Thanksgiving

Yorgason Family Thanksgiving
It was great to be with family at the Clubhouse. The food was delicious. The girls had fun making their annual apple candy turkeys and of course, they loved eating them!

Thatcher Family Thanksgiving

We had lots of good food and time to sit around and talk.

 The men went out to try to catch and shoot a turkey...(well, not really, but they did get out to shoot at some fake birds)

 For those who slept over, Uncle Joe caught some "birds' in the morning and put them into a cage. They kept getting out, but he managed to catch them over and over again. How many birds can fit into this cage? According to Carly, it's one too many!

Grandpa cleaned out his fish pond and we were there when the batch of new fish arrived. We're looking forward to some good fishing this year!

Gateway Children's Museum
We got some fun cousin time with Dave & Holly's family while they were up. The museum had plenty of fun to offer for everyone!

Simple pleasures...

Grace made friends with this swan in the first few minutes, and it was hard to convince her to leave it for all the other fun activities...

We went to a dreidel-painting class... 

We spent a lot of time dropping pennies into the funnel...

And the balls were a ton of fun...

Painting Our Kitchen Table: Before and After

This table is one of our best purchases. We found it 5 years ago for $100 on KSL! This year we bought two new chairs to make it fit our growing family. So we needed new chair covers to tie it all together. And you can't see it here, but this wood is very soft with lots of dents, and the finish has been coming off in many places. So it was time for a paint job...

We moved it to the garage, and we got to work. I don't know why we chose to do it the same week as tithing settlement, but let's just say this was our daily late-night project for over a week.

We sanded a little and primed it a lot....

Put a few coats of red paint...

Sanded the edges, and antiqued it with a dark glaze (Paul's Mom helped with this), and then applied the tricky varnish...(I accidentally shook the can, so that set us back a few days)


Also, we antiqued the chairs and table legs, and I sewed new chair covers....

and we finally brought it back upstairs to enjoy (and destroy)!

Happy Birthday, Lu Lu!

Claire turned two! We started the morning out with singing and presents from her sisters, and ended the day with a visit from Grandma & Grandpa Yorgason, a little party, and more presents. She loves her new baby doll and Squinkies. All day long, she asked us to sing the birthday song to her, and had a big smile when we did! It was fun for her to have a special day.


She has been acting like a two-year-old for a couple months now (very independent). I've had to explain to the older girls on multiple occasions that two-year-olds just act that way, and then they've shot back, "but she's not two!" So it's nice to finally be able to say that she is two.

Usually when we ask her how old she is, she says "tree." Even though we constantly corrected her, she never admitted to be one-year-old, so I'm guessing she'll continue to think that she is three this year too. That shows she is very determined, and she knows what she wants!

Here are a few fun facts about our Claire...

Things We Love Most About Her
Her cute smile with the twinkle in her eyes and scrunched up nose
She is funny and makes us laugh all the time
Claire is very caring--when someone is sad, she tries to comfort them
She is helpful around the home, always clearing her dish and throwing away trash
She is very polite--says "thank you" and "sorry" very often
She loves to cuddle and give hugs


Fun Facts:

She is such a "daddy's girl" and often cries when he has to leave
Learned to go potty (just #2) over a month ago on Mommy's birthday
Still not potty trained, but most of the time she insists on changing her diaper by herself
Loves to go to Nursery and has never cried about going
After finishing her own food, she makes her way around the table eating everyone else's leftovers
She has a very dependable internal clock that wakes her up every morning at the same time, regardless of how tired she is (currently, it's every day at 5:48 am)
She always has a loud, energetic "Hi!" and "Bye-bye" for anyone who comes to our home or is on the phone
As soon as she wakes up, she yells to the top of her lungs for mommy or daddy



Favorite activities:
Anything that the big girls are doing and will let her join in
Take care of her babies
Call Daddy at work
Help in the kitchen and try doing things herself, like pour the milk and spread her own peanut butter
Play on mommy & daddy's phones
Pretend that her sisters are the mom, and she is a baby that needs them (big hugs!)--the girls are constantly asking her in a baby voice, "Claire, do you need me?"
Read books on the couch--her favorite is "Five Little Monkeys"
Run away from us, singing "Na Nee, Na Nee...(with giggles and squeals)!"
Sing songs--and she's gotten to where she gets mad if anyone joins in ("No, my sing it!")
Her favorite songs are "I See Temple" and "ABCs"
Color and do homework with the older girls (she likes that she knows how to draw a circle)

Here she is trying to be like her big sisters, sneaking make-up on...

Favorite Foods:
apples & grapes
raisons
oatmeal
cereal
candy
gum ("num")


Surprising Foods She Eats:
whatever we are eating for dinner--she's not picky
olives
hot sauce
hot salsa
pepper on her dinner
salad


Cute Phrases:
"dat twon" (that one)
"a ho zu" (I hold you--or, I want you to hold me)
"Mimi" and "Day-cee" (Millie & Gracie)
"my do it!" (I do it myself)
When she is eating delicious food, she'll comment in between bites, "mmm...mmm, yummy!"
While cleaning up, she sings, "Bee bup, bee bup..."

Guess Who Our Newest Addition Will Be...

After long, hard deliberating, we decided to go ahead and find out the gender of our baby. We took all three girls to the ultrasound. Half of us guessed it was a boy; the other half a girl. And the ones who guessed a boy were......not right!

We were all happy with the news and excited at the thought of being a family with four girls. My Dad has always said, "It takes a real man to have a boy the first time around." But I say, "It takes a real man to survive in a house full of girls!" Paul not only survives with all his girls, he thrives! He loves being a daddy to girls. And they all adore him!

We are so grateful that this new little one seems to be healthy. She has three older sisters who are very eager to meet her and take care of her!

Part Two to Grace's Prayer

The other night, Grace's prayer was so cute. Here's the link if you didn't read about it yet.
 
Tonight, Grace asked again in her prayer if God would help us to be nice and not fight. Then she said,

"I've been asking and asking and asking and asking and asking and asking and asking and asking and asking if NOW we could be nice, and you did NOT do it! In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen."

I guess we need to teach her that we have agency, and if she wants to not fight, she is the one that needs to try to make that happen. But I hesitate to correct her, because I just get a kick out of her prayers! And when I really stop and think about it, I suppose that as adults we pray in a similar way, asking God to make things happen while being unwilling to actually take accountability for our own actions. Hmmm...the things we learn from our children!

Random Stuff

All Dressed Up With Nowhere to Go
Grace just needed to dress up, do her nails, make-up, and hair. She wasn't preparing to do a dance performance or go anywhere. Just wanted to feel pretty! So we snapped a picture. The little swing in her hip looks so natural, doesn't it?

 And Millie wanted to join her in the picture taking...

And so did Claire...

Crazy Hair Day
It started out like this, but the wire hurt so she made me take it out. At least we got the picture!

Gracie's birthday card and presents for Mommy
She didn't just give them to me. She hung them on the wall above my bed. She would have just kept adding more and more hair bows to tape up, but I suggested that was enough.

Sexual Discrimination
And so it begins! The first note to go up on a bedroom door, announcing that some in the home cannot enter. There was a major typo in the first draft--to not allow girls! Boy, they fixed that one quick! I'm not quite sure who they were trying to tell not to come in. We still don't have any boys except for Daddy...I think we NEED a brother in this home to set some things straight.

Claire Meets Snow
Well, she met it last year, but everything still feels like new because she was too little last year.

Pure cuteness!

Brushing Power Struggle
This little thing is the most difficult one to get to brush her teeth! She will NOT let us brush her teeth! I'm worried about the amount of cavities she'll have at her first dentist appointment. On this particular night, she just lounged in her Tinkerbell chair with a look as if she is IN CHARGE! A little reminder that we have no power over her when it comes to the teeth.

Beauty Queen in Jammies
Doesn't matter if her hair isn't done...all she has to do is smile!

Ballerina in the Making
Grace has come up with some new ballet moves! She is becoming quite the dancer! We love every performance she does!

Tickle Time with Daddy
Even though it seems we don't get enough time with him ever, Daddy sure knows how to make it "quality time' for the girls. He started out with a tickle game tickling them, but in the end, they got him down on the ground in laughter.

Roller Skating Lessons
Millie has a new pair of roller skates so this gives her an opportunity to master yet another skill. She loves taking a difficult task and figuring out how to do it.

Making Cookies with Mariana
These little women were in heaven making sugar cookies with Marianna, our dear friend.

Gracie's Prayer Tonight

You had to be listening closely to catch the words of the dinner prayer tonight. Why doesn't God answer this prayer? Believe me, she isn't the only one praying for it!

"...And please help us that we won't be mean. I've prayed for that one-hundred times and you haven't answered it yet, so please remember it this time..."

Halloween and Such

Halloween
Oh, it's easy to please our little girls with Halloween costumes! All they wanted to be was what they try to be most days: ballerinas and fairies with mommy's make-up on!

We thought it would be pretty cold that night, so Gracie was concerned. She really doesn't like wearing a coat, leggings, or anything too warm. During her prayer over lunch she prayed that it would be warm enough while trick-or-treating that she wouldn't have to dress warmly. We were surprised to actually have nice weather, and for awhile there, these costumes were enough!

Halloween Parties:
Our Ward party was such a blast! Here is our family picture. Millie was a pirate, Grace was a praying mantis ballerina, and Claire was a dancer.

Grace and Millie both went to Miss Kristi's preschool party. Grace was dressed as an Ant Ballerina (because she couldn't find her praying mantis glasses), and Millie as a Fairy.

At Grandma and Grandpa Yorgason's Halloween party, Millie was a queen. She asked Grandpa to pull out her tooth that has been dangling for a couple weeks. Grandpa gave it a good pull, then he left the last part for Millie to do on her own. She gave it a quick tug and got it out herself! That made for a VERY happy Millie Mae!

Fall Art
Grace's rendition of Painted Pumpkins...

Real leaves from our hike, made into a tree by Millie...

Leaves we got from our hike, rubbed with fall colors...

And Millie's fall tree with poked holes for sunlight to shine through...

Wedding

It was a joyous occasion one Saturday in October to have our very own family wedding in the backyard!

The Bride, Tessa, looked as beautiful as can be...

The Bridesmaids were joyful and supportive...

The Maid of Honor helped serve refreshments prior to the ceremony in order to entice the bride and groom to stick around for a few minutes...

And the matchmaker was honored to actually perform the wedding...

Here's the post-wedding kiss (that we hope sparks romance for these two)...

And the entire wedding party gathered for one last picture...

We REALLY hope these two decide to have babies soon!

Our Best "Treasure Hunt" Ever

We had a very memorable treasure hunt with our girls a couple weeks ago. They went to the first clue and found this...

The second had this...

This was the third...

And the fourth...

And last, but not least...

Still, they didn't get it. So we set it all out (asking all the while, "why was there a diaper, and bottle, etc?) and helped them sound out all the words. Finally they got it! Millie had a big smile and asked, "Is it TRUE?" She was ecstatic about the news! Gracie, on the other hand kept repeating all day long, "I don't want you to have another baby!" She got over the bad news by the next day, and is happy about it now. But she insists that she wants us to have a girl! Claire is still pretty oblivious, but she'll catch on eventually. 

We're so excited to have another child coming to our family. We had a little scare at first with some tests and thought we were going to have another miscarriage. So when we went in for the ultrasound, and saw a heartbeat right away, we were filled with gratitude. Now we're 14 weeks along and due April 25th. I'm finally past what was a very difficult first trimester. The fatigue this time was worse than ever before. It's SO nice to have my energy back again! As for finding out the gender, we are still in limbo. Paul would love another surprise baby. I'm not so sure I want to wait that long to find out. We'll see who is more convincing!  :)

Tooth Fairy Alert!

Part I
Millie noticed at least 6 months ago the slightest bit of looseness to her front tooth. Since then, she has announced to everyone that she has a loose tooth. And she has been asking for months when she will lose her first tooth. We've read plenty of library books about the Tooth Fairy, and the suspense has been high!

One blessed morning in September, just minutes before going to the dentist (incidentally), Millie tried opening a container of play-dough with her teeth. In her words: she said it hurt her teeth, and she thought it might have made them come up. She worried her friends would think she looked funny, so she ran to look in the mirror. That's when she saw the missing tooth and the blood! She quickly grabbed some toilet paper and called out the exciting news!

We never found her tooth! So her story was, "I lost my tooth, and I lost it!" Throughout the day, I would find her sneaking in front of the mirror to get a look at her teeth. She asked a few times, "Did I really lose my tooth?" and "Are you sure this looks different than before?" So funny!

Luckily, the dentist had a nice plastic tooth necklace for Millie to put under her pillow so that the Tooth Fairy would know to come. Millie came in during the night (proving her Mom's suspicions) to tell us what the Tooth Fairy had left her: a tooth-shaped note and a dollar bill! The next day, she took her note and dollar everywhere she went to tell the story to all. She got thinking at one point, and asked us, "Is the Tooth Fairy really real?" Our reply, What do you think, Millie?

Part II
Now, a few weeks later, the new tooth is pushing it's way up, and Millie's second front tooth is being wiggled loose. She is again SO excited for it to come out. Every day she gives it lots of wiggles to loosen it, and she has begged relentlessly for Daddy, Mommy, and even Grandpa Yorgason to pull it out. She is a brave soul when it comes to something she really wants! Here's one (real, not staged) attempt by Daddy to get it out...

Hopefully not a Tattoo!

Over General Conference weekend, we were enjoying a nice Sunday up with family in Paradise when Paul accidentally got a tattoo. He was trying to stop a go-cart that was headed out of control when he leaned across the engine and burned his forearm. Here's a picture...

As you can see, the engine burned a pretty little (big!) design on his arm. Twice, while in Bishop interviews, ward members caught a glance of it and stopped mid-sentence to ask, "Bishop, do you have a tattoo?"

It seemed so bad at first that we started to wonder if it would leave a scar.  I wondered what it would be like to have to explain that story over and over again. But the body quickly got to work with the miraculous healing process, and we are now hopeful that most of it will fade. Still, crazy to see what a little go-cart accident can do!