So, at some point during the afternoon, Zane had taken Lily into the playroom - and set her in the office chair, got his little kindergarten scissors and started cutting off her curls. He obviously knew this was wrong, not only because he is almost 6 years old, but also because he hid all the locks of hair behind one of my craft storage things on the floor under the table. There is a big hunk out of the middle top layer in the back. Some smaller cuts here and there on top and sides. I can tell you that I am much more angry that he did this than if Lily had done this to herself. He knows better. She has such beautiful hair, and it will now have to be cut at some point. Thank goodness it does blend in right now, and once it grows out a little, I will just have to get her hair layered to hide it better.

Any ideas for a relevant punishment for him (in addition to the obvious, no more scissors)? We've told him that we will tell him tomorrow morning what it will be - we are just too angry about it right now and John and I need to have a private conversation to get on the same page.

fathers and sons...

Zane and John headed out camping for Fathers and Sons last weekend. This is the first time John remembered to take the camera, only he forgot to check the battery. So, he did at least get a couple pictures before it died! John has always worried about losing track of Zane on these things, so this year he bought some short range walkie talkies. It was a good idea in theory. I don't think he realized that Zane would be calling him on it every 5 seconds! They did have a lot of fun, and I am super happy to watch the other kids while he goes on these things. I hope that Zane will have fond memories of these campouts with his Dad.

dance festival...

A couple weeks ago, they had the annual dance festival at school. Each class gets to perform a dance on the high school football field. We had dance festivals at my elementary school, so it was neat for me to be there. I loved that the 5th graders did Tinikling. It's a dance from the Philipines where two people bang together bamboo poles to the beat on opposite sides of each other while dancers jump in and out between them. Make sense? I was especially excited about this, because in my elementary, the 6th graders got to do this dance every year. It was so much fun, and I have very fond memories of doing this dance.

The kindergarteners did a March of the Penguins dance. I applaud the teachers for getting being able to coordinate the kindergarteners together and keep them seated for the rest of the performance! And other than sitting directly in front of the speaker and having to keep our hands over our ears for the entire thing, it was fun! Great job Zane!

baby evan's blessing...

3 kids sure makes things a lot busier. We had Dr.'s and Dentists appointments, school testing, and a baby blessing last week. Zane had his spacer put in to hold the place of the molar that was pulled. He did great, and it has been no problem for him. He had his end of year kindergarten testing as well. No surprise that he passed off everything. His teacher had him do his reading at Level 20 - (Kindergarteners should be at Level 3-4), but said she thinks he is probably more like Level 26-28 (that's like 2nd-3rd grade). Smarty pants.

Evan's baby blessing was this Sunday. What a better day to do it than Mother's Day? I must say that I don't mind doing it on a Sunday other than Fast Sunday, because then I don't have to get up and bear my testimony. We had a very special meeting that day that was done by the regional special needs mutual. If I wasn't already weepy from hormones, I still would have been crying. John was especially touched during the blessing, about how grateful he was that we have a healthy baby. It is unusual for him to cry, and I even worried that maybe he had some sort of "revelation" during the blessing. I was glad to learn later that he was just really touched by the special meeting that day. It was very sweet.

We were so blessed to have my parents, John's parents, both sets of my grandparents, and my sister's family there. It was so nice to have family around for that special day. We love you all, and wish we could see you all more often.

after school...

this is what after school looks like at our house

babywearing...

So, I have done a little sewing already since the baby was born. Partly out of "necessity". I was meaning to make a wrap style baby carrier before Evan came, but didn't get to it. So - here it is, in all it's glory. (It's a crappy self - portrait and I had to cut my head and body off, because it just looked too horrible, but give a girl a break - I just had a baby).

And a view from the top with him sleeping snugly and soundly inside. Awwww!!

Today is a good day!

stories...

Zane has taken to telling people "stories". Ok, some of you might call them lies, but they are just too imaginative for me to do that. We have told him that it's fine for him to tell these stories as long as he says "just kidding". He mostly tells these stories to other people and not us -I'm sure looking for their reaction.

Recently - he told our neighbor that John's work is moving to Hawaii, and we are leaving very soon and have to pack up. He is very convincing, she called me in a panic. Ha!

He told my grandmother all about his brother "Josh?(I can't remember the name)" who lives in Salt Lake and is a scout.

He often talks about his brother "Jake" who died, and even goes so far as to pretend cry about it.

And this is my favorite thing he has been doing lately:

These are signs on the play room/craft room door that say: Funland - Bob's carnival games And cafe - Open Forever, never closes.

They make Donut Soup there. Yum!

the first week down...

Evan is 6 days old, wow! Thanks so much to my mom for coming down and helping out. It really was nice for the kids to have Grandma to play with, even though I'm sure they wore her out. The real test will be next week when I am on my own. Evan is still doing good, although he seems to have days and nights just a little bit mixed up. Some nights are better than others. He's not really awake at night, just doesn't sleep very restfully. He doesn't really settle in to sleep until after midnight, and then wakes every 2-3 hours - so unfortunately I don't get a lot of sleep. Such is life with a baby. Other than that we are doing good, and I'm trying to not expect too much of myself. (My house is going to be messy and I don't care if I stay in my jammies and even my bed half of the day.) Lily and Zane seem to be doing "ok" with the new baby, and I hope that continues. They both love to hold him and give him kisses. It's very cute. He is a sweet little baby. Now - pictures!

the pictures are here...

We are home! I feel great, everything went perfectly. Evan is doing wonderfully, too. Here's a few pictures for now and then I'm going to take a nap!

Evan Bradford Collins

Abi is still at the hospital, but I (John) wanted to let everyone know that Evan was born this afternoon at 3:19, 7 lbs. 7 oz., 20 in., and both he and Abi are healthy and happy. I'll let Abi post all the details (and pictures) when she gets home from the hospital, but anyone interested can know that they are both healthy and happy. I love each member of my family very much, and I am glad that each one of them has chosen to be a part of my family.

--John--

happy easter...

lately...

We have had a busy week. We got new callings at church recently - John is the new Cubmaster, and I am the Cub Scout Commitee Chair. Basically that means we are in charge of making sure things are running in the scouts, and then we do Pack Meeting once a month. This week was the Pinewood Derby - probably the "biggest" deal pack meeting of the year. So, we were busy. I think it turned out fun for the boys, at least I hope so.

The weather has been so nice, so we have been enjoying that too. The kids (Zane mostly) wanted to go out and run in the sprinklers one day - so I suited 'em up and they had at it. It was great fun to watch Lily who wasn't quite sure what to think of the "spray" as she called it. She is really becoming a funny little girl, and she LOVES to do anything that big brother does.

Today, we went over to the Arts Festival, even though it was rainy. I was surprised that there were still quite a few people there. Zane and Lily both got their faces painted. Lily got a cute butterfly on her cheek and she couldn't stop saying "fly, fly" the rest of the day. Zane wanted tiger stripes and green eyes, to match the tigers on his shirt. He also made a creative little hat. We also got the house clean and finished up everything ready for baby and Easter tomorrow. Zane says that Monday is Wester, haha!

(I hope to get another post in tomorrow night before baby comes on Wester!) Enjoy the pictures - and make sure to check out the 2 videos in the post below - too funny.

what happens when you are 39 weeks pregnant...

Two videos for your enjoyment. The first one - what your kids do when you are too tired to care anymore. The second one - much more scary - what they do when you are not watching or paying attention at all (Zane took this video of course).

Ok I know that last one is REALLY scary. I know that she's been getting these plug covers off for awhile now - I just never knew how she was doing it. Kudos that Zane knew enough to tell her "No, No", but yet he did stand there taking a video of it. And, yes, I know - this one would qualify me for "worst mother of the year" but I'm over it.

it's official...

Baby Evan will be born on April 13th , unless he decides to come earlier. Yay! We are excited!

fun in the church parking lot...

Well, we have a really *ugly* driveway for riding bikes, so when the kids are itching to go bike riding, we head over to the church parking lot. These pictures were taken this past Saturday. Love the weather this time of year. Oh, yeah and a picture of my pretty pink glitter toes too, thanks Steph!