February Randomness

You can bet we saw the Justin Bieber movie: opening night, of course.

We also had our first Blue and Gold Banquet, where I learned that when the leaders say "Your scout needs to make a cake for our fundraiser," what they really mean is "YOU need to make a cake, and you should spend a minimum of five hours on it and use lots of fondant and make it as fancy as you can."

Liam's cake may not have been the fanciest, but he made it ALL himself, and it auctioned off for $55 at the fundraiser, which made him feel pretty dang good.

We bought a wee cake,

which we brought home, and gave all the kids a fork to dig into. After about three minutes, they had their fill and the rest went in the trash!

This month, we've also been enjoying Declan's long hair,

and earning awards for academic achievement and overall awesomeness.

We've been finding new ways to pass the horribly long Wyoming winter indoors,

and doing some home decorating and remodeling.

(Safely, of course.)

We've also been following through on one of my New Years resolutions: to bring back the kid date nights. We started off with a double date; I took Liam, and Garreth took Sam and we all went to a Western Wyoming men's basketball game.

Liam and Sam went out to score a free hot dog, and when they came back in, everyone was facing them and singing the National Anthem. I couldn't help but bust up laughing at the looks on their faces when they thought everyone's attention was on them!

When you go on a date with Sam, you pretty much plan on there being ice cream involved.

A few weeks later, Garreth and Liam went on their date: out to dinner,

then home to work on a model car.

And finally folks,

here is one of the reasons I have a private blog:

Two freshly bathed and lotioned boys jumping on my bed and laughing their heads off.

Pure bliss right there.

Valentine

Valentine's Day started on Sunday this year with our annual "fancy" dinner. Okay, really just spaghetti by candle light. Fancy for us.

About five years ago we received a chocolate fondue fountain as a gift, and it has been a Valentine's tradition ever since. So after dinner, we got the chocolate flowing.

This might just be Sam's favorite day of the entire year.

On Monday, we sent the kids off to school with their valentines. They all wanted to make theirs this year, so we went online and picked out ones that were easy enough for them (and not me) to make. (I did learn something from last year's all-nighter making 30 ipod valentines.)

Grace made homemade suckers to include with hers.

(Could this be her last year of doing class valentines? Sniff.)

Liam went with the rocket.

All the teachers got hand lotion.

And Sam went with the tootsie pops.

After the kids all left for school, Declan sat down to make his valentines. Poor youngest child... I just got out a bunch of cards from years past and let him choose one for everybody. But we did buy small bubbles to give to everyone,

and he had fun delivering them to everybody's mailbox.

In the afternoon, we hit the elementary school for the class parties.

Garreth is always amazed at how different Valentine's Day is here than in Ireland. When he grew up, it was a day to send anonymous valentines to people you had a crush on, a day just for lovers. Over here, the kids give valentines to everybody they know!

I love celebrating it with the kids and making it a family holiday. Otherwise it just seems like a day of forced romance.

But I also always enjoy a good Valentines date night without children.

35

The actual day of my birthday was not such a great one - I had a cold, then Grace got sick with strep throat at school and we spent the afternoon at the doctors. Garreth and the kids made it special though, with streamers and balloons and gifts. Garreth even bought an ice cream cake the night before, but decided to hide it out in the garage freezer. Which wasn't plugged in. It may have been runny, but it was yummy!

The rest of my birthday week got better. Garreth and I went to go see a movie - my choice - and both loved it. ("The King's Speech." Go see it.) Then we left on Saturday morning to head over to Salt Lake for a day of fun. Grace and I went shopping at IKEA while the boys went go-karting, then we all met up for dinner at the Mayan.

It's been years since we've taken the kids there (in fact, Grace was the only one who remembered it) and boy, were they in heaven.

I mean, what's not to love about a restaurant with cliff divers,

drummers in head dresses,

acrobats who do tricks on a huge scarf,

and fire dancers?

Meeting one of the divers. Grace might have found her dream job.

It was such a fun night. The next morning, Garreth had an early flight to Houston, so we got a cheap hotel out by the airport and spent the rest of the night swimming in the hotel pool. It was a perfect, week-long birthday celebration with my family and I loved every minute of it!

Fish

Just a quick word about Grace.

She seriously rocks the swimming pool.

She is one talented little swimmer. She has always loved the water and seems to have a very natural talent, but since joining the swim team, she has improved even more. Recently she has even mastered the flip turn - you know, when swimmers get to the end of the pool and flip and kick off the side to do another lap.

The other night while swimming as a family, Garreth was even asking her for coaching tips. She is that amazing. Watching my kids grow and develop their talents is one of my absolute favorite things about being a mom.

Wrestling

I have never been a big fan of wrestling. It always seemed like such a strange sport. (Maybe I was judging it solely by the singlets.) When Garreth and I were first married and dreaming of our future family, I was certain that all our kids would be piano players and he knew that all our boys would wrestle. In my newlywed compliance, I would agree, but secretly hoped that we could steer clear of this one sport.

Then I had three boys.

Who spend 98% of their day wrestling each other.

So when wrestling sign-ups came around, I thought, "Well, why not?" And I have to admit, it's growing on me. We signed up all three boys, but Sam had a rough night the first practice and just never came around to it, so Liam and Declan were our "wrasslers" this season. (That's what Liam's coach actually calls it. Wrassling. Remember, we live in Wyoming?)

Here's Declan at practice. Three year old wrestling is maybe the most hilarious thing I've ever seen.

After a full month of practice, it was time for their first tournament. It was exciting to see their names on the brackets.

The stance. Very intimidating.

Warming up. The dads are definitely more into this than the kids.

Out of 150 wrestlers, the only two kids in the 8 and 9 year old division 77 - 84 pound weight class were Liam... and his best friend Anthony.

Discussing strategy.

Liam is a great little wrestler: very strong and very determined. He beat Anthony the first match.

But Anthony won the second match. And the tie-breaker. Liam had a hard time losing to his BFF, but felt better when he got to stand on the second place platform and receive a medal and a T-shirt.

Declan was also very good. He is naturally tough just from having two older brothers! He loves wrestling and the huge grin never leaves his face, even when he's administering a brutal take-down. There were about six kids in his weight bracket and he placed second.

Tough guys.