Writing through writers block

I have a case of writers' block again.  Which is annoying because I have two posts waiting to be completed and another one that I want to start.  But I just can't seem to get the words together.  This seems to always happen whenever I start taking this blog thing too seriously.  

My post Tips for Vacationing with Babies - 2012 Edition is drawing a little bit of extra attention from Pinterest.  That's awesome and makes me happy that people like my ideas.  The extra attention is making me feel like maybe I should put some extra effort into all my posts.  But I don't really want to put extra effort into anything right now, and certainly not this little place where I can slack off and be myself.  I don't even like proof reading my posts - trying to do some quality writing is way out of my range right now.  

So in order to get my little writing voice back, here is a very low quality post describing the pictures from the last week or so.     

We made homemade ice cream for Family Home Evening.  We had to go grocery shopping and I figured adding ice cream ingredients was a good way to justify going to the store as part of FHE.   

The girls sat outside by the ice cream maker and watched it crank for a while.  When the ice cream was finally done they were so excited to eat it.

One of the secrets to getting anything done with toddler twins is to keep them occupied.  Here are the girls playing with lotion so I can clean the kitchen.  

They moved the lotion inside and smeared it all over the table.  I didn't care because getting the kitchen clean was more important.  They were having fun and not destroying anything.  When they were done the lotion wiped right off and actually was a really good furniture polish.  I don't know the last time my table was so shiny.

Here is a random picture of Derrick.  He loves to carry his bus around and then drive it on every surface that he comes across.

Derrick has also learned how to get up on the table.

Take a good long look at this picture because it is the last one you will ever see with Charlotte or Lydia sucking on a binkie.  That's right people BINKIES WENT BYE BYE.

Here is a picture of what the girls traded their beloved binkies for.  A brand new swimming pool.  When I told Lydia that she had to say bye bye to her binkie before she could go swimming she spit her binkie out right away.  Charlotte followed a second later and that was the end of the binkies.

(One of my Work in Process posts is a detailed description of how we said bye bye to bottles and binkies)

My biggest fear with getting rid of the binkies was that the girls wouldn't sleep well at night.  The first night they did take a little bit longer than usual go to sleep, but they didn't cry about the binkies like I thought they would.  Instead they just fell asleep outside our door.

They've asked for their binkies a few times, but I just remind them that binkies went bye bye.  They accept that answer and then ask to go swimming.  

In addition to the pool we also bought a project for Brandon.  I asked him to build a sand table for the kids.  He hasn't had a wood project since August so he was happy to have something to do with his tools again.  

As you can tell, the girls have super curly hair.  As you can also probably tell, it's usually not brushed out very well.  It did look good on Sunday and I was determined to get a picture to document the occasion.  Charlotte thought we were playing a game and kept running away from me.  But I finally got this picture of her ringlets.

Brandon usually dresses Derrick for church on Sundays.  He does a great job and Derrick always looks really cute.  Here is how Derrick looked this week.  The shirt and the bow tie belonged to Brandon when he was a little boy.

We go out to the pool at least twice a day.  Being in water is about the only way to beat the heat around here.  This pic was taken at about 8 in the morning so I had the water in the sun to try to warm it up a little bit.  By the afternoon we move the pool under the patio and stay in the shade.

Derrick likes the pool, but he also likes to play in the dirt.  I'm so glad I didn't try to grow a garden here.  Derrick would have been in it constantly.

Remember how right after we moved here Brandon had to spend a month at the NTC in California?  Well he earned a medal for that month.

A neighbor gave us this stroller that her kids outgrew.  I'm still deciding if it will fit out needs, but in the meantime Lydia loves to play in it.  That neighbor also offered us a crib (it will be our fourth) and two boxes of baby clothes.  This is why I pay tithing people.

Lydia and Charlotte still have a thing for boxes.

Here are the girls playing Bag Bag with Daddy.

He always takes them to a different room and drops them off.

Lydia found a bunch of fabric squares from one of my long forgotten projects.  She called them her "laundry" and stacked them in a pile.  Here she is sorting them.  She called them "baby clothes."

Okay I know this is another picture of the girls playing bag bag.  But guess what's important about this picture?  The girls are wearing underwear!  Binkies went away so easily that I decided to start some serious potty training.  Plus I decided that I'm just sick and tired of buying diapers.  So I started asking girls if they wanted to wear underwear, and they usually answered yes.  Both of them are doing great compared to where they were last week.  Lydia will run and "sit a potty" all by herself without me reminding her.  She's had very few accidents since Monday.  Charlotte is now able to actually pee in the potty - something that she never did during the last six months of casual potty training.  She's still having accidents, but she's getting there.

I don't know what is up with half these pictures not turning this week.  Grr. Anyway, here I am.  I'm 26 weeks along.  Next week we will finally have the ultrasound where we find out the baby's gender.

And here is a little picture of Derrick with the toy vacuum.  He loves this vacuum and pushes it around all the time.

Okay that's it for this week in pictures.  Hopefully I've broken my writer's block and you will be seeing two other posts from me shortly.  I want to get them posted before we find out the baby's gender, but we'll see what happens.

A typical day

It's time again for another typical day blog post.  Actually I was due to do this in May, but Brandon was gone and so there weren't any typical day's in May.  So this is for Tuesday June 4, 2013.

7:30 Lydia comes into my room.  Usually I can get her to snuggle in bed with me for a minute or two, but today she announces, "I leaking."  So I get up and change her diaper.  Derrick and Charlotte wake up too so I get Derrick up.  Derrick is really wet so he gets a diaper change and Charlotte is really poopy so she gets changed too.  

7:40 Time for breakfast.  Everyone wants cherrios so that is what we have.  Usually Derrick just gets a handful of dry cherrios, but he doesn't seem to want that today.  I put the cheerios into a bowl and pour a minuscule amount of milk in there too.  He likes to poke the cherrio box with his finger so I let him do that and then he immediately starts eating.  

Charlotte and Lydia follow my example and stand up while eating.

They each have their own "little counter."

7:45 We slept with all the windows open last night, but I can already feel that today is going to be a warm day.  Charlotte helps me shut all the windows and turn on the air conditioning.

7:50 Brandon unexpectedly walks in the door.  He wasn't told that he needed a certain piece of equipment today so he had to drive all the way home to get it.  He and I gripe for a minute about why they can't just have lockers on post to keep all their crap inside.

7:55 Lydia slips on the floor and starts crying.  I've learned it's best to just hold her for a half hour rather than deal with her following me around and crying for the whole morning so I sit down on the couch with her.  She wants to watch Shrek so I turn that on first.

Thank goodness Brandon is home because he cleans the dishes, starts a load of laundry, and changes Derrick (who always poops during breakfast.)  If Brandon wasn't home I would have had to leave Lydia sobbing on the couch while I did all those things (or not do them at all).

Charlotte and Derrick join us on the couch.

8:40 I finally escape Lydia when she "pick my owie" and starts to bleed.  She does this just so she can get a "banaid" so I get up and give her one.  Derrick starts crying for a bottle so I make one for him and wash all the dirty ones.

9:00 The kids want to "pay ow-side" so I open the patio door and they go out back.  I turn off Shrek and turn on the I heart radio app on my computer so I can listen to Utah's 101.9 the end.  I always listen on Tuesdays and Friday's so I can hear the movie and DVD reviews from Kenny D, my trusted movie critic.

Brandon has changed out of his PT clothes and leaves for work.

9:05 For some strange reason the girls want to wear jackets and shoes even though its getting pretty muggy outside.  I help them into those and they go back out to play.  I finish cleaning up the kitchen while listening to the radio.

9:30 The girls want peanut butter spoons.

9:40 The girls are ready to come back inside and want to watch Shrek again. So I turn that on for them and keep cleaning.  The Kenny D segment goes on longer than usual and since I want to keep listening to it I find myself cleaning things I normally avoid like the George Foreman Grill.

10:00 I'm done with the radio and need a break from cleaning.  So I sit down with the kids.

10:05 Shreks over and now it's time for "Baby Shreks" the last 5 minutes of the 3rd movie.  Dreamworks DVD's are programmed so you I can't just go the the menu and it drives me nuts.  It takes FOREVER to finally get the DVD cued up to the place with the babies.  But the pay off is worth it.  Charlotte and Lydia love watching Shrek's three babies, and it always reminds me of my life with my own three crazy babies.

10:15 Charlotte is poopy so I get up and change her.

10:20 We're done with "Baby Shreks" (we usually watch that little part about 3 times to justify how long it takes to cue up) and so I turn off the TV.  I go in my room and start putting clean laundry away.

10:25 Derrick starts screaming which is his way of saying he is ready for a nap.  so I put him down and he falls asleep right away.  (I should mention that he screamed ALL weekend. I was ready to call the Doctor on Monday morning and get him checked out.  But then he woke up on Monday and was perfectly happy and has been ever since -unless it's naptime.)

10:30 Charlotte and Lydia say that they want to take a nap too.  I know this is a ploy to get the three goldfish crackers that I give out as a "bedtime treat" (to replace the bottles they gave up two months ago), but I play along anyway.  I put them down for "naps" and go back to putting away laundry.  The girls get up and play quietly in the toy room while I work.

11:00 I'm done putting away my laundry which is kind of a big deal because I usually take until Thursday to get the laundry put away.  Since Derrick is asleep and the girls are not, we go into the "office room" to work on a project.

I work on cutting out the last two (HURRAY!) T-shirts for the T-shirt quilt.  I feel like I have been cutting up shirts forever.  I've been able to cut an average of three shirts each chance I get.  I have a total of 64 squares - four of those are extras because Brandon found 2 shirts that he would rather have in the quilt than 2 that didn't have as much sentimental value that I'd already cut.

The girls "play with mon-nee" while I work on the shirts.

They also climb up into their favorite shelves.

11:45  Lydia announces that she is "HON-GREE" so it's time for lunch.  I make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for the girls, but they are more interested in eating turkey because that's what I put on my sandwich.  I'm getting tired and I'm not in the mood to make this a real "meal" so I let them eat under the kitchen sink.

12:00 Lunch is mostly over.  I sit down in the living room and read one of the Fort Hood newspapers.  It's about 4 days old, but that's okay.

12:10 Charlotte and Lydia need diaper changes.  We try to be quiet, but we wake Derrick up while we do that.

12:15 It's good he woke up because one of the garbage trucks goes by and so we all go out and watch it.  It's the truck that comes around and picks up all the large bulky items that people set out by their trash cans.  It's fun to watch it smash up big things.  Once I saw it smash an old couch.

12:20 It's too hot to stay outside very long so we go back in and I feed Derrick peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for lunch.  He LOVES those.

12:30 I make it back to the couch and finish reading the paper.

12:50 Charlotte is poopy again.  She's starting to have really bad diarrhea.

1:09 Charlotte needs another diaper change.  I change her then put on Lady and the Tramp and then sit on the couch and doze.

1:35 Derrick is poopy too - luckily it's solid.

1:40 The girls want a snack and I agree with them.  We all have Graham crackers and milk.

1:50 I go in my room and fold up some blankets that are on the floor.

2:00 Charlotte is poopy AGAIN.  I hold her while sitting on the couch.

2:05 Derrick starts screaming out of no where so it's time for him to go back to bed and finish his nap.

2:10 Lydia finds a pair of underwear and asks to wear it.  I'm not in the mood to keep track of her in underwear today so I tell her no, but she pitches a fit.  Finally I agree and tell her to sit on the potty first.  She does, but instead of peeing she has a little bit of diarrhea.  There is no way I'm putting her in underwear now.  She cries and finally I talk her into wearing underwear over her diaper.

2:20 I put Charlotte and Lydia on the couch and give them some pedialite that I bought months ago in case of this very situation.  I'm so glad I don't have to wait for Brandon to buy some after work.    

2:30 The girls ask to watch "Stoy Sory - Daycare one" so I put in Toy Story 3 for them.  I really can't stand to watch that movie again, but I'm getting too tired to do anything so I grab a book and read that while the kids watch the movie.

2:33 Derrick isn't asleep yet and he can hear the movie so he starts crying to get up and watch it.  So I go get him.

2:55 Diaper changes for Charlotte and Lydia again.  Both diapers are really runny, but Lydia's especially.  I'm so glad she was wearing a diaper.

2:25 The other garbage truck comes down the street and we all run outside to watch it dump the garbage cans.

3:30 Lydia and Charlotte seem to be getting sleepy so I put them down for their naps.  Charlotte wants to sleep in her bed, and Lydia wants to sleep in her "home" in the office. Derrick seems sleepy for real this time so he goes down too.  I go back to reading.  I'm ready an unauthorized biography of Nancy Reagan by Kitty Kelley.  I don't know why, but no matter who the subject matter is, I love Kitty Kelley's books.

I check on the kids and find Charlotte asleep in the hall.

And Lydia asleep in her "home."

4:20 Brandon comes home, but he doesn't seem to be in a very talkative mood.  Work is driving him crazy with how boring it can be so he goes outside to take out his frustration on the fire ant nests.  (They've replaced box elder bugs his personal nemesis.)  I enjoy the silent house and keep reading.

4:50 I'm done reading and decide to make dinner.  I make sloppy joes because Brandon has been asking if we have the ingredients for them forever - and we finally do have manwich.  I also check my e-mail and facebook accounts.

5:30 Dinner has been done for a while, but none of the kids are awake.  I tried to wake up Charlotte and Lydia, but they are still gone.  I don't even touch Derrick's door. Brandon comes in from cleaning the patio and declares victory on the fire ants - he flooded their nests with the garden hose - and we eat together.

6:00 We're done eating and catching up on our days.  I try to wake up the girls again, but no luck.  I know that once they do wake up we are going to be in for a long night.  We sit down on the couch and each turn on our separate computers.

6:18 Derrick wakes up and is very upset.  I change his diaper and give him some medicine.  Then I give him some dinner.  He gets happy again.

6:50 Lydia wakes up, but she says she doesn't want dinner.  She reminds me that I told her she could have ice cream when Daddy came home so I get her a bowl.  But I make her eat it at the table and she cries and cries and cries because she wanted to eat it on her little counter.  She doesn't even touch her icecream because she is so upset.  Obviously she isn't feeling too well. I end up taking her to the couch where she keeps crying in my lap.

6:55 Charlotte wakes up and cries when I change her diaper - she's poopy again.

7:20 Lydia is over her tantrum and wants ice cream again.  I give it back to her and she eats it.  Derrick's poopy - this is getting really old.

7:40 Brandon entertains the girls with some games on his computer so I slip off to our room where I lay down on the bed to take a break.  I don't plan on it, but I fall asleep.

9:10  I wake up and I'm surprised by how dark it is.  When I come into the living room the first thing I find is Derrick standing on a chair.  So now I know he can climb onto chairs.  (The next day he learned how to use the chair to get up onto the table.)

Brandon and the girls are still having fun with the computer.

Derrick seems hungry so I feed him some yogurt.  Lydia wants strawberries so I give those to her.  Charlotte isn't very hungry, but I'm certain that's because she doesn't feel well.

9:35 Derrick has yogurt in his hair so it is bath time. When Brandon was gone I discovered what a great time killer bathtime can be.  So now I like to put the kids in the tub every night.  Taking a bath every night has finally helped Charlotte get over her fear of the bath tub (unless it's Saturday night and I have to wash her hair).  Some nights I almost have to drag her out.  Not this night though.  We spot a little bit of poo in the tub and everyone is out of the tub in an instant.

10:10 It's time for scriptures and prayers.  Up until about 2 1/2 months ago we always read scriptures in the kids' room while they fell asleep.  That worked for a long time, but once the girls could get out of their beds and wanted play around it became annoying.  Eventually we figured out we should just do the routine in the living room while they played and then put them to bed at the end.

So we sing a hymn, read a chapter from the Book of Mormon, read a page from the conference edition of the Ensign, and write in the girls' and Derrick's journals in the living room.  The kids play around while we do this.  Lydia likes to hold the scriptures, she calls them her "scibbers."  Charlotte and Derrick both like the hymn book, but so far we've avoided any major fights over it.

10:35 We take the kids into their room and put them in their beds.  We say a family prayer.  Then the girls each get a bedtime treat of three goldfish crackers and Derrick gets a bottle with water in it.  Then we give kisses and sing one last song.

We leave the hall light on to give the kids some light, but we turn off all the other lights.  I learned while Brandon was gone that the girls would leave me alone at night if I went in my room and shut the door.  So that's what we do.

10:45 Brandon gets some stuff together for work in the morning.  Then we go to bed.  Except I can't sleep (because of the unexpected late nap) so I stay up and work on my blog about normal things around Fort Hood.  I hear someone out in the hall, but the noise soon stops.

Later when I check on the kids everyone is sleeping soundly in their beds.

Lydia still likes to have the side up on her crib.

I can't believe how big Derrick is getting inside his bed.

12:05 I'm done with my blog post and so I go to sleep.

Sometime in the night I hear someone creep into my room and fall asleep by my bed.

I have no idea what time Brandon gets up and gets ready for work, but he does that and kisses me goodbye.

7:00 I wake up and discover that it is Charlotte who is sleeping on my floor.

7:30 Charlotte wakes up and hops in bed with me.
8:00 Lydia and Derrick wake up and the day starts all over again.

That night Brandon and I celebrated out anniversary by going to a movie.  Here I am all dressed up and at 25 weeks pregnant.

Normal Things: Wide Open Spaces

I've been planning on moving away from Utah for years.  Brandon and I always knew that in order to get a job with an airline we would most likely have to move away.  Later when the dream changed to the FAA we still knew we'd probably have to move.  And still later when the Army came into the picture we knew that we would have to move.  So it's not a big shock to be living in another state. 

We've been here in Texas for 6 months.  We are really starting to feel at home here, and we don't feel like such greenies.  Brandon is no longer the newest member of his unit. We've even learned to refer to things "on post" instead uttering the faux pas "on base." 

I thought I'd show you more things that have become so normal to us.  And yet, when I stop to think about them I remember that they weren't so normal just six months ago.  

First off lets talk about the sky.  This picture was taken on a bike trail that is basically across the street from our house.  Check out that sky. 

The words to the Dixie Chicks song Wide Open Spaces go through my head every time I look at the sky:

Who doesn't know what I'm talking about

Who's never left home, who's never struck out?

To find a dream and a life of their own

A place in the clouds, a foundation of stone

Many precede and many will follow

A young girl's dream no longer hollow

It takes a shape of a place out west

But what it holds for her, she hasn't guessed yet

She needs wide open spaces

Room to make her big mistakes

She needs new faces

She knows the highest stakes

Before we left Utah I wondered if I would miss the mountains.  Once we got to Fort Hood I became enchanted with how BIG the sky is here.  It's what makes everything feel like a wide open space. I wish I had a panoramic lens for my camera so I could help you see how big the sky feels.  It's every where, and it goes on forever.  The clouds move incredibly fast across the sky.  They don't lazily drift, they speed walk.  One minute the are there and the next they are gone.  It's amazing.  

This is the park that is across the street from our house.  There is a house that blocks the view of the park from our front windows so the kids don't have a constant visual reminder of how close the park is.  Otherwise I think we would be there ALL the time.  In the back ground of this picture is a water tower and some 4 story buildings.  One of those buildings is the hospital where Baby D will be born.

This is our mail box.  The kids love going to the park and then walking up the bike trail and across the street to check the mail.  They like to pick all the wild flowers/weeds along the way.  In the evening you can see the flashing of the airport beacon light from the mail box.

Last time I did a "normal things" post I talked about how the Chili's on post looks just like a regular Chili's.  Well here is proof.  I took this picture while we drove down the road.  I tried to get the boring Army buildings in the back ground, but failed.  Let's just say that this building stands out.

The on post hospital (which I avoid) is being expanded.  Here is a picture of it under construction.  I think it will be done in 2015.

This picture shows off one of the oh so charming street names on post.  One of these days I need to get a picture of "Hell on Wheels Ave."  Oh and check out the sideways stoplight.  That's pretty normal too.

When we first moved here I was always so intimidated by the soldiers at the gates.  Now I hardly bat an eye when I hand my ID to the soldiers.  Actually my ID is registered with the Fort so I can use the express lanes now.  All I have to do is roll down my window, put the bar code of my ID under a scanner, wave to the soldier who makes sure I look like the picture that pops up on his screen, and then drive through the automatic gate.  It's so nice.

This is the main gate as seen through the back window of the jeep (I'm always worried somebody is going to think I'm a terrorist when I try to get pictures of the gates.)  I took this picture on a Saturday afternoon.  If I'd taken it on a weekday morning all 7 lanes of the gate would have had long car lines in front of them.

Despite living super close to the airport I didn't spot the tower until about two weeks ago.  It's visible from the elementary school up the road from our house.  On Saturday we drove down to the airport so I could see the tower up close.

Thanks to the airport there is a steady flow of helicopters and airplanes flying around our house.  No one in this family minds though.  Everyone stops and listens every time something flies over.  The kids usually all run to the windows and try to see whatever is flying around outside.  Today Lydia even paused mid-emotional outburst to listen to the roar of an engine.  

The loudest things that fly over are the C5-Galaxy airplanes.  They are made to fly low and slow to do reconnaissance and drop parachutes.  About once a week we have one fly over our house again and again as the pilots practice touch and gos on the runway (at least that's what I assume they are doing.)  I filmed it awhile ago.  Here is a video of that.  Before you watch it you should know that the lens on my camera doesn't capture the size of the airplane accurately.  This thing is HUGE.  The sound on the other hand is exactly right.

As you can sort of see in the video, there is nothing behind our house except trees.  I love that!  On cooler nights I make sure we sleep with the windows open so we can hear the crickets at night.  And in the morning I always hear a chorus of birds chirping.  Our back yard is also visited by squirrels and rabbits.  Can you see the rabbit in this picture?

Of course our backyard is also inhabited by the infamous "fire ants."  Everyone in our family quickly learned to spot their ant hills.  New hills always pop up after rain storms.  Here is one of the biggest ones in our backyard. I put the pen in the picture to give you some perspective.

If you disturb one of these ant hills the ants will swarm out within milliseconds.  And watch out because fire ant bites HURT.  They itch like crazy too.  Being bit by one is only slightly less painful than a bee sting.  What's really sad is the ants themselves are so tiny you wouldn't think twice about them if they didn't pack such a wallop.

Oh check out our green green lawn.  So far we haven't had to water our grass at all because of all the rain.  It rains at least once a week here.  And when it rains it RAINS.  Each weekly storm is what I would consider a "once a year" level of rainstorm back in Utah.  You get soaked in seconds, gutters overflow, giant puddles form in the yard.  It's awesome.

And while we are on the subject of weather I should mention the tornado watch we had a few weeks ago.  It was a day or two after those big tornadoes went through Oklahoma.  I woke up in the morning and there weren't any birds chirping.  We went to the park and the air felt weird.  It was just hot and still.  It was like that all day.  Finally, in the late evening, the hot air broke up and everything felt right again.

Well that's all the normal and yet not so normal stuff I can think of right now.  Experiencing new things is one of my favorite things about living in a new state.

Twenty Somethings

My youngest sister Hillary turns 20 years old today.  That means that me and my 4 siblings are now all "twenty somethings."  This is the first time we've all been classified in the same age group.  We weren't all in elementary school at the same time, and we weren't all teenagers together, but now we all get to be in our twenties for the next year and a half.  

My siblings are some of the most important people in my life.  There were times when we were growing up that we didn't get along very well, but now we are all really good friends.  We live far away from each other so we enjoy the few times we call all get together.  We support each other and take care of one another.  We all have the same sense of humor.  None of us can spell worth a darn either.  (Playing Scrabble as a family resembles a game of BS.)

So many times 20 - 29 year olds are portrayed as irresponsible and lazy.  That's not the case in our family.  I want to tell you about each of my amazing siblings.  Sorry if this comes across as a little braggy, but if you can't brag about your own family then who can you brag about?    

Hillary

Hillary's pre-mission photo shoot

Hillary is currently serving on an LDS mission to the Louisville, Kentucky area.  She's part of the wave of 18 year old elders and 19 year old sister missionaries.  According to her most recent e-mail her mission has 14 experienced missionaries, 20 twelve week missionaries, about 16 six week missionaries, and 22 greenies on the way.  As of tomorrow she will be in charge of her area - and she's one of the ones who has only been out for 6 weeks! 

Hillary is a very talented person.  She is an amazing cook and worked for the Joseph Smith Memorial Banquet Kitchen before her mission.  She can also do hair like no one else.  You know all those amazing hair updos you see on pinterest?  Well Hillary can do them all - on herself!

Hillary struggles with a learning disability, but that hasn't stopped her from "reading" hundreds of books.  She gets around her reading issues by listening to audio books.  That leaves her hands free to knit, crochet, paint, mow the lawn, garden, or whatever else she wants to do.

Billy

Billy with Mom, Dad, and Hillary after one of his BYU Symphony concerts

My sisters and I say that Billy actually has the musical talent that we just pretended to have.  Billy started playing the trumpet when he was in 5th grade.  In 8th grade decided he wanted to play the French Horn too.  Later he started exclusively playing the French Horn.  In high school he was a member of the Granite Sr Youth Symphony and the Utah Youth Symphony.  He used his talent to get himself a music scholarship to BYU.

He went to BYU for a year and then took a break while he served a Summer Service Mission in Nauvoo (playing the marching band version of the French Horn, of course), and a two year Spanish speaking mission to Tucson, Arizona.  When he came home from his mission he was a little worried about how well he would be able to play after such a long break.  But he shouldn't have been too worried.  He started practicing again and was soon able to secure a spot in BYU's top symphony.

Emily

Emily and David with Asher and Bridger

Emily lives in Colorado and she says that people are always surprised when they find out how young she is.  Despite being "only" 24 she has been married for 4 and 1/2 years, earned her bachelor's degree from BYU-Idaho, and has two sons.  If that isn't enough she has also encouraged her husband, David, as he worked on his Bachelor's degree and then his Master's Degree in Marriage and Family Therapy.  Oh and she's also expecting her third son this September (about a week before my baby is due.)

This past year Emily worked for the student housing department and helped plan activities for the residents.  At the end of the school year she won an award for planning the best activities and always staying within her budget.  Emily has also been teaching Zumba for about a year.

This week Emily and David start a new chapter in their lives as they move out of student housing and into an apartment in the town where David has a job.  I'm sure it wont take Emily long to make new friends and find lots of new things to do.

Lindsey

Lindsey and John with Rocklond, Knoxx, and Gretta the dog

Those of you who have been reading my blog these past few months know what a great sister Lindsey is.  Let me tell you about some of the other amazing things she has done.

Lindsey holds the record for graduating from high school with the highest GPA out of all of us kids - she was in at least the top 10% of her graduating class.  She also graduated Cum Laude from Southern Utah University.  (Which she earned even though she had a baby and moved out of state during her Sr year.)  She's decided to stay at home while her kids are little. So aside from student aid jobs and student teaching she hasn't taught in a school yet.  In the meantime she teaches pre-school for her son Rocklond and 4 other children.

Lindsey can do anything she sets her mind to do.  Whether it's tiling her in-laws kitchen back splash, playing pranks on her book club, running a marathon, sewing baby blankets, or making a fondant wedding cake (that was her most recent accomplishment) she can do it all.

Valerie 

Me and Brandon with Charlotte Derrick and Lydia

And then there's me.  Sometimes I feel a little inferior when compared to my talented siblings.  But I've done some awesome stuff too.

It would be easy to say that the most amazing thing I've done is gestate/raise 4 kids in a ridiculously short amount of time.  But I'm don't really want to talk about that right now.  There's more to me than the Mommy side.

In high school I passed 6 AP tests which translated into 36 credit hours.  I went to Snow College for two years and earned an associates degree.  Then I spent a year at the Salt Lake Community College and picked up some credits for cheap before transferring to Utah State.  I went to USU for a grand total of 3 semesters before I graduated with my bachelor's degree in Economics.  And I did it all without taking out a single student loan. (Thank you financial aid and younger siblings still at home.)

I spent 2 summers working for the Snow Fun Youth Conference department at Snow College.  My favorite part of that job was working on the ropes course.  I also spent a season working as a Tax Associate for H&R Block.  And lets not forget the 2 1/2 years spent as a Billing Manager and later Internal Auditor for Conservice.

Brandon and I have been married for 6 years.  He's in the Army and pursuing her dream of being paid to fly (instead of paying to fly which isn't as fun).  Right now we are just in the application phase, but soon we hope to be off to flight school.

Oh and I also have this little blog that I've maintained with at least one post a week for the past 4 1/2 years.

. . . 

So there you have 5 twenty somethings who aren't sitting on their parents' couch playing X-box or whatever the current stereotype for the age group is.

The most recent picture of all of us together.  This was taken last September when Billy came home from his mission.