May-to-date!

It has been a bit of an eventful May so far...and we're only half way through! The first week was not so busy, but this last week has been a little crazy, but all good things.

Mother's Day

Dylan's sweet teacher, Mrs. Sears, held a Mother's tea for us moms on Friday. It was so fun to be there with my handsome Dylan. Then on Saturday, Danny and the kids gave me the day off. It was nice to spend some time all by my lonesome...however, I have reconfirmed that I really hate shopping. I wished I had just spent the day reading or something more relaxing. I definitely need to hire out all shopping trips! I think I'd rather clean my house than shop...now that's saying something! Sorry...back to celebrations. Danny really outdid himself this year. He's not much of a cook (or wasn't) but he wanted to make something special for me. I have to hand it to him...he made delicious spinach and sun-dried tomato stuffed pork chops, a yummy strawberry avocado salad with honey vinaigrette and rice. I saw the pork chop recipe and thought that it was pretty ambitious for an amateur, but it turned out really good. He and his sous chefs (Jesse and Grace) pulled it off and it was great to have a yummy dinner that I didn't have to make! I was spoiled and it was fun!

On Tuesday, we had a special opportunity to go see the Angel Moroni get placed atop the new Gilbert Temple.

It has been so fun to live so close (about 5 miles) to a temple being built. We have watched it's progress for the past year. But it was so wonderful to be there for this part. I pulled the kids out of school a little early and we went and sat across the street from the temple in 105 degree weather. We were hot, but it was so worth it. I'm so grateful that my kids have that memory. They'll always have a special feeling toward "their" temple! How blessed we are to have temples and to have a beautiful one so close!

And finally, tonight was Danny's 38th birthday. We are now the same age for a month!

We celebrated with some pie and a few "practical" gifts (his favorite kind!) We sure love that daddy of ours and hope that he had a good birthday!

Tomorrow, Jesse has a State fair at school presenting his project on National Historic sites of AZ, then all the boys are heading out to the father/son camp out, Grace has a birthday party to go to, then we get to hang out...just us girls. Ad then it's on to our last week of school and all the craziness that comes with it (kinder graduation, academic lunches and so on!) Bring it on...I'm ready!

One Whole Year!

Ok so, technically, she is nearly 14 months old, but I never posted her 1 year pictures and stats...so here goes!

Our beautiful little Milly is ONE!

 

Isn't she pretty? As pretty as she is, she is also such a sweet, happy girl and we just love, love, love her. She is just so much fun and brings our family such JOY!

One year stats

20lbs 13oz (70%)

29" (40%)

head 18cm (60%)

At one, she had 4 teeth, was crawling everywhere and always getting filthy because she loves to be outside! Since her birthday (3/22), in the past few days, she has started getting up and walking a bit. Today she took 20+ steps. It's so fun to see all the kids get excited about her accomplishments. It looks like she will be walking steadily very soon. This makes her my 2nd earliest walker (Dyl was walking at 13mos.) She's also my 2nd biggest baby at a year behind Dylan as well. 

This year has flown by and I am just enjoying all of Milly's milestones and watching her grow. We have so much fun with our almost toddler! As always, we are so grateful for her!

A quick little catch up!

I really should do an individual post for each one of these, but I don't have the time or energy to do that. So here is a quick catch up to bring this up to date and then a renewed commitment to keep it that way!

First off, we headed for the hills over Spring Break and went for a camping trip at Santa Catalina State Park down it Tucson. We planned on spending 2 nights, but it was too cold at night and too hot during the day with not much to do around the campsite and not enough shade. So we wimped out and went home after one night and a hike in the mountains. It was beautiful, nonetheless and we had a good time!

 

Next up was Milly's first birthday...where did that year go? We celebrated with a little cake and the traditional "let her eat her own cupcake and see how messy she gets!"

The end of March brought Jesse's very last Pinewood Derby. His car was awesome and even though he didn't place. he looked cool doing it!

April started with Easter, of course. The Friday before, we hosted a fun Easter Egg Hunt and Spring Eggstravaganza! I was too busy organizing the hunt, egg toss and water games so I wasn't able to fit photographer into the fray, so unfortunately, there are no pictures. But it was a lot of fun and just may be a new annual event!
Saturday morning brought buckets of treats from the ol' Easter Bunny!

And Sunday brought the obligatory Easter outfits and rushed photo shoot...it's not great, but it was the best we could do in less than 5 minutes and without Mom completely losing her temper! (Just telling it like it is!) They looked really cute anyway!

Finally, we had a visit from Uncle Steve and Aunt Kirsten plus Suzie, Eli and Wesley. It was fun to have them hang out with us, although we missed the rest of the crew. Here are some pics from a trip to the zoo.

 A couple of other significant events are worth noting. We said "goodbye" to our old, faithful Ford Windstar with 160,000+ miles on it and said "hello" to our "new" 2008 silver Honda Odyssey with 46,000 miles. We love it!

Also, we made an offer on a short sale and hopefully we will be able to call this place home soon! Keeping our fingers crossed!

And there you have it!

11 Months

Milly is a girl on the move. She is enjoying her increased independence and abilities. She especially loves taking off when I get her diaper off...me, not so much! She sure is cute, though!

I didn't do a post for 10 months, so I'll have to do a little catch up. She has been quite busy these past two months. She has become very adept at crawling and prefers it to being carried. Which means she is always a mess. She especially loves crawling around outside. With winter this year being mostly in the 70's, she's had lots of opportunities to be outside. She also loves eating rocks, leaves, sand and sticks...I can't wait for her to get past that stage!
She has started pulling herself up and cruising along the furniture and she just discovered the thrill of walking while holding on to our fingers.
She got her top two teeth and enjoys using them, much to our dismay. I'm hoping she doesn't go through a bad biting stage like Jesse did...that was awful! She is also an expert pincher, again, a skill we'd happily do without!
Milly is still a happy, sweet little girl. And we love her the mostest!

Isn't she pretty? (I might be a little biased!) Don't mind James, he had to get in on the photo shoot, too. I think he's pretty handsome as well.

February Stuff

A random photo shoot at McDonalds. "Take a picture, Mom!"

 

 Jesse took a spill on his scooter and we ended up in the urgent care. Luckily his wrist wasn't broken, just a sprain. He was a little disappointed that he didn't get a cast, but he did get a cool splint and a sling. I think the coolness of a cast would've worn off quickly. He's doing just fine now and is not even wearing the splint anymore. Thank goodness! Here's a picture of him waiting at the urgent care.

We took advantage of the 75 degree weather and headed out for a little hike in the San Tan Mtns. Beautiful day and beautiful scenery. The also had a little demonstration on panning for gold and the kids got to try their hands. They each ended up with several nuggets of "San Tan gold" (gold-painted rocks!) That was much more fun than trying for the real gold flakes! It was a fun way to spend half the day.

 

A Valentine's dinner for all my little (and 1 big) Valentines. Heart-shaped pizza, red jello, chocolate-dipped strawberries, sparkling cider, balloons and candlelight were all on the menu. The kids loved the "fancy" dinner. I love my cute, funny Valentines!

10 and 3

The end of January brings a couple of birthdays to the Thatcher Clan, which culminates in a few days worth of celebrations. This year was no different.
Jesse turned the big 1-0! I cannot believe that I have a kid in double digits...I guess it's all down hill from here! Soon we will be spiraling headlong into the teen years. Heaven help us!

For his birthday he wanted waffles for dinner and we opened his presents. He also was "turned" 10 by his dad.

James turned in his "Terrible 2's" for the "Thrilling 3's"...one can hope anyway!

To celebrate both birthdays, we went to an indoor playground called Makutu's Island...always good for a fun time.

And we finished off the weekend with cake and presents for James. Jesse requested a "desert island" cake and James was just along for the ride. I think this may be the last year that I can get away with just one cake between the two of them, I'm sure James will have his own opinion by next year!

And just so I can toot my own horn a bit, here's a close up of the cake, I think it turned out pretty cute!

Don't mind the messy desk in the background!

I love my two sweet birthday boys...life just wouldn't be as much fun without them!

My Good Citizen

Grace earned a Character Counts: Citizenship Award at her school. Grace is always so kind and helpful to her teacher and classmates. We are so proud of our good citizen!