This & That Thursday ON THURSDAY!!!

Have we, as American parents, really taken enough time to consider whether or not
Teletubbies may contain hypnotizing British mind-control messages?
It's worth revisiting.
I'm just saying.

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Can you even believe it?
I'm actually writing this post on a Thursday?

But seriously, I have realized this week that this blog
needs to be more of a priority again.
This is currently the main way I record our family's life
and if there are big gaps those memories will get lost.

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I am SO excited that the Lemmons family is
visiting this weekend!
We'll miss Josh, but can't wait to
hang with Jenny and the kids.

Now I just need Kirsti to move to Utah
and all of my besties are within one days drive.
Nirvana.

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Chachi and I celebrated 12 years last weekend.
I'd been thinking we had hit 13, but it's 12.
This past year should count as two!

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American desserts are much too sweet.

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It's kind of amazing how misogynistic some men still are.
Don't believe me?
Watch this season of Survivor.
Holy crap, people.

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I love chocolate chip cookies
almost more than anything else.

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When is a new season of Project Runway going to start?
I'm dying inside.

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Matt and I have been talking recently about celebrities who
don't have very remarkable or attractive facial features,
but who are still attractive when viewed as a whole.

Case in point: Keira Knightly.

Her eyes alone are beautiful, but her nose, mouth, face shape, body type and teeth on their own are not the current standard of beauty. And yet, somehow she is beautiful.

Discuss.

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Evangeline has her 2nd Grade Concert tonight.
We are so excited to see her sing.
Dinner is in the crockpot and a special dessert is made for after the concert.

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Movies I still need to see:
- Selma
- American Sniper
- Still Alice

Movies you should watch if you haven't already:
- A Normal Heart
- The Imitation Game
- Whiplash
- Birdman
- Boyhood

Movies you should skip:
- Saint Vincent
- Wild
- The Grand Budapest Hotel

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Family Updates

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MATT - 37

Matt is really enjoying his work. He recently set up an office team-building plan for the entire staff to run a 5K. That means Matt has been training for it himself. I am so proud of him going out each night and running a bit further!

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EMILIE - 37

I have been really getting into hand-lettering and I am practicing every day.  You can see my daily doodles on my Instagram account.  I have also been on a quest for the perfect red lipstick and I finally found it (but, seriously, I bought 8-10 lipsticks to find it).

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ELLA - 10

Ella is gaining more friends and more confidence.  She sings in a Children's Choir at church and loves it. I have recently found her reading for pleasure which is HUGE for her. I never thought it would happen and I'm so grateful, although learning long division in school is killing her these days!

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EVANGELINE - 8

Eva's finger is almost entirely healed and she is due to be baptized this Saturday! We are having Milk & Cookies after her baptism and she is so excited for the ordinance and the party afterwards.  She is loooving being in Activity Days at church and is so thrilled when every second Friday rolls around. She is reading very well (way above her age level) and has recently fallen in love with the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series.

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BIANCA - 4&1/2

Bianca's best friend lives just behind us and hse has been having lots of playdates with him recently. She is a crazy about PreSchool and asks every day if it is a PreSchool day.  She knowns all of her alphabet and the sounds each letter makes.

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JUDE - 18 months

Jude just began attending Nursery in church this month and so far he's not feeling it!  I think it may have to do with the fact that after having just four teeth for months now he is suddenly getting FIVE more all at once. He is speaking a lot and his favorite thing to do is talk to Daddy on the phone.  he also adores jumping on our trampoline with his big sisters.

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CECILIA - 7 months

Cecilia tried eating foods for the first time last week and LOVED it! I have never had a baby take to it so quickly. She gobbled down the entire bowl of oatmeal cereal on the first try.  She is rolling everywhere and actually really loves tummy time.  She has a bit of a flu right now, but when she isn't barfing she's happy and smiling.  She is still tiny and Mommy is currently sewing her up some shoes since we can;t find any small enough for her!  This entire family is wrapped around her little finger.

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THE FAMILY

We are all loving our monthly dinners with the extended family at Grandma and Grandpa Ahern's house.  We recently visited Temple Square with the kids for the first time since moving here (except at night to see the lights last winter).  The girls loved the visitor's centers and the grounds of the Temple.

Matt and I celebrated our 12th Anniversary this week (with a rather disastrous date).  We all got to see Emily Foley this past week and it was the greatest!  The entire family is beyond excited to have the Lemmons come stay with us over Evangeline's baptism weekend.

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This & That...the Monthly edition???

I mean, has it come to this?
I can't even post once a week now?
Pathetic.

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I got Evangeline the first
Diary of a Wimpy Kid book last week.
She read it in 3 days.
Book 2 arrives from Amazon on Monday.

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Made these Black Bean Burgers for dinner this week.
Everyone loved them, but MAN this made a lot of burgers!!!
I cannot image that Ree Drummond uses this recipe to make just 1-2 patties.
We got 5 adult portion burgers from this recipe.
It must be the burly ranch men she feeds.

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Evangeline's three finger-symapthy fish have already died.

We bought three new victims...er...fish.
I just fed them and then sat staring at them for 20 full minutes,
my face 2 inches from the tank.

Observation 1: I think the last ones died because the food flakes were too large.
Observation 2: Lulu (the blue one) is a total bully.

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Is anyone else watching Survivor?
Brutal episode this week.

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All week Jude has been asking for something I cannot decipher.
The funny thing is he is saying DOG in perfect Russian over and over.

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I'm coming down with something.
Blech.

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This is his newest game.
But doesn't he run into things and get hurt?, you ask?
Yes.
Yes he does.

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I signed up to decorate a teacher's door for teacher appreciation week. I cut everything out using my silhouette cameo. When I arrived Wednesday morning it turns out they made a mistake. I did NOT have a single door but an entire 10' x 6' bulletin board. I hightailed it to the teachers workroom, grabbed some butcher paper, and went to town. The grass, tree trunks, and sun are butcher paper. The yellow and orange flowers are a lei from the dollar store. Everything else was cut on my silhouette cameo. And just so you know I will always be totally bugged that I didn't spread the words out along the width of the board instead of clumping them on the side. Blerg.

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Tomorrow Chachi and I celebrate 12 years together.
I have a super-secret day of fun planned!!!
Follow me on Instagram if you want to follow along with our adventures tomorrow.

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I made the Roasted Asparagus and Mushroom Pasta in Lemon Cream Sauce
from 400 Calories or Less with Our Best Bites cookbook tonight.
It was supposed to have asparagus and I was super bummed that we were out.
Well, it was AMAZING! Like, amazing.
We added sliced grilled chicken on the side.
Everybody raved!

BUY THIS COOKBOOK.
That's an order!

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Travel // 5 Activities for Families to do in Boston

CAMBRIDGE SCIENCE FESTIVAL

This festival is such a great event for all ages! The festival is huge and has booths and displays, exhibits and activities for kids. MIT and other college students had to invent robots for the science fair and my kids were mesmerized as we went to each different display and saw the amazing robots at work.

There was a huge range of robots and the jobs they performed. There was a very large mechanical face and when a human looked at it and made a face it mimicked it. Sticking out it's tongue, raising its eye brows, etc. So cool. There were robots trolling the floors, fighting with each other and a robot whose only job was to pull out your chair from under you when you tried to sit!

Our favorite was a very fluid and sleek robot (which cost $16,000 to make, by the way) who recited entire scenes from Star Wars, danced whatever style of dance you asked it to did Tai Chi. 

Outside we made rockets and launched them, learned about fossils, touched living sea creatures and the girls even made their own silly putty at one booth. 

 

FRANKLIN PARK ZOO
This is an excellent zoo! All of our kids loved it. It is a very hilly zoo, so be prepared to walk quite a bit and get a leg workout.  We saw zebras (and even a baby zebra...awwwww...), tigers, lions, lots of birds and reptiles.  The giraffes were gone and that was sad-times, but the other animals we saw were awesome.

Funny enough, the playgrounds at this zoo were the big hit.  They were pretty awesome.  It's nice for kids to have something to engage in after a long walk and the zoo has a lot of different playground equipment for there is something for kids of all ages.

BOSTON'S PUBLIC GARDEN
This is a great park with a lot of different activities to offer for families.  There are Swan Boats that you can ride (for a fee) across the pond in the park.  We had a lovely ride which was so relaxing and fun.

After our ride we visited the statues commemorating the book "Make Way for Ducklings".  I still can't understand why there isn't a stand by the statues with people hawking the books for way too much, because I totally would have bought one.

This is where you get to take all of the fun photos of your kids on the statues...a must!

( me and baby bump riding the mommy duck & the obvious duck-lips shot )

There is a lot of open area for kids to run and play.  We ate lunch at the Earl of Sandwich Cafe in the park and it was great!  When we finished the kids played a wicked game of Red Rover on some of the open grass.  There are a few stands that sell merchandise that you can buy from as well (as with all tourist merch it is pretty expensive).  

KIDS MUSEUM OF SCIENCE

This science museum is wonderful! We were there for a few hours and I feel like we didn't even come close to seeing everything it had to offer. We started in a projects room where the kids engineered their own toy top.

There were tons of fun exhibits and experiments to do. 

There was even an engineering challenge which Evangeline won quickly!  Holla! My kids are geniuses.

There was an awesome playground inside that all of the kids loved.

The BUTTERFLY ROOM inside the KIDS MUSEUM OF SCIENCE
The big winner of the day was the Butterfly Room.  Oh. My. Gosh. It was completely enchanting.  We had to pay, like, $10 for our family to go in, but I told Matt I would have paid $50 just to go in there myself.  It was so cool. 

Having a butterfly land on you is a truly enchanting experience that belongs on your bucket list!

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Jude is 18 months!

WORDS JUDE SAYS REGULARLY

Daddy, Mommy, Ella (Ewwa), Eva, Bonka, Cici, Judo, Doggie (Doddie), More (Mo), Cookie, Banana (Nanna), Thank you (Teek-Oo), Soft, Bye bye, Cracker, Ny-night, Drink (Ba-ba), No-No, A-choo, Fishy, This (Diss), Diaper, Jump (Dump), Cereal (Ceree-o), Hi, Uh-oh

TWO WORD PHRASES

Hi Daddy

Cookie Nana (Meaning he wants to eat a banana)

LIKES

His family, jumping on the trampoline, dancing to his favorite songs (Gold Digger by Kanye West and Jump Around by House of Pain), drawing with markers on everything (ugh), bananas, any kind of meat, fruit snacks, bath time with Bianca.

DISLIKES

Having his nose wiped, waking up from naps,

QUIRKS

He loves pushing things! He pushes chairs, garbage cans, toys, anything he can around and around.

RECENT HAPPY MEMORIES

He puts bottles in Cici's mouth when she's fussy

He hands out the wettest, grossest kisses to mommy.

Him jumping with his sisters out on the new trampoline.

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2015 so far

We are only 4 months into 2015 and so far our family has experienced...

- 2 sinus infections

- 1 pulled tooth

- 1 UTI

- 3 birthday parties

- 1 fractured finger

- 3 stitches

- 1 call to poison control

- 1 trip to the ER

- 1 death in the family

- many bouts of the flu
- 2 trips to Urgent Care

- 2 root canals

- 3 months of PPD

Well guess what, 2015! 
WE WILL PREVAIL!

You can throw anything at us 
and we will still rock you!

Also, you're a butt-dog.

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She's Away Home Now: Granny Bannatyne

When I was growing up I lived for a few years with my Granny. Whenever someone passed away she would say, in her still- present Scottish accent, "She's away home now". 

Last Saturday morning (April 4) it was Granny's turn to go away home. She passed peacefully in her sleep with her loved ones beside her.  I find myself spontaneously crying these days because I miss her, but I rejoice that she is home.  Granny is the last Grandparent of mine to pass, but she was the one whom I was closest too...by a lot.  She was a constant presence in my life from childhood until adulthood. She came to every school performance, every 4-H competition, dance competition, orchestra concert, choir performance, every activity, every milestone.

When she had a stroke in 2007 I went to her home each day to sit with her for a few hours so she would not be alone.  We talked for hours about her childhood in Scotland (and later Ireland), about her Father (who passed away when she was 10 years old) and her brothers who also passed away in her childhood. We watched hours of Food Network together and talked about cooking.  We talked about our favorite books and about love and family and life truths. We laughed and told funny stories and shared memories of a good life spent together.

The last time I saw Granny was two years ago. She came (with my Uncle) to Pennsylvania and we spent the day together. She got to meet our three oldest girls (two of whom share her natural red hair color).

Towards the end of our time together she held my arm as we walked, leaning heavily on me. She stopped suddenly and turned to look into my face. "Oh Emilie, thank you for being so kind to me when I had my stroke!" she said. "No Granny, it's you who have always been kind to me. You helped raise me and a part of me will always be who I am because of you".

I will always remember that moment. We both took the opportunity to express our love and appreciation for each other. What a blessing.

My Granny is not having a traditional funeral so our little family is going to visit her grave next week, dressed in our best, and share memories about her life and her goodness. I hope I can find some beautiful lilacs to leave there - as they always remind me of her.

Mosiah 16: 8 "But there is a resurrection, therefore the grave hath no victory, and the sting of death is swallowed up in Christ."

2

This & That Thursday

Cecilia turned six months old this week.
She is the picture of health
(in a teeny, tiny, frame).

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Evangeline's finger is healing well.
We took of the gauze today and were able to replace it
with a standard band-aid.
Progress!
The splint stays on for another 3 weeks.

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Our family is going to
EXOTIC IDAHO
for Spring Break! Holla!
Soooo excited to spend Easter weekend with friends.

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Watched "A Normal Heart" last week.
Holy cow.
Powerful.

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Props to The Children's Place
for having little girls' shorts
that have more than a 1/2" inseam.

(So hard to find...sheesh!)

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It's been up for one week and it's official:
the Trampoline was SO worth going to
Wal*Mart on Black Friday for.

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It took me exactly four minutes to pre-order this book
when I found out the publish date yesterday.

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Emily Foley is coming to Utah next week!
SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!

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Stupid kale.
You're gross.

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I made the best homemade burgers of my life last night for dinner.
They were the juiciest homemade burgers I have ever had
AND they were half ground turkey/half extra lean ground beef.

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Ella played all kinds of innocent jokes
around our house yesterday for April Fools.
I have to admit....it softened my heart a bit
towards my most-hated fake-holiday.

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