She is 5!!!

JayLee turned 5. I was looking through pictures on the computer and decided she needs a post all to herself. CAUTION: There is a picture overload in this post!!

She was a colicky, ornery baby. It may have just been that we didn't have a clue what we were doing but JayLee was rough. I used to dread every night at about 7:00 because I knew she would cry and cry and cry. She didn't want to eat and who knew when she would sleep. Nevertheless we all survived.

And we love this little girl!! When she got over the colic it was like having a different baby. Very social. Smiling at everyone. I remember one morning we woke up to her laughing in her crib, cutest thing ever! She loved her binky. She was and still is afraid of men (hope that lasts another 20 years). She was also terrified of the vacuum but she still doesn't really like anything that is too loud.

She is one beautiful and crazy, funny girl!!

She LOVES

Babies
Horses
Cameras
Aunts, Uncles, Grandmas, and cousins (in no particular order)

I cannot count how many times she fell asleep on that rocking horse. It was a lot.

I have to beg her to wear anything but cowboy boots. stillThis is a picture of my Dad and JayLee when she was almost 2. Just a couple of weeks before he passed away.

She loves to be outside, swim, sleigh ride, swing, ride bikes, RIDE HORSES or just play with friends.
She rides her stick horse ALOT!! inside or outside, it doesn't matter. We have had to lay down the law about riding in my bedroom since she busted my full length mirror.JayLee has NEVER been afraid of horses. She has wanted to lead them since she could walk. There has been many fights over who gets to hold the leadrope.

She loves to sing and dance. She memorizes songs super fast. We really only listen to the radio in the car but that is all it takes. She LOVES Taylor Swift and Cowboy songs (Chris Ledoux). About once a week she has some ballet dance she has made up to show her dad. She is creative and smart.

She is so fun and we are so proud of who she is.
She is 5 and she is ready for Kindergarten.......except she failed her vision screening so next time you see her she may be wearing glasses.

Ioka Lane

The only thing I don't like about living where we do is the long, cold winter. This winter wasn't so bad because my friend and I got our kids together to play and the two of us pulled out some power tools. We have been talking about doing this for a while and I know some of you don't care about the crafty stuff I do, so you won't have to hear about it here anymore. For those of you who do care, we started a blog. go to http://iokalane.blogspot.com/ to see what we've been up to. Here is a sneak peak though....

JayLee's dance recital

Jay's dance recital was this Friday. Here is a video of Jay's class. Her class is 3-5 years old so she is one of the oldest in the class. When she stops she is trying to get one of the younger girls that ran off the stage to come back out. I was really proud of her for stopping to help, she is a really neat girl. It was fun to see her watch out for someone else when she could have been nervous herself.

She had a blast and she was really excited to wear makeup. Let me just tell you that her eyelashes are AMAZING!! They are so long! I was so jealous while I was putting mascara on her. She is one lucky girl. Sorry about me moving so much while taking the video. Olin was on my lap and kept moving back and forth. I finally had to put him on the ground but he was so excited to see JayLee.

This is part of her class. She is pretty good friends with the 2 girls in the yellow and the littlest girl in the purple is the girl she tried to get to come back out on stage. She is definitely sad that dance is over for the year.

As I was talking to her teacher, she told me that she was really excited for when she starts teaching them to turn out because JayLee is so naturally turned out. I just laughed but it puts a whole new perspective on being bowlegged.

Hannah's visit

Not much has been going on here lately. Lottie is growing up fast though. She is a really fun baby. She has a 4 month check up tomorrow so Ill let you know how big she is then. This picture is just when I was changing her into her pjs. She is almost always smiling and you can get her to laugh quite a bit now too.

JayLee's dance class went to a nursing home a couple of weeks ago to perform. Of course my camera died after one picture but atleast I got one right? Her dance recital is coming up and she is pretty excited about it.

My sister Hannah came to visit yesterday along with her 2 kids Liam and Kahlen. Hannah came out to get some pictures taken. (My friend Nichole is AWESOME. Check her out on Facebook or her website and then come and visit me to have her do your pictures....she is AMAZING!!!) Hannah left for a couple of hours to get her hair done and then get the pictures. She was worried about leaving me with 5 kids under the age of 5......rude huh? I even got them all in one place for a picture. OK honestly, it was really cold outside (too cold and windy for Trent to work outside) and Trent helped...ALOT. And Lottie and Kahlen and Liam slept for most of the time. But you have to give me props for getting them all to sleep and the picure.

Her is cute little Kahlen. She is so fun and her little brother Liam LOVES her.

Of course there had to be a little disagreement between the 2 boys. It all started with me using Olin's precious beloved John Deere blanket (click here, here, or here if you need to be reminded) I was feeding Lottie and that was the closest one. Liam saw it and thought it was pretty cool and wanted that blanket so he grabbed it and laid down on the floor.

What? you don't see the green blanket..... Enter, Olin. Yep, he took it and he thought it was really funny. If you don't know Olin, he is a tease and he likes to wrestle so Olin saw this as the perfect opportunity.So Liam eventually caught Olin and they wrestled for a bit. Then Olin being a year older (but not much bigger) than Liam got the blanket back and said triumphantly, "I'm stronger than him." It was all in good fun and Liam, being a pretty big tease too, just laughed when it was all over. It was fun to have Hannah come and my kids thought it was pretty cool too. Thanks for coming out Hannah. We love you!!

JayLee and Kash

JayLee has grown up so much in the last year. It's crazy to think that just a year ago she couldn't reach the stirrups on her saddle and now we had to lower the stirrups. Lowering the stirrups is something that didn't happen much for me, she doesn't know how lucky she is. It has warmed up here so we've been riding more. Here is a video of Jay riding Kash in the pasture. She LOVES to lope on him. We're still working on steering but luckily Kash takes care of her.

Inside Out and Backwards

If you've met Olin, you might think he is a sweet sweet boy. He looks at you with his blue eyes and smiles and he has you wrapped around his finger. He is funny and cute and he is the first one of my kids to break a window. Yep, that would be Olin. How? you might ask,

Well most kids might accidentally break windows by throwing a baseball from the outside of the house in. Right? Not Olin. He threw a baseball bat inside and almost out.

After he did it, he was so surprised that the glass would actually break. He just stared at it until we came and sent him to timeout. Were just glad it happened now and not 2 months ago when the temperature was well below zero.

Another Baby Blessing and Warm Weather

I stole this picture from my sister in-law Alese. Last Sunday we went to Levan for Otto's blessing. Alese had a lunch at the firehouse after church and Michele once again (with groans from men in the family) pulled everyone together for a family picture. Way to go Michele, I love it!!

Were so excited for Alese and Ryan but I think Olin is the happiest. He can't wait for Otto to get big and rope with him. Notice Otto's blanket in the family picture. Alese bought one for Olin and gave it to him for his 1st birthday (it is his favorite blanket) seen here, here, and here. She also had the forsight to buy one for her future child but Olin can't quite wrap his brain around it. Everytime were together he tries to claim that for his own. But can you blame him, it really is a cool blanket.

This Saturday it was FINALLY warm enough to take all the kids outside to ride horses. Lottie was so cute. She was only out for about an hour but her eyes were wide open the whole time and her little mouth formed into an "o" shape, she was pretty fascinated with the new world she discovered.

And just in case you know Rio, this was him snooping Lottie and my camera out.

Before we say anything about riding horses to the kids (mostly JayLee) Trent and I do a lot of whispering. If we say, "maybe we should ride horses today," very loud or loud enough for JayLee to hear we never live it down. She wants to go out right that second and ride her horse. And if we tell her, "yeah Jay, we'll go out in a while" she can't really contain herself. She just says over and over, "Is it time yet? Can we go catch Kash now? When are we going to go...." You get the idea. She is definitely horse crazy.

Olin isn't quite as horse crazy as JayLee is. Don't get me wrong, he loves them but isn't quite as comfortable on them. He would rather ride with someone. It was kind of like pulling teeth to get him on alone. He rode with me for a while even though he loves his Dad's horse "Hazel Girl"

Trent took Hazel into the pasture and trotted some circles for a while and Jay, Olin, Lottie and I stayed in the trees by the house. I took this picture when he was coming back and thought it was pretty cool. Zak likes to stay pretty close to whoever goes in the field riding.When Lottie fell asleep, I got a turn to ride. JayLee and I went and rode in the pasture for a bit. She is getting pretty good at making Kash do what she wants. Last year she got really frustrated with him when he would go back to the tack shed and would just yell for someone to help her. On Saturday she didn't let him get away with much though. I was really proud of her.