Baker #4

Family Reunion

2009-10-25T18:24:00.002-06:00

Here is a little slideshow of some of the pictures from my big family vacation to the beach in San Diego and Disneyland...

Teaching Language - At It's Finest!

2009-09-27T18:30:00.003-06:00

This is how it feels to teach language to some of my children...
Seinfeld History Lesson

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An exchange I had the other day with a child...
Me: What is this?
Child: A dog
Me: You're right
Child: YES!
Me: So what group should we put the dog with?
Child: I don't know... the shirt?
Me: No. A dog is a what?
Child: DOG!
Me: Yes, but what is a dog? Is it a person?
Child: YES! ... No (and laughs)
Me: You're right, it's not a person it's an "A" "A"
Child: ANT!
Me: No, it's an "ANI.."
Child: ANIT!
Me: No, but good try, it's an "A-N-I-M..."
Child: ANIM!!
Me: ANIMAL! It's an animal
Child: Oh yeah, an animal!
Me: So where should the ANIMAL go?
Child: With the cat!
Me: (sigh of relief and roll my eyes that the exchange is over)

Mind you this concept has been gone over at least 6 times with the child. And the exclamation points are because the child says everything with emphasis and excitement!

By George, He's 2!

2009-09-06T18:17:00.002-06:00

I've decided that being an aunt is the best job EVER! I get to spoil the nephews and then when they aren't behaving, send them to see mom :) However, I was glad I got to buy a fun vacuum toy for my nephew A's 2nd birthday. He likes to say "I need to clean, I need to clean"

Visit to Seattle

2009-09-06T18:09:00.005-06:00

My mom and I drove up to Seattle on the 4th of July to see my brother and his family...

Since my brother's neighborhood is "un-incorporated" all types of fireworks were legal. A was scared to death so I let him wear my dad's Bose headphones (sacrificing my own hearing for the children...) I had borrowed for the trip. J thought it was great fun - noise and all! But mostly he liked chewing on the light-up necklaces I bought them :)

Since A was taking swim lessons, we decided to try out a local community pool. The temperature was a little chilly, but that didn't seem to deter the boys much!

We also tried out a new Aquarium/Zoo. You can't really go wrong with little boys and animals.

What trip would be complete without a picture of someone standing inside an animal's head?!? None, I believe :)

Spring Time Fun

2009-09-06T17:58:00.005-06:00

Well, the time has come for me to update. I don't make any promises as to the frequencies of the updates, but 6 months is a little longer than I would like. So here were some activities from the spring...

They have this awesome park in West Jordan that the boys love to go to. Add bubbles and life just does not get any better!

My brother's kids came out for a little bit while he and his wife went to Hawaii. One of our entertainment options was going to the pool. Does it look like J likes the slide? I'm not quite sure...

My nephew A liked to do everything that his older cousin does and so I was the jumping pole that got him from place to place.

The bounce house is a FAVORITE with the boys! Although playing the video games has become more enticing than bouncing :)

I'm a Homeowner!!!!

2009-03-08T18:56:00.009-06:00

I closed on my condo/townhouse on Tuesday March 3rd and I received the keys on Friday March 6th. Welcome to my new abode...

Doesn't the outside look inviting??

There is a half bathroom to your left in this photo and then my living room. Don't the carpets look clean? My sister and I spent about 3 hours cleaning the carpets in the whole place with a steam vacuum. Jealous you weren't there to help aren't you?!?

Where I will probably spend most of my time :)

I am almost done cleaning the kitchen. I just have to clean the inside of the fridge and stove...

This room is opened to the hallway and stairs, so it is technically a "loft" room.

The 2nd bedroom that hopefully I will eventually have a roommate for...

And the bathroom they will get to use...

This is my bedroom with my new queen bed. Well, new to me!

There is a huge soaker tub in there. It's too bad that I don't like baths! Showers only...

My friend wants this closet. One day I'm sure I'll fill it up :)

The Beach in February

2009-03-08T18:51:00.003-06:00

We went to La Jolla beach on Saturday Feb 28. C wanted to run around in the freezing water, so I staked out my spot on the beach with A and made sandcastles. He would say "castle", I would build it, then he would knock it down and laugh hysterically. Who knew that would be so fun???

A and me relaxing on the beach.

Legoland & Dramamine

2009-03-08T18:34:00.007-06:00

My first trip to Legoland...

I just want to know who gets paid to build these things?!?!

A could only go on a couple of rides due to height restrictions, but he loved the train!

I did go on a couple of rides with C, who was the perfect size for all of these rides. However, this is where the Dramamine came in. Who knew I would need it for kiddie rides?!?

For those of you who haven't been there - they have entire city scapes built out of legos. So I decided to take my picture @ New York City since they have a lego Citicorp building (where my dad worked pre-retirement). He would probably have been a little prouder if their stocks weren't doing so poorly...

Since C did not want his picture taken today - this is what we got! Good thing A loves to get his picture taken and says "cheese" as soon as a camera is pulled out :)

There were some play areas and A liked me to follow him around so he could label everything he saw and wait for me to confirm that he was correct.

I thought it would be fun if we were all in the shark. Can you see my eyes at the top???

I figured I should get a picture taken that you could actually tell I was in it :) 3 Dramamine and 1 Excedrin later, the day was over!

Professional Sledders...

2009-03-08T18:13:00.005-06:00

My brother and his family came into town President's Day weekend to visit, so we took advantage of the fresh snow..

My sister is just admiring my sledding skills :) I half went off a jump and was very off-balance...

In case you weren't convinced of my skills in the last photo - I tried tubing as well!

Me and my nephew coming down the hill. I had to use my feet to make sure we didn't go over the jump - hence the flying snow!

Fortunately we made it down the hill in one piece - and he loved it!

Ou-Ou-Ou...Ah-Ah-Ah

2009-01-19T17:31:00.003-07:00

A trip to the zoo included A saying "Ou-Ou-Ou...Ah-Ah-Ah" a thousand times and running from animal cage to animal cage. I must say that visiting the zoo has an added level excitement when in attendance with a child whose favorite thing to do is make animal sounds :)

After a few attempts, I got both of my nephews to look at the camera at the same time. Monkeys and gorillas were big hits - especially the gorilla eating his own poop. Ah the memories...

Finally we went on the merry-go-round. A chose 3 animals to sit on before finally being satisfied sitting on the animal right next to his big brother! Although I must say that the merry-go-round went a lot faster than I remembered. Next time I might need some Dramamine...

"Give Me Five"

2008-12-03T07:54:00.001-07:00

Five Things I Was Doing 10 Years Ago
1. Attending Waubonsie Valley High School
2. Being the only child left at home with my parents
3. Attending early-morning seminary
4. Pretending to take piano lessons from Sherri Moss
5. Hanging out at the Child’s house

Five Things On My “To-Do” List Today
1. See children
2. Go to my nephew’s birthday party
3. Go to a professional development meeting after work – FUN!
4. Make some phone calls for work
5. Play with my nephews

Five Favorite Snacks
1. Peanut Butter Cups
2. White corn tortilla chips with mild salsa
3. Popcorn
4. Clementines
5. Nutty Bars

Five Jobs I Have Had
1. LC’s Frozen Custard – I scooped custard (and made it – and ate it…)
2. Hallmark – and yes it is annoying if you put a card back in the wrong spot!
3. Jacobs Engineering – filing, filing and more filling. Oh, don’t forget the data entry…
4. IP Relay Operator – took and made phone calls for the deaf/hard of hearing
5. Speech-Language Pathologist at an elementary school (hence the “see children” on my list of things to do)

Five Things I Would Do With a Million Dollars
1. Buy a townhouse
2. Travel the world
3. See my family more often
4. Buy fun things for my nephews
5. Invest (safely in CDs currently)

Five Things That Made Me Laugh This Week
1. My dad dancing to “Manheim Steamroller” Christmas music
2. One of my nephews running around with no pants on – (part of potty training possibly?!?)
3. While trying to glue a Nativity back together I got superglue on 5 of my fingers and almost glued the Nativity to the kitchen counter
4. My mom finding two more Nativities online to purchase and then her proceeding to tell me why they would be good ones… (like a kid at the candy store!)
5. My nephew doing a “Kung-Fu” kick at Wal-Mart while saying “Hi-ah!”

Five People I Tag to Answer the Same Questions
1. Janene
2. Amanda
3. Maren
4. Conni
5. …
(I guess I should work on getting more friends!)

Bumps and Bruises

2008-12-01T21:14:00.004-07:00

So I had a very exciting Thanksgiving Break. It started off with a race on a bounce house obstacle course that ended like this...

And now looks like this...

And Sunday night, the day before I have to go back to school, I fell down the stairs (who knows how - I'm going to claim it was due to favoring my good ankle due to the above photos...) which resulted in the following:

A lot of ibuprofen later, I am just hoping this goes away soon!

Vegas Baby!

2008-11-15T18:08:00.003-07:00

Last weekend (Nov 8) I went to Vegas with some friends from school. We spent most of the day shopping (gag, cough, hack...) but the night ended fabulously when we went to see "Stomp Out Loud".

This is one of the scenes that they did and I must admit it was very entertaining and quite amazing at their skill level. However, there were times that I wish I had brought my ear plugs as my heart was thumping to the beat. But I did remember to take an Excedrin before the show which was a good decision on my part!

At the end, we had a group shot (One person is missing! Hence the space beside me...) with one of the performers and man - he was SWEA-TY!

Hard at Work... Or Play...

2008-11-01T11:39:00.009-06:00

So, for Halloween at school they have a parade in the morning of every single class that takes over an hour. Seeing as how I just know a few kids, we had a lot of down time waiting for the kids I see. This is how we (my co-workers and I) spent that time...

This is me, the resource teacher and the speech tech at the school. Are you scared?

Just in case my teeth weren't big enough before...

I'm pretty sure we look like we have "syndromes" in this picture :)

A little classic black and white to suit your fancy.

Have you ever seen conjoined twins that have a 6 inch height difference and about a 60 pound weight difference? Well now you have...

A little sun burst to lighten your life :)

Do we look like we could be in professional pop art?!?

Another classic - sepia

J is even more tiny and there's two of me. What excitement!

And one more scary x-ray picture. Special for Halloween :) Now doesn't that look like more fun and more productive than doing paperwork while the rest of the school is parading around?!?

Trunk or Treat

2008-11-01T11:35:00.002-06:00

So we had a lot of Halloween activities this week, two of which were trunk-or-treats. One at my parent's ward and one at my sister's ward. But I couldn't pass up the chance to go with them and see my nephews in their costumes. Doesn't Batman look tougher this year?!?

Me and the boys. No family event would be complete without one of these pictures. And in case you can't tell, A is a horse :)

Building a Fort

2008-11-01T11:32:00.002-06:00

One night I was helping babysit the nephews and C and I decided to build a fort. Inside we used a flashlight to play a variety of games. The only problem was I couldn't sit up, so it was very awkward. But what more could a little boy want????

I'm BACK!

2008-08-07T17:18:00.009-06:00

I got back Monday night from Ireland and the U.K. It was a fabulous trip, but now I am trying to recover from jet lag while trying to get some hours in at work before school starts next week! This week I have woken up at 4 am, 3:30 am and finally 5 am. Believe it or not, I was happy to sleep in until 5 this morning!

Needless to say I have A LOT of pictures that I am currently trying to sort through, so here are just a couple and then I will do another post soon!

Who goes to London and doesn't get a phone booth picture? No one I believe...

My dad and me at Stonehenge :)

At the Stocks in Warwick - I know, I know, you're thinking "again"?!?!

A picturesque moment on a boat ride on our way to the Lake District. Have you ever seen so much green?!? I think I will buy that house when I am rich... Oh wait, I'm on a teacher salary!

This is me at the Blarney Castle and YES! I kissed the Blarney stone - don't I seem chatty?!? I'll let you know if I come down with some unknown disease any time soon...

Family Photos

2008-08-07T17:09:00.003-06:00

Before I went on my big trip we had family pictures taken. It's been a long time since it has been done, but here we are (minus two) in all our glory! (the minus is a long story...)

I wanted a picture with me and the boys, but as you can see it didn't work out all too well... However, we'll just consider it a "character" picture :) Of course, A had been sick the previous night with a 104 degree fever so that may be why he was crying!

Just one more for good luck :)

British Isles

2008-07-13T09:32:00.003-06:00

I am shortly to head out on an 18-day tour of the British Isles - including England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland! I am incredibly excited, yet nervous about the rigorous schedule this tour has us on... I have always wanted to go to England and Ireland and in a few days, it will be all too real. Watch out UK - here I come!!!

4th of July

2008-07-08T12:27:00.005-06:00

My brother and his family drove down from Washington and were with us on the 4th of July. We actually ended up doing our own fireworks on the 5th since that was when we could get the whole family together!

Me and baby J relaxing on the blanket viewing the fireworks spectacle (Of course - I use the word spectacle loosely since we only had $10 worth of WalMart fireworks and some sparklers that wouldn't lite!). And yes, I do realize it is still light outside... That's what happens with young children!

Then I was able to wrangle A into my picture as well - although I'm pretty sure he didn't appreciate it!

I was trying to get a picture of A, but he was being super crazy like always, so this was the best I could get! I'll have to try again when they are here again next weekend...

Who Doesn't Love a Train Ride?!?

2008-06-11T10:49:00.004-06:00

My sister and I decided for entertainment we would take the train into Salt Lake to see my dad at work...

I volunteered to hold A on the train since he wasn't interested in his stroller and C was out and about. My sister got to hold C until a seat opened up and the following is how he looked...

I know what you're thinking - SWEET! Socks with flip-flops, way to go mom for letting him leave the house like this! However - to my sister's defense (and my own) she tried multiple times to get him to take off his socks and I tried about 10 different ways from the time we got out of the car and got to the train station. No luck as you can see :)

We got to eat lunch in the Church Office Building cafeteria with my dad where he got to show off his grandboys to his buddies and then we walked around Temple Square for a bit. If it appears I am clutching C for dear life, it is because I was sure he would try and get away from me before the picture was taken to play in the water!

School's Out!!

2008-06-11T10:36:00.004-06:00

I never thought the day would come that I would be more excited for school to end. I always thought that as a student it was the best day ever - I have a renewed appreciation for the last day of school and I am 100% confident that the teachers are more excited about it than the kids!

I received this plant from a family that I saw their little preschooler once a week. She got it for me because it says "try" and I always make her try things, even if they are hard, at least a couple of times. Aren't I a mean teacher?!?! However, I wasn't sure what to do with it since I had almost killed it in the last 2 weeks of school, so I took a picture of it to commemorate my first year completed :)

For our big end of the year celebration you will note on the building behind these lovely gals that we attended, none other than the best buffet ever, Chuck-A-Rama (cough, cough, gag). And we were required to pay for the $10 meal ourselves - what a send off! Needless to say, these are two special ed teachers that won't be coming back to my school next year and I'm sad :(

This is a gem of a picture isn't it?!?!

And the laughs just keep on coming... us Special Ed have to stick together!! (There are a few more on our team that chose not to attend this delightful lunch and leave work early:)

Logan Funeral

2008-05-18T08:15:00.001-06:00

On Monday, we had another short funeral service in Logan, UT since she was going to be buried in Smithfield. I was really glad that I was able to attend both services and that I could take a couple of days off of work.

My dad and me :)

My grandma's casket was beautiful! And the roses were really pretty. My grandma used to have the most beautiful rose garden in the front of her house before they moved into a smaller place, so it was nice to see roses as the flower of choice.

This is my grandparents headstone. They have had it purchased for awhile now. Their favorite picture to show people was a picture of them laying down on the grass in front of their headstone - creepy huh?!?

The girls at the funeral.

Another photo of me and my grandpa. I sure do love that guy!

The Baker representatives that were able to be there in Logan.

San Diego Funeral

2008-05-18T07:57:00.002-06:00

I have been meaning to post these pictures for awhile now, but life has been crazy with school ending in just a week and a half. Anyway, these are pictures from my grandma's funeral in San Diego...

My parents were really nice and bought me a last minute plane ticket so that I could be in San Diego for the funeral with the rest of the family. We flew out Thursday night for the funeral on Friday. Unfortunately, my sister and I forgot to check to see if our flight was on time so we spent a little extra time in the airport and of course, I spent that time playing with A :)

6 of my male cousins were the pallbearers. The funeral was really good, but of course I cried... a lot! I was frantically trying to get this picture so that we could have one of the pallbearers.

After the funeral the Relief Society in my grandpa's ward provided lunch for the family. It was really nice to sit and talk with aunts, uncles, cousins, etc. Isn't my grandpa cute?!? It was actually quite difficult to take this picture - my grandpa kept trying to talk or eat his food...

These are the representatives from my immediate family that were able to be there.

And what would a funeral be without a group shot?!?! There were only a couple of grandkids that were unable to make it, so it was nice to be able to get a group photo.

And finally, we flew back on Saturday morning. Fortunately this time, our flight was not full, so there was a lot of extra playing room for A.

And just one more with A - I just can't get enough of him! Plus, since I don't have a family of my own, I have to get my pictures somewhere - it might as well be of my cute nephews!

My Grandma & Me

2008-04-23T21:14:00.001-06:00

My grandma passed away this past Tuesday. I just thought I'd share some pictures and memories of her...

My grandma made me my most favorite blanket in the whole world. Unfortunately I didn't like her too much when she dyed it pink again because it was thrashed. But I liked my mom even less when she made me put it away in a box when I was 12! Fortunately my grandma loved me so much, she made me a new blanket then :)

When we lived in California, I always remember spending Christmas with my grandparents in San Diego. We would all sit around the Christmas tree and my grandpa would pass out presents. It seemed to take all morning, but it was nice to not have it so rushed!

My grandma use to say a little poem to me "I have a little shadow, that goes in and out with me, But what could be the use of it is more than I can see..." She may have recited more than that, but that's the part I remember. She use to tell me that when I would follow her around the house and try to help her. Do you think I should have taken offense by that poem?!?!

She doesn't have it anymore, but my grandma use to have a rocking chair that was just big enough for an adult and a child. (Two adults don't fit - trust me I tried before it was thrown out!) I liked to sit with my grandma and watch Jeopardy and Wheel of Fortune. It was the perfect sized chair...

My grandparents had a beautiful garden. The best thing they grew were blackberries. I remember picking berries with my grandma and eating more than I was putting in my basket. Then she made FABULOUS jam with the berries. To this day, regardless of the berries, whenever my mom makes jam, I always ask - "Is it Grandma's jam?"

I loved talking with my grandma. She was never a big phone talker, but I knew she loved letters so I tried to send her a card or letter every couple of months. I knew she appreciated it when two months later, she would mention how much she loved the card and how she had put it in a special place.

My grandma loved quilting. She always had one project or another going on. I remember that when she use to visit us when we were little, my mom would always have a quilt up for my grandma to work on. I use to love to sit and read books underneath the quilt while my grandma quilted.

My grandma and grandpa say this every time they get back to the house from going anywhere (even the grocery store) - "Home again, home again, never to roam again." As much as I miss her, I know that she is really home now.