6 Months

Shiloh turned 6 months old yesterday. To celebrate, she got to eat some baby food. We gave her some carrots. She wasn't interested in eating any of them. Hopefully that will change.

Here she is getting her first bite.

Shiloh had her 6 month check up today.
She weighs 17 lbs 6 ozs (75%) and is 26.5 inches long (75%)

Light bulbs

Do you remember a video I posted awhile back about the new and improved light bulbs that will be replacing the evil incandescent ones?

If not, here is the link to that video.

Here is a new video from Glenn Beck. You know, that fool who told us to buy Gold when it was something like $450 an ounce and now it's $1,500 an ounce. Oh and he's the same fool who's been telling America to have some food storage...just in case. Here's his latest bit of advise. I for one am going to follow it. Off to the store I go to stock up!

School House Polka

I have come to love Veggie Tales and so have Mason and Cooper. Here is one of my favorite Silly Songs with Larry.

Mother's Day Video

So instead of a card for Mother's Day this year, the boys wanted to make a video. Here is what we came up with and I didn't prompt them to say any of this.

Core #1

For my Family Foundations class we are focusing on The Family: A Proclamation to the World, as I said in a previous post. For the first core, which each core is two weeks long, we focused on the first paragraph of the proclamation which talks briefly about the plan of salvation, marriage, and eternal families. Here are two talks I really liked from our first core studies.
David A Bednar's talk "Things as they really are" here
Robert D Hales' talk "The Eternal Family" here

Holy Roller

Yesterday at church, I was in the mothers lounge changing Shiloh's diaper. When I was done changing her diaper, I put her on the floor, on her tummy so I could wash my hands. When I turned around she was on her back! There were two other moms in the room with me, neither of them saw her roll over either. Then she rolled over again this morning, from her back to her tummy this time. After missing her first two rolls, I was determined to not miss the third! So today I coaxed her into rolling and had Mason take video for me. I can't believe I have a holy roller (get it?).

Look at that cute little face. I just love her and her chubby little cheeks. Now when people say, "look at those rolls" they may not be just talking about the rolls on her body.

Mother's Day

I had a really great Mother's Day. I woke up to Jeff, Mason, and Cooper giving me my present. They got me some awesome new jewelry, which I LOVE! They also got me a chocolate bar, that one wasn't a surprise. Cooper accidentally told me earlier in the week that they got me one.

I wore this set to church yesterday.

Jeff made me my favorite dinner. Georgia chicken, homemade french fries, and a green salad. mm mm if you've ever been privileged to have Jeff's Georgia chicken, you know just how good it is.
Jeff treated me like a princess all day, which really isn't any different from any other day. Jeff is so good to me every day of the year. I am so blessed to have him in my life and to have three beautiful children to share our lives with.

Oh boy

This is the kind of thing I put up with every day. I love every minute of it. I wouldn't have it any other way.

My Personal Boycott of Applebees

Crystyne and I are usually fans of Applebees, because it is easy to eat there and will usually do the half-price appetizers. Well we decided to go yesterday because we had a gift card to use. We went with Crystyne's brother Jared, his wife and two kids, because our boys were at a birthday party.

Well anyway on with the story. (For context 1/2 price appetizers is between 3-6pm)

We arrived at Applebees between 5:10 and 5:15, promptly told them we needed a table for 4 adults and three children, and they told us it would be a 10 or 15 minute wait. At 5:45 the hostess apologized to us and told us that the table they were going to sit us (the largest booth) in was still occupied and the people were finished eating and were just chatting. A few minutes later they sat us in a smaller booth. Now I need to point out here that there was not a long line waiting to be seated in the lobby, several people with smaller groups were seated before us.

So we sit down and order a quick appetizer to get us started. We ordered a new dish called potato twisters. As we were eating the twisters I noticed a chicken strip on the plate. I thought, hey this is weird, maybe this got on the plate by accident. I offered it to Ethan (our nephew) because he was hungry, but he declined, so I decided what the heck, don't pass up a free chicken strip and bit into it. Well it was still raw inside and I had to spit it back out. We politely asked our waitress the next time that we saw her about the raw piece of chicken in our appetizers. She chuckled nervously, slightly embarrassed and said that she will take it away.

So we order our meal (Our half-price appetizers) and wait (30-40 minutes for our food). In the mean time the waitress fills our nice ice cold water cups with luke-warm water, melting all our ice. By this time I think everyone is slightly irritated.

After eating our dinner (which was good), the waitress brings the checks. We notice that our meals were not half-price and we ask the waitress about it. She tells us we didn't order our meals before 6. We say yes this is true, but you made us sit in the lobby for 30-40 minutes, while others were seated ahead of us. She then tells us she will get her manager.

The manager comes (and I don't want to be mean) but he didn't have the best appearance (nasty teeth), he walks up with a pompous air about him (which I understand, I have been accused of that on occasion), but very rudely he says to us, "Folks our policy is that you have to order your meal before six, so I am going to do this but it will be the last time!" (He was acting like we do this all the time.) So Crystyne says, "But we had to wait in the lobby, we were here at 5:15, and there wasn't anyone in the lobby when we came in, AND the hostess came and apologized to us for our long wait". He decides its best to argue and says, "Well its Friday night and its a busy night.", I finally say "Fine", and we get our new receipt. We both paid for our meals with gift cards and I must point out that he did write off the small portion left over on Jared and Michelle's bill after the gift card, but it was too late to win me over.

I walked outside, before I got too mad and said something I would regret. You know how they say, it takes 20 positives to make up for 1 negative. I have looked past bad experiences in the past and turned the proverbial other cheek, because we liked the food. Well unfortunately Applebees will not have the opportunity to make those positive strides anymore, because I am going to boycott them.

Look Alike

Last weekend someone told Jeff that he looked like David Boreanaz:

And that I looked like Emily Deschanel:

Funny thing is, both are in the show "Bones", which neither Jeff or I had ever seen before, so I had no idea who they were talking about.

Then last night at school right before class began, Elder Thomas told me that I looked like Emily Deschanel. After our opening hymn and prayer, this is what happened:

Elder Thomas said, "Before we get into tonight's lessons, I want to talk about one thing. Can I have Crystyne stand up". I looked at him, sat there for a few seconds wondering if he meant the other Christina in our class, but I realized he was looking at me.

So I pointed to myself and with a questioning type look on my face said, "me?"

While laughing, Elder Thomas said, "yes".

I stood up, still not knowing why.

Elder Thomas proceeded to ask the class if they had ever watched "Bones". He told the class that he and his wife were watching "Bones" last week and his wife asked him he thought I looked like Emily. He said that that was just what he was thinking when she asked him. He wanted to know what everyone else thought. I didn't see if our how anyone responded. I was sitting in the front of the class and was too shocked and a bit embarrassed to turn around.

What do you think? Do I look like Emily Deschanel? It is hard for me to see any resemblance. To me, I look like me, not Emily.

I guess Jeff and I are going to have to watch "Bones" now to see our look alikes.

Have you ever had someone tell you you look like a famous person? Who?

Sleep like a baby

Lately Shiloh has been turning herself completely around in her crib. A good amount of the time her head is buried under her blankets. On this particular day, when I put her down for her nap, her head was where her feet are. I had just gone in to check on her and this is what I found. I wonder when she moved herself around, I never heard her awake talking or sucking on her fingers... Then today around noon just after getting the boys their lunch, I came in the living room (singing really LOUD) to feed Shiloh and get her down for her nap and this is what I found. She looked so sweet.

The phrase "sleep like a baby" I think is referring to babies who have older siblings. They really do learn to sleep through everything. Shiloh is a great sleeper and she doesn't startle at loud noises.

Mason and Cooper were great sleepers too, but they didn't sleep though tons of noise like Shiloh.

Good Advice

I got this forwarded email this morning. I usually don't open them, let alone post them on my blog. For some reason I opened this one and thought it had some good advice.


ONE.... Give people more than they expect and do it cheerfully.

TWO.... Marry a man/woman you love to talk to. As you get older, their conversational skills will be as important as any other.

THREE.... Don't believe all you hear, spend all you have or sleep all you want.

FOUR.... When you say, 'I love you,' mean it.

FIVE.... When you say, 'I'm sorry,' look the person in the eye..

SIX.... Be engaged at least six months before you get married.

SEVEN.... Believe in love at first sight.

EIGHT.... Never laugh at any one's dreams. People who don't have dreams don't have much.

NINE..... Love deeply and passionately. You might get hurt but it's the only way to live life completely.

TEN.... In disagreements, fight fairly. No name calling.

ELEVEN.... Don't judge people by their relatives.

TWELVE.... Talk slowly but think quickly.

THIRTEEN.... When someone asks you a question you don't want to answer, smile and ask, 'Why do you want to know?'

FOURTEEN.... Remember that great love and great achievements involve great risk.

FIFTEEN.... Say 'bless you' when you hear someone sneeze.

SIXTEEN.... When you lose, don't lose the lesson.

SEVENTEEN.... Remember the three R's: Respect for self; Respect for others; and Responsibility for all your actions.

EIGHTEEN.... Don't let a little dispute injure a great friendship.

NINETEEN.... When you realize you've made a mistake, take immediate steps to correct it.

TWENTY.... Smile when picking up the phone. The caller will hear it in your voice
TWENTY- ONE.... Spend some time alone.

Random

Mason used some of Shiloh's rings to handcuff her.

Then Mason and Cooper wanted to take a picture with me.
I LOVE these kids!

Easter

Saturday we went and had the kids picture taken with the Easter bunny.

As we were walking away, Cooper wanted to know who was in t he Easter bunny outfit. Jeff and I both tried to play it off like we didn't know what he meant. Then Mason said, "I know! Santa is in the suit helping the Easter bunny out!" Yup. What he said.

Easter Sunday

The kid's Ester Baskets

Since we have church at 9am, we had the Easter bunny, aka Grandma and Grandma Borders, come while were were gone to set out the baskets and hide the eggs. As you can see, they were pretty excited to see that the Easter bunny came.

The Easter bunny hid eggs inside and outside.

The boys and their loot.

Do you like how Mason posed for the picture? This is what he did for every picture during the hunt.

We didn't get a chance to color eggs before Easter, so we colored a few on Easter Sunday.

We had Easter dinner at our house and invited Jeff's parents over to eat with us.

Earth Day

Earth Day is a funny holiday to me. Don't get me wrong, I am not a planet hating, oil spilling, littering fool by any means. Why do we set aside one day a year to do something good for our planet? Shouldn't we be doing good things for our planet every day? Recycling? Not littering? Picking up garbage we find?

Anyhow, we did do something good for our planet, not because it was Earth Day, but because there were some good sales and we had to take advantage of that!

So thanks to Earth Day sales we got an Autumn Blaze Maple tree for our back yard. They are suppose to be fast growers, hopefully that is true, we could really use some shade in the summer time.

Here it is! The boys were so excited that they got to help plant it.

This is what the Autumn Blaze Maple will look like eventually.


Also, Lowes (where we got the Maple tree) was offering a free tree, so we got that one too. It is just a seedling, so we recycled the plastic container the Maple tree came in and put the seedling in it. See I do love our planet, I recycled the plastic container. The seedling is a European Larch and will spend the next year in the planter. Then we will have to figure out where we what it. It will most likely go in the back yard to give us even more shade.

Here it is in it seedling glory.And here is what the European Larch will look like all grown up.

Oh and we have an extra European Larch seedling if anyone wants it, just let me know and it's yours!