Ring Around the Rosie

Ring Around the Rosie a video by Jerel & Amanda on Flickr.

Here's Zay doing Ring Around the Rosie with cousin Jocie!

Ellie & Eliza

Ellie is one of Eliza's 23 cousins.  She's four years old and just about ready to be a mommy--she did a great job holding Eliza and helping to keep her happy!  We went to Ryan & Amy's for their son Brigham's 9th birthday party.  After the party we watched some fireworks and Zay was even brave enough to try a few of those snap-it things that make a popping sound when you throw them at the ground.  He also had lots of fun leading cousins Molly and Jocelyn in Ring Around the Rosie.  He just loves having so many kids to play with, so I guess we might just have to have 15 kids of our own...

Another announcement from our growing family

Thank heavens we're not having another baby, in case that's what you thought!  With the addition of Zay Zay and Liza to our family, we just don't seem to fit in our house anymore.  I detest moving and told Jerel I only want to do it once, so we are looking for a house that will suit our needs for quite some time.  I further explained that I don't want to move since I've finally made some friends in our ward, and that means the sooner we move the better because if we wait longer I'll just be more attached.  But the real prompt for moving has come from a lot of research into the education opportunities for our kids.  We have a found a school with a learning approach that we really like and the only way to ensure our children can attend it is to move into that school district, and specifically into that school's boundaries.  So we are looking for a house in the Bethany area and have put our house on the market just a few days ago.  For those of you who wonder why you didn't get a personal notification, well, that's just the way we do it--our big announements are done via this blog.

So if you know of anyone looking for a great house, huge yard, and lots of recent upgrades and remodels send them here and look up ML: 11084679.

Big Projects

We've been doing lots of big projects around the house lately.  Here's Zay Zay next to a huge pile of barkdust that Jerel spread around.  It sure looks nice now, but it was a ton of work.  Jerel says next time he's going to just pay someone to put it in for us--it costs an extra hundred dollars but saves you 10 hours of work!

Our big baby

I've heard that sometimes when you have a new baby, the older siblings will start doing baby things again.  Isaiah hasn't really done much of that, but I did think it was funny when he asked to get into the exersaucer recently. 

Little sleepyhead

Eliza was happily playing in the exersaucer, so I ran upstairs to take a quick shower.  When I came back down she was sound asleep!

Five Whole Years

To celebrate our Wooden Anniversary, and to honor Jerel's life long, yet very secret, passion for the Wizard of Oz, we went on a hot air balloon ride.  It was so fun!  We had to be at the launch site at 5am, and it's about an hour from our house.  Luckily I have a friend who was willing to let our kids sleep over at her house the night before and then watch them until we got back.  Getting Zay Zay to sleep in a strange place was a bit tricky, but we managed. 

So we got up super early and headed to the launch site.  Jerel got to help a bit with inflating the balloon and it was cool to watch the whole process. 

I was a bit nervous about the flight since I have a bit of a fear of heights, but it wasn't bad at all.  I think since the basket was pretty tall I didn't have to worry about falling out.  We were in the air for about an hour and saw lots of Oregon's vineyards, and pretty farmland that looks like a quilt when you're up above it.  Jerel was laughing at me because I had my camera and kept zooming in on things down below.  I guess when you're up high the whole purpose is to see the big view; if you want to see something close up you should just stay on the ground.  He had a good point, so I quit zooming!

What have the past five years of marriage been like for us?  Let's see...there's been a lot of the mundane things in life--Jerel has taken out the garbage about 250 times; I've done about 900 loads of dishes and more than a thousand loads of laundry.  Then there have been the fun, pre-kids trips--England, France, Israel, Italy, Croatia, and Spain.  Jerel has spent about 10,000 hours at work; Mandy has had lots of different jobs from working for a book publisher to coaching preschool gymnastics and now doing CPA work from home.  In the past few years Jerel and I both lost our last grandfathers, but we've also added 13 more nieces and nephews.  (In fact since my little sister had her baby last week, for the first time in our marriage we don't have any pregnant siblings). 

Then there was the hardest part of all--giving birth to our two kids in (unplanned) quick succession.  They have brought us so much joy.  Zay Zay is almost two now and it's so fun to watch him as he talks more and more and has started singing songs.  Last night he was leading some of his cousins in Ring Around the Rosie and it was adorable!  He likes to keep repeating the "Ashes, Ashes" part so you never know when "we all fall down" is going to come.  And sweet Eliza Mae is such a content and happy baby; she smiles spontaneously all the time and although people often tell me what a cute boy she is (she wears a few too many of her brother's hand-me-downs) she's really quite pretty with long dark eyelashes and big blue eyes.  Should I write a whole paragraph about the approximately 3,000 diaper changes?  I'll save that for another time...

Jerel has been a comfort and support for me countless times.  He makes me laugh all the time and has had a calming influence on my life; I, on the other hand, have spent the last five years trying to get him to wear colors other than tan and beige, and I've spent the last four years trying to convince him I'm still just as funny as I used to be!  We were both a bit older and a bit independent (read: set in our ways) when we married, but because we have a deep respect and love for each other we are able to respect each other's need for independence while still developing a strong reliance on each other.  Our wedding announcement had a little poem in it, "Today I'll take your hand, then offer you my heart.  I'll look into your eyes and whisper, soul to soul, 'The love you give has made me whole.  You've made me whole.'"  I feel more whole, more complete with him in my life now than five years ago when I wrote that poem.  He is a blessing in my life and I'm so glad we've spent the last five years together.