A Fence Update!

Our yard backs a farm, which we love, but we haven't always loved our back fence. Years ago it was a nice tight wire fence and then a huge tree fell on it, and some cows pushed through it, and some horses pushed through it.... well you get the idea. Needless to say, the fence got uglier and uglier! It had been repaired with wire and clips and even rope in one spot. It had random pieces of fencing and also random posts of various heights all along it. It was pretty ugly. Can you see the random fence posts and random types of wire all along the back?? Fancy right? 

A few months ago the back neighbor decided to change it out and he and Hema took it down.  Here is what it looked like for the last few months. By the way can I tell you how much I love that my sweet 7 year old mows the lawn now!! 

Well today the neighbors and I put the new fence up. We wanted to keep some of the wire open along the back nearest the horses. Our kids LOVE to feed them carrots and grass and all of that. We were using some old fencing that another neighbor gave to the back neighbor and I was crossing my fingers it would turn out. It started out a bit scary. 

But after some serious stretching of the fence and some magical power washing by this little man:

It turned out pretty great! 

I'd have to say that for a few hours of work and some free fencing, this little yard project makes a big difference! Now if I can just get the fire pit done! 

Weekend Update

We had a great weekend. Hema went pheasant hunting with Jason and my dad down on the farm. Little Hema was thrilled to check out his "dead bird" when he got home. Little Hema is dying to go next year.  

Then we watched the TCU vs. Utah game. All I can say is wow that was ugly! But here is daddy with his little Utah fans - win or lose! 

Then on Saturday night, our cute little nephew and niece, Joey and Ava slept over. The kids had so much fun and stayed up too late and slept on the couch. Amazingly, I got all 5 kiddies ready and we were even early to church at 9:00 am. (Thanks to daylight savings!) 

Monday we all went and got our flu shots. Unfortunately they were all out of the nasal mist. Hema tried so hard to be brave. here he is demonstrating how his arm hurts less if he holds it out after the shot. 

Here is Little Hema with his new BB Gun. He is so excited about it. It was going to be a Christmas gift, but his dad is a sucker and couldn't wait! haha! Love you babe! 

And finally, here is the wall all repaired and textured. Now we just need to finish removing the vinyl lettering and get it painted! So nice to have that part all finished up. I had told the company what the other drywall guy said about the texture and they sent a new one who did a great job! (I know the picture is rotated wrong oh well!)

Today Cora is 5 months old and later we are going to Chuck E Cheeses with Chelise! So look for another post later! 

A Tooth! And a wall update

Sweet little Cora cut her first tooth today! I can't believe how quickly she is growing up. Makes me so sad. I just want her to stay a little baby longer. Each times she does something new, I just want to cancel everything else that day and sit and rock her and hold her and cherish her and somehow stop time for just a moment and take in that little chunk of her life that is so fleeting...that time that we will never have back again. The time seems to go faster and faster with each child. Does every parent feel this way? 

She is rolling everywhere, can sit up if you position her with her hands on her legs, laughs and giggles at everything, and is the happiest most content little baby ever! She LOVES to take a bath and loves to splash. But of course stops smiling and moving every time she sees the camera. 

I put a washcloth over her girly parts for the picture and it looks like she is wearing some weird red loin cloth. Haha! 

I love this horsey hooded towel that the Mahoneys gave us when Little Hema was born. Hema and Vela both want to use it every day. It's so cozy and cute! 

We are so grateful for this sweet little girl in our family and can't imagine life without her! 

Here she is with Krychele on Halloween. We saw Uziel on Sunday too, but I forgot to take a picture. We sure are grateful for Krychele and Uziel!! 

Now for the good and bad with the leaking wall...

The Good: We found out that the leak was coming from the vent for the new furnace we had installed earlier this year. (This is good news because it isn't from the toilet or something else yucky!)

The Bad: It took a 7 foot tall hole in the wall and also a hole in the ceiling to figure that out. 

The Good: The company that installed the furnace fixed the pipe that was leaking and is also fixing the holes in the wall and ceiling. So we don't have to pay for any of it. In fact the sheet rock guy already came over tonight to get the measurements.

The Bad: When we asked the sheet rock guy how he would match the texture on the wall he said, "Oh do you want that part textured? That might be hard." Uh, yeah - we'd like it to match the rest of the wall please.... I've got to admit that made me a little nervous!!  

Here's a picture of the problem pipe that had was removed. See how that pipe at the bottom of the picture doesn't go straight in and line up...yeah that's where it was leaking.

Halloween Fun and a Scary Mess

What a fun day! This morning we had the Halloween Party in Hema's kindergarten class. The kids were so cute in their costumes and had a lot of fun.

Then I ran home and got my hubby and the girls and we headed back for the costume parade. Cora wasn't sure what to think of all the crazy costumes walking by.

Our Little Batman loved being int he parade. He of course has a mask and cape but couldn't wear them in the school. This is the same costume he wore last year. It still fits great and is in perfect condition and he really wanted to wear it so why not right??

Yesterday we discovered water leaking from above somewhere on an inside wall in our family room. This was how it looked this morning when I left to help at Hema's class party. That bulge above the baseboard is water behind the paint. Nice huh? Just to give you an idea of the size of the damage - that white on the top of the picture is the outlet so it was pretty small. 

And here is what I came home to about an hour and half later....

In case you aren't sure that is a hole over 6 feet tall cut in the wall of my family room. I hate to be a complainer and I am certainly not a carpenter, but wouldn't it have been better to cut the sheet rock off the back side of this wall in the utility room rather than this side in the middle of the family room? I'm just saying....

Yeah so now we know where the water is leaking down - but not where the water is coming from and it has stopped leaking. So I guess the plan is to leave this nice hole until it snows again and see if it starts to leak again...great plan huh? I'd like the plan a little more if the hole was in the utility room...Oh well I think I better call a plumber! 

**Update: The leak is back this morning and there hasn't been any rain or snow....so now I'm thinking maybe it's my shower! Ughhh definitely calling a plumber today!

Monday Fun

We sure are enjoying the warmer weather. Hema took a group of student fishing today at an urban pond in Sandy (he tries to work fishing into everything he does: work, church callings, play, etc...). So we decided to head up and hang out with him. We packed a picnic lunch and ate and then played on the playground until the students left. Then Hema helped the kids fish.

The playground was really fun and the kids loved that it has a big fish in the middle.

Here are the kids doing a little fishing. Our neighbor, Hema's little buddy Jackston, came with us. The boys didn't catch anything. Probably because the kept throwing rocks into the water.

Cooling off in the shade with some cold drinks. This isn't the best picture, but I love how tan Vela is! She's our little chocolate princess!

We had a fun FHE tonight. Vela insisted that we sing several rounds of "Popcorn popping on the apricot tree." It is so cute how she loves songs that have actions to them right now. Then after the lesson, Little Hema wanted the activity to be a paper airplane contest. So we all made airplanes and then went outside to see who's could go the farthest. It was really fun! It's funny how the littlest things can be so much fun with kids. I think we will definitely do that again.

After FHE we planted our new tree. Hema reinforced the fence again and then threatened the horses that he would eat them if they touched the new tree. They looked pretty freaked out! Ha ha! They should be though, he is pretty sick of replanting that tree and Tongans are known to eat horse!

A List

A few things making me happy today:
- No one in our home is sick! We are all feeling great. Yeah!!!
- Hema installed the new garage door opener last night. He literally replaced every wire, screw and part out there. Man is the new one nice!
- We have had a few nice days with warm afternoons. Can't wait for spring.
- My parents came over for dinner tonight. Can't ever have enough time with them. Grandpa and Little Hema played catch for a very long time.
- We are going to Disney on Ice on Friday. The kids are going to love it!
- Got our taxes filed on Saturday. Hurray for refunds!
- Vela climbed right up in her big girl bed tonight and stayed there!
- Thanksgiving Point Gardens will open for the season in just a couple of weeks. Love the gardens!!
- My tulips and daffodils are all poking up in the flower bed.
- My house is mostly organized - still have the utility room, both upstairs bathrooms, the garage and I need to finish Vela's new bedroom.
- Just figured out how to type these: ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥
- We've been contacted about a few possible adoption situations lately. Nothing solid - but it's always nice to be reminded that it could happen anytime. We are all so ready for a baby in this house. Keep us in your prayers!

I'm Ready for Spring!

I don't know about you, but I am about done with winter. By early February every year I start to wonder why we chose to live in Utah. It's cold and the air is about as ugly as it gets. Even the snow is all dirty and black on the ground. This time of year I start to get a little stir crazy and have to start planning some fun things to do in the spring and summer. Last night I booked our trip to Tuacahn. We LOVE to go each year. This year they are showing Tarzan and the kids are so excited to go.

I've been pretty busy getting things organzed around here. It's nice to have something to keep me busy with the junky weather. We have taken so much stuff to DI and given tons more away to people. I feel good about it because I know that others can really use the stuff in this economy. People have been asking for some before and after pictures. I had these ones on the computer. I may live to regret posting this before picture of my junk drawer. Oh well!
The Junk Drawer BEFORE:

And AFTER:

On Monday night the kids were ready to get out of the house and run. We had already been to the dinosaur museum so we headed over to Jungle Jims. Little Hema had been asking to go ever since his cousins bnirthday party was there. They kids had so much fun. It wasn't busy at all and both Hema and Vela loved all of the rides.

Our kids are the perfect age for the rides there. But to be honest it's a pretty dumpy place. You know a place is dirty when you tell your son to not wash his hands in that gross sink after using the bathroom!! We sanitized our kids well after we left. I sure do hope it warms up soon. Who knows what scarey place we might end up at if this cold continues!

Catching Up!

I decided I'd do one of my long posts rather than the mini ones I had thought of earlier. Might as well get caught up tonight. Here I go!

We had a great Christmas. One of the main reasons that I didn't post anything is because I hate to waste time on the computer when Hema is home. I usually post when Little Hema is at preschool and Vela is napping for when the kids are in bed and Hema is working late. I love that my hubby gets 2 weeks off for Christmas and with him home and most of my family in town, I didn't want to spend my free time on the computer.
Anyhow, here are some of the fun things we did over Christmas break.
The kids made build a bears for their birth families. Hema made a snow leopard for Katie and Vela made a cute black dog for Chelise and Leiana. The kids also made an animal for themselves. Hema chose a matching snow leopard to keep and Vela of course chose George - a monkey. She is pretty obsessed with all things monkey since she loves Curious George.
Hema got to see Katie and give her her Christmas gifts. It is always fun to be with Katie. We went to Iggy's and watched the end of the Utah bowl game. Katie is doing great and we just love her so much and are so grateful that she is willing to continue to share her life with us and more importantly with Little Hema! Vela's sweet birth momma Chelise is living in Vegas now so we just mailed the Christmas presents to her and Leiana (Vela's sister). We sure do love them too and are excited for her to move back in the next month or so so we can see them again.
We also had our Tongan branch Christmas party. It was really fun with dinner, Santa and a dance. Tina came and brought Joe and Ava and the Ahotaeiloas also came. We hadn't seen them for a while and it was really fun to catch up with them and see their cute kids. We keep trying to convince them to come out to our Tongan ward since they are in our boundaries. No luck so far!
We slept over at my parents on Christmas Eve like we usually do. Christmas Eve was so much fun. We had everyone there except Jessica and Marilee and their families. Jess couldn't come out because she is due to have another sweet baby boy in a about 10 days. Marilee and her family came a couple days after Christmas. It was fun to see the grand kids playing and having a great time. They really get along great and hardly fight at all. It was especially nice to see Porter and little Hema playing so well together. All of the grand kids love the new slippers they get from Grandma and Grandpa each Christmas. My mom also gave each of us a copy of the poetry she has written. She is so talented!
Here are the kids presents waiting to be opened. Little Hema loves his Leapster. This new boggle game has been such a hit. (No little pieces to lose!) Vela loved her presents, but pretty much wanted to mostly play with anything Hema had. They were really excited about the capes I made and have been wearing them around a lot. They also loved the new fishing poles they got from their dad. (Since Vela threw both her pole and Little Hema's in the lake last year). Why don't kids fishing poles float??Christmas Day we have a lot of fun at the Katoas. But honestly, we didn't take any pictures. Oh well. Hema's siblings who are single always spoil the kids rotten. I swear they got as many gifts from them as they did from us. They are too generous with our kids! Thanks guys!
We went swimming on a couple days after Christmas. This is Vela's new suit. Not a great picture, but how cute is the tutu on her?!?!
My niece Brynlee was in town for her 1st birthday and we got to go to her party. The kids loves the party hats.Our annual New Years Party was a lot more mellow than usual. My parents left early to check on grandpa. I took this picture around 10:00 - right before most everyone else went home. Which was fine because we were all pretty tired.On New Years Day we get together with the Katoa family. It is so much fun. I really couldn't have married into a nicer family. They are so loving and great. We sure do have fun together.Aunt Lote is always so great to play games with the kids and keep them busy.
I LOVE this picture of some of the little girls trying to be quiet and looking so bored listening to the grandpas talk.
Then my momma had a birthday on the 4th. We took her to eat a a Thai restaurant she loves. They food was good and we had a great time - even though Hema choked on a spring roll at the very end and vomited a ton. Sorry mom and sorry to the waiter who had to clean that up. Welcome to my life with a kid who is a serious barfer!
Here is a picture of Little Hema making pizza Hawkins style. The sauce goes on at the very end on top of all the rest of the toppings. Delicious!
Here's a group shot of my Primary kids the night of our stake dance.These are the couples that did the samba. Check out the ties and skirts we made.

Sort of blurry I know. The kids with my parents that night.Wow! I guess that pretty much covers it. I am now officially caught up on blogging. And to think that took less time than it is taking Hema to replace the garbage disposal. For some reason it broke last night. The garage door opener broke last week. I guess lot of things in houses last about 10 years since we moved in here 10 years ago in December.