Ayres Insanity

  Tonight the kids were talking about daddy's jobs and they asked if I was allowed to work at Union Pacific, I said yes, but that I didn't want to. They asked "if you had a job would you quit to take care of us?" When I told them that I did quit my job to take care of them, the looked at me, shocked and puzzled and said "YOU WORKED???" I don't think they understood why I was laughing.

  Kid conversations are the best and   I've had some fantastic conversations with my kids lately, a couple that we're worth remembering so enjoy!   The other day the boys were discussing flies at breakfast, they were talking about how flies only live for one day, then Taevin asked me is there is a heaven for flies to go to when they die. Being still early and not really paying much attention to the exchange, I just said "I don't know bud". Ryler immediately looked at Taevin and said, "Well if mom doesn't know then NO ONE knows!" Boy have I got those kids fooled!   This morning I was sitting on the steps with Zoey, she looked at me and said very matter of factly,  "mommy, you have boobies."  Me: "yep, I sure do"   Z: "to feed Aspy?   Me: "yep, to feed Aspen." She looks down and says "mommy, I don't have boobies." Me: "you'll have them when you get bigger." She smiles and says "I wan

Zoey and her little friend Sadie   My little Zoey turned 3 one week ago. She is getting so big and more beautiful every day. A blond haired blue eyed princess, or should I say queen? Because she seems to think she's the queen, and is obsessed with princesses, particularly Cinderella. In fact this morning she was waving around her sparkly wand while wearing a tiara and singing bippity boppity boo!   For weeks before her birthday she begged for a pink Cinderella bike, and who were we to resist such a cute face? So a Cinderella bike it was, and the look on her face was worth every penny!    When I imagined having a daughter, I pictured a quiet, delicate girl who loved tea parties and princess movies so I was in for a surprise when I got Zoey. She is loud, spunky, wrestles with the boys, and has never showed any interest in a tea party, but she is becoming more and more girly every day.   She has recently given up the binky which has been a challenge to say the least but we&#

  What a crazy year so far! Last year we started discussing the option of selling our house and moving somewhere closer to Russ' jobs. We went back and forth for a long time being hesitant to leave the place we'd grown to love so much, but finally felt strongly that it was time to go.   We wanted to get Taevin through the school year before moving so we didn't list until March. Things went well, so well that we got ELEVEN offers the first weekend we showed our home. I couldn't believe it! Apparently it was a sellers market. We accepted an offer that ended up falling through after a few weeks so we started showing again. We had several more showings but one couple came through that really stuck out to me. Stuart and McKenna, they were a young family with a cute little girl. They reminded me so much of us when we first moved there, and I hit it off with McKenna immediately. They loved my house and I knew that they were the ones that I wanted to have it. They put in an of

  The last few months have been well, crazy with the move and such (I've been meaning to post about that), but I had an interesting experience in church a couple of weeks ago.   It was a particularly difficult Sunday for the kids, they're always a challenge but for some reason they were all going crazy through sacrament meeting that day. I had to keep taking the baby out and the other three wouldn't stop  wrestling and pestering each other and Russ and I just kept giving each other that look of total exasperation! I was standing in the back bouncing Aspen on my hip when the closing song finally came. It was the week of Pioneer Day so the song was "Come, Come Ye Saints" and the 2nd verse hit me as it never had before.       Why should we mourn or think our lot is hard?      Tis not so, all is right I looked at my  family a few rows up and realized that all IS right, I have a beautiful family, and we were all there together, even Russ, which is rare. All

  Since we just had our big vacation I told Russ not to do anything for Mother's Day, but I knew that Taevin had big plans since he kept talking about my big surprise. I had suspected breakfast in bed and sure enough, Sunday morning I woke up to pancakes and eggs, a necklace made out of a matchbox, and a couple of really sweet notes from Russ and Taevin. I have to say, my favorite part of the whole thing was when Russ came to me on Saturday night and asked me how to make pancake batter! His talents definitely lie somewhere outside of the kitchen but despite his lack of experience, he did a great job.    Simple and sentimental, that's my kind of Mother's Day!

  On the 29th of this month is our 10 year anniversary. We knew we wanted to do something big this year, so instead of paying off debt and fixing cars with our yearly tax return, it was time to make some memories, and that's exactly what we did.   We wanted to surprise the kids so we packed and loaded the car the day before. I woke them up early on April 23rd and told them that dad's car had broken down and we had to go pick him up (he had worked the night before), we met Russ at his mom's house and told them. Their reaction was not what I had expected, they just smiled suspiciously and went along with it. Taevin told me later that they thought we we're kidding. They got more excited once we arrived at the airport.   Because we fly standby we had to fly into San Diego and then to LAX. Given the number of kids we have and how young they are, I'm sure everyone who saw us at the airport was hoping that we weren't on their flight but for the most part the kids did

  Oh my! My sad neglected blog. All of the time I think to myself "I should blog about that!" Why? Because my kids are hilarious and they give me plenty to blog about, what they don't give me is the time to do it, and to be honest, by the end of the day I'm so exhausted I can hardly remember to brush my teeth, let alone everything funny that happened throughout the day.  Today was no different other than the fact that I'm making a point to remember some of this day.    It's 10:30pm and I just tip toed into my kids rooms to kiss them goodnight, they're so stinking cute when they're asleep and now I'm going to take a much needed moment for myself and blog about my day instead of wasting time watching another one of those train wreck reality shows like last night.   It was rainy and dreary from the moment we woke up and I can still hear the rain pounding on the windows now. I knew it would be a rough day since we'd be cooped up inside all day, b

  Taevin informed me the other day that he was a "grown man" and that I should stop treating him like a little kid. While I'm not so sure about the grown man thing (and I'm certainly not ready for it!), he does have somewhat of a valid point, after all, he is 8 now.   This post is clearly overdue, but Taevin turned 8 on January 16th and was baptized on February 2nd. Eight is a big birthday! My parents made sure that my 8th birthday was extra special so it was important to make sure Taevin's was too.   Grandma Airplane (my mom) came into town for the big event and got him set up with everything he needed to start the scouting program and although we opted to not do a big party with Aspen still being so little, dad took the boys out for a fun filled evening at classic skating.   The baptism went perfectly, we were surrounded by supportive family and friends and Russ did a great job with the baptism and confirmation, Taevin was such a big boy. I couldn't have

  This is not a recipe blog, however, I have a few recipes that are staples at my house. The kind of stuff that when you make it, people gobble it up and ask for the recipe (yeah, it's THAT good).   Well, this particular recipe that I'm about to share is one that I got while I was on my mission and it's one of my favs! In fact, every year I celebrate the coming of fall by making this soup, buying a new sweater and warming my pumpkin spice scentsy. I started this tradition several years ago because I'm so in love with the fall season.   Anyway, my sister Jenny called today and asked for the recipe so I figured I'd share it with whomever might be interested. Enjoy! Lemon Chicken Soup 12 C. Chicken broth 1/3 C. Lemon Juice 1/4 C Butter 1 Pint Heavy cream 12 oz. Bowtie pasta (or whatever you've got) 1 1/2 C cooked chicken 1 1/2 C. Sliced carrots 3/4 C. Chopped celery 1/4 C. chopped onion (optional) 1/2 C. Flour 1 1/2 C Water In  a

  What a crazy month! So many changes in our lives, Aspen being the biggest change, but by far the best. Despite her being fussy, high maintenance, and the cause of sleepless nights, we love her to pieces!   Christmas was... well, not what we'd hoped for this year but such is life. Russ has been working 70 hours a week and with a newborn it was hard to get out, but somehow we managed to get the Christmas shopping done (thank goodness for online shopping).   Zoey got sick a with croup a few days before Christmas but we got her in to the pediatrician and got her treated and figured we'd be OK to go to my big family party on Christmas Eve, (which I really didn't want to miss since I had been working on my grandma's gift, a picture quilt, for the last 3 months and was dying to see her open it) anyway, that would've been the case, but despite my best efforts, she got Aspen sick. I took her in the morning of the 24th assuming that the pediatrician would give her a littl