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Grandma Came!

In honor of my mother, who we just had a visit from, I've put these little puppies on our background!  She loves her dog Lucy, and this is the closest I could come to setting our backdrop to our recent visit from her!  She loves penguins too, but I couldn't find one!  Anyhow, Grandma came in on the 11th and stayed until the 17th.  We had a lot of fun with her, but we gave her our little cold bug and got her sick!  We owe her a big apology for that!  Sorry Grandma!  We love you and hope you are feeling better.  It was nice to see her since we hadn't seen her in almost a year.  The kids had fun doing some crafts with her and even made a yummy popcorn treat together.  It was nice to visit and catch up on each other.  One of these days we need to make it to their new home in Georgia.  We haven't been there yet.  

Tess had her first teeth cleaning last week and did wonderful.  I was actually shocked that she sat still and cooperated with the whole experience!  She came home with her bag of goodies, ate the floss, and has been cleaning the tile with

 her new toothbrush.  What a good little cleaner!

Porter also had his first T-ball practice and was sooo excited that he now has a cool baseball hat.  It's gonna take some practice to get the hang of running fast around the bases, though!  After he got to first base they told him to keep on running and so he proceeded to keep running straight instead of heading to second base!!  Time for dad to have some practice in the back yard!

Owen, sweet Owen, still won't walk.  In fact, he doesn't even want to stand up.  He scales the furniture standing on his knees and crawls like mad all over, but simply refuses to stand up and walk.  If you have him stand up next to something, he'll do it for about 10 seconds and then wants down.  One of these days, he'll realize how fun it is to move a bit faster.  I'm not worried - I was a late walker - so maybe he's just taking after his Momma.  

Brandon and I are doing well.  We're just trying to get everyone healthy again.  We all got some colds while my mother was here and we've been hacking for almost a week.  We're hoping this is the last cold for the winter.  It's supposed to be 88 today, so I'm hoping the heat kills the bug in our home.  My big news is that I donated 11 inches of my hair this week to Locks of Love - which makes wigs for children who have lost their hair during chemo and for other reasons.  I now have a fun new short hair-do!!  I also decided to go back to work part-time for awhile to put some money aside for a new home, so I got a job again in dentistry.  The kids are excited to spend a couple of days a week at their favorite friend's house.  She used to teach first and second grade, so we're excited for Tess to have some pre-school and Porter will have some fun stuff to work on during the summer too.  Maybe this will convince Owen to sleep in his port-a-crib that he hates so much!  We'll keep you posted!

Well, I promise I won't take so long before I post again - It's just been busy here!!

We love you all! 

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Happy Birthday Owen!

We really can't believe our baby turned 1 today!  It is really crazy how fast this last year has gone by.  When he woke this morning, I ran into his room singing Happy Birthday, and he immediately stood up in his crib and started dancing to the song!  He is such a fun little boy.  We feel so fortunate to have him in our family.  Porter made sure that Owen got to do whatever he wanted to all day long.  Porter even asked me when he got home from school if I made Owen take a nap!  I had to explain to him that Owen is still little and wanting to take his naps!  I think his favorite part of the day was the constant singing.  I told Tess that every time we walked past Owen we had to sign Happy Birthday.  He loved it.

Owen enjoyed his day and was thrilled to have chicken and rice for dinner.  He loves anything with rice.  He loved all of his presents and new clothes.  We finished off the day with cupcakes and some fun visits with family on the ichat and the phone.  He was pooped and ready for bed by 6:50!  We sure love him and are looking forward to many more birthdays together.

Okay, Just Shoot Me Now!

As if this winter couldn't get any worse in our household with sickness.......now Porter's cough has turned into pneumonia. I just simply cannot win. I scrub the house daily, bought a new vacuum, bought a new washer and dryer, feed the kids right, load them up with orange juice and some random extract Amy told me to give the kids, and bathe them daily yet - they are still getting sick. We are averaging attending church every other week and sometimes less cuz someone is always sick and we're not wanting to infect anyone else. We've informed our bishop that we are indeed not inactive, we'd rather be at church, but we're at home with sick kids (Owen and Tess both even had pink eye)!! And to top it all off - LOST is driving me crazy!! What's up with Kate having Claire's kid?? And what about the Oceanic 6 are now 8? Why on earth is Sayid killing someone for Ben? If anyone has these answers, please enlighten me! I can't believe there is another two years after this season for a full resolution of these issues that are making me grind my teeth at night!

So, aside from our issues mentioned above, things are at least progressing here in Mitchell land. Owen is crawling more on his knees and we're surviving to say the least! Brandon's job on the Mayo clinic is humming along and he's getting anxious to finish it soon. We've finally gotten back into our normal routine after being spoiled from Nana for over a week! We had to re-train the kids after she left. Grandparents always give extra special attention and spoiling, so detox must happen after they leave! I've found my self praying for our hot summer to kill all the sickie bugs that keep coming into our home!

Hopefully this week will be full of happy times and no more trips to the doctor. Let's at least hope that come Thursday night, LOST won't give me heartburn!

A Visit From Nana!

We had a wonderful visit this week from Nana Barb.  She flew in last Friday, the 8th, and left this afternoon.  We were thoroughly spoiled and had lots of her yummy cooking!  There were tears to be shed when she left, and now we are looking forward to the next time she visits.  Up until Thursday we had fantastic weather and were able to spend a lot of time outside, which really made the visit nice.  

Last Saturday we all headed to Tucson to have a little birthday party for Tess with Fafa and Punkin.  Punkin made Tess a special cake, and Nana provided the princess crown - so she was all set!  We all had fun and Tess 

made out with some fun new clothes.  She has been really enjoying her new bike.  She's already biffed it a few times, but gets right back up and keeps on going.  We're really proud of her for trying so hard.  

Porter had his Valentine party on Thursday and had a ball.  He came home with a bunch of Valentines and has been slowly picking away at the candy when I allow him to have a treat!  He's loved having Nana here, and made all of his Valentine crafts at school for her!

Chocolate Thunda, Owen, is doing well.  He's still growing like crazy and developing a way fun little personality.  He's army crawling all over the place and has made big improvements this week with his standing up next to things.  We're getting there!

Brandon and I's big news here is that we FINALLY got a Mac computer!  We've been dreaming about one for quite some time, so we

 feel like it's our new baby.  Maybe we should give him an official name with the Mitchell surname!  We'll keep you posted on any new e

mail accounts or what I decide to do with the blog.  I may go the distance and actually do a full website for the family and then ditch the blog.  I'll let you know what I decide to do.  Email me if you

have a webcam and want to chat and we can exchange "handles" - bjpmitchells@yahoo.com.

Brandon bought me my birthday present early and now I'm the proud owner of the new pink Nano!  I'm learning how to use it and having fun.  Brandon made me an 80's workout mix today and I'm enjoying the fun stuff on it.  My goal this week is to memorize the words to Ice Ice Baby!  Chris would be so proud!  I'll let you know how I do!

For Valentine's, having a sitter here - Thank You Barb!! - we went out with some friends for dinner and had a blast getting to know them better.  It was nice to have a night out.  I also went the distance with our family tradition and made the kids a fun breakfast and used food coloring to make everything pink and red.  They loved the pink pancakes, but Tess wouldn't touch the pink milk.  She said if it wasn't strawberry milk, she wasn't going to drink it!  Next year I'll know to buy the strawberry milk!

Anyhow, that's it here for now.  

Word to your mother!

Happy Birthday Tess!

What a wonderful day we've had here at the Mitchell home! Tess turned 3 today. It's crazy to think our baby girl is that old already. It feels like yesterday when I was out walking in a foot of snow in Rexburg trying to induce labor - - - and it worked! Tess had a fun day picking all of the activities to do here at home today. She got to have a little friend over tonight and we all went to Red Robin for dinner. The big prize was her new bike! She has been wanting one for quite some time, so it totally made her day. Thanks to Papa and Grandma - she's all set with a helmet and knee pads. Thanks to Uncle Chris and Aunty Amy - she has a fun basket and a crazy loud horn for her bike. I think she's set! She's really looking forward to Nana flying in on Friday. She will be here for 8 days, so we are all really excited to see her. We're all headed to Tucson Saturday to have a little birthday party for Tess with Fafa and Punkin.

Not much else has been going on here. We've all had our colds a few times over. I ended up with Strep, Porter had another ear infection, and Owen ended up with pink eye! Knock on wood, but I think we're all on the mends now. I sure hope so! It's starting to warm up here, so that should help.

Porter got registered for spring T-ball. This will be his first year playing T-ball, so we're anxious to see how he likes it. The season doesn't start until March, so stay tuned for more info on that. He's looking forward to a little Valentine party in his class next week.

Owen continues to do well and is growing daily. He's really got his little army crawl down pat. He will get up on his knees and rock back and forth, but he's not gutsy enough yet to get those knees moving. He's just following the path of his two siblings and getting mobile a little late. No complaints here by me. Once they are mobile, there's no stopping them!

We hope everyone is doing well and enjoying all that cold weather up North! We'll be thinking of you when we put on our shorts next month! The kids send kisses to everyone!