Quiet....it isn't always good.

Her face might be messy or she may have a runny nose most of the time but London sure is cute.

I think they look so much alike. Their baby pictures have tons of similarities. Cade even loves to drag her around and pretend to wrestle with her. He's a good big brother.

Now to the title. I snuck upstairs to get ready and was glad that they seemed to be playing with each other. I heard a little giggling and a lot of quiet. I kept telling myself it was fine but my curiosity got the better of me. They were hiding behind the counter when I found them. I couldn't hold my laughter in. London was BEAMING! She was so excited to have someone color all over her face and to see that color on Brynlie. I was trying to take a picture of Brynlie alone and London kept poking her head in and saying, "Cheese!" Too funny. Luckily I had just bought washable markers. They even decorated my tile. Gotta love it!

Brynlie's Debut

She cracks me up! I think she got her moves from her dad. :)

I know...I can't believe it either!

Wow, a post after nearly 16 months! We have our first family snapshot after way too long. This picture is proof that we are alive and well.

The kids start school tomorrow. Not too excited about that. It's been fun having them around and they've played great together.

Brooklyn gets baptized next Saturday. That's crazy to me. Time is flying. Brooklyn loves playing the piano and playing with friends. She took diving lessons this summer and absolutely loved it - did a great job too. She just informed me that she wants to play the violin too. We'll see.

Caden is venturing into 1st grade. Hopefully he doesn't get too wiped out. He starts flag football soon and can't wait. He's a pretty good brother to all of these girls!

Brynlie (or Blim as she has been nicknamed) is growing up fast. She loves to help me fold laundry and begs to get London when she wakes up from her nap. She is a good helper and pretty funny.

London is almost 16 months. She crawled at about 5 months and didn't walk until 14 months. She takes the cake on being our hardest kid. We'll definitely keep her though. She makes us laugh all the time with her funny faces and jabber.

Heath is loving work. He is traveling around to lots of offices extracting wisdom teeth. It's awesome that he gets to do what he loves most.

I'm still enjoying being home with the kids - unless they are fighting. :) Here's to hoping I can post something before another 16 months have gone by!

The Grand Arrival!

London Talia Snell, was born in grandioso fashion on Thursday, April 15, 2010 at 12:25 am. She weighed 7lbs, 7ozs and has a head full of nice dark hair. She sure was anxious to be born, as Chelsea started having contractions around 11:15pm, we got to the hospital around midnight and she was delivered by the nurses, because the doctor didn't have time to get there, at 12:25am. For those of you that know Chelsea, she loves her epidurals, and unfortunately this time she didn't have time to get one. She was very disappointed with that, and now that she has delivered with, and without, the epidural she has solidified the opinion of, "Why in the world would you want to go through that without one?!"
Here are some pictures of London. Many of you may see a very close resemblance to her older brother, Caden, when he was a newborn.

She's 2!

Brynlie's birthday happens to be today on Valentines Day. I know, cute huh. Well what's really cute are her 2 year old pictures we took today. Not that the pictures are that great, but the person in the picture is what makes them so cute (yes I'm bragging about the good looks of my little girl!)

She's getting OLD!

You know your almost 2 year old is growing up when you're in the other room and your child keeps yelling for you. You pretend you can't hear her and then she starts calling for you by your first name! Apparently I was needed.

Happy Hearts

The other day we took the kids to the store to buy some presents for kids who don't get much. They picked a name from the "Angel Tree" and off they went to pick out a gift. We talked to them about the true meaning of Christmas and how it's better to give than receive. We then asked them how they felt, if they had fun, etc. This was Cade's response, "My heart felt happy and...it beeped."

The verdict is in....

For those of you who may not know, I am 18 weeks pregnant. I had a regular appointment today and was surprised when they said I could have my ultrasound right then. And......we're having another GIRL! I'll be honest, Heath and I were hoping it'd be a boy, but of course we're excited. Brooklyn and Cade on the other hand....not so excited. When I told Cade that he was going to have another little sister, he furrowed his eyebrows and grumpily said, "I didn't want a sister!" A few minutes later he followed up by saying, "Mom, I already have a sister!" I told him that now he will get to have his very own room. He got all sad and said, "But, I wanted to share with a boy!" Poor kid. I think he'll get over it though. Brooklyn isn't so upset now that she realizes that the boys are completely out numbered, which to her means-girls rule. Brynlie of course is clueless. We'll have plenty to deal with once she does clue in.

A Bunch of Randomness

Just a cute shot of the kids before heading off to church.

I'm sure it's pretty obvious but Cade is pretending to be Luke Skywalker. And yes, we do go out in public like this and he typically doesn't match this well. Fun times.

As I was heading out the door for church Cade showed me what he was wearing under his suit. His football uniform! I was laughing so hard. He didn't show Heath until we were at church. You've gotta love the kid. Last week he wore his red soccer socks with those sweet boots. Church shoes are definitely on Santa's list.

It may be hard to tell but I couldn't resist taking a picture, Heath put Brynlie's shoes on the wrong feet and had no clue. I think Brynlie even knew something was weird.

We always make a pit stop at Jacob Lake on our way to Utah. The kids love playing on the rocks there.

The kids loved climbing Grandpa Bob's tree and swinging from it.

Grandpa Bob is the best with kids. By the end of our visit he was best buds with Brynlie. Grandpa's face lights up when he sees them at his door.

Brooklyn had fun carving her pumpkin.

This girl has some serious hair! You never know what it's going to look like in the morning.

The kids had so much fun at Halloween. Brynlie LOVED getting her face painted, Cade thought his "chest hair" was so cool he wanted to paint more on for church. And of course Brooklyn loved getting to wear makeup.

This is how Cade came downstairs ready to go to the store. The boy had THREE pairs of underwear on top of those shorts! I told him to take them off and he looked at me like, "What's the big deal mom? Everybody wears underwear."

Last Wednesday Heath and I went on a real date! Our typical date consists of a redbox movie every now and then. But this time Heath set it all up....even the babysitter! We got to go see The Phantom of the Opera. It was awesome. The Phantom had the most incredible voice. We had a great time. Thanks for the wonderful date Heath!

Soccer

Now that the soccer season is almost over, I am finally getting some pictures up. Cade was so excited to play this year. He got to pick out a ball and some cleats with Heath and he was ready.

He is number #9 and the day he got his uniform was like Christmas. He wore that thing with pride.

He's even scored a couple of goals which he was so excited about.

At the beginning of the season, he really got into it and was stealing the ball, etc. Now he kind of just runs on the outside. It's still fun to watch.

Every time he gets excited about something he's done he will look at us on the sidelines and give us his thumbs up.

Hopefully he will always enjoy soccer, but I think he'll play a lot more sports before he decides on his favorite.

Dad's Gone Again

He's only a phone call away but she still misses her dad. She won't say "dad" yet but she was looking for him this morning and was even signing dad.

So to pass the time the kids watch a little Signing Time. Brynlie is OBSESSED! If she wants to watch it she will turn the TV on, sign "play", yell "MA!", and then start dancing. It's pretty hard to resist. It's fun to see her sign some things since she isn't talking a whole lot.

Apparently I shouldn't have interrupted her while she was eating.

Cade and Brooklyn were both complaining that their eyes were "wet" yesterday because they missed dad. He'll be home soon enough.

Night in with the kids

Chelsea got to go out this evening with lots of the girls from the ward so that meant that I got to stay home with the kids. On my way home from work Chelsea called and told me to pick up this grand movie because Brooklyn really wanted to watch it.

So I thought to myself, "Self, since you can't have a date night with your wife, why don't you have a date night with your kids." So I picked up the movie from the Redbox at WalMart, and picked up a couple extra goodies as well to enjoy with the movie.
When I got home and showed the kids what I got for us to do tonight Brooklyn was so excited for the movie, while Caden's response was, "I don't want to watch Hannah Montanna; it's a girl movie!" I love that boy!! Then I had to explain to him that sometimes the best thing to do as boys is to make the girls in our life happy by doing things that they think is cool. Not sure that he quite understood that, but when I showed him that we got to eat popcorn and root beer floats while we watched the movie he was okay with it.

Anyway, we had a fun time eating our munchies and being curled up together on the couch watching Hannah Montanna. I can't wait for football season to start :)

Surprise, Surprise it's a Post!

This is a typical face for Cade. He loves to you give you a thumbs up.

We started the summer off by driving to Utah. It was my dad's 60th Birthday! We had a great time with all of the grandkids running around. Oh yeah, there were lots of hot dogs too. You can't have a party with dad and not have hot dogs and pop. It was pretty good.

Brooklyn and Cade had fun exercising to a Jillian Michael's DVD. Brooklyn did the entire thing. I was impressed. Cade on the other hand, kept getting tired. Maybe it was the cowboy boots?

Brynlie is probably going to be our bag lady. She loves to put shoes on and carry anything that might resemble a purse.

Brooklyn turned the big 6! She had a Hannah Montana party with her friends and cousins. It was her first party with friends so she had a great time.

First day of school already! She was so excited and is still loving it. Party because she says she gets 3 recesses. For that reason alone she wants to stay in first grade forever!

Cade couldn't leave without giving her a hug. As we were walking away he told me how much he was going to miss her. Then when we went to pick her up he said, "Mom, I might cry when I see Brooklyn because I missed her."

Brynlie is now 18 months. Wow. That went by fast. She is coming into her own these days. She's not afraid to let you know what she thinks. She is also quick to give hugs. She always walks up to the kids when they are in time out and hugs them or pats them on the back.

We were afraid we wouldn't get any smiles but she was all over the camera idea. Every time she would say "cheese" she would start laughing.

They are all growing up so fast!

Worth Quoting

Brooklyn has been wanting to make bracelets for awhile, so the other day I told her that I bought her some really cute beads for her bracelets. In a completely somber and serious voice Brooklyn responded, "Mom, can you please stop shopping so that we can go to Disneyland?"

The kids are still addicted to Star Wars. That was their movie pick today and Cade enlisted me to have a light saber fight with him. We were battling it out when I heard Brooklyn yell to him, "Cade! Use the forest! Use the forest Cade!" Cade immediately put his hand out. "Mom, I'm using the forest on you!" OH! I get it. The forest=the force! May the forest be with you!

Home from the Hospital!!

Thank you so much to everyone who has been so kind and done so much for us during the past couple of weeks. We have appreciated everything from the baby sitting, to the meals, to the thoughts and prayers. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Cade was finally released from the hospital on Tuesday afternoon. He is home now and still has a PICC line in that allows us to give him his IV antibiotics for another week here at home. He was a trooper during the entire process and had such good care from the physicians and nurses at Banner Desert. We particularly liked the nurses in the PICU, Bob and Janna. I have put some pictures up of our little guy through this whole process.

In the wagon outside the hospital

Chelsea reading a story right before surgery

In the PICU right after surgery

His daytime nurse, Bob

His night time nurse, Janna (on the left) and Respiratory Therapist, Frankie

Recovering after he was extubated. The yellow tube in his nose is what they used to feed him for a little while.

At home with Dad, feeling better