Week of February 16 to February 22

Well, the neatest thing for me this week was that my big brother came to visit me! He was here in Utah for business so he drove down from SLC to visit me in my house for the first time ever. (He is a bit of a homebody -- which we will boast as a virtue rather than a vice!) He and I got to chat for about four hours -- just him and I (not without interruptions by little people, of course, but still, pretty continuous). Wow! He's a cool guy! I really do like him. I was glad he could stop by.


This week marked the last official week of city-league basketball here in Springville. Megan and my last game was actually last week. We had a lot of fun and, on my league, Megan can drive in and score just about every time she has the ball. Also, too bad if you're the girl she's assigned to guard, because she will steal that ball from you every time! Here's a picture of our budding basketball star:

Wednesday night was Sarah and Kevin's last game. Sarah had one of her best games ever, grabbing rebounds, making shots, and stealing balls. She was even fouled on one of her shots and made BOTH her free throws! (Her dad said, "Wow, Sarah! Your mom can't even do that!" Nice, huh?) Here's Sarah:

Kevin did a great job as coach and Sarah learned a lot and had a great time, as well. Watch out for the future Skinner Family Women's Basketball Team!

Here's a funny blurb from our life. The girls have discovered The Brady Bunch and have been recording all the episodes to watch after dinner. It is very funny to watch them watch those shows. The other day, Peter pulled a large black box out from under the bed where Marsha and Jan had been telling secrets. My girls said, "What is that?" I had to tell them that it was a tape recorder! Weird, huh? The other funny thing was that when I mentioned that Alice was the housekeeper, Mariah said, "No! She's the Grandma!" That really made me laugh. It just goes to show how much our Grandmas help around here!

Oh, I also had temporary color put in my hair, which is what my friend who does my hair recommended for "color virgins." LOL It should last about eight weeks I was told. The good news is that I really like it! Most people can't tell because it is so close to my haircolor. I had to ask Kevin if he noticed anything else different about my hair besides my new haircut. LOL

Week of February 9 - February 15

This week the unthinkable happened. My oldest daughter became a . . . teenager! How could that be?? Wasn't it just a few weeks ago that I lay in bed wondering how she had grown old enough to be a kindergartener?Isn't she beautiful, though? She's kind, too, and confident and smart and athletic and talented. She's much better than I ever could have dreamed her to be -- even from the moment I first fell in love with her when they placed her in my arms. So, even though she is "old" now, I can't complain. It's been a lovely thirteen years. Happy Birthday, Savannah!

Here is the chubby, little imp who is reminding me that I get to start all over with her:

She eats solid foods now, of course, so we had to do the "messy baby-food picture." You will notice how she has two spoons of her own in her hands. That's because after she stole my first spoon, I got a second, and then she stole that, too. So, yes, it's a three-spoon job. She sure is happy, though! Also, she has stopped doing the cute baby-consonant sounds and has moved on to monster noises. We can hardly have a conversation at the dinner table because of all Beth's hollering! I just watched her roll from her back to her stomach. Just now! Oooh, mobility is not too far away!

I hope you all noticed my poll in the top corner of my blog. Please take a moment to cast your vote. I have always thought that when my hair started to go grey, I would just leave it. Unfortunately, I didn't count on the reaction my children would have. My three oldest, all at different times, have looked at me with these big mournful eyes and asked, "Mom, are you getting OLD?" I guess they think that if I have grey hair then I am going to kick the bucket any day. They have been laying in bed imagining themselves as orphans. Poor dears. Still, maybe this is an important lesson for them to learn -- haircolor has nothing to do with how hale and hearty a person may or may not be! AND, growing old is not something to be afraid of. What do you think? Here's your chance to have a say!

Have a great week!

Week of February 2 - February 8

So, I had this terrific brain wave about three weeks ago that Kevin and I should take our kids to the circus! It happened to coincide with finding free children's tickets offered for a circus coming to Orem (which is just ten minutes down the road). Funny, that. But still, it sounded like a great idea. Afterall, it's winter and yucky and we needed something fun to look forward to. Also, circuses are much more affordable than trips to Hawaii (or trips to anywhere for that matter). AND we had never taken our kids to the circus!! You can probably see from all my enthusiasm that I had my family pretty hyped up over it in no time. We twins and I checked out books from the library about the circus and talked about what we might see. We were all pretty excited. Finally the day arrived! We had planned to go to the 4:00 show (it was a Monday) so the kids wouldn't be up too late, but Kevin forgot about an appointment at work so we had to go to the 7:30 show. Still, we were ready to have fun. Here is all of us in our seats waiting for the circus to start:

It was a small circus, of course, but they still had elephants and bears, lions and tigers, and even scooter-riding poodles. It was a good taste of the circus. They didn't have any tight-rope walkers and the trapeeze act only used one swing, but they had a guy who balanced atop a big stack of chairs and another guy who ran along a giant pendulum thingy. These last two really had the older girls on the edge of their seats and hiding their eyes. At the intermission, Megan asked, "What if he fell and died?" I said, "That's what makes it so exciting is that it is so dangerous!" and Megan said, "Exactly! And if he did die then we would all feel terrible because we're the ones who paid to watch him do it!" This made me laugh. She's right! What were we doing at the circus anyway??

In the end, it was a great memory-building experience. Unfortunately, we did all get very tired and the twins started whining to go home. Here is a picture at intermission. Notice the expressions on the faces of the twins:

We went on a Monday. On Wednesday, we were driving in the car and Cheyenne said, "Remember when we went to the circus? Let's do that again sometime." To which Calianne responded, "BUT NOT ME!!! I DON'T WANT TO GO TO THE CIRCUS!!" It took me awhile to calm her down. A little post-traumatic stress going on, you think? And then on Friday, Calianne said to me, "Remember when we went to that circus that had only one trapeeze and they didn't throw candy at us?" When I assured her that I did, she said, "Let's not go there again." So much for treating your kids to all the traditional joys of childhood! I am having a great time laughing over it, though, so there you go.



We had preschool at our house this week and the letter was "L." So, on Tuesday we learned about the Liahona (sometimes living in Utah is so cool) and we dressed up like Lehi and the Liahona told us where to go. Of course, sometimes we did things wrong and the Liahona stopped working. Then we had to repent before we could continue! We also made our own Liahonas out of clay. That was a hit! On Thursday, we did lollipops. I told the kids the story of the lollipop tree and sang the songs. That will forever be one of my favorite preschool memories, all those little faces staring at me, completely enchanted by the thought of the lollipop tree and listening to the story in the song I was singing! Then we made real lollipops. To wrap it all up, we colored lollipops and ice cream cones, cut them out and pasted them on our tree pictures. It was great fun. Oh, and we played Looby Loo, of course. :)

Week of Jan.26 - Feb 1

This week Savannah got to skip school and go to work with Dad for a full day. What fun! Kevin didn't schedule any clients for the day, because that would be awkward and unethical to boot. Instead, Savannah got to attend his meeting with his interns, meet everyone in the office (as did his new intern), and (most fun of all) got to be with him while he recorded for the radio. She reported that she was too scared to say anything beyond, "Hi," but that she considered singing. What a girl! Too scared to talk, but maybe not afraid to sing! She also got to do some unchaperoned exploring of the office building as well as some running down the halls in the as of yet unoccupied half of the building. She seemed to have a great day and her Dad had a great day sharing it with her.

Bethany turned 7 months old this week. Why did she have to do that? She has started to give hugs. This is great when you can get her up on your shoulder and get her arms around your neck. If you don't, then she hugs your face enthusiastically and that can be quite painful! She is so cuddly and loveable, though, so I never stop her. She often goes from a seated position down to her belly, but she is not crawling yet. I am thinking, that is probably a good thing!

We had basketball games and pictures this week and they were great fun. We also had bookclub here at our house. I got to play basketball this week over at the church and Kevin and I went to the gym a couple of times. The girls and I are still wringing the time out of each day to do some sewing. Overall, we are all doing well. Hopefully, you are well, too!