All About Max

Max at his Kindergarten graduation. It's crazy to think that my baby is officially a first grader.
Max with his friend Ethan. They received awards at there school assembly on Monday. Max was awarded Student of the Quarter for his class. Way to go Max! I was a little surprised because at the beginning of the semester a note was sent home saying how Max has had a hard time following class rules... not talking and keeping his hands to himself. The teacher said no matter where I put him or who he sits by he's mister social and likes to talk to everyone. He gets this from his Grandpa Ernie! We talked to him about needing to listen to his teacher and follow his class rules; I take it it worked.
T-ball season is over, Max enjoyed playing this year. Now it's time for soccer. I think I might sign Hanna up as well.

Random

Today my little brother turns 30! Happy Birthday Uncle Greg!
My brother Michael's Birthday was last week, but we had him over last night for dinner and ice cream cake. This was the first time he's been over since we've moved in. It was great having him here!
Daisy is crawling everywhere sometimes I actually can't find her (did I really just admit to that), she is just so tiny. I think it's so cute!
Walt is "army" crawling, but you can almost always find him laying down with his thumb in his mouth. When you walk by him you just have to pick him up because he puts his arms straight out wanting you to pick him up.
When Daisy sees something she wants it doesn't matter who or what's in her way she'll get it. Sometimes Walt will just let her crawl over him with no fuss, but today he was done!
Daisy and Walt splashing in the bath together. I made Daisy sit for the picture but she is almost always on her knees trying to get her hands on something. We call Daisy our "crazy monkey" and Walt our "chunky monkey" they're so fun!
Here is a picture Hanna drew and she wrote the names as well. I asked her why Van was sad and she said he wants me and Max to hold him. I was pretty impressed!

Max Lost His Front Tooth

Max lost his 1st top tooth. He has already lost 4 bottom teeth, but this was his first big front tooth. I felt horrible I forgot to put money under his pillow the first night, which he had told his t-ball team, "I can't wait for tonight, because I lost my tooth." Then his coach asked if the tooth fairy was coming and he said, no my mom; whoops! The worse was he reminded me before he went to bed and I said don't you worry, now go to sleep. And I forgot! Well, since he knows that it's me anyway I guess there was no real trauma done.

HAPPY 6th BIRTHDAY MAX!

Max's birthday was May 6th just a day after mine so I took him to lunch at the Deli and we both got sandwiches and ice cream, yummy! (Thanks to my friend Allison who got me a gift certificate there for my birthday. She also made me a big brownie cookie, that was so sweet of her, it really made my day). It was so nice to have some one-on-one time with Max, he is such a good boy who's growing up way too fast!
We celebrated Max's birthday on Saturday where we had his Army Party! The kids had a wonderful time going through an obstacle course, having a water balloon toss, and playing "hot grenade". I was so glad Danny was there he always does such a good job with the kids. He took charge of all the games having the "Soldiers" march to the different activities and so on.
Most of the kids wore camouflage, which made it all the more fun.
The kids doing the water balloon toss.
Here are some kids doing there army crawl through the finish line. Their medal for finishing the course was a root bear float. Max had a very Happy Birthday, thanks to all his friends and family who came to celebrate with us!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!

I'm 31 today! Here is a picture of Daisy and Walt that brings me so much happiness and joy on my birthday. You can tell that Walt is just screaming with joy in this picture. The babies aren't feeling very well today, but I plan to drive to Vegas this afternoon to go to lunch with Danny (Indian, my favorite) and shopping. Food and shopping = a Happy Birthday! A big thanks to my mom and Dee for offering to watch the kids for us.

Walt and Daisy

I forgot to mention how Walt is much bigger than Daisy so it really confuses people, they're not sure if they're twins or not. Walt is wearing 6-12 month clothes and size 3 diapers and Daisy is in 3-6 month clothes and size 2 diapers. I haven't weighed them in a while but they're at least 2-3 lbs. different.

Here is the video of Walt and Daisy talking and laughing at each other...

Our New Church Callings

Well, I've been called as a Relief Society teacher. This will be my first time in a calling in the Relief Society. I'm nervous, but excited for the new experience and it's a calling I can do with the babies because it's only once a month usually the second Sunday and it's just during the last hour.
Now for Danny...he was called as the 1st Councilor in the Bishopric. He was ordained as a High Priest yesterday. I know he'll do an excellent job and I'm so grateful for his willingness to serve. We have wonderful members in the ward who have already said they will be happy to sit with me and hold babies during sacrament and the Sundays I teach in Relief Society.

Trip to Cali and Easter

Me and the kids (and grandma) drove to CA last week to visit my dad, my sister and my friend Carolee who was visiting from PA. I hadn't seen my dad since his heart surgery and I really wanted to see him. It was great seeing him, the kids always have so much fun visiting their grandma and grandpa.
I had a lot of fun visiting with all my McCook friends! I hadn't seen Carolee since last year because she lives in PA for the next few years and she was going to be in Cali so I made a trip down to see her and was able to visit with her, her mom and sisters Kristen and Joy as well. It was so fun seeing them all and their cute families!
It was my mom's birthday while we were in CA so my sister Rebecca, my brother Greg and I took her out to lunch to Northwoods Inn, a restaurant we haven't been to in forever, it was yummy, and we had a great time together!
Then we got to visit my sister Rebecca and play with cousin Baxter at the beach. It was a little cold, but the sun came out for a little while and the kids had fun playing by the water and making sand castles they even swam in the pool.
We also got to dye some Easter eggs. The kids always have so much fun playing at the beach especially with their cousin Baxter!
The kids and the family Easter basket.
Daisy and Walt sitting up on their first Easter.
The kids all ready for church. Thanks to Aunt Rebecca Hanna and Daisy have Easter dresses. She hand knitted Daisy's cute little dress, pretty amazing huh?! (Walt has now found his thumb and loves it).
After church we went to Aunt Cindy's for dinner and a big Easter egg hunt. I just love this picture of Danny and Walt. We all had a great Easter Sunday!

Daisy and Walt

These are Daisy and Walt's 6 month pictures. This was the only picture that turned out of them both together. I wanted them to be able to sit up, but unfortunately they're still not doing so. We propped them up for most pictures, but Walt had his hand/fingers in his mouth in every picture. It was extremely exhausting trying to get 2 babies to look cute at the same time!

I always take a naked picture of my babies at 6 months. I was able to get Daisy to sit up for a second for her naked picture.
We couldn't get Walt to sit up, but that's OK I just love his big happy smile.

A Big Thanks to Our Mom's

We have been able to get a lot of the house decorated because of our wonderful mothers! Dee loves garage sales and has had a garage full of stuff that we were happy to put to use.
Most of our books for our library, a huge rug, a mirror and a beautiful rod iron decorative piece in our formal living room, most of our picture frames in our family room, our dinning room table and chairs and our large puzzle play mats in our playroom are all from Dee.
I know she's given us or should I say Danny has taken more, but those are the bigger items that come to mind. We use to say things about her garage sale addiction, but for now on we'll be much more thankful for it!

My mom is an amazing seamstress and thanks to her we now have beautiful curtains in our family room and dinning room. She also bought and made all our bathroom towels; she made them more fancy by sewing fringe on the ends of them and also made a duvet cover for Hanna's bed. My mom has had to come out a lot to do all the work she has done and we are so grateful for her talented skills!
Also a big thanks to craigslist, we have found almost all the other items from there. We're still not finished decorating, we still need a kitchen table, love seat and chair for our formal living room a desk for our library/office, the master bedroom and Hanna's room both need attention but, we will be taking a break for now unless we find more great deals on craigslist that we just can't pass up! Speaking of great deals, last weekend we found rope lights that go in the master bedroom and family room all for only $20. and we even have a couple extra strands, (if you haven't shopped for rope lights before FYI it's $25. a strand and we got about 10 stands). I would have to say we are huge craigslist fans!

You Know It's Time to Potty Train When...

you find your 2 year old has taken off his clean diaper to poop (all over your bed)! I was actually a little impressed that Van tried to clean it up with the wipes. YUCK!

Kids Speak

I did this fun little quiz on Facebook and I thought it was so funny I just had to post it to my blog...

The first answers are from Hanna my 4 year old and the second are from Max my 5 year old, they weren’t together when they answered.

1. What is something mom always says to you?
"get dress"/”clean up”

2. What makes mom happy?
"when I clean up the play room"/”when I help her”

3. What makes mom sad?
both said, "when I don’t help”

4. How does your mom make you laugh?
"when she tickles me"/”during the quiet game”

5. What did your mom like to do as a child?
"play dollies”/”play”

6. How old is your mom?
"18”/”19”

7. How tall is your mom?
"5 lbs"/”16 inches”

8. What is mom's favorite thing to watch on TV?
"Conference”/”Joseph Smith” (I’m really not this spiritual, I just don’t have a T.V. and I don’t watch when my kids are awake so they don’t know.)

9. What does your mom do when you're not around?
" help the babies”/”play with the kids”

10. If your mom becomes famous, what will it be for?
"famous?”/”a talent show”

11. What is your mom really good at?
"playing basketball at Chuck E Cheese”/”helping dad”

12. What is your mom not very good at?
"holding me and Max”/”counting to 150,000”

13. What does your mom do for her job?
"clean the table"/”clean the bathrooms”

14. What is your mom's favorite food?
"spaghetti”/”chili”

15. What makes you proud of your mom?
"----“/”because she’s so nice”

16. If your mom were a cartoon character, who would she be?
"Barbie"/”Minnie Mouse”

17. What do you and your mom do together?
"date night”/"dates”

18. How are you and your mom the same?
"same skin"/”same hair”

19. How are you and your mom different?
“we weren’t born at the same time”/"cause she’s a girl and I’m a boy"

20. How do you know your mom loves you?
"because I’m your child"/”because she gave birth to me”

21. What does your mom like most about your dad?
"going on date night together”/”to kiss him”

22. Where is your mom's favorite place to go?
"all you can eat”/”the library”

Camping

Our family loves camping (especially Max and especially if his cousin Zachary is going too). I even enjoy camping, but with two 6 month old babies that's a whole other story. Also, with a bigger family it's a lot more work to pack and unpack just for one night of camping. We wanted to camp at the Valley of Fire, but sadly it was all full. The same thing happened last year so we found another campground not too much further past Valley of Fire by Lake Mead called Echo Bay.
The kids were just happy to get to a campground even the babies had a great time camping during the day, nighttime was a different story. I was nervous for the night because I know that with one baby and camping I usually nurse all night, but with two I wouldn't be able to do so. Danny and I didn't get much sleep, Walt wanted to nurse all night, Daisy did pretty good but still wanted to be held so Danny got a little taste of my camping trips with a baby. Hopefully, they'll be better at our next camping trip in August at the beach because that one is a whole week.
The kids had a fun time playing at the lake before we headed back home.

Creative Kids

I tried posting this one with my post yesterday, but I ran out of time.
Thanks to Danny and the missionaries our play structure is up, yea! Yesterday, I found the kids doing this activity... Van would bring toys from the shed to Max and Max would tie them to a rope from the ground and Hanna would pull the rope with the toy up to the top of the structure. If you look close enough you can see the scooter hanging form the rope. I thought this was so creative, (even if I didn't want all those toys up there).

Last Weekend Events

Max was the cuttest "little" skunk in the Cummunity Play last Saturday. This is another wonderful thing about small towns everyone gets a part in the community play. I grew up being a part of the Chino Community Plays and had a lot of fun doing so even if my parts were never a main one like my Sister Rebecca or Brother Michael's.
Me and the kids cooking some bread that Hanna got as a birthday gift. As you can see Van did not want any help mixing.

Hanna Turns 4 Years Old

Hanna turned 4 years old Saturday March 7th. We had two very busy days. We had a birthday party for her on Friday with her friends from Pahrump and on Saturday we had an early morning pancake birthday breakfast with our friends from Vegas. Her party on Friday I had asked the few people I new to tell all their friends to come as well because I wanted to get to know more people. I wasn't sure how many would be coming so I made a big pot of spaghetti and made cupcakes for the kids to decorate and a cake just in case there wasn't enough cupcakes. We had a big turn out (about 30 kids), it was a lot of fun, but a little bit crazy too! Luckily, I had a sweet mom ask if she could take pictures for me, good thing she did or I would have completely forgotten.
Friday night there was a small circus in town so we had Hanna's cousins Ruby and Zachary come with us to that and spend the night too. While at the circus Danny and I kept talking and saying that we felt we were in another country. It was a little strange but the kids really enjoyed it.
On Saturday we had planned for our friends from Vegas to come out to see the house and so we were going to have one big party for Hanna in the day, but then sadly Danny's cousin passed away and his funeral was then planned for that same day. So I decided to have our Vegas friends come out early and have a pancake birthday breakfast for Hanna instead. It was so great seeing all of our friends especially the Risenmay's who now live in UT and were in town visiting our friends the Blackwell's new baby girl. I wish I had had more time to visit with them all, but I had a funeral to go to at 11:00 and a funeral luncheon at my house. So I was busy cleaning up the breakfast and getting ready for the luncheon while they were all over. It was a very busy two days!
Hanna we are so lucky to have you in our family. We love you and Happy Birthday!

The Kids

Daisy and Walt are officially 6 months old and they are growing so big! Well, Walt is; Daisy just a little thing. People get so confuse because they are such different sizes they’re not sure if they’re twins or not. Walt is in 6-12 month clothes and wearing size 3 diapers and Daisy is in 3-6 month clothes and her pants still fall off and in size 2 diapers. Daisy has her 2 bottom teeth already and Walt dosen't have any teeth yet. They both roll over, but neither of them is sitting up yet. We feel so blessed to have these two precious spirits in our family. OK, enough about the babies yes, they do have other siblings…

Hanna went with Grandma Susan to CA last weekend and she got to go with Aunt Rebecca and her cousin Baxter to the San Diego children’s museum, she had such a fun time. I hear that it’s so much fun, the next time we’re in town I've gotta go! Aunt Rebecca got Hanna this cute dress for her birthday; I think she looks so cute in it. We all missed Hanna so much, but I think Max and Hanna missed each other the most. They just talked and played so well when she got back, it’s so nice to see them getting to be such great friends. (Oh, and by the way, Hanna is not short her brother just keeps growing! These are size 7 pants he's in (thanks to adjustable waist bands)and he's already growing out of them).

Max and Hanna are off with Grandma Susan to St. George this weekend. They went to my cousin’s little girl’s baptism, so we just have our 3 littler ones. Yesterday, I was able to give Van a lot of attention and spend some good quality time with him. I made us popcorn, went to the park, took him to McDonald's and gave him his own bath. He had a fun day! Whenever I make popcorn I can’t decide if I should make butter popcorn or caramel, so I half it and do both. When I placed these two bowls in front of him with no siblings there to share it with he raised his hands up and let out a little giggle/scream and then kept giggling while eating, it was so cute!

The Babies

I finally have Internet, but it's dial-up so I might not be able to blog as much as before, we'll see how it goes. But Because I knew I had no internet I haven't taken very many pictures. I only have taken a few of the babies, so here they are.
Walt and Daisy are almost 6 months and they are getting so cute! Here is Walt and Daisy playing together, I love Walt laughing!
This is our jumper, but our doors are too high for them to jump so they just have to swing, but I guess they like it because they both have fallen asleep in it. Poor Walt's little head on the tray.
Daisy has become a thumb sucker and I'm trying not to let her. I've been trying to give her her pacifier instead. It's so adorable though (as a baby, but not as a 6Th grader). Aren't they so cute?!
I have the cuttest video of Walt and Daisy talking and laughing at each other, I'll have to try and load it another time. This post took me forever, it only let me post 1 picture at a time!

We're Doing Great

So last time I posted the library was clossing so I had no time to post. Well, I'm still coming to the library to get on the internet because we still haven't gotten ours connected. I really hope that we'll have it soon, I'm just dying without it! Anyway, we are doing great! We love it here in Pahrump! The people here are so nice. The first day I went to Walmart with all my kids by the end of my shopping day I had 2 carts and a lady helped me to my car (or should I say bus) which was parked far awy! Then I went to the DMV and got my van registered and when I got home the lady from the DMV calls and says how sorry she is for giving me the wrong plates and that I'll have to go back. Well, she calls me back the next day and asks if I'm going to beable to make it in and I told her yes sometime today and then she says, well were do you live and I said by the winnery and she says me to I'll bring them to you when I get off work tonight. Crazy, huh! The other thing is we go to the Pahrump Nuggett Buffet once a week on Wed. it's only $9.60 for our whole family to eat kids 5 and undre are free and on Wed. we get buy one get one free! And everytime we go everyone is so nice and tells us we have a beautiful family andone night a couple asked if they could give our kids each a $ for being so well behaved! Crazy, huh!
The ward is great and Max enjoys riding the bus to school. Got to go hope to beable to post some pictures soon!