Year In Review

Answering these questions each year is a great way to keep track of your life a year at a time.

What did you do in 2008 that you'd never done before? Gave birth to a baby girl (surprisingly enough, it's not much different than giving birth to a baby boy).

Did you keep your new years' resolutions, and will you make more for next year? I don't think I made any except for the "want to be skinnier" wishful thinking. Probably won't make any resolutions this year either.

Did anyone close to you give birth? Oh my, yes! Julie had a girl, Diana had a girl, Amy had a girl, Cynthia P. had a boy, Patti had a girl, Allison had a girl, Whitney had a boy, Ilenia had a boy, Cindy had a girl, shoot - who am I missing?

Did anyone close to you die? Clint's three remaining grandparents all died this year within 5 months of each other.

What would you like to have in 2009 that you lacked in 2008? More patience. More energy. More fun.

What date from 2008 will remain etched upon your memory, and why? December 5, 2008 - the day Allison was born.

What was your biggest achievement of the year? Surviving.

What was your biggest failure? Letting my temper get the better of me more times than I care to admit.

What was the best thing you bought? Um...we finally bought an MP3 player.

Whose behavior merited celebration? Hayden's behavior improved dramatically when we removed artificial color from his diet. That was definitely worth celebrating.

Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed? Hayden's, before altering his diet. He was having multiple tantrums and meltdowns every day that would leave us both in tears.

Where did most of your money go? Just the day to day stuff - nothing big.

What did you get really, really, really excited about? All the new baby girls in our family.

What song will always remind you of 2008? *Twinkle, twinkle, hippopotamus. How I love your big, gray bottomus.* Oh, do you mean a song on the radio? I have no idea! I'm so out of touch with current music.

What do you wish you'd done more of? Go to the Temple.

What do you wish you'd done less of? Being frustrated with the kids.

How did you spend Christmas? At home with my family. We learned pretty quickly that it's too much hassle to travel for Christmas.

What was your favorite TV program? We discovered The Office this year and watched all the previous seasons before the current season started. Hilarious!

What was the best book you read this year? To Kill A Mockingbird.

What did you want and get? A swing set for the backyard.

What was your favorite film of this year? I don't think I saw a single movie in the theater. That's right, I'm the only female in this country who has yet to see Twilight!

What did you do on your birthday? Is it bad that I can't remember and it was only last month?

How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2008? Stretchy pants and tent shirts - otherwise known as maternity clothes.

What kept you sane? Getting together with my friends at Book Club once a month.

Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most? I don't get too excited about celebrities.

Who did you miss? Everyone who doesn't live in my vicinity.

Who was the best new person you met? My new sister-in-law, Courtney.

Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2008? That time is going by way too quickly and I need to do a better job of living in the moment.

I am excited for a great 2009!

Feel free to tag yourself and answer these questions if you feel so inclined.

Three Weeks Old

Here is our little angel in her Christmas dress. She had a lacy headband on at one point, but it kept slipping down over her eyes. She's still such a little squirt...her tights came up to her armpits and her shoes were the smallest ones we have and they kept falling off.

And here she is earlier in the day getting a little tummy time.

Merry Christmas (better late than never)

After weeks of searching, debating, deciding, spending, wrapping, and finally opening...Christmas is now over. And after all that work I think their favorite gifts were the 88 cent whoopi cushions we got from the cheap section of toys at Walmart. Makes me wonder why I even bother. :-)

Merry Christmas from the Kobers!!

More Haydenisms

We had some Whoppers malted milk balls amongst all of our holiday candy and Hayden let us know that Whoppers are good for you because they clean your teeth. *ha*ha*ha* The other night he said he needed to eat some because his teeth were dirty. So we let him eat some and then sent him to the bathroom to brush his teeth.

And tonight we went to Uncle David's night-before-the-wedding "rehearsal" (don't know what we were rehearsing) dinner. After they had eaten, all of the kids and a few of the dads went into the cultural hall to play basketball. Hayden was in there with them and having a good time. But when more of the grown-ups joined in the game, he came to the sidelines and said, "This is a hard level! There are too many grown-ups playing." Hard level?!? If that's not proof that he plays too many video games, I don't know what is.

Christmas Gingerbread Houses

We went to Clint's sister's house last night to decorate gingerbread houses. Well, actually they were made out of graham crackers, but they were just as fun to decorate.
Jared did more eating than decorating, but he did manage to get a few things on his house.
The boys graciously gave the parents plenty of time to decorate their own houses and quickly found another holiday activity to keep them occupied. I think they are a bit addicted to video games.Wonder where they get that from?
And since she's another week older, here are some more pictures of Princess Al (as Clint calls her). Here she is with her cousin Daphne, who is exactly 3 months older.

We had a onesie on her earlier that had bright pink letters that read "I Am Not A Boy!" on the front. Kyle said she's needs that shirt because she looks like a boy. Okay, I'll admit she could use a little more hair, but I think she's pretty enough to pass for a girl. She was only awake for a little while and then spent the rest of evening like this. She's such a great sleeper, thank heavens!

Haydenism

Hayden just cracks me up. He is the funniest kid ever, and the funniest part is that he isn't trying to be funny.

The other day I was playing a game on Yahoo called Dynomite. He was pronouncing it DyMONite. I tried correcting him and he said, "I know Mom. I'm saying it in Spanish." He thinks that just because he once watched all of "Cars" in Spanish, he's now fluent in the language.

She's One Week Old

I finally figured out the problem with my camera. Here are a few more pictures of Allison. We're thinking she's going to have red hair afterall. It looked blond at first, but (depending on the light) it's looking more red now.

Jared LOVES his baby sister. Maybe a little too much. He tries to pick her up all the time. "I hold it?" He loves to give her kisses, especially when she's sleeping. He even crawled on top of her in her car seat to give her a kiss. And he always has to give me updates on how she's doing. "Baby's sleeping!" "Baby's still sleeping!" "Baby's awake!" "Baby happened!" - that one means she's crying. It's really sweet and hopefully they'll stay close like that as they grow up.

Technical Difficulties

I know she's more than a week old and I haven't posted any new pictures yet, but I'm experiencing technical difficulties with my camera and can't get the pics uploaded to my computer. Please stand by.

Family Wordle

That was fun. You can make your own at Wordle.net.

She's Finally Here!!!

Wednesday Way Back

Lest you think "no news is good news" I suppose I should check in and report that we're still waiting for this little one to make her grand entrance. Four days over due and counting...

In the meantime, here's a fun Wednesday Way Back Machine photo. I like to call it "Life is Just a Bowl Full of Jared."

Still here....Still pregnant.

Okay, I was only kidding when I said she needed to wait until next week, but apparently she took me seriously. I'm now officially 10 months pregnant and still no sign of her coming any time soon. She can't come today because I still have two more Christmas presents to buy, so that's what I'm going to do this morning. This afternoon we are going to put up the Christmas decorations. Normally I'd wait until we get into December, but Clint and the boys are so excited to get everything out, and who knows when we'll get the chance later, so we might as well do it today. And she can't come tomorrow because most of our Bishopric is out of town, so Clint has to sit on the stand (which leaves me with all three boys by myself - yikes). So it looks as though we may get a December baby after all.

Just Checkin' In

Nothing new to report. I'm still here and still huge. But I found out my OB is going to be "unavailable" all week because of a family emergency, which means this baby girl and I have to try to hold out until next week unless we want a stranger to catch her. Bummer.

The Wednesday Way-Back Machine

*Occasionally on Wednesdays (when I have nothing better to write about) I'll post some older pictures that are saved on our computer that would never get seen otherwise.

I think I'm having Disneyland withdrawals. It's been 617 days since we were there last. Our original plan was to go last month during Fall Break, but being "with child" put a hold on those plans. So the next best thing is looking at pictures from trips past. Here are some of my favorites:

Another Baby (Non)Update

I had my 38 week appointment today and they finally decided to check me. She said I'm "almost 1 cm dilated." No big surprise or disappointment there. I never dilated with my others until I was in active labor. The baby has also un-dropped herself. She was really low last week, but she's up high again this week. I think I'm just going to resign myself to thinking she's not coming until December. Then if she comes by her due date, it will feel like she's early.

Still no name picked out.

What Could Be Worse?

Q: What's worse than being 9 months pregnant and having to take care of three whiny boys?

A: Being 9 months pregnant and having to take care of three whiny boys who have the stomach flu.

TGIF!

Oh, but wait, it get's even better. How about being 9 months pregnant and having to take care of three whiny boys who have the stomach flu and the youngest removes his diaper and poops on the carpet in the entry way. Oi! What next?

Baby Update

There's actually not much to update about. I'm 37 weeks now, but the Dr. still hasn't checked me so I have no idea if I'm dilating or not. I'm occasionally having some pretty intense contractions, so hopefully something productive is going on. She is head-down and has dropped according to the Dr. That would explain why it feels like there's a bowling ball resting on my bladder. I've got my hospital bag packed (mostly) and her 'coming home' outfit arrived today (I ordered it online - it's really cute!) so we're ready to roll once she decides it's time.

Election Day

I can't believe I forgot to post about this. On Monday Kyle's first grade class held mock presidential elections. I'm not sure what the exact process was, or how much discussion the class had about the candidates, but after school Kyle told me he got to vote for the new president.

"Who did you vote for?"

"I can't remember what his name was."

"Was it McCain?"

"No, that's not it. The other guy."

"Obama?"

"Yeah, that's the one!"

I tried to keep my composure while I asked nicely, "Why did you vote for him?"

"He has a cool name...And I liked his big chin."

I couldn't stop myself from giggling at that.

"Well, that makes about as much sense as anyone else's reasons for voting for him."

Sixth File, Sixth Picture

I got tagged. Here's the sixth picture from the sixth file on my computer. It was taken last Easter after an egg hunt at the park near our home. This was taken about 30 seconds after the hunt ended and you can see that Hayden's face is already covered in chocolate. I love that kid!

She Blew It!

A momentous occasion transpired in our family yesterday. Kyle lost his first tooth! It's been loose for about a week, but he was really nervous about it falling out and refused to try to help it along. But yesterday morning Jared got mad at Kyle about something and hit him in the face and ended up knocking his tooth out. It's about time!! Uh, I mean, "No Jared, we don't hit!" Kyle was so excited to put his tooth under his pillow last night and see what the Tooth Fairy would leave for him. He made sure it was placed just right so she would be able to find it and then he went to sleep.
This morning as I was in the shower I heard Kyle yelling from outside the bathroom door, "Mom, the Tooth Fairy didn't leave me anything!!" Oh no! I pretended like I couldn't hear him and yelled back that I'd talk to him when I got out. I couldn't believe that we forgot to leave him something! It was all he could talk about the night before, but we were so exhausted after getting them all to bed that we completely forgot about it. I quickly looked around my room for some money. All I could find was a $5 bill in my jewelry box. Knowing the Tooth Fairy wouldn't be able to keep up with that kind of generosity, I had to sneak out to the hall and grab my purse. But all I found in my wallet was a $20, another $5 and some pennies. Shoot! Then I remembered that I had a Sacagawea dollar in one of the pockets in my purse (it had been there for years) and decided that it would have to do. I wrote a message on a post-it note, stuck it to the dollar coin and then snuck out into the hallway. The coast was clear so I dashed to Kyle's room and dropped the treasure next to his bed and then ran back out. He came down the hall and sadly told me that the Tooth Fairy didn't leave him anything. I told him to go check again and he showed me that there wasn't anything under his pillow except for his tooth. "Maybe it fell off your bed. Did you look around the floor?" He immediately started looking around and discovered the loot in between his bed and the crib. "Oooohh! What did you get?" I asked. "I don't know. It looks like a big penny." He looked so disappointed. Until I had him read the words "One Dollar" on the back. That cheered him up. Phew...crisis averted. But that Tooth Fairy had better get her act together.