Boys Will be Boys

Quinton loves playing with his cousin Triston when we go to Rigby. They're starting to get along really well now. They played for hours the other day in the water (note the soggy diaper) and even strutted their stuff shirtless.

Fast Food

Here's the video that I mentioned in the post below.

Cute Little Girl

I finally broke down and bought some bows and flowers for Clara. I'm glad I did because she is really cute! Here are a few pictures of her cuteness.

First Meal

We have started feeding Clara rice cereal and, well, she's terrible at it. She really likes the food, but all she does is stick her tongue in and out. Here she is trying it for the first time.

Cutie Patooties

I'm so glad I have a sister with a nice camera who is willing to do photo shoots of my kiddos. They're always happy to smile for Aunt Jeni, too.

Barry's 26th Birthday

Barry turned 26! He's really getting up there. We took it pretty easy on his birthday and had a  picnic in the park. I think his favorite part was the BYU season tickets I got for him. I thought there would be a Barry-shaped hole in our ceiling he was jumping and yelling so much. He works super hard, though, and totally deserves it!

At the park for our picnic. 

Barry took Quinton fishing a couple days before. I think he already loves it!

Getting Ready for Summer

Barry is finally done with Spring semester! Woohoo! He got a week off and we enjoyed it thoroughly. Tomorrow he's back to work with a summer class and internship. Luckily the class is only two weeks long and the internship shouldn't be much longer.

We celebrated my birthday recently and Barry got me some nice running shoes and a beautiful framed saying that says:

"Friendship isn't a big thing, it's a million little things."

This was really special because we talk a lot about how it's the small stuff that makes our relationship so great.

He also knows what else I like:

And he made me an awesome birthday cookie because I don't like cake very much.

This past week we went and visited Barry's sister, Sarah, in Rexburg who just had a baby girl. She already had three boys, so a girl is pretty exciting. Barry played with the boys a lot to give Sarah a break. Sidra is an adorable baby!

 Here I am with the four crazy kids at my mom's house (Clara, Connor, Triston, and Quinton).

Then on Saturday we spent a day in Oakley with Barry's dad. We just mostly hung out, napped, and had a wiener roast (it's Barry's dream to be able to start a fire in his own yard someday!)

Quinton had a fun time playing outside and is already starting to get a tan!
I hope with summer coming we'll all stop getting so sick all the time. Clara is getting over an ear infection today and Quinton just got over ear infections and tonsillitis, but now he's coughing again today! It never ends! I just wish I could do more to help them. 

Family Pictures

Jeni took some family pictures for us because these kids are growing too stinking fast!

Our First Walk of the Year

So we got out our double jogging stroller I bought when I was pregnant with Clara, sewed up a hole in it, and got all ready to go on our first walk as mommy and company. It went pretty well, walking around campus and then over to Caldwell park. Of course as we reached the farthest point from our house, Clara decided enough was enough and was done with our little walk. I tried to make it okay by letting Quinton out to run around and I held her for a minute, but as soon as she got back in the stroller she was upset again. So I took a deep breath and started the trek home. That's when our lovely walk turned into mommy sprinting (which was really a very slow jog) the 12 blocks or so home because Miss Clara was very upset. I guess I was nervous that Clara was going to get heat stroke or something because I sure felt like I was. And it didn't help the situation much whenever Quinton would lean over and grab her binky out of her mouth and stick it into his own. Well, needless to say, we made it home and Clara stopped crying the last block or two before it was all over. The lesson learned here is that mommy needs to get in shape and staying closer to home is wise. 

Here's a picture of Quinton in his new booster seat. As you can tell, he is ecstatic.

Conference, Grandpa Jenks, and Easter

We've been busy the past couple weeks. We went to Oakley for conference weekend and Barry's Grandpa Jenks' funeral was that Monday. It was a nice celebration of his life and it was good to see family. Quinton had a lot of fun each day playing with his cousins. We had a couple close calls with some Miracle-Gro and a fall in a hole, but he survived. He tripped and was walking funny and after a lot of debate we took him to the emergency room where he proceded to walk perfectly normal. The nice thing was that they weren't busy and we got to see the doctor that delivered Quinton. Oh, and he got a Dum-Dum, so he was ecstatic. We slept in our tent trailer for the first time and except for running out of propane for the heater the first night, all went well.



Quinton and Clara have been sick lately. I can't wait for them to get better. I feel so helpless as a parent sometimes when there just isn't much you can do for such little kids. Clara looks so sad with her runny eyes and Quinton wakes up from coughing. It really stinks. I think we're on the downhill of it, though. This picture is of Clara the other day. She was so pooped out from being sick that she fell asleep holding her toy in the air.
Quinton is getting really good at letting us know what he wants. He says "please" and "thank you" all the time. Now I just need to get him to respond to me saying "stop" and "no." Having a toddler is really teaching me what patience is all about. I've never really been a kid person until having my own so each day my mothering abilities are definitely stretched and developed.

This first picture is of Quinton's dinner tonight. He must have thought the tomato sauce would make a good facial. It was gross. 

Clara is really fascinated with herself. She was playing on her playmat and managed to get really CLOSE to the mirror and she was smiling and cooing at herself for quite a while. I can't believe how fast she's growing. I packed up her 0-3 month clothes today, which is always traumatizing. Sigh.

Last weekend we went to Rigby and had an Easter Egg hunt before Connor's blessing. It was sunny all day until the kids stepped out the door to get the eggs and then it started raining. But they had fun anyways. Quinton really got into finding the eggs. We had a little hunt the next day at our house and after he got all the eggs we showed him a basket with toys and candy in it. He didn't want that, though. He just took the eggs out of it and was on his way to find more.

Barry only has 3 more weeks of this semester and then he's done! Of course he starts summer school right after that, but it's nice to be moving along. We are renting our place out and moving in a couple months probably to the Idaho Falls area where Barry hopes to do an internship. We'll see where life takes us from there!

Spring Break

For Barry's Spring Break we were lucky to go up to Island Park and stay 5 days in my parent's timeshare. It was fun and very relaxing, especially for Barry who has a ton of school work to do. We swam, slept, ate, drove, swam some more, watched movies, and played with grandparents and my sisters and their families. Barry and I even got to play racquetball. He might have beat me in points, but I think I got him in style. Quinton had a ball playing with Triston and Johnathan as they wrestled around the condo. I think Clara's going to have to toughen up to withstand his rambunctious ways. In the meantime, she was all smiles for Connor. Thanks Grandma and Grandpa for the fun time!

Here are some pics of the trip:

After Triston left, Quinton was very entertained with Rumikubs and a diaper box!

Since we got back we've had to get in the groove of real life again. Barry's working day and night on papers and I chase Quinton even more now that he discovered climbing. He definitely has a lot of energy! Last Saturday my mom and Shari came and we went to a fair at the Holt Arena, which was a lot of fun.

I just took this picture today. Clara is getting so big! I took out the playmat today and she loves it! She even got ahold of the parrot once or twice.