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Wednesday, January 18, 2012
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Christmas break
Here is a look at the fun we had down in Spring Texas this Holiday season.
Christmas Eve we enjoyed a big family dinner and Christmas play :D. Rhett was the shepherd. Clara and Avery were little sheep. The one thing that I did miss from my family was singing Christmas carols around the piano!!!
Christmas morning we all gathered at Grams and Grandpa's house to open gifts. We were spoiled! As a family we all got little motor boats to enjoy out on the pond at Grams and Grandpa's new property. We went to church and thoroughly enjoyed their very talented ward choir. Very beautiful Christmas music.
mingling in the midst of all of our fun was a ton of sickness!! :( so sad! Morgan's girls got a cold just days before we came down. Soon the Hulsberg family became tummy sick. Then on the ride down one of the Bullock kids got tummy sick and arrived ill to Grams house. Then the most of the Bullocks began to get ill. Then poor Morgan had 2 girls come down with sick tummies. Then Grandpa Tolman got flu-ish and Grams wasn't doing too great. Then Rhett got a bad cough along with the Hulsberg kids. The 2 babies Clara and Avery both got fevers for a couple of days. Rock got flu-ish. Poor Maddie got sick and her little guy had a couple of go arounds with a sick tummy. Clara caught the coughs from Rhett and they are both battling that.. did I forget anyone?!! Morgan, Raf, Steve, Damon, Keely, and I are about the only ones that didn't come down with anything.
BUT
Despite all of that we had a BLAST!! We enjoyed each others company for the while we were all down there together. We played a lot of cards, ate a lot of food, and did a lot of shopping. We celebrated Morgan's new baby due in March throwing her a mini shower out at Olive Garden. We spent a lot of time down at Randy and Jill's new property and some of us even camped out there one night. We even got some big group family photo's done on the property that turned out beautiful.
We celebrated New Years at Morgan and Raf's home. So much fun, food, cards and fireworks. It was a blast!
We loved the weather. LOVED IT! Rock and the guys spent a lot of time down at the pond working hard to help Randy get some things done and moving it along. I enjoyed being able to go for looooong runs and not being too cold or too hot. The grass had become very green and alive again after the damaging drought this summer and the moisture in the air was divine! We enjoyed a going to dinner to the Suddarths home, a friend from Rocks mission. It will be fun to see them more if we end up moving down that way.
Rock enjoyed doing some manual labor after this long semester behind the computer and in the library all the time. But he was still busy networking while we were down there. He met with several people, had a couple interviews, and spoke on the phone with a guy. It is making us anxious as graduation approaches but excited that we are seeing there is hope in finding a position after school is done! CRAZY.
That was our most exciting break. So fun. But, it is good to be home and have responsibility again. Now, just to get my kids better!
Rhett and his wings on the way home.
Roman candles were Rhett's Favorite
Clara would often hang out in this little nook in the Tech Protect "office".
It looks down into the foyer and she would yell so everyone in the house could here her.
Stinker smile
She loved these little chairs.
You could tell she just felt so grown up sitting in them.
Clara and Avery took turns sneaking snacks from each other during meal times.
Clara and cousin Avery
Her little peoples!
Rhett opening his stocking
little shepherd boy
Decorating Christmas cookies.
I'm pretty sure he ate a good 3/4 of the cookies he decorated
and more of the stuff he was suppose to use for the decorating.
oh well.
little sheep
Christmas Eve we enjoyed a big family dinner and Christmas play :D. Rhett was the shepherd. Clara and Avery were little sheep. The one thing that I did miss from my family was singing Christmas carols around the piano!!!
Christmas morning we all gathered at Grams and Grandpa's house to open gifts. We were spoiled! As a family we all got little motor boats to enjoy out on the pond at Grams and Grandpa's new property. We went to church and thoroughly enjoyed their very talented ward choir. Very beautiful Christmas music.
mingling in the midst of all of our fun was a ton of sickness!! :( so sad! Morgan's girls got a cold just days before we came down. Soon the Hulsberg family became tummy sick. Then on the ride down one of the Bullock kids got tummy sick and arrived ill to Grams house. Then the most of the Bullocks began to get ill. Then poor Morgan had 2 girls come down with sick tummies. Then Grandpa Tolman got flu-ish and Grams wasn't doing too great. Then Rhett got a bad cough along with the Hulsberg kids. The 2 babies Clara and Avery both got fevers for a couple of days. Rock got flu-ish. Poor Maddie got sick and her little guy had a couple of go arounds with a sick tummy. Clara caught the coughs from Rhett and they are both battling that.. did I forget anyone?!! Morgan, Raf, Steve, Damon, Keely, and I are about the only ones that didn't come down with anything.
BUT
Despite all of that we had a BLAST!! We enjoyed each others company for the while we were all down there together. We played a lot of cards, ate a lot of food, and did a lot of shopping. We celebrated Morgan's new baby due in March throwing her a mini shower out at Olive Garden. We spent a lot of time down at Randy and Jill's new property and some of us even camped out there one night. We even got some big group family photo's done on the property that turned out beautiful.
We celebrated New Years at Morgan and Raf's home. So much fun, food, cards and fireworks. It was a blast!
We loved the weather. LOVED IT! Rock and the guys spent a lot of time down at the pond working hard to help Randy get some things done and moving it along. I enjoyed being able to go for looooong runs and not being too cold or too hot. The grass had become very green and alive again after the damaging drought this summer and the moisture in the air was divine! We enjoyed a going to dinner to the Suddarths home, a friend from Rocks mission. It will be fun to see them more if we end up moving down that way.
Rock enjoyed doing some manual labor after this long semester behind the computer and in the library all the time. But he was still busy networking while we were down there. He met with several people, had a couple interviews, and spoke on the phone with a guy. It is making us anxious as graduation approaches but excited that we are seeing there is hope in finding a position after school is done! CRAZY.
That was our most exciting break. So fun. But, it is good to be home and have responsibility again. Now, just to get my kids better!
Rhett and his wings on the way home.
Roman candles were Rhett's Favorite
Clara would often hang out in this little nook in the Tech Protect "office".It looks down into the foyer and she would yell so everyone in the house could here her.
Stinker smile
She loved these little chairs.You could tell she just felt so grown up sitting in them.
Clara and Avery took turns sneaking snacks from each other during meal times.
Clara and cousin Avery
Her little peoples!
Rhett opening his stocking
little shepherd boy
Decorating Christmas cookies.I'm pretty sure he ate a good 3/4 of the cookies he decorated
and more of the stuff he was suppose to use for the decorating.
oh well.
little sheepSunday, January 8, 2012
Santa Clause
I think I may have posted before that Santa Clause came early to our house! We wrote him a letter and sure enough. He came. Rhett was way excited about it. Rock and I had fun being able to find a sitter to do the shopping together.... there was NO way I could have gotten away with stuffing things into the shopping cart with a 4 year old!
We were inspired by some friends and the things they do for their family as a Christmas tradition. I think we may have done it a little different and we're just going to feel it out for the next couple of years.. but we are going to do 3 gifts (like the wise men). One fun gift, one religious gift, and one learning gift from "Santa". Then we plan on giving nicer stocking stuffer gifts as well. Then as mom and dad we plan on giving a gift from us. It may change over the year.. and we didn't do way great this year....
Rhett got a cool race car, a dog pillow pet, and a Book of Mormon story book. I made him some transformer jammies and we gave him some fun stocking stuffers that include this awesome light twirler thing... it's funny how the most inexpensive things are the kids most favorite thing. In his stocking he also got a recorder to play music on. He has fun with it .. but it is LOUD!
Clara got a bumble bee glove wash cloth, jammies that make her look like yummy peppermint icecream :D, and a musical walker. She loves dancing to it. We'll see how much she puts it to use now that we are home to use it!
I am just realizing how FAST this Santa stage is going to FLY by!! Rhett is almost to his prime years of believing.. then what will I do? They grow up too fast!
Later that day (since it was still before Christmas day) we went to the mall and decided to take Rhett to say THANK YOU to Santa for all his gifts and for coming early. Rhett was excited up until the point of actually sitting on his lap.. then he decided just to say thank you and that sitting on his lap was not for him. BUT we did have a Santa at the ward Christmas party and Rhett sat on his lap then.
We were inspired by some friends and the things they do for their family as a Christmas tradition. I think we may have done it a little different and we're just going to feel it out for the next couple of years.. but we are going to do 3 gifts (like the wise men). One fun gift, one religious gift, and one learning gift from "Santa". Then we plan on giving nicer stocking stuffer gifts as well. Then as mom and dad we plan on giving a gift from us. It may change over the year.. and we didn't do way great this year....
Rhett got a cool race car, a dog pillow pet, and a Book of Mormon story book. I made him some transformer jammies and we gave him some fun stocking stuffers that include this awesome light twirler thing... it's funny how the most inexpensive things are the kids most favorite thing. In his stocking he also got a recorder to play music on. He has fun with it .. but it is LOUD!
Clara got a bumble bee glove wash cloth, jammies that make her look like yummy peppermint icecream :D, and a musical walker. She loves dancing to it. We'll see how much she puts it to use now that we are home to use it!
I am just realizing how FAST this Santa stage is going to FLY by!! Rhett is almost to his prime years of believing.. then what will I do? They grow up too fast!
Later that day (since it was still before Christmas day) we went to the mall and decided to take Rhett to say THANK YOU to Santa for all his gifts and for coming early. Rhett was excited up until the point of actually sitting on his lap.. then he decided just to say thank you and that sitting on his lap was not for him. BUT we did have a Santa at the ward Christmas party and Rhett sat on his lap then.
3 most exciting things ever ..
1. We took our first flight with both kids. It went amazingly well. Rhett had a blast and Clara was wiggly but did SO great!
2. Rock and I celebrated our 5th year anniversary!!!!! HOLY COW. We enjoyed a night out to Dave and Busters. Ate some good food and had fun playing games. My favorite was the coin drop machines..... I didn't do so hot.
3. I turned the big 25! ... yeah. I know. I look way older... It is sad how much having children ages you :( But I will say that I still feel like I JUST turned 20 :D I had the best birthday. Shopping, yummy steak dinner with the in-law's, and gift opening! I was so spoiled this year.
Rhett on the airplane!!
2. Rock and I celebrated our 5th year anniversary!!!!! HOLY COW. We enjoyed a night out to Dave and Busters. Ate some good food and had fun playing games. My favorite was the coin drop machines..... I didn't do so hot.
Not the greatest picture.. Rock and I in the Dad's Corvette :D
3. I turned the big 25! ... yeah. I know. I look way older... It is sad how much having children ages you :( But I will say that I still feel like I JUST turned 20 :D I had the best birthday. Shopping, yummy steak dinner with the in-law's, and gift opening! I was so spoiled this year.
Thursday, December 15, 2011
The things Clara has learned ... from Rhett?
She is getting so fun. From about mid October to now she has learned new things every week. We've loved it. Especially Rhett. She started to officially crawl about mid October and quickly got the speed to escape from Rhett! About mid November she started to pull herself up on things. By Rhett's birthday she started to slightly cruise along the furniture and by now she is EVERYWHERE!! up and down and all around. The last couple of days have been a blast as we've watched her dare to let go of things and stand!! She's not amazing..but she is daring and she can stand for a handful of seconds at a time.
She loves to do the stinker sniff. Crinkling her nose and sniffing in and out fast. Rhett gets her going on that one pretty bad. She loves to stinker smile for the camera. She shakes her head at no, no, no. She waves her hands to say all done and to tell Rhett to get the heck out of her face!! She waves bye bye....but with both hands.. cuz she's cute. not weird :D. She has a love/hate relationship with Rhett... but she adores him most of the time and just laughs so hard at him and with him. She loves to sit and watch him play. Rock and I have had fun watching from the living room as he plays and talks to her while she stares straight up at him. She LOVES to dance. Mostly to the them music to my Jillian Micheal's DVD. She loves her little singing chair. It is just her size and she loves the music.
Her most prized possession (besides a Binky and bottle) is her blankets. Why have my kids become attached to their blankets? She LOVES hers. Snuggles it, tackles it, chews it, and loves it.
She can be a STINKER though. Of course. She "runs" away when she knows you are going to tell her no.. It is so hilarious. A couple of days ago as we were wrapping presents we'd left to get some tape and heard the paper getting crinkled. As I ran back into the living room Clara flipped around and crawled in the opposite direction straight for the corner of the couch - that is often the place Rhett will run and hide when he is naughty. Did she learn this from him? - It was so funny we repeated it several times just to laugh... I shouldn't encourage her behavior.
She also loves to yell at Rhett. Especially at bedtime.. WHY WHY WHY? - She'll stand up. Drop her Binky, and Yell at the top of her lungs... just like she use to. When we go in to settle her down she quickly flips around and buries her head into her blanket like she is asleep... as I am writing this I am laughing so hard realizing that maybe she learned this from Rhett as well!!!! haha. When his is being loud I open the door and he flips around and into bed like he is asleep. FUNNY!! oh dear. My kids. How do babies learn these things!!!
She loves to do the stinker sniff. Crinkling her nose and sniffing in and out fast. Rhett gets her going on that one pretty bad. She loves to stinker smile for the camera. She shakes her head at no, no, no. She waves her hands to say all done and to tell Rhett to get the heck out of her face!! She waves bye bye....but with both hands.. cuz she's cute. not weird :D. She has a love/hate relationship with Rhett... but she adores him most of the time and just laughs so hard at him and with him. She loves to sit and watch him play. Rock and I have had fun watching from the living room as he plays and talks to her while she stares straight up at him. She LOVES to dance. Mostly to the them music to my Jillian Micheal's DVD. She loves her little singing chair. It is just her size and she loves the music.
Her most prized possession (besides a Binky and bottle) is her blankets. Why have my kids become attached to their blankets? She LOVES hers. Snuggles it, tackles it, chews it, and loves it.
She can be a STINKER though. Of course. She "runs" away when she knows you are going to tell her no.. It is so hilarious. A couple of days ago as we were wrapping presents we'd left to get some tape and heard the paper getting crinkled. As I ran back into the living room Clara flipped around and crawled in the opposite direction straight for the corner of the couch - that is often the place Rhett will run and hide when he is naughty. Did she learn this from him? - It was so funny we repeated it several times just to laugh... I shouldn't encourage her behavior.
She also loves to yell at Rhett. Especially at bedtime.. WHY WHY WHY? - She'll stand up. Drop her Binky, and Yell at the top of her lungs... just like she use to. When we go in to settle her down she quickly flips around and buries her head into her blanket like she is asleep... as I am writing this I am laughing so hard realizing that maybe she learned this from Rhett as well!!!! haha. When his is being loud I open the door and he flips around and into bed like he is asleep. FUNNY!! oh dear. My kids. How do babies learn these things!!!
Tolman Kids Stats
Clara and Rhett both had appointment last week. AND shots. I'm pretty use to this running around with 2 kids. But this appointment was rather eventful.
They made me strap Rhett down. Hold him on my lap. Wrap my arms around his arms and hands and clasps is legs between my legs. Yeah. I think they are dumb. I think they made it worse than it had to be and he wriggled more..... so. 4 shots turned into 6 shots and very VERY VERY sore legs for a few days. :( Other than that he was great. He is healthy. They checked his eyes and he can see well. He is 40.2 lbs. 42 inches tall (3.5 feet). Both in the 90%.
Our Dr. is pretty funny. Rhett gets nervous around him though... this time out of nervousness he kept spelling his name over and over again kinda sorta awkward under his breath. R-h-e-t-t, R-h-e-t-t, r-h-e-t-t... :D but he knew all his colors and shapes and whatever he was asked.
Clara did pretty amazing other than the shots as well. It was pretty hard for me to have to let Rhett sit there and SCREAM and cry from his shots while I held Clara's hands down too.. BUT they both got succors after. Clara LOVED that. She is getting bigger. AT 9 1/2 months old she is 18 lbs - 40%, 28 inches long - 70%, and her head is 17 inches - 25th percentile.. I am proud of her growth.. at 6.5 months she was 25% for head and weight and 50% for height.
They made me strap Rhett down. Hold him on my lap. Wrap my arms around his arms and hands and clasps is legs between my legs. Yeah. I think they are dumb. I think they made it worse than it had to be and he wriggled more..... so. 4 shots turned into 6 shots and very VERY VERY sore legs for a few days. :( Other than that he was great. He is healthy. They checked his eyes and he can see well. He is 40.2 lbs. 42 inches tall (3.5 feet). Both in the 90%.
Our Dr. is pretty funny. Rhett gets nervous around him though... this time out of nervousness he kept spelling his name over and over again kinda sorta awkward under his breath. R-h-e-t-t, R-h-e-t-t, r-h-e-t-t... :D but he knew all his colors and shapes and whatever he was asked.
Clara did pretty amazing other than the shots as well. It was pretty hard for me to have to let Rhett sit there and SCREAM and cry from his shots while I held Clara's hands down too.. BUT they both got succors after. Clara LOVED that. She is getting bigger. AT 9 1/2 months old she is 18 lbs - 40%, 28 inches long - 70%, and her head is 17 inches - 25th percentile.. I am proud of her growth.. at 6.5 months she was 25% for head and weight and 50% for height.
December so far
Ever since we'd returned from Imperial, Rock has LIVED at the school. Seriously. It has been the most busy past 3 weeks. As such is December.
We kicked off this lovely month with a birthday bash! Rhett turned 4 December 1st. Jamey and her kids came up to celebrate with us. We loved every minute of seeing them. Rhett decided he wanted to have an angry birds birthday ... until he saw Grants awesome party ... then he wanted a transformers party...but we stuck with the angry birds and he still loved it. I had a blast making his cake and planning his birthday.
The following Sunday at church they recognized his birthday in primary. Poor Rock now has a calling in the Jr. Primary and has to sit RIGHT behind Rhett and watch his silly, stinky, wiggly behavior. Rock tells me that when his teachers tell him something he responds " I'm four " to them. STINKER! Let me tell you. Rhett is a boy. But seriously. BOYS ARE SO GROSS!!! Just these past few months I've been told, heard, seen the yuckiest things by Rhett. But. I love that gross face. :D
I have been busy busy busy getting ready for Christmas. Running around town to buy gifts, make gifts, wrapping gifts and sending gifts. AND we had to go shopping for SANTA!!! So we found a sitter for that. Rhett is to old to get away with stuffing things in the cart. I feel like we are all ready to go! We are excited for Houston...but right now Rhett is excited for Santa. We wrote him a letter and asked him to come early to our home because we will not be here for Christmas day. He is coming Saturday! lucky little boy!
As I said, Rock has been living at school. It has been THE busiest semester yet with juggling both MSHR and MBA coursed and these past few weeks have been crazy. Early mornings and late nights. I have had to do a lot of single mom living. I've missed out on going to the gym as often as I had before and worked out with Jillian Micheals :D. Rhett loves to work out with me. We've eaten dinner alone a lot.
But now it is all over!!!!!!! Rock is done with his Masters in Human Resources Degree!! woot woot! We went out to a dinner celebration last night that was very nice. When students were encouraged to get up and say a few words one of the spouses stood up and said some things. She put everything very well and EXACTLY what I was thinking. How proud I am of Rock in seeing the hard work he has put into school. I have seen him evolve this sememester and handle many of his stressful times amazingly. Next semester will be MUCH less stressful. He is ready to have a bit of a break.
We kicked off this lovely month with a birthday bash! Rhett turned 4 December 1st. Jamey and her kids came up to celebrate with us. We loved every minute of seeing them. Rhett decided he wanted to have an angry birds birthday ... until he saw Grants awesome party ... then he wanted a transformers party...but we stuck with the angry birds and he still loved it. I had a blast making his cake and planning his birthday.
The following Sunday at church they recognized his birthday in primary. Poor Rock now has a calling in the Jr. Primary and has to sit RIGHT behind Rhett and watch his silly, stinky, wiggly behavior. Rock tells me that when his teachers tell him something he responds " I'm four " to them. STINKER! Let me tell you. Rhett is a boy. But seriously. BOYS ARE SO GROSS!!! Just these past few months I've been told, heard, seen the yuckiest things by Rhett. But. I love that gross face. :D
I have been busy busy busy getting ready for Christmas. Running around town to buy gifts, make gifts, wrapping gifts and sending gifts. AND we had to go shopping for SANTA!!! So we found a sitter for that. Rhett is to old to get away with stuffing things in the cart. I feel like we are all ready to go! We are excited for Houston...but right now Rhett is excited for Santa. We wrote him a letter and asked him to come early to our home because we will not be here for Christmas day. He is coming Saturday! lucky little boy!
As I said, Rock has been living at school. It has been THE busiest semester yet with juggling both MSHR and MBA coursed and these past few weeks have been crazy. Early mornings and late nights. I have had to do a lot of single mom living. I've missed out on going to the gym as often as I had before and worked out with Jillian Micheals :D. Rhett loves to work out with me. We've eaten dinner alone a lot.
But now it is all over!!!!!!! Rock is done with his Masters in Human Resources Degree!! woot woot! We went out to a dinner celebration last night that was very nice. When students were encouraged to get up and say a few words one of the spouses stood up and said some things. She put everything very well and EXACTLY what I was thinking. How proud I am of Rock in seeing the hard work he has put into school. I have seen him evolve this sememester and handle many of his stressful times amazingly. Next semester will be MUCH less stressful. He is ready to have a bit of a break.
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