Update

On Memorial Day we went to Tucanos for Scott's birthday lunch. Tucanos gives a free meal anytime in your birthday month so our time was running out. It is yummy. Corbin the carnivore especially loves it.  I hit up Savers because they were having a sale and it was CRAZY crowded. Thrift store shoppers with a good sale is a scary thing. I did find some sweet finds. Scott went to a movie. We don't go visit graves on Memorial Day because we don't have any family buried in Boise. I explained to my kids why we celebrate Memorial Day but that's about it. Next year I need to tell them about their paternal great grandpa Allen who flew B-26 bombers in WWII.

I took the kids to Settlers Park on Friday night to play at the splash pad. It was pretty hot. We played for awhile and then we came home and Scott and I went on a date after that. I've been watching my friend Jessica's daughter for a few hours the past few weeks so she's babysat for us in exchange a few times. I love having her babysit. It's great.

I went to a neighborhood yard sale Saturday morning. I found a 6 person tent for $5. Hopefully it has all the parts. Last year I bought a giant tent for $60 and it was missing a pole. Doy! I figured this deal was worth a $5 burn if it didn't work out. I found a tiny dresser for the kids room. I never have enough storage in there. I found a really cute pair of shoes that look like have never been worn. Score.

The past few weeks we've been having Corbin mow the lawn. He does a pretty good job. He goes all over the place all haphazard and crazy but he gets most spots and you can't tell how crazy he mows it when he's done. I think I'm going to make him do the breakfast dishes this summer as part of his summer chores. I'm really not looking forward to teaching him how to do the dishes. Teaching your kids how to work is dang hard.

Cutest Bubba.

Little Pipes

Gabbers

Piper has gotten very good at coloring. She takes a very long time and carefully colors in the lines. You can see in the two pictures below how she has gotten even better from this picture.

Some Corbin school work. I really hate holding on to stuff so I snapped some pictures.

A self portrait. Ha.

Update

Since I started going to my boot camp a couple months ago, I've pretty much gone 5 days a week with few exceptions. Last week they started their new 90 day challenge that I did not sign up for and it was so liberating. I skipped 3 times last week because I didn't have to take it so dang seriously. These people are total fitness maniacs but hey, that's the name fitmania, ha. Anyway I still really like going but sometimes I have other things going on in my life and I don't necessarily want to have to go to bed super early like a grandma and get up super early to work out. I did some Biggest Loser workout DVD's instead. Anyway I'm paid up until the middle of July so I'm still going to go but I'm not going to revolve my life around it anymore. Hooray for me. Moderation in all things right? To do the challenge they take a before and after picture in your skivvies and weigh you and measure you and post it on the internet. This is not a mentally healthy thing for me as I have tended to be either overweight or nearly anorexic when I'm overly concerned about such things. Plus they don't eat any sugar or processed food. I can't imagine, although I'm sure it's a good idea. All things in moderation! Anyway nobody cares about this I'm sure.

Things with the kids are pretty usual, play dates, story time, bk lunch date, bike rides, books, lots of coloring, Netflix. Corbin has been begging for a mohawk haircut so I gave him one. I can't handle the trail in the back so I just left it long on top. He loves it. He's pretty excited school is getting out soon. 

On Friday night we had a family bbq at Gabe's house. Chase and Rachel were driving through on their move from tornado alley OK to Portland, OR for Chase's PA school. There was some delicious food and even better conversation into the night. Scott and I drove separate cars so he could take the kids home to bed and I could still stay late. Bless him. I could really go for some more of Jory's artichoke dip about right now!

Gabby quotes:"Mom, we never call you mother, we call you mom always...sometimes I call you Mitzi."

"Mom, I'm so hot that my head has tears." Haha!

I got a new rug and painted my coffee table. I also thought a picture of my family room actually clean and tidy was worthy of a picture as well. I'm sure it lasted several minutes.

I forgot to mention another favorite thing about my little Ry Guy. If I put out my finger he will come and grab it and walk with me. Be still my soul!

Game time! Ryan is sucking on a game piece over there I think. Nice!

Little Pipes got invited to her first birthday party and my little outgoing spitfire wasn't having any part of it. After a half an hour of holding on to her clinging for dear life and saying "this isn't excited for me" I got the heck out of there. 

It was a superhero theme and there were lots of fun obstacle courses and all kinds of cute things and Piper wasn't feeling any of it!

Corbin's "new 'do"

Ryan sleeps in a pack in play in our closet, (like all our babies minus Corbin). He will sit just like that in his "bed" and rock dang hard and loud at all different hours of the night. He never makes a peep verbally in the night but at least once a night, usually more he can be heard throughout the whole house rocking in his crib. It's so weird and funny. My twin brother's Alex and Lance would rock together all the time on the couch. We have home video of it. It's hilarious! Alex's daughter Lexi does the exact same thing, if she is happy she runs over to rock on the couch, anxious, sad, whatever the mood she rocks all the time. I'm not sure if Ryan has the Beal rocking gene or not but it's hilarious and a little weird. Ha. 

Ryan's 18 months

Ryan had his 18 month appointment a couple weeks ago. Here are his stats:
Weight: 25-8 lbs 49%
Height: 31 3/4 in 49%
Head circ. 49 cm 80%

We keep thinking he is our giant baby but really he's not. He's only 49% in weight. He's shorter than Corbin was so he seems more stocky and compared to my girls whose weight at that age was 10% or less he seems extra big. He does have a giant belly and there's no disputing that. He loves his blanket and sucking his thumb the best. He loves when he gets to be involved with his siblings in any way and he HATES when he is left out. The girls will often go in their room and shut the door because they don't want Ryan to ruin whatever they are doing or playing with. He loves to climb on the table and on everything. I had to take down the ladders on the kids fort in the backyard because he could climb to the top and then he liked to spin in circles. It was horrifying. He loves to run fast even though he runs with his very bull legged legs completely straight. I love it when he does his excited dance where he stamps his feet back and forth very quickly. I also love that he will come up to me several times a day and give me a leg hug and then run and go get into more mischief. He will also give us long narratives of babble and he is very expressive and we think he's hilarious. He finally went to all of nursery by himself today. Hooray!

He is hardly saying any words which seems to be a common theme with all of my kids at this age except for Gabby who had a remarkable vocabulary at that age.  He says "uh oh" and "up" and that's about all I can think of now. He is definitely my youngest of 4 and I have been quickly giving into his screaming demands to get him to stop crying. I admitted this to his pediatrician and I am starting to step up my game. I was amazed last week when I was trying to make breakfast and he was screaming for food and I knelt down and explained to him that I was making his breakfast and that he needed to stop crying and I counted  to 3 and I couldn't believe it when he stopped crying by the number 3. Wow, these babies know what's going on. So I am trying to boot camp his behavior a little bit and trying to make him more accountable with communicating his needs with at least sign language. It's hard though I have to say, especially when you have 3 other kids demanding one thing or the other or fighting or whatever it is. It's time for me to put some more focus on him however. One thing is for certain he is ADORABLE!

Here's the other kids at 18 months
Corbin's stats:
Gabby stats:
I didn't record Piper's stats at 18 months but I went digging and found them.
Weight 21-4 lbs 10%
Height 32 inches 50%
Head circ. 48 cm 90%
Here's a blog post with a few pics of Piper at 18 months. She was hardly walking or talking at 18 months.
Piper 18 months:

Last week was so great because I had no big obligations. Hooray! I was really able to clean my house last week and it was nice! And guess what? No big obligations this week either. Wow, my house will really be clean and maybe I'll actually play games with the kids or try to teach Gabby to read this week. She can totally read the very beginning BOB books and I've hardly worked with her. She's a smarty pants and she knows it.

We also got our disgusting carpets cleaned and they look so much better. I really want to get new carpet but I'm kind of freaked out about a big decision like that. It took me 7 years to paint my house so carpet seems like a way big decision. We'll see. For now getting our carpets cleaned really lifts my spirits. Our carpet was looking very black and it was depressing.

Piper quote: "Mom, I will always be crazy town."
Corbin quote: "I'm glad that I have grains and vitamins because meat and dairy can cause lots of damage." Ha! Maybe I shouldn't have let him watch the Netflix Forks over Knives with my mom and I. He was totally engrossed by it and now he thinks meat and dairy are the devil, which rightly so for him to think that after watching that film. (Moderation Corbin, moderation).

Nana and Papa went to China and they sent us some souvenirs. They kids all love their new jammies except for Ryan. He started crying the minute I put them on and stopped the minute I took them off. I guess silk is no beuno for him.

Arco Reception

Scott's birthday was on Monday this week. It was kind of crazy timing with the wedding that I didn't feel like I had sufficient time to plan for it. Luckily Kelsey was still with us and she saved the day. We got up early and worked out and then when we got home she offered to go and buy things to make Scott a special birthday breakfast while I took a shower. Then she cooked the breakfast while I set up the decorations. Then she cleaned up the breakfast dishes while I got myself and my kids ready. After we were all finished she said there was something to the whole sister wives thing. I couldn't agree more! Wow having two women to get things done was really, really helpful. We then went out and did some birthday errands and then she took my kids home and babysat while Scott and I went to the new Avengers movie for his birthday. Truly she saved the day! I took a few really loud, cold naps during the movie but it was still a good time to be at a movie together in the middle of the day. Scott really enjoyed it so that's even better. After the movie Kelsey headed to Arco for the week. That night Scott grilled some steak and we had costco cheesecake. It ended up working out great. 

Things were pretty same old with the kids this week. On Thursday night I went to a brand new book club that my friend and her sister started up. I use the word friend pretty loosely here because I really don't know her that well. We have ran into each other for years at the same activities with our kids so we finally started to talk to one another and became "friends." She invited me  to join the club and I did. It definitely got me out of my comfort zone to meet a group of women and none of them are LDS. They all seem really cool and I'm excited about it. I haven't had too many non LDS friends since high school so I think it will be good to branch out. Most of the ladies in the group are Christian so I don't think anyone will be suggesting 50 Shades of Grey or anything like that so that's good. Books seriously need a rating. Just saying!  

On Friday morning I got packed up and headed out to Arco. I left Scott and Ryan at home. We figured that was a win win situation. I can enjoy myself much more in Arco without a toddler to constantly be making sure he's not destroying my mom's house or drowning in the ditch. Kelsey was already there of course and Gabe and his boys came around 7:00 and Trisha and her kids arrived around 9:00. That night we had a great time gabbing into the night. On Saturday we helped set up for the reception and just hung out. 

Kelsey took charge of this reception and she did a great job. It was so nice to just help and not be in charge this time. Arco is not a very warm place and we thought they were crazy for trying to have a reception outside in early May but that's what Keaton wanted, so that's what they did. All week it was raining and freezing but Kelsey was determined to do it outside. Well Saturday came and it was sunny all day. It was still pretty chilly and windy but no rain. The reception was cold but it was beautiful, one lady even wore her earmuffs. So funny. Hart and Jory and kids also came Saturday night and after the reception we had a good ol' Beal gab. Amanda fit right in and laughed and handled it quite well when we got inappropriate  and with Hart and Gabe that tends to happen a lot.

Sunday was Mother's Day and it was great to be with my mom on Mother's Day. She is wonderful and I love her. My Mother's Day treat was getting to eat my mom's Sunday dinner. That will always be my favorite thing. We drove home after a nap and it was so nice to see Scott and Ryan again. Gabby especially missed her daddy and mentioned it several times.

Gabby quotes: "Mom, sometimes I'm a good listener...sometimes."

The girls were playing together while Scott was home and I was doing some errands. When I came back Gabby was telling me all about her Gabby and Piper time and the things they did together. I heard her say to Piper, "Isn't Gabby and Piper time so fun?"

Gabby and her friend Audelia were complaining that Piper was being mean to them Audelia said, "Piper said her favorite thing is to be mean to us." Ha.

Piper: "Mom, you always make me laugh."

Corbin came home from school on Thursday and came and gave me a hug (he's not very affectionate so this was a little abnormal). He said, "I'm excited for Sunday," me,"Why because you'll be in Arco?" C:"Because it's Mother's Day." He can sure be a sweetheart. 

The kids filled out questionares in primary. Some of the responses were kind of cute I thought. (Of course). 

What doesn't your mom like to do? Corbin: change diapers, Gabby: look at my boogers (Both true)

One of my favorite things to do with my mom is? Corbin: to share (so true)

If I could go anywhere with my mom it would be...Corbin: Pizza Hut

Love my kids. So happy to be a mom.

Ryan folding his arms for FHE.

It was nice because Kelsey just re-used some of the stuff I made from her wedding and Chase's wedding. That was great to get some more use out of that stuff. That fabric wedding cake took me countless hours. I think I cut out 10 yards worth of fabric flowers. Insane! 

Keaton's Wedding

This week was mainly recover from ward party slash get ready to leave for my brother's wedding. Nothing much happened. Tuesday night we had a girls night and some of us couldn't leave until 2:00 in the morning and then I was still wound up until about 3:00. That is late folks! But I sure do love my girlfriends in the ward, they are the best!

On Thursday night Kelsey and Justin rolled in from Washington. We chatted for a bit and then went to bed. Kelsey joined me early for my 6:00 am fitness class and they all laughed at Kelsey for having the same genetic uncoordinated moves. Good times! After we got ready Kelsey and I went and found not one but 3 new dresses for me to possibly wear to the wedding. We left around 12:30 to drive down to Utah. Only 30 minutes behind schedule which is pretty much on time for us. Scott went and had a client sign a cash deal and got a $1000 bonus before we left town. Now that's the way to start your weekend. The drive was still long and ugly but so much better with no kids and Kelsey and Justin to keep us company. We left our kids with a young, single mom in our ward. She has a 4 year old and they just came and stayed at our house. She is so great and I didn't have any worries the whole time we were gone. I knew my kids were in good hands, (probably better hands) Ha!

We met up with lots of Beals for dinner and I took them to my favorite place, Hires of course. I think they liked it. I don't know, but I did! After that we went bowling. As usual I was a terrible bowler and got last place. We all split up after that and Scott and I and Kelsey and Justin headed to the Cannon house for the night. Jeff and Janet are in China right now so we were just greeted by the cat. Nicole came over and said hi for a minute. I really wanted to watch a movie on the back deck because that's one of my favorite things. They have a great set up down there. Scott had to work for about 30 minutes before he figured out how to jimmy rig it. There were just too many cords to sort through in Jeff's office. He ended up being able to stream it through Justin's laptop. I'm so glad he did because I loved watching a movie out there that night. We watched Disturbia.

We got up and got ready and then headed over to Nicole and Rustin's to bum off some cereal from them and instead got a wonderful breakfast of pancakes with whip cream and strawberries and scrambled eggs. Awesome!

We drove to the Bountiful temple for the sealing. All of my siblings were there except for Lance and Katie and we weren't sure if they were going to make it but they came at the last minute. It was really cool to be in the sealing room with my whole family. All of my siblings are now married and we were all there together and my dad was the sealer so it was just a really special time. My mom said it was the highlight of her whole life. It was pretty amazing.

After pictures we went to a luncheon at a church in West Jordon and it was really nice. They had it decorated nice and the food was really delicious! We just sat around and talked for several hours. It was really fun. After that Scott, Kelsey, Justin and I headed back to Boise. It was a quick trip but it was a lot of fun. I didn't even mind the driving part so much because it's so much easier to drive it without kids. We came back and all was well. Gabby seemed to miss us the most and gave me a hug and said, "I'm so happy you're back." Sure do love my sweet, loud, wild, messy kids.

The kids "helping" daddy plant potatoes. Little Pipes is behind Scott. It was impossible to get a picture of all 5 in there.

It's never too early for a little water sliding right? April, 70 degrees.

Bowling. Kelsey on the left killed it.

Happy couple Keaton and Amanda

All the Beal ladies: mom, sisters, and sister in laws, we are missing Amanda though. Darn.

Love!