Another lost tooth

Kyrie lost tooth #10 last night. Is that a lot for an 8 year old? It sure sounds like a lot to me! But the dentist said it's normal for kids to lose teeth quickly, because when one falls out, the ones around it get wiggly very easily.

Anyway, it's become a ritual for Kyrie to write letters to the Tooth Fairy. Her letter this time was hysterical!


You can click on the picture to make it bigger. Just in case that won't work for you, here's what it says:

Dear Tooth Fairy Tooth #10
If you can please give me a thousand dollars
Anyway if you can't I understand
Cencearly, Kyrie

I die from the cuteness! I actually hadn't seen the letter until Derk showed it to me. I remined him before bed to be Tooth Fairy, and then I heard him and his parents cracking up, calling to me to come see the letter. That Tooth Fairy thought the letter was so cute that she left Kyrie $5 for that tooth! In the morning, Kyrie came running out to tell me she'd gotten $5. I told her how cool that was, then she proceeded to say, "Yeah, but I asked her for a thousand!" lol! So then I told her that would have been awesome and that I'd pull out my own tooth for that much money! ;)

This letter will be saved forever and ever. She actually ended up seeing it on top of my dresser, got very sad and said the Tooth Fairy must not be real after all since I had the letter. I told her the Tooth Fairy let me keep it since it was such a cute letter. I hope she still believes for a while longer because it's ridiculously fun to play Tooth Fairy.

Kyrie's 8th birthday and baptism!

I cannot believe Kyrie is already 8. That just sounds way too old. And it makes ME feel way too old to have an 8 year old! ;) Her birthday was pretty crazy this year. On her actual birthday, we kept things really low-key. We had almost Derk's entire side of the family coming down for her baptism that weekend, and she wanted to wait for them to celebrate. So her actual birthday we spent at home, and we made Fettuccine Alfredo, per Kyrie's request. She did open a couple of gifts -- a package from my mom, and then Derk and I got her a new bed and nightstand.

Late that night (or should I say early the next morning), Derk's parents arrived. Friday we went and did a little shopping. Kyrie got some gift cards for her birthday and wanted to go spend them. Friday evening, Jessica and her boyfriend Mike came down from Phoenix to spend the weekend with us. We had a fun time hanging out and playing games.

Saturday was pure chaos! Kyrie's baptism (for those of you who don't know, in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, children aren't baptized until age 8, which is the age of accountability -- click HERE for more details, and scroll down to "Little Children and Baptism") was scheduled for 2pm, then we had her party scheduled for 4:00. I don't know what we were thinking! Actually, I'm pretty sure we weren't thinking. Anyhow, I ran around like a crazy person all morning trying to get everything ready. Meanwhile, we were waiting for Derk's brother, Drew, his wife and their 2 girls to come into town for the baptism. Around 10am, I realized they'd forgotten about the time change (we're an hour ahead), so that's when the praying started! I wanted them to be there so badly and kept praying and praying that they wouldn't miss it. They were due to arrive around 2:30, so we hoped we could stall the baptism until then.

My mother-in-law made Kyrie a white dress to wear after the baptism. She made my wedding dress, the blessing dress both Kyrie and Cambria were blessed in and Asher's blessing outfit, so I thought it was only fitting that I ask her to make this dress as well. It turned out so beautiful! I helped Kyrie get all dressed and ready, then we were in a mad rush to get to the church.

This is the front of her program I made

And here's the inside
(click on the picture, and it'll be large enough to read)

We'd done the opening song, opening prayer, Jessica sang a beautiful song (to hear the song, click HERE -- this is NOT Jessica, it's just a Youtube video I found-- and to read the lyrics click HERE) and my talk on baptism, then I went in and helped Kyrie change into the baptism jumper. I tried to take as long as I could, both because I was savoring this special moment with her and also because Drew and Rebecca still weren't there. I led Kyrie to the baptismal font, and Derk was already in the water waiting for her. She was literally walking down the steps to the font when Jean (my mother-in-law) said Drew and Rebecca had called and said they were in the church parking lot! Talk about "in the nick of time"!!

After the baptism, Grandma Stephens insisted we get some family pictures. I'm so glad we did!

Kyrie in her beautiful dress


My 3 rugrats!


Our family


Drew (Derk's brother), Rebecca, Abigail and Lauren


4 generations!


Scott and Jean, Derk and I, Drew and Rebecca, Jessica and Mike


Asher and Abbie--
the cutest little 4.5 year old cousins you ever did see!


The whole Stephens Crew


This picture is special because Derk performed the baptism
and Scott performed the confirmation


We sure love this girl!

After the baptism, we headed (okay, rushed) back to our house to get ready for Kyrie's birthday party. We had a house full! There were 19 people here total, including Kyrie's friends and Derk's grandparents. Crazy, but way fun. Kyrie wanted an ice cream cake this year, which took me off the hook for making the cake. I was a little bummed at first, but it ended up being a blessing because I wouldn't have had time anyway. Here are some pictures from her party!

The rest of the weekend passed in a blur. We had so much fun, and I was so busy that I pretty much forgot to take any pictures. We had everyone staying at our house, which was once again super crazy but super fun at the same time. We stayed up late every night playing games, went to Chuck E. Cheese one night, went to the park, did lots of playing on the trampoline, enjoyed good food and, most importantly, enjoyed great company!

Making our house our home -- Part 5

This little project has been on my To Do list for quite some time now. I went out with a friend today, and we ended up stopping at JoAnns. I actually remembered to look for the fabric for this project, and I found exactly what I wanted! I was so stoked! (The bathroom will be repainted, hopefully this week, so it'll look even better once that's done!)

Before
(notice the ugly shower head)

After
(no more ugly shower head!)

Crazy Wednesday

Today has been crazy. We headed out to run some errands this morning. I had a load of clothes to drop off at Goodwill and decided to head inside to look for a shelf for Bri's room. I was totally surprised to find exactly what I was looking for (plus a few extras, lol). While browsing, the entire building started to violently shake. It took me a second to realize it was an earthquake! I haven't been in an earthquake since I was in 4th grade. It actually measured 5.8 on the Richter scale! Derk and the kids were in the van waiting for me, so they didn't feel it shake as badly as I did inside. We were all totally fine, and there wasn't any damage to our house, either (whew!).

At dinner time, we decided to watch a movie and eat our dinner in the living room. About halfway into the movie, Bri wandered off. Next thing we know, we hear a big bang and then her screaming. I jumped up to find her, and she was running toward me with blood dripping down her face. She'd been trying to climb up on one of our bar stools and somehow fell and sliced her lip. I scooped her up and looked her over, and she'd sliced it pretty badly. I handed her over to Derk so he could clean her up a bit while I grabbed a sweatshirt, her "baby" and her blanket. Then we headed to the ER.

Luckily she didn't need any stitches. The doctor said it's pretty deep but that she got lucky with the placement of the cut. If it was any closer to the part where the lip meets the face, she would have had to get some stitches. He prescribed some antibiotics to fight infection and sent us on our way. She was such a trooper. She was freaked out and clung to me, but she let the doctor examine her for the most part. There were 2 times when she got really scared and started crying and begging to go home. :( It was actually my shortest visit to the ER. We were in and out within an hour and a half, then we had to wait 30 minutes at the pharmacy. But to leave home at 9:15 and get back at 11:30 is a world record, I think!

Derk gave her a cool washcloth to put on her lip.
She refused to put it down, so I guess it really helped.

After a few minutes, she got super bored. I looked around, desperate to find something to occupy her with when I saw all the latex gloves. I decided to make her a couple of balloons! She thought that was so awesome!

She was beyond exhausted by the time we left for home.

We got home, I gave her some meds, we got her some clean pajamas and then tucked her in. Her lip was already looking a lot better, so hopefully it won't take long to heal. And hopefully it doesn't leave too nasty of a scar!

Merry Christmas!

I can't believe it's the end of 2009 already. Our day started off early. Really early. As in, 3am early! Kyrie came in at 3am and started talking about something. I can't even tell you what she was talking about because it was way too early for me to listen. :) We basically told her to go away and to please, please, please sleep for at least 3 more hours. She wouldn't have it. After I think 30 minutes of her bugging us, Derk all but threw his laptop at her and told her to go watch a show. That made her happy. But then Derk and I were up off and on for the next few hours, quieting her down and checking to make sure nobody was getting into the presents. I was so afraid she'd wake up the other kids if I fell back asleep and that I'd wake up to all the presents opened. Kyrie came back in at 6, way too excited to wait any longer. So we agreed to get up and let her wake the other kids up at that point. We were done opening presents by about 7am. *yawn*

Even with such an early start to our day, it was still the best Christmas ever. It was extra special because it was our first Christmas in our very own home. And it was super fun for us because we had purchased things we knew the kids would flip out over. I just love seeing the kids' excitement.

Here are the kids with their presents from Santa

The girls with their stashes


Spiderman playing with his new Spiderman

I also got a couple videos. Scott and Jean (Derk's parents) had talked to us about what to get for the kids, and we'd given them an idea for Kyrie. I'm so glad we talked to them about it and knew they were getting it for her because I knew ahead of time to catch her reaction on video!

Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing

After all the presents were opened, we noticed there was an envelope on the tree from Santa (the video isn't the best quality, because like I said, it was really early and wasn't quite light enough for the camera)....

Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing

After the excitement of the trampoline died down, we came back inside and watched Miracle on 34th Street. When that was over, Derk and I started on breakfast. One of the traditions from my side of the family is that my mom always makes a yummy crepe breakfast, so that's what we did. Kyrie refuses to let that tradition die! She looks forward to it all. year. long. Then we just played the rest of the day and relaxed (and napped!). It really was the best Christmas.

We hope you all had a fantastic Christmas. We sure miss celebrating with our family, but you are always in our hearts! Merry Christmas to all of you. We love you!

Christmas Eve 2009

Today was pretty fun. Derk and I were up until after 1am this morning wrapping gifts. While we were wrapping, Derk mentioned that a coworker had told him about a place to go hiking called Picacho Peak State Park. It's about a half hour north of Yuma. So we decided to do that for the morning. We woke up around 8, packed a picnic lunch and headed out. We managed to do 2 small hikes and a little bit of exploring before Asher and Cambria were worn out. By that point, they were both begging to be carried, which made for some very tired parents!

A pretty scenic view

Derk, Asher and Bri each found walking sticks


Kyrie kept finding quartz that she couldn't leave behind


A couple of self-portraits with my Asher


There was also a neat little cemetery that had some cool headstones

After that, we came back home and watched Miracle on 34th street. Derk made us pepper steak for dinner (so good!). Then we cleaned up the house a little bit. After that, we sang a couple of Christmas songs, then we opened our Christmas Eve jammies. I snapped a picture, and then we read the kids the story of the birth of Jesus. Bedtime came next, and let me tell you, I wish I had the "Santa won't come until you go to sleep!" excuse every night of the year! They went to bed so easily. Which is great, because Derk and I needed time to set up the trampoline for tomorrow.

I've decided being sneaky is way too much work. Every little clang the metal made during assembly made me so nervous the kids would wake up. I lost count at how many times I ran inside to make sure they were still asleep. We got it all set up without any problems, though, and now I cannot wait to see their reactions in the morning!

We wish all of you a very merry Christmas!

You really can paint laminate furniture!

Derk says I'm way too anal. Maybe he's right. But it seriously bugs me that my girls don't have matching furniture. For example, Cambria's bookshelf and her toy box are white while her bed and dresser are wood. It just drives me up the wall. Since Derk wouldn't go for the idea of buying them all new furniture (I was only half serious when I suggested it anyway, lol), I decided to paint instead. I chose to tackle Cambria's furniture first (we're buying Kyrie a new bed soon, so I want to wait until after we get that picked out). I read up on how to paint laminate furniture, and despite Derk telling me it was a bad idea and wouldn't work, I went for it. And it turned out pretty great! There are a few small things I need to touch up, but it actually worked!

We took the drawers out and then moved it into the garage. I took all the hardware off the drawers, and then we sanded everything down. You have to be careful not to sand all the way through the laminate to the particle board. You just sand until you get the shiny finish off. Then you prime. I did 2 coats of primer, just to make sure it was really well covered. Once that dries, you're good to paint.

The drawer pulls gave me some serious grief. I thought having a white dresser with pink drawer pulls to match her walls would be really cute. So I got some spray paint and thought that would be super easy. Well, apparently I really suck at spray painting. Or something. Because it didn't work at all. I ended up having to soak them all in paint thinner and then spent a good amount of time today scrubbing all the paint off. And let me tell you, breathing in all those fumes wasn't good. I felt so loopy! At least Derk had fun making fun of me. ;)

Before

During

After

Next week, I'm doing her bed!