Same old Lang Syne

We'll, it's that time of year again. Wherein I attempt to better myself as a human being and reflect and reminisce and look ahead and prioritize and ruminate and assess and strategize and grammaticize. Probably I should resolve to write on my blog more often. But that would take the fun out of life. I told Jessie I have a great plan this year. We spent the day organizing our house. So my New Tear's Resolution is to organize my house. Boom. Halfway there, and I can relax until 2015. Sometimes I amaze myself with my good ideas. But I do need to come up with some amazing resolve to share with you folks because Tradition! tradition! So.

Nope. Feeling no motivation. Which gives me an idea. Instead of figuring out what I should accomplish this year, let's list the things I already accomplished this year. Because let's face it, I've been pretty rad. Prolifically productive, really. And let's make a numbered list. Because I love numbered lists.

1. I made a baby. A pretty cute baby. Honestly, this took most my efforts this year and maybe took precedence over everything else. But it was worth it, because I grew a happy smily cuddly human being and that makes me giddy.

2. I kept alive three additional human beings, and they are reasonably clean and well educated and can walk and talk and identify various cartoon characters. And they occasionally say please and thank you and I love you. And they don't smell like a dumpster. Amazing work there.

3. I completed seven years of marriage, and my husband claims he still loves me, and I even made dinner for him a few times and let him go to football games and stuff because I basically rock.

4. I got a little bit crafty. I helped my kids do things involving glue and paint, I even made my own ugly Christmas sweater and utilized a glue gun. It's not origami, but you should be impressed.

5. I organized some stuff. Problem solved and planned and made some corners of my house useable, and dare I say, pretty. I may have acquired a small obsession with the organization department at Walmart.

There was some other stuff I did, but I don't want to nauseate you with my coolness and make you all jealous and stuff. All in all, it's been a pretty good year, and one with a lot of changes for us, so we're inking next year we'll just do nothing. Like Veggie Tale pirates. Here's hoping you had an awesome year and were super cool and enjoyed your life. Happy New Year everybody!

Here's to the little guys.

Hey all. What's up? I figured it was about time to let you all in on the recent ongoings over here. Having four children has definitely been an experience, but we're starting to get into a routine or something. So I thought I'd give you a little rundown of some (non-comprehensive) highlights for each of the family. Here goes.

Youngest to oldest, shall we?

Here's the man of the hour. Ethan is definitely his own person, but also many things about him remind me of the other kids. He sure looks mightily like his brother. He is very loved around here, and keeping his siblings off of him is pretty much a full time job. He is mostly very chill and sleeps very good at night, although he has some fussy spells we think are because he's not a fan of dairy.He has just started smiling, which is a lot of fun, and Jessie even had him laughing a bit. Probably because Jessie is so funny looking. Ethan enjoys bouncing, eating, napping and being held.

This pretty much sums up Spencer. Cute as heck and trouble to the core. He enjoys picking out his own clothes and taking off his clothes. He falls down a lot, so he pretty much always has bruises, scrapes, bloody noses, or something. One particularly nasty fall left half his face bruised and his lip swollen up like a platypus. We're constantly in terror of concussions and falls. He loves his brother to a fault. He is always in everything. He dumps out cereal daily, gets out pans, spills water, plays in the bathroom, steals keys, and is generally a menace to society. (And he's not even 25 yet). But his laugh is ridiculously cute and when he cuddles it's amazing.

Kimber continues to be the most adorable thing on the planet, who happens to moonlight as the Hulk. She just had her third birthday and is still tickled to be 3. She is still verbally gifted, and pays close attention to everything, often asking questions I have no idea how to answer. Be careful what you say around this one. She loves big words, drawing, ponies, dancing, and being contrary. Reverse psychology works wonders on her. She is obsessed with Cinderella and likes to help me cook. She is a sensitive soul, and probably my only child who prefers me to Daddy (jury's still out on Ethan.)

Madeline is my guinea pig, by virtue of being first to do everything. She started kindergarten and LOVES it. She loves recess, the bus, her teacher, homework, reading, her classmates, her backpack, treats, holidays, and everything else about school. She is getting older and more responsible, and loves to help with the baby. She still loves socializing and begs for friends as soon as she gets home from school. She still does drama better than anybody I know, and we often have some attitude adjustments. But she's also a good girl who rarely violates a rule if it's been impressed upon her. She loves songs and little ditties, spelling, months of the year, Sprout, and her siblings.

Jessie is, in a word, busy. Being Elder's Quorum president takes a good chunk of his time, as does increased responsibility at work. Here we see him supporting Noshavember. I think we can all agree the man looks mighty fine with a beard. But it was scratchy, so it's gone now. He's been great about picking up the slack around here when I get overwhelmed. We took a little anniversary trip without the kids (except Ethan, the little mooch), and it was great to remember that I like this guy quite a bit and we used to be young and fun. He is only a little maimed from playing football this Thanksgiving, and he enjoys being the coolest Dad in the world and making me smoothies.

No picture of me. Because my computer is about to die. But trust me, I'm the one writing this, and I'm still alive. They took me out of visiting teaching because someone told them I don't get relief society and now I'm a webelos leader, so lots of fun new adventures there. I spend most of my time nursing, doing laundry, trying to sleep, or trying to control my children.

So that's us lately. The Warner's are super duper exciting. Thanks for stopping by. See you at the next circus reunion.