{Scouts}

For the past year I have been the Primary 2nd Counselor so I have learned a lot about the scouting program and why it is so important. Now that Rhett is 8, and gets to go each week, I have an even better perspective of why it is so great! Tuesday is his favorite night, whether his pack is picking up garbage or going on a bike ride he comes home with a big smile and tells us all about it. A couple of months ago he earned his first badge, the "Bobcat". At pack meeting I painted his face and he was turned upside down by Cody as I pinned the badge on him (wrong side up). He was able to put it on the right way after doing a good deed for me at home. Ethan of course is so jealous but his time will come :o)

{Grandma Ila Ashton}

On December 8th, Cody's Grandma Ila passed away. We knew this day was coming, as her health has been deteriorating and she has told us many times she was ready to return to be with her husband after being separated for many years. We will miss so many things about her, when you loose one you love it seems that life will never be the same without them. Although she is Cody's Grandmother, she took me under her wing as well and I feel so close to her as well. She is the definition of "spunky" and full of life! When we were first married I loved to hear her stories from the past, as well as her busy social schedule filled with friends, family, church, and lots of activities such as water aerobics.

She shared her testimony often (to us and to her ward every Fast Sunday) and family was so important to her. She kept a schedule of all her posterity, and wrote several letters weekly as well as made many phone calls to catch up on all the latest news. I will treasure those letters, there is something so much more personal about a letter you receive in the mail as opposed to an e-mail.

Cody and I were able to make a quick 2-day trip to Utah and Wyoming for her funeral, we flew up Sunday to Salt Lake, rented a car, and drove to Lyman where services were held. All but one of Cody's siblings were there (Lesli was having a baby on Monday!) and we had a nice time telling stories and memories we all had of Grandma Ashton. Below is a picture of her house in Lyman, Cody's Grandma and Grandpa Bluemel, Cody's cousin Lindsay and I, and Cody's home her grew up in, in Lyman.

There was a lot of extended family there, and a lot of people who loved Grandma Ashton. The funeral was wonderful, and I was able to accompany Mona as she sang one of Grandma's favorite songs: Where Love Is.

The Gene Ashton Family

Ila's children and their spouses

The Grandchildren and their spouses (there are 26 living grandchildren)

Great-grandchildren (she has 83!)

{High School Reunion}

A few weeks ago Cody and I went to my 11 year High School Reunion (they didn't do one last year). I was a bit nervous to go since I really haven't kept in touch with too many people from high school. The reunion included two classes, and I come from a large school so I didn't know how many people I would recognize.....

The answer to that was not too many! I was surprised to see how much some people have changed, and then others looked just the same. I had a great time eating and hanging out with my sweet friends, Waterworld Chicas :o) We all worked together in the summers at Waterworld and had so many crazy and fun experiences together. Now we are all married, some of us have children, one of us is a doctor, and we all have grown a lot. It was great to be back together. It was a fun night and I wish I had taken more pictures!!

{Halloween}

October has come and gone....it was a busy and fun month filled with lots of parties, pumpkins, costumes, and treats! The boys enjoyed picking out a pumpkin and pulling all the slimy seeds out.



Cody worked hard finding a jack-o-lantern pattern online, and printed and cut it out. He wasn't thrilled when I told him that they boys should be able to draw with markers on the pumpkin and then he should cut out their design..... ;o)



Mr. Pumpkin turned out to have three eyes, a carrot shaped nose, and an interesting mouth but it looked great when he was carved and had candles glowing inside.

This year Rhett has been talking for months about being The Emperor from Star Wars. I will admit, I tried to discourage him because it was a difficult costume to find and so freaky looking!! His heart was set on it, and so we ordered the mask online and found a black costume to wear and he was set. Ethan wanted to be a vampire, and Kade picked out a lion costume that looked so cute.




This was the first year we stayed home and went trick-or-treating in our neighborhood, and the boys lasted a long time. Rhett and Ethan even went through the haunted house of a ward member. It was a fun month, now it's on to Thanksgiving and Christmas!

{Soccer Stars!}

Rhett and Ethan had a fun soccer season full of many evening practices and Saturday games. They both improved a lot and had a great time playing and making new friends. Rhett especially enjoyed playing on the same team as his cousin Mason. Now we are on to baseball and t-ball....busy, busy but I wouldn't have it any other way! It's fun being outside together and enjoying the fabulous weather we earned by the HOT summer!

{New Family Pictures}

We had family pictures taken and I am so happy with how they turned out! I am impressed with how many great shots she got, my boys are not easy to photograph!!

{Rhett's Baptism}

Rhett was baptized a few weeks ago and it was such a sweet experience for our family. He has been looking forward to this day for a long time. Grandma and Grandpa Ashton drove down from Utah, and we also had my parents, as well as Dustin's family and my Aunt Laraine and Uncle Mark. Several friends from our ward attended also, and Rhett was very excited to have so many friends there on his special day.

Seeing Rhett and Cody all dressed in white choked me up, and Cody and I both sniffled through the opening song "Baptism". The spirit was already so strong. As Rhett was in the water, about to be baptized he looked so excited and happy. When he came out of the water he smiled the biggest smile and it was a moment that I will never forget. Later he told me that he felt The Holy Ghost very "hard" as he was baptized and recieved The Gift of The Holy Ghost.




Ethan and two of Rhett's cute friends (Madelyn Cox and Logan Lunt) sang a song. Ethan was very nervous and got the giggles but luckily pulled it together and they sounded so sweet. The Bishop gave Rhett a journal to record his feelings and thoughts after being baptized, and Rhett did that night after everyone had left.



After the baptism family came over for a lunch and it was nice visiting with everyone and hearing family stories from the past. I feel so blessed to have such strong examples in my life and for my children. I am thankful that Rhett made the choice to be baptized and be such a good example to his younger brothers. He is taking his new responsibilities very seriously and he is a good example to all of us of how sacred the promises we make are when we are baptized as well as the importance of repenting daily for the wrong choices we make.



We love you Rhett! You are very compassionate, thoughtful, and show concern for everyone you meet. He is always thinking of nice things to do for others and making sure he doesn't hurt others feelings. I am so glad he is the first boy in our family so he can be such a great example for Ethan and Kade.

{Kade's 3rd Birthday}

Kade had his 3rd birthday a couple of weeks ago! He had fun being the center of attention and opening some fun presents. He loves Spiderman and footballs so he got some new Spiderman PJ's and a watch, and two new footballs. He also had fun opening some plastic animals that Rhett and Ethan picked out for him at the store.



Aunt Ally worked hard to make him a Bunny Cake, isn't it cute?



A few days later Kade invited 3 of his friends over for a little birthday party. Kade even showed them his funky dance he does when he wins the game called "Hulabaloo" (see the picture below). It was cute to watch 4 little boys running around and having a great time together. I loved listening in on their conversations and deep thoughts :o). When they were painting pictures of dinosaurs Jalen said "I love dinosaur dreams. Dinosaur dreams are good for your body." in a very serious voice. The other three boys all nodded their heads in agreement.







Things we love about Kade: *he loves to snuggle in the morning and at night, he'll say "snuggle time!" and stretch his arms out wide *he loves to make his brothers laugh *he is addicted to gum *he loves balls and playing sports *he is a great bike rider (with training wheels of course!) *he's into dinosaurs and Dora *he loves when you read to him *his favorite foods are pancakes and cantelope *he has big brown eyes with long lashes *he gets so excited when his brothers come home from school, but also loves having alone time with Mom while they are away *he thinks when we are driving we are racing other cars, and when I slow down he tells me to "get back in the race Mom!" *he loves to wrestle with Ethan and is getting pretty strong himself! *he makes us laugh with the funny things he says. We love you Kade!!

{Rhett's 8th Birthday!}

Rhett's birthday was September 6th, a day he had been looking forward to for a long time! He woke up early to open his presents before Dad left for work, and was happy to get some Star Wars toys he'd been wanting.



Ethan had gone shopping with me the night before, insisting that we needed to get Rhett a pet for his birthday. Being the non-pet person I am, I told him he could choose a lizard or a fish. Ethan carefully selected a Beta fish (or data fish as he still calls it). I love the picture below of Ethan looking to see Rhett's reaction when he unwrapped (took a towel off) of the bowel and saw his pet.



It's been over a month and the fish (Patrick) is still alive. That's great for us, our lizard and frogs lasted under a week. Rhett kept saying "I didn't know a fish was such a fun pet!"

Rhett's birthday was on a Sunday so that night we had Dustin and April's family as well as my family over for ice cream sundaes. A few days later Rhett had a movie themed party with some friends where they had fun playing games, eating pizza, watching a short Scooby-doo movie and then having cake and ice cream. He has so many great friends, and it made him so happy that they would come to his party.





Happy Birthday Rhett!! We love you lots!!

My cute sisters are all leaving and it makes me sad! Before Ashley and Brittany left for college my Mom took us all to Cheesecake Factory.



Melissa lives in Utah where her husband Sam is finishing his last semester at Weber State.






Ashley is back in Hawaii.....(BYU-H)




Brittany is in Idaho.....(BYU-I)




Good thing Ally will still be home for awhile, I don't think my boys (or I) could take everyone being gone far from us! I love my sisters!!!

{Boy Crazy}

Around here things get pretty crazy with 3 boys close in age. As most of you know I grew up the oldest of 5 girls, no brothers so there are plenty of things I have had to adjust with having 3 sons of my own. Cody is always having to remind me to let my boys be boys....and not be so protective of them! The other night they were having such a fun time pillow fighting, I had to snap some pics. They were laughing and knocking each other down, then getting back up to do it over and over again. I love to see them playing together and getting along.



Later it was bedtime, and Rhett wanted to read Kade a bedtime story. Ethan climbed in Kade's bed and they listened and laughed as Rhett read to them.





I love my kids more than I thought was possible. My life feels wild and crazy sometimes - but simple things like this bring me such happiness that it makes all the spilled milk, fighting, tears, potty humor, and loudness that comes with being a mom of boys worthwhile.

{ER Round Two}

Poor Kade had a rough patch....but we hope this was the last emergency room visit for a long time! A couple of weeks ago we were at my Aunt Suzy's home in Mesa at a dinner celebrating the return of my cousin Max from his mission in Estonia. They have a huge backyard with a city park playground size swingset. Kade ran in front of his cousin while she was swinging and the impact knocked him down. He kept crying and pointing to his clavicle saying his "neck" hurt. My parents were sweet to watch our older two boys for the rest of the night while we took Kade to the ER.

We went back to Cardone Children's Hospital and before too long had an x-ray showing a fractured clavicle, broken all the way through. Luckily it heals fast and you don't need a cast so we were given a sling and ace bandage and were on our way. The first few days were rough because Kade didn't want to take it easy so he fell on it several times (ouch!). A week later I took him to the Orthopedic Surgeon and he had Kade move his arm a bit, and things were looking great. We took the sling off last week for good and he is feeling good and almost healed.



As for his seizures, he hasn't had any since we started him on his medication in the hospital! That's exciting, a better prognosis than his neurologist had told us to expect. He hasn't been sick yet (a fever may trigger them) but we have lots of ibuprofen and aspirin ready just in case he comes down with one.

The side effects of dizziness and clumsiness that he had the first week or two after are gone, so that's exciting. He does have behavioral side effects but we give him liquid vitamin B6 twice a day with his Keppra and that has helped most of them go away. He still is a lot more impulsive (at stores he'll run away from me and I actually have to chase him, whereas he wouldn't do that before) but we will deal with that over the liver side effects the other medications have. It does make me wonder if that's why he ran in front of the swing though, because I would have thought he knew better? Anyways...we meet with his neurologist this Friday, so I'm interested to see how that goes.

We love our Kade and are glad he is feeling better!!

{1st Day of School}

Summer was fun, but Rhett and Ethan were excited and ready for school to start a few weeks ago. Ethan has been looking forward to Kindergarten for a long time and finally the day came! I woke up at 4am worrying about letting him go all day, 5 days a week, along with all the other fun things moms worry about.



The boys were up before 7am, dressed at ready to go with still 2 hours left. Finally it was time to go, so we walked to school together. In the hallway Ethan saw two of his good friends, Cody and Mason. They all ran together and hugged each other in excitement!! It was the cutest thing I've ever seen, I wish I would have had my camera out to capture that moment.



First Kade and I went to Rhett's class. He has a really fun teacher, I am so excited about this year for him. He was excited to be at the same table as his friend MaClay, and also see other friends in his class too. Ethan was too impatient to wait, so when Kade and I got Rhett settled in his class Ethan went without me to his room.



Kade and I said goodbye to Rhett and went to Ethan's class where he was already settled in his chair, coloring away. His cute teacher has already done so many adorable things, including sending Ethan some fun mail before school even started!

After a few minutes it was time to go, and Kade and I walked home together. I was anxiously looking at the clock all day, so excited to pick up the boys and hear how their first day was. They came home excited about their teachers and new friends, so it looks like we are off to a great start! As for Kade and I, we are enjoying our time together and he gets to slip into the role of only child which he loves. He has had some fun playdates and friends over, but also loves to play with Mom and read books so we have a great time together. He still has 3 years left until Kindergarten so it will be fun to have that time together :o)