Today our internet wasn’t working.  I came down and got on the computer and shut everything down to see if that would help.  Well, it only took a couple of seconds to shut everything down, and then I went right back upstairs where all the kids were.  Jaxon came walking into the kitchen with his shirt off.  I thought that was a little weird and asked him why his shirt was off.  His answer….”because it’s polite.”  Well, okay whatever.  I started doing the dishes and after a while Jaxon comes up to me and asks me, “Do you like my hair?”  I look down at him and he has a couple of bald spots.  His shirt was off, because he was trying to cut his own hair.  Here’s the rest of our conversation.

Me:  “Ahhhhh!!!  Your hair!  It looks horrible.”

Jaxon (slumps his shoulders and looks at the ground):  “I should have left it (the hair) on.”

Well, while we had this conversation, I heard the water running in the bathroom, so I went in to see who was in there.  It was Parker….with a pair of scissors, more than ready to cut his hair, too.  Luckily I caught him before he cut anything.

So the moral is:  Put the scissors up very high.

I have pictures of the awesome haircut, and I will post them later.

All the pictures I posted during Christmas were pictures that Scott took, but I actually took some, too.  I finally downloaded them, so I wanted to slap some on here.  There are actually a couple of Scott.    Enjoy!!

I don’t really have a high place to set up our nativity, so it’s down where all the kids can reach it.  I kept trying to arrange it how I wanted it, but every time I went into the living room, someone had changed it all up.  Jaxon liked them all to be in a straight line, so the arrangement you see below is compliments of Jaxon.  Parker liked to just mix them all up, and Keaton thought they must have been tired, because he would always lay some of the people down on the chest.  I actually saw him doing it once, and he was pretty careful about it.  I guess all my yelling at them about being careful with the nativity sunk in…well, expect for Berkley.  Berkley of course, just liked to throw them all over the floor.  By the end,  the angel had a broken hand, but nothing else was harmed, and I’m not exactly sure if the angel’s hand had been broken last year.  I was quite pleased that the nativity people came out so good (just a few scratches).  But, it is funny that whenever I went into the living room, I knew who had been arranging the nativity just because they all liked it their different ways. 

Scott on Christmas day….

I think he was even more excited than the kids.  The first picture was taken by Jaxon, that’s why his head is cut off….okay, I took it.  The paper he’s holding says 1 year subscription to Make magazine.  I ordered the subscription too late, so that’s all I could give him on Christmas.

Swimming in St. George

Jaxon and Parker wanted to ride on Scott’s back.

And here’s the sledding…..

Sledding fun!!

While we were vacationing for Christmas, Keaton had a birthday…..

I know these pictures are lame, but it’s what I got.  As you can see, Keaton had a super amazing cake made out of 3 donuts.  He seemed to be pretty excited, though.  I feel bad for the little guy.  I bet he’s going to hate his b-day when he gets older.  I can’t believe he’s 3 years old….I don’t know where all the time has gone.  I remember being sad when Jaxon turned 3, because I didn’t want him to be that old yet.  Keaton is a fun little kid.  He can be very stubborn sometimes, but I think his stubborness has really helped him in using the left side of his body.  He honestly amazes me.  When they finally told me his diagnosis, in my mind I already started putting limitations on him.  I thought about all the things I didn’t think he would be able to do, but I was soooooooo wrong.  He is a good little athlete.  I’m amazed at how well he does.  He loves sports, and he doesn’t let his “disability” weigh him down.  After watching him these last couple of years, I would have to say that he can do anything he wants….whatever he puts his mind to, and is important to him, he will find a way to do it.  I’ve learned some really neat things from him, and he’s only 3.  I just love watching him.

And here is Berkley.  Any time a closet door or the refigerator door opens, Berkley comes running.  He could sit and play in the referigerator or closet for hours if I would let him.

And here are two pictures I didn’t recognize.  Jaxon has been sneaking into the closet lately, and I didn’t know what he was doing.  I’m pretty sure he took these pictures.  He’s not supposed to use this camera….the little stinker.

I was playing a game on the iPod and in came Parker….

Parker (pointing at the iPod):  “Mom, does that have hide and seek on it?”

Me (laughing): “No.”

Parker:  “Oh, can we play hide and seek?”

It was my cue to stop playing the game. 

Berkley wasn’t all that into sledding, but at least he survived…..

Which as you can see Parker was knocked down more than once.

From these pictures that Scott took, I have learned how dangerous sledding is.

And here’s Kevin….luckily he was okay.

Keaton was asleep most of the time we were sledding, but he finally woke up, and I got to take him down a couple of times.  I am not quite the daredevil that Scott is, so I think Keaton liked sledding with me.  Then, we have Parker.  His is a sad story.  If you look close at his picture he has a fat lip, and he had a bloody nose.  He was going to sled down the hill, and at the end of the hill is where the cars are parked.  If you get going too fast you will go right over the snowhill and plow into the cars.  Well, Kent was helping Parker get on his tube, and yelled down to Scott to stop him at the end of the hill.  Scott yelled back to let him go, and he would catch him at the end.  Well, Scott didn’t think he was going fast enough to go over the small snowhill in front of the cars, so he just sat and watched, and didn’t try stopping him at all.  Parker flew over the snowhill and slammed into our van.  He actually came out pretty good.  I saw the whole accident out of the corner of my eye.  I was in the van getting something out when all of the sudden this object flew into the van.  I looked up and realized it was Parker and ran over to him.  I thought for sure he would have a broken nose or a broken leg.  But, thankfully all he came out with was a bloody nose and fat lip.  I thought for sure he wouldn’t want to sled anymore, but 2 minutes later he was asking Scott if he could go again.  Crazy little bugger….He gets it from his dad. 

I am kind of in a reflective mode tonight.  Sometimes I like to sit and think about life.  Sometimes I wonder why certain things happen to certain people…not that I am angry or anything about things that have happened to us, but even as I have watched other people and the trials they have been through, sometimes I just wonder why those things happen.  I guess a better way to explain my “wondering” is instead of asking why, I like to ask, “What am I (and all those involved) supposed to learn from this?”  That question makes it easier to endure instead of saying “why me?”  Well, I just read a really good article on the LDS website and I found out some things about President Spencer W. Kimball that I had never known before.  This is taken from an article by James E. Faust.  Here’s what the article said:

“Early in life, President Spencer W. Kimball (1895–1985) learned the necessity of work. He had many painful experiences in his early years preparatory to his great ministry. As a young boy he nearly drowned. He suffered from Bell’s palsy. His mother died when he was a youth, and while he was still a young man he lost his beloved sister Ruth. Shortly after marriage he contracted smallpox, and Sister Kimball counted over 100 pustules on his face.

He learned early about financial reverses and lost some investments. Like Job, he suffered from boils, which continued for many years and on one occasion came on his nose and lips. On one occasion he suffered from 24 boils at one time; not long thereafter he began to suffer the excruciating pain of heart attacks, which continued for many years and finally resulted in open-heart surgery. He became bothered by a hoarseness of his voice, which was relieved through a blessing from the Brethren, only to return later, along with the boils. A serious cancer in the vocal cords required surgery and thereafter voice training and cobalt treatments. The Bell’s palsy returned, and skin cancers were removed” (James E. Faust, “The Blessings of Adversity,” Ensign, Feb 1998, 2).

It was a good article.  I never knew President Kimball went through so much.  It talked about how adversity is an extremely good teacher.  I would have to agree with that.  Although a few things in our life have been hard, I think the times I have learned the most were the times that were the most difficult.  So, even though some things are hard, and extremely painful and difficult, life is still good.  One good lesson I’ve learned is that when times are good just enjoy it as much as you possibly can.  All those hard difficult days make the good days so amazing.

Well, yeah, those are my thoughts for the night.  I still need to post the sledding pictures, but I just really liked that article I read, and wanted to share my thoughts. 

Not only did we go swimming during Christmas vacation, but we also got to go sledding.  I would post all of those pictures, too, but I’m beat.  All I can think about right now is going to bed, so hopefully soon I will get the rest of the pix posted.

We got to go to St. George with Scott’s family for part of Christmas vacation, and I really had a lot of fun.  It was so nice to get away from home for a while, and it was nice to have Scott around so much.  I like it when he gets time off of work and we get to do fun stuff together.

Swimming in the hot tub.  The pool never did get very warm, but the hot tub was warm enough for the kids to get in.

Parker before the crypto virus……..Parker now infected with the cryptosporidium virus

Hiking at some canyon (I forget what the canyon is called)

Keaton trying to keep his distance from me.  He did not want me to hold his hand or even walk by him.  He wanted to try rock climbing by himself.  It’s just not cool to hike with mom. 

Making his getaway.

Parker taking care of Grandpa’s hat.  Parker said his leg hurt on this hike.  I don’t think it was as fun for him as it was for Jaxon and Keaton.

I think it was still a little fun for him though.

Then, of course, we have Jaxon….the little monkey.

It was kind of scary watching Jaxon run around on these rocks.  I thought he was going to trip and fall and go off the edge of one of them.  But, I guess I just worry too much. 

And, this is where Jaxon was last seen before we lost him.  Jaxon decided to head back to the van, but he didn’t tell anyone.  After a few minutes I noticed Jaxon was gone, and started asking everyone if they  knew where Jaxon was.  No one knew where he had gone, and I started to panic.  Scott and I took off to go try and find him.  I couldn’t see him anywhere, and started thinking that maybe he had fallen off a rock and gotten hurt, or he had just decided to go hike some other part of the canyon by himself.  Well, Scott’s dad went back to the where the cars were parked to see if he was there, and there he was.  Thankfully he wasn’t hurt, but I was sure frustrated.  Little Jaxon was so proud of himself because he had beat everyone back to the cars. 

We visited an old cemetary where some of Scott’s distant relatives were buried.  It was kind of a cool old cemetary, so I started looking at some of the headstones.  Jaxon followed me around and seemed pretty interested in what I was doing.  Here’s our conversation:

Jaxon:  (Pointing at a headstone) “Mom, what does that one say?”

Me:  “It says his last name was Spendlove.”

Jaxon: “Oh, was he supposed to be my uncle?”

We also went to a little ghost town…..I believe it was called Grafton.

Some cool pictures that Scott took while we were in Grafton.

Scott takes amazing pictures.

Pretty good photographer.