Audrey's Baby Blessing

Photo and video editing at www.OneTrueMedia.com

This morning was the blessing of newest niece, Audrey. Here is a quick slide show of the pictures I took. She is adorable - plus the fact that she has 3 older brothers and is the first girl in her family gives me hope!!
Enjoy

Boys, Boys and more Boys!!

Tonight our cousins from Utah are here visiting....they have 3 boys and we have 3 boys.

3boys + 3 boys = (I know you are thinking 6 boys but you are wrong!) It equals....NOISE!!!!!

But they are fun and while I may be a little frazzled, they are having the time of their life. Plus, I really am grateful that my kids have such great cousins for friends! Here they all are....

Christmas Day Dancing....

So, Christmas has come and gone once again and I feel a sense of accomplishment that I am documenting the day for once. I never got the Christmas cards out, I still haven't mailed Melanies presents, and there were people I wanted to talk to or see that I never did. But at least I am writing this so that someday my family can look back on what turned out to be a fun and special Christmas day.

As every Christmas day does...it all began with Santa. I don't know how many more Christmas mornings will come when all of my boys still believe so I am trying to treasure what I have left. He brought Pokemon and Transformers for the older 2 and Tyler got his beloved Rocking horse that he refused to get off of all morning! For Sean (and the rest of us, but mainly Sean) was an xbox 360 so that he can once again have fun playing with his brothers online. Especially important now that they are all once again living all over the country! They seem to have duped all the wives into believing that the only way they can possibly keep in touch with each other is through the xbox. But, it works and they hang out more than ever before so how can we complain! Santa also brought me a much needed laptop that I am currently LOVING! Trust me, Santa knew how badly we needed one, our computer was on it's dying breath!

After Santa, my parents came over and we opened the rest of the presents. It was fun as usual!! Tyler was especially cute making sure that every piece of paper was off before he moved on to the next tear! Maybe he is getting OCD from Melanie! We cooked Christmas dinner and just relaxed, playing with all the new toys.

THat night Jason and Jackson went to spend the night with my parents and Sean was busy reading a book I gave him. So, Tyler and I spent about 30 minutes dancing in the kitchen. Sean gave me an ihome that goes underneath my kitchen cabinets ( I LOVE IT!) so Ty and I put it to good use! It may seem like a small thing, but it made my Christmas. He was so cute and so into the music. We just danced and danced. I am sure the neighbors thought I was a crazy lady dancing by myself since Tyler was hid by the cabinets but oh well. It was one of those moments that make all the hard parts of being a parent seem insignifigant. They may be crazy, dirty, loud and stubborn boys but they sure are worth it. I really do love being their mom.

Family + Friends = FUN!

Just before Christmas we had an extended Eames/Parry family Christmas party. Everyone came for the good food and to see family that we wish we could see more often! Of course the night wouldn't have been complete with out the "talent" show, although I think we would all agree that some of the families came with more talent than others. Richard told stories of the "good ol' days", Alan recited his legandary "Night before Christmas" (which I will never tire of hearing!), Wanda had a fun quiz on neat facts about all the parry kids, Eden sang Silver bells, the Darell Parry girls did an awesome job on the Cindy Loo poem, Dene's son played guitar and the Eames all danced around to Alvin and the Chipmunks! I just sat back and laughed but the boys seemed to have fun! Oh - I am sure that Rex did something great but was dealing with kids at that point and was out of the room.



Jackson brought Christmas presents for his Uncle Vaughn. He knew exactly what he wanted to get him and he found it within minutes of getting to the toy section...a toy helicopter. After all, what else could your cool uncle who flys helicopters want?


All in all it was a great night and I feel greatful to be a part of this great family that is so full of love and laughter!


Enjoy the pictures and we can't wait until the next extended gathering!







Here is my newest nephew Samuel...isn't he cute!?

Concert Video

Here is the video clip that I was finally able to download. It isn't the whole song but you will get the idea of it all! Jason is right in the middle behind the kid who keeps boppin his head to the music! Make sure you pause the music player at the bottom of the page or you will have both sounds streaming in!

Make an on-line slide show at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Christmas Concert

Last night was Jason's Christmas Concert. I am working on getting a short video that I took uploaded but in the meantime, here are some of the pictures I took....

In case you are wondering what is wrong with Jackson's shirt - he had a little too much fun with the water fountain right before we left!

Photo Shoot Fun!

So today I did a photo shoot with Jackson and Tyler and while I got some great shots, I also captured one of their typical, everyday fights! Here is how it goes...

I tell Jackson to lean over and kiss Tyler on the cheek,

As you can see, Ty wanted nothing to do with his brother, much less have his lips anywhere near him!
Jack tried to make things better...



...but was shot down again...



At this point Ty realized that he was in trouble and that Jackson was upset. )Although I tend to think that the pout on his face had more to do with knowing that he was in trouble!)





Finally they made up...

Once Jackson was out of the picture and Tyler felt as if he was getting his way, I was able to get this great shot!

Hope you enjoyed this glimpse into our daily life in a house full of crazy boys! It is always entertaining if nothing else. Yesterday, I was working on the computer when Jackson came in and calmly stated, "Mom, I think the toilet is broken." (Not a great thing to hear from your 4 year old!) "What do you mean broken?" I asked "Maybe you should come see" replied Jackson. I hurried to the bathroom to be met in the hallway by water flowing out of the bathroom and Tyler standing there smiling at me like he had made his own personal swimming pool. When I looked into the bathroom, the plunger was laying in a very full, overflowing toilet! Apparently, while Jackson was cutting up a bar of hand soap using playdough tools, Tyler thought it would be fun to unroll the entire roll of toilet paper into the toilet. The toilet on the other hand wasn't thrilled about this idea. Of course instead of coming to get me right away, they decided they could fix it themselves. I am sure they were thinking something along the lines of...'we are the sons of a Home Depot man, why would we need to consult mom to fix something as manly as a clogged toilet!' So, while it was a lot to clean up, at least it was just water and toilet paper! I know it could have been worse! Later in the day, when enough time had passed that I could laugh about the whole thing, I wished I had taken a picture of the overflowing water and the plunger in the toilet. After all, a picture is worth a thousand words, especially when it deals with a toilet!

Deck the Halls!

So, since I haven't blogged in a while I have a bunch of pictures that have been piling up. Here they are!
The first few are from a few Saturdays ago when we decided to put up all of our Christmas decorations. I had forgotten how much I enjoyed putting up lights when it is 70 degrees outside! The kids had a blast with it, although I think that their favorite part was getting to climb on the ladder!
The next few are from our family tradition that came a little early this year. Normally we do homemade gingerbread houses on Christmas eve, but I thought I could get off easy this year and buy the pre-made ones! No one else agreed with my plan so we made that one early and I will be baking lots of gingerbread in the coming weeks! Oh well, making this one did help to put us all in the Christmas spirit!
The last few pictures were taken last night. Jason's school had a Story book night. All the kids came to school in the PJ's, with thier blankets, pillows and stuffed animals. Then some of the students and teachers read them Christmas stories. They sang Christmas songs and ate cookies. It was a fun night, wait....I take that back. It was fun for Jason and Jackson....I spent the evening chasing a very stubborn Tyler around (he wouldn't take a nap yesterday - FUN!).
Anyway, I hope you all enjoy the pictures and that you are all having a great Christmas Season!

Need a good laugh?

So I have been really sick with a bad head cold and I haven't felt like posting. But, I figured we could all use a good laugh so I am bringing back business time. It always gives me a good laugh no matter how many times I watch it. Hope you like it just as much. Make sure you press pause on the music player at the bottom of the page before you press play or you will miss all the HILARIOUS lines in the song!!

Horse Riding Fun!

Last night we were able to go horse riding with the YW. We all had so much fun and the boys loved it! They woke up this morning asking when we were going again and Jackson now wants a pony of his own! I should have expected it!Here are all the pictures! Enjoy!

Thanksgiving

Here are a few pictures from Thanksgiving - I didn't take very many! We went down to Casa Grande with Sean's family and had lots of fun! Sean and I brought our ice cream maker so most of the pictures are of the cousins making ice cream! It was Yummy!

Jackson's Preschool Program

Here are the pictures I finally got downloaded from Jackson's preschool program. He was so cute and sang all the songs with all the hand motions. Not bad considering most of the kids just sat there and stared out into the audience! Not that there is anything wrong with that, after all I have been watching Jason stare into the audience for 4 years now!!

Oceanside/Disneyland

Last October we took a family vacation to Oceanside, California. Sean's brother Denney and his family joined us and we had so much fun! I had too many pictures to choose from so here is a slide show of the trip! Enjoy!

Photo and video editing at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Kids, Dogs and Neighbors!

It is now my belief that when you dare in life to hope for a nap, all goes terribly wrong! Yesterday morning we all woke up to a fairly normal morning. Jason liked his poster, although he made me add that one of the things he didn't like were Barbies. I don't know how I forgot that one! Anyway, Tyler started the day with a minor cough. We took Jason to school, went to the gym, and came home to get ready for Jackson's preschool. Tyler's cough was a little worse but I wasn't all that worried yet. By 2 when we picked Jackson up Tyler was wheezing, had a minor fever and was telling me that his ear hurt. So, we picked up Jason and I scrambled to find a doctor to get him into. It wouldn't have been so hard if it wasn't a new doctor and new insurance but we got in around 4. I left the doctor with, no kidding, 6 prescriptions. When he is healthy, people have a hard time believing me that he has health problems because he looks so healthy. (I also found out yesterday that he is 95% for weight and 99% for height) But trust me, when he gets sick, he gets really sick! So, I went to Target to fill the prescriptions, thinking that they would be faster than Walgreen's. Nope! An hour later I finally left with most of the medicine, I still have to go back for one more today. Then it was off to work on getting everything ready for Young Women in Excellence, which is tonight! For those of you that don't know, I work with the Young Women at Church and this is the night that they get to display and talk about the projects they have worked on through out the year. It is a big deal. Anyway, I did photo shoots a while back of all the girls individually and together so I have been trying to get them edited and framed so we can display them tonight. I think I finally got home around 10 at which time Jason starts feeling sick and the dog is seriously hyper. I think it was 11 when we all fell asleep. That would probably be enough to qualify as a crappy day, don't you think? But no, it doesn't end there! At 12pm Tyler woke up crying and while I got him some Tylenol I heard the dog whimpering. I went to see if she needed to go outside only to find that she had thrown up multiple times all over her kennel! It was beyond disgusting. I threw the dog outside so that I could wipe the tray down and she started barking, it had been seriously 2 or 3 minutes and all of a sudden my doorbell rings. There was no way I was going to answer, I knew it was my neighbors who I have now decided are mean. They came over once before when she was barking in the middle of the day and I was so nice about it. I felt bad and have tried to make sure she doesn't bark from then on. This was the first time since and they couldn't make it for 3 minutes! Plus, it was the middle of the night and I was home alone! I was too scared to answer the door! I let her inside, cleaned everything up and gave her a bath which put me back to bed around 1:30. At 6:30, Tyler was awake and therefore so was I! Good news is that I can tell he feels much better!
Well, I hope you all enjoyed my story. I am sure I have now convinced some of you to run from the idea of have kids, dogs or even neighbors! Luckily, all days aren't like that one or I would be running too!

Homework

Last night around 11pm I was finally finished with all the laundry and getting ready to go to be when I suddenly remembered that Jason is the "Star of the Week" at school this week. No big deal, right? Wrong! He was supposed to complete an "all about me" poster over the weekend with pictures of his family, himself, his favorite things, things he hates and what he wants to be when he grows up. AHHH!! I had completely spaced it. So, I couldn't send him to school with nothing, I mean he is only Star of the Week once in 2nd grade...so needless to say I was up until 12:30 in the morning completing the project. I don't know what I would do without the internet! It sure helped to have instant access to pictures of soccer balls and pokemon! He left with the poster this morning and although I know he has no appreciation for what I did to make it for him, my hope is that years and years from now, the pay off will come! On the other hand, if I had just managed my time, remembered the project and been more on top of things, it would have been done before last night arrived. So basically, it's my own dang fault! Oh well, maybe I can take a nap today...not likely but it's worth a shot!

Siblings

I have a strange phenomenon occurring in my home. Here is the situation...my 7 year old, who for his entire life has seen me as the beacon of all truth and knowledge, has recently decided that I know nothing. I am wrong about everything and have to be the most clueless person on the earth. Now, I am not saying that there aren't days when that is completely possible, but is he supposed to realize that? I miss being the smartest person he knows! The one he comes to will all his questions, easy and hard! I just wasn't prepared for this stage of parenting yet. I thought I had a few more years! On the flip side, my four year old has reached the worship stage. He has started listening to everything I say and treating it as absolute truth! Even to the point that he now makes his bed in the morning without me asking. Maybe he can sense my sadness and is trying to pick up the slack! Who knows. I would be thrilled with a happy medium but I have a feeling I will be dealing with this for a while. Any suggestions from all the seasoned parents out there? Or at least stories that are even worse, that might make me feel better or at least give me a good laugh!

Sean left today for a week long conference in Dallas. So, we are hanging around in the house in our PJ's, slowly cleaning the house. Jason doesn't have school so I think I will do something fun with them later, maybe a movie.

Anyways, I should probably end my session of procrastination and get back to work. Have a great day everyone!

Veteran's Day

So in honor of Veteran's Day I decided to Blog about Sean. I could just make fun of him in a nice teasing sort of way (wait...is that where Jason gets that from?!) But the truth is that he is a great husband and an incredible father and I am lucky to have found him. So, you ask, what is he up to lately? Well, he is working a ton right now for a section of Home Depot called Capital Projects. Basically they have 80 stores in AZ, CA, NV, CO and UT that are under some sort of remodel. He is the project manager for around 20 of them. (I think that's right, he can comment if I have messed up any of this) So, he flies all over from Sunday night to either Thursday or Friday and then recovers on the weekends. This will happen for the next 6 months and then Home Depot will send him to the next phase of training. Other than that....today he is my hero because he fixed the TIVO. And everyday he is my hero for what he does for our family and his willingness to serve our country, we sure are proud of him. Happy Veteran's Day Babe, I love you!

!!COMMENT ALERT!!

So I have gotten a ton of complaints from all of you that couldn't leave a comment without having a Google account. So, I fixed it!! Comment away people!

Old Friends

So it just struck me as I was sending out a mass email to let everyone know about this blog that some of the people I was informing, I hadn't spoken to in FOREVER! Considering that they might be confused about what our family was up to I decided to take this chance to fill them all in. As I am sure they would tell you with much enthusiam, I am terrible at keeping in touch with people! So here is my feeble attempt to fix that!

The Eames time line

Fall 2002 - Sean joined the Air force

Most of you knew at least this but since this is where the journey began it seemed weird not to include it!

March 2003 - We moved to Germany

At first it seemed like one of the worst times in my life but it became one of the best. Some of my best memories and best friends were in Germany. I miss it, I miss the culture, the sights, the travel, the people, but most of all I miss the closeness you felt with friends when you are all on the other side of the world and just trying to make the best of it!

April 2005 - Moved to California

California was short, only 7 months. However, during this time my oldest son started kindergarten and my youngest and 3rd son was born. As short as it was, it was great. While usually it takes me at least 6 months to make a place seem like home...we met Jesse and Trisha our first week there and the next 7 months we like an extended party. Living on base was a blast and everyone should at least get a short amount of time to live near the ocean!

November 2005 - Moved to Cheyenne, Wyoming

It was cold and windy and the baby ended up in the Hospital for 8 days with RSV but other than that we bought a home that I loved and even more than the home, I loved that my soon to be best friend, Melanie, lived about 7 houses away! We met great people in Cheyenne and it was a lot of fun. However, Sean was coming up on his 4 year mark in the Air Force and started considering getting out. We thought and prayed a ton and it felt like the right thing to do so right after he pinned on Captain, we made the break! He started applying for jobs and I started freaking out!! Despite all my freak outs ( which Sean could tell you about in great detail) he ended up getting hired by the Home Depot to manage one of their stores. That should happen next summer/fall - he is still in their training program call the Store Leadership Program. He is still doing the reserves so at least I can still go to the commissary!

April 2007 - Moved to Arizona

Home Depot brought us back to Arizona which is what we consider to be home, it was a hot summer but I am finally starting to remember why we moved here now that it has cooled off! If anyone wants to visit, now is the time! :)

So, there it is in a nutshell. Sean and I have 3 sons and a dog and we are doing great in Arizona. It has been a wild ride at times but I wouldn't trade it for the world!

Any questions? you will just have to leave a comment! HA!

Random Thoughts

So ever since Jason has had to read 2, 60 page books every month for school I have been searching for a book that would actually interest him. You know, a book that he would want to read so that it wouldn't seem like such a chore. I found it!!! I couldn't be happier. It is called Dragonling by Jackie French Koller. The best part is that it is the first in a series and I can't get him to stop reading! Maybe it was because I was an only child but I have such great memories of reading as a child. I want to give my kids that gift. So, now that Jason is set that probably means it is time to start teaching Jackson to read, maybe after Christmas....

On a much more disgusting note, this morning I found bella trying to eat one of Tyler's poopy diapers. I gagged and then tried to wash out her mouth in the sink, which she wasn't too crazy about. Needless to say she is banned to her crate for a while until I can deal with her again! It is a good thing I know that as cute as puppies are, the good parts about owning a dog don't come until you put in a good two years. It is all about perspective, right?

So I am singing in Church on Sunday. It will be my first time singing in the new ward. I can't say I am nervous because I am doing one of my favorite songs that I have performed a bunch before but the first time for new people always rattles me a little. But I think it is a good rattle, I always seem to have a shaky note at the beginning of the song that ticks me off. Then my competitive nature kicks in and the rest of the song goes great so that no one will remember the shaky note!! oh well.....

I know this blog has been really random but I havent' written in a while. Since the blog was random I decided to add a random picture as well! This was last Febuary on our trip to Puerto Vallarta. It sealed the deal for my kids that they are going to learn spanish and grow up to be dolphin trainers. It think it was the moment they saw one of the trainers "surf" the dolphin that did it for them!

off to clean the house!!! See ya next time :)

Halloween Pictures

So I finally got my camera to work - I still don't know what wasn't working but suddenly it worked. Anyways... here are the halloween pictures! I have more to add soon but these should at least get me started! As you can see, we were all fighter pilots. It was a fun night but I have reached the point where I am ready to throw all the candy away!!

Happy Halloween!

So, it is Halloween and i don't feel stressed at all! That seems to be a big accomplishment these days! We carved our pumpkins last night which was lots of fun. Tonight I will take some pictures of the kids in thier costumes with thier pumpkins. We have a Halloween party tonight and I am going to go in a party mood, honest! it should be fun and I am looking forward to seeing these friends of ours, it has been a few months. The only downfall of today is that Tyler has been sick. It is just the normal cold/flu but with him everything turns into something bigger. So I have been busy keeping his temp down and keeping up with the breathing treatments. Yesterday he got so bad Jackson asked me why Tyler was "speaking duck" Even I had to admit that his breathing had a quacking sound to it! Years ago this would probably freak me out but years of dealing with it has given me a sense of humor. You do what you have to I guess.
We are going to Tucson this weekend to stay with Sean's cousin Jimmy. I am looking forward to it. We have wanted to go stay with them since we moved back but haven't had a full weekend where Sean wasn't working until recently. They have 2 boys that fit in with my boys wonderfully so I can't wait. Plus they teach a ballroom dance class for adults every friday that we are going to take. Sean said he would do the class only if I promise to let him lead. I do have an issue there but I am going to try to give up control!! :) I will let write how it went next week! When Jason was a baby we took a bunch of classes and they all seemed to end (maybe not all, but a good portion) in an argument. I just need to admit that Sean is a better dancer than I am, that is the first step to recovery! Anyway, it should be fun!
Happy Halloween everyone! Hope it is a great one with lots of butterfingers, snickers and very few tootsie rolls and dum dums! Let's boycot the cheap houses!! :)

It was a long week.....

So last week while Sean was gone I managed to break both the TV and the computer. It just seemed like everything was going wrong and all I was doing to cope with it was getting mad at the kids. So, Saturday I had a mini break down and then we went to the ward Halloween party. Fun! Actually it wasn't that bad, I just don't feel like I fit in this ward yet. So I spend my time with my family and just say hi to a bunch of people that I really don't know very well. This was my whole fear about moving back to Arizona. Everyone here seems to be surrounded by friends that they have had forever and a ton of family. I miss being in military wards where you were all in similar situations and were looking for new friendships. I know I am just complaining because I have hit the 6 month point and that seems to always be my breaking point when we move somewhere new but so much has happened lately to add to it all. Sean has been gone a ton which is never fun, the only person I do spend time with from family is moving away, and I got together with a friend of mine from years ago before I joined the church. I loved seeing her again but it also made me sad that I have missed out on so much time with so many friends I had made over the years that I no longer talk to. One of the downfalls to moving so much in my life is that I feel like I am always starting over and I am terrible about keeping in touch with people. I am trying to change this, Melanie is helping :), but sometimes it just feels lonely. I think Sean being gone is adding to the feeling big time. But on the bright side, I haven't given up... I keep trying and I know it will get better, it always does somehow! In the mean time, I am determined to handle things better this week than last. I refuse to yell at the kids as much and I am going to be more organized about my time. Of course I say that while I waste time on the computer but I needed to get this all out. So Melanie, if you were wondering why I didn't call this weekend, now you will have an idea! :) Anyway, I am off to do loads and loads of laundry. It is going to be a better week even if I have to force it!

Oh, I added the picture of the kids just for fun..