David Randy

This is one of my favorite pictures of the Prophet Joseph Smith. When you think about everything Joseph and Emma went through for the restoration of the Church, it doesn't seem fair that five of their eleven children died so young. But then after we had David Randy five years ago today, I came to understand that the Lord didn't take Joseph and Emma's children, He visited them with five angels.

 

But for a Small Moment, by Liz Lemon Swindle

Homecoming!

Last week was a big deal at our house.  It was Homecoming at the High School.  Brand likes to participate in Spirit Week, therefore, I get to participate also...by making all his costumes.  It was fun though, and even the elementary got in on some of the action.  And of course, we all collected plenty of candy at the parade.  The football team won the game and Brand's JH football team won their third straight game earlier that week, so overall, it was a good time!

Monday - Favorite Superstar Day
Brandan is Napoleon Dynamite

Tuesday - Tourist Day

Wednesday - Superhero Day
Can you believe some of the high schoolers didn't get this costume?  And forget about trying to explain a phone booth...

Thursday - Class Color Day
Each class was assigned a color and the teachers were suppose to wear tie-dye.  Even the elementary participated in this one.  Dash was assigned yellow, but he didn't have a yellow shirt so while we were dying Brand's I made him a yellow shirt and the other boys got shirts because we had extra dye.  I thought Dash would feel bad about not having a colorful shirt so I put his name on his to make it special.  I was wrong.  Colt felt bad about not having his name on his shirt.

Friday - Red, White & Blue Day
Yes, those pants are what you think they are.

Brandan's a Birthday Boy & Male Bonding

Brandan turned 31 last Friday and the boys could not have been more excited.  They were nearly as excited for his birthday as they get for their own, but I guess that is because they kind of made his birthday into everything they wanted.  For instance, they were sure he wanted a pinata shaped like a basketball and they were also sure he would want them to hide his presents in the yard and then draw complicated treasure maps that he would have to follow in order to find them. 
The pinata was supposed to be a surprise the boys and I made Brandan, but none of us are very good at keeping secrets.  I left pinata making instructions up on the computer, Dash told Brand his surprise started with a 'p', and Colt, well Colt told Brandan "your surprise is not a pinata".  The boys had a blast making the pinata though.  All the while we were painting, Colt kept bouncing around asking "whobody is going to keep Daddy calm?"  If Brandan had half as much fun on his birthday as the boys did, then he had a fantastic day.
I will say, however, that now that Brandan's birthday is over, Colt is dying for his own birthday.  We got him through Dash's birthday by promising him that after Dash's birthday was Daddy's birthday and then it would be his birthday.  So the morning of Brandan's birthday, Colt asked me if his birthday was the next day.  He was pretty devastated when I told him he still had 43 days.

The family with Brandan's presents, his pinata and the treasure maps.

Breaking the pinata.

I always knew Brandan was a good Daddy, but lately I've realized just how important he is in his children's lives.  The boys idolize Brandan and they couldn't have a better role model.  We are all so grateful he is in our family.

Brandan, Dash & Colt on the roof installing the new skylights.  Scary.

Sport didn't get to go on the roof (you can imagine how happy he was about that), but he did holler encouragements from the trampoline.

Colt decided he wanted to try riding his bike without training wheels so we headed over to the school parking lot for a trial run.  He still doesn't know how to make it work yet, but Brandan got a great workout.



Sport chased the bike riders around the parking lot.  You'll notice his shoes are 3 sizes too big.  He outgrew his favorite shoes and now he refuses to wear anything, but Dash's old Sponge Bob flip-flops.  Classy.



Daddy and the boys wrestling.  This happens at least 4 times a week, or really anytime Brandan is lying on the floor.

This looks posed, but I swear this was just another snapshot of the action. 

Old as the hills...

So the other day the family went into the hills for a little hike.  While we were walking around, the boys discovered "dinosaur bones", aka, a deer skeleton, but the boys consider all bones to be fossils.  Well, we were in an isolated area and the presence of these bones started to freak Colt out.  He couldn't stop talking about it and he kept asking if we could go home because even though he "knows all dinosaurs are in heaven, this one could be here anywhere".  I know, I know, his reasoning was air tight, but we decided to take our chances.  In an effort to comfort him, Dash said, "Don't worry Colt, all the dinosaurs died before even Mom was born."  Brandan got a real kick out of this (I guess he forgot he's older than me) so he asked Dash if he was sure about that. Apparently he wasn't because after thinking while, he rephrased his statement.  "Well, most all the dinosaurs were dead."  

And not to be out done...

If sending Dash to Kindergarten was hard on me, it was next to murder on Colt.  On the first day of school, Colt packed his backpack and dressed up special, all in the hopes that I would forget he wasn’t old enough to go to school and just send him anyway.  Colt was as sad as I was to watch Dash walked into his classroom and we had a quiet walk home mourning Dash’s absence.  He did, however, perk up a little throughout the day when he realized he got to pick out the movie to watch, the game to play and the cars he wanted to drive around.  I hadn’t realized how much influence Dash had on Colt, but for the first several days Colt kept correcting me while we played to explain to me that Dash didn’t allow certain things.  When I finally started convincing him that he could do things anyway he wanted now Dash wasn’t there, he got a little more excited.  And when I asked him if he wanted to play a game with me and he realized he could be any of the players he wanted, he said, “I kinda like being the oldest boy at home.”  And things have really gone up from there.  He likes the preschool we do together and is doing really well.  I’m sorry to say we hadn’t realized how intelligent he was before because Dash kept answering everything for him.  And the last couple days Colt has actually started playing with toys without me reminding him that he didn’t have to wait for Dash.

Colt posing for his pretend day of Kindergarten.



Sport is also making strides.  He is starting to say all sorts of words now, but he particularly loves to scream out “backpack!” while watching Dora, even when he is supposed to be saying things like, “map” or “abre”. 

Sport leaping from the bed onto a pile of pillows.

All the boys still enjoy our regular routines.

The boys and I reading stories before bedtime.

Other than all our school work, we have also been doing some gardening.  We have battled, and I mean battled, the deer all season.  Just as our green beans were starting to come on, the gate at the community garden was left open and most of our beans were eaten.  This is what we were able to salvage.

Our first four (and only four) pints of green beans.