We are homeowners!!!!

Yes, we finally did it!!! We purchased a home and will be moving into it over the next few weeks. I am so excited to be settling down, finally. We have been looking for months and found the home that felt right. This home is in a great location. It is about 10 minutes from Evan's office, 10 minutes from Evan's brother, and about 12 minutes from the temple. The schools are great. The ward is great, and the home is just what I wanted.




















So a few details about the home: My favorite part is the walk-in pantry. Taneal and Camie's favorite part is the jacuzzi bath-tub in the master suite. I also like my closet, it is a VERY nice size. All four bedrooms are upstairs along with a game room. Downstairs has the kitchen, laundry room, a large breakfast room, a family room, and a formal living room with a half bath. The floor plan is great. We are so excited.

The newest addition to the Black Family

Sklyer Black was born in June to Bryce and Katie. Skyler is their third son, no girls. They are just the opposite if Evan and I a year ago! Congratulations to Bryce and Katie, we are so excited for you!

The newest addition to the Bell Family

Aaron Tyler Bell, known through his predelivery life as "Taco", was born Sunday in Las Vegas. Aaron is Eric and Angela's first baby and we are so excited to welcome him into the family. You can view more pictures of Aaron at their blog and also read about the 8 pound 12 ounce delivery at http://www.ericplusangela.blogspot.com/

I can’t believe you are already ONE! You are no longer a little baby. You started really walking about two weeks ago. You took your first steps at eleven months. Right around your birthday you started walking about ten feet. You hadn’t quite figured out how to stand up without holding onto something. Once you figured it out you excitedly practiced until you got it down. You were so proud of yourself! You have the biggest grin. It was fun to watch you be so proud of yourself. The crawling days are over.

You weigh 23 pounds. You are pretty tall, 31 inches. You have your Dad’s build, very broad shoulders. You personality is great. You are pretty happy, usually attached to me, or in close proximity. You are very curious, which is a good thing. You like to empty out the pots and pans. You like to put everything into your mouth. I pulled an alive spider out if your mouth once. YUCK! You like to walk around holding my hand and are involved in whatever I am doing. You like the remote. You like pushing buttons on the phone. You like to wrestle with Danielle. Danielle can make you laugh harder then anyone else. You don’t like to be forced to do anything. You like to talk gibberish. You have taken cars and pushed them around and made noises! My first true boy moment! You growl and do things that my girls never did.

You love dogs. I guess that is a good or bad thing considering our family’s history with dogs. Evan taught you to hang your tongue out of your mouth when you hear the word “dog.” You are pretty cute. You can say the word “dog”, too.

You have picked up on this scream. This isn’t just any scream. This is the ear piercing scream. Once you did it with your mouth close to my ear and I don’t think I could hear for hours afterwards. You mostly do this scream if you are bored or if someone does something you don’t like. The place you do it the most is at the grocery store when it is most embarrassing. You have also done it in Sacrament meeting.

At about eight months you ate food really well. Now you will barely take a taste and then you are done. Your favorite food to eat is Nacho Cheese Doritos. We call them “fire chips” because the package looks like it has fire on it and Danielle gave it its new name.

Let’s talk about the words you know: Mom, Dad, Danielle, dog, don’t, stop, no, yum, hi, happy, birthday, and thank you

You really like to take a bath. You like to put your lips into the water and blow bubbles. The way things are going you are going to be a little fish.

Your sleeping habits- I think I must be doing something wrong. None of you children have ever been much of a sleeper. You go to bed around 9pm and sleep until around 7am. You usually wake up once a night, you just want to be held and then you fall back to sleep. I’m not sure what wakes you up or why. For naps, you take about a 30 minute nap. If your nap is cut short, you might take a later nap for about 20 minutes. Usually you fall asleep around 11am.

I love watching the differences develop between boys and girls. Your sisters adore you, especially Danielle, at lease most of the time. You are really learning to stand your ground and defend yourself with her. You have such a strong will and determination in that little body of yours.

Spencer turns ONE!

Spencer turned one during the family reunion. 45 people sand Happy Birthday to him. Later that night he started singing "happy birthday to you"! At first I was thinking in was a coincidence that his babbling sounding like that, until he repeated himself! We video recorded him singing it and he has been singing in over and over daily since his birthday. I guess having 45 people singing to him made an impression.

He is taking steps, he can walk across the room by himself. He just can't get into the walking position alone. He can stand up at furniture, just hasn't realized he can take off by himself. He gets so excited and is so proud of himself when he walks. He is just so cute to see walking across the room. Too bad I can't share video on this blog!

Family Reunion

The family reunion officially started on Tuesday, but guests started arriving the Wednesday before. I was privledged to have my neice and nephew, Allen and Elle, from Utah, and Austin, Tyler, and Audrey from Houston, come spend a day and a night at my house. We went frog fishing in the Bayou behind my house. A snapping turtle got Tyler's foot twice, and only Tyler. Elle cut her foot somehow, so we came home and went swimming. With my children included, I had nine kids staying at my house. I am amazed how my mother-in-law had sixteen children and my mom eight. I loved having them all at my house, but I was tired after they went home.

Friday night Trina and her two boys came from Utah. They stayed with me until the reunion started on Tuesday and then came back to my house until Friday evening. I sure have a wonderful sister-in-law. She is so down-to-earth and a wonderful mother. I always have liked Trina and I was so fortunate to spend so much time getting to know her again.

We spent Monday at the beach. I don't know about you, but Galveston Beach is so much fun. The water temperature is wonderful. It is almost like bath water but still refreshing. The waves are calm. The beach gently slopes into the ocean so the kids can go out pretty far and still touch. The water isn't very clear, but I think everyone had a blast. A few of us, including me, got sunburned, so next time we will be even more careful and lather on the sunscreen. Spencer sure enjoyed crawling around in the waves.

Three days of the reunion were spent at Troy and Becky's ranch where we stayed cool inside and played water activities outside. We toured the ranch via hay ride minus the hay (a trailer ride pulled by a tractor) We had water games, went to the Blue Bell water park, and the older kids went water skiing. We could not have asked for better weather.

Thursday night we all headed over to Troy and Becky's house for a swimming party. (The only way to stay cool in a Texas summer is staying in the water). That night Allen told memories he had of all his brothers and sisters. I think everyone really enjoyed that evening reminicing. That night Allen and Gerberta and six of their eight children came to my house. Trina and her two boys came along with Evan's parents and Nancy, Rachel, Seth, Quinn, and Lance. I had a house full and was delighted. I love having people visit.

Guests started leaving on Friday. The reunion was so much fun. Evan's family is full of great people who are hard-workers, so willing to pitch in and help, and easy to please. We ate so much fantastic food. I think the total head-count was 45! We were only missing 21 people. Not bad for an immediate family of 66 and 2 on the way.

Camie finishes Mom & Me Preschool

This year Camie attended a Mommy and Me Preschool. All six girls in our ward will begin kidergarten next year. Last fall the moms decided to have preschool once a week, rotating houses of the students. The had a great time doing crafts, learning the ABC's, singing songs, eating lunch together, and getting to know each other. On the last day of preschool, everyone came to Camie's house and we stamped their hands on t-shirts. They had a great time and were pretty silly!

School's out!

Taneal finishes the 1st grade this week. She is growing up so fast. She has become such a good reader and is enjoying reading The American Girl books. She has learned to add double digets and has become great at spelling and writing. She is excited for this summer and all the swimming she hopes to do. Way to go, Taneal!

Walking? Not yet.

Spencer is getting close to walking and having fun practicing. He is cruising all around the furniture, standing up on walls, and even letting go long enough to clap. I can't believe how fast he is growing up!

The Pirates

Our ward had a tallent show called "Latter-Day Night Live" and our family dressed up as pirates and sang and danced with the son The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything by VeggieTales. Evan also was in the skit, but he took this picture

Isn't Camie cute?

Taneal in her Pirate clothes.

Spencer even joined in on the show

Danielle danced right along with us. I figured she would get nervous and hide behind me, but she stood by my side and danced!

Easter

We spent Easter out at the ranch with cousins. We planned on riding 4-wheelers and being outdoors, but the cold weather definitely changed our plans. We had a great time indoors and the girls played hard with their cousins. They built indoor forts, played games, and watched movies. We really enjoy getting together with family.

I sewed and sewed and sewed some more. Taneal's Easter dress was in her favorite color, blue.

Camie's favorite color is not orange, but I loved this fabric so much. She looked so beautiful and was quite excited to wear "high heels"!

Danielle is as cute as ever. She loves pink and picked out her shoes. I finished her dress in February, so she impatiently waited until Easter to wear it.

Spencer is so grown up! This is his first tie. He didn't seem to even notice he was wearing it. I felt like I needed to make him something, but Evan was pretty adamant about not dressing Spencer up. He says he lets me dote on the girls, but I was not to mess with his boy!

Of course, Easter pictures are to be taken outdoors with flowers. The weather would not allow, so as soon as it warms up, we will do an Easter picture retake, somewhere in the beautiful flowers.

Baseball Season in Full Swing!

Taneal started the baseball season playing on the Cardinals with machine pitch. She hits the ball quite often, and that machine sure pitches those balls fast! She still is pretty nervous about the ball coming at her, but is doing a great job!

Camie is a star player on the Cardinals t-ball team. She sure has some power behind her hits. She still has a hard time focusing on the game when she isn't hitting. I think she spent most of her time with her mitt over her face trying to peek through the holes, or inspecting the dirt through the grass whever she happened to be standing. If started to feel better as a mom when the coach had to say her name atleast twenty time before she heard him. I'm not the only one she tunes out! T-ball sure is a fun game to watch.

Baseball is a whole family experience!

St. Patrick's Day

St Patrick's Day is a lot of fun in our home. We start out by decorating treasure boxes. If you put a box out under the light of the moon with the lid open on the eve of St Patrick's Day, leprechauns have to fill your box with their treasure! Well, we tried this and it worked! The morning of St PAtrick's Day is so exciting! The leprechauns came!

Another St Patricks Day tradition is to wear green and eat green. For breakfast we had green eggs and green pancakes with green milk. Lunch we had green apples and green grapes (with regular sandwiches). For supper we had green oven baked chicken (which was very tasty but looked . . . green), green mashed potatoes, and a green salad with green punch. We topped out the evening with green snickerdoodles!

Taneal's a "snaggle tooth"

Friday Taneal came home from school and pulled her first top front tooth. A week later, in the car on our way home from Spring Break, she pulled the second tooth that had been hanging by threads. She has the cutest smile and is fun to listen to her try to talk.

Spring Break

Spring break was spent at Grammy's house visiting cousins. The kids loved being out in the country and playing outside with cousins.

Spencer is crawling!

Spencer learned to crawl this week. He is 9 months and now VERY mobile. I love watching him move around and start to explore.

A Day at the Zoo

We hadn't been to the zoo in quite a while, so I decided to pull Taneal out of school and all of us go for the day. The night before I asked each of the girls to decide which 3 animals they wanted to make sure they saw. Taneal wanted to see the elephants, alligators, and snakes. Camie wanted to see the Giraffes, Gorillas, and Hippos. Danielle wasn't sure what all this zoo and animal talk was about, but she decided she wanted to see monkeys. The anticiaption was definately there. They suprisingly slept well, but were up and dressed at the crack of dawn hurring me out of bed. They were so excited.

We arrived at the zoo and the weather couldn't have been better. There weren't any crouds, so we picked the perfect day to be at the zoo. After about four hours we had seen all the animals on our lists and many, many more. The kids were on their best behavior, even Spencer. They were ready for another round and pretty adamant about it. The problems was that Camie could no longer walk, her legs were aching so she insisted on riding in the wagon. Same with Taneal. I decided it was time to go home. They resisted a little, but after I assured them we would be back some time in the future, the happily agreed to go home. They were tucked into bed and asleep by 7pm. What a fun day!

Camie learns to ride her bike

After months of encouragement, Camie finally decided she was ready to learn to rider her bike without training wheels.
She has become VERY good at riding her bike and even likes to "wiggle" as she rides fast! She scares me. I am glad she willingly uses her helmet, knee pads, and elbow pads because I am sure they will save her from many scrapes.

Taneal's Birthday

Taneal celebrated her birthday with her cousins, family, and neighbor. She loved her barbie cake in blue, her favorite color. Her favorite gift was the super mega stamp set from her cousins. She spent the entire next day writing and illustrating a book with all her new supplies.