Happy Birthday Brent!

Today Brent is 36 years old. Closer to 40 than 30. Ouch. For his birthday he took the day off so that I can go to Women's Conference at BYU. What a guy, huh? One of the many reasons why I love him. I thought I'd pay homage to his red hair because some people don't realize he was a true redhead! I guess the freckles and ability to get a sunburn on a 50 degree cloudy day wasn't proof enough. According to his mom Brent was perfect, slept all the time and was a joy to have around. Hmmm. I'm not sure I buy it. She loved to dress him in clothes that matched his hair (luckily rust colored clothes were plentiful in the 70's), which she kept long and feathered until he buzzed it in jr high. Then she payed him to grow it out and he grew it out until he was a senior in high school. It was ponytail length by then, so she payed him again to cut it.

So in honor of Brent turning 36, here are 36 things things the kids and I love about him...

1. You are supportive of the things I want to do.
2. You are an awesome dad-the boys look up to you and think you are so fun. But they know you mean business too!
3. You can laugh at yourself.
4. You are so hands on with the kids-no task is beneath you. You change diapers and help feed babies in the middles of the night.
5. You are still a goofball.
6. You worked hard to get your education- DOCTOR Milne! And you work hard to provide for our family
7. You try to make our yard look nice because you know it makes me happy.
8. You boot me out of the house when I need a break or to spend time with friends.
9. You can easily do without and you don’t complain.
10. You have a beautiful and strong testimony
11. You teach the boys well and praise them often.
12. You put the needs of your family above your own needs
13. You like to go on dates with me and you like to watch movies with me even though I always ask questions
14. You always thank me for doing daily household chores-laundry, cooking, cleaning
15. You tell me I look pretty
16. You’ll come home and cook dinner if I've had a crazy day and haven’t gotten around to it yet.
17. You like to think of fun things to surprise us with
18. You are a great speaker and a great teacher
19. You do things for me that I hate doing-run to the store, change a stroller tire, fix computer stuff, get gas
20. You let me pause the TV and the DVD player all the time and only give me a little bit of a hard time. Ok a lot, but you still let me do it.
21. You put your clothes in another room’s closet so that I can use all of our limited closet space in our room.
22. You are super-duper smart and I can ask you things I don’t know
23. You aren’t a picky eater!!
24. You do homework every day with Garrett, even when you’ve had a long day.

Garrett
25. I like it when you sleep by me
26. I like it when you play with me

Eli
27. You take us to fun places
28. You play scrabble with me
29. You play computer games with me

Luke
30. I like it when you give me hugs
31. I like it when you let us play the Wii
32. I like it when you play baseball with me

Owen
33. I love when you give me huggies
34. I love you because you are silly and funny
35. I love it when you let us play the Wii

Max
36. You give me good snuggles and make me laugh

Love you babe! Hope you have a happy birthday!

Eli's Befores and Afters

This is dedicated to my dad who couldn't even stand to have us wiggle a loose tooth in front of him. Ironic that I am now married to a dentist. My dad would rather saw his arms off than be a dentist, or go to one for that matter.

BEFORE & AFTER


Check out the size of those teeth! Yowza!

The hair was an experiment. Eli was born with two cowlicks on top of his head that swirl in opposite directions. This creates a chunk of hair that has never laid flat whether it was 1/4 of an inch long or 2 inches. Eli wanted to grow it out until he couldn't stand it any more. I'm such a nice mom. And I did not prompt these facial expressions.

BEFORE

AFTER

Garrett's Star Performance

When I get busy blogging is the first thing to go. It's been a few months and I didn't know where to begin. So I'm just picking some things that we've done over the past few months. The next few posts might be a random and a little bit of old news but maybe that'll get me back in the swing of things!

Recently Garrett had his 4th grade performance. His sweet teacher knew he loved trains and assigned him a part as a railroad worker. He didn't have to speak or sing by himself, but he had to go stand on a chair in front of everyone and do some actions to the beat and blow his train whistle while he was singing the song. He was the only one with a part for that song and I couldn't believe he did it by himself!

So many kids, parents and teachers came up to us afterwards and told us what a great job Garrett did, including the principal which Garrett thought was pretty cool. We were so pleased at the encouragement and support these sweet people showed Garrett. He is lucky to be surrounded by awesome friends and one heck of an awesome teacher who knew he could step outside of his comfort zone to do this. He initially told her "no thanks" but she persisted and I'm so glad she did! I had no idea that he had a little part (I just knew he needed a costume) and was surprised to see him get up there by himself. So what did I do? Cry of course! And so did his teacher! It was a joy to see him participate with his peers and accomplish something he didn't think he could do.