Dear Baby

It appears that I have to remind you that this is MY body, not yours. Please remember this the next time you feel the urge to kick, pinch, squeeze, bounce, roll, hit, and tangle my innards ALL NIGHT LONG. 

Sacrament Meeting Haikus

Rob speaks nervously

How to build a better life

He has much to say

Two kids - a handful

Fish fly making a big mess

Is the meeting done?

A little girl scowls

Try hard not to laugh at her

Take her serious

I can't sing right now

My voice doesn't really work

I don't mind so much

The Dangers of Public School

Some lovely little child in Grace's preschool class has taught her that it is acceptable to...  how to put this delicately... no, there's just no way. I'll just have to be blunt. Taught her to pick her nose and then eat whatever she finds there. I KNOW that she didn't learn this at home since Rob and I have no such uncleanly habits, and Sam can't bring himself to put his fingers in his mouth even if there's something good on them like chocolate or honey. So in an attempt to head this behavior off, I've told Grace that it will make her very sick if she continues. I'm fairly sure this is a lie. However, since I will certainly be very sick if she continues, I feel justified. 

Christmas Vacation

I've been meaning to post for weeks and if I had just taken the time to do a little each day it wouldn't be so overwhelming now but since when have I ever taken the non-procrastinators route? We went to Arizona for Christmas which I didn't write about before the holiday because it was a surprise for my mom that all her kids were going to be there for Christmas not just half of them like she had supposed. All in all we had a great time and the kids were sorry to leave, though we did manage to uphold our Packer family tradition of being sick at Christmas time. This is the 4th year running! Luckily this year no one was actually sick on Christmas day. There was a pernicious little stomach bug that made the rounds and Sam and his cousin Jack had amazingly loud and lingering coughs. Rob had a sinus things that made the drive home with all the elevation changes particularly painful for him. Other then sickness, we had a lot of fun with all the cousins and aunts and uncles there. The kids loved their Christmas loot; in fact I think this is the first year that every gift was a hit. My sister's family got a Wii for Christmas which definitely stole the show. I wish I had gotten a picture of my Dad and Grandpa playing tennis. It was a hoot! Finally, we didn't have the sunny skies and balmy temperatures I had been dreaming about all December. After just 2 days of good weather we had rain and even snow! for the rest of our time there. I didn't get any pictures of the snow covered cactus which I regret, but that was the day Grace was throwing up so I had other things on my mind. SO we had a great trip and loved seeing everyone, but were happy to come home to our own beds. School was supposed to start up again today for the kids, but we are in the midst of another snow storm so pretty much everything has been canceled and closed. Since I have not had a minute of alone time in almost 4 weeks, you can bet I'm praying for school to be in session tomorrow!

Here are some pictures from our trip. They are not in any order... most should be self explanatory.