amazing

Tonight I gave the girls a 30 minute warning and told them that at 6:30 we were going up stairs to clean the loft up. They had pretty much taken all the toys out of the armior and it was a mine field up there. At 6:30 I said come on let's go clean...and surprisingly they all followed me upstairs. They each picked out what they wanted to clean up and they did it no complaining or anything. I was kinda jsut standing there wondering who these children were!! YAY!!

sick days

when the kids are all sick...the house gets turned upside down
but then they crash hard too!

Courtney is under the purple blankie, Sams under the teal, Sydney under the light blue and Namy is lying there watching them all sleep!

more sickness

Well now Courtney has strep and an eye infection. Samantha has the eye infection but the strep hasnt hit her yet. So now we have all 3 of them on antibiotics and 2 getting eye drops every 3 hours. The doctor is letting me just call and get a perscription if Sydneys eye gets it! And Syds temp went up to 104.8* last night so I made a call to the Dr. we were doing everything right and we just had to keep monitoring her. If it went past 105 then take her to the ER. Thankfully it never went up any higher. talk about scary!! Alyssa gave her a cool bath and cooled down a bit. She slept w Namy last night and when she woke up this morning it was only 101* getting better! Lot's of fun this weekend at the Howe household!

104.1*

After a fun time at the park yesterday we got home and Sydney didnt look so good. I touched her and she was burning up. Her temperature most of the day hovered around 102 and that was w ibuprofen. The highest the thermometer read was 104.1. Scary stuff! I made her sleep in our bed. I stayed w her until Jon got home at 12:30 am from his Las Vegas trade show trip. I am not feeling so hot myself and have been dosing myself w ibuprofen, Nature Made Immuni-C and Zicam. This morning since it was Friday, I decided to take her to the doctors. My kids get ear infections every once and awhile but dont complain that there ears hurt. It wasnt an ear infection but strep throat so now we are about to start the 10 day ammoxicillan regime... I did ask to get the grape flavor put in it (which they have to call the Dr to get permission to do) Let's pray that know one else gets it here especially my Mom since she decided to stay a few days longer that would be horrible for her to take it back home with her!

French Toast

This morning Papa made French Toast. Saying the twins loved them would be an understatement. I think Courtney at 3 pieces and Syd had 3 1/2. YUMMY! It was the most Namy and Papa had ever seen them eat!!

Rain

the girls were outside catching raindrops the other morning...

The Chuck E Cheese Par-tay!

Since Sam was three she has told us she wanted her fifth birthday party at Chuck E Cheese (and her sixth birthday in New York City...) The nice thing about the Chuck E Cheese birthday party was we never had to go there..we would say that's where your having your 5 year old party and she has been totally fine with that. SO today was the day she finally got to have her party there. She was so excited and pretty much everybody from her class made it plus a few other friends. Namy and Papa flew in Friday night to be here for it too. The nice thing about having it there was not having to clean the house before and after a party! The kids all seemed to have a great time. Pizza, cake, ice cream, balloons and GAMES who wouldnt have a great time! I have a feeling that we will be going to Chuck E Cheese often since we dont have an excuse anymore but I was pleasantly surprised the pizza wasnt as bad as I remembered it and this place is brand new so everything is super clean! Good times!

Chuck E Cheese

Party time at Chuck E Cheese!

making cookies

The best part of making cookies is licking the dough!

Kids vs Parents

Today was soccer game day...but it was raining. The league Sam is playing in is really good about letting us know if practices/games are cancelled and they didnt call so I assumed it was still on. We play about 30 minutes south of where we live so I figured it wasnt raining down there. Namy and Papa are in town but Namy decided to stay home w the twins and Jon so just Sam, Papa and I braved it. The city of Goodyear usually closes the fields down when it rains so I thought we'd probably get down there and then find out it was cancelled but it wasnt! The bad thing was that hardly anybody showed up. There was enough for 2 teams but the kids decided that they didnt want to play against eachother they wanted to play against the parents! The wore us out. Sam sure had a great time. She loves this game so much and it's so exciting to see her enjoy it so much and really get in the action! I played 2 quaters, made a goal, got tripped and tripped a kid! Then I let one kids older brothers play. The kids ended up beating the parents 11-7 and towards the end the parents really put on an effort to get some goals w no luck!

She scores!

picture

the other day we went to the Goodyear Community park and the girls saw this rock and made me take a picture of them on it...

this park is a pretty cool park but I dont like going to it by myself. It's so hard to keep track of the kiddos. There are 2 park areas and a climbing wall sorta all close together but far enough away that they can only be at one park area at a time. At one point I thought sam was climbing on the backside of the climbing wall near the play structure that twins were playing on. The twins decided that they wanted to go to the other play structure so I went to get Sam and she wasnt there. She had gone over to the other structure. I got a little paniced and Sam got a little yelled at by me on how she cant do that. She got so sad and said "I am so sorry! Do you forgive me?" I forgave her and told her not to do it again other then that it was a fun time at the park!

Sams Big Day

Sams day started out with a bunch of packages that came in the mail last week that needed to be opened! I knew one was from us but the other 4 we had know clue...They ended up being all from the Hodges'. Kinda funny that each item was shipped seperately. She got 2 really cool coloring books, a funky swimsuit and the game TWISTER! The twinks got her a unicorn pillow pet (which in hindsight they should have each gotten one...) We spent the morning playing before Sam had to go to school. We cant bring cupcakes to share w the class so I opted not to do anything for her at school since all of her classmates (except 2) are coming to her Chuck e Cheese party on Sunday. She did get to wear a birthday hat and sticker plus she got a birthday card from the teacher. After school we went to Bashas', I had ordered her a small cake (the grocery store sent her a bday w a coupon for a free cake- score!) When we got home she got another package to open (clothes from us) and a card from her Godparents. Samantha really wanted to go to a restaurant that she had never been to so I suggested Famous Dave's BBQ since Jon and I have been wanting to check it out too We ordered the All-American BBQ Feast® A full slab of St. Louis-style spareribs, a whole chicken, 1/2 lb. of either Texas beef brisket or Georgia chopped pork, coleslaw, Famous Fries, Wilbur Beans, four corn-on-the-cob, and four corn bread muffins. When it first came out I thought maybe it wasnt enough for all of us plus Alyssa and her friend Mandy...I was wrong we even brought some home! The chicken was amazing! They even gave Sam a flaming sundae! We got home and sang happy birthday and had a little cake. The kids ended the night w a movie in our bed w their Daddy. I think Sam is really going to enjoy being 5!

all the packages
a new outfit from Alyssa

Twister

the flaming sundae at famous Dave's plus she is wearing her new dress

the free cake

happy birthday to you

happy birthday to you

happy birthday dear Samantha

happy birthday to you!

FIVE

February 17 2005

February 17 2006

February 17 2007

February 17 2008

February 17 2009

February 17 2010

SAMANTHA KAY IS 5

salmon

The other day out of the blue Sam said "When boys wear pink it's called salmon." Where does she get this stuff...

White Tank Moutains- Black Rock Loop trail

Yesterday Jon had the day off so we headed over to the White Tank Moutains (after a quick stop at Sprouts for their tasty sandwiches.) We took the twins on their first "real" hike. Well it wasnt that long of one less then 1/2 mile but we want to start them out slowly...

Trying to get a group shot in front the big cool cactus

and again trying to get another shot at the trail head.

ah perfection!

along the trail they have these little signs that tell you about plants and wildlife that we are looking at. Sam loved it and would run and to find them.

Desert Ironwood

I think I saw one but it was to fast so I didnt get a picture of it

Sam being the leader of the pack

Sydney, Sam and Jon...Courtney didnt want to get on the rock
but then she did!
I caught a cactus
so did Sam
and Jon
and Courtney

they were all over the place
then we finally found the plaque about them!

cute kids in the desert

the trail we went on had a short loop and a long loop. On the other side of this trail the sign was down so we thought it was the short loop...a little freakout when we got to the other side and saw this sign!

We will be going back in a couple months when all the spring flowers pop up!

After the hike we had a little picnic and some playtime at the little park
the girls loved climbing the tree
Samantha figured out how to climb up and jump down all by herself!