Spiritual Sunday Moment

Today we listened to a CD our neighbor put out just in time for Christmas. It's called "Let Him In" and is very beautiful. After it was over, Dylan looked at me with tears in his eyes and said, "That song touches my spirit, Mom." I love how honest and open he is with me - and how innocent, but deep and spiritual he can be too.

Later on, Marcos and I met for FEC (Family Executive Committee - where he and I meet to discuss our week and any issues we may have). It's a habit we're trying to establish, but often forget. After our meeting, we held interviews with the kids. Preston is still trying to get used to them and feels awkward and shies away from the questions. But he's making progress. We talk about being nice, sharing toys, not pinching and trying to use the potty. We ask him if he likes dinosaurs and enjoys playing with him during free time. And then we remind him that Heavenly Father and Jesus love him and want him to be good. Simple 3-year-old stuff. But Dylan is pretty open and honest and obviously on a different level than Preston. Marcos asks him about his testimony and his answers are always beautiful. After that we talked about school and what he likes, what we want to learn, if he has any needs or concerns, etc. and at the end we open it up to him to add anything else he has for us. When we turned the time over to him, he said, "Well, okay. I was just thinking... So how are your prayers going? Are you praying a lot? The scriptures teach us to pray. Do you believe in Heavenly Father and pray to Him often?" Marcos and I glanced at each other for a split second acknowledging yet another very spiritual moment guided and directed by a child. Time practically stood still as I watched him through teary eyes in complete awe. Part of me wanted to laugh at his imitation of such grown up matters and the other part was ready to break down and cry. I felt soft and squishy and touched to the core. We both answered him honestly and then I said, "What about you? How are your prayers?" He answered in a confident voice, "Oh, they're fine. You don't need to worry about that. Of course they're great. I pray all the time and my Heavenly Father loves me and guides me." He then proceeded to get out his scriptures and read a verse to us. He said he picked a verse from Jarom because that's the book we're reading from in our Illustrated Book of Mormon during devotional so he thought it would be appropriate for his interview. I know he picked the verse at random, but it was a really good verse. Oh to have the faith of a child again!

Thanksgiving 2010

Thanksgiving was a lot of fun this year. All my sisters were able to be to my mom and step dad's house on Thanksgiving day. My two step sisters were there as well. It was nice to have all my sisters and their families together for the holiday. My mom cooked, but we each brought something (except Angie since she lives so far). Alicia made some delicious yams, Melissa baked the pumpkin pies and I made homemade rolls. That's right people, I did it...and I got more compliments than I thought possible. :) It was my mom's Lion House recipe so it's not like I reinvented the wheel or anything, but go me! I rocked the house with homemade rolls! I know, I even surprise myself with my pioneer-ish skills sometimes. Everyone had a good time, the kids played really well in the toy room (and with their new cars from grandma) and we were even surprised with the big news that Angie and Justin are expecting their third baby in March! I was so excited, I could hardly stand it. They have two boys and are now expecting a girl...just like us! And their kids are quite close in age to ours. So even though they don't live down the street from us (they're in Idaho), the kids have so much fun when they get together and play. Yay Angie! Oh, and because her boys were both born via c-section, she is actually scheduled to have her baby on Preston's birthday. That will be birthday number three on March 15 in our family - Preston, my step niece, Taylor, and now baby girl Johnson. We definitely have a lot to be grateful for this year!

Don't you love Marissa's tongue? That girl has a long old tongue and sticks it out all the time. Super attractive, I know. =) And no, that is not Marcos with me...it's my brother-in-law, Nate (Alicia's husband). Angie told me to hop in there next to someone so I would actually be in one picture for Thanksgiving since I was the official photographer for the event.

My cute mom sitting on the counter eating her pie. Hard work cooking for such a crowd! The picture at the top in the middle is Melissa and Gustavo (Gus for short). They're such cute, shy newlyweds. I have to say, I miss that stage a little bit. We're in the you grab one kid, I'll grab two, survival stage of marriage I suppose. ;)

Uboldi Thanksgiving FHE

I wanted to do something Thanksgiving related with Marcos' side of the family since we will be spending Thanksgiving with my mom and step dad. We talked back and forth a bit and decided doing a family night together with dinner was a good idea. I had such good intentions, but it snuck up on me. I was supposed to send out an email with the details and completely spaced it! Go figure. Hopefully good intentions get me points somewhere (maybe heaven) because my thoughts don't always come to fruition. Anyway, despite my lack of preparation, it turned out really good. We decided to just do a normal meal so Amy and Laura brought lasagna, I made a salad and garlic bread and some little pilgrim hats for decoration, and Mercedes (Abuela) brought ice cream for dessert. The kids were playing in the toy room downstairs and we decided to eat without them. Great idea! We were able to enjoy our own meal before they gradually wandered up one by one to eat. For the most part, the kids all played well and got along and I think they all had fun together. We did a simple family night with a song and prayer. Marcos read a Thanksgiving story (although I probably should have had him choose another one because it didn't keep the kids' attention very well). Then we all told what we were thankful for and put leaves on our bare tree (which was very Charlie Brown-ish until Laura came with a few more branches for the poor, pathetic tree. :) I had borrowed a bunch of Thanksgiving things so we finished off with a play the kids put on for us. They didn't really prepare anything. They just stood up there in their outfits. Dylan wanted to fight the Indians instead of make peace with them, Preston physically sat on the "Mayflower" and kept saying, "I'n a cowboy" (yes I'n, not I'm), Dylan ran right into Kylie and knocked her down (although she seemed fine and it was an accident), Diego was an Indian frog hopping around, Mylo had the bear join the play...and plenty of other silly kid moments, but I think they had fun. I'm glad we did it, even if we did finish up a bit late for a school night.

Thanksgiving at Dad & Suzanne's House

Last Saturday we got together for an early Thanksgiving celebration at my dad and Suzanne's house. The kids were playing so well together that we decided to have the adults eat before we called them to dinner. Great idea! We were more or less finished eating before they wandered out of the toy room wondering what was going on.

The cousins closest to Preston's age are two 2-year-olds who both happen to be girls. They were putting on dress-ups and Preston just had to join in. Let me just say, he was a very pretty princess twirling around in his purple dress!

We finished off the afternoon watching Toy Story 3, although Marcos ended up watching the BYU game on the TV upstairs. The only down side was missing Justin in Angie, who couldn't be there this year. :( It was a really fun day for everyone!

Home School Blog

I decided to start a blog to track what we've done here at the "Uboldi Academy." I take a lot of ideas from other blogs, but I always end up tweaking stuff to make it work for our family. I thought it would help to look back and see what worked and what didn't and to see how we grow over time. It's going to take me awhile to catch up on what we've done and to make my lists of resources I love, but here is the link if you want to check it out.

mariashomeschooladventures.blogspot.com

The Many Faces of Marissa

I was looking back at my pictures when I came across a day I took a bunch of pictures of Marissa. I was trying to get a good shot and she was squirming around and pulling faces the entire time. She was about six weeks old at the time. I realized how funny babies are with all the faces they make and decided I would post this.

Marissa Update

I won't say much since my post was so recent and long the other day, but I had to post her 4 month stats. She went in on Tuesday for her 4 month well check. Pretty much in the same percentages...

Height: 26 in (95%)

Weight: 15 lbs 8 oz (90%)

Head: 16 1/4 in (55%)

I just wanted to post this video. It doesn't quite show what was going on, but I had to try. It's hard be the person playing with the kid and filming at the same time, but I wanted to remember this. It was TOO FUNNY! I had a big bright blue Maverik mug with ice and a little drink left in it and actually started shaking it a little to see how much was in there. I noticed Marissa was completely fixated on it and started to shake her head ever so slightly while she followed it with her eyes. It was hilarious! I got the camera and was able to get her to sort of reenact it. It really was so funny. As you can see, she's quite alert and very attentive. She's always watching one of us trying to figure out what's going on in this crazy world around her.

St George

We decided to go visit my grandparents in St. George before all the holiday visitors started coming and before the weather got iffy enough that we might hit a storm driving down. I went back and forth at the end trying to decide if we should go or not. Here's the story.

My friend, Jamie, and I are playing indoor soccer and I got hit really hard with a ball on Monday night. In general I'm pretty tough physically so when I say hard, I mean REALLY FREAKING HARD!! She was maybe 5 feet away from me and had a killer kick. I think she meant it to go over me, but it hit me right in the face. Not the head, the face. I honestly thought I had broken my nose and it was probably gushing blood. I couldn't feel my lips for 20 minutes. I kid you not, they were completely numb. It's never happened to me before, but it was strange. I pulled myself together and played the rest of the game, but I was for sure feeling it. The rest of the week I had a headache that would not stop.

Thursday when I still had a horrible headache, I actually went into the doctor. He said it was a pretty common side affect of a head injury and just told me to keep taking motrin and not to play until the headaches stopped since a compound head injury is really bad. I had all but decided to postpone the trip until after the holidays when the cards didn't seem so stacked against me. But then my grandma called and was seeing which day we would be coming and I talked to my mom, who said I should be fine and a vacation would be good for me...so I talked myself back into the trip. Bad idea.

We left Friday morning-ish and I was not feeling great. I thought it was medicine and caffeine on a relatively empty stomach. We stopped at a rest stop and I threw up...but it was mainly my drink so no big deal. I thought that would solve the problem and was cursing myself for not taking better care of myself physically. We grabbed subway for lunch and headed down the road. NOPE! We had to pull over a couple towns later, where I lost my entire lunch and then some. Not pretty. The baby was fussy, we lost her binkie somewhere along the way, the kids were whining about who knows what. Um, yeah, we should have turned around at that point and called it a day. But no. We carried on, assuming I really was just car sick and reacting to all the weird factors. But I felt like crap. And mommy not feeling well when the kids are off their routine and extra needy is not a good thing.

Saturday we got up and went hiking, Marcos took the kids to the tennis court while I took a nap with the baby and then we went to see Megamind at the theatre. Marissa screamed for grandma (another overly tired incident) and Preston was antsy and wiggly at the movie. Stupid expensive 3D movie! It was good, but not worth $30 for a matinee with a wiggly 3 year old. I should have stayed home with Preston and just sent Marcos and Dylan. Not great, but overall a decent day...

And then night hit. Dylan threw up all his dinner. We pulled off all the sheets, cleaned it up and started over. Thankfully I had the presence of mind to ask grandma for a bowl because he was up every hour that night throwing up. One of those horrible bugs where you throw up even when there's nothing left in your stomach. He finally was so sick of it that he went and laid on the ground in the bathroom and asked me to bring him a pillow and blanket. So sad. He was so sweet though. He kept looking up at me and thanking me for coming in to help him while he was sick. Makes it worth it somehow. :) So I was up twice with the baby and seven times with Dylan that night. Nice!

We almost left Dylan home to watch a movie with grandpa at home and took the rest of the family to church, but I had a feeling... Instead I left Marcos at home with the boys and took Marissa with me and grandma. Thank goodness I did because Preston lost his breakfast soon after we left. That would have been a DISASTER in the chapel! I did thoroughly enjoy a very quiet three hours at church, although I was exhausted from basically not sleeping the night before. Luckily it was easy to get a nap in with sick kids sleeping all over the house. YIKES!

Poor grandma! She is such a good hostess. She's really good at having people over and can cook like there's no tomorrow. And very few of us could eat much of anything. Plus she's very clean so having people throw up all over her house was probably not her favorite thing either. I felt so bad. I wanted to just leave, but having kids throw up driving home didn't sound great either.

Monday we were all feeling better for the most part. We packed up and headed out around 11, but ended up stopping to see the dinosaur tracks they discovered down there since we hadn't done too much during our trip. It was actually pretty cool. And we stopped at a little restaurant in Nephi on the way home that had these cool trains throughout the restaurant. The kids really liked that too. Not our best trip, but what to do you do? I'm just hoping grandma and grandpa don't catch our stomach bug.

The first night we set a trap to catch a raccoon. We caught one a couple trips ago and Dylan loved it. Nope, just the stray cat that wanders through their yard. :) At least I captured a cute picture of grandma and Marissa!

Hiking. Probably the highlight of my trip. I LOVE hiking and so do the kids. And it's much easier with Marcos there to keep track of Preston when we're close to a cliff. I still felt a little gross, but not bad. Oh, and Preston LOVED this little fishing pole and fish my grandparents had. It's the one thing that saved us while he was sick. We'd just distract him with something about catching fish and he'd go back to doing that instead of begging for food when he couldn't eat anything.

Sunday night Dylan was feeling better so he and Marcos hiked up a little trail close by and waved down at us. They took a good picture of the temple too. But pretty much most of the pictures looked like the other three...lots of crazy hair, sleeping, red cheeks from fevers and pajamas. Oh, except Preston LOVED the chalk board in my grandparents spare bedroom too. One day he would run out and tell me what letter he drew, then run back and draw another. That kept him busy for quite awhile...all in a diaper just in case he threw up again.

Dinosaur tracks and such at the Johnson farm. Kind of cool to see. We only spent about 45minutes there since we were on our way out of town, but it was fun.

Trains at JC Mickelson's in Nephi

The food was nothing to write home about, but it was a fun atmosphere and we had the restaurant to ourselves which was awesome. We could let the boys kind of wander and see the trains without worrying about bothering anyone.

Halloween Festivities

I know...super late. But I still have to get it posted. Here are a few of the Halloween activities we participated in this year.

The activities' days girls had a trick-or-treat party for the nursery kids. Preston wasn't sure what was going on, but learned quickly the meaning of trick-or-treat. He was a pro in no time!

Pumpkin carving. Marcos had a crazy week and isn't the biggest fan of Halloween anyway so we did our Halloween stuff for school the Friday before Halloween. Preston was more interested in coloring pictures than carving pumpkins and getting messy so he colored while Dylan and I did the hard work. Marissa joined us after her nap and kept trying to grab the bowl of seeds. She is going to be trouble when her mobility improves! We carved one pumpkin per kid. Preston's "face" was the one we were going to do for Marissa, but her face was too big for the little pumpkin we picked out so we switched them. I had found a squinty-eyed smile for Preston since that it pretty much how he smiles for the camera and more of a baby face for Marissa. They turned out cute anyway and Preston was excited about his when it was finished.

We went trick-or-treating at the zoo Saturday afternoon with our friends the Talbots. After the zoo, they came over to watch the Real Salt Lake game and then we headed over to the church for dinner and trunk-or-treat. The truck-or-treat got moved inside due to the rain so the kids trick-or-treated around the hall in the church. Weird, but it worked. The dinner was fun though! It was cool to actually get to talk to people a little instead of just hand out candy and rush away.

After the church party, we headed to mom's for more food (YIKES!) and to hang out with the fam. It was fun to spend the evening together and the kids were really well behaved. They played in the toy room most of the time and we were actually able to visit. My mom bought the "big boys" matching Halloween outfits. It's the first time I've ever been able to get Marcos to dress up. Hurrah mom! He wasn't exactly a "tough" looking biker though. We tried to get them to pose looking mean...it didn't work. They just aren't mean enough I guess! :)

Marissa

Like the rest of my posts, this one is a few weeks overdue. I was going to post a "three month" post, but never did. She'll be four months in a week so I think I'll skip it and just post a few pictures from the past month of her. Not nearly enough pictures...dang it! The days I remember, I take a million, but I definitely don't get the camera out as often as I should. Oh well. That's what happens with child number three apparently...especially when you are in YW and trying to home school. Just not enough hours in the day!

I don't have new stats for her except to say I'm sure she's still right up there at the top of the weight and height scale. She is tall, strong, sturdy and an adorably chubby little bubby. :) She is mellow and tolerant...until she's not. Then she can scream with the best of them! It took me a little while to figure out what was going on. Did I eat something that bothered her? Does she have a stomach ache. Can I really NEVER drink a Diet Coke? She can't possibly need to eat again, right? Why is this child screaming? Marcos was convinced it was him. She would scream when I'd leave for YW and I'd get an urgent call, "I need your help, Maria!" Well, as soon as we discovered she just can't tolerate being overly tired, life has made sense again. It's very strange. Neither of the boys were that way. She'll fuss if she's hungry, but you can stretch her meals out an extra hour if you absolutely have to as long as you have a binkie. My boys can hold her and love her way too much and she doesn't flinch. But if you get her past her bedtime, her little body can't handle it and she just screams. And for now she still likes to be swaddled and likes her pink soothie binkie to go to sleep. She lights up when I enter a room, which warms this tender mother heart of mine and smiles at anything. She has such an easy smile, but gets so excited and shy that she turns to the side a bit when she is in a full grin. She rolled over early...from her tummy to her back, but doesn't do it often. That may have something to do with the fact that I don't put her on her tummy enough. :/ She giggles, but not because she thinks things are funny yet. It stems from the fact that she is quite possibly the most ticklish little thing I have ever seen. She fights the laugh though and tries to hold her breath and hope it will go away. Pretty amusing to watch. When she had a bit of a bellyache one night, I was gently rubbing her tummy in a circular motion and discovered just how ticklish she can be. She would squirm from one side to the other trying to escape the "tickle torture." I absolutely LOVE her fat rolls! There are three or four on her thighs alone. And those chubby cheeks are completely irresistible. I just want to nibble them! She has her daddy's eyes, although the jury is still out on the color. And she has those expressive eyebrows of his. You know, the kind that seem to have an extra muscle there raising them at such random moments, but making her face come to life. She sleeps 7-9 hours at night, but has started slipping into a habit of waking up more often. I'm usually so tired I don't notice what time it is and just grab her to feed her. Then I realize she didn't really need to eat. So we will be working on that bad habit now so we don't have a big problem on our hands soon. Several ladies in the ward have started calling her the community baby. Kind of endearing. Pretty much some lady in the ward is always holding her. I send her to Relief Society during Young Women's because she tends to be a distraction to the girls who all want to hold her and coo at her instead of listening to the lesson. The Relief Society ladies have started fighting over her, knowing there is a baby to hold for an entire hour. So she's the community baby and Marcos and I both love it. It takes a village, right? She will always be "Baby Echo" to the Young Women who were at Echo Lake for girls' camp this year. They started referring to my big belly as "Baby Echo," joking that she was going to be born at camp.

Wow, that was long! And yet only a tiny portion of what I could say about this precious little daughter of mine. Things I'm sure I'll be glad are recorded some day I suppose. Here are the pictures for the majority of you who I'm sure skip all my lengthy boring posts and glance at the pictures of the cute kiddos. :)

Three months old

Someone gave me this onesie for Marissa. Not something I would have bought, but it does make me smile. :)

Happy little bubbers!

That shy face she gets when she smiles and starts to look away always makes her look like she's winking. ;)

I was changing Marissa into her Halloween costume and she spit up a little bit. I didn't have a burp cloth so I just used her onesie, which was already unsnapped since I was in the process of changing her outfit. She giggled and giggled. I guess a shirt in your mouth is kind of funny. :) Anyway, I had Marcos grab the camera and managed to film her giggle for a minute. She laughed so hard it gave her the hiccups. I sure love this happy little baby!

Anthony's Visit

A few weeks ago, we watched Anthony for a few days while his dad was out of town. Unfortunately as a temporary mother of four, my camera skills were not up to par. I hardly took any pictures of the kids. But we had lots of fun so I guess that will have to suffice. Dylan and Anthony ended up sleeping in Dylan's twin bed on opposite ends of the bed. In the past, I've always used the blow up mattress, but it's so big that they have to be in the family room and with Anthony needing to be to school early, I didn't want them up late watching movies. So it was a structured, boring visit and yet really fun just doing normal everyday stuff together. It's hard not seeing him very often any more and seeing how much he has changed each time we do get to spend time together. He really was like one of my own kids for so long. It was fun for him to be here over a weekend and to get to go to church with us. It ended up being the same weekend as our ward's Primary program, which was good and bad. Bad because he didn't get to sit by Dylan during sacrament meeting, but good because he got to hear his buddy, his best friend and "brother" bear testimony in his AMAZING talk. Sorry, I'm having a proud mommy moment here. Dylan really did do amazing. He had this half page talk to do. I was shocked when I saw his "part." I think they gave it to him because it was similar to a talk he'd given in Primary, plus he's a pretty strong reader for his age so they figured he could read it without much help. And he did the day he got it. But I like him to memorize stuff and not be looking down and reading. You know, working on the public speaking skills. So he memorized the whole thing. It was like 6 or 7 small paragraphs and he did so well. Anyway, Anthony thanked me for taking him to Primary with us and said he enjoyed it. I guess you never know. Maybe our example will mean something to him one day. Here are a couple of pictures from his visit.

Preston didn't really sleep with Dylan and Anthony. We thought that might be a bit too crowded, but a couple of nights we let him lay there until he fell asleep and then moved him to his own bed.

Anthony still sucks his fingers just like when he was a baby.

Preston doesn't really take a sippy cup to bed, but he kept saying he was thirsty which finally annoyed me enough that I caved. I put a little water in a sippy cup and let him hold it.

CARAMEL APPLES!

Preston LOVES Clifford books and his two favorite right now are called "Picking Apples and Pumpkins" and "The Pumpkin Pie Prize." In one of the books, they make caramel apples. So...Preston started asking me to make caramel apples many times a day, a task I've never before attempted. One day I was in the produce department and saw the caramels and just decided we were going to make caramel apples this year. I read a couple tips online and then went for it. Hmm...apparently it's an acquired skill because these were the saddest looking caramel apples I have ever seen. The kids still had fun and seemed to enjoy eating them, although they were way too big. Note to self, buy small apples next time.

Thankfully Marissa is used to being mauled by big boys who love her way too much! :)

She's pretty tolerant of all the extra love and attention she receives.

Bedtime stories on Dylan's bed

Friday = pizza + movie

Gotta love Fridays!

Flying Orange Dragon Slicers

Marcos at the first game. He held his roster folder the whole time and paced along the sidelines. So funny!

Playing the game. Dylan prefers to play defense and is quite good there, but Marcos has the kids rotate positions so they all learn a little of everything.

Marcos LOVES the huddle. He gives a great pep talk before, during and after the games!

This is most of the team - one player was missing from this picture

Yep, Dylan's soccer team was once again "the dragons"... only this year they kept adding words to it. They went from the orange dragons to the flying orange dragons to the flying orange dragon slicers. I'm guessing by the end of spring, their team name will be 10 words or so. :) It was an awesome soccer season! Marcos got roped into coaching as they were short on coaches this year. It was entertaining watching him pace the field like a professional coach the entire first game. He had told me how nervous he was and his mannerisms definitely confirmed it. He caught onto coaching quickly though and by the end was amazing. He definitely is good at motivating the kids! I was a spectator, soccer mom and wife of a soccer coach. It was basically just survival mode for me, but so nice to have something I wasn't in charge of since most of the kids' activities fall under my jurisdiction. Anyway, here are a few pictures from the season. I've got video somewhere, but can't find it at the moment so I won't post that part. Marcos got all teary-eyed like a proud papa after their final game. Softy! Just one of a million reasons why I love that man so much!