Play Date!

Today was so fun and busy. After we dropped McKenna off at school, we went to my friend's house, she is my visiting teacher. There were 4 of us girls there with our kids. I love those girls! So fun and a great lesson to start the day off! Then we rushed home to walk to school to get McKenna bc we were having a play date! Avery and Holland walked home with us!! Avery is 13 days older than McKenna (and in her kindergarten class...and was in her pre-k class too!) and Holland is 2 days older than Ashley and they are sisters. It is perfect!! We love getting them together and they all...even Danielle play so well together and have so much fun! I love those girls too...all 5 of them!! :) It was so fun. Bev and the boys stopped by too... the day just couldn't have gotten any better.

On a side note, I got a lot of cleaning done too which was nice. Ashley ended up slamming her finger in the car door and gashed it, and McKenna has a fever with a rash all over her body now. Weird. But it was a great night anyway. They are troopers!

The Barbie car

So, I have been saving this story in my text messages so that I wouldn't forget it. I just thought it was silly and wanted to remember it. Now I have a journal so I can write everything down!!
We got this barbie car at a garage sale for $5!!! All we had to do was buy a battery for it. Sweet! Ashley loves that thing. She drives it constantly. So, this is our conversation one day as she was driving it.
Me: Hey Ashley, are you a Nascar driver!?
Ash: (silence)
Me: Hey Cutie!
Ash: (silence)
Me: Ash!?
Ash: MY NAME IS ANNIE!
And as she drives away, she says, "MOM,say goodbye Annie!!" She is so silly.
I just had to share. One day, I will get my journal bound. That will be so fun!

Hanging out at dinner.

I worked again today, but Isaac was home with the little ones. McKenna went to school and Isaac took the 3 younger ones to the store. They had a good day. :)
When I got home we had delicious breakfast for dinner! Isaac made waffles, eggs, sausage, and bacon. Then we took some of my plum jam and made plum syrup out of it. So yummy! We talked about our day. They each had something sad or crazy. Ashley- her eye is so swollen! We are going to keep an eye on that. hmm.. McKenna- a boy was walking behind her making kissy noises. Ewww, she said she just gave him dirty looks. Good girl :) Danielle said she stepped on a pricker outside. Poor lady. But they had fun today just playing! Then we played the humming game. Where you hum a song and have to guess it. They are really good. Ashley makes up songs most of the time. She will hum and we can shout, lullabye baby! or something random and she will say Yeah!! hehe, it's cute. But every once in a while she will hum a good one. Danielle copies us mostly or sings them outloud. Cute too. Then we played eye spy. I love doing games like that at dinner. They have so much fun! And so do we. :) Thomas LOVED dinner. Ate awesome!! Daddy's boy for sure. Eggs, bacon, and sausage.... and waffles- well, that's me.
It was a good night together. Then Isaac works Wed and Th night and then we will finally have the whole weekend together. Yes!

Thanks big sis!

Thanks Kellie for calling me and teaching how to work the gadgets. I will add more pictures later, but at least now I know how it works. Love you! :)

Simple Monday

I worked today. I do like what I do, but I honestly hate leaving my kids. I would prefer Isaac be rich and I stay home, but ah well. We can all dream! Isaac got home from work and bball at 7:30a and stayed up to take care of the kiddos. So, Aunt Bev watched the kids all afternoon while Isaac could sleep. She is SO WONDERFUL!! Such an awesome sister and GREAT AUNT! The kids love playing over there with their cousins.
I picked them up after work and of course Danielle wouldn't even go to me. Such a stinker, but again, she does love her Aunt Bev. Thomas was sure attached to me and so was Jason! He loves me too!! We had a good night. Thomas was SO fussy for probably a hour, which is uncommon bc he is such a great baby! It became a little frustrating, but eventually he decided he wanted to play. We had dinner, played on the tramp, and then baths. Then we read probably 10 books, which is a lot for us, but they love it! We should do it more. Danielle wanted to watch signing time in the girls room, but I think the tv in there is about to kick the bucket. :)
Nighty night!

Oh, so I really shouldn't be keeping track, bc the elementary isn't. But McKenna did so great in her school fundraiser. $206!!! I would love to see what others brought in, but we are proud of her! Isaac brought her to my work and made her sell the cookies. "Hi, I'm McKenna. We are selling cookies for my school. How many would you like to buy?" lol- Isaac teaches well. :)

Primary Program

Today was the Primary Program. I had all the kids up and ready by 10, then I had to get ready and get Isaac up...poor guy just got home from work at 6. But there were no complaints. Church was at 11. They did so wonderful! McKenna sang the songs so great and then the ones she didn't know, she would just lip sing.... copying Isaac from the seats might I add. I asked him, why do you do that, and he said she looks better with her mouth moving than just standing. So funny. But she looked beautiful! And also said her part very well! Ashley and the Sunbeams sang "A Sunbeam!" She was also beautiful and so cute. She would jump so high! I think she was having fun, they are so precious! Uncle Ryan and Aunt Brianne surprised us and came to see the program. Yeah! It was so great to have them there. Thomas fell asleep during Sacrament meeting which was so nice and Danielle...she sat with her 2nd mom the WHOLE time. We would bribe her with fruit snacks, she would come over and just shove them in her mouth and then leave again. Stinker. Isaac said we bath her and feed her, and Bev is her "Mom" She is a sweetheart, I know she loves me, but she definitely has a soft spot for her Aunt Bevry.
Church was great as always. I just love going more and more. I just feel so at peace learning the teachings and feeling the spirit. We had a great lesson on Faith. We have faith in so many things, faith that our children will be taken care of while we leave them at school, faith our car will start each morning. Just simple things, but it's faith. I am thankful for the faith Joseph Smith had to seek our the true church. And even Noah. Silly I know to bring him up, but seriously, he built an ark and to think..for what!? There was no water around. And Abraham! He and Sarah had waited years to have a baby. And then finally they have Isaac and Abraham is asked to kill him. Ah, I personally kind-of don't like that story, but seriously, could you imagine, great faith! (and glad he was stopped) What amazing examples for us. I love faith!
Thomas is starting to get more and more to handle during Relief Society. He just wants to be everywhere, but if I can get him to sit with me, he prefers to sit upside down. :P He thinks it is so fun! Silly boy. Oh and he has a thing for hands I think. He loves feeling hands, and people feeling his face with hands. He loves hands!
Ryan and Brianne came over our house for awhile and then we went to Bev's for Chile verde burritos. MMgood! It was delicious and a great night! The kids just love each other and play so well together! It is so fun! And the dessert I might add- I do love me some dessert!
It was a great day to a great week!

The Tooth Fairy

On Saturday morning, McKenna came in about 5:50am to show me her tooth that had just fallen out!! Has there ever been a more excited child! It is her bottom right. She was so happy! She asked if the tooth fairy would still come and I kind-of knew she would be too excited to go back to sleep, so I told her it was almost morning and that the tooth fairy would have to come the next night. I texted Isaac at work, he got off at 6 and he said to tell her that the tooth fairy makes her list before every one goes to bed... So, sure enough, when he got home around 6:15am, she jumped out of bed to show him her tooth. I don't think she went to sleep the rest of the morning, considering her and Ashley were up and running around about 7 730ish.. It was an early morning, but so exciting! We called Aunt Bev, spoke to Nana and even Uncle Ryan Sat. We told Ashley she lost her tooth and she said, "Mooomm, it's not lost, it's under her pillow." Silly girl. :) We asked McKenna how much she thought the tooth fairy would bring and she said that Avery at school got a quarter, so probably the same. "you get what you get and you don't throw a fit Mom" Again, she is so selfless! What a sweetheart! Before she was wiggly mouth, now she is space mouth! She thought of those by her self. Cutie. :)
The rest of the day was good and a little mellow. Isaac has a ringtone for his text messages to the song "I'm not afraid" by Eminem. Danielle now walks around the house singing "I'm not afraid". What a cutie. She does that to a lot of songs all the time. Mostly, "A sunBEAM!" and then "head, shuldas, knees, and toes...eyes, ears, mouf, and nose" Cute girl. But another funny one she sings is "who let the dogs out, woof, woof..." We went to a Bees game and they played that there, so it's pretty entertaining to hear her sing that too. :) They all love to sing and make up songs. I love it!
Anyway, we can't wait for the tooth fairy to come Saturday night!! :)

Lucky girl

Today was a wonderful day! The girls are so funny. I love my kids so much and am so lucky to have Isaac. I am so thankful to our Heavenly Father for giving me the opportunity to raise my children on this earth life, only to hopefully teach them all I can to return to live with Him again someday as an Eternal Family. I am a lucky girl!
Just a few funny things that happened today.
First, this actually isn't funny, but... I ran over McKenna with the stroller today. Who does that? :( We were racing to school, we weren't late, we were just running. I was pushing Thomas and Danielle, with Ashley on top and McKenna was running. She ran right in front of me and I couldn't see her. Ran that big boy right over her. :( We went straight to the nurse to clean up the bloody knees (plural) and get bandaids. She was very sad, but we got her tears all dried up before we took her to class. What a trooper!
When we picked up McKenna from school, she was so excited to tell me all about her day. She has so many great girl friends, which I am secretly thankful that they aren't boys... She loves school, except for today that it was Friday, they don't have recess on Friday's and she doesn't love that. But she has fun. So, walking home she tells me, "Mom, Grace taught me a new word." And as she puts one hand on her hip and the other half way up her side, and says with plenty of attitude! "OMG!" I couldn't help to laugh. She was perfect in her little sassy attitude. She is getting so big! Then I respectfully told her what that really implied, and then threw in that it was actually a Commandment not to say the Lord's name in vain, even though I definitely knew that is not how she took it, I just took it as a teaching moment. I suggested that we talk to Daddy and see what he thought of the new phrase. But it was still very entertaining. She put her cousin Mitchell in the wishing well. He broke his arm last month. Again, she is so sweet! OH, and her first tooth is about to fall out. I had no idea one little tooth could be talked about so much and felt over and over and over again. But she is so excited! And it is so ready, hanging by a thread. Yuck! Danielle is constantly having me feel her teeth too and Ashley is telling us hers will fall out soon as well. They are so cute, losing teeth is so exciting... It means one thing... TOOTH FAIRY!!! One more thing, McKenna told me "Rycker has a crush on Grace, he told me!" AHH!! Kindergarten, does this seriously happen all ready. I'm not ready for that yet!
Ashley came home from school with a magic trick. They had learned about bbbugs. So, they made a bug out of a piece of candy. One marshmallow looking thing with 8 legs. She said "watch it disappear!" As she took out each of the 8 legs and then........ ATE IT!!! What a silly girl. It was such a cute trick. I love Sunshine Circle! I don't love what it does to my bank account, but I do love the program, the teachers, and environment they provide. It is wonderful!
Another funny thing Ashley did was during dinner. We had just said prayer and I had dished everyone up. We always talk about how our day was during dinner, good and bad, but we were silent just for a sec. All of a sudden, I hear "yes, yeah, ok, yeah" I look up and Ashley has a toy phone up to her ear. Oh my goodness, it was so funny. I said "Ashley, we don't talk on the phone at the dinner table. Who were you talking to?" She says "ok, I'll call you later" hangs up the phone and then says, "Moomm, Aunt Bev!" She is so funny!
Danielle during dinner was singing to her girls during school at the dinner table. It was so cute, and she actually kept singing the same made up song over and over again. "to my gurls at skool, Mum" What a sweetheart.
Thomas is starting to walk more and more. He would much rather prefer to crawl only bc he is faster at it I think, but he is a good walker. He LOVES playing catch with his balls. I love playing that with him! And the girls take such good care of him. They make him laugh all the time.
We had a great day! We made strawberry jam to add to the plum jam I made last week. My first year ever making jam! It is delicious! We took a walk and fed some horses our corn stalks from our garden. We went and watched half time at the WHS football homecoming game. McKenna and Ashley loved the dresses, dancers, and especially the cheerleaders. Danielle was running around and of course, what did Thomas find, a ball to play with! It was a little chilly. McKenna was so sweet, she wanted to share her blanket with me and then with Thomas, where she only had a nightgown on. What a selfless child. Then we took Isaac dinner at work. As we left, McKenna said, "I love visiting Daddy at work every night, it's my favorite thing to do." They all love their Daddy so much! He is a great daddy!
I love my little ones so much. They are such treasures in my life. I am so grateful and am so blessed to be able to raise such perfect children of our Heavenly Father! I am a lucky girl! :)

The Doctor's Office

Today was eventful! We dropped McKenna off at school this morning and then Ashley, Danielle, and I headed to the doctor for Thomas' 1 yr check up.
Stats 19 lbs 12 ozs 10%, 31.5 inc long 95%. woot woot! Head 44 cm <5%.
Dr. Tayler convinced us all to get flu shots. So, Thomas had 4 shots all together. What a trooper! He was so brave and hardly cried. Then I went, and Danielle. Danielle was also a trooper, so big and hardly made a peep. Now, my little drama girl. Ashley Tanna... I had to CATCH her, not even kidding, she was running from me in the room. Then, once I caught her, she was wailing her arms and LEGS all over the place. I thought it was a little funny, but so embarrassing! Then we had to go give the receptionist some insurance information and Ashley cried and screamed in front of everyone for 10 minutes! Oh my goodness. I love that girl, but her little tantrums. woo!
Then we went and got McKenna from school and took her back to get her shot. She wailed her legs around a little, but I think it was just from looking at that needle. She was scared. And didn't cry at all! They are all so big! Then Ashley tried to take Thomas out without me and slammed him into the door. Ah, I was so mad. We rushed out of there as quickly as we could. I know she is only trying to help. She will be such a great mom! I just think sometimes, Thomas and I need a break.
But no, the doctor's visits didn't stop there. After lunch, we were cleaning house. I was folding laundry and the girls were supposed to be cleaning their room. McKenna I guess thought it would be fun to stick a bead up her nose and then blow it out. Well, Ashley has a hard time blowing out of her nose. She stuck that bead in and there it stayed. Ah man, just writing about it now, lol. So funny! Where do they come up with these things. We had to take her to the doctor to get it out, but I was definitely not going back to Dr. Tayler for the sheer embarrassment of it, so we happily went to Dr. Larson's office. And he has a new doc, Dr Brian who was great! 2 nurses, a doctor, and mom all had to hold her down while we would repeatedly put saleen solution up there and then lift her up to blow her nose. They were very impressed with how strong she was! She is a little athlete for sure! Just before the 4th try, Dr. Brian said we will try one more time and then they were using pliers. Oh dear. Luckily, she blew really really hard and there it came. This pretty big clear bead. I was so proud of her and excited. And she learned how to blow her nose very well! Ashley was very pleased and then cheerfully asked, "can we still keep the bead?!" Lol. What a cutie.
It was a great day. Thomas took a 4.5 hr nap! I actually woke him up for dinner! We had a great night. They are all great eaters! We went to the store also and picked up Halloween costumes. I can't believe I did that before October, but they were under $10 so I couldn't really complain. I don't mind buying costumes every year, bc they aren't just Halloween costumes. My girls wear them all year long as dress ups, so it's just another fun one to dance around the house in.
I need to remember what funny things they say better. I'm not very good at that, but if I think about it later, I'll write it. Whenever they say something silly, I always think, Oh, I better remember that, but I struggle. Maybe as I continue to write, those silly sayings will sink in longer.
I love my new journal.

The beginning

Hello world. I have finally decided to figure this out and blog. Blog about what's going on in our lives, what my children are up to, and mostly what they say and do daily. This will be from now on, my journal... if I keep it up. I hope I keep it up.
There are 6 of us Garners. Our family is the wonderful! Isaac and I have 4 beautiful, amazing children. McKenna-5 just started kindergarten and is so smart! She absolutely loves it! Ashley-4 goes to pre-K and is our little social butterfly. Friends with everyone! She also gets very upset on the days McKenna gets to go to school and she doesn't. Danielle-2 is such a sweetheart. She loves her sisters so much! And also cannot wait until she goes to school. All three of the girls are the best mom's to our handsome baby boy Thomas. He just turned one. And this past week has finally decided that he thinks he wants to walk. He can, he just hasn't chosen to do it yet, he would rather crawl. He is the happiest little baby boy you will ever meet! And all four of them are best friends! Couldn't make a mom and dad happier! Then we have a dog named Samson, he's a German Shepherd and Isaac has trained him very well! He keeps us safe and active. :)
For the last month, I have been a blog stalker. A friend at work had me read a blog of a friend of hers who lost a child. Then that led to another who lost a child, and then some who had cancer and so on. All these people with struggles and grief. I loved reading their blogs. My heart ached and still aches for each one of them. But their faith in our Heavenly Father and their love for him and our Savior is just so remarkable! They are so inspiring to read. Then, reading their blogs didn't only be about their grief but about what they had to say about how they grew the past week, or what happened next in their lives. It made me want to grow in the ways they had... through learning and understanding of our Heavenly Father's plan and the understanding that our Savior, Jesus Chris knows our pain. And just growing in life. It made me want to journal my children. So, here I am.
The very first post of have is something McKenna said last week, that has just stuck to me and I couldn't wait to write it down.
My dad found out he had cancer in May, 2010. He had a huge operation to remove all that they could in July. He is still ill.. has an infection. SO... McKenna came home from school last week and told me about this wishing well they have at school. They put people's names in there who are sick. She told me she put my name in there bc I was sick which was so sweet...but what I thought was SO sweet was that she was so happy to tell me that she put Grandpa's name in the wishing well. My heart melted. What a sweet little girl, so innocent, so precious! We pray for Grandpa every day, multiple times! She really does listen. It was a proud moment in my life.
And so it begins... the journal of my kids lives! I hope that I can keep this up and consistently write about the precious, silly, or funny things they say or do. I am looking forward to it! :)