Christmas Fun

2011 Christmas card

December 2011

Merry Christmas!

We are sending love to all our family and friends this holiday season. We are so grateful for all of the people in our lives!

Here’s a short summary of the Smith happenings…

Robert continues working hard at his own business. He currently has two residential developments he is working on in St. George. He enjoys working with the 14 and 15 year old Teachers at church. And, as always, Robert is the greatest help with the girls. Highlights of his year include a BYU football trip to Memphis and meeting Chad Lewis at the Spudman Triathlon.

This year I’ve taken up swimming and also started playing tennis. My hobbies are great but my full time job is the best (and hardest) part of life…taking care of the needs of 3 girls, figuring out what to feed the family, cleaning up whatever I decide to feed the family, the process of having clean children and clothes etc, keeping fighting as minimal as possible, homework, bills, getting everyone where they need to go (on time?), activity days and Young Women’s sports, hosting playgroups. Wait a minute! No wonder I’m half crazy!

Mackenzie (5) loves kindergarten. She always asks to stay for “extended day” and is always disappointed when it is Saturday. We love seeing the progress she is making with sounding out the words she writes and reads. Mackenzie loves animals, especially kittens. We may have to ban her from checking out kitty books from the library because of the sobbing it can cause.

I was worried about Brooklyn (4) being home so much without her pal Mackenzie (who is doing all day kinder). But she has done great. Luckily Brooklyn has preschool and dance twice a week so she can feel big too. She is constantly writing her name and drawing pictures for everyone. She also loves to help me in the kitchen. She always says, “I want to help make!”

And Charlotte…what to say about Charlotte…She is now 14 months and so, so cute and requires so, so much attention. We love watching her little personality developing. Her favorite foods are frozen go-gurts and mandarin oranges.

Much Love,

The Smiths 

Oh yeah and Brooklyn turned 4

Back in the blur of November my sweet goofy Brooklyn had birthday #4. She is growing up so quickly and I've been packing up all the 3T dresses and wishing she wasn't too tall for them.

Brooklyn decided she wanted bunny cupcakes to take to her preschool class and this is what we came up with.

Here she is with Braden and Oakley. I go to go to her class, take treats, and play freeze dance with the kids.

Brooklyn got to celebrate her birthday in Fallon since we were already there for Thanksgiving. I think it was exciting for her to have her birthday at Grandma's!

Truth

"A sweet and obedient child will enroll a father or mother only in Parenting 101. If you are blessed with a child who tests your patience to the nth degree, you will be enrolled in Parenting 505. Rather than wonder what you might have done wrong in the premortal life to be so deserving, you might consider the more challenging child a blessing and opportunity to become more godlike yourself. With which child will your patience, long-suffering, and other Christlike virtues most likely be tested, developed, and refined? Could it be possible that you need this child as much as this child needs you?"

Elder Lynn G. Robbins April 2011 Conference

Merry Christmas!

 Brother Dresser in our ward had all this fancy equipment to take family pictures at our ward party. Family pictures in this family are a rarity so I was excited. Isn't Christmas time the best?

Toothless

Mackenzie is losing teeth at an incredible rate. She is a few months away from turning 6 and has lost 6 teeth. Her 2 bottom front teeth have grown in but the rest don't show any signs of coming any time soon. We're hoping her big girl teeth are stronger than her baby ones!

Halloween 2011

 Neighborhood trunk-r-treat. Alladin theme- we have Princess Jasmine and her pet tiger Raja and the parrot Iago

Just what I needed

Sadly, this is the only picture I took the whole weekend...BUT my 2 big girls and I took a weekend jaunt to Fallon. FLEW there I might add. Had a heavenly time. Cousins. Including one just home from a mission. Dinner every night (made by not me). Baby kittens-2. A tiny dog named Mojo. I got a little break from a [super cute] 13 month old who is quite DEMANDING/NEEDY at this point in her young life. Best part: hubby sincerely telling me he has a new appreciation for me when we get home :) Special thanks to Robert for the break and Shawna for the food.

Under the Sea

3 good lookin's

Hit up The Little Mermaid at Tuacahn. Good stuff.

Sleep Mask

 The tooth fairy brought these sleep masks when Mackenzie lost a tooth. I thought the girls would have fun playing with them. But to my surprise Brooklyn actually sleeps with hers every night! I took this picture of her in her sleep.
Brooklyn also has this made up friend "Georgia" who she talks about all the time. My friend Georgia has a pet pony. My friend Georgia has a new friend named Betsy. She comes up with all sorts of things. Funny girl.

Hard kindergarten teachers

Mackenzie told me that kindergarten teachers are pretty hard. I asked her what are the hard things she has to do in kindergarten. She told me "Being quiet during rest time is so hard. We just keep talking and we are supposed to be quiet. The second hard thing is getting to school on time." She must be keeping up ok if the hardest thing she has to do is be quiet during rest time!

Mackenzie is doing all day kindergarten so she goes from 8am to 3pm. Brooklyn goes to school and dance twice a week from 9am to 1pm. It makes for a lot of time at home for Brooklyn with out her usual playmate but so far Brookie has been really good about playing by herself. She's actually done a lot better than I thought she would. She is always very excited when its time to pick Kenzie up from school though. I love that part!

First Birthday

Happy Birthday Dear Charlotte...

 

Ole Miss

Oh yes we did. Go to the BYU football game at Ole Miss that is. We stayed in Memphis and enjoyed the zoo and Children's Museum. Then there was the game. We seriously lucked out with the weather. And then we lucked out by winning.

                                                             Packing

                                                             Football fun

Elephant tusk

                                                                   Feeding birds

Whole fam

Amazing Eyes

At church yesterday Charlotte and I were out in the foyer with another lady and her baby. The mom said to me "Your baby has amazing eyes." And I gushed back "OH! Thank you!" And then she proceeded "I just love those leg rolls. My daughter is just so skinny."
The wheels start turning in my head...wait a minute she just said "thighs" not "eyes".

Quote

I like this quote. It reminds me of my dad.

First Days

Brooklyn is going to preschool at the Winner School. She is especially excited for her dance class and her pretty purple tutu.

Yes, this is my kindergartener. Mackenzie is so ready for this. That's what I keep telling myself. It's true though.

Good luck this year my beautiful girls!

Learning

Goodbye Training Wheels

Yep. Mackenzie is a 2 wheeler girl. What a big step. Here is the picture she drew for her Dad who did such a great job working with her on her bike. So cute.

[You may need to click on this picture to see it a little better]

Rick and Melissa

We are so happy for Robert's brother Rick and his new wife Melissa who were married August 20.

Spaghetti

Spudman

Spudman is an awesome tri up in Burley, Idaho where you swim a mile down the Snake River, bike 25 miles and run 6. Last year Robert did the race without me because I was quite pregnant. I was a little bitter and made the goal to do it this year. Here we are after the race:

Do we look half dead? We were! I didn't have a goal time in mind because I had no idea how long the swim and bike would take me. I ended up with a time of 2 hours and 48 minutes which I am happy with.

OK, what do you think the highlight of the weekend was for my husband? It has nothing to do with his lovely wife or the race. Not even the post race meal (which was so good- Maddox- after being so hungry). It was meeting Chad Lewis (BYU and pro football great). The first time we saw Chad when we were registering and Bert wasn't very thrilled about what he said to Chad but he got another chance when Chad and his wife borrowed our bike pump. I thought it would be cool for Robert to have a picture with Chad so I asked Robert if he had his phone. He looked at me like a was crazy- then he said oh yeah, lets get a picture. He told me after he thought I was telling him to ask for Chad's phone number. Oh man I cracked up at that.

This was my first time leaving Charlotte overnight. We had 4 different people help watch the girls so it was kind of a pain. But they did great and Robert and I had the best time on our quick overnight getaway/race.

4th of July

4th of July 2011 spent at the cabin with our friends the Hyers (not pictured)

Oakley parade

Fallon Continued

Slow posting about it, but we had the best time during our Fallon week. It kind of made me homesick to tell you the truth. If I hadn't been dying to see Robert (and the girls missing daddy too) we may have stayed all summer.

The 4 amigos and homemade icecream

No hands. No problem.

The girls even got to ride horses. Our friend Sandy, who used to work at Jeff's, was so awesome to let each girl take a nice long ride and feed Ruby carrots afterwards.

Somehow this is the best shot I got of the chubby babes. Maybe you can't tell from this pic, but they were seriously buds. My orders were for Blake to teach Charlotte how to entertain herself. He failed.

We had some fun with Great Grandma Jean who lives up to her name. She's so great. Cut the flour. Bubbles. Flannel boards. Dress up. Waste basket basketball.