Spring!

Spring! Finally! The semester is almost over, and Mike and I couldn't be happier about it. In celebration, I'm posting lots of pictures and videos.

First, let's get the updates out of the way. School is going well for me. I was supposedly offered a choral scholarship, but I haven't seen any confirmation on it yet. I wasn't counting on a scholarship, so if I get one, it'll be a nice bonus. Either way, the director of music education says she thinks I'm doctoral material. That's encouraging! She recommends that I get my Bachelors ASAP, then take a few years off to get some teaching experience before getting my Masters and Doctorate in quick succession. She says she thinks I have the natural intuition to be a great educator. Realistically, it might be a long time before I get my Masters, but it's nice to have a clear goal and the support of a teacher I admire a great deal.

Mike is considering another change in his major, but he's unsure right now. He's considering everything from meteorology to business, but he might just stick it out as a nuke engineer. I worry that he's too concerned with getting done quickly and making money than with finding something he's good at and that he enjoys. I worry that if he picks a career based on salary, he'll be miserable at work, and all that time and money spent on his education will mean nothing. As it is, he's doing well as a nuclear engineer. Maybe all he needs is to remember what got him excited about it in the first place. It's easy to forget what you love when you're burnt out.

Hyrum continues to do very well in school. His teachers are impressed with his reading and say he finished the kindergarten curriculum a while ago. They're making up new lessons for him to check his reading comprehension. My mom gave him a 196 page Curious George chapter book for Easter which he can read all the way through with no help. He's also top in math. He loves to quiz us on addition at home. His teachers also say his penmanship is excellent. Looks a little funky to me, so I'll just take their word for it. Hyrum's speech is improving steadily since we started him at the speech and language clinic in Idaho Falls. It looks like he'll be in pretty good shape when he starts first grade this fall.

Emily is like bottled sunshine. She's such a cheerful little girl. It always comes as quite a shock when she her mood suddenly takes a drastic turn to throwing tantrums. I guess that's a typical 3 year old girl thing. For the most part, she loves to sing, dance, make up stories, pretend to be a cat, play dress-up, and all those other things that make her so much fun to be around. She's very smart. Hyrum must be teaching her because I don't know how she already knows all her letters and letter sounds. She can also read common words that she sees often like Emily, Hyrum, Mom, Dad, and cat. Mike and I want to look into the possibility of getting her into a preschool this year.

Alright! Picture time!

Instead of Easter baskets, the kids got trays and bowls of candy. Emily got hair accessories and Strawberry Shortcake dress-up doll. Hyrum got slime and a Frisbee.

Last weekend, we took the kids to Spring Scrimmage at BSU. Before the game, they let the kids play on the field and meet the coach and players. Sadly, we took the scenic route through Arco and Craters of the Moon, so we got there as they were ushering everyone off the field. The kids still got to run out onto the field and play for a short time before a security officer tapped me on the shoulder and told us we had to go. I did manage to get a video and a few pictures. :)

Go Orange! Go Big Blue! Fight! Fight! BSU!

Some of Mike's friends from OBNUG.com (a BSU fan site) saved us seats to watch the game. The kids weren't as interested as they usually are in a real game, but they had fun posing for the camera anyhow.

We decided to take the long way back to Shelley again so we could drive through Craters of the Moon and hopefully hike the lava tunnels and the ice caves. We told the kids that it was created by several volcanoes thousands of years ago. Emily was really excited to see a volcano, and made up a cute story during the long car ride. Sorry, for some reason, the sound quality is low on this video. I plan to edit this video and upload it again. Until then, you may have to turn up your speakers.

When we got there, we learned that the lava tunnels and ice caves don't open for the year until May. We decided to take the kids on a short hike (if you can call it that) to the top of a spatter cone. Emily, who had been so excited, suddenly got scared and made Mike carry her to the top. I'm including lots of pictures for Dave's sake. You'd better be reading this, Dave! Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong about any of these rocks too.

This is the vent in a spatter cone. Spatter cones are like mini volcanoes and are formed after the magma becomes cooler and spatters out of vents in larger chunks. The cones are more jagged than smoother cinder cones.

This is the view of the lava flow from the top of the spatter cone. It's just black lava rock for as far as you can see.

The family (minus me) at the top of the cone. Emily still wouldn't let Mike put her down.

This is a cinder cone. These are formed from the cinders which are expelled when the magma is still very hot. The rocks are fine--about the size of gravel. Cinder cones are formed before spatter cones. There are several of both types at Craters of the Moon. This one looks much more impressive in person than in the picture.

Just a typical view of the lava beds and cinder cones.

And another one.

Lava beds are pretty common in East Idaho. In fact, we drive through one nearly every day on the way to school in Pocatello, so it's a little hard to get excited about seeing more lava rock desert. Still, when you step outside the everyday and realize the amazing forces at work on our planet, it'll take your breath away.

Well, that's all for now. Back to studying for finals!

Easter and Other Stuff

Alright, I know it's been a while since we've posted a new blog. I'll try to keep it short.

I've been really proud of Mike lately with school. He has been really dedicated and working hard to get good grades. Mike has changed his major. He was struggling with some of his programming classes and not enjoying it as much as he was enjoying his math and physics classes. He spoke to his astronomy teacher who recommended he try nuclear engineering. Mike has been really excited about this idea, and even more excited about the prospect of $150k - $200k a year to start. They'll even provide tuition reimbursement for him to get his Masters and Doctorate. I'm mostly happy that he can finish his degree in nuclear engineering quicker than he can finish in computer engineering. I really miss being home with the kids.

This leads me to my next topic. My job. Shortly after I came out of training, two more classes came through with 22 agents each. Those 44 agents were congratulated, given graduation certificates, and as they were eating their cake, were laid off and sent home. Of course, the rest of us started to panic about the security of our jobs. Center Partners assured us that our jobs were safe, but there were signs all around that Capital One might cancel our contract at any moment. The end result was a cut in hours for the entire product group. Every day I wish more and more that I had signed on with the Sony account. I'm currently looking for another job, but I don't dare quit at Center Partners until I have another job lined up. The economy hasn't hit East Idaho as badly as it has other areas, but jobs are still scarce.

The kids are absolutely adorable! Hyrum is doing so well in school. He can read entire books by himself with only minimal help. We're so proud of him! He'll be ahead of most of the other kids in that area when he starts kindergarten. His speech is still a little behind, but he is making huge progress every day. His teachers want to have him see a child psychologist and have him tested to see if he's border line autistic. We've been wanting to have him tested for a while, but with all the moving we've been doing the past several years, it's been tough. If he is diagnosed, we'll have a lot more resources available to help him with his speech. Of course, we hope nothing is wrong, but it'll just be good to finally know. He continues to excel academically.

Emily is bottled sunshine in convenient travel size! She is such a happy child! Emily is very funny, and she knows it. Although she loves being girly and wearing jewelry, dresses, and carrying purses, you really can't call her ladylike when she'll drop the whole facade to stand on her head or pretend to be an animal or sing a silly song to make us laugh. She is also very smart. She knows most of her letters, several numbers, all her colors, and shapes. She must think that she needs to make up for all that Hyrum doesn't say by jabbering all the time. She speaks very clearly and in full sentences, and even expresses complex ideas. She loves to sing primary songs, and can say prayers all by herself. She thinks she can spell as well as Hyrum. And although she can spell Hyrum and Emily correctly, all other words are spelled "H-I-J-K-O-O-O-O-P!"

Ok, so both my kids love to sing, and they sing very well. But every time I try to get a video of them doing so, they decide to goof off. I love the part where Hyrum gives the camera an exasperated look after Emily's high note solo. He wasn't happy about being upstaged.

I must say that this Easter was the best I've ever had! On Saturday, we took the kids to my work for an egg hunt. Emily was an egg hunting demon! Hyrum was a little too timid to pick up very many when there were so many other kids who wanted them too. I swear, that kid is too gentle for his own good. The kids ended up with quite a haul. They each got a blow up Easter Bunny (which they both love and won't let out of their sight for too long), several pinwheels, finger puppets, bottles of bubbles, foam gliders, stickers, whistles, and of course, too much candy. I think the kids were a little disturbed to find out that the Easter Bunny is actually a red headed chain smoker. (actually, she's a coworker, and a very nice lady.)

After we came home from Center Partners, we dyed and decorated eggs. We had a kit with glitter pens and foam stickers. The kids loved it, even though Hyrum looks so serious in his picture.

Then Mike and I had a babysitter over to watch the kids while we took advantage of a 50% off coupon to a grand opening of a new restaurant in Idaho Falls. The place was called The Hard Hat Cafe. It's supposed to be really great food, but we'll never know. We had a reservation for 7:25, but still had plenty of time to enjoy the construction decor while we waited an hour to be seated. After being seated, we sat. And sat. And sat. Nobody waited on us for about 45 minutes We brought it to the attention of a waiter as he passed by, and he informed the owner. The owner came to our table and apologized and promised us that he would send a server immediately, but that the food would still take 30-45 min to cook. We had already kept our poor babysitter much later than we had intended. We decided to leave and picked up Jack In the Box on the way home.

On Sunday morning, Hyrum woke up first. He waited patiently for nearly an hour for Emily to wake up because he didn't want to go see what the Easter Bunny had brought until he could share the excitement with her. When she finally woke up, it took Hyrum a while to convince her to go to the living room with him to see their baskets. She was probably too young to remember last year, so she's fairly new to this whole Easter thing. However, the moment she came around the couch and saw her new pink and purple tricycle, (exactly what she had asked for. "Mom, I want a PINK bike!") she threw aside her blow up Easter Bunny and ran full speed to check it out!

Hyrum got a new fire station Lego set. Hyrum is a mad genius with Lego! He can build anything! He patiently waited until he was sure it was ok and he had permission to open it. We gave him the go ahead, and he went to work building a fire truck. Then he brought in his old set and introduced his new Lego fireman to his old Lego dock worker. "Oh, hi! Nice to meet you! I have a new truck. Want to come for a ride?" "Sure, that will be fun!" Later, he told me they were friends. (love my kids!)

Before you think we spoil our kids from the size of their Easter stash, it wasn't all from us. They also got new, very cute hoodies and an Under Dog video from my mom. My Grandma Sears gave Hyrum a book and Emily a blanket with zebras, monkeys, and tigers (her favorite animals) on it and gave them both bendable Easter Bunnies and lots of goodies. Mom helped me buy an Easter dress for Emily too. (although I still need to pay her back...)

After church... Oh, that reminds me! Mike and I have new callings. Mike is a ward missionary and I am a Sunbeams teacher. Anyhow, after church, we came home and had an egg hunt in our back yard. Hyrum was much more aggressive at home than he was at Center Partners and beat Emily hands down in the number of eggs found. That night, we had deviled eggs which is the only Eastery thing we had for dinner that night. We had Easter dinner and watched Conference with my mom and Sherwin the week before since they were in Oregon for Easter.

This weekend, we've finally been blessed with some beautiful weather. Mike was able to take the kids out to ride their bikes while he worked on the Toyota. I was sick in bed. *cough cough*

Happy Easter!

So today is Easter. What better time than now to finally update the blog?

But before I get into Easter stuff, I wanted to brag a bit. We had our first parent teacher conference at Hyrum's school this past week. He is doing well, although he still has a ways to go. We met with 3 different teachers since he has a regular teacher, a speech pathologist, and an occupational therapist that work with him in class. They all commented on how much he loves to sing. That's my boy! Wonder where he gets it from? Currently, his favorite song is "A Child's Prayer," which he insists on singing at least 40 times a day.

They also all mentioned how quiet and obedient he is in class. They say that compared to the other kids, he's much quieter and behaved. In fact, his speech pathologist was thrilled to tell us that he actually shoved a kid off of him for getting in his personal space and being obnoxious. While she said that she would prefer him to communicate it another way, she was cheering him on for finally standing up for himself. The other two teachers agreed that they were amazed and encouraged by the act.

Talking with them also answered quite a few mysteries. One day, he came home from school and started pointing out all the things on the ceiling. He'd point to the doorbell, the fire alarms, the lights, anything that was up high that he hadn't noticed before. He was particularly intrigued by the doorbell. When we went to the conference, he started chanting "doorbell" as we neared the school, and we couldn't figure out why. As we entered the front door, he immediately pointed to the fire alarm next to the door. We decided that he must have thought it was the same thing as the box that houses the door chime at our home. Then the teacher told us a story of how they had a fire drill and Hyrum flipped out. She was afraid she was going to have to have him go home early or sit in the nurse's office until school was over because he wouldn't calm down. Now every time he goes to school, he has to check for the fire alarm. Even when we go to stores, he has to check it out and know where all the alarms are. It's a sort of paranoia for him now.

Emily is doing well. She's trying more and more to walk. She loves to stand, but when it comes to moving around, she'll drop back down to her knees and crawl. Oh well. I'm sure it'll come in time. She's also jabbering a lot, and loves to sing with Hyrum. She's getting more teeth, and her hair is starting to get longer and curlier. She sure is a cutie!

Mom came to visit yesterday. Hyrum was thrilled to see her! It took Emily a little while to warm up to her, but a little food helped Mom to make friends with her. We went out to Julie's house. She made us a nice lunch. Afterwards, on the way home, we decided to stop for ice cream. We had seen a shop on the way in that advertised ice cream, so we went back to find it. It turned out to be the shop where Julie works as a chocolate dipper. I think Julie would be happy to know we got to see her workplace. She loves her job there!

After sacrament meeting today, Mike had gone ahead to set up for our primary class. He had left Emily's diaper bag in the coat room, and we needed some toys from it to keep her happy while we taught. So I headed up to the coat room and nearly ran right into a woman coming out. A quick double take, and I realized it was a high school friend of mine and Jacob's! I knew that she was living in Nampa, but hadn't actually been to see her, although we had exchanged a few emails. She has been fighting a rare form of breast cancer, but things are going very well now. Last I had heard, she had a clean bill of health. She was always a very positive, upbeat person. That was something I had always admired about her when we were in school. It seems that hasn't changed one bit. What an inspiration! She's just as cute and cheerful as always! I was sure thrilled to see her!

So, on to Easter stuff! The Easter Bunny crashed last night and didn't wake up again until the kids were awake. So he came to visit after church during nap time. Emily got a stuffed bunny, a bunny bath mitt, bunny shaped soap, socks, and shoes.



Hyrum got a duck bath mitt, duck shaped soap, a duck shaped bath fizzy, a Buzz Lightyear kite, and a bike.



The soaps are entirely too adorable to actually use. Hyrum loved the bath mitt, and played with it like a puppet, making it quack. Nearly all was forgotten at the realization that the bike was his, although candy still reigned supreme. once he finished off his candy bracelet, we couldn't get him off the bike. He drove it in the living room, the kitchen, the bedroom, the hallway.. that's not really saying much though since our apartment is roughly the size of a shoebox. It took some convincing to get him to put it away in the garage. But when we told him he could "park" it next to the car, he thought that was super neat. Sure we may have splurged a little on the bike. But it actually wasn't very expensive at all, and I'm sure he'll get a lot of enjoyment from it. Since Hyrum has this week off for spring break, I think I'll take him to the park to ride his bike and fly his kite. The weather has been so nice lately!





Hyrum also enjoyed hunting eggs again this year. I think he remembered doing it last year, because it only took a little prodding to get him to put down the candy and search for them. Maybe next year Emily will be able to help.





Sadly, Emily wouldn't cooperate for pictures today. I'll try to post some of her later. Sundays are always hard with Emily. It really messes up her schedule. She likes her new shoes a lot, so we'll have to see if she'll let me take pictures of her wearing them.

That's all the news from around here. Yep... exciting, I know. But I DID give you pictures this week, so no complaining!

Oh, and Hyrum just pulled his bike from the garage, insisting he sleep with it in his room tonight...

Easter 2007

It was a quiet but enjoyable Easter at the Haddox home. We had planned to spend Easter with my family this year, but because of money restraints, we had to stay home. Sorry to my 2 grandmas who have not yet met Emily. We'll just have to plan another trip when our financial situation is a little more stable. For now, you'll just have to trust us that she's the most adorable little girl you'll ever meet!

Mike woke up early and made us all pancakes and eggs for breakfast. It was very yummy. After breakfast, we dyed eggs... yeah, I know it's usually supposed to be done the night before, but time got away from us watching movies, and Hyrum was falling asleep in his seat, so it had to wait. Here is a line-up of some of the eggs.

This one is an authentic Hyrum original! Note the bold crayon strokes and strong lines that represent man's struggle to find higher meaning in life... or something like that.

This egg was inspired by Hyrum's new hobby of running around the house finding and pointing out stars and circles. (Saars and Kirkles)

This was on the back of the "I Love Emily" egg.


This was the back side of the yellow "Egg head" egg shown on the bottom right of the line-up.


The main purpose of this egg was just to give Hyrum something to meow at. It matches the cats on the quilt I made him when he was a baby. He still sleeps with his quilt even though it no longer fits his regular sized bed.



I figured my favorite egg deserved two shots. This is a creation of Mike's and features a car on the front and a tow truck on the back. The top half is dyed blue for the sky, and the bottom, green for the grass. It also has clouds and a sun that didn't show up well in these pictures.

After egg coloring, Hyrum got to dig into his Easter basket. If there wasn't enough sticky, sugary goodness in the syrup from the pancakes, he got even more of it from the malted milk ball eggs and chocolate bunny. He also got a game of Memory. We played a few games with him with the cards facing up. We started with only a few different pairs and tried building up to more with each round. He's starting to catch on to the game, and maybe soon, he'll be able to play with the cards face down. I sure would have loved to get Emily something, but money didn't permit this year. Honestly, she's too young to know the difference anyhow! Next year we'll make it up to her.

Because we had to dye the eggs in the morning, the egg hunt had to wait until evening. We had wanted to hide eggs outside, but it was on again/off again rainy outside. Even when it was sunny, the ground was still soggy, so we had to hide the eggs in the living room. Mike tried to keep Hyrum distracted while I hid them. It was a tough task since Hyrum remembered hunting eggs from last year and wanted to get right to it. He rounded up those eggs pretty quickly and thoroughly enjoyed himself!


Sadly, all our nicely decorated eggs met a swift end. Only moments after the egg hunt, Hyrum helped me turn them into deviled eggs to go with the turkey roast I was making for dinner. He loves to watch me and Mike cook and always wants to lend a hand. I was afraid he'd make a mess of things, but as it turned out, he watched us very closely and did a really excellent job of cracking and shelling the eggs all on his own. He was very careful and didn't dig one single pit.

Bedtime was... well... difficult. Apparently, all that sugar makes kids hyper. Who knew?

Each year, I look forward more to the next. Holidays are more and more fun the older Hyrum gets and the more he understands and remembers. Soon, Emily will be able to enjoy the fun too. I can hardly wait!