birthday girl and precious boy

Christian joined us at the table this week. He is sure excited to eat with the rest of the family.

Christian smiles for the camera! I had to make sure he wore his little Christmas suit at least once in December before it got too tight. He has started giving us kisses lately. I didn't realize a 4-month-old could copy behaviors in this way. He is sure a sweet boy.

Our little princess is now three. This birthday was kind of anticlimatic for me, since I have already been thinking of her as a three-year-old for several months now. A wonderful lady in our ward made her a princess birthday cake.

Nathan was in charge of this party. He made sure we turned out the lights, sang "Happy Birthday," blew out the candles, and opened presents properly and in the correct order. We had to re-do the birthday song at his birthday party in October because apparently we did the lights and candles wrong.

Our Wonderful Whirlwind Week

Now that we've had a week to recover, I can do a post about what we've been doing lately that has been keeping us from updating our blog. This is going to be long, so feel free to skip down to the pictures if you're not interested in the details!
Nov. 20th - David's family begins to arrive in town. Nathan throws up all night and part of the day.
21st - A bridal shower for David's sister, Dianna. Rosie and Jessica did a beautiful job putting it on. I love David's family! That evening, we had a bunch of the family over for dinner. David made pizza! I love David!
22nd - Church. I stayed home with a sick Nathan during Sacrament Meeting. Then Grandpa Boren took my place so I could go to Primary and teach Sharing Time. After church we had another big family dinner at our house. After that, I went with David's mom to see a choir concert that Melani was in.
23rd - Grandpa and Uncle Ryan watched the kids while all the girls went out to lunch to celebrate Grandma Boren's birthday. Christian was an angel and slept the whole time I was gone. In the evening we had another big family dinner at our place. Uncle Stephen and Aunt Rosie made a delicious gourmet masterpiece. After that was a big family home evening and birthday party for Grandma.
24th - We all went to the Mount Timpanogos Temple for Dianna and Matt's wedding. It was a beautiful wedding with a beautiful bride and handsome groom. The kids all looked darling dressed up in their fancy clothes. After the wedding was a luncheon put on by Matt's family. It was fun to catch up with relatives and get to know Matt's family better.
25th - David and I went with his parents and a few siblings to the Provo Temple to do a sealing session. It was a special experience. After we got home, Grandpa, David, and Nathan hiked up to the Y. Then Grandpa helped David replace some worn out vent stack covers on the roof. Thank goodness Grandpa noticed they needed replacing. We would never have realized and we could have gotten water damage in our house this winter.
26th - We celebrated Thanksgiving at my sister LaChelle's house. My whole family was there and we had a great time eating, singing, laughing, and playing with all the little kids.
27th - We drove up to Logan to attend the baptism of our nephew, David. It was a very nice baptism. We were so glad he invited us to his special day. We spent the rest of the day up there enjoying more time with David's family before they all went their separate ways.
28th - My brother Michael married Kristin Jensen in the Mount Timpanogos Temple. It was great to be in the temple with my parents, and all my siblings and their spouses. We had a nice luncheon afterwards, and then enjoyed a lovely reception.
29th - Church and Clara's birthday. I have some cute pictures from the birthday party, but I'll save those for another post.
30th - I spent most of the day cleaning up the house, doing mountains of laundry and getting everything back to normal after a week of festivities and not doing housework. Whew!

Nathan and Daddy at the "Y."

Nathan loves Grandpa Boren!

My sister, LaChelle, made the wedding cake. Murphy's Law was definitely at work. Things kept going wrong, including a whole section of the cake crumbling off, but she still managed to make it look gorgeous. I don't know how she makes such beautiful wedding cakes. I can't even make a pretty birthday cake...

...and I'm not 9 months pregnant like she is!

Michael and Kristin are a lovely couple. If I had any pictures of Dianna and Matt, I would also put them on, but we forgot our camera at their wedding.

Don't you ever just feel like sitting in the kitchen sink?

Like Pulling Teeth

Life's so tough, especially when you have the cruelest parents on earth.

In the past two months, our poor kids have been subjected to THREE big sessions of family pictures. Yes, we are the cruelest parents on earth. The pictures on this post are from the first session, back in September when my family gathered for Christian's baby blessing. Notice Nathan's bare feet (He took off his shoes in hopes that it would delay the pictures.) and beautiful "smile". Actually, he either scowled or stuck his tongue out for EVERY picture. (I hear Borens laughing...David made awful faces for many of his pictures as a boy.) This was the first picture of each of my siblings and their spouses. Well, technically, Michael was still engaged then, but that's okay. I still can't believe we're all married.

The second photo session was a few days before Thanksgiving, when David's family gathered at the Mount Timpanogos Temple for his sister Dianna's wedding to Matt Funk. The wedding was beautiful and Dianna and Matt looked radiant. Our kids looked like they would rather be anywhere else, with their tear-stained faces and runny noses. Granted, it was quite chilly outside. Fortunately, they recovered at the luncheon afterward, where Clara discovered the joy of fingerpainting on the tablecloth with cake frosting.

The most recent family pictures were taken 4 days later, at my brother Michael's wedding to Kristin Jensen. As we were on our way to the wedding, Nathan tearfully said, "Oh no! Are there going to be pictures at this wedding too? I'm not going to be in ANY MORE PICTURES!" Poor kid. It was not nearly as cold outside for these pictures, but Nathan wasn't going to put up with any more. As we all posed for the big group photo, Nathan escaped and ran away. David and I shrugged and said, "Well, I guess he's not going to be in these pictures."

Sorry, Nathan and Clara. Pictures are a fact of life, especially in my family. The faster you cooperate, the faster it's over. Sorry, Dianna and Matt, if our kids are looking less than happy at your wedding. We thought it was beautiful, and we're so excited for you. Sorry, Michael and Kristin, if you can't find Nathan in your wedding pictures. He had already endured all that a little boy can endure. We are glad you got married. Someday you'll be wrestling your own kids during family pictures.

Halloween, Birthday, and Other Fun

Halloween was a blast! David, Sherrie, and Nathan were pirates, Clara a princess (we forgot to put on her crown), and Christian a bear cub. The kids got a ton of candy and stuffed their faces when we got home. Clara ate so much that she threw up in the middle of the night. Gotta love those midnight clean-up parties.
Sherrie is our resident artist and has been taking an evening watercolor class through Utah Valley University. She painted this scene of a cat playing with a ball of yarn. Her goal is to get some art up on the walls of our house.

Nathan turned five last week! We can't believe that we have a five year old. Nathan and Clara helped make the ghosts on the cake. Nathan was really excited to get a tool set, two broken VCR's to take apart, a box of life cereal, and telescopic fishing pole. He and Sherrie took apart a VCR the next day and Nathan said that it was the best day ever.

Carving pumpkins and summer squash is a fun activity.

Sherrie and Nathan at the elementary school skate night. Nathan was not very fond of skating. He became quite angry at the skates and we eventually took them off. He walked around the rink with Sherrie. Sherrie had her skates on and Nathan walked with his shoes. Clara had no fear with the skates and didn't want to leave when it was time to go. She fell a lot, but was having the time of her life. Christian was very handsome in the stroller.

For some reason Clara got the idea that princesses put a lot of lotion in their hair. She came downstairs with oodles of lotion caked in her hair and on her face, declaring to all the world, "I have princess hair." Maybe she'll start a new style.

Clara is our dancing princess. She particularly likes this dress because it's pretty when it twirls.

Nathan is a little monkey. We weren't huge believers in evolution, but after watching our kids, we're starting to have second thoughts. They seem to be evolving backwards, from humans to monkeys. Christian is not quite sure what to think about this whole thing. He'll probably evolve into a monkey too.


Here's our other little monkey. Our little monkey princess loves to hang upside down. Maybe she was a bat in a former life.

Christian's Blessing and Fall Fun

We blessed Christian yesterday during church. He was asleep for most of it, but was awake by the end of the blessing was happily looking around. We had a nice time with Sherrie's family and Aunt Mel. Thank goodness for Aunt Mel's fancy camera that can take a bunch of pictures really quickly. I don't think we would have gotten any nice pictures otherwise because Nathan and Clara had the wiggles.


Nathan and Clara love taking baths! Clara likes getting her princess hair clean.


We carved one of our summer squashes and named him Pepe. We gave him one eye and one tooth and an old pepper from our garden for a nose (thus the name Pepe). He fits right in with our crazy family.

Our aspiring hair dresser Nathan worked his magic with Clara. She won't hold still for her parents to do her hair, but apparently Nathan is acceptable. He did a pretty good job and even added bows and berretes (spelling?). He did a great job. If he's not careful he'll find himself with a new daily chore.

Christian hanging out with Grandpa Manwill.

Little did we know that over conference weekend our house would be invaded by pirates. Uncle Stephen was one of those pirates and David, Joshua, and Nathan went on pirate extermination patrol. Uncle Stephen didn't stand a chance.

We've been cleaning up our garden and Nathan's always a big helper. Nathan decided that he was going to use "his" hacksaw to cut up the old sunflower stalks so that they would fit in the garbage can. He cut a bunch of them and only cut himself once. His toolbox is gradually adding tools while daddy's toolbox seems to be gradually losing tools.

Huckleberries and a hike

Things are going well here in Oremland. We picked tons of tomatoes this week and need to make them into salsa or tomato sauce (feel free to come get some if you need any). We also have zucchini and yellow squash overtaking our property (That much less lawn that needs to be mowed). Christian is growing like a weed and eats like starving grizzly. He's starting to smile a little more, but has a good knack for stopping when the camera comes out. School, work, preschool, primary, and the rest of life is keeping us happily hopping.

This morning we had crepes with huckleberry sauce. Clara (our little bear cub) would eat all of the huckleberries off of her crepe and then ask for more without eating the crepe. We made her eat the crepe before having more, which she did promptly. It was a great feast.

Yesterday we went on a hike up to Battle Creek Falls in Pleasant Grove with Aunt Mel. It was a perfect length (about 3/4 of a mile). The best part was the feast of popcorn, apples, and gummy worms once we got there. Clara stomped around the entire creek, but Nathan was scared of the cold water. It was very refreshing.

We went to Foothill Elementary's Fall Festival. David got to be in the dunk tank. Nathan had first dibs on dunking him. Luckily the water was pretty warm. The wind did make it a little cold after being dunked. Nathan and Clara enjoyed the air pressure rocket launcher. Nathan was talking about it for the next two days and had figured out how to build one. He even designed it on a piece of paper. We might have to build one (birthdays are coming up!).

preschool and potty training

Grandma and Grandpa Boren visited last week for a couple days. Nathan got to spend a day with Grandpa, Daddy, and Uncle Stephen, building the set for Aunt Mel's upcoming play, "A Midsummer Night's Dream," at Lehi Jr. High. Grandpa also brought his chainsaw and cut down the diseased tree next to our garage. We loved having Grandma and Grandpa visit, and were sad that we couldn't find an excuse to get them to stay longer! That's how it is when you have to share your wonderful in-laws with 6 other siblings.

Nathan started preschool this week. He is teary-eyed and dramatic when I drop him off, as if we're saying goodbye forever. "Goodbye Mom"...chin quivers..."I love you"...sniffle..."Good bye"...waves as he slowly backs away..."Goodbyyyeee." It could break a person's heart, but he comes running with a big smile on his face when I pick him up. He insists that he doesn't like preschool at all, but I think it's just because he's worried that he's missing all the "fun" with me and the other kids while he's gone.

Clara has been resistant to potty-training for the past several months, but suddenly this week, she has decided that she wants to be done with diapers. She's been practically accident-free for several days now. Hooray!!! David and I have had almost nothing to do with it. She has potty-trained herself. (And for those of you who know Clara, you understand why it wouldn't work any other way!)

Swimming at Aunt Mel's pool

Set-building at Aunt Mel's school

Christian smiles for the camera

Timber!!