in a nutshell...

so here's a smorgasbord of tidbits from our lives for the last month...

ben had a business trip in washington at the end of march, so we decided to take advantage of cheap fares and tag along. joel, kadin and i came a few days early and stayed with kadi and joel and then we drove down to ben's parents house for the weekend when ben flew in. here's kadin, joel and carter having a "popcorn party," their favorite activity before bedtime.
grandma and grandpa shafer have lots of trains for the boys to play with and they always push them around on top of the coffee table. sadly, this has done a bit of a number to their nice, new coffee table, so grandpa mike made a new train track for the kids that goes right on top of the table... brilliant! happiness for grandma and grandpa and fun times for the boys!
brock and emily graced us with a visit earlier this month. man, we miss you guys... we're pulling for a job for brock in the bay area!

ben and i ran the salt lake city marathon last saturday. for all the gory details, click here. this was our first time back to utah since moving away in october. it was great to be back. morgan and nate blessed their precious, little guy, sayer, the day after the marathon, so we were lucky to be able to be there. thanks for putting us up morg and nate! it was a great week, filled with lots of fun times with family and friends and lots of yummy food. and yet again, i was a lousy picture taker... ben and i took a couple of pictures in the morning before our marathon and that was it. not a single picture of sayer's blessing, my family... nothing. nice huh? i really need to be better about that.

i'm so proud...

i know everyone thinks that their child is really smart, but my child is honestly a genius. no really. (don't worry people, i am joking... a little bit). this morning joel was begging me to help him put together this new fish puzzle i picked up for the boys last week. i had to get in the shower, so i told him to work on it by himself and that i would help him when i was done getting ready. i came out of my room and was shocked to find that joel was just finishing putting the 50-piece puzzle together all by his lonesome. i gushed at how proud i was of him and i don't think i've ever seen him smile so big. it was so cute.

and, of course, like most little boys, his favorite part of putting puzzles together or building a tower with blocks is messing it all up when he's done.

a little word from the not-so-wise

lest you think your sweet toddler is snoozing away like the little angel you think he is, i would recommend checking on him.... RIGHT NOW! or you might find this:


better yet, i advise us all to invest in video baby monitors. yes my friends, that is none other than desitin...


i didn't take a picture of joel because he was freaking out and beside himself, but, yes, he was covered in the desitin as well... in his hair, on his face, covering his shirt, all up and down his legs, under his fingernails, etc. don't worry, joel is still alive... i didn't strangle him or anything, although i did call ben and tell him he better get home from work soon before i DID. i just put all my rage into scrubbing and cleaning that greasy, thick, nasty stuff. thanks to ben, everything is spic and span again and there's not a stain to be found on any of joel's sheets, blankets or clothes, although ben has some nasty open wounds on his knuckles from all the scrubbing. and most importantly, joel is perfectly fine... he didn't eat it, thankfully, and he seems to be recovering emotionally from witnessing a very angry mom. :)

the big D

isn't disneyland just so fun? i know, i'm a dork. but i seriously had such a blast there this last week. my boys loved it. and luckily, ben, who was there on business and quite depressed that he didn't get to be apart of our little vacation, was able to come for a day and half. i've noticed something about myself... i love to scream on the big, fast rides. it just makes it way more exhilarating. try it next time you go to an amusement park. it works, i swear. my favorite screamers were space mountain, splash mountain, the tower of terror (across the way at california adventure), california screamin' (also at california adventure), and the river rafting ride at california adventure where we all, like true nerds, donned our full rain-poncho regalia. too bad for you i don't have a picture of that.

this was joel's favorite ride. oh wait, i lied. the train that goes around the whole park was joel and kadin's favorite, but this was a close second. that's my sister, hailey, with him. they also loved the submarine finding nemo ride.... very cute. and the buzz lightyear ride, where you get a gun to shoot all the evil emperor zurg targets. dad's the only one who got above 100,000 points. he pretty much rocks.

my dad and ben. they're just not manly enough, i guess. :)

hailey and alexis.

and of course, everyone has to take a picture in front of the gate with mickey's head made of flowers... we just didn't get to it until our last night after dark. next time, though, we're going to get a great shot.

sadly, that's all i have. man, i suck at taking pictures.

the flu

last week my kids got the stomach flu.... again. i swear, i'm going to shoot myself if my poor kids (or poor me) have to go through this again... like ever. i think this is like the fourth or fifth time they've had the flu in the last 18 months.

ben left on a business trip to chicago on tuesday night the 12th. after midnight that night, joel, woke me up covered in vomit. the poor thing. he spent all night throwing up over a dozen times. i "slept" on the couch so i could hear him, did about 3 loads of laundry, cleaned the carpet on several different occasions and changed his sheets and clothes countless times throughout the night. kadin slept through all of this, but woke up the next morning at about 7:00 dry-heaving. after kadin woke up, i finally called my aunt and uncle in tears, asking if they could run to the store for me and get some gatorade. kadin didn't throw up until the next night, again at about midnight, but thankfully only once. they kept throwing up and having the runs off and on over the next 4 days. it never ended! what happened to the 24-hour bug?! it was so heart breaking to see them so miserable.

ben finally came back on thursday night. lucky him. he timed his trip perfectly to miss the bulk of the nastiness. we were supposed to leave on friday evening to drive down to newport beach to hang with my family for the week, but ben sent me to this fabulous hotel for the night instead so i could have a break and we could give the kids a little more time to get better. i shopped my little heart out AND, most importantly, i slept in. it was a perfect rejuvenation from the nightmare-ish last 3 days.

but saturday morning, kadin threw up again. he seemed to be fine, so we figured his stomach was just a little queasy still and that he was all better, so we took off for southern california that afternoon... whooops. bad idea. 45 miles away from our destination, he threw up all over himself, his blankets and his car seat and then for added measure he threw up again after we had just finished cleaning everything up. yuck. so... after kadin got better, and then after i got better, then after alexis got better, oh and after my mom got better... we all had a great trip! jillian also got the bug, but it hit on her flight back to utah after she had left us. sorry jill.

i'll post the FUN stuff from our trip in a couple of days...

a little jaunt to las vegas

ben had to do some business in las vegas a couple of weeks ago, so we all went along for the ride. ben's boss has a beautiful home in henderson that we stayed in one night and then we stayed at the luxor for a couple nights... which was really weird to do with our kids, but hey, that's the hotel that priceline.com assigned us. we went to the shark reef aquarium at mandalay bay, which our kids LOVED and are still talking about. we played "rockband" (kind of like guitar hero, but add in some drums and a microphone and rock your heart out) with the borgersons, some friends of the shafer family from the lovely town of aberdeen, wa. we went hiking with my friend lark and her family. we had a great time. as always, we didn't take nearly enough pictures, but here's a few...

we found kadin like this lounging on one of the beds at the boss's house... he's totally into living in the lap of luxury.

joel and kadin driving the rental car... they wish.


hiking with the fillmores. lark's little girl, afton, was seriously a pro hiker and climber, and lark was a true champ - she went hiking while 9 months pregnant. yes, that's right folks, 9 months pregnant. she rocks.


good times were had by all.

"hail to the prophet, ascended to heaven!"

the beloved prophet and president of the church of jesus christ of latter-day saints, gordon b. hinckley, passed away tonight at the age of 97. my heart is broken, yet rejoicing. what a tremendous man! president hinckley has been the prophet of the mormon church for the last 12 years; half of my high school career and the whole of my adult life... it goes without saying that this man has had an incredible influence on me and i love him with all of my heart. i can just picture him right now, walking arm-in-arm with his sweet wife, marjorie... cracking silly jokes for her. i thank my God for such a special man to guide us through this era of our lives.

cool new find

my boys, like most children, are fascinated by ANYTHING that moves... cars, trains, planes... they have all sorts of toys of these kinds and they love to watch shows about them: the movie "cars," "thomas the tank engine," etc, but there hasn't really been anything about airplanes they could watch. several months ago, my good friend, janaya, introduced me to this sweet website that all your little ones will just LOVE...

"andy's airplanes."

it features a new, animated DVD series for kids, all about a cute, friendly little guy named andy, who flies around the world learning about history and, of course, airplanes. you can get the first episode, "andy meets the blue angels," here. my boys get so excited about airplanes and can spot an airplane in the sky no matter how tiny, (isn't it amazing how they can do that?) so they totally dig this show. joel runs around the house flying his airplanes saying, "i want to be a blue angel someday! they're AWESOME!" this, by the way, is a direct quote from the first episode. and since kadin does everything that joel does, kadin does it, too. sigh.... so cute. andy's airplanes also has a fan club your kids can join. you can check the fan club out here. so, if you're looking for something new, fun and educational for your kids to watch, or if you need a cool gift for your nephew or your kid's next birthday party, i would totally recommend this. joel and kadin just adore this show, and anything that teaches good values, gets my kids excited about life and gives me 5 seconds to fold the laundry is an A+ in my book.

the new pad

here's some pictures of our new apartment in sunny, beautiful california.

the kitchen:



the dining area:


the living room:


the boys' room:

the play room:

"o christmas tree..."

take a gander at this beauty.... (i mean the tree, not ben)



this is the first year of our marriage that we went all out and got a "for real" tree. i went to target and bought 2 packs of 350 lights thinking that would be plenty and that i'd have a leftover strand.... think again whitney. i had to run back to target and get ANOTHER box. all said and done, we ended up with over 900 lights on our tree. okay, so maybe i went a little overboard, but i think our tree is pretty much totally awesome ...don't tell me if you don't agree.

isn't christmas wonderful? sigh... i hope you are all loving life and this wonderful holiday season.