3, 2, 1!!!!

Well Maxwell is one and I am so glad to have him in our family. Our little Max is always in a good mood, ready with a smile and a loves. This week is a special because, just for 8 days, I have a three-year-old, a two-year-old and a one-year-old.

I remember the day Max was born...I woke up early to get ready to head into the hospital for my c-section, I didn't get much sleep from being so excited to meet Max for the first time. It was a Sunday and very quite at the hospital, Paul and I waited for the doctor and the kids came in to say good luck. I was very excited, nervous and terrified all at the same time. But after a very short time in the operating room I heard that cry (that beautiful, wonderful, first impression cry) and was it loud. He never stopped crying all the way through getting cleaned, weighed and bathed. The nurses all commented on how loud he was, but once he got back to me he hardly ever cried again. I remember being in the room with Paul and the kids and thinking of Ammon's birthday coming up and realized I had just given birth to three boys in less than three years, Wow! I wouldn't trade this for anything in the world, even though I do need a nap every once in while. HAPPY BIRTHDAY MAXWELL KEITH!!

A New Look 2X

Emma decided to cut her hair and now she is looking quite sassy (straight or curly). And of course, after weeks of waiting and wiggling, you can see Jacob finally lost his top tooth.

Aaarrrgh!!!!

I used to think I got over my fear of spiders when I became a mom, it was either them or us....until today.

Ammon and Isaiah were out playing on the porch while I was watching through the window, suddenly Ammon freaks out and comes flying in the house screaming that there is giant spider. I casually come out onto the porch to check it out, thinking that there was a relatively large spider in need of being put to death. When I rounded the corner to see the largest spider I have ever seen in my life, dead or alive. I have to say I wasn't even going to attempt to kill that thing. This spider had to be as large as my hand and the creepiest thing with eight legs. Needless to say I left this little spider alone and waited for my big strong husband to rescue us when he got home. Paul decided to hose the thing off into the weeds to live out it's life in peace. Here's to hoping I never run into it again.

Preschool Rules!!!

Ammon's first day at preschool was great, first thing he got to do was write his name on a piece of paper and put it on a chart for the question of the day: Are you a Boy or a Girl. He choose correctly and managed to write an "A" with some squiggles behind it. He did a great job on his self portrait as well, making sure every square inch of his body was covered in his favorite color...GREEN! I love you little boy of mine you make us so proud, can't wait to see what you'll do in the future.

WOW! It's Quiet!

The excitement start last night when we began to pick out outfits and had Paul give the all the kids (including mom) blessings. EMMA AND JACOB HAVE STARTED SCHOOL!!!!. (Ammon to follow shortly.) There was a mixture of excitement and nervousness this morning, not very much breakfast was eaten. I am already enjoying a quieter home. Ammon and Isaiah are asking "Where are Emma and Jacob?", even though they were there when they got on the bus. I am sure in about a week I'll be missing all the noise (or maybe not).
Seriously, I love my kids and I will miss them a ton while they are gone, I am so proud of them and who they are becoming. Good luck today, my sweeties.

The Talent Runs Deep

Here are Emma and Jacob at the family reunion doing some of their talents: Emma did a great rendition of pat your head and rub your tummy, she also did a great little magic trick. Jacob made an awesome paper airplane that flew beautifully. We had so much fun at the first family reunion the kids played tons with all the cousins and had a blast at the amusement park. It was great to catch up with everyone from out of town and hope everyone enjoyed themselves. Toran and Erin (who organized the whole thing) did a faboo job despite all of us.

In Their Sunday Best

Here is an updated picture of the kids I took today before we left for church. Enjoy!

Jacob and the Haka

Our family attended a luau last night and Jacob was able to learn how to do the Haka with some other volunteers. It was quite entertaining and I have to say Jacob showed quite of bit of talent.

I Have Teeth!!!!

You can't see it from the photo (you can only see one) but I have 3 teeth and I'm very happy about it!

BIG NEWS

I will no longer be changing three bottoms a day, we have a graduate from the Potty Training Academy (the PTA for short, oh wait that's been taken. Oh well)! Whoahoooo! I can't tell you how excited I am about this latest chapter in my life, and that right there is very sad, that having a three year old finally go potty is the highlight of my life. I'll take what I can.

Max's Surgery

Well we made it through surgery in better condition than we first thought. The surgery itself only took about 30 minutes and the recovery at the hospital was about an hour. Wow! We are blessed. Max is doing great and is healing up nicely. Here are the photos we took that day and hope this will be the last time we have a kid go through surgery! (I know FAT CHANCE.) With Max this makes three surgeries so far and I know with 4 boys that we will most likely have nice hospital stays in the future.;(

Painting the Playroom

Here are some photos of the painting we are working on in the playroom. We are trying to make it more "magical" for all the kids. Emma, Jacob, Fran (my mom) have helped me make this project a lot of fun. It is a work in progress and we have to work on it when the younger kids are distracted or asleep;)

The Hill Cumorah

After visiting the Sacred Grove we ventured over to the Hill Cumorah and climbed to the top where we saw the statue of Mormon and also a very large cat that was sunning himself on the marble bench. Emma and Jacob wanted, of course, to take this cat home fearing it was lost and had no home. I assured them that judging from it's very well fed belly that the cat would be fine.
The weather was beautiful and it was fun to climb up and see the view. The Hill Cumorah is not very close to the Smith's Farm, so it had to be quite a hike for Joseph to get there and back.

Visiting Palmyra

Emma, Jacob, Paul and I were able to visit the Sacred Grove this Spring Break and were grateful for the opportunity to see where the Restoration took place. Here are some photos we took of the area. If you look very close you can see the Temple trough the trees, this was taken in the grove itself. As you can see the leaves were not on the trees yet, but things were beginning to bloom. It was very peaceful and there were plenty of benches placed throughout the grove to allow you to just think, even the kids enjoyed just being still for a while. Because of the time of year there were not a lot of visitors to the grove, we had one other guy there and we never saw him once we entered the grove.


We also had a chance to go through the Smith's log home and also the larger home they built later, where the records were translated and hidden from the mobs from time to time. The small home that you see is a very accurate reconstruction of the home where Joseph was living at the time of the first vision, also where the angle Moroni came to visit him. The original log home was destroyed long ago but the footings and root cellar were still there, the Church built it as accurately as they could. The larger home is the original structure. The whole thing was awsome!!

This is our Family.

Mama Mac aka Monica (me) is 36 and a stay at home mom who loves her husband and her quite gorgeous 5 children. Monica enjoys being home, her favorite hobbies include quilting, reading and being creative with her home (when time permits).

Mac Daddy is Paul, he is also 36 (he's still 4 months older than me :)) and works very hard at work so that when he's home with us he doesn't have to be interrupted with anything to do with work. Paul works at MacArthur, Heder and Metler, a law firm which he founded more than 8 years ago. He has been blessed to have been joined by 5 wonderful partners and a great and very capable staff. (Angie is our life saver)

Emma, our oldest at a very wise 9 years of age. As you can see she is very beautiful and full of love and life. Emma is a very good student and is in love with the Spiderwick series, she has read all the books once and in the process of reading them again. She rules this house of all boys with somewhat of a patient hand, she is our little princess and we are so proud of her and who she is becoming.

Jacob is the next in line at age 6, he is extremely creative and smart. He loves to build things, usually out of things that he finds on the walk home from the school bus (much to his mothers disgust that he's picking dirty things up and bringing them home). Jake is interested in baseball this year and is getting very good at it.

Ammon, our 3rd at 3 and is very energetic and very smart. He keeps us on our toes and is a great little friend to anyone who will play with him. Dinosaurs are his favorite toy, movie, book and subject to talk about. He can name most of the dinosaurs and will talk at length about what each of them likes to eat.

Isaiah, our sweet little 2 years old, may look sweet and talk sweet but he knows how to push his older brother Ammon's buttons and he enjoys it immensely. I don't think Isaiah realizes that Ammon is a lot bigger than he is (thank goodness Ammon hasn't realized it too). But for all of Isaiah's teasing he loves being with his brothers and sister more than anything and he is our cuddle kid, always good for a big hug and kisses.

Max is the last in line at age 6 months and he is sooooo sweet that none of us can keep our hands off him, or our lips for that matter. Max is not doing much right now except looking especially cute and lovably. Max is have a little medical problem right now and we hope to have him fixed up soon. But he is healthy and happy.

Well that's us and I'll try to keep this updated as much as possible, especially with photos.

See ya'll

Monica