4 Years of Fun

Ellie celebrated her 4th birthday this week! We have had so much fun with Elz Bellz in our family. She showers us with love and exhausts us with never ending energy. As you can see in the previous post we had an epic Willy Wonka birthday party to celebrate. But I decided to off load some facebook pictures so we can have this year of' Ellie memories' in our family album.

 This is one of my favorite pictures of Ellie to date. As I sat at the table she came up and said  while posing, "hey Mom, how do I look?"

 Ellie loves cooking with me. She helps me make things every single day. At times it gets messy but most of the time it is our special time.

 Ellie decided she wanted to have a movie night, one Friday night, with root beer floats and popcorn. She created her own concession stand for Mitch and I to come and partake of. We did have to pay a penny to receive our food, she's pretty smart.

 This is a picture of Ellie's face when I ate the last gusher and did not properly destroy the evidence. She sat and cried/screamed for 30 minutes. I told her she could cry all she wanted but it would not bring that tasty treat back. Her words included, "how could you!?...I can't believe you! ...and I wanted that!"  The whole tantrum was so ridiculous (especially because I rarely eat their fruit snacks) that I could not stop laughing and had to snap a pic. I know, bad mom.  :)

 This is the first time El came out having done her own hair for a play group. She was pretty proud of herself, I love her style.

 This year was Ellie's first year of soccer. She was absolutely a joy to watch!

 Please ignore the middle finger. On our anniversary we went to the Blue Bird. Ellie chose a little bag of peach rings (her favorite) as a treat. She never will smile for the camera, her silliness always comes through instead.

 Ellie is our little fish. She loves swimming and took swim lessons this year.  She is always one of the first ones to jump into the lake.  She also learned to ride a bike this summer and is quite in love with the joy of peddling that thing.

I can't forget one of her most favorite people, Dad. When he comes in the door at night that little lady is nearly glued to him. She has to sit next to him at dinner, wrestle with him, and read books with him. You would think that would make me feel bad, no no really. I enjoy a break and we are happy to have such a good dad in our family.

 I threw this one in just to remember how much she has grown. Ellie can hardly wait for her new little sister to come. She is always telling me how she will feed her and hold her and get her out of her crib. What I really heard is, "Mom you're going to have to make sure I don't squish her". She told me just the other day, "when I grow up, I want to be a Mommy ."  She melts my heart.

We are so blessed to have this beautiful little girl in our life. She fills us with love, patience, and smiles. Happy 4th Ellie bug.

Ellie's Birthday Party

I have some serious updating to do on this family journal! We seem to be constantly on the go and life always has a tendency to fill up with more adventures with each new day. Our latest celebration (after Thanksgiving of course) was Ellie's 4th birthday. We have been counting down to this for weeks and Ellie could hardly stand the wait.

Because her birthday fell on a Sunday we did a birthday party on the Saturday before. Because Ellie LOVES candy we decided to have a Willy Wonka birthday party. I had so much fun planning and the kids got plenty sticky so I suppose it was a success!  Our biggest dilemma was who to invite. Ellie has A LOT of cousins but we decided to only invite the ones that were within a year of her age. Luckily, a few older ones stopped by at the end to pick up their younger sibling so hopefully no body was sad. We still had 9 cousins within her age group, plus a few little friends.

We spent the day licking the walls, making candy necklaces, playing candy, candy, who has the candy (button, button), wearing Wonka glasses and playing with glow stick balloons. It turned out to be a fun and exhausting day!

 We are not responsible for death or damages contract...very important for a 4 year olds birthday party. :) Silly Ellie cheesing it up. Isn't Mitch a good sport. He said, 'the next time we do a birthday party let's go somewhere that I don't have to wear a costume.'  But you better believe that Ellie loved the look!

 We used Jolly ranchers and made lickable stars. However, we had to re-do four of them throughout the day because Max kept making the rounds and licking everyones.

 Again pulling some goofy face, one day she'll smile at the camera.

 Here is cute Max with cupcake stuffed through his binky. He could not keep his hands off the treats.

 of course, the set up. Notice her VERY important Birthday badge.

These were our tasty candy necklaces.

 Here are some more pictures of the lickable stars

Last but not least, the coveted 'Golden Ticket". Happy Birthday Ellie!

USU vs. BYU

We love our Aggies so much. We have such great memories of Logan which make it all the more special.  The Lifferth family and Matt and Keira Dorius went up to Logan for some tailgating fun. We had so much fun trash talking and teasing.  However, once the Aggies quarterback got hurt, the game was pretty much over and the trash talking came to a quick end. Dang Aggies.

 My handsome man and I. I think He get's better looking everyday.

 Uncle Ryan tailgating with his grilling skills. The kids joined us for the tail gate portion then we sent them off to get babysat at our old bishopric members house, Brother Halling.

 Oh how I love my little buddies.

 Robb's car that every one loved.

Diane Oldroyd came and stopped by and said hello as well. We love good friends!

 The whole group. We had a lot of fun.

 The after math. Sad Aggies, Happy Cougars. :(

To Be as Cool as Dad.

I walked down into our play room just in time to snap this picture of Ellie pouring water on Max. Evidently, it was gel and she needed to do his hair. One day He is going to get bigger and give her a good whack.

It's not so surprising that she was putting 'gel' in his hair. The kids are always reenacting everything that Dad does. Everyday when i'm getting ready Max comes in the bathroom and grabs dad's deodorant, opens the lid and wipes it on his tummy.  If Ellie finds a tool she begins fixing things just like Dad does.  When he comes home from work he is greeted with hugs and kisses while i'm left in the dust like chopped liver. Oh, well. I'm admittedly grateful for the break. :)

Max continues to shower us with snuggles and kisses. However, his 19 month old personality is starting to come out. He throws out the occasional scowl, plenty of high pitch screams and loves pulling everything out. He can say, Mama, Daddy, drink, bye bye, thank you etc. He is a sweet little boy.

    Ellie is getting better at going to pre-school. She has had some anxiety about going but is getting better each time. She continues to push her limits with us as parents but is highly motivated by praise and sticker charts.  Her absolute favorite thing is riding her bike, especially if Dad is with her.  She is overly frustrated if she can't do things that other people can do. Her latest thing is being upset that she can't juggle like you guessed it, Dad.

Ellie is also learning how to write her letters and is getting pretty good. This is the first time i've seen her write her name. She spelled it wrong but is getting very good. I really like seeing her cute little handwriting.

Oh, and I can't leave out all the funny things she says! The other day she was in the potty and Mitch went in to 'wipe' her. She went #2 and Mitch walked in and said, "oh! it smells like roses in here!!", Ellie replied, "oh, well you smell like poop!" Mitch told her that was not a nice word so she thought for a moment and said, "okay, then you smell like crap!". I was outside the bathroom with the giggle fits while Mitch continued lecturing about her poor language. Kids are fun!

Grandma turned 89!!

Oh Grandma, you sure are awesome. Grandma turned 89 this week and decided that she wanted to try the ifly as a birthday present. Her response to the experience, "That was not as fun as I thought it would be." None the less, it was fun to watch.

She is just awesome, don't you think?

Last Ski of The Year

We are so lucky to have Uncle Robb and Aunt Carlie to take us boating. They have a really nice boat and we love going with them.  Mitch was awesome as always and made Dad of the year. We snapped this family picture. Yes, Max does have his binky in. :)

Girls Day!

Ellie and I decided to have a girls date on Saturday.  I'm not much of a pedicure girl but after being sick for the last 13 weeks (did I mention i'm pregnant?!) I decided I could use a little girl time. So I took my favorite little lady with me and we had a lovely time. 

   They clipped, filed, and painted her little toes for 5 dollars and she enjoyed the massage chairs. The only problems is that she had a case of the giggles while they touched her toes. She was adorable. Little girls are so special. I simply adore her.

First Day of Pre-school

Today was Ellie's first day of pre-school. Kids always grow up so fast but we have been so excited for pre-school to start. Ellie loves learning and meeting new people. She is helpful and a self starter. Today she brought me into her room and said 'Surprise!' and pointed to her bed that she made all by herself. What a cute little lady.

 Oh I could just kiss her little face off. Last week she told me she needs to find a boyfriend. I just about choked on my food. I asked her where she heard about a boyfriend. She said (her cousins) "Ethan and Olivia were talking about them and I need to find a boyfriend...or a girlfriend. Either one I guess." Oh Boy!

 She made sure I got a picture of her strawberry shortcake backpack.

 Here she is with nakey brother Max. Don't ask why he's half naked, it's just one of those days.

Here she is sitting in class. I like this picture so much because I feel like there is just a hint of Lifferth in it. All my kids are Dorius clones. This is the first time that I thought that she looks just a little like I did as a kid. **Happy Feelings**

Last but not least. Here is broken hearted Max. He was very upset to leave big sister behind. They are best buds. Cheers! To new beginnings!

My family has participated in the Logan to Jackson (LOTOJA) bike race for more than 10 years now. The race is 206 miles long, crosses 3 states, climbs nearly 10,000 feet and is the longest amateur bike race in the United States.

For us it has become a family tradition that allows us to cheer each other on, train and race together, and enjoy a beautiful weekend.  But this year the race took on a new meaning as it meant the end of a long, hard year for our family.

This year we had 2 teams and 2 single riders in our group. Here are our teams:

Team Semicolon

 Team Beating the Beast

Obviously, the names of our teams are a little strange, however we had our purpose. Last October, my 64 year old dad (Rick) was diagnosed with colon cancer. He spent the last year undergoing major surgeries and a terrible 6 months of chemo.  His last treatment was in July (2013.)  From the day he felt well enough until now he has been pedaling away to try to strengthen his body again.

You can't imagine the joy it is for us as children to go on a bike ride with our dad as last year we were uncertain if he would be with us. We are happy to announce that he is now in remission and was able to ride part of the relay with us.

This year we dedicated our race to him. My sister had the white and blue jerseys made that have a biker with the blue cancer ribbon representing colon cancer.  (A special thanks to Melissa Ricks for the artwork on the jerseys!)

I think everyone knows someone who has or has had cancer. For our family, cancer has taught us to cherish every moment and live in that moment. We have become a little more selfless and learned how to pray a little harder each day.

I hope that we can all enjoy the opportunity we have to be healthy and make the most of our bodies. Each day is a gift and we need to cherish and enjoy it.