Disclaimer

Ok so for johnny's birthday, I recorded the kids singing to him Happy Birthday- the only way I could get blogger to post the video was to first upload it to youtube-well for some reason youtube did upload it, but then there is this random Japanese comedy class or something that comes on. I apologize is the content is in inappropriate (it is Japanese) I am still trying to figure out how to only post my kids video.

Happy Birthday Daddy

Jane Bea is ONE!!!

Today, my baby officially turned 1 today. We formally celebrated last week in California with Johnny, my Mom, and brother Jeff. So this day was all about her favorites- starting off with pancakes and a bath. Then I had to work, so Jane went to her second favorite place- her daycare! and I joined her for lunch and a special birthday cookie. Then home for another favorite- mac'n'cheese. I cannot believe how fast this year has gone by. Jane is still my spite fire. She came over 3 1/2 weeks early and has never stopped letting her sweet and often loud prescence be known in this house. She has 6 teeth (which have often found their mark while nursing!) walks around the furniture, loves crawling, climbing, exploring, WATER, her siblings and has been known for being kind of a Momma's girl. Jane we love you!!!!!!

David Cash turns 3! a Weekend of Fun

My little man has turned into my sweet and not so little boy. Cash thankfully still runs into my arms each morning with a Cash smile for a hug. He is a great combination of sweet and tough- he loves to cuddle yet is all boy. For his birthday he has been asking for a few things, a new orange big boy bike, a watch, a rocket, a fishing pole and Woody/Buzz Lightyear and between us, my Mom and brother that is what he got. We celebrated Cash's birthday "Hanukkah" style with Friday at Dream Nite, Saturday we went to see Kung Fu Panda 2 (the kids and Johnny loved it- Jane was not a fan so she and I spent 99% of the time in the lobby)he got his bike, Sunday he fell asleep and woke up to his room decorated and his other presents and special birthday dinner complete with fruit kabobs. Cash is learning more and more words, his shapes, colors and one of his favorite things this year was going with Johnny to the golfing range. He makes the best facial expression including my favorite-when he he raises his eye brows up and down when he is tells you something he is excited about. Cash we love you!

Zoo Nite

For the last several years, I had the perk of taking my family to Dream Nite at the Hogle Zoo, it is an event they put on after hours for my patients. After last years face painting, Sydney planned her outfit and what animal she wanted on her face accordingly! So she became our snow leopard, Cash still really did not want anything to do with the face painting, especially after a failed panda bear. Kristin and her family joined us which was fun. We decided to celebrate Cash's birthday a little early with his requested alligator cupcake cake. Overall a great night!

Memorial Day

For me Memroial Day does just what it names says- it is a day filled with Memories-

as a kid it was the day we would either go to Downey to my granparents house- play in the hot tub and bbq- to this day the smell of steak on the bbq reminds me of my grandpa or we would head to my Aunt Diane's where we would swim, hang out in the Green's van, eat cool ranch doritos, peanut butter rice crspy treats and of course red slush!

now as an adult or more specifically a Mom we have started new traditions- once again living in Utah for the most part the graves we would visit are in California, leaving Johnny and I to create new traditions, so for us Memorial Day=backyard campout well. . .once again Mother Nature is throwing us a curve ball and it is still raining in UTAH! so enter Johnny- and his backup plan- blanket fort in our living room. I had to go into work for a few hours on Saturday night and came home to a serious blanket fort. Johnny should add blanket fort construction to his resume. With poles, c clamps and every large blanket we own oh and it also included our queen mattress, syd's twin mattress and cash's toddler bed mattress. So for two nights we "camped" in style. Then this morning we went "orienteering" in the form of geocaching. It was suprisingly fun.

With that said- I want to say how grateful I am to those who have given thier lives so that I may live in a country that is free. Thank you.

11 Months old!

So our little Jane Bea is 11 months old! She is active and into everything! She has 4 teeth. She loves to mimick sounds and can be VERY loud when she wants to be heard. She loves to crawl around and walk along everything and has mastered climbing the stairs ( which freaks me out) and I am embarrassed to admit but as our third child- she has been exposed to sugar in a way her brother and sister never were- case and point in these pics she found a container of chocolate frosting. . .

Kobe You are a BAD boy

To some extent there is nothing harder than being a Laker fan in the middle of Jazz country (save only being a BYU fan living miles away from the U of U) so this week has needless to say been rough in the Hollingshead household. The kids after learning form their parents who learned it from their parents-yell at the TV during games. So when I yelled at the TV on Sunday during the game, "C'mon Lakers"- Cash was quick to yell "Kobe you are a BAD BOY"

If We Act Now. . .

Ok- I know to some extent I have "sheltered" my kids in terms of the TV shows they have been exposed to. Basically only the Disney Channel (just Disney Junior) and then some of the shows on PBS kids, so when I let Sydney watch "Cookie Jar" TV aka CBS Saturday morning line-up she was enthralled, not by the cartoons, but the commercials! We proceeded to have the following conversations when she would run upstairs to grab a quick snack or to tell me what she saw

Conversation 1

S- Mom do you have pajama jeans?

L- No, Boo what are they?

S- Well, they are pajamas BUT they are jeans as well (then she did this dramatic pause so I could take in the sheer awesomeness of this product) They are really cool-you should get some

L-Well thanks Syd maybe I will

Conversation 2

S- Mom guess what?

L- What?

S-Ok, so I just saw this really cool wallet on TV (she is totally talking with her hands at this point) you could run it over with a like (yup even though this girl was born in Utah, she still appreciates the fine use of the word like) a 20 pound truck and it won't break- you could drop it in a puddle and your stuff- it won't stain!

L- (I am trying sooooo hard not to laugh) wow Syd thats sounds really cool

So Sydney goes down stairs and I go in to tell Johnny all about it- within minutes I hear this from the basement

S- Hey Mom- its made from aluminum

When she emerges from the basement she goes to tell Johnny all about the wallet

S- Dad guess what they have this wallet and if we act now they will send us 2 wallets and the 2nd one is free, but we we have to act now. . .

No we need to go back to monitoring her TV shows- I see an ab roller, Snuggie and other as seen on TV items will be on the top of her Christmas list!

What a Difference a Day Makes. . .

So part of the "drama" around Sydney's birthday was that there are 3 kids in her kindergarden classes who all have b-days in the same week! So when we realized one little girls party was going to be the same date and time as ours we knew we'd need to move our party- and since I woke up to this on Saturday morning- the teddy bear's would have been able to go sleeding and not to a picnic-

Spring where are you?

Third Times the Charm-Happy Bithday Sydney Jay

I love birthdays and holidays and all of the fun planning and details that go along with. SO back in March, Sydney and I began discussing "theme" options for her birthday party this year (we do friends parties on the evne years and then special family adventures on the odd years). Of all of my themes Sydney quickly grabbed onto having a teddy bear picnic- so in my mind (which thinks in themes-its a little weird) I had the whole thing planned out with the date of Saturday April 30th in mind- well. . .what I had not planned on was Sydney getting invited to another birthday party for the exact time- so plan B- after whining about to everyone, my little sister helped me come up with a new plan to pitch to Syd- a camping party- Syd bought into it real quick and now with a a new theme I went into planning mode- that is until I looked at the weather report. SNOW! or at the very least balmy temperatures of 42 degrees for our camping party. AHHHHH!!!!! So quick phone calls to all of our guests and on Wednesday we switched the party to Thursday (her actual b-day) instead of Friday. CRAZY!

Party Details: We bbq hot dogs, had watermelon and chips- all her favorites. Instead of cake Sydney wanted pudding, so dirt cups fit right in with our theme and we rounded out the evening with s'mores
Games: while I had planned on some, we ended up not needing them, the kids just played and played-especially with the fish
Fish:so when I told my co-worker I wanted to do a fishing themed game at the party she told me how her sister buys the little feeder fish for parites and the kids love it. Oh, while an amazing idea and probably the hit of the party-it was also to biggest stress for me. Background: On Wednesday night, I take all 3 kids to Walmart for a little one stop shopping. We go back to the pet department where I order 15 fish. I only needed 12 and felt 3 extra would be a good enough buffer-ha! So we are finishing up our shopping when i felt a little water on my leg as Sydney yells I am sorry it was accident! BAM! She had dropped the bag and now there are 15 fish flopping all over the eisle! Luckily there was a worker guy who helped me as well as this crazy lady (seriously she was unstable) collecting the fish. We finally get the fish back in a new bag and I bring them home, place them in a vase. Well, the kids and I decide they might be hungry so I smash up a peice of Rosco's dog kibble and sprinkle it on top. The fish go crazy eating it up. I leave the room to change Jane's diaper and come back to Cash and Syd feeding the fish more kibble-whole sized kibble- I start trying to sccop the kibble feast out, when I realize we already have 3 fish dead! With 2 quickly following! By morning I was down to 7 fish. My plan was to leave work early pick up so more fish at Petco, well I go toPetco and they have some sort of infection with their fish (which were half the price of Walmart)and they were not for sale. SO I quickly hop on the freeway to go to Petsmart, I buy 20 more fish-figuring they only have to live 2 hours until the party starts and dash home. By the time the party started I had 5 more dead. But, in the end it was a blast and all the kids got to take a fish and a flashlight home.
Update:
everyones fish are still alive and well-3 out of 4 we were left with are dead!
Decorations:orginally we were going to set-up our tent, but with some scary rain clouds lopoming, Johnny quickly built 2 teepees (and also made me a table-man he's good)

So overall it was a lot of fun!

Jane Bug Jane

I know I really have been quite awful about blogging so here are some pics of our Jane Bug- she is now 10 months old and is crawling up a storm and pulling herself up and walking along things and every once in a while finds herself standing up independently. She loves to be held. She loves her brother and sister. She has a great smile and we love her. . .now if only I could get her to sleep through the night and in her own bed

Hello? Is anyone still there?

Hi! Ok- for those few people who still check to see if I have posted anything- I do truly apologize- I do not know what happened to November-or December or even January or February, but I promise that I will try harder to post again on a more consistent basis-

So yesterday I picked Sydney up from school and she informed me it was a day of sirens (drills) a fire siren and then one siren where we had to all squeeze on the stairs called lock down in case someone comes in and wants to hurt us or has a bomb!

How completelty scary/sad my little 5 year old now has to practice in case some psycho decides to pick her school for their random act of violence! Luckily Syd did not seem to grasp the seriousness of her words, in fact she was more annoyed as she told me that the substitute would not let her go and get her backback during the fire "siren" because she had a lot of important stuff in there! SO I told her that I supported her teacher and that I could replace anything in backpack, but could not replace her- to which she responded "You could adopt!"

Witches

I have always wanted to throw some sort of Halloween party (other than the ones I plan for work) but never have, so this year I took a small step by hosting book club this month- and the book? Witches by Roald Dahl- I had seen the movie and book was a fun read so last night we got to together, we being the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (the name of the witches secret organization) the ladies in the group were good "spirits" and went along with it-

ARRRR we be pirates

I know I have said it before, but I love Halloween- I begin plotting and planning costumes waaaayyyy in advance. This year I decided that we would be pirates and the baby (pre knowing the gender) would be our parrot. Well, they moved the time honored tradition of the ward trunk or treat up 2 weeks (translation PANIC since my Mom who I usually rope into making the costumes would not be in town just yet) so GASP I had to sew (well and hot glue) the costumes! Jane's parrot turned out more like Elmo in bird formation, but oh well- We arrived at the trunk or treat only to discover we did not have our memory card in the camera- so I am stealing this pic from Kristin (lets be honest she takes waaaayyyy better pics anyway)

If planted it will GROW

Sydney was given some pumpkin seeds by a kid in our ward that according to him were "magical" since I was 7 1/2 months pregnant i was really not going to take on planting a garden, but after nagging one day a took a sippy cup that had been left outside scooped out some dirt and planted 2 of the "magic" pumpkin seeds- the results? 5 pumpkins 2 which are at least 40 lbs! and vines all over my yard!

Mommy Wow I'm a BIG kid now

Cash started a little while ago being fascinated with the toilet, since I was about to give birth I wasn't too excited about potential accidents, so I sort of put him off. Cash like the rest of us is stubborn and without sticker charts or bribes has pretty much potty trained himself- his latest feat? peeing standing up- too cute!

Kids the darndest (meanest) things

So Cash finally figured out that it is BYU and not BYme and the other day he stated, "I go BYU" which dream crusher Sydney quickly refuted-"You don't go to BYU Cash" so I jumped in saying "Well if Cash studies hard and is smart he can go to BYU" (disclaimer-I am BY no means implying that you are not smart if you did not go to BYU) then Syd looked at me with shock mixed with 5 year old attitude "Well you went there and you are not smart" OUCH!! so instead of flinging mud back in a very mature fashion I used my words and said, "Sydney what you said hurt my feelings" naively thinking my saying this would impact her, oh no- her response, "I''m sorry, I just didn't know that you were smart"

Afternoon Tea

Sydney was invited to have afternoon tea with her cousin, Ella (she is Johnny's cousin Stefanie's granddaughter)at the Grand America hotel, so with her "up do" done and makeup on Syd was so excited. I managed to squeeze into my homecoming dress from my senior year in high school. We had a great time.

Note: I was the only person who actually ordered tea everyone else did the hot chocolate thing- but man- peppermint tea with 4 lumps of sugar- soooo good. Thanks Jenny and Ella we had a great time.

PS Syd got the zipper stuck trying to help me out of the dress when we got home that I had to go to my neighbor's house to get out of the dress!

Cash and Jane

Both Cash and Syd love their baby sis- and jane loves them giving them her best smiles

Jane is not a fan of the flash on my camera