Seven

It's hard to believe that Micah is seven. The time really has gone by so fast and he's gotten to be such a big kid! One of my favorite things about Micah is his laugh. You know, the one that comes from the gut. He has a laugh that when you hear it, you can't help but laugh too. It's great! He is such an awesome kid and so much fun.

We spent a few weeks deciding on how he would spend birthday #7, he didn't want a party this year, only putt-putt and going out to eat with the family. Therefore, it was spent doing just that. Krispy Kreme donuts for breakfast, oreo cupcakes at school (which was given the "these rock" stamp of approval by one classmate), and the day of sugar was off to a great jumpstart.

Because of Micah's exquisite taste we dined at Pizza Hut (rain caused putt putt to be put on hold till Saturday) and then headed home for the grand finale.

This is the first year he has NOT asked for a Star Wars cake. Times are changing, or else he just wants to test my cake decorating skills on a different genre.
After cake, gifts, and a few rounds of Rockband, it was off to bed.

Happy Birthday, Micah! We love you.

Just like dad

A few months ago I started noticing something different about Asher's eyes...

Do you see what I'm talkin' about?(Okay, this is an exaggerated picture, but seriously, I noticed one of his eyes was crossing slightly)


Since we have been throught this before...

and there is somewhat of a history of eye problems, (Dudi's legally blind & two of my brother's had issues, but that's a side note... it's totally Dudi's fault:) I made an appointment.

You can imagine Asher's excitement.
Yes, excitement. His dad and his big brother both have glasses, so yeah, he wants to join the ranks of men in glasses.
You can imagine my frustration. Micah had the same problem. Micah was 5 though. Asher is 3, just like his dad was. Here we go again, the battle of trying to keep those things on his face and in one piece has just begun.
But he looks so darn cute in them...

Let it snow

Don't laugh. We have lived places that do get a lot of snow, but the South isn't know for its wild winters.
If we hit the 50's it's getting a little crazy. BUT, Monday we woke up to white fluff coming down. It "snowed" all day long, nothing stuck of course, and at the end of the day this is what the storm left.

Just my kind of winter.

Go Nie!

This is just a public service announcement for those of you who are fellow readers of the Nie Nie Dialogues (and I've notice quite a few of you are).
*If you haven't checked it out lately, check it out today!*
For those of you who haven't heard of Nie or her story, you might want to check it out at nieniedialogues.blogspot.com. I came across it about 5 months ago-Amazing story.

You're it!

I guess in the blogging world people "tag" each other (I'm still new at this). I have been tagged twice. This go around my friend Hotchie tagged me -"Tell us five things about the Anderson family that people might not know." So here goes.

1. Dudi was a primary chorister. Yes, he was. Did the whole kit-and-caboodle. It was a BYU ward that only included a junior primary. Let me just say that the primary program was AWESOME. It consisted of Dudi singing solos for the congregation while about 10 primary kids stood there looking at him. Not his favorite calling, but the kids loved him. Good times.

2. Something most people probably don't know is that I started my college education in Interior Design. Turns out I got married, he was going to graduate before me so I changed my major to Marriage, Family, and Human Development so that I could finish too. I plan on going back to get my Interior Design degree in the future.

3. Micah is awesome at puzzles. At 3 years old he was doing 100 pcs. puzzles (by himself), now he has moved on to 1,000+ pcs. ones. He is really, really good.

4. Asher is a funny boy. He loves the colors green and blue. Currently he only wears green and blue clothing. Thank goodness jeans are blue! If you see pictures of Asher posted and he's wearing the same shirt in all of them, they weren't taken on the same day. He IS always wearing the same three blue and green shirts! Not a battle I chose to fight!

5. Olivia. She loves, loves, loves baths/showers/water. If anyone mentions taking one, she runs to the door, starts undressing, and repeats "ba, ba, ba." Needles to say that no one has taken a bath/shower alone in at least 3 months.

There you have it. I now tag Rachelle, Lauren, SalliJ, Shannon, and Aleasha-5 things about your family people might not know.
-0h, Sal, I'm still working on the one you tagged me with! Check back soon!

Wordle Christmas

If you've never seen a "wordle" before, you're definitely missing out (www.wordle.net). The algorithms used to generate the wordles make for some very interesting works of art that are uniquely personal because the words or phrases artistically displayed are inputted by the individual user. The pattern of artistic arrangement and font type, color, and sizes are also all customizable. All in all, one could literally spend (waste?) hours and hours creating wordles that can be posted on the web or saved as a pdf file.

After catching on to several spousal hints, I decided to go out on a limb this last Christmas and make a wordle for Mary's present. My intention was to create a piece of verbal art that captured the essence of our nine years of marriage. To do this, I included a stream of nouns and adjectives of what defines our marriage, as well as all the places we have visited, our favorite T.V. shows, favorite foods, favorite restaurants, favorite games, a plethora of inside jokes, etc. Click on the link below to see the wordle.

title="Wordle: youknowwhat"> src="http://www.wordle.net/thumb/wrdl/431673/youknowwhat"
alt="Wordle: youknowwhat"
style="padding:4px;border:1px solid #ddd">

I paid Kinko's to do a 24"x36" print of the wordle on premium photo paper. I didn't know what kind of frame Mary wanted (I'm good ... but not that good), so after Christmas we went to Michael's and picked up a nice frame at 40% off. I hung the piece up in our bedroom above the chase.

Resolutions

If this doesn't inspire you to make goals, I don't know what will :)

Last Monday's FHE lesson was on goals and making resolutions. Here is what the end results were:

Dad: "Be a better dad and husband (emphasis on dating). Oh, and be able to play all "Rock Band" songs at expert level. "

Mom: "Be healthier (it's a yearly tradition of mine) and do better at reading my scriptures."

Micah: "I want to be a better runner. That way I will get a ribbon at the fun run next year." -(curse you fun run! Awesome goal though!)

Asher: " I want to be a good brother and be a big boy and go to school and listen to my teachers." ( So sweet I could eat him! I don't have the heart to tell him that it's not gonna happen this year. But hey, the being a good brother and listening part is definitely doable!)

Liv: "Try to leave my brothers glasses alone!" (okay, so this is MY resolution for her, is that allowed? Not only does Micah have them, but at the end of the month Asher will have them too! Wish me luck!)

Sick & Tired

The kids are sick...I'm tired! :)

A holiday in review

Now that the holiday season is over and we are getting ready to start back to school and work, I will resume posting on my blog. We had a fun few weeks and I thought I would recap the highlights with pictures. Enjoy... there are a lot of them.

We spent our vacation days...

mainly just hangin' out,

pondering the important, and not so important things,

braving the wild animals at the zoo,

being silly,

visiting with cousins,

playing a few gigs,

okay, so it was more than a few,

playing games, and laughing a lot,

(I told you it was more than a few)

staying up too late,

enjoying time together,

playing with new things,

and loving time together.
Check out the sweet pjs. Asher got to pick the material for Christmas pjs this year. I accidently cut my pattern too short so I didn't have any. What, you think it was on purpose?