Shakespear Shuffle

January 2015

It was birthday month at the Shakespear home!  We started things off with Hunterbug turning 7!  Too bad he was pretty sick on his special day but despite all that he was still pretty smiley & cheerful.

 

 

We've had this book for years about a pig who makes his friend a birthday cake (but then ends up eating most of it before his friend sees it) so Hunter really wanted to recreate it.  As tempting as it was I did not eat his whole cake beforehand like the pig.

We have all become spaghetti monsters around here.  We probably eat it once a week.  But hey the kids absolutely love it, gobble it down, it requires absolutely no coercion for them to finish their plates & it's super easy & fast.  Enough said.

3 days later Emma & Justy turned the big 5!!!  I can't believe these two will be headed off to school next fall.  Emma asked me the other day what it was like to have TWO babies in my tummy.  I may have given here a little too much information.  Hopefully she will forget that conversation & still want to have children some day :).  They have all been a little obsessed with babies in the tummy lately & they want me to put a pillow in my shirt & trick Jeremy when he comes home.  I don't think he'd fall for that one.

 

 

They wanted to eat cake & donuts & play at the park so despite the gross weather we did just that.  Thank goodness for rain boots & fleece!

 

Playdoh loving & learning to cut with scissors.  It makes a big mess but boy is he entertained for a long time.

 

We have had a baby over to play lately & we now remember what fun a Bumbo chair is to have around.

 

I think it was the third weekend in January my parents came to visit bearing fun birthday gifts to open - books & socks for everyone!  I love that my Mom buys them socks because I never have to & socks are so annoying because they go through them quickly & they're expensive & the kids were grateful to get some exciting socks with cool designs :).

So instead of presents from us & birthday parties we convinced the kids that we could take them to an indoor water park.  At first we thought we'd go to the Great Wolf Lodge but then we discovered the Wings & Waves museum & water park in McMinnville & it was like half to a third of the cost!  It was a blast!  Just as much fun as Great Wolf.  It was such a wonderful day - hopefully we can do it again soon.

Afterwards we ate at Alf's restaurant - serving burgers & ice cream.  My Dad worked in McMinnville when we were living in Oregon when I was a kid.  Well back in the day, this restaurant invented a new burger & to come up with a name they held a competition.  The prize was a free burger meal each month for a whole year.  Well my Dad submitted the name All Day Burger & won!  I remember going there a lot & it was pretty unique because they had a pet monkey on display.  Well the monkey (a different one I presume) was still there, the All Day Burger was still there & so was a black & white picture of my Dad!  Boy he looks so young!  It was so fun to go back.

The famous All Day Burger

 

Hyrum had his 2nd Pinewood Derby & it happened to be on the day we celebrated Hyrum's 9th birthday!  He won the prize for overall fastest car & we are heading to districts in a couple of weeks.  I love that Hyrum just wanted to create the car & he didn't really want to race it at all.  (Jeremy convinced him to go anyway).  I just love that he's not that competitive.

Sometimes it's hard to get Hyrum to make up his mind about things.  But we finally got him to reveal that he really just wanted to play baseball to celebrate his birthday so we obliged & so did the weather.  I can't believe this kid is getting so big.  He will be double digits next year :(

I also love that he asked for a cookie pie rather than a cake - I much prefer pie too!

Life around here is all about compromise.  One morning everyone wanted me to play with them.  I had a request to play Ninjas, ponies & dinosaurs so........ we had the dinosaurs dance at the ball with the ponies & the Ninja guys were the band playing the music.  Everyone seemed happy & we played that for over an hour.

 

These three guys love to help me doing whatever- making banana bread, jam or mopping the floors.  It's fun to have so much help!  When Em & Justy turned 5 they were put in the dishwasher rotation putting away clean dishes.  Their reactions?  "YESSSSS!!!  I have been wanting to do this for so long!"  "When is it my turn???  I can't wait".  And even though it's been several weeks of being in the rotation they still get that excited about it.  Love it!

 

Taking after big brother!

Hyrum can get really giggly at night when I let him stay up past 8...

So when we arrived home from our Christmas vacation we found out that the house we are renting is being sold in June so we needed to find a new place to live.  Yikes!  That threw our plan for the next 3ish years right out the window.  We tried to find a place to rent but instead found our dream home.  We are in the middle of the process but things are looking great so we'll probably be home owners in a couple of months.  Here is our future backyard & fire pit.

 

Just another day at the beach!

  

Dallen drew this family picture the other day.  I thought it was Justy that drew it because Justy has just started drawing like this himself so I was shocked it was Dallen.  He drew 8 people instead of 7...hmmmm...

I had to take Hunter to see an ENT specialist in Portland so Havalah so graciously agreed to watch my other crazy kids.  It worked out perfectly because we got to celebrate Luke's birthday!

I love miss Juliette & Dallen together.  They are so cute.

 

Picture on the left is Dallen's of himself wearing a black diaper.  I am the other person laying down getting ready to change his diaper.  The picture on the right is Justy's picture of he & I together.  Love them both!

The laundry has been especially out of hand lately.  I usually am really good at staying on top of it but not so the last little while.

There is a itty bitty park not too far from our house that we have discovered & the kids love it.  I'm not sure why because there's not much to do but they prefer it over the other parks.  Maybe it's because we're always the only ones there?

  

Ahhhhh.. Short Sands beach my favorite place to go in the world (at least for now).  This was the best day ever.

 

 

 

love this smile

I get to volunteer in the school every other week.  Found this on display outside Hyrum's class.

Hyrum has worked really hard to become a self manager - a program they started for the 3rd, 4th & 5th graders.  You have to get all the teachers you interact with & the principal to sign off on it & show/prove that you are responsible & make good choices consistently.  Way to go Hyrum!