And another one's gone...

The drama continues as Benjamin loses his baby teeth! Last week he had been in bed for a miserable hour before he finally got up and said, "Mom, please get this tooth out of here!" So I brought him into my bathroom and tried to help him out. I wiggled and tugged and that little tooth just wanted to stay put. Ben was nearly out of his mind. Finally, the tooth was just hanging there and Ben pulled it out himself. That tooth had the longest root I have ever seen on a baby tooth!

Birthday Parties Galore

We have three birthdays in the month of September! Brock and Lauren were born on the 20th, and Benjamin was born on the 23rd. It's so hard to make all of them feel special at the same time. I do my best to give them each individual celebrations.


Lauren invited six friends to sleep over. She had a lot of fun and a lot of frustrations. Lauren said that she would never invite all of them over at the same time again. It was too much for her to manage. It was too much for me to manage too! The girls started doing make-overs at about 1 a.m. and I was getting a little grouchy inside. When I had to tell them all to get in their sleeping bags and go to sleep at 3 a.m. my grouchiness was coming out. I guess I'm not the sleep-over-kind-of-mom. I don't think the girls' ever planned on sleeping! All this in the name of making Lauren happy for her 12th birthday. Lauren finally got her ears pierced! She is counting down the days until she can wear all of the earrings she has been making for the last two years.

Brock is probably the one who gets the short end of the stick at birthday time. I made him his favorite carrot cake with cream cheese frosting. He got a couple of really exciting gifts like shirts and pants. Waa Hoo! He would much rather have some kind of new technical gadget. Some day Brock...

Benjamin requested Chinese stir-fry for dinner and a chocolate cake. He is nuts about star wars! So guess what he got for his birthday---galactic heroes from star wars. He was a very happy six year old.

Benjamin loses his first tooth!

Finally, Ben was able to lose that first tooth! The tooth was barely hanging on to anything for about a week before Ben decided it was time. He stood in front of the mirror, nearly in tears, and just popped it out. He was so surprised! He loves to smile and show everyone his gap. Now his other bottom tooth is loose...

Flashback Friday

This photo was taken back in 2000. Jessica was turning 5 and Lauren was nearly 2 years old. We were living in an apartment in Klamath Falls, Oregon. I snapped this picture on a Sunday after church. The girls were running around in their slips! I thought they were so cute. Notice how Lauren is standing on one tippie toe.

Some of you may remember that Jessica cut her own hair. It was so short. She cut it almost to the scalp in some places. She looked like a european punk rocker. The crazy part is that some people actually thought I cut Jessica's hair in that style. I didn't think I would survive that ordeal!

My girls are young women now. It's amazing how the time has gone by so quickly. I love the song that you probably hear playing right now. "Slipping Through My Fingers." Sometimes I feel just like the words to this song. Before I know it, my girls will be leaving home. It makes me so sad to think that their childhood is nearly gone.

Flash Back Friday!

I love the whole idea of a "flash back Friday." I have to thank my sister-in-law, Ashley, for the inspiration. My sisters are just going to love this one.

This picture is a flash back of my 4th birthday. I always had a heart shaped birthday cake for as long as I can remember. It is because my birthday is so close to Valentines Day. If you look really closely you can see my silver tooth. There are not many pictures of me smiling and showing my teeth. I was very self conscious of my silver cap on my from tooth. Apparantly back in the ancient times dentists did not cap a child's tooth with anything but silver. Someday I need to find out why.

I love to see my sisters looking so much like their own daughters in this picture. Polly looks so much like Cami. Shelley, well she looks a little like she wasn't ready for the picture to be taken. Tammy is such a mix of Chelsea and Brittany. Chris is the spitting image of his son Jerin. Chuck looks like he just wants to bug Chris.

I had such a great, stable childhood. Everything seemed so simple back then. Here we are all happy, without a care in the world. It's nice to have a "flash back."

McGee and Irvin Reunions

While in Farmington, New Mexico, we went to visit the graves of our deceased family members. Here we are with Great-Grandma Irvin next to Grandpa Woody Irvin's grave.
Here is Great-Grandpa Jewel and Great-Grandma Leona McGee's graves.
This is my...second cousin I think?... Audrey and Ben in the famous climbing tree at Grandma and Grandpa McGee's house.
This is where we stayed for the McGee reunion in the Colorado Mountains. It is so beautiful!
Here are the original nine McGee kids with Grandma and Grandpa. As pictured from left to right: (Back row) Diana, Chris, Curtis, Steve, Chuck (Front row) Julie-my mom, Polly, Grandma, Grandpa, Tammy, Shelley. That's a lot of kids! :)

I love my goofy cousins. That's all I have to say.
So funny!
Me, Chelsea, Tammy
Ben's new found best friend, Jason. (He's Ja'michael and Julie's son. They also have Jamie and Jane. I don't know how they keep all the names straight!)
Me and my little cousin Sage! She is so sweet!

I Forgot About Boondocks and Temple Square!

While we were in Utah we also went to Boondocks with the Stoner side, and had tons of fun! Everyone got soaked from the water bumper cars, and we had fun playing laser tag and doing gocarts. I couldn't find any pictures of this, so I'm guessing my mom forgot to bring out the camera. Before we left, we just had to see Temple Square again.
All four munchkins! (I miss all my long hair!)
A lovely picture if I do say so myself :)
This is our Christmas picture for this year. Just kidding. In one of the buildings on temple square (there are so many I don't remember which one this was) there was a kids section with all kinds of cool hands-on toys. We just had to dress up and pose for this.
Hahaha! In the gift shop they were selling all kinds of Church History stuff. They had like Nephi, Moroni, Helaman action figures, a mock liahona, all kinds of things. Lauren and I felt inclined to try on these cute little bonnets!