My New Best Friend

After months of trial and error and deductive reasoning, along with a chance encounter with a random on-line article, I think this little box is going to solve a lot of problems.

Seems that I have developed an egg protein allergy. Small amounts of fully cooked eggs seem to be okay. ANY amount of uncooked egg is NOT. I, however, am choosing to send in a substitute whenever humanly possible.

Good news? This stuff does wonders for my pancakes. Bad news? My favorite cookie recipe needs a makeover.

An Excuse to Play with Lexy

I've mentioned before how much my children adore our babysitter, Lexy. They love and cherish her. Cannot get enough of her. Getting home from church on Sundays now takes an extra 30 minutes because we must tell Lexy good-bye, that we love her, that we miss her, ask when she's coming to play again, give her a hug and repeat a dozen or more times. If given the choice between Mom and Lexy, Lexy wins each time. Even with Kehlton!! In all seriousness though, I love her too, and I am SO glad my children love her SO much. Makes life a little easier for me.

For the last week or so, Lexy hasn't been able to come over, so everybody involved has been going through some withdrawals. We decided to grab Lexy and head for the Foothills Aquatic Center a few miles from our house.

WE. LOVED. IT!!!

This is just one third of the center. This is part of the baby pool. The water slide? Brychan wanted to go down it SO bad, but was very worried about all the water rushing down with him. He was so brave and finally went down the slide, all on his own. Once on his back and once on his belly. I was so proud of him!!

The boys and Lexy (sorry, Lexy. I know you'll hate the photo, but life in our family must be documented! :) ).

Brychan dipping his toes,and jumping in.
Needless to say, we are pretty darn excited about going back to the pool with Daddy in tow. We really had a lot of fun, and I can't think of a better way to beat the 113 degree heat!

One of the MANY Reasons...

I LOVE my son.

After a horrible afternoon, I sat in the office, crying uncontrollably. I had just reached my limit and crying was obviously the only reasonable thing left to do (the fact that I have been up since 4:00am going non-stop has NOT helped).

My sweet Brychan, who had just woken up from his nap

(and who I had just snapped at not even 2 minutes earlier),

came and put his little hand on my arm and asked,

"Mommy, what's wrong?"

when I didn't answer, he asked again.

And again.

I was finally able to squawk out that I was sad.

His obvious response was,

"Mommy, why are you so sad?"

"Because I'm not a very good mommy today"

He gave me a huge hug and said,

"Everything will be okay, Mommy. You stay right here."

He left me alone and quickly returned with toilet paper

for me to blow my nose and wipe my eyes.

Granted, it was only about 2 squares of toilet paper,

but it was the thought that mattered.

He again reassured me that it would be okay,

gave me another quick hug,

and went on his way.

What on Earth would I do without that thoughtful, sweet, little boy?!?

Splash Park Fun

This week, we decided to try a new splash park not too far from here. We invited Lala, Jocie and Hallie to join us for a morning of fun!

The boys both loved these water spraying frogs. They had a blast trying to squirt each other!

And cute little Hallie!

After we got done at the splash pad, we picked Daddy up from his office for a quick little picnic at one of our favorite neighborhood parks. It was a fun, fun day!!

**Thanks for all the photos, Jocie!!**

Brutus

Last night, my sister called saying she was on the way to the emergency vet clinic with Brutus. He has been pretty sick on and off for the last few months, but meds weren't working this go around. He was scheduled for an appointment this morning, actually, for cancer screening.

As soon as Ashley walked into the clinic with Brutus last night, they just took him to the back without her. And as soon as she told me that, David and I decided that I needed to drive out to Scottsdale to be with her just in case.

Unfortunately, the "just in case" was for good reason. The vet told Ashley that chances were good that he had lymphoma, and because of the symptoms he was showing last night, she suspected that he had a tumor somewhere in his brain. After a lot of discussion and a LOT of tears, it was decided to just let Brutus go peacefully and not have him suffer through his illness any longer.

Brutus was 9 years old: old for a boxer. A boxer who was considered an "abnormality" due to his white coat. But Brutus was the best dog I have ever seen (sorry Kodi!). He was fiercely protective of Ashley and was just as protective of my children. He and Kehlton had a special bond from the day we brought K home from the hospital. They loved each other tremendously. Even on Brutus' sickest days, he would still allow Kehlton to climb all over him. As I was sitting with Ashley and Brutus last night, I just kept wondering if I had taken enough photos of him with the kids over the years.

My sister has seen a lot of heartache over the 7 or so years that she's had Brutus. She has experienced trauma and pain that no person should ever have to live through. And through all of that, Brutus was right by her side. He was her protector, her confidant, her best friend. He will be greatly missed by all of us!

1st Sunday in Nursery

When did he get so big?!? Well, maybe "big" isn't the right word (because he is still quite small). Grown up? I can't believe Kehlton is old enough for nursery already. If somebody could figure out a way to make time slow down, I'd greatly appreciate it!

As I mentioned earlier, we started Kehlton's transition into nursery an entire month early. If you know my son at all, he does NOT like to be left with other people. He doesn't really even care for meeting other people. I've been taking him to YW with me for months now just trying to get him to warm up to the girls. He is just perfectly happy hanging out with his family. He truly doesn't need to be bothered with anybody else. Pretty much the polar opposite of his big brother.

So this was his first Sunday in Nursery last month.

He looks like a willing participant,

And he looks like he's happy to be there,

But don't let these photos fool you! These were taken the first 5 minutes of his very first visit...before he realized that Mom and Dad don't just stand there next to you and watch you have fun. 5 minutes before the blood curdling screaming began. I really wish I would have gotten a photo of his true feelings for nursery, but my hands were too full of my baby climbing desperately up the front of me, clinging on for dear life.

He is making progress, though. Just this week he decided that he is completely in love with our babysitter (the same one we've been using for months). So maybe this will be the Sunday that he decides he loves nursery, too.

Our Happenings

The last month has been absolutely insane around here. Hence the lack of blogging. But here's a quick re-cap of events:

May 8(ish) - May 18: My parents and brother came for a visit. It was the first time we'd seen Nathan since he got home from his mission, so that was lots of fun. And the boys had a blast spending so much time with Grandma and Grandpa. Well, Brychan had lots of fun. Kehlton waited until the last 3 or 4 days of their trip to decide to be social. We went to the zoo, the library, and had several trips to the park.

May 13: Mark, Jocie and Hallie move to Phoenix!! Dave and I went to help unload their truck, and unfortunately, I haven't seen any of them since! They have come over a couple of times since they've been here, but I was gone. Hopefully we can get together and play soon, because I've heard that the kids already love each other!

May 21 - May 25: I left my boys behind while I went up to Camp LoMia for Girls Camp with our ward. IT. WAS. COLD!! But, it was also a lot of fun. We had over 30 girls from our ward at camp this year (ours is by far the biggest ward in the stake). I love going to Girls Camp and am looking forward to next year. While Mommy was gone, Daddy and the boys worked on lots of projects, made several trips to the park, played with cousin Hallie and even made a few visits to the office.

May 21 - right now: More sick bugs at our house. The day before I left for camp, Kehlton spiked a fever. The morning I left, he was covered head to toe in hives. When I got home, both boys had nasty noses and coughs, and within 2 days of being home, I had the crud as well. We are all much better now with just minor coughs lingering.

May 31: Back to work for me! I had originally planned on not working at all this summer, but when the opportunity arose for me to just work the field trips for summer camp, we decided it would be worth it. So for 2 months, I am working 6am - Noon, 3 days a week. The boys have an amazing babysitter that comes to the house to play for 3 hours or so. So basically, I'm getting paid to accompany a bunch of elementary school kids to the movies every Friday, and other fun places around the valley (on Tuesdays and Thursdays) while my boys get to play with Lexy (Brychan cries every time we take her home).

June 5: Kehlton's first official day of nursery! He's been going for the last month because we knew it would be a hard transition for him. I was hoping that having big brother in there with him would help ease the transition, but Brychan is so busy with his little girlfriend, Bella, that he can't be bothered to play with his little brother. :) Hopefully, Kehlton will soon decide that nursery really is an okay place to be!

I do have some photos from all these events that I hope to get posted soon. Just wanted to let all of you know we are alive and doing well!!