My Girls

Cara gazing/smiling at her Papa Talley.

Natalie being a girl. She is into purses, jewelery, and everything girly except for hair-bows!

Cute girl - leaving a path of destruction everywhere she goes :)

Cara's Blessing

Cara was given a name and a blessing by her father on June 6, 2010. (Dominic's Birthday). We were really late to church, which, surprisingly actually is not a common occurrence for our family. We walked into the chapel just as they were calling for Kirk to bring Cara up front. Despite the rushed morning, it was a wonderful blessing and I was so grateful to have a husband worthy of the priesthood he holds to give our daughter a blessing. He did an amazing job.

All You Can Do is Laugh...

Kirk has been out of town this week so I am trying to keep myself and three little ones busy. Thankfully, we've got a gym membership to the Y, I can let the kids play for a while and work off some stress and unwanted calories. Anyway, last night we all went, newly potty-trained Dominic went to the bathroom right before I dropped him off, and I had a great work-out.

I went to pick the kids up and figured I should have Dominic go to the bathroom again before we got in the car to go home. I took him into the little bathroom and he was getting ready to go and I noticed when he pulled down his pants that he was covered in poop! I tried to clean him up but quickly ran out of wipes. I had to to ask the lady who works with the kids if she happened to have any extras. She didn't. Then she asked me if he had pooped his pants and when I said yes, she says to the other woman, "oh, it was him". She turns and tells me that they had found a "piece of poop" on the floor and could not figure out where it had come from. I am now a little skeptical of these ladies watching my kids, but if I'm being really honest, I'm glad they didn't figure out it was my kid walking around with poop pants earlier and interrupt my work-out. I'm pretty sure that's horrible of me, but I figure no one was really worse off for the extra minutes Dominic spent in poop pants - well at least I hope. (Assuming of course that these nice ladies cleaned up the poop that made it to the floor).

So, as I am cleaning up a poop mess, Natalie, who had been interested in what I was doing, suddenly decided that she wanted to try and go potty too. She practices going potty at home a lot. I was so preoccupied I didn't notice that Natalie actually sat on the little kid sized toilet and fell in! One kid covered in poop and another soaked in toilet water - great! (not to mention that of course Cara was crying this whole time, lol :)

I did eventually pull everything together and Dominic and Natalie (with only a diaper and shoes on) walked out hand in hand to the car. It was really cute. No one even tried to run away until right as we approached the van. It wasn't until I was driving home, that I looked at my hand, noticed the brown smudge on my knuckles, and realized I had forgotten to wash hands after all the chaos - I tell you this is real love - a mom with poop on her hands. Anyway, we all made it home, got cleaned up properly and I have to be grateful that for events like last night, and while back, I seem to be in the perfect mood to handle it well and laugh it off. A true tender mercy!

P.S. It also helps to remember that others have battled the same wars and made it through - I remember my sister in-law telling quite a whopper of a kid/poop story about a trip to the park a few years ago - you should ask her about it sometime.

Summer Begins

Natalie & Dominic "fishing" with golf clubs in our pool that hasn't been cleaned out for the summer yet.

I lost our camera - and of course it was stressing me out not to be able to take picture of my kids who are growing way to quickly, but in reality, we probably needed a new one anyway. We had a combined birthday party last Saturday for the Pavkov/Lee June birthdays and I knew I would need a camera seeing as Dominic will soon be three, Cara will be blessed on Sunday etc. so Kirk found me a great new camera and now I have tons of pictures to upload - first, my cutie pie...

Caroline

Aunt Bethany is in town - she's getting married in T-16! I love how chubby my baby looks - she is getting into her 3-5 month chub stage that apparently my girls go through, but this pic is over the top :)

Natalie

Talie girl is growing quick! she is quite timid around water, but thinks she really likes to go swimming. At the birthday party she was much happier to eat. The poor girl takes after her mommy. Anyway, she and cousin Eliza were so cute eating together, and as soon as Eliza got up, Natalie moved in to eat her food too. (She does this at home with her brother's food after each meal - I think its pretty funny).

Dominic

Dominic will be 3 on Sunday and I can hardly believe it! He had a blast at his birthday party and for days was talking about going to Aunt Ali's house to take a shower - it took me a minute to realize he was talking about the slip 'n slide - which sprayed water - too cute. He patiently waited for his cake and ice cream and he and cousin Isabella blew out the candles on their cake. We tried to take a picture with Dominic and my family that was there - he wanted nothing to do with it - and this last picture of him perfectly captures his personality these days - a little stubborn and prone to tantrums - but we sure love him!

And our newest addition...

Who-dey

Kirk decided when a stray decided to camp at his friend's house that he would bring her home to be our outdoor cat that kills the moles ruining our yard - well who-dey (as in "who dey think gonna beat them bengals" clearly not my name choice) is not much of a hunter and is more of a lap cat. Go figure.

Cute Pics!

My sister Mary Jo - who my kids loving call "Jo Jo" took super cute pictures of my kids the other day. Here are a few of my favorites.

Yea for Moms!

Happy Mother's Day to all you moms! While we absolutely deserve a day of recognition, I've been thinking about this greeting card holiday and what I really want to get out of it...

My husband told me a disturbing fact he'd heard. The majority of women who sign up on the Ashley Madison website (be grateful if you haven't heard of this nasty website created for people in committed relationships to find people to cheat with) do so right after Mother's Day and Valentine's Day. Really? "My spouse didn't do enough on a holiday to make me feel special and that's the act that would push me to ruin my family through infidelity". Sorry, for me that's absurd. I learned in a talk at a women's conference this morning that women have 9 expectations for every 1 a man has. The speaker concluded "this means women are disappointed a lot". Maybe we should cut the husbands a little slack this Mother's Day - we would for our kids...

All the moms I know totally deserve way more than a day of pampering but also know that that's not what being a mom is all about. We're not moms because we expect elaborate gifts and surprises (although that might be nice :) Mom's do what they do because they love their kids so unconditionally they can't help but dedicate their time, talents, body and sometimes sanity, to try and give their children everything. Being a mom is giving more than can ever be repaid because of that unexplainable bond with your child. The most I will hope for on this Mother's Day is a lanyard. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/poetryeverywhere/collins.html.

Potty Training

So Dominic finally went to the bathroom on the regular toilet before his bath this evening - I made a huge deal of it, and he was obviously quite proud of himself. Later, when I was getting him in his PJs we had the following conversation:

Me: "Dominic, you went on the potty today! That's so great! Good Job!"

Dominic: "Yes, I went on the potty" (leans in and hugs me) "I'm so happy for you mommy".

Haha! I thought this was so funny - I guess the kid knows this was just as much a triumph for me as it was for him.