Happy 30th Birthday Matthew!!

(October 2007)

I remember when 30 seemed so old. In fact considering I still have 4 years to get there, it does still feel old!! HAHA! I can't believe you're already 30, how did that happen!?! Well I thought I would try and make a list of things I love about you.

(End of 2004 sometime, I just know I was pregnant with Quinn)

- You love me!!
- You know all the good and bad things about me and still love me!
- You always tell me how much you love me and how beautiful I am. (You're good for the self esteem.)
- You are extremely hot!! Even with a receding hair line! ;)
- You have the bad boy image that I love, without being a bad boy. (At least you intimidate people without trying.)
- You have awesome eyes.
- I love your arms...the muscles!!
- You are sensitive.
- You rent AND watch girly movies with me!
- You will even tear up!
- You love babies.
- You'll fight with me over it being your turn to hold our babies.
- You change diapers!!
- You love your boys.
- You will get down and play with our boys.
- You love to teach our boys.
- You sing to our boys.
- You aren't judgemental.
- You are forgiving.
- You're a good listener.
- You're good at giving advice.
- You're committed to our marriage.
- You're willing to try new ways of making it stronger.
- You listened to John Lund's For all Eternity Cd's.
- You are helpful.
- You clean bathrooms...and everything else too.
- You are an awesome cook.
- You are very thoughtful.
- You love to buy things for me and the boys. (It's his love language!)
- You love your parents.
- Especially your Mom!
- You love your siblings.
- Especially Laura!
- You love my family.
- You're laid back.
- You are extremely smart, without trying.
- You do so well in science and have a love for it. (I'm amazed at how much you know and remember.)
- You love history too. (I'm not good at it!)
- You love to teach others!
- You are humble...can't admit to how smart you are.
- You have a great knowledge and understanding of the gospel and scriptures that I admire.
- You help me want to be a better person, wife and mother.
- You hold me when I cry, even if you don't understand it.
- You have greater potential then you realize.
- You are pretty much great at anything.
- You have a natural ability at sports, but you don't play them.
- You can play any video game and be good at it. As much as I dislike them!
- You don't like to fail.
- You are very loyal.
- Especially to your friends.
- You have a hard time saying no. Which has hurt you at times.
- You love cars, and know so much about them and how to fix them...just by teaching yourself. (I'm sorry you don't have your corrados!!)
- You are a very hard worker.
- You went to school, took care of Malcolm and worked really late nights for our family.
- You want to be the best you can for me and the boys.
- You are supportive of me and the things I need.
- You are the best father ever.
- You are the best husband ever! I couldn't have picked a better eternal companion!

- You are my best friend.

(Chlarson Family Reunion 2006)

Well I'm sure I could think of several more, but it's making me neglect our children. I love you so much Matthew. You are the greatest thing that I have. You have helped me through some of the hardest things in my life, just by being here. My biggest fear is losing you and I don't know how I would survive without you. I'm thankful for you and your commitment to me. I'm proud of you! I can't wait for all the rest of eternity with you.

(Nate, Matt and Jeff grew out their beards from Thanksgiving until Christmas 2006.)

Thanksgiving Break

I have a couple of things that I would like to post about...but I just haven't taken the time to write a post. It's busy when we go home.

Like always we went home for Thanksgiving. Matt gets a whole week off, so we went home for a week. We had Thanksgiving with my family this year. Matt's family went to Utah, but we were able to see them for a few days. We went to Tri-Cities with Cynthia and enjoyed doing some shopping with her.

Quinn loves Ben's cat. Matt always asks him if he wants to take it home and he'll chase it around trying to catch it. He's always picking it up and trying to hold him. He calls kitties "keke meow", it's so cute. I'll be sad when he stops calling them that.
I had Melanie take some family pictures of us for Christmas cards. It was very last minute and I even forgot to put anything on my lips. I ended up looking a little washed out. We actually got a couple pictures we could use, but most of them were this type of thing. Oh and I'm so glad I wore black and Malcolm is covering up my belly.
On Wednesday night we did a pre-Thanksgiving appetizers. Why get way to full all in one day!?! We had a wonderful Thanksgiving dinner. All us girls made something to contribute. Matt volunteered to make the potatoes. He makes the best too! He's a great cook!! Some times he gets a little carried away experimenting, so Pop had to pose for a picture to pretend he was telling him no extras. Funny, funny! Also Milo's the turkey carver.
Our Thanksgiving table. I took a few pictures of us all at the table, but there are just too many of us to fit in the picture.
Matt and Tom took over dish duty afterwards!! Notice even Tom took over wearing Mom's apron. How thoughtful of them!!
Milo was assigned to put on a movie for the kids and watch them. They were all very content!!
Apparently Mason had too much turkey. He's always climbing on the couch and relaxing...for about 2 seconds. Busy boy!
Mom taking time to play Uno with the kids. It's amazing how young they are and they get it!!
The day after Thanksgiving we decided to hit Wenatchee and do just a little shopping. Mostly Mom just wanted some flannel fabric at Joann's that was on sale for 99 cents/yard. She got tons for so cheap. The kids were all really good. We didn't do much, just spent some time together.
Jayni and Malcolm lounging together watching a movie. They had so much fun together, and got along great. They are so cute.
Some how they ended up switching places. How funny!
Saturday was a pretty lazy day. I just sat around watching "Lost". Then we all went to see "Enchanted" at the theatre. It was very cute. The kids for the most part all enjoyed it. When we came home we had chili and scones...yum!! Then Tom had an "Alumni" Big Bend basketball game, that we went and watched. I don't know how I got a picture with him actually looking at the camera.
Tom taking a moment to amuse his son. Our family didn't stay the whole time. It was a late game. I was sad to hear that we missed Tom dunking it. I would have loved to had a picture of that!!
We had a great week. Soon enough we'll be home for Christmas break. I can't believe how fast time flies. Matt's almost done with this semester!!

30 Weeks!

Yay!! 10 weeks to go! Next week I'll be in the single digits. Isn't that a good feeling!?! I went to physical therapy today and he discharged me. I didn't have too much pain this last week, and my hips weren't off when he checked me. We'll see if it lasts. I'm just glad I don't have to use the SI lock. The baby is still growing, obviously! He's hurting me when he moves now. I'm getting a pretty good shelf going on. I'm losing my ice addiction. I rarely crave it, and my mouth isn't watering for it anymore. I only walked once while I was home. The other days we either went some where or we were busy doing other stuff. I was still disappointed though. I worked out today, and as tiring as it was...it felt so good!!

29 Weeks

And the count down continues. The baby is growing tons...or so it seems. He's everywhere he can possibly be at this point. I'm really poking out. That's just how I carry obviously. I have no where to hide a baby being so short waisted. It's so hard to imagine that I still have 11 weeks of growing to go. I swear this is my most active baby. He rarely stops moving...and he constantly has the hiccups. I love his activity, but I know it will be getting more and more uncomfortable. I'm so happy that I have been continuing doing my aerobics and walking. I'm getting more and more out of breathe. I hope I can continue to do it though. I just want to see if it makes any type of difference. With the other boys I didn't do any type of exercise, I just sat at my desk at work all day long. It has felt so good to stay active. I'm home for Thanksgiving and won't be doing my aerobics here, so I hope I can pick it up when I go home. It's so hard when you slack for a while. It's just so easy to be lazy. blah, blah, blah...I'm tired and not making much sense. I almost forgot to write the post. I had Matt take one quick picture before going to Tri-Cities today. (That's why it such a great one!) I was just going to bed and thought I better do this quick. Oh and yes...I noticed these last two pictures you can totally see my belly button sticking out. With each pregnancy I have a "slight" belly button hernia, so I can't help it. It' quite hilarious when I laugh or cough because it sticks out a ton. Luckily my belly button totally goes back to normal after I deliver!

28 Weeks

I'm totally obsessed with knowing where I'm at in my pregnancy. Only two weeks and I'll have 10 weeks to go. It seems better then 12 I guess. But I'm jealous of Melanie, she's in the single digits!! It's so funny that last week I was saying how the baby is mostly on the bottom of my uterus. He's totally every where now. I swear this baby moves more then the others did. He never stops. So I went to the doctors last week and he actually gave me a perscription for iron. Yea!! I just barely filled the Rx today so I can't wait to start taking them. Also I went to the physical therapist today and my hips were totally off again. My left hip was about 1/2 inch higher then my right. It sounds like he's going to want me to wear this SI lock thing. He's going to decide for sure when I go back after Thanksgiving. Malcolm and Quinn are still in swimming lessons. Besides the fact that I'm a huge whale in a swimsuit, I love being weightless for a 1/2 hour. After Thanksgiving only two more weeks after that.

Good News and Home for the Weekend

I was going to do this post earlier in the week, but I have gotten a little distracted. I am so happy to say that I have found all my posts from my old blog!! I've been thinking about some of my posts that I lost, so I search on Google for "thehardytimes anniversary" and I found it. I had to click on "cached" under it, and it takes me to the page. Then I started looking up other ones that I remembered, like Quinn's trauma. I kept finding them and were saving the pages to my desktop. Matt had tried searching for March 2007 before and it never came up, but I started searching by month, sometimes had type it in different ways, but I ended up finding all my post right from the start. Needless to say I have been trying to get up some of my old post, starting from the most recent. It's going to be a long process, especially since I have to find and reload all the pictures. It's so annoying, yet at the same time I am so happy!!!!!

This last weekend we went back home. Matt's sister Laura came home, and we haven't seen her since May. Our niece Rose has gotten so big!! She's a year now and walking, and she's a total girl. Mike and Laura are going to end up having all the girls for us I think. I'm not seeing it in our cards. We were so glad that we were able to see Laura and Rose, they'll be coming home again at Christmas.

Right after we got there Malcolm did a face plant into the side of the couch. I don't know what's up with him lately. He's been getting hurt left and right. It's usually Quinn who's accident prone. Like all kids he wanted a band-aid, and when he looked in the mirror, he thought he was pretty cool. He even got just a little bit of a bloody nose. He must have hit himself really hard!!
Quinn's loving the apples that Paka is peeling and slicing for him. It's so cute Quinn totally came up with this name "Paka" for Merle. He won't call him grandpa, and sometimes has corrected me on the name. I hope all the kids will call him that, it's just so dang cute.Rose with her cute little round face. I think she really enjoyed her cousins. Malcolm was cute with her too. He wanted to make sure she wouldn't choke on the toys downstairs. They always talk about baby Rose. Quinn also loved Rose. He does this funny thing with babies. He's always touching their heads. I'm not sure why. I love the white trash look. Matt didn't even do his onesie up, just tucked the flap into the back of his shirt.
Rose was mad at me, because she couldn't get past the chairs to go down the stairs. That's all she ever wanted to do, and of course hasn't quite mastered them like she thinks she can.
Brianne and Tom had a weekend getaway to Coeur d'Alene so Mom and Pop were watching Jayni and Mason. We spent the majority of the weekend with Matt's family, but while Quinn was napping on Saturday, Mack and I went to the park with them. Jayni and Malcolm love to play together, and generally play very well together. Jayni is just so dang cute with her new little haircut!!
Mason was all grin like always. He's started jumping and spinning, and it's so cute. I can't believe how grown up he's getting. I was going to say how big he his getting, but that's to be expected since he's bigger then Quinn. He was having so much fun and never slowing down.
Malcolm loving Rose. I think he must have thought he was pretty cool to be feeding Rose her bottle. (Even though she doesn't need the help anymore.)
The last weekend we were home, Quinn couldn't get enough of his lawn mower, so he was pretty excited to get back outside to play with it. Of course I could only get a shot of his back.
I was trying to get the boys to sit down together for a picture, but it wasn't working. I was totally wanting to get some family pictures while we were there, but it never happened. A weekend is just to short. Malcolm was enjoying the leaves though.
I took tons of pictures of Rose this weekend. I guess it's because she will sit still and just stare at me. I love her big round eyes!!
As I said before she is a total girl. She loves shoes, (She picked out some cute pink sparkly shoes all by herself, she know what she wants.), and she has this cute little purse that she wanted as her "new" toy. She will put toys in it and carry it around. It's so cute. This is her all ready to go to church, with her purse.

27 Weeks

Wow this is a bad picture!! I love the look I'm giving. I'm now 27 weeks. It seems like this last week has been a long one. The baby seems like he's grown a ton. He's pushing really hard now, but he's still seems to be sitting at the bottom of my uterus. Every once in a while I feel him high, but not regularly. I still love to feel him move! This last week my back has been bothering me more then it has since going to physical therapy. I went to physical therapy today and he said that my hips were twisted. He said that I might need to wear an "SI lock" if it keeps doing this. That is a little thing I'd wear around my hips to keep me all together. I'm hoping it won't come to that, then I'd have to wear it all the time. I have an appointment on Thursday. I always love my appointments for some reason. I guess it means I've made it another month. Now hopefully the holidays and January will fly by!!

Birthday and Halloween

Monday night as we were just about to say family prayers, we got a knock on our door. Matt answered it and in walks in Mom and Pop. They wanted to come surprise me and be here to celebrate my birthday. How sweet of them! I had no clue. I was just glad that I had cleaned all my floors that day!!So Tuesday, the big day, after Matt was done with his morning classes we went over to Moscow and ate lunch at Sangria's Grille! One of our favorites!! We'd been wanting to take Mom and Pop there for a long time, but just never had a chance all the other times they were here. We then did a little shopping and came home. Mom made my favorite cake, angel food cake with glaze, and they sang "Happy Birthday" and I opened my presents. Then Mom and Pop had to head back home. It was fun to have them come spend the day with us.

That night we had "Trunk or Treat" for our ward. Quinn didn't really want to put on his costume but once we told him all about the candy he was fine. I'm glad that we did a few previous practice runs to get him excited about it!! These are our little Knight and Dragon.

The Knight and Dragon with their friend Georgey the boxer!

Matt is a student aid for an anatomy lab on Wednesday nights from 6pm-9pm, so he had to miss out on trick or treating with us. (So glad there was trunk or treating the night before.) Luckily there was a group of our friends going out with their kids, so the boys and I tagged along with them. We went to an actual neighborhood instead of our apartments. Our friend George used my camera to take all the pictures since I couldn't with my two kids. He tried taking a group shot, but didn't quite know how to zoom yet.
Quinn was so excited to put his costume on this time. He knew what the reward was. He talked all night about how he was flying. Right before we left to walk around he asked for his stroller. I'm so glad since I would have ended needing to carry him.
Malcolm loved trick or treating. This is the first year we've ever gone door to door. I'm glad we went with a group of people or Malcolm might have gotten tired of waiting for Quinn. The other husbands of the group kept great track of all our kids!!