Fathers Day

The kids have been after us for a while to take them camping, so this year Chris decided that this was what he wanted to do to celebrate Fathers Day. I was jumpin' up and down for joy, let me tell ya! But hey, it was his day, so we'll do what he wanted to do!!! I have to admit though, I had a blast with the kids, and I haven't laughed that hard in a LONG time!

So, this is what it takes for the Haycock girls to "rough it!" (The trash bags have all of our bedding in them.) We got there and Shelby said, "Hey camping isn't so bad as long as you bring the house with you."

As we were pulling into Pine Valley (every time I go there I think of All My Children) Morgan let out an ear piercing shreek that caused Chris to slam on brakes and yelled "Look Mommy, Oreo cows." Ok, I'm not going to even pretend to be an expert on cows, but I've been around cows my whole life and I've never seen cows like these. Whatever breed they are, they will forever be known to our family as "Oreo cows"
Reason #1 why I don't like camping: We had literally been there 30 seconds when Preston was covered in dirt!!

She's such a Daddy's Girl

Chris and I were sitting around the campfire while the kids played with guns that they'd made out of sticks, when we heard: "I HAVE THE ULTIMATE GUN!" I turned around to see Preston chasing the girls like this:

What do you say to that??????? ........I mean, REALLY!!!!

Their Charlie's Angels pose

Our campsite was on a little creek and was so pretty.

Saturday night, we had a scary story contest. Shelby won by a landslide even though it had Chris and I in tears!!! I had to go to the truck to write her story down word for word. it goes as follows (imagine her shining a flashlight under her chin for effect) "Once there was an election. And there was this guy named John McCain. And he had a star by his name. And then there was a guy named Barrack Obama and he had a toilet by his name. And the guy with the toilet won. And we all peed our pants in sadness. And the Japapanians felt sorry for us." Let me remind you, SHE'S 8!!!!
On the way home, we passed this sign and I had to have Chris turn around to get a picture.
This prompted the following commentary by Chris: "Weeeelll see, the soda is twenty five cents and the cup is another fifty cents. The lid is a dime, ice 5 cents and the straw another fifteen. But today, and today only, we're offering the straw for FREE. So which combination would you like? or do you want to go for "The Works." We were all rolling!!!
All in all we had a great trip. We laughed a lot and it was so nice to just get away as a family. We've made a commitment to make more time to do stuff like this. Even though camping DEFINITELY is not my thing, I don't care what we're doing as long as we're all together!
Happy Father's Day to the Best Daddy in the world!!

Entrepreneurial Spirit

Our girls have reached the point that they've gotten really into name brand stuff. I don't see a problem in the world with that.... IF THEY'RE WILLING TO WORK FOR WHAT THEY WANT! They are trying to earn money for school clothes, and this is how they're doing it. (Yes I realize that by the time I'm done buying all the supplies I could have just bought the dang clothes, but at this point it's more about teaching them an important lesson than anything!.)
They made $21 in one afternoon.. NOT TOO BAD if you ask me!! More importantly, they had a ball!!!! They got soooo excited every time they sold one and would start jumping up and down and squealing. It was pretty dang cute. They spent the whole morning making their signs, shaving ice and watching the clock. The best part of the whole deal: it wiped them out. They've just sort of been vegging out the rest of the afternoon!!!! NICE!!
Chris took the training wheels off of Preston's old bike on Sunday. (His new one is slightly big for him and I wanted Chris to teach him to ride on the little bike thinking it would be easier!) He immediately picked it up!! Well, today he was "racing" me home from the snow cone stand, when I noticed he had his feet resting on the handlebars. 4 days without training wheels and he thinks he's ready for trick riding. This is what I get for going to a BMX demo one time and telling Chris that those guys were out of their minds and there's no way in the world I'd ever let our son do that crap!!!!! ugh.... BOYS!!!!!!!

Awards

Yesterday was field day at our school and Morgan placed 3rd in the whole 1st grade for the 50 meter dash. She was SO excited about her medal!!Today was the end of year Awards Ceremony. Morgan got the Math award and Shelby got the Art award and the P.E. award..... Yes, you read that correctly.... SHELBY got the PE and ART award....When she got back to her classroom, she said "Mrs. Fuson, how did I get the art award? I suck at art... my horses look like anteaters!" HAHA!! Her teacher reminded her that she's great at writing poetry and, of course, dancing. However, she didn't once question the PE award even though she's the most non-athletic child there is!!! lol
Oh well, I'm proud of both of my little over achievers.

Morgan's Birthday

So I realize that this is WWWAAAYY late but what can I say... life's been crazy! Morgan had her birthday on the 20th and got spoiled rotten!!! SHe had a fun friends party with a "50's Rock and Roll" theme.

Pin the record on the Jukebox

Her cake

I can't believe how fast she's grown up. Here are a few of my favorite pictures of her.

Dance Recitals

Tonight was the endof year recital for the girls. Here is the Hard Knocked Life performance. SOOOO stinkin' cute!!! Love it!!

Shelby's ballet class. She's the 4th one from the right in the very beginning:

Shelby's Combo class Tap. She's the tall one in the back with her skirt falling off lol:

Shelby's combo class jazz. Again she's the one in the back with her skirt STILL falling off:

Mother's Day

A while back, a friend asked me what the point of a blog was. I said that everyone uses them for different reasons but I do one because 1) it's easier to keep our family updated on the things going on with the kids. This way I don't have to tell the same story over and over or worry about sending tons of pictures out etc. and 2) I SUCK at keeping a journal, so I sort of use it for that purpose. (Our church is BIG on keeping journals.) This post is sort of a mixture of both I guess.
Today was a day that, to be completely honest, I'm glad is over. In the past, Chris has always tried to keep me busy so that I don't have time to really sit and think long enough to get sad. However, this year I had to work. I had a full 8 hours last night to work myself up into a hysterical, tear streaked, self-pitying mess. I miss my mama. She was all that I had for most of my life and then suddenly one day, without any real warning, she was gone. It's just not "supposed" to happen this way. Yes I know most people lose a parent at some point. But your parents aren't supposed to die at 39 years old. I'll admit, I haven't ever really dealt with it and I don't know that I ever will. I just don't even know where to begin that process. Church didn't exactly help either. I was all good listening to my kids sing in sacrament meeting. Thinking "Ok, I can do this. This day isn't going to be so bad" And then the talks started... I think it was at the "I don't know how I would be able to raise my kids without calling my mom for advice" part that I completely lost it and gave up all hope of making it through the meeting without a full on "ugly cry" (you know the cry where you can't breath and your face gets all red and twisted up). When we got home, I was looking for something for Shelby and found my high school yearbook. I turned to my Sr. page and found the message my mom had written. (just click on it to enlarge the pic if you're just dying to read it)I decided to post it on here because I'll re-read the blog more often than I'll ever dig the old yearbook out. Sitting here now, thinking over the day, I keep going back to October 9, 2001. I don't think you can really understand a parents love until you become one yourself. I'll never forget the moment that it hit me that the love that I felt for my daughter, was the exact love my mom felt for me. I think that epiphany, at that exact moment, was Heavenly Father's way of letting me know that she was there, even though not physically. I've had to remind myself of that over the years. It's funny how the Lord works some times. I'm not going to say that this note made my day all better, but it definitely helped me to suck things up a little and enjoy the good things about it.
Now ya'll (I gave up on trying to break the "ya'll" habit) know that I'm a sucker for a homemade present from my kids. This years presents made me laugh so hard. Shelby made me an "antique vase" and wrote me a love note. Her note was very sweet and heartfelt. And apparently I can "make the grumpyest person in the world laff". Yes well, she makes me "laff"!!
Morgan made me a Recipe book. (She has the same teacher that Shelby had last year, so now I have Volume 2. haha)

Morgans Entry:

Preston made a flower out of his hand prints and answered a few questions about me. 1)What does your mom say to you?- "Do your chores" 2) What is your mom's favorite color? "blue" (I hate most shades of blue lol) 3)What is your mom good at? "Exercising" (well.. obviously hahahahahaha) 4)What does your mom do when you are not around? "Sleep. She works" 5) What do you love most about your mom? "Her hugs"I love my babies. I love each of their little personalities. I'm so grateful for the opportunity that I've had to be at home with them and watch them grow and discover new things. And even though there are days that I miss just being "Jana", I wouldn't trade being "Mommy" for anything in the entire world.

Dance Pictures

For some reason my scanner scanned these a little dark, but I think they still turned out really really cute! They have their end of year recital in 10 days and then we get a break for a couple of weeks.... YYYYYAAAAAAYYYYYY!!!!!! Funny story about the orphan pic. When they were getting ready to take the pictures they were telling them to say different things (cheese, boys etc.) one of the little girls pipes up and says "SAY WHISKEY!" and since we live in "Mormonville" her mom (who tries be this perfect little "Molly Mormon") looked like she wanted to die! Seeing her face was pretty funny for the rest of us moms haha




Oh, Morgan wanted me to post that she scored 3 soccer goals tonight!! WOOOOHOOOO!!!

PRESTON WYATT

Five years ago I walked through the ER doors at Valley View Medical Center and began the long walk all the way down to Labor and Delivery. My Dr. liked to induce his patients starting at midnight. Well the main doors to the hospital lock at 10pm so you have to go through the ER which is on the complete opposite side of the hospital. Chris and I actually got a kick out of all the people in the hall that were wishing us luck. I remember after the 2nd or 3rd person I asked if they were wishing me luck for a good delivery or that I'd actually make it all the way down the hall. (Why they couldn't have just put a door and a small parking lot right next to L & D is beyond me. Stupid male architects lol) Ok back to the story...So I made it down to Labor and Delivery. That's when I found out that our hospital has some kind of mathematical formula that determines whether or not they can induce you and of course I didn't qualify (by less than a point) After some SERIOUSLY dirty looks and a few tears, the nurse was nice enough to fudge some numbers for me and they gave me Cervidil. Well by 6am I was hurting like crazy but I wasn't progressing so she had to fudge a few more numbers so that she could start me on Pitocin. Pitocin and I have a very love/hate relationship. Love that it works, hate that it hurts!!! After several hours and a couple of terrifying moments, we finally got to hold our little boy for the first time. Preston Wyatt was born at 3:37 pm. He was 7 lbs 1 oz and 20 inches long. I can honestly say that hearing him cry for the first time was the greatest relief I've ever felt in my life. To this day I get choked up remembering that feeling. Because of some very minor problems, Preston and I spent that night in the nursery with him hooked up to oxygen and monitors. It took me until almost daylight to convince the nurses that no matter how much they promised to come get me if they needed me, I was not leaving my son by himself in that nursery and neither one of those chicks were big enough to make me. They kept trying to convince me to "go get a good nights rest". Yeah like that was going to happen.... IDIOTS!! So after a long night, he finally got clearance to go back to my room with me. I should have known then that he'd be trouble. HA! He's been a healthy and happy little boy ever since!
Here's my little man the day we brought him home from the hospital. I agree with his Aunt Brittany, he was quite the "little stud muffin" in his little outfit!Here are some of my all time favorite pictures of Preston:
2 days old. (Yes Charon, I know that tennis shoes and khaki's are a no no!!)
2 weeks oldAbout 4 months old "helping" Daddy mow Grandma Almeda's lawn. He wasn't quite sure what to think at first but he grew to love that lawnmower pretty dang quick!Preston at 9 months. He wouldn't wear his hat correctly for anything in the world, but he also refused to take it off!! now if he sees someone wearing his hat like this, he scoffs and says, "Why is he wearing his hat like a punk?" Once again... I should have known then he'd be trouble lolWhen mommy dresses him....When he dresses himself! 2 yearsSee....TROUBLE!!!Striking a pose during our Back to School fashion ShowDr. Seuss DayThis is what is left of his "blankie". Ya'll don't even want to know what kinds of things he's done to this poor thing to get it to this point. All that's left is a strip about 8 inches wide and as you can see there are pieces of yarn dangling all over it. BUT, he REFUSES to give it up. We've tried everything but to no avail so we finally decided to just let him have it. He'll give it up when he's ready or when there's nothing left but a pile of string.... either way is fine with me. Preston's birthday dinner. Every time it's his turn to pick a place to go out to eat, he picks Chili's. Always!This is when he's my favorite!!!I've always said that if I ever had a little boy, I wanted him to be ALL boy! WOW!.... I should really be careful what I wish for because he is definitely ALL!!! BOY!!! He's rough and rambunctious. He breaks everything he touches. He's stubborn and fearless and rarely thinks anything through before he does it...... I wouldn't have him any other way. Words can't even begin to describe how much Chris and I love and enjoy this little boy. He makes us laugh every day, and always makes each day an adventure. Happy 5th Birthday PRESTON WYATT aka "Little Man", "Buddy", "Ya little shit" (lol)

Catching Up!

It's been a busy week. So here's a quick catch up on what's been going on around the Haycock house. All of the Haycock women got new hair cuts this week. Shelby's was a little tough to swallow at first, but I love it now. She LOVES it. As she was getting it cut, she kept saying "I love my hair. I think it's so pretty. I love it." Jayne just kept saying "well I'm glad you do" in this horrified tone. It's ok, I still love ya Jayne.
I love Morgan's hair. It's a lot cuter when it's curled but we like it straight too.
Holy Blondeness!! I've never been blond before and I have to admit that it's fun! (Ignore the lack of makeup please. I was on my way home from getting it done.)
It's soccer season again for our family. Morgan and Preston are playing this spring. I got suckered into being the assistant coach for Morgan's team this year. Do I know anything about soccer??? Um... that would be a big huge NEGATIVE. But we're making it work. Morgan has been kicking some serious butt. She's scored in both of her games. Preston scored too, unfortunately it was for the other team HA!! Oh well he's having fun and that's all that really matter.
This morning, Shelby and I did our first 5K. It was actually a lot of fun. We did it to help raise money for Hands for Haiti. They are providing prosthetics for the victims of the earthquake. I didn't realize this (cause I live in my own naive little world I guess) but they don't have running water in Haiti. Most people have to walk to the local water hole to get their daily water. Obviously, that's a little hard to do if you don't have legs or arms. It was a great workout for a great cause. Sonda and Chloe even joined us. We all look like hell, but we had fun.Yeah, I tried to be good and actually wear my knee brace (much to Chris' dismay) but it only lasted about 20 yards before it was down around my ankle. It's definitely time for me to go get my new knee brace.