300th Post--Exciting News!

Wow, I've been blogging for 2 years and have reached 300 posts! This one will be short and sweet. We have exciting news in the Winzenz household!

Brooke is rolling over! :) She rolled over for the first time (all the way over and lifted her head up) this past Wednesday, May 27th. What a big girl she is getting to be! She will be 4 months old on Monday. What a joy this precious girl is in the home.

Field Day!

Last week the kids had field day at school. They all love it! What a fun time for them to be outside playing games and having a grand time. It was a beautiful day for it, too. A little humid, but at least it wasn't raining. :)

Here's Megan waiting for her next game to start.Going through the Hula Hula Bula Bula game.
Here's Kate holding the beach ball. They had to see how many times they could hit the ball and keep it in their circle of people.

Brandon was very careful to get as much water into the bottle as he could!

Love the tongue sticking out in this one

Here's what Carli wanted to do while the older kids were playing

Brooke was adorable in her little sun hat!

I'm so glad I am blessed to be able to stay at home and go to all these fun events the kids have at school. I love being a SAHM!

Brandon is off to camp!

Brandon was off to camp this morning. I was sad and nervous to see him go! He was a little on the serious side this morning, too, between the bouts of complete excitement. :) He was so sweet! He gave all of his sisters a hug, wanted to hold Brooke several times, and when we got in the car to go to school he actually climbed into the back seat between Kate and Megan to sit by both of them! He is not usually the chummy brotherly type, but he was such a sweet guy this morning. I miss my Bud already!

Here he is all ready to go!Stopped for one more photo-op with Carli and Brooke.

We stayed to see them off on the bus. They were all very excited to get going! I'm sure he will have a fabulous time. He has never been away from us before so I'm a bit sad and nervous to have him gone.

Here is just a sweet picture of Brooke from Sunday. She usually falls asleep in the car on the way home from church and this week was no exception. We found her a little later with her little hand up by her face. Too sweet!

Brandon's Birthday Bash

We had Brandon's party the Saturday after his actual birthday so here's what happened the day of. He opened his main present that morning, which was sitting on the end of his bed, Rock Band. He was pretty excited about that! Later, before dinner, he was able to open the rest of his gifts, one of which was this book, Runny Babbit, by Shel Silverstein. It is the most hilarious book when you read it aloud. He also got some of his favorite toy right now, Bakugon. Don't ask me what they are, I don't understand them. :)

After gifts we ran to the park with the fam and met Megan's Girl Scout troop there for their end of the year awards. We took pizza for Brandon's birthday dinner--cheese pizza and breadsticks with dip--his absolute favorite. He was a happy guy!Brandon and his buddy, Caleb, hanging out in the tree.Sydney and Megan enjoyed being in girl scouts together.Here are some of the girls saying the Girl Scout pledge (I think)At the end they always do the circle of friendship (I don't remember what it's really called, but this sounds good) :)I don't know what Kate ate or drank, but here she is in all her glory with a blue tongue.Ben and Brooke--so sweet together! Brandon's birthday party was a great success. After Kate's huge party I was ready for a nice easy event. He invited just a few friends to come over for pizza and cake. They opened presents and just played and hung out together. Talk about easy-going. It was great! Brandon had fun and enjoyed having his friends there.

Here they all are eating pizza.Brooke was enjoying the party, too. Isn't she just so sweet?! Looks like she is waving!Opening gifts. His friends definitely know what he likes!Funny looking cake, eh? I asked him if he wanted a rectangular cake or a double layer round cake. He said, "Both." Here is what he requested. It was really yummy!

Musical Kids

Brandon and Kate just finished up the year of piano lessons with a lovely recital. They both did very well considering they refused to practice any more. I had never even heard Brandon play his pieces as he would only play them at his lessons for his teacher. She is moving so they are finished taking lessons for now. I am sad they are done, but they were both wanting to quit anyway. Funny thing is now that they are not taking lessons anymore they are both on the piano more than before! Silly kids. :) They are both so talented!Kate needed a little help in the middle of her first piece. Otherwise, she did great!

The kids also finished up their year on the 3rd and 4th grade Chimes teams at school. Kate enjoyed it very much. This picture is awful, but it's all I got that night.Brandon finished his second year on the chimes team and is sad to leave it behind as he moves onto intermediate school. He is excited about the music options coming up, though! He wants to go into percussion. He will be awesome! He is so musical.

Swimming

Summer has officially started when the pool opens! We have a week and a half left of school left, but we are already enjoying our neighborhood pool. We love it! The kids have a blast and we love to have friends come swim with us. If you ever want to cool off just let us know! Friday we had a bunch of friends join us and we had a great time. Can't wait to do it again!

Kate enjoying the cool of the poolMegan and her good friend SydneyBrandon and his buddies jumping inMegan relaxingBrandon and his gogglesCarli and her buddies, Madelyn and Allison

Baby Birds

A little over a week ago I was in our front yard watching the kids play and I could hear some very faint baby bird chirping. It was so sweet and sounded so close! Last year we had a nest up in one of our rain gutters outside Carli's room so I ran inside and up to her room to peak out the window. I thought maybe they were in there again (those never hatched, unfortunately, because of a huge storm and the mommy bird never came home), but it was empty. I went back out and looked in our front tree, but no luck there, either. The sound stopped and I gave up.

The next evening I was out and could hear the birds again. They had to be in our yard! I hunted around in our bushes and finally found the tiny little things in our bush/tree (I have no idea what kind of plant it is) right by the porch. There were 3 little tiny beaks open as wide as they could go chirping for food. How sweet! I knew the mother had just been there (I saw her fly out of the bush) so I knew they were being taken care of. I had the kids come look at them one at a time and very carefully and quietly. They were all thrilled! How neat is it to find 2 brand new baby birds in their nests in a place where they can see them easily?! Here are some photos of "our" birds. How fun are they?! I was looking forward to watching them grow and change and letting the kids have that experience.

Sunday we came home from church (2 days after finding the birds) and the kids all wanted to go check on the birds. Brandon and Kate were the first over to the tree and they kept saying they couldn't find them. I told them I'd be right over to show them where they were. The nest was hidden in the branches pretty well. I went over and I knew right where to look, but to my horror there were no baby birds! The nest was still there, however it was pulled down to the side and there were some feathers hanging around from the mother bird. Just behind the nest was a tiny little egg, one that had not hatched, that had fallen out of the nest when it was "attacked." We were all so sad that our little birds were gone. I instantly knew what had happened. We have had 2 or 3 stray cats wandering our neighborhood the past couple of weeks and I knew one of them must have gotten our baby birds. How awful!

Brandon's Volleyball Season

All the sports seasons are over! Brandon had a blast playing volleyball this year. Even though his team only won one of their games they did a good job and had fun. Brandon is pretty darn good so I hope he continues to play!

Megan's Soccer Season

Megan played soccer this spring through the YMCA. It was pretty fun. We had some rained out practices and games, but overall it was a fun season for her. She is great at playing goalie! I wish she would continue, but I think this will be her only season. On to the next thing...

Pinewood Derby

The Pinewood Derby was held several weeks ago. I am so behind on posting events happening with the kids. There has been so much going on! Ben took these photos as I was home with Megan that night who had the chicken pox.

Brandon's car is the one on the far right. It's blue with the red lightening streak on the back. He was excited about it. Our cars are never the fanciest or coolest, but I love that Brandon designs them himself and is happy with them. He's such a great kid. :)

Here are all the sisters hanging out at the end of the track.Brandon also passed into Webelos that night. He was very excited to receive his Bear award and move up. He worked hard to get everything done! We are very proud of you, Brandon! You are doing so well in the scouting program.

Random photos from today

I took a picture of each of the kids today. They are not edited or anything and are completely random--just what they were all doing at the moment. For some reason I just wanted to document this today. Just keepin' it real, I suppose. :) Here they are in all their glory...

Kate raiding the fridge

Carli eating a quesadilla and watching tv
Brandon playing a computer game

Brooke playing in her activity saucer

Megan hanging out in the family room

Carli

Utah trip (post #2)

I forgot to include this picture in the previous post about graduation. Here is my Dad with two of the red-headed grandkids, Harper and Brooke.

After the graduation Friday night we drove down to Cedar City. We got up early and headed down to St. George because my cousin, Lauren, was getting married in the St. George Temple. It was so neat to be in the temple with so many family members. It was a simply beautiful and perfect day in St. George. She was beautiful, the groom was handsome, and it was so lovely and peaceful on the temple grounds after the ceremony. We even saw Elder Holland walk up into the temple! He stopped to wave, shake hands, and say hello to everyone. That was very neat to see him in person!

Me and Brooke after the weddingAfter the wedding there was a lovely luncheon and then we headed back to the temple to go through a session with my brother, Brett, who is leaving for the Romania Bucharest Mission in a few weeks. That was really special. My parents and all of my siblings were there as well as my Grandpa and Grandma Morris, my Grandma Johnson, and a cousin and an uncle. It was wonderful to have the entire family (except Ben and a sister-in-law) in the temple together. I am blessed with such a special family! The siblings went in on a camera for Brett to take on his mission. He was pretty excited about it. Here he is after he opened it.Brooke loved spending time with Grandpa. I love this sweet picture (Brett, sorry, but you kind of ruin the shot back there on the couch. lol!) She was so content on the trip.My mom has the most beautiful lilac bushes in her backyard. We tried to get some cute pictures of Brooke after church on Sunday, but she was more interested in looking at the dog than looking at the camera.

Duh, I didn't even think to get a picture of me and Brooke on mother's day or one of my and my mom. Oh well. It was a wonderful day with my dad fixing yummy crepes for breakfast and then we had all the Cedar City family over for dinner. Dad grilled salmon and it was soooo good. All of the food was great. I was able to talk to Ben and the kids. I missed them on Mother's Day, but it was nice to have a relaxing day. :) Thanks so much, hon, for taking good care of the kids while I was gone! I love you!

Weekend in Utah

I was so happy to be able to fly out to Utah last weekend. I flew into Salt Lake Friday morning with Brooke (who was an angel baby the entire weekend) and my parents picked me up. We then met up with my youngest brother, Brett, another brother, Spencer, and sister-in-law (married to my other brother, Thayne) Kailee, with little nephew Harper and the California Pizza Kitchen downtown. We had some really yummy pizza and then headed out. My parents and I took a little trip over to Temple Square. Oh my, was it beautiful with all the gorgeous tulips and other flowers everywhere we looked! It was so lovely!

Me and Brooke are down there at the bottom of the photo. :)

My Dad, me, and Brooke

The only thing she fussed about was having to get her picture taken in front of the flowers. She wasn't enjoying it much. It was really bright out there, though, so I really don't blame her.

That evening we were able to attend Thayne's graduation from the University of Utah with his MBA. Way to go, Thayne! You are awesome! This is Thayne, Kailee, and Harper. They are expecting boy #2 in August!Thayne with Mom and DadThayne adn Kailee walking with the procession to the graduation.Kailee (sil), Brett (bro), Harper (nephew), Thayne (bro), me, Charisse (sis), and Cory (bil)

That was Friday. Next post will be Saturday and Sunday!