an early Christmas present

I would like to thank Grandma and Grandpa Oregon for the fantastic Christmas presents they sent us. I know it is no yet Christmas, but we did open the boxes and the kids love them.

A Tucson way of celebrating

As this is my last year living in Tucson I have made it a point to celebrate the Tucson way.

My first step was to visit Winterhaven. This is a neighborhood that goes all out with their outdoor Christmas lights. One even had a dancing light and water canon display! It was fun to walk around with the family...so glad that it is warm here.


The next trip we made was to La Encentada for their "enchanted snowfall." You can't get more Tucson than this: We stood on fake grass while fake snow fell on us. Wow. I found this particularly humorous.

Here is Ella enjoying the "snow"

Here's a picture of the so called snow.

Yes, I had fun. Yes I would still chose the seventy degree weather and fake snow over twenty degree weather and real snow. I just won't be seeking out this fake snow anymore.

Merry December

I would like to begin this post with a picture of my youngest:

Rhys at six weeks.

And now for our Christmas happenings:

On November 23rd we bought and trimmed our Christmas tree.

Look! A picture with me in it.

December 4th was the ward Christmas party and my older kids got to ride a train to see Santa!

Ella asked Santa for a "stuffed bear that is purple" and a barbie.

Eli asked for a robot.

I like to plan ahead. And with a new baby in the family I've been planning Christmas presents way in advance. The purple bear and robot requests were way off the radar. Santa, if you read this blog, please help me!

Experiments

Halloween is over. I waited a full week. Now is the time to throw out the candy so I can bake cookies and pies. But how does one convince the kids that this is necessary? Oh, I know! A Special Saturday Family Home Evening.

How would a Family Home Evening get rid of candy without putting the kids in a sugar coma? Easy. You discus the creation followed by the fact that there are rules (like gravity) that everything is subject to. Then you bring up that some things react differently like how vegetables rot when they are picked but fruit continues to ripen. Next (and this is key) you mention how some things sink and some things float. Then you ask, "Which candies do you think will sink and which will float?"

I know, you are thinking that I am a genius. Well, I am. But I must admit that the idea of experimenting with the candy was given to me by someone else.

Want to know the results? We had a fun evening destroying the Halloween candy. We tasted a few. Eli caught on to the fact that the candy was being ruined and decided that he should eat more and destroy less. Ella just wanted to throw more candy into the water.


Oh, and the scientific results: Only chocolate candy floats. And then only a few of them do...

Whoppers
Kit-Kats
3 Musketeers

While Ella unwrapped more candy to throw into the bowl I really got into the experimenting mood and decided to microwave M&Ms. Everyone knows the candy shell protects them so they "melt in your mouth, not in your hand," but how long do those shells protect the chocolate when they are microwaved? It turns out that the last one minute before they crack open and the melted chocolate escapes.

But what about Skittles?

They only last thirty seconds:

Conclusion: M&Ms are better suited for the hot desert than Skittles

Yes, I am a nerd. But also I got rid of three bags of Halloween candy without upsetting my children. When the bowl of water was full of candy and the experiments were complete I sorted through the remaining candy, selecting a few to keep for rewards, and threw everything into the garbage.

Two weeks ago...

Two weeks ago I had a very busy day planned. Ella, Eli and I left the house early to make it to the follow up dr appointment with Eli's surgeon. That appointment was at 8:30. Immediately after Eli's doctor told us that Eli was just fine we had to "run" to the pediatrician's office for flu shots. The flu shots were scheduled for 9:30. Next door to the pediatrician is my ob/gyn where I had a 10:00 check up.

Happily we made it to each of our appointments on time. And while Ella was proud that she didn't cry when she got her flu shot, the more exciting news came during my appointment. When my doctor asked me if there was anything he could do for me I replied that I would like to be induced as soon as possible since my husband was leaving town on Monday.

He was surprisingly accommodating. He stepped out of the exam room to make a phone call to the delivery center. Ten minutes later I left the Doctor's office knowing that I would be induced in less than two hours. !!!

I am very lucky to have such good friends here that are willing to watch my children on such short notice. I am also lucky that Chris happened to have that day and the following day off from work. Talk about amazing timing.

Well, I was induced. And we had a baby boy. Rhys Riley Willliams was born on 10-20-2010 at 18:18. He weighed 9lbs 3oz and was 21 inches long.

Here he is on his two week birthday:

Ella and Eli love baby Rhys.

Mother and baby are doing great. And now I have three kids!

Happy Halloween

Halloween in Arizona involves shorts and flip flops. This is very different than what I grew up with in Utah. I remember completely covering my costume with a big winter coat-every year. In Tucson you can actually see the costumes the children are wearing. Here are my kids in their costumes:

ready to go trick-or-treating

Watching the Labyrinth.

Ella loved handing candy out to the trick-or-treaters. Eli loved that people gave him candy when he went trick-or-treating. Happy Halloween.

Announcing...

We recently welcomed a new member to our family.

Rhys Riley Williams was born on Wednesday (10-20-2010).

Chris sent out an email announcement to our families and I thought I would share it with you too. I will make my own post later...now I think I will sleep.

-Mal

Rhys is a Welsh name. It means "enthusiastic". It also sounds similar to the Latin word for laugh (risi or risum) which we thought especially fitting as Malinda literally laughed him out. Honest to goodness, no pushing, she simply couldn't stop laughing because the epidural made her legs feel all tingly and weird (everyone who knows Mal is nodding their heads right now). The OB actually told her to stop laughing because he wasn't quite ready yet. Three seconds later a baby boy popped out.

It just seemed that given the happy, rapid nature of this child's entry into this world he required a suitable name.

Malinda performed wonderfully and so far everyone is very happy and healthy and resting.

Our love to y'all,

Chris

Here are some videos:

Laughing Mal

Baby Rhys

Surgery

My son was born with a mark on his forehead. His pediatrician told us it was a Nevus Sebaceous. Then, another pediatrician called it something else. Then a dermatologist said it was a juvenile xanthogranuloma and that it would go away by the time he turned three.

Eli is 2 1/2 now and the mark was growing skin tags rather than going away so we decided to get a fourth opinion. The new dermatologist diagnosed him with a Nevus Sebaceous. Since this was the same as the first diagnosis given, we decided that it was the correct one.

A Nevus Sebaceous has a risk of becoming cancerous later in life. With this in mind we decided that the sooner we have it removed from Eli's forehead the better.

Yesterday was the surgery. Eli and I left the house at 545am and drove to the surgical center. Sweet Eli was so well behaved wile we waited. He knew we were having his mark removed and he was very brave. We sang lots of songs to fill our wait time and he made all the nurses fall in love with him.

Here are some pictures of my brave and happy son:

Giving mommy a cheesy grin while the nurse checks his pulse.

In his hospital gown.

On his way to the operating room.

Seconds after waking up post-op.

The circle on his forehead, that most people never noticed is now a line on his forehead that most people will never notice. And now I have the piece of mind that I did all I could to prevent health problems for him later in life.

And I must add that this was way more traumatic for me than for Eli. I was so worried that something would go wrong. I was particularly anxious about his sedation. Thank goodness I have a wonderful husband who was able to give Eli a father's blessing the night before the surgery. It was really more for me than Eli, and it worked...my anxiety went away and I did not go into a stress induced labor while waiting for Eli to wake up after the surgery.

Welcoming Fall

We recently spent a fun evening at the local elementary school's Fall carnival. We walked halfway there then boarded a school bus that shuttled us the rest of the way. I had no idea how excited my kids would be about riding on a school bus. We could have gone home happy after just that one ride.

At the carnival there were booths for games the children could play to win treats. Ella and Eli played a digging for treasure game, a fishing game, a put your hand in a bowl of spaghetti and search for body parts game, and many more.

The first thing to do at a carnival is get your face painted.
Here is Ella showing the flower on her cheek:

Eli chose to get a tattoo rather than have his face painted.
Here he is making a pirate face while showing off his pirate tattoo:

A train ride was high on the agenda since that is the motivation we used to get Eli to eat his dinner. He even got to ride on the blue train!

My daughter rode the mechanical bull!

I tried to get a picture of them coming down this slide,
but my phone doesn't take good motion photos.

They loved this obstacle course. Ella raced against her friend and Eli raced against his. They went on it over and over.

One of the booths that we had fun doing was pin the pumpkin on the patch:

Here we are with our friends lining up for the potato sack race:

Go Eli, go!

By the time we left Eli was beyond exhausted and Ella was asking when she gets to go to another carnival.

What a fun way to welcome Fall!

Soccer!

Today was Ella's First ever soccer practice. I don't know who was more excited, her, Eli or me, but boy were we happy for soccer to start.

Soccer practice started at 530pm so of course we were there at 430pm. Now, wait a minute. You know I like to be more than on time to things, and we were so excited...so we had a picnic dinner at the park and played around until practice started.

See how excited she is?



I am not the coach. I would be, but I am due to deliver our third child in three weeks. So I am the assistant coach.

I started the kids (four girls and four boys) dribbling to the fence across the field and back. then, after discussing such rules as "no hands ever, just use your feet" and, well that was the only rule today, we circled up for a passing game involving learning everyone's name.

After a water break I reluctantly let the head coach take over.

Here they are practicing their passing:


I loath red ants. And sadly every park in Tucson is infested with them. Here is Eli scratching his newest bites:



Learning how to score is important. Here is Ella shooting against the coach:



The practice ended with a team meeting. The coach went over the rules: have fun and be a good sport. Then we voted on a team name. The kids suggested names like "airplane", "helicopter", "soccer team", and "dinosaur". Eli (not actually on the team) suggested "pirates". We "voted" and then the moms chose pirates because they thought it would be easy to make a team banner for the pirates.
Ella was beyond exhausted when the hour long practice ended. She said she had fun and is excited to keep playing.

Eli had fun (omitting the ant bites) and I'm pretty sure he thinks he's on the team too.

Go Pirates!!!

Don't "bug" me

While in Oregon the family participated in a bug eating contest. Gross. Being pregnant has a very nice excuse element to it and I did not need to participate. Ella also refused. And I have to admit that I didn't even notice if Chris ate any because I was so busy watching Eli eat bug after bug after bug!

Here you see Eli eating a Larvet.

Eli won the contest.
(The sign says "I'm a real man, I eat bugs")

The bugs were roasted and seasoned, but still, they are bugs.

Eli wouldn't touch the crickets, but thought the Larvets were like chips.


Now why can't I ever get him to eat dinner?

Vacation overview

My family spent the last week up in Oregon. It is always fun to visit family and we are never ready to leave. Now we get to enjoy these great picture memories...


First we went to a cabin up in Sunriver:

We loved the cooler weather and the nature all around us. we went for bike rides and nature walks.

This is our booty from the nature walk

The cabin had a hot tub...

We floated down the Deschutes river.

We played with our aunts and uncles

and we played with our cousins.

Back in Medford...

We visited the science museum:

Ella's favorite room was the bubble room

We played at Grandma and Grandpa's house:

Ella loves her cousin

Fun in the sandbox

We played lots of games.

I even got a girls day out!

Julia and Gray paid us a surprise visit.

Of course there was swimming.

Chris taught Ella to dive.

Then we flew home.

You know a vacation is successful if you are completely worn out: