Happy Birthday Gavin!

I can hardly believe that Gavin is 10 years old. I remember when we decided to have baby #2 I wanted to have a baby in January. At the time their wasn't many if any January birthdays in our families, so I thought that would be the perfect month. I had it all figured out and we got pregnant just as I had planned, that is for my January baby. So lets just say I was a little surprised at my first doctors visit when the nurse told me his due date was not only in December but on my birthday, the 26th. When it was all said and done we were very excited to be adding to our family. We didn't find out what McKinley was, and Matt thought that we should do the same with Gavin. I wanted to know but on the way to our ultrasound I told him that if he didn't want to know I would be OK with that. We tell the ultrasound tech that we are not going to find out the sex of our baby. By the end of the ultrasound Matt's curiosity had gotten the best of him and we found out that we were expecting a boy. The thing I remember most about Gavin's pregnancy was the heartburn, and he felt so much bigger then McKinley. The doctor kept telling me that I was measuring smaller than my first pregnancy, and the baby would probably be smaller. I was so ready to have Gavin when I headed to my doctors appointment the morning of the 21st. With Christmas fast approaching and my experience of having a birthday right after Christmas, I begged my doctor to start me. I remember he looked at me, said nothing, rolled his chair over to the phone and called the hospital to see how busy they were. After hanging up the phone he instructed us to go straight to the hospital, no stopping anywhere, for anything. I remember feeling so excited and nervous as we drove to the hospital in Payson. Gavin was born at 9:22 on December 21st 1998 and weighed 8lbs 8oz (which was almost a pound bigger than McKinley, what do doctors know). I remember hearing them hitting his back trying to get him to cry. After a few minutes of poking and prodding with no real cries they decided that they should take him to the nursery and check him out. I will never forget that feeling of fear and panic as I lay watching Matt give me one short second to see him and then being rushed away by the nurses. It was close to midnight before I was able to hold him. Matt said that he really never cried all that much while he was in the hospital. We were able to take him home with us and Matt says that he made up on the crying at home. We are so blessed to have Gavin in our family. He is truly a peacemaker. Gavin may be small in size but he has a huge heart.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY we LOVE YOU.

Christmas Traditions

One reason I love Christmas is because of all the fun traditions that we do. I can't remember all the toys I received as a child, but I remember the traditions. We have started some new traditions of our own and carried some on from our childhood.

My Mom would dip chocolates every Christmas Season, and they were the best. I can't remember when I started (maybe 5 or 6 years ago) but this is one tradition that I have continued and is now expected.

I am not sure why Jade didn't sit on Santa's lap, but she sure enjoyed her homemade sucker.

Lilli asked Santa for some gum and little reindeer. Lilli favorite thing in the world is gum, and I am not sure what little reindeer she is talking about.

Yes this is my preteen and she is way to big to sit on Santa's lap. What else would a preteen be asking for? Ipod and her own email address.

Gavin reminds me of his Dad in so many ways, and one of those ways is his love for music. He is also asking for an Ipod.

Granny Goose's Christmas Party is another great tradition.

The kids love their bag of goodies that she gives them every year.

Last year was the first Christmas derby and it was a hit so they did it again.

My hot husband and beautiful sister-in-law.

Our Ward family has a great tradition that the kids love, a hayride. It seems to fall on the coldest night in December every year, but the kids don't care.

We sing lots of songs and take fruit baskets to some of the people in our ward.

After we deliver all our fruit baskets we head back to a roaring bonfire, doughnuts, and hot chocolate.

Yes we are missing Gavin, he had basketball practice.

Party time for the Grandkids!

On the first Saturday of December you can find Grandma and Grandpa Ercanbrack doing something with their grandkids. Mom and Dad started this tradition several years ago and it is a huge hit with all the kids. In the past we have been ice skating , bowling, out to dinner, to temple square, and much more. This year the kids had a sleepover and played the Amazing Race. In the race they had to go shopping and help Santa get some presents for some special kids, identify pictures of their parents when they were young, and even make a gingerbread houses. My kids had a great time with all of their cousins and Grandma and Grandpa. Thanks Mom and Dad for giving them this great memory and being such a positive influence in my kids lives. I had McKinley take my camera and get some pictures, most of which are of the gingerbread houses. The frosting must of been really good because the kids seem to be licking their fingers.

Before..... and After.....

The first part of July Matt started Jenny Craig and 4 months later he has done GREAT! Even better than losing all that weight he has lowered his cholesterol by 67 points. We have all learned to eat a lot healthier and feel much better about our health. I know that we can't control the future but I hope that our actions today will help us live a long healthy life together. Great job Matt, you look smoking HOT!

tag 8 things:
8 t.v. shows i like to watch:
1. E.R.
2. CSI Las Vegas
3. Smallville
4. Oprah
5. Biggest Loser
6. Survivor
7. American Idol
8. So You Think You Can Dance

8 things that happened yesterday:
1. Helped out in Jade's class
2. Went to Provo to get a gift for Tracy's bridle shower
3. Made Amish bread
4. Made dinner for the Missionary
5. Ate dinner and visited with the missionary
6. Had a Young Women cast meeting for Y.W. in Excellence
7. Went to Tracy's bridle shower
8. Went with the missionaries to discussion

8 places i like to eat: I need a lot more than 8
1. Red Mango
2. Cafe Rio
3. Tepanyaki
4. Olive Garden
5. Pinkberry
6. Melting Pot
7. Mi Ranchetos
8. any Thia place

8 things i am looking forward to:
1. Young Women in Excellence
2. Young Women in Excellence to be over
3. the weekend (we are going to St George)
4. GRASS
5. Holidays
6. growing old with Matt
7. meeting Matts Mom
8. Every morning when I get out of bed I can't wait till it is night and I get to get back in.

8 things on my wish list:
1. GRASS
2. My kids wanting to keep their rooms clean
3. To go see my sister in New York
4. To see more of the world with Matt
5. To know that my kids will stay strong in the church.
6. To grow old with Matt
7. My kids to always remember how much I love them.
8. to finish this triathlon without dieing this weekend.

8 people to tag: I think that everyone I know has done this tag.

Halloween Party at the McMullins

Halloween Day

In preschool we had asked the kids what they were going to be for Halloween and over half of the little girls said a princess. I decided that I had the perfect old prom dress to be a princess myself. It was so fun to see the reactions of the preschool kids when they saw me as a princess. One of the little girls dressed as Cinderella gave me the biggest hug and just smiled, others told me that I looked soooo pretty, they all wanted to see my shoes (which weren't glass but very sparkly), and even the boys couldn't resist fluffing my dress.

Halloween night I lost the princess in me and we went for the chocolate instead.

Ward Halloween Party

We start Halloween with our ward party. I was completely shocked to see Dad dressed up, but it was great. Now that McKinley is in Young Womens she was helping out with the fishing pond and had her costume off by the time we got any pictures. She was a really cute China girl.

Come to my Shoe Party!

I am going to have a shoe party next Wednesday the 29th. It will be at 7:00 P.M. here at my house. Everyone is welcome to come. Check out their link below, they have some really cute shoes.

http://www.shoeparty.com/

Salem Pond

I have to admit that I love to read all of your blogs, but sometimes I end up feeling a little guilty. Let me explain. I see all of these wonderful activities, crafts, and parties that you do with your kids and I start to think that maybe I am a boring Mom. Now I am not fishing for a compliment on how you feel about me and my mothering abilities, I am just sharing my Oprah light bulb moment with you. Instead of feeling envy and guilt while reading others blogs I decided to be inspired by all of you awesome Moms. I have been inspired to share the way I am feeling at certain times, inspired to spend more quality time with my kids, and to realize that we all have different talents. Thank you for sharing a glimpse of your lives on your blogs, and inspiring me to do better. As most of you know it was Fall break last week and I was reading someone blog (I don't remember who's) that was talking about how much they enjoy beautiful fall days. The kids had cleaned house all morning so we decided to get out and enjoy the beautiful fall day at Salem Pond.

We weren't sure if there would be any ducks to feed, but soon found out there were plenty.

I couldn't believe that they would eat the bread right out of their hands.

These are some smart ducks! This one decided that he would go for the whole slice of bread instead of the small piece.

Lilli was so funny, she would start to get a little nerves when the ducks would get close.

After feeding the ducks and playing on the playground we decided to go for a short walk. Lilli thought it was a little hot so Jade gave her this branch to shade herself. Even though McKinley wasn't to excited at first to go feed some dumb ducks, in the end we all had a great time.

National School Lunch Week

Last week at school it was national school lunch week, so Lilli and I headed to school to go eat lunch with Jade and Gavin. On our lunch calendar at home it said we would be having corn dogs, but it was tacos instead.

Lilli thought it was so cool to eat school lunch with Jade and can hardly wait to be in elementary school. Jade eats at 11:30 and Gavin doesn't eat till 12:00. When I sat down with Jade all of her friends were so excited to sit by Jade and her Mom. I was very impressed with all the different healthy choices the kids have; apples, carrots, tomatoes, cucumbers, and corn. Of course they also get the huge doughnut for dessert.

It was a little different story when Gavin came into lunch. It was Gavin and myself eating together, Jade and Lilli had headed outside to play. I asked him if he wanted to go eat with his friends but he thought it was OK to eat with Mom. I know the day is fast approaching that I am not longer cool in my kids eyes.

Blankets

I am calling this my blanket post because I have a couple of stories that I wanted to share, and they both involved blankets.

I have a sister-in-law that is going to be having a baby boy the end of this month, so I decided that I wanted to crochet around a blanket for her. Well I have a really cute nephew that I love so very much, I won't mention his real name, but Matt calls him Lil C, and I was watching him for a day. I had moved the blanket form off the couch to a chair by the window, thinking that it wouldn't be bothered. Enjoying one of my favorite hobbies, reading blogs, I didn't notice this cute nephew had stop watching his show and started playing with the blanket. It wasn't until he was running into the kitchen with the thread wrap around his shoe did I realize what was going on. Of course it didn't unwrap from the spool, it unwrap from around the blanket and I couldn't resist taking a picture. No matter what I will always love you Lil C.

I am sure that everyone has either been attached to a blanket or, has a child who has a blanket they can't go without. This blanket was given to me by a high school friend when McKinley was born 12 years ago. Jade became very attached to this blanket and would cry at night if she didn't have it. In the past she has been given new blankets but, they could not replace this one. As you can see it has seen its better days, and really needed to be replaced. We had gone to Wal-Mart as a family one night and they had some of their fabric on sale. I asked Jade if she would like to pick out some fabric to make a new blanket and she loved the idea. She promised me that she would throw away the old blanket after we made her a new one with the fabric she got.

Here she is with her new blanket that she loves. Jade brings such a special spirit to our family and I love her so much.

Spooky Crafts

My sister-in-law Bonnie wanted to make some Halloween decor for her house so she put together a fun craft night. The best part about it was that the crafts were cheep, only took a couple of hours to do, and I think they turned out really cute.

For this one Bonnie collected some branches from different trees around her house, and we found some birds at Roberts Crafts and JoAnns Fabric. We removed the leaves from the branches, attached the birds and then spray painted them black. Totally easy!

The other craft that we did used paint canvases that were seven dollars for three, also at Roberts. Bonnie found some spooky images off of the Internet, that we traced on the canvas, and then painted black. Thanks Bonnie for planning the fun and easy craft night. I will provide the house anytime.

Annual Passes Expired

Matt really wanted to go to Disneyland one last time before our annual passes expired, so he and the kids have been selling fruit each Saturday at the Murry Farmers Markets to earn the money to go. Matt has also said that we are going to be Disneyfree in 2009 so we headed to California last week and had a great time.

I love this picture because it looks like the goat is even smiling, only in the happiest place in the world.

Mom has become a regular at Disneyland also and it was fun to have her come with us.

It was pretty hot so the kids were cooling off in California Adventure.

Waiting for the parade.

If you look close you can see that Lilli has her eyes closed and is sticking her tongue out. This became her staple face on every ride that would take a picture.