Always room for one more!

A week ago we got to have alot of my family come and visit. I love it because we never just have one person or family come visit. As many people as can get school and work off and as many people as can squeeze in the car will come too. We had Liz and her three kids come (we missed Brayden, who had football) my mom, Annie, Michelle and then the last part of the week Grace and her kids came too. All of the kids played together so well and were really excited to see eachother. It was a blast!
The first day we walked down to the park by the lake and had a picnic and practiced our baby drops. I don't remember it hurting so badly when I was in 3rd grade. Liz had a pretty sweet bruise behind her knee all week. That night we went to the movie in the park. We saw Enchanted, I can't believe with all my girls I hadn't seen it before. I loved it.
Elizabeth has turned into a maniacal, rock hard, workout machine, so we "got" to workout with her a few times. It was great except that I couldn't straighten my legs for a week, they were so sore. We also spent a day at the water park. We all took a turn on the flo-rider. You can see on the slide show a great wipe-out picture of Klave. He actually did the standing up one where the rest of us did the body board side. It's great fun just make sure you have your swim bottoms on good. It's dangerous that way, just ask Annie.
In the outrageously hot weather we also conquered the Wild Horse Monument hike and a cookout at the sand dunes. The hike is actually only about a quarter of a mile, if that. But it's steep and we had a lot of kids. The cookout at the sand dunes we all agreed was something we would definitley remember. It's not like the sand dunes in Rexburg that you can play on and slide down. It was more like your worst nightmare. Building a fire to roast hot dogs when it's 100 degree weather and smores where the chocolate is melted before you open the package. Sand in all of your food. I guess I was getting desperate for exciting things to do in Moses Lake. I only wish we took some pictures.
One of my favorite things is girls night out with my sisters and mom. This year it was Klave and 11 kids so we put them to bed before we left. We went to dinner at El Rodeo(good food) and had so much fun talking. We have so much fun together, I laugh so hard with them and my cheeks always hurt by the end of the night from smiling so much. It's too bad we live so far from each other, but it just makes the reunions that much sweeter.

And you will be bless!

On my mission the Africans would always say that. I love it! Anyway I have so much to blog about which I will get to someday, but right now I just have to say how blessed we have been. I'm amazed! I have really wanted to get serious about getting our food storage this year and have been working on it as much as I can. You just have to know that when you want to do something the prophet asks you to do, Heavenly Father is going to help you do it. Soooooooo, on with the list. Twice now someone has called us that is moving and decides to just give us their food storage and emergency preparedness stuff, hundreds of dollars worth of food and supplies!!!! A free deep freezer, free flats of strawberries for jam, a great inside deal on some heavy duty storage shelves. I know there is more that I'm forgetting at this moment but basically our storage room is overflowing. I see how the Lord blesses us way more than we deserve, it makes me want to be so much better!

Cirque du Chandler

Do you see a resemblance?

This morning at breakfast there was a live fly on the window near Nora. She reached over with her pointer finger and smashed him, just like that. She's got skills!

I love to see the temple

Usually we go to Seattle each month so we can of course visit Dan and Grace but also to go to the temple without worrying about finding a responsible, fun, available, and most of all cheap babysitter. For the month of June we missed our chance to go before they left town the last half of the month. So did we give up? NO. Not totally anyway. One day after Klave was done with work we drove down to the Columbia River temple which is about an hour and a half away. There is a stake center there with a field and sand volleyball pit and drinking fountain, so Klave watched the kids while I went into the temple. It was so great to go inside and I enjoyed every minute of it. It's so peaceful there. I come out feeling totally refreshed for life and find Klave just about unwound. Nora I think just had pants on and was filthy, Nadine and Naomi were digging in the sand pit, equally dirty and Lucy was laying on a blanket crying. Klave is a great dad but I think he just needed some more resources, like snacks, swings, toys, etc. Anyway I come out ready to watch the kids and he's like, "That's ok, I can't leave you with these kids. They're crazy!" That was really nice of him to be so concerned for me but inside I was thinking, "What do you think I do every day of my life?" I tried to get him to not worry about it and go ahead inside but he persisted so we ending up just heading back home. The girls love going to the temple. They spend most of their days pretending like they are going to get married, so they really wanted to take their white dress-up to the temple and get their pictures taken. They loved it and we got some pretty cute pictures. Here you go...

Psycho in real life!!

So, a few days a week I go to the church and workout with some other ladies while our kids all play in the gym and on the stage. It's great, we have fun and our kids do too. There are about 10 little girls that come with their mom's and they are all 2-5 years old. This last week once I got to the church which is about .5 miles from our house I realized I forgot Lucy's pacifier which is crucial to being able to workout the whole time. So I called Klave to see if he could drop it off on his way out. He said yeah but he was about to get in the shower so it wouldn't be right away. After about 30 seconds I realized I couldn't wait so I just decided to run home and grab it before we started. I got inside our house and heard the shower running and my dark side took over. I could not resist the temptation to pretend attack my unsuspecting hubby. I stealthily tiptoed to the bathroom, (he didn't even close the door!!) postitioned myself just right and snatched open the shower curtain.
Poor, poor Klave had soap all over his face and was swinging blindly at his assailant. I was laughing hysterically and almost crying. Partly because I felt so badly for scaring the living daylights out of him. That really made my day, all throughout the day I would think about what happened and start cracking up all over again. At the end of the day is when the terror set in. Klave came home from work and said, "I've been thinking all day about how I'm going to get you back." Not fair, I get scared way more easily than he does!

My girls

Just a few things about my girls. I've noticed that everything is considered "fair", no matter the outcome as long as it's determined by eenie meenie miney mo. Their favorite car is "the one that Daddy gave you, Mommy" it's a '91 Subaru Loyale. It's a real beaut. But they would rather ride in there than in Klave's work car, a 2007 Honda Pilot. I think it's because it is really loud, we have to roll down the windows because the a/c isn't that great and because one of them has to ride in the front seat so we all fit. (Don't worry there are no air bags.) Whenever we arrive somewhere they yell, "Don't open the door, I'm going out the window!" Nadine loves to dig for worms it's just that she usually stretches them so far that they break, then she has to find a new one. The other day she was just playing with one and I was watching her as she stretched it out and not really thinking almost put it in her mouth!! AAAAAAHHHHHHH luckily I stopped her before it made contact! She must get that from Klave. Naomi loves to stash stuff under her desk, like her clothes, even though she has to walk past the dresser to get to the desk. I always find a pile of things I've asked her to put away right there under the desk. Nora wasn't really talking yet or saying any words which kind of worried me, because she's almost 22 months old, but she has the greatest expressions. I would try to work with her to say some words and she'd try for a while and then shake her head and try to cover my mouth. Actually the last few weeks I've been making it a real focus and praying alot for her to be able to learn and she had been trying so much more. You still can't understand most of what she says, but she's saying things and tries to copy us. She's such a sweetie.
Lucy is starting to smile alot more and laugh a little too. I can't wait till she can defend herself from all of her overadmiring sisters.

Another story about Nadine, a while ago she came and sat on the couch across from me and says, "Remember when Naomi got sick at church...." and on and on for probably 5 minutes relating every detail about what she was wearing and everything that happened that day. At the end of the story she's like, "Do remember that mom?" "Yeah I do" I said. Then she says, "Oh, I don't."

It seems like I write down alot of the crazy things they do, but they really surprise me often at the profound things they say. This morning we were reading in our scriptures about the Nephites preparing for the Gadianton robbers to come down to fight them and how they made armor to protect themselves. I was explaining to them what armor was and then Naomi asks, "So, how can we protect our bodies?" I was impressed at how thoughtful that was and they had a lot of good answers to it too. I sure love these kids.