MR & MRS MIKE BUVALA!

Ok so I am not very good at expressing my feelings/thoughts in words so I am going to let the pictures do the talking instead. But, I will just sum it up with...the weekend of November 8th was amazing. I loved hanging out with all my cousins, setting up, getting ready, feeding Randi the BRAT diet (bananas, rice, apples sauce, toast), doing flower arrangements, eating, dancing, looking totally hot (if I do say so myself, ha ha), seeing how breathtakingly beautiful my cousin was, etc. The only downside was that Mike and I never got our "food in our teeth" picture. In no particular order...cousins getting ready
Tyson and me
If a girl cop marries a boy cop, of course there has to be a gun on the garter belt
The photographer's niece asked, "is that girl a princess?"
Mr and Mrs Mike Buvala
MOH1, Bride, MOH2
Randi and Carol
My man Tyler
Funnest wedding picture ever
The happy couple
Only real brides drink Pepsi (dute-dute)
My other man, Jared, and me
Ok so I am not much of a crier but I did cry for the first time Friday morning when I found out that the wedding fairies got Randi the Photo Booth she had dreamed about having! Thanks wedding fairies...I had a blast in there :)
Nice tongue Jennifer :)
Last but not least...

A LITTLE SOMETHIN' ABOUT EVERYONE!

TWINS: Seriously, how do they sleep like this comfortably?! They aren't identical but every once and while they do the exact same thing and it makes me smile.
ELIAS was being very stealth-like and went into our room and climbed up onto our shoe rack and dropped all these shoes into the twins' playpen and the weird thing was, we could hear them all laughing. Look at Elias' face though, he is mad cause he is stuck! Muhahaha. Quick update on Elias and speaking: he is saying a few new words now, including "Emma" and he is mimicking words a lot more than he ever has and it actually sounds like the words! Yay Bubbas!
EMMA: Here is a conversation between Emma and me...needless to say, I am not the smartest person around.
Emma: "Mom, is watermelon a compound word?"
Mom: "What is a compound word?"
Emma: "2 words put together to make one word, like I know 'water' is a word but is 'melon'?"
Mom: "Yes, it is a compound word."
one more....
Emma: "Mom, does 'to' have one 'o' or two 'o's in it?"
Mom: "It depends on how you are using it and daddy always says I use it wrong so...call grandma and ask her."
I am definitely not smarter than a 1st grader.

OUR BRAVE LITTLE SOLIDER!

Today was the day we have been waiting for for a long time. Elias had his surgery to get tubes in his ears. Last night Grandma Jensen came and stayed the night so we could leave the other kiddos in bed while we took Eli to the hospital at 5am. After midnight he could no longer have food or liquids...what?! No bottle for Eli...are you freaking kidding me?! At 4:30am he woke up and Jared went in and layed him back down and a few minutes later he was up again so we brought him into our bed and played with him, he loved it! He didn't even ask for a bottle, yay! We headed out the door to the hospital and he was loving it, we got to the hospital and he was still loving it. We checked him in and turned on the laptop to watch Bugs Life while we waited for the next step. Shortly after getting the movie turned on they had us go upstairs to get situated for the surgery. Still no mention of the bottle, yay! Elias decided that the elevator was the coolest thing ever so we rode it up and down a few times while we waited for the next step. Then they called us back to get him changed into his hospital garb. We got him dressed, turned the movie back on and just snuggled with him on the bed, still no mention of the bottle...can I say yay again?! The anestheisologist came in and talked to us, the dr came and talked to us and a couple of different nurses came in and he was still so good. Somewhere during that time Eli started getting sleepy and fell asleep in my arms so we layed him down on the bed and kept our fingers crossed that he would stay asleep while they took him away and knocked him out.The nurse came in and took him and Elias wrapped his arms around him and layed his head on his shoulder (he must have thought it was his daddy). After they carried him away they took us to the waiting room where we sat for a whole 10 minutes before they came to take us to recovery. I could hear him crying on the other side of the walls so I rushed to be with him and hold him but he wanted nothing to do with me or Jared for that matter. 99% of kids coming out of anesthesia are combative and boy was Elias combative. If he had been any stronger, Jared, the nurse and I would be covered with black eyes and bruises from his flailing arms and kicking feet. Nothing would calm him down, not a sucker, not a bottle, not going outside... nothing. Finally Jared just strapped him in his carseat and about half way home he settled down. He was still wide awake and didn't go down for a nap until 11am. I look forward to him waking up and talking :) I mean, waking up and actually being able to hear us without it sounding like we are talking under water to him. Way to go buddy, you did such a good job today!!

HALLOWEEN!!

This year was a great Halloween. Kind of trippy though to realize that 1 year ago we went trick-or-treating with a 5 year old and a 1 year old and now this year we went with a 6 year old, a 2 year old and two 4 month olds! We were going to meet up with some friends for a BBQ and trick-or-treating but Jared was going to come late straight from work and I was going to get the kiddos ready and head over there with my food and what not. Just before 6pm when I realized there was no way I was going to be on time because all hell had broken lose in my house (every kid was crying and poor Emma was just trying to get her hair done and make-up done but alas she couldn't because she had to help with babies, bless her sweet heart) I called Denise to tell her we would be late and that I could bring my food by now so they could have it on time and she asked if we were ok and if she could help and I gave her the typical Carol answer, "no, we're good." After I hung up the phone I broke out into my typical Carol 2008 sweaty armpits and ran around the house trying to get ready and get out the door. As I was loading up the car while 2 kids were quiet for 2 seconds and Emma was feeding one of them my sweet friend Denise came and brought reinforcements. Her and her son showed up and grabbed babies, changed diapers, loaded up car seats, etc and we headed over to her house. When Jared showed up I told him what happened and started crying. You know it's funny...people make comments on here about how great I am, but I am really not. It's the people around me who make me this way. I have great support from my husband, my daughter and my friends. Thank you Denise for ignoring me and showing up and saving us, it meant more than you know.
Ok back to Halloween. So Emma was Princess Aurora again this year and had a great time but next year we will bring a water bottle so she wont complain of thirst on her journey for a bucket full of candy :) Elias was Mike Wazowski from Monsters Inc. - a costume which he picked out and totally surprised us all. We ordered him Lightning McQueen from Cars but he didn't want it so we borrowed 4 or 5 other ones from my friend and he picked that one, so random so cute though. The best part was him trying to eat a sucker while in the costume, he just couldnt quite get his arm to reach his mouth, HILARIOUS!! After about 3 houses we ditched the costume so he could keep up with the other kids. Every house we went to he would say, "um...um...um...un suck" (translation....um, I am going to pick the sucker in your bowl of candy). Emma ended up with about 100 pieces of candy and Elias had about 15 pieces. He didn't even care to get candy he was just having so much fun running up to each door he didn't really stick around for the treat once they opened the door. The twins had a glorious night as well. Being pushed around in a stroller outside with snuggly costumes on...I mean, does it get any better than that?! On Monday Emma made a haunted mansion and this is how I found Elias the next day...shhhh...dont tell Emma he ate it :)

PHEW, WE SURVIVED!

I know that everyone has busy weeks and I am not the only one but I just was thinking, I am so glad last week is over. It had great parts to it, like Jared's brother getting married and going to my first Suns game but it also had crappy parts like 4 days of stomach flu. Here is our week in a nutshell...sorta.
Sunday: church, primary meeting for Jared, going to Jaime's house to learn how to make homemade caramel apples.
Monday: therapy for Elias, Jared and Mike took down the bane of Jared's existence (the trampoline) and we hauled it and its 500 pieces back to the store to return it and get a new one, went on a double date with Randi and Mike to the Suns game (we had free $100/seat tickets, thank you Dad).
Tuesday: 5am, Elias woke up puking and continued to do so every half hour to hour for the next 6 hours, dragged all 3 boys to the doctors office for their regular check-ups, went and got the stuff needed for Enrichment (I am the Enrichment Leader)
Wednesday: got everything ready for Brandon's wedding on Thursday, got asked to give talks in church on Sunday, got Emma from school and as soon as she walked in the door she puked every where and continued to do so until 10pm, Jared went home teaching, canceled giving talks on Sunday, I left Jared with all the kids and went and did my Enrichment thing at the church, came home and picked up and went to bed.
Thursday: 3am I woke up and puked all over the bathroom (awesome), stayed in bed and slept, Jared worked from home and took care of the kids, got up and got ready for the wedding (along with Emma to be a flower girl), partied at the wedding and came home and went to bed. (my favorite part of the night was when the DJ announced the wedding party and he said the flower girls and Emma and Maddy went out there and strutted their stuff and spun around like they were on the cat walk)
Friday: Disinfected the house, then Jared got sick, got all the kiddos ready for the wedding reception and then went to the wedding reception with the kids and no Jared (thank you family members for helping with the boys). Aren't these pictures of Elias and Brylee cute...first they kiss, then they look like they got caught kissing.
Saturday: Randi's bridal shower, Votaws Halloween party and Marlee's 1st birthday party.

Every time weeks like this happen I think, "as soon as this is over my life will slow down and I can just sit back and snuggle babies," but inevitably it doesn't. I want to be a kid again with no responsibilities, anyone else want to join me?! If not, feel free to join me this week...3 more Halloween parties, another Enrichment, family reunion, etc.

THE BOYS' STATS!

We decided to spend an entire afternoon at the doctor's office and do 2-4 month check-ups and a 2 year check-up. Between getting all the measurements, shots, discussing fluids in Elias' ears, etc...I don't think we will do a 3-in-1 appointment ever again! Here is a picture of the last peaceful moment we had while waiting for the Dr to come in.
Elias: Weight: 32.9 pounds (90-95%)
Height: 35 inches (50-75%)
Head Size: 51.2 cm (90-95%)

Tyler: Weight: 15.0 (50%)
Height: 24 3/4 inches (26%)
Head Size: 42.3 cm (49%)

Tyson: Weight: 14.15 (49%)
Height: 24 1/2 inches (25%)
Head Size: 42.5 cm (50%)

Thank heavens for head size: the first time Tyson has ever topped Tyler on any measurement!

PYSCHO PANTS!

QUESTION: What do you do when you think you have 2 different kinds of formula in your pantry but it turns out they are the same kind and you have to mix 2 different kinds of formula to make one magical cheap concoction and your husband is out of town with all his brothers?!

ANSWER: You load up all the kiddos of course. Good thing you only need formula because there ain't no room in your shopping cart for anything else anyways.