Santa Phobia Returns!!!

Logan got out of school early today so we thought we would take a trip to see Santa. While Makenzie seems to have recovered from Santa Phobia, Ashleigh recently developed it. Actually, Makenzie was crying in line but Jeff was able to calm her down. There was no way she was sitting on his lap though and Logan at 70 lbs is getting too big. Maybe Ashleigh would have been fine if we hadn't handed her off to some strange guy in a red suit and white beard. We don't know what Logan is doing with his arm. Good Times!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

The kids had a great time decorating the tree. Ok so two of them decorated while the other snacked. As you can see, Makenzie even dressed up for the occasion!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING

Here is one of my favorite pilgrims.

Are those turkey feathers?

And for your entertainment my oldest pilgrim sings a Thanksgiving song.


I have many things to be thankful for this Thanksgiving but most of all I am thankful for my three wonderful children and my husband. Hope you have a great holiday!

Happy Birthday Jeff!

A Birthday shoutout to my husband. I can't imagine my life without him. He is a great father and husband! HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

AND THE EMMA GOES TO . . .

Last night our the young women in our ward had their Evening in Excellence at the Emmas. We had everyone dress up in prom dresses and passeD out "Emmas" (gold spray painted Mrs. Butterworths syrup bottles) to all the girls. We had a red carpet event with the papparazi too. This is why I love my calling. It's so much fun and we really do have great young women!

9 is FINE

Oh how we love this girl! She turned 9 months on the 18th. She has the best attitude and continually smiles, except those on occasions when your not feeding her fast enough. She is a pro-crawler, she babbles all the time, and she is pulling herself up to furniture and walking around it. She also loves her brother and sister - her face lights up everytime they enter the room. She still doesn't have any teeth but makes do and gums things to death if she's eating table food.

HALLOWEEN HAPPENINGS

Makenzie and friend Macie Trick-or-Treating on Halloween. They had a great time.

Here is the cutest witch you ever did see. See only kept the hat on for the picture.



My sister Pam came down for the weekend so all the cousins, but a few got together Saturday night and went to the trunk-or-treat at the church. Logan is on the right. He was 4-arms from Ben10. They had a good time together.

AHH MEXICO!!

We just spent 5 days in Rocky Point and had a great time. It was a nice little family vacation. We went down with some friends from our ward.

Ashleigh spent most of her time at the beach under the easy up shade. She loved just sitting in her pack n play and enjoying the nice breeze that came off of the ocean. I guess she got a little hungry and tried to eat the pole. The older kids loved the beach. Makenzie spent her days playing in the sand. She thought the water was too cold. She also didn't want to swim with the fish. One morning there were so many schools of fish close to the shore. They were so thick that the water looked black.
We couldn't keep Logan out of the water. This was on Sunday and we told him to only put his feet in the water. By the time we headed back up to camp he was wet up to his neck. He loved being out there in the waves. The current kept on pushing him down shore and we had to call him back several times.

Dance Class

Why Kids Should Not Answer The Phone!

So today at 8am the phone rings and I answer it not realizing that Logan answered it too. It was the automatic substitute system from Chandler Schools calling. So I'm listening to the job and all of the suddent I hear a beep and the recording says "You have accepted the job for Friday September 27th starting at 7:45." What??? Logan was trying to be helpful by following the recordings directions and pressed 1. Needless to say I was a little upset - I hadn't planned on working today. Note to self - do not let the kids answer the phone anymore! He gets to help with the laundry and cleaning tomorrow that I had planned to do today while he was at school.

The girl loves singing. Even when interruped she can pick up where she left off. She especially like singing to her baby sister. I'll have to get it on video and share.

Big Box Fun

We got a new slide/swing set the other day but who cares! Boxes are more fun! We thought of closing it up shipping them off to Grandpa in Germany - but we'd miss them too much!

8 GREAT MONTHS

She is doing so good! She is on solid foods now. She eats 2 jars at breakfast, lunch and dinner and also drinks a bottle after each meal. She is crawling all over. We can't keep track of her most of the time, she is so fast. Just within the last two days she has started pulling herself up to things and standing. We love her bunches!

Jeff P Simpson

I found this on Janeil's blog and thought my photo turned out pretty good. What do you think. Try yours at www. simpsonizeme.com

Eating

Here are some cute pictures of Ashleigh eating and making a mess.

Ashleigh the Great

Asleigh has started to crawl but really wants to walk. All day she practices getting onto her feet. She can't figure out how to get her head off the ground though.

SCHOOL DAYS, SCHOOL DAYS

First Did you know I'm doing a preschool. We sacrificed our playroom and tranformed it into a preschool room. Here are the results. Not bad if I do say so myself.

Second. Here is my baby boy on his first day. Interesting fact - his teacher and I went to the same junior high & high school. We were on the cheer squad together. The picture above is him lined up ready to go. The one below is him posing in front of the mass chaos that is the first day of school. I always prided myself on not being a sappy mom, but as Jeff gave him a father's blessing this morning I found that my eyes welled up with tears. I held it together as we dropped him off but the tears are right on the surface and probably will be all day. Man I love that kid!!

Logan's 6

Logan turned 6 on Thursday. We took him and 5 friends bowling. They had a blast but we forgot the camera. We can't believe how big he is. We love him and can't wait to see what he'll accomplish this year. He starts school next month and is so excited.

Good 'ol Friends

While we were in Utah we were able to visit some of our friends "The Beans" who moved up there last year. We had a great time and they took us to the Dinosaur Museum at Thanksgiving Point. This is my friend Serene.
Makenzie & Bella
Logan & Maddie
The whole crew.

4th of July Fun

We were able to go to Utah and visit Aunt Pam's family this year for the 4th. Because of daylight savings times fireworks didn't start until almost 10p.m. As you can tell, Logan enjoyed the show. He loves the fact that fireworks can be set off right in the street in front of the house.
Makenzie loved sparklers. That is until she droped one and picked up the wrong end. She burnt her finger pretty good and decided she had had enough.
Ashleigh also enjoyed the light show, but what she really liked was my sister's 100lb golden. She would laugh every time Skipper would come into the room.

Like Father, Like Son

So the other day Logan handed this note to Jeff and then left the room. It says - I accidently saw Fourarms and Heatblast (Ben10 toys we had gotten him and were saving for his birthday). Jeff said he used to be shy like that. He remembers one time when he went to Thatcher after being away for a while and wanted to show his friend his new GI Joe action figure. To "break the ice" he wrote him a note, put it in the door, rang the bell, and left. He then came back a few minutes later and asked his friend, "Did you get my note." And then things were just like he had never left Thatcher.

It is such a fun stage (other than the amount of paper Logan goes through in one day). I love him writing me notes. It's fun to read them and try to figure out what he is saying. He is such a sweet and thoughtful kid. He writes notes all the time like I love you mom, from Logan. It's great!

5 months and counting

Ashleigh is 5 months. They are so fun at this stage. She loves standing in her exersaucer. She tracks things around the room. She takes 1 long nap during the day and 2 shorter naps. She loves to be held upside down. She loves ice cream. She is starting to notice when we are eating food and wonders why she isn't eating with us. I think she is ready for cereal.

Flagstaff - Family Reunion

We had the opportunity to go to Flagstaff for a family reunion a couple of weeks ago. Jeff spent the first part of the week hiking Havasupi then we met up with him on Thursday. He had a very enjoyable time hiking, except for the hike out. We enjoyed the cooler evenings. This is a picture of us at the top of the Snowbowl lift. Ashleigh had had enough by this time. I think her ears were bothering her.

This is on our way down. She's all better now. She went everywhere with us. She is our most portable kid. She slept good away from home. She's so fun to take because she just goes with the flow.
We went to a deer farm about 25 miles west of Flag. We saw deer, reindeer, camels, llamas, goats, pigs, monkeys, and birds. Logan was his usual self getting right in there, Makenzie on the other hand had to be held by Aunt Marcie.
But she soon got over her fear and even pet the animals.

SUMMERTIME FUN

We went swimming at a friends house last week. Ashleigh loved it, although you can't tell by her face. She just kind of hung out. It was so relaxing it put her to sleep. Logan and Makenzie started getting their sea legs back. They were a little scared at first but did better the longer they swam.

GIRLS' CAMP IS OVER ... and we all survived

I had the wonderful opportunity to go to girls' camp this week. This is a pictures of the girls in our ward - all 26 of them (all but one) came to camp. We had a great time. We spent 4 days in the woods and loved every minute of it. We have a great group of girls in the ward. It was exciting to see them interact and include one another. I absolutely love girls camp. It is such a unique and wonderful experience for the girls and their leaders to really get to know one another and feel of the spirit daily.

Thanks to my great husband for supporting me in my calling. I truly love him and don't know where I'd be without him. Thanks to my great mother-n-law who supported my husband by coming to stay with my family when I was gone. Her willingness to help made me feel more at ease as I was away from them, in fact I didn't cry over missing them until last night. Thanks to my children for being so great and easy going. They are good to always go with the flow. Thanks to friends and family who helped mine by entertaining my children or calling to check up on them and Jeff.

I am so happy to have had this experience. It was great!

KINDERGARTEN HERE I COME!

Logan graduated from preschool yesterday. The bucket on his head is an astronauts helmet, not a trash can as you might have thought. This week he wants to be an astronaut so (in his own words) "I can sit on the moon and touch the stars and see shooting stars up close." We are so proud of him. He as learned so much this year. He is starting to read, he writes all of the time, and can add & subtract! WAY TO GO LOGAN!!

4 MONTHS ALREADY

Ashleigh is 4 months old today. We can't believe how fast she is growing. She has started reaching for things and is able to get a hold of them. She is also sleeping between 10 and 12 hours at night.

She is deciding whether or not she's a binky or fingers girl. I have found her in her crib in the

morning on her tummy with her fingers in her mouth.

She started rolling over from her back to her tummy. She also started rolling from her tummy to her back, but doesn't do it as often.

It's been a great 4 months. We love you Ashleigh!

HAPPY MOTHERS DAY

Today at church we had a great sacrament meeting about forgiveness. There were 4 speakers and each one was asked to talk about a Christlike attribute their mothers exhibited. Each one touched on their mother's ability to forgive. They all reference Presiden Faust's talk on forgiveness. If you didn't have the opportunity to hear or read it you ought to. http://lds.org/conference/talk/display/0,5232,23-1-690-24,00.html The bishop's wife talked and said she both loved and disliked sacrament meeting on Mother's day. She said she loved it because if your child happens to be one of the speakers you get to hear all about the wonderful things you do and because you get to hear the primary children sing. She said she disliked it because when other people talk she goes through a check list in her mind and checks off the things she does as a mother. She says she often leaves the meeting with a whole list of things she needs to work on as a mother.

Last night I was not the most patient with my children. Friday I returned from a quick trip to San Diego with a cold and have not been able to sleep or breathe well. Anyway last night as soon as they went to bed Jeff went to the store. They were not quiet and did not go to sleep right away. I had to go in several times to "remind" them that the needed to close their eyes and go to sleep. Makenzie kept talking and all I could hear is Logan saying, "Mom, Makenzie is on my bed. Mom, Makenzie keeps talking." Finally I had to put Makenzie in time out on the couch in the front room for them to take me seriously. Jeff came home put Makenzie back in bed and they all fell asleep. This morning Logan came in and gave me this letter of appology. What a sweet hearted little boy. It wasn't his fault I was so upset last night. It was my choice in how I reacted to them. I love him for his sweet and giving spirit. To translate it says - I am sorry for making you mad. Will you please forgive me? To Mom. I am so thankful to my Father in Heaven for giving me the opportunity to raise these special spirits. I hope that I can always do better at being a mother and work on my own checklist.