sweet sixteen weekend

two fridays ago, on the fourteenth, 

this little baby girl...

and this little one year old girl...

and this little two year old girl...

and this little four year old girl...

and this little five year old girl...

turned into a big sixteen year old girl!

really?

yes really.

i know.

i can't believe it either.

but it happened.

because fridays are so crazy around this place, and no one in the family, including the birthday girl herself, would be able to attend our traditional birthday family dinner, she opted for a saturday morning french toast kind of party with everyone in attendance.

(it's not fair that she is so cute, even in the morning without getting ready.)

most of her presents started with the words "justin bieber", as in: justin bieber perfume (it actually smells surprisingly lovely), justin bieber posters - which we will post later after we've found room on her walls for them, and maybe her favorite present of the day...

 a justin bieber tshirt!

in case it's not already clear, allie is a huge j.b. fan. HUGE.
and while sixteen may not be the average age of a girl with bieber fever (more like 12), that doesn't bother her in the slightest. she's loved him from the beginning and doesn't care that it isn't a super popular way to be in high school. i love this about her, she is not a fair weather fan. everyone knows of her love for j.b., even ethan knew a card with justin bieber on it would be a hit, all without any help or prompting from me.

 (justin on the front wearing purple, his trade mark color, and allie in yellow with pink hair. 

i can translate ethan writing, it says: justin loves you allie. i love you too. ethan)

needless to say, i think this card was her second favorite present!

later on saturday her big birthday plans were to go get a pedicure with her BFF, lauren, but when we went to pick her up, there was something in the backyard that lauren was dying to show her....

SURPRISE!

lauren, with a little help from her cute parents, threw a fantastic sweet sixteen party for allie that she never saw coming! it's possible i'll go straight to hell for all the lies i had to tell her over the last few weeks and especially on saturday, but they worked because she never had a clue about any of the preparations and was genuinely surprised to see so many friends in lauren's back yard. it was awesome.

the girls ate and played games and roasted smores by the fire pit, ate cupcakes, laughed their heads off and then snuggled up in blankets to watch a movie outside in the backyard. allie was so touched, she's pretty much been smiling for the the last two weeks over it.


it was a great thing for her to feel so loved and so special on her big day! 


my thoughts on having a sixteen year daughter are complicated. i admire her strength and her love of others and her strong testimony of our Savior's love. i worry about falling short on being the mother she needs - its often hard to balance when to push and when to step back and let her figure it out. some times i feel like i can't keep up with the hormones and drama of being sixteen! but more often than that i feel so proud of all the good things that she's choosing for herself and excited for her future that looks so bright. 


love. this. girl.

happy happy birthday allie !

 sixteen is going to rock.

(p.s. allie, i did this whole post in purple in honor of your beloved j.b.)

hard but good

our house has been kind of quiet the last few days.
wednesday, the teenagers left to go with our old stake on pioneer trek.
it's been so strange not having all three of them home at the same time.
ethan and i have tried to stay busy to fill the void.
until today, when i drove to wyoming to cheer and hug and welcome home three really dirty, stinky, pooped-out, smelly, grubby, sunburned, (did i mention smelly?) pioneers, er, i mean teenagers.

we got to welcome the wagon companies in as they came over the hill.

i don't think i've ever cheered so loud, taylor said he knew i was there before he saw me, because he heard me hollering. heehee.
just thinking about how neat it was to cheer them in gives me goosebumps.
it was awesome.
the kids were so excited to see their parents that they started running full speed with their wagons to get to the finish line. do you see spencer?

they were so dirty and sunburned that at first, i didn't recognize any of them.
and they smelled so bad that after i hugged them, i had to change MY shirt too because the stink had spread to my clothes too.
seriously.
eeew.

so they survived, and they say, it was hard, but also great.
here's the proof...

(allie was less than thrilled that i wanted to photograph her "ugly moment" - her words.)

right now, they're doing rock paper scissors over who gets the shower first, so i guess i'll have to wait to hear all the inspirational stories until later.
and right now, i am very grateful, for leaders who loved and cared for my kids so exceptionally while they were gone.

the moore kids can do hard things!
oh ya.

p.s. spencer says that they've been on such a spiritual high for the last few days that he would like to take the next couple weeks off of church. nice try dude.

perfection or nothing

this girl...

is lovely

caring

delightful

bubbly

beautiful

friendly

talented

curious

hard working

SMART

did i mention lovely?

and i adore her

but she is also

a perfectionist

which can be kind of rough

because she has a very full schedule

there's just not enough TIME during the week

to devote to cleaning her room the way she wants it to be clean

on saturdays when she does clean it, it can take HOURS - for real.

because every little thing has to be organized and reorganized to death

during the week, there's no time for such details

which means she doesn't clean it at all

so usually looks something like this...

sort of a "perfection or nothing" approach

saturdays are perfection,

weekdays are nothing

and when i said being a perfectionist can be kind of rough -

i meant rough on ME

because in this house, her room is what i see across the hall

every time i leave my room

and it makes me completely insane to see this mess

all

the

time.

but really, i've mostly tried to make peace with it

because if that's the worst thing, i'll take it

so i try not to nag her too much about the room

i said try

because i know it's just not that important in the grand scheme of things

and she's so lovely, i'll take her perfectionist or nothing room

especially over, you know, piercings and drugs and worse.

with that said,

a few weeks ago, i learned something new about my girl...

this girl

this darling, beautiful, lovely, talented, perfectionist with a messy room....

will do

ANYTHING

including cleaning her room in the middle of the week

WITHOUT BEING ASKED

for a chance...

to drive

and if you think i'm not taking advantage of this, you're wrong.

three things

lately ethan says, "mom, three things", holding up three fingers and then proceeds to tell me four to five random things. it usually goes something like: "one. why do we have green bananas?" "two. can i play playhouse disney on the computer?" " three. where are my mittens?" "and four. can i have gum?"

there is never the same amount of questions or tidbits as he originally tells me there's going to be, they are listed one right after the other without letting me answer them one at a time, and there is always a varried sampling of information.

his lists of random things always makes me giggle. i usually answer him back the same way.

so today i'm posting "three" random things, ethan style.

one. saturday ethan took the best bubble bath in the history of bubble baths. we poured the normal amount of bubbles in but this time we turned on the jets which made the bubbles go crazy. he was pretty excited when the level of bubbles kept rising and rising. when taylor and spencer saw what he was up to, they were super jealous and vowed to take a bubble bath like this one soon.

two. i don't know what came over me during the hair styling routine this morning. but today, i curled a throw back to the late seventies with a little bit of feathering and everything. i loved it and felt a little connection with farrah all day long. just kidding, but i did like it.

three. i think taylor is super handsome. i'm always surprised when i see him walk in the door from school. he is so grown up! tall and handsome and kind. i love this guy.

four. teenagers like texting. our phone bill is pages and pages long. luckily our fee is just a flat rate for our whole family (that the teenagers help pay each month). at first i wasn't sure how i felt about texting, especially since the number of texts per month are in like the 4,000 range (for real) PER KID,  but now i've decided that it's no different than all the hours i spent tying up my family's phone line when i was a teenager. plus, i LOVE being able to get ahold of them during the day. scenes like this make me laugh. what i should've done was zoom out to show that they're in the middle of people talking all around them, but also in their own little world.

tall enough to be a man

i have a big christmas catch-up post coming soon.

but before that, there are more important things to blog (and brag) about...

like wishing a happy 14th birthday to this handsome boy,

i mean, man, i mean, young man.

i get a little weepy when i think too much about what a big year this has been for spencer.

he was always a good kid, but this year, i can tell that he knows it.

spencer has the best attitude and most positive disposition.

WHAT? yes, that's right i said, positive and spencer all the same sentence.

no more being the eyore of our family, like i said, i can tell that he feels better.

a lot of times in the last few months, i have found him in the kitchen, doing the dishes without being asked.

just because they needed to be done.  

and even though i would love him if he didn't do the dishes, this is just an example of the kind of kid he is.

yes i'm bragging, i just think he's great.

this year, he scored more then 12 lacrosse goals, i lost count.

earned lots of merit badges at scout camp

auditioned for and made it into the jr. high musical (coming this spring)

helped ethan with countless hours of whatever wii game he was trying to master.

pulled thousands of weeds and moved at least that many boxes

wrestled for the first time with the jr high team

(and only threw up once during their hard-core conditioning)

helped taylor hang our christmas lights

ran track for the first time and rocked the hurtles

starting shaving good grief!

grew at LEAST six inches and two shoe sizes to pass allie and catch up with taylor

with a lot of hard work, he's earned all As and Bs so far this year

plus lots of things i'm forgetting

man i love this guy!

tonight we'll be celebrating with a spaghetti dinner, strawberry cupcakes and a late lacrosse game with his indoor league team. and maybe later saving the world from the evil covenant.

in other words, his version of a pretty much perfect night.

happy happy birthday spencer

i love you

boys

here are a few things i've learned about boys so far in my fifteen years of raising them:

1. they have a tendency to act before they think.
2. spiders are no big deal to them, neither is squishing one.
3. they really do have hollow legs and the need to fill them is constant.
4. they care as much about their hair as the girl in the house.
5. most of the time, they are best friends, except when they hate each other.
6. they like to compare muscles, strength, height and arm pit hair.
7. ping pong and frisbee are contact sports.
8. just about any object can be made into a weapon of some kind.
9. they want to be ninjas when they grow up more than anything else.
10. the percentages go something like 51% gentlemen, 49% pigs, depending on the meal.
11. they worry about how they will support their families and where to go to college.
12. they can pick up the controller to any video game and instantly know how to play.
13. they secretly believe that chuck norris is as awesome as his jokes portray.
14. they are as emotional or maybe more than the girl in the house.
15. they are consummate show offs and hot doggers

16. especially when filming each other.

17. they have big hearts

i love (most of the time) being a mother to boys

NOTE: taylor informed me that some of these photos were reenactments of a few star wars light saber moves. which forces me to add #18. boys are dorks. in a good way.

six for sunday

nothing super big going on around here, so for now, all i can post are my random bits of life...

one. i'm so happy that chuck and american idol are back!

happy that captain awesome has played a bigger role this season so i have more time to look at him.

i almost forgot how yummy he is.

we already have a few favorites on idol, but i'm glad it's hollywood week coming up, i'm so done with the auditions.

two AND three. we should've bought ethan an ipod for christmas too. he's constantly pestering the teenagers to borrow theirs so he can play the games.

AND, i found these woody costume pjs online for so cheap i couldn't pass them up, i knew they would be a hit. he's been wearing them around the house with his cowboy boots non stop.

what's funnier than a toddler dressed as woody playing his sister's pink ipod on the couch?

four.  i bought a dyson! after years and years of needing a new vacuum every eight months or so (seriously), i finally talked rich into picking one of these sweet babies up.

i was so excited about the new purchase, that yesterday i vacuumed every inch of the house including dusty mouldings, blinds, window seals, cobwebs, and ceiling fans. i had to empty the canister SIX times. gross, but also glorious.

five. three words: good. mail. goodness. the first delivery, were these red farberware pots and pans that i've been coveting over forever. they're so gorgeous!

thank you april who found the killer deal and my mom who agreed to go in on them with her! second, my cute friend nicki spoiled me rotten with a fun box full of music, treats, home decor and delightful personal touches. i loved that she stuck this fortune to the outside of the box.

i'm so lucky to have such cute ladies in my life!

six. one of the best ideas i've ever had. last week at sunday dinner, i told the teenagers that they were going to be in charge of choosing a dinner that week, and that they would responsible for helping to prepare it. i'm realizing that although the kids have some cooking experience, taylor's leaving for college in 2.5 years (what the heck?!) and i probably ought to step it up in the kitchen department. taylor can't afford to lose any calories from his diet.

so this week, we had shepherd's pie, chicken & veggie stir fry and homemade pizza all prepared by teenagers. the best part is thoroughly enjoying my time with them in the kitchen.

the end.

five for friday

random bits of life this week...

one. the strawberry shortcake cupcakes i made for spencer's birthday turned out so awesome!

last year for my birthday, my SIL lisa gave me the wendy paul 101 gourmet cupcakes cook book  so far, we've made about ten different recipes from this book and they've all been awesome - and super easy. these had a spoonful of strawberry stuff baked in the middle that made them very moist and super yummy.

my only complaint about them was that the whip cream topping started to slide after about one minute which made it hard to deliver the extras to the neighbors. oh well, more for us eh?

two. rich is in the thick of the "death march" of toy story 3 at work, which means, in a nutshell, that he's pulling long ridiculous hours every day including saturdays. ethan sees him the least because he's usually in bed when rich comes home at night, and even sometimes when he leaves in the morning. 

so when we had him all to ourselves for the whole day on sunday, ethan had to take advantage of some snuggling on the couch. i love this, it makes my heart melt a little.

three. clear the roads! taylor got his learner's permit this week.

i'm starting to get motion sickness going around and around the church parking lot. we've got to get this kid out on the road soon. bleh.

four. after a lot of begging, allie finally got contact lenses on monday. it was time, and needless to say, she's over the moon about them.

however, she informed me last night that without her glasses, her face is too plain and boring and she's going to have to start wearing brighter make up to make it exciting again. what?

five. spencer has been counting down the days to the spring lacrosse season, so when we heard about an indoor winter league, he was IN. the indoor field is fun because the ball never goes out of bounds but makes taking photos with no reflection a bit of a challenge.

this week he also started conditioning with the wrestling team, which from what we've heard, is pretty intense, but he loves it. i'm grateful that he's staying busy with things that he loves, and all the extra exercise makes for a happier spencer which is nice.

ok, this post could've been "ten for friday" with the busy week that we've had, but this will have to do for now!