Fallin' into Winter

It is Sunday FUnDaY as my friend Karen calls it. I, of course as usual, am drawing a blank as I sit down to FINALLY write more on the family blog. Momma bear gave me a hard time on the phone the other day because I haven't updated in awhile. As I logged on to do this, I just checked hers and her family entry is even older than my last....go figure!

This fall has been an interesting time. I thought having both big boys in school all day would allow me to accomplish much MUCH more, but boy was I wrong. I have learned that I accomplish more with some time constraints...when Dillon and I have nothing planned or I don't have any pressing work to do, I find that we just frolic the day away. Kindergarten broke the day up enough to keep me busy and on schedule. I am LOVING the time with Dillon, although we miss the brothers when they are gone. Dillon is quite bossy and I have apparantly told him he is 'being bossy,' because his new thing to tell me all day is, 'mom, you're a little bit bossy.' Pretty funny I think.

Oliver and his friends, JP and Dominic on the first day of school.

Oliver is in Mr. Weber's first grade class. He is retiring this year and we are so happy we were able to have him as a teacher his last year. He is the "bug" guy of the school and even has a talk radio program on public radio on Friday afternoons, during which he talks all about bugs for the little audience. They have a gerbil, tarantula, hermit crabs, preying mantis, and many other creatures in their classroom. Needless to say, Oliver loves school and is learning all about bugs!

Ethan is in Mrs. Miller's class. He didn't want me to walk him to school on his first day...I made him, don't worry. He thinks she is a great teacher and is learning and excelling in all areas. His new thing is football and begs to go to the University of Montana football games with me (we only get two tickets). He has been taking his football to school everyday and plays on every recess. I love to hear his play by play details when he gets home from school.

They started piano lessons yesterday and are quite excited. They fought over who got to practice when they got home and were really excited to show dad what they had learned....after all, mom knows nothing (after taking for 8 years) and dad is the piano king.

The mountains are teasing us, they are turning white and the level is slowly dropping. We got out the sleds and hung them up yesterday. Uncle Mark comes this weekend and they asked if we could go sledding...pray for snow!!! Mark is my baby brother :)

Happy Birthday Jon Dillon Post!!

The big '3'.

Everyone loves Dillon. Ethan and Oliver both revel in his attention and love to play with him. They even go as far as, 'am I your best buddy?' and 'who do you like more? Me or Oliver'. It is funny because he is a little bully, a little crazy, a little bossy...alright, a lot bossy, a little aggressive, and a lot bit of fun. He is our monster. (read past posts about his obsession with Monsters)

Del's sister Mariann is pregnant with her second and Dillon learned the concept of having a baby or something else in your tummy from her pregnancy. One funny thing he says lately is, 'I have a baby monster in my tummy,' while pushing out his big belly. He has this really deep voice and just uses all kinds of different voices when he talks.

I want to write more, but we are off to the lake with friends!!

A few pet peeves (one of them is that term)

I wrote this blog months ago and never posted it. I am laughing now, but what the heck, I am posting it.

I am not a grumpy or moody person (sorry if you feel differently about me). However, there are a few things that BUG me. Here are a few of the ones on the top of my list:

• CALL WAITING. I am fine with people having it, but come on saying things like, "I have to get this call" or "I have another call" and "Oh, so and so is beeping in" is plain rude. In other words you are telling the person you are presently speaking with that, "someone more important than you is calling me" or "I'd rather talk to this person." There are exceptions in my mind, however. For instance, if your husband is beeping in on the other line and you say, "(husband's name, is calling me. Can I call you back?" or "the babysitter is calling, I need to see if everything is okay with the kids." Obviously, there are exceptions and phone ettiquette probably depends somewhat on who you are talking to. I personally do not have caller ID or call waiting (except on my cell phone). If you have call waiting and you have caller ID, you can see who is beeping in and call them later after politely getting off the phone.


• Saying, "I'll let you go." Okay, I will be frank. I very much DISLIKE when someone says "I'll let you go." When in a phone conversation, how you end a phone call depends on who called who. Saying "I'll let you go" implies that the person you are speaking to wants to get off the phone. You shouldn't make that assumption unless they give you reason. If you are the one that needs to end the call, be honest and say, "I have to go, (give a brief reason)" or "Can I call you later? I need to go make dinner." Saying "I'll let you go now" is pretty much saying, I am done talking to you. That is how I feel anyway, so in that case you might as well say, "I don't want to talk to you anymore." If you are one of those people that says "I'll let you go," I realize you probably don't mean to make the person feel stupid for calling you, but think about it next time you are about to say it. If you have to get off the phone, say that. Also, if you did not call the person, you should never say, "I will let you go." The only person that should ever say, "I'll let you go," is the person who made the call. I am probably guilty of my own pet peeves. So please excuse the venting. Like I said earlier, I wrote all this months ago and never posted it. Please keep the phone calls coming...maybe I was in a grumpy mood when I wrote this. Who knows!

I had to throw in a picture for fun, so I found this one to go along with the Peeve theme: Shoeing horses in my garage. Come on! Yes, they do poop everywhere. Del didn't want our puppy to sleep in the garage because, 'she will stink it up with dog smell.' I have to say walking into the garage while franky was being shawed (sp?) definately smelled worse than my puppy! I hope you enjoyed a moment in the life of a cowboy's wife.

Monsters.....again

Dillon is haunted (or befriended) by monsters day in day out and night in and night out. It is kind of funny, creepy and weird. He woke up the other night at about 2:47 am and said the Monsters were teasing him. Another night he woke up and said they were sleeping by him. The other afternoon, they were in the garage, but Coconut (our puppy) ate them. He isn't really afraid and usually will go back to sleep just fine or continue playing, but isn't this just weird for a two-year old to be so creative? Dillon DILLON dillon Dillon. What a funny kid.



One day he decided to serve breakfast while we were still trying to get out of bed. Mmmm piles of rice krispies!













I am pretty sure he learned this one from his daddy. Reading the paper on the pot....specifically the Wrangler rodeo and team roping news.







And, well what can I say? Potty training is dangerouse stuff. You might fall in, fall off, hit your head, you never know when the helmet will come in handy. Seriously, he did fall in this week. It was pretty much just a head and knees poking up. He did not like me laughing as I pulled him back up. Another time, he was standing up on the stool and it slipped out from under him and he hit his chin on the toilet bowl. No wonder he doesn't like to tell me he has to go. I can say that it is getting much better. I don't know if he is potty trained or if we are (just take him every few hours and he is good to go, but if we forget, he doesn't usually tell us).

Oliver Turns SIX!!

Talk about excited. This kid had a countdown going since mid January. When you only get a friend birthday party every two years, IT is a big deal.

Oliver wanted to be part of the ENTIRE planning process. About three weeks before the big day, he wanted to make his invitations. They were so cute, he drew pictures of R2-D2 and different clone troopers and then colored them. I wish I had taken a picture. Everyday after that, he said, "mom, let's talk about my birthday," or "let's plan my party." It was so much fun!

We played star wars bingo,

jedi light saber training, pin the arm on R2D2, and ate a clone trooper helmet cake!

The weekend before, we went skiing and snowboarding at Schweitzer Mountain in Sandpointe, Idaho and did a little family birthday on the slopes. Our neighbors (they are awesome) invited us to their cabin and offered to watch Dillon for the day why we took the boys skiing. Dennis and Dillon hung out in the lodge and did some sledding while Gwen met up with us for some afternoon skiing. The conditions were pretty extreme, but the temperature wasn't too bad. It was a little scary when we got off the lift at the top and couldn't see each other as we went down. The wind was so strong, we weren't able to get enough speed to descend the mountain quickly enough. After we FINALLY made it back to the bottom, we found a great high speed quad that only took us about 2/3rds the way to the top and fed into about five intermediate runs and the terrain park. We had a blast the rest of the day hitting the jumps and bumps. I am so proud of Ethan and Oliver and the tough skin they showed that day amid the conditions. We literally skied our legs off. I have never, and I mean NEVER, been so sore after a day on the slopes.

On our way up to the cabin, we pulled over to check out this herd of about 40 elk. Sweet.

Eight is Great!

Look how handsome Ethan is in his new suit! Isn't he cute? Ethan has had this thing with suits since he was five when my Aunt Sheryl bought one at the DI (Deseret Industries thrift store). She sent up this little grey suit, straight from the eighties with pleats, shoulder pads, you know, the works. I have to admit, I didn't really want him to wear it, but Del thought the suit was awesome and Ethan wanted to wear it, so I relented. He did look pretty cute for a kid stuck in the eighties. However, he wore that thing faithfully every Sunday for like a year regardless of what other clothes I would beg him to wear that day. As the suit slowly became tighter (he had to suck in to button) and the cuffs became shorter, he still wouldn't wear anything else. Finally, one day in church, he really went to town with the markers, a green one to be exact, and marked his suit up and down. I DID try to get the markers out. I washed the suit a few times and then reluctantly took it to Goodwill. Alright fine, I didn't OxiClean it and I was a little excited for him to at last wear something else to church. But boy was I in trouble when Ethan found out that the suit was gone, GONE.

Ethan turned eight on February 1. And, guess what he wanted for his birthday? A new suit (surprise, surprise)! I found this new suit at Macy's during their winter clearance and paid $100 less than the original price. I was so excited, and then I realized I had to buy new shoes, a belt, and a shirt to go with his new suit. An expensive birthday to say the least.

I can't believe how fast time flies. I am not sure if I am ready to have an eight year old. So many things change as your children get older. I hope Del and I are doing our part to teach him the IMPORTANT things in life, the things that really matter. One day he is a little boy and the next he is accountable for his actions. I am not sure if I was ready for him to be baptized. I didn't feel like I taught him everything he needed to know to be baptized and confirmed a member of our church. Sure, we read about baptism, had FHE's (family home evenings) about it, talked about it and tried our best to make sure he was ready, but was he READY? Bishop Lind thought he was (we have an awesome bishop).

We decided to have Ethan baptized on his birthday so he would always remember he was baptized that day. It wasn't until I was at the gym two weeks before on the elliptical when I realized February 1st at 6:30 p.m. was right smack in the middle of the super bowl. I fretted until the day came. Would anyone come? Would the bishop come? Not that getting baptized isn't more important than a football game, but I really felt like I had jeopardized his baptism because I scheduled it during a HUGE sporting event. I was sooo wrong. The turn out was amazing.

We were so lucky to have my parents come up and attend his baptism. However, we wished Del's parents could have been there to be a part of it as well. We missed them. A lot of family friends attended as well as the missionaries, Ethan's primary teacher, two members of the primary presidency, and the Bishop. We are so blessed with amazing friends in our ward and community. Sean Cather (a family friend) and Grandpa Nichols gave talks and spoke directly to Ethan. His daddy performed the baptism and confirmation and then the bishop spoke to Ethan. Words cannot express what an amazing experience it was. I wish I could write exactly what the bishop said, but I can't (when he was talking, I sat there wishing I was writing it all down). He said something like this, "do you know what is happening right now? what millions of people are watching on TV tonight?" Ethan, of course, says, "no." (remember, Del is a team roper) And then he said, "They are watching the Super Bowl, the biggest football game of the year, maybe the biggest sporting event of the year. And do you know what God is watching right now? He is watching you. This is what matters." I just love that guy.

Look how handsome they are! It was cute, someone reminded them to take their socks off before going into the font. Dillon was quite the handful during the baptism because in two year old language, "I be baptized with Ethan."


Grandpa Nichols gave the talk on receiving the Holy Ghost and presented Ethan with a head lamp to symbolize the light and guidance the Holy Ghost can give you. Grandma Sue lead the music as she turned down Ethan when he said he wanted her to sing the musical number. If you know my family, you know we can't sing and if you know Del's family, you know they can. So my mom was not about to get up there and sing in front of Del.


The next week Ethan came home from school all worked up over something. He couldn't put his finger on it, but said he might have done something wrong and 'what if he doesn't know when he does something wrong.' A few days later, the same thing. He was really distraught this time almost to tears. When I finally got something out of him, he said, "I think I lost the Holy Ghost." I tried not to laugh....not a laughing moment for an eight year old. How sweet is that? I asked him what he did that made him think he lost the Holy Ghost. He was just so worried he would lose it. I promise, we didn't lay it on too thick. He is a very intelligent little boy and really thinks things through. Then he wanted to know how do you know if you have the Holy Ghost? I am very proud of him and HIS choice to be baptized. EIGHT really is GREAT!!

My Friend Monique

I am a nerd. Yes, the type that gets excited over weird, random things like saving a lot of money at the grocery store. My friend, Monique, is amazing when it comes to good deals and getting food for almost free. I don't cut coupons very often, but if you know when certain stores have certain sales, there is almost always a coupon (a really good one) floating around out there to combine with these great deals. So today I went to Albertson's to hit their Quaker sale, which they have twice a year (I think), and had my coupons from a previous ad from another store ready and get this, this is amazing, I bought $50.48 of Quaker products (10 boxes granola bars, 2-48 oz. containers of oats, 2 boxes of instant oatmeal packets, and four boxes of Life Cereal) for $8. Like I said, I am not very good at doing this, but this is one sale, I have been taught how to hit.

I briefly met Monique in Tucson, Az at a mutual friend's wedding shower some seven or eight years ago. We moved to Missoula a few years after that shower and within a month or so, Monique moved into town with her awesome family! SMALL WORLD. Anyway, Monique has taught me everything I know about getting great deals and buying food for 'almost free.' She also taught me how to make awesome tamales and has inspired me with her amazing zeal for life. Monique had two babies (close in age ~some 13-18 months apart) to raise while her husband served in Iraq and then several years later added twin daughters to the bunch. Despite having her hands full, she always has a smile on her face and time to spread word of good deals. I don't know about you, but right now, every penny counts and the less I spend on groceries for my three boys, the more I can save or spend on our barnhouse. Monique just moved to D.C. for six to nine months while her husband does some officer schooling for the Marines. I am going to miss her and her great money-saving advice! Monique you are awesome!