w16: All About Austin

April 14-20, 2013

Wednesday we celebrated my first born. He turned TEN. You know I always get super sentimental about birthdays. I feel honored and privileged to have been a mother for a decade. It has been an emotional, rewarding, stressful, exhausting and joyful journey. How grateful I am that it will not end.

I am about done by 9 pm. Exhausted. The body will not move. Get the kids tucked and then I'm about good for nothing after. So for the first time ever I went to bed the night before a child's birthday without the house decorated. I set the alarm for 4 am {and happy to report I DID wake up and get it all finished before I woke him up at 5:50 am. He wanted to wake up exactly when he was born. ;) }

                                                  Ten written in Ten different languages.

Sadly enough 6 am was the only time all of us would be together that day so we had a Birthday Breakfast Bar with all kinds of breakfast choices {naturally all nutritional.} 

Then we rushed to get ready for the day. We dropped off the girls at a friend's house and the school kids at school. 

Side note: The Stake Recognition Dinner for Personal Progress and Duty to God was scheduled that night. I knew I wouldn't be home to do our normal family party so that's why I pulled Austin out of school so we could spend the day together. I had a ton of errands to run for the Stake event so I tried to think of a fun and creative way to spend time together without him feeling like we were just running errands. He is not his sisters who like to shop after all.

I presented a gift bag to Austin. Inside was a disposable camera, pen, 10 envelops and a clipboard with the following information:

The TEN Challenge

Using the camera provided to document your day complete the following challenges. Each challenge must be completed at a DIFFERENT location and in any order. Have fun!

After each challenge was completed Austin opened the corresponding envelop. On the outside of each envelop was a math problem {thanks Kurt} that he had to answer before he could open it. {The answer was always TEN.} 

Here is how Austin completed his TEN challenge:

#1.  

Do 10 sit ups, Slide 10 times, Do 10 jumping jacks, Swing 10 times, Do 10 push ups, Go around the merry go round 10 times, Do 10 high knees,  Go across 10 monkey bars, Run in place 10 times and Touch your toes 10 times.

{Great way to get started. Our hearts were pumping and we were excited. I won't lie, I did skip the sit ups ;) }

Envelop said: Top Ten Reasons why we LOVE {and celebrate} Austin

He has a testimony of the church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.

#2.

Go to aisle 10 and pick out something for your party on Saturday.

At a party store in Boise. He got lucky. Aisle 10 was the BOY party aisle. He picked out water guns for his friends.

Envelop said: Top Ten Reasons why we LOVE {and celebrate} Austin

He has been given the gift of knowledge. He is smart and witty.

#3.

After you pass 10 fast food places stop for a milkshake.

He made sure to keep track of this! ;) It was also at this point that he received a special phone call from Madagascar. His face lit up talking to Grandma and Grandpa Richards. Thanks for calling!

Envelop said: Top Ten Reasons why we LOVE {and celebrate} Austin

He has a desire to be obedient and honest.

#4.

At 10:10 give your mom a combination of 10 hugs and kisses.

                        Envelop said: Top Ten Reasons why we LOVE {and celebrate} Austin

He has a contagious laugh that makes me smile.

#5.

Find a $10 book.

At Deseret Book Austin used his $10 to pick out a discounted book and had money left over to buy the watch he really wanted. This conversation cracked me up:

A: I love this store. I could live here.

a few minutes later

A: Wow. There is a lot of church stuff here.

M: It's a church store.

A: No wonder I could live here!

                        Envelop said: Top Ten Reasons why we LOVE {and celebrate} Austin

He is good and kind with his animals.

#6. 

Find 10 places to hide {and come back in 10 minutes!}

                        Envelop said: Top Ten Reasons why we LOVE {and celebrate} Austin

He has a fun and vivid imagination. This allows him to write creative, descriptive stories and draw impressive pictures.

#7.

Buy 10 flowers to give away to 10 people.

 This was my favorite challenge. He gave the first tulip to the lady that checked us out. When we got to the car he started to get nervous about giving away the rest. We decided to give the rest away together as a bouquet. I found the perfect cute elderly couple. We walked over and gave them away. They were so surprised and gave Austin a hug. His smile was priceless. Love these moments.      

                       

                        Envelop said: Top Ten Reasons why we LOVE {and celebrate} Austin

He has a quick mind that memorizes easily including lots of fun facts.

#8.

Take 10 steps in the Dollar Section and pick out something for your siblings.

For Spencer: bug catcher, Ruth: sunglasses, Lucy: barbie 4 wheeler, 

Emma: set of scented erasers.

                        Envelop said: Top Ten Reasons why we LOVE {and celebrate} Austin

He is kind and compassionate to little children. For example his sister Lucy adores him. 

#9.

Order the 10^th item on the menu {hope its yummy!}

He chose Carl's Jr. The 10th item was a quesadilla.

#10.

Download the 10^th Free {and clean} game app

                     Envelop said: Top Ten Reasons why we LOVE {and celebrate} Austin

He has a love of reading that brings him great joy and knowledge.

We had a little bit of time left before he had piano lessons so we went to the arcade in Ontario and played a few games. I'm happy to report that we are both terrible gamers! This makes me happy :)

After piano Kurt took all the kids to gymnastics and raced over to get ready for the recognition dinner. I really enjoyed our simple day together. It was priceless just to spend time one-on-one. Austin is a great kid and I love him.

A few other things not related to the birthday happened this week:

Friday we may have all played hooky from school and life to enjoy a pajama day together. It was MUCH needed. I felt like I had been run over by a semi truck. Honestly the kids play so well together and I was able to take two naps in between reading books, weeding, laundry, and making cookies. Again I say it was much needed.

That evening we drove to Adrian to see Jillian and Kurt Nielsen in their school play of Aladdin. They did such a great job! My kids loved it. The boy especially were super inspired by Kurt as the Genie. "He's so hilarious !" Spencer was quoting everything he said. And I just like them having a good role model. Afterwards we went out to Jen's for ice cream and brownies. We didn't get home till 11:30 pm but we sure had fun!

Saturday morning both boys played their soccer games at 8:45. Other than disliking the fact that we have to get going to early I do like getting a good parking spot AND we were done at a decent time. Unfortunately both boys lost but fortunately its not all about winning. Huge bonus the weather was actually really nice {shocker!} 

Emma had definitely entered the world of hand games {i.e. Miss Merry Mac, etc...} She is even teaching Lucy! Their current game of choice is "Tic Tac Toe, 3 in a row, Row Sham Bow...."

Back home to do some chores and get ready for the rest of the day. Austin had a piano recital at 1 pm. We were late and just barely made it in time! Phew that was close. It was not not his best playing but considering he had to jump up there just about a minute after he arrived he did well. I hope he continues to put forth effort because he has natural ability.

Then it was time to party! Austin had invited 2 friends {Daniel and Kasen} plus Spencer and Emma to Wahooz to celebrate his birthday. It was loud, full of giggles and potty humor. I was personally grateful I keep Tylenol stocked in the car.  

We had a great time and the kids were well behaved. We did 3 events and then spent the rest of the time at the arcade. We all had lots of fun. And again I will say that I'm SO glad we are not gamers!

First Event: Bumper Boats {we got soaked!!}

Second Event: Go Karts

Third Event was Laser Tag {my first time, so much fun!}

Then an overload of arcade games. Both moms had sent the boys with $20 and so they put that on their arcade card since I was obviously paying for everything else. Daniel was great and shared his card with Austin. 

To my pleasure they spent the most time playing air hockey.

If possible they were even MORE silly on the way home than the drive there. We stopped in New Plymouth to pick up the girls from Kerri. She volunteered to take them to lunch and shopping so they could have something fun to do too. After we picked them up Lucy really wanted to call her dad. "Ah Kerri Kerri Kerri go shopping shopping shopping." Puts the phone down and says to everyone, "Stop guys talking dad." Then back to Kurt, "Shopping, shopping, shopping." It was hilarious.

They came home with cute outfits and were all shopped out. Thanks Kerri!!

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Romans Reflections

- This really warmed my heart: During the sacrament Emma Lynn was reading the scriptures about her baptismal covenant. After finishing that she pulled out her Faith in God book and was working on it. As soon as we got home from church she got on the computer and pulled up Elder Holland's talk from conference. I gave her a CD and picture from the mutual theme this year, "Stand in Holy Places." She promptly hung up the picture and turned on the music in her room telling Ruth, "Let's listen to this every day so we can memorize it." Its in these moments I can SEE her testimony growing and can envision her as a YW reciting the theme and doing her personal progress. Its sweet.

~ Lucy's new phase is "Cool Awesome." Not just "cool" or "awesome" but the combination of both. After I finished her hair one morning, "My hair is cool awesome." 

~ Spencer's was to write about the most important people in his life. How can you not smile about this?

~ Lucy is going through the "My Do It" stage. Gotta love independence.

~ Ruth goes through about 6 outfits a day. She is quite the fashionista.