Happy Birthday to Abby

Abby turned 8 this week. She's excited to be baptized as a member of our church soon. Her birthday wishes included taking a few friends to Panda Express for dinner, Chocolate Layers for dessert, and making two crafts-decorating flip flops and a hat.

It was a fun day for her. Thanks to all the birthday wishers who made her day so special!

Happy Anniversary--We're Teenagers!

This past week John and I celebrated our 13th wedding anniversary. To keep with tradition in our family, we had a family birthday party to celebrate the birth of our family. We talked about what we LOVE about our family, we had our favorite cake (chocolate molten lava cake) and ice cream, we sang "happy birthday to us", and opened presents.

John and I felt the need to help the kids feel unity and loyalty within our family. John shared some great thoughts with the kids about what it means to be a team player-although team players each have different roles and responsibilities, they all work together in order to succed. He bore testimony to them about the plan of salvation, the sealing power in temples, and how exciting it will be someday to all be able to return to God's presence as a family. We're all on the LeSueur team.

Every team needs some sort of uniform. Here's ours.

On the front of the shirts, the kids say MVP --most valuable player. John's says, "Head Coach", and mine says "Manager".

It was a fun day. And from a mother's perspective, it was quite reassuring. Sometimes it's easy to only notice the fighting, arguing, bickering, complaining. . . on a day-to-day basis. But today I noticed only gratitude between each other, kindness, compliments, laughter, and lots of love passed around. I felt progress towards our end goal--to be an eternal family unit. It was a good feeling.

Of course, John and I did some celebrating on our own as well. He and I checked ourselves out of the parent roles a few weeks ago and had a grand time. He's my best friend, and I'm his as well. The kids know we're first in each other's lives, and that knowledge provides them a sense of security and pride.

Happy Anniversary to Us!

"A First"

I took the kids to the dentist a few days ago for their 6-month cleanings. With four kids being seen at the same time, I walked the halls between rooms to see how the kids were doing. All went well generally. A few small fillings, but nothing too crazy. . . until I heard Mason's dentist start yelling (he already has quite a booming voice) things like "this is a first", "I've never seen this before".

Through the process of cleaning Mason's teeth, the dentist came across red and swollen gums. After further digging, he found a piece of lead (from a mechanical pencil) stuck between Mason's teeth. It had been there long enough to create redness and swelling. What the?!?

But, knowing Mason, it didn't surprise me one bit. He's always chewing on strings, metal, sticks, rocks, rubberbands, pencils, plastic, seeds,. . . I find myself constantly saying things like, "Mason, is that food? Don't put it in your mouth." I tease him about still being in the oral stage along with BabyKate.

As Mason walked out of the dentist's office, Dr. Taylor thanked him for providing "a first" for the dentist. In all his years, he 's found a lot of funny things in kids mouths, but he's never found the tip of a pencil.

Until now, of course.

Baby's First Easter Egg Hunt

We're all in love with this cubby baby. Her latest nickname is 'Miss Potamus'--because when she's in the bath, Mason thinks she looks like the baby hippos swimming at the zoo.

Spring Break--Part 1

The highlight of our first week of Spring Break was going to the cabin with some favorite cousins, the Wrights. Among other things, we enjoyed playing in the snow, reading and relaxing, playing lots of games, visiting, hiking, building forts, fishing, riding mountain bikes,

exercising, going on walks, and feeding horses.

Mason and boys, preparing for a great snow-ball fight against the girls.

John with baby Kate, watching the snowball fight.

Roasting Smores over the fire.

Taylor and cousins, fishing--waiting for a bite.

After a few hours of building and working, the kids showed us an AWESOME fort.

Pretty impressive!

This picture is a still-shot of Taylor and Derek's personality! Snuggling together, reading from the same book titled, "Dangerous Book for Boys". Life couldn't get any better for these two.

EmmaClaire was one of the "big kids" this trip and enjoyed a lot of playing outside and hiking.

And, just for kicks--baby Kate is SOOOOOOOOOOOOO cute! Especially all

bundled up in her warm snow clothes.




We came home full of great memories.

Such a great helper!

Never assume Andersen will do fine carrying in a grocery bag without "busting" almost everything in the bag. His nickname, "Buster", is very well suited.

4 eggs out of the dozen survived.

Who would have thought that walking about 12 feet from the car to the kitchen would have brought on so much dammage. And all good intentions too--just trying to help out. Gotta LOVE 3-year old boys.

One of those Moments. . .

Today I took Andersen and Kate to a fabric store. Shortly after getting there, Kate started fussing, and I knew her time was ticking. Andersen continued to hide in and around every bolt of fabric. To say the least, I was ready to get out of there when I got to the check-out stand.

After turning in coupons and reviewing my receipt, I realized that I hadn't paid for a big piece of fabric. By this time, Kate was outright crying, but I asked the store clerk to help me figure things out so I knew I had paid the right amount. She spent a few minutes looking, then called another lady up to the front. By this time, there were about 8 other people in line. . . just waiting for me to finish. During all this, Andersen went around the corner of the counter and was looking at the candy. A lady came up to me and said with a smile, "just so you know, your little boy is doing some creative shopping". Uh oh--with Andersen, that could mean ANYTHING!

I quickly came around the corner to find him sticking suckers in all of his 6 pants pockets, one at a time. He had 9 suckers in the pockets so far, with two in each hand, trying to stuff them in too.

All 8 people in line had eyes on me, Kate was crying in the shopping cart loud enough for the world to hear, and the store worker was yelling, "where did that woman go?" I'm laughing as I write, but it wasn't too funny then.

I got down to Andersen's eye level and asked him to put the suckers back on the shelf. His response wasn't great, and we had a few moments of quiet confrontation. I ended up picking him up and removing him from the suckers, quickly paid for my things, along with a bag of reces pieces, and was glad to get out of the store.

Andersen was glad to get a treat in the car. Half way home, he yelled from the back seat, "mom--something is in my nose".

What would motivate a 3-year-old boy to stuff reces pieces in his nose? I'll never know. It took a few hard and long blows to get them out, and he's fine now.

As I tucked him in bed tonight (much earlier than usual--for my sanity), we had a good talk about stealing and not taking things that don't belong to us, paying for store items first, and why it's not good to push things up our noses.

As busy and mischievous as he is, I still just love his little personality. He adds color to my days and I couldn't imagine being a mom without him. I LOVE HIM!