Dear Family and Friends,

Allison has rushed up to her room screaming and is lying on her bed crying (saying "its as bad as when I had ringworm") because I am planning to tell everyone the big news. She has glasses! And all the tears, crying, and low self-esteem that came with them. I wonder if I am cut out to be the mother to a girl sometimes. I think I must be doing a bad job when I can listen to her cry on and on about her glasses and just send her to bed or church or whatever anyway. She hasn't worn them to school yet so tomorrow morning should be interesting. I'll have to break out another box of tissues. I think they look really cute on her and she can see so much better. Jeremy picked the glasses up Friday night and she just walked around with a look of amazement on her face. Then today it hit her that she needs to wear her glasses in public and for the rest of her life pretty much. She walked to church bawling with a notebook in front of her face. Got almost taken out as she crossed the street. Jeremy, man that he is, took on sacrament meeting by himself while I went to a ward conference. Spencer had a major case of wiggles, Robyn was in full on look at me princess mode and Allison was crying and hiding behind her hands, under the pew etc. I am hoping that she will realize she is still beautiful and that seeing is worth the inconvenience of glasses and that she is still the same person.





Allison has been having play practice every day after school for up to 3 hours and even more. And an all day practice Saturday. She came home Thursday with her hair style for the play and informed me that I was responsible to get her hair to do this weird Dr. Suess look for every performance and dress rehearsal. Still working on getting it to look just right.



This week she has 2 dress rehearsals, 2 assemblies and 4 performances. Think she will be one tired little girl Saturday night and I am so ready for this to be over. She has had a great time but I had no idea it would be such an intense experience. I will post lots of pictures and video of her next week.

Last week I told Robyn that only babies wore pull-ups. So now she only wears underwear except for at night. I think I have used the phrase "its OK" too often in her life as every time she has an accident she just shrugs it off by saying in her sing-song voice "its OK". ITS NOT OK!! I hate cleaning up. But its for a short while and she will get it eventually. And she is pretty good when we go places now to not have any accidents. Its mostly when she is caught up in playing and running around. Happy nappy time has turned into happy, climb out of my bed quietly and fill my crib full of toys without making any noise time. She has a great time at nap time although no sleep is involved. But I sometimes get to grab a 20 minute power nap so I am fine with it. As a result she crashes at night and will sleep in till we wake her up (10 am on Saturday!). Funniest sight this week was when she was playing at the neighbors in their backyard and peed in her clothes. So she shucked everything and ran down the street buck naked to get some new clothes. Yesterday Jeremy took the kids while I was gone and picked up Kayla's old day bed for Robyn to use. Robyn is very excited to go get a mattress tomorrow and move to a big girl's bed. Since she climbs in and out of her crib at will right now I don't think it will be a hard transition.



Spencer has had an easy week of little homework or activities. He did get to go on a field trip to the dinosaur museum and a gem show this week which he thought was cool. Jason and Kelly gave him a wallet for his birthday which he has carried everywhere this week. He has shown it to everyone he meets. My parents gave him a skateboard ramp kit that he has been busy trying out. Sunday night he set it up, Jeremy over rode him saying that he had to have a helmet and 2 attempts later, a loud crash and screaming like the mortally wounded came from our backyard. Once we realized nothing was broken we didn't give him enough sympathy as he tried to convince us he had broken his muscle in his buttock. He has been showing us the purple and then green bruise all week to prove it. He has since improved and has been having fun with it. He has been pounding away at his boxing bag and it has been a good thing. When he has been sent up to his room for time out he hits it for a while and comes out all panting, flushed and happy. He has been struggling a bit this week to control his temper and his random body movements, noises, spazzing out. Don't know how much is bi-polar or meds and how much is a 10 year old boy. But if he runs around a bit usually things are much better. He started Webelos in scouts and was very impressed that now he has "homework" every week to work on. This week he had to keep track of his budget which fits right in with his wallet/money obsession right now.



We have been having a warm spell and everyone has been outside as much as possible. Robyn has been "helping" me get weeds and dead plants picked up. Her job is to give the plants a drink. This involves much spillage and clothing changes but she has a great time. We planted our front pots with pansies and primroses so it feels like spring. Taylor has been chipper with the sunny weather. I have been laying him out on the grass in the afternoon and he just lies there tanning and smiling. This Tuesday I meet for his transition meeting for his new school. Someday all the paperwork/meetings will be over and he will switch schools.

Today Jeremy was set apart as Elder's Quorum President. He will be awesome and I think will have a great experience with it. I think we are both a little apprehensive about what his schedule will be like but we will just have to wait and see. We know he will be gone Sunday mornings and Wednesday nights. Don't know much beyond that though. He has 2 really good counselors though which should help a lot. Today he and Spencer went to the Draper temple dedication broadcast. Spencer thought it was cool. Jeremy said later that Spencer was in his own world the whole time which often intruded on Jeremy's. I think that kid is literally unable to sit without moving or making some type of noise. Between meetings all morning, church, home teaching and then the dedication Jeremy is DONE. I think he will be glad to go back to work tomorrow. On a lighter note, on Thursday he was able to go shoot an LDS concert for a newspaper. I don't know if they ended up using his pictures but he had fun and the winner was Brandon Osmond who he knew so that was neat.

Friday night we had cousin night with kids running around and having a great time. We found Storm's cage stashed away in Robyn's room at the end of the evening with a traumatized hamster squished into a collapsible house. But all survived and want to know when its happening again. Saturday Jeremy and I met Jason and Kelly at Lauri's and spent the day cleaning. 2 truck loads of garbage and 1 load to the DI later we had made a big dent in the project. We're planning to meet up again in 2 weeks to tackle it some more. We did most of the kitchen and bathroom so the worst parts are out of the way.

I seem to be busy with plain everyday often dramatic life. Thursday I was pressing snooze when Jeremy muttered that he had a reminder on his calendar about Spencer's dentist appointment. I jumped out of bed realizing that we were supposed to have left 5 minutes earlier to get to his 7 am appointment in Provo. So Spencer and I made a dash for it looking oh so lovely and made it there 5 minutes late to get his retainer in. Jeremy held down the fort getting Taylor and Allison off to school. Life seems to have it moments. Like this morning when with an hour to go before we needed to leave starting the pancakes when Allison decides she want to do something different for her church talk and Spencer shouts out in a panic that Robyn had dumped a whole container of fish food in his tank and that his fish were dying unless I cleaned it right now! Somehow though everything gets done, kids feel neglected at times but it all works out. And we have our moments of sitting out on the grass together or me having my moment of kid free quiet with my slice of left over cheesecake and a new book. So life is good.

Love to you all, Heather