Southern California Grandkids

Here are some pictures that we took on Natalie birthday of all of the the southern California Higham grandkids. There are Yee, Bruschke and Doug Higham kids. So fun to have the 9 cousins so close together (both in age and physical location). Mom and Dad, if you want to have these pictures in your own collection, click on them and then right click on the picture and click on "save as".Alyssa (3 days), Dallin (9 weeks), and Tanner (14 weeks)

Left to right: Taylor Yee, Bailey Bruschke, Morgan Yee holding Alyssa Higham, Natalie Bruschke, Daniel Yee holding Dallin Yee, and Spencer Bruschke holding Tanner Bruschke

Happy Birthday Natalie

Yesterday was Natalie's birthday. It was so fun to be able to get together with family and friends for a great dinner (ham, funeral potatoes, green bean casserole, carrots and rolls). Sarah and Justin and their kids and Doug and Liz and baby Alyssa were there, along with Grandma and Grandpa Bruschke, and Liz's parents, Les and Terri. There were 19 of us in all, including all the babies (Tanner, Dallin and Alyssa). Most of the kids were down from the table by the time that we brought out the camera. Justin and Brett sacrificed for the rest of us by sitting with the kids.Here is Natalie enjoying her pink birthday cake. She didn't care what kind of cake she had as long as it was pink.
Natalie got lots of fun presents for her birthday. She got a fun kitchen aid mixer to go with the kitchen she got for Christmas. She got a cute Cinderella doll kit thing. She also got a couple of books and a marble run game. And of course a couple of outfits.

Most of Natalie presents were opened with Spencer, Morgan and Daniel helping out. There wasn't time in between them giving her the next present to even think. It was fun to see the cousins being so "helpful" though.
Overall it was a fun night and I think that Natalie had a great birthday. I can't believe that she is already three years out. Of course, she is three going on 25. Hopefully this birthday will be a goodbye to the "terrible twos"!!!

Alyssa Kate Higham

Just wanted to let you all know that Doug and Liz were blessed with a little baby girl, Alyssa Kate Higham, on Thursday. You can visit their blog to see more pics (click on Doug and Liz in family and friends list at right). Doesn't Doug look so proud?! She is sure beautiful Doug and Liz!

The Mom Test

I got this in an email from a friend the other day. Thought it was too classic to keep to myself.

"I was out walking with my 4 year old daughter. She picked up something off the ground and started to put it in her mouth. I took the item away from her and I asked her not to do that. 'Why?' my daughter asked. 'Because it's been on the ground, you don't know where it's been, it's dirty, and probably has germs' I replied. At this point, my daughter looked at me with total admiration and asked, 'Momma, how do you know all this stuff, you are so smart.' I was thinking quickly. 'All moms know this stuff. It's on the Mom Test. You have to know it, or they don't let you be a Mom.' We walked along in silence for 2 or 3 minutes, but she was evidently pondering this new information. 'OH...I get it!' she beamed, 'So if you don't pass the test you have to be the dad.' 'Exactly' I replied back with a big smile on my face."

Thanks for sharing Ruth!

So I have definitely gotten out of the habit of blogging since just before Christmas. I am really wanting to get back into it, so hopefully I will continue to find things to blog about. Sometimes life just seems dull. Don't ask me how that happens with four kids at home. OK, maybe life isn't dull, but it would definitely be dull to someone reading about the 10th diaper I had changed that day. Or the up-teenth time I put Natalie on timeout. Or how about the hundred time I hear "mom, I'm hungry" even though they had just gotten down from the table. Oh the fun times! We have been getting out to enjoy the beautiful weather we have had lately. The sky has been so clear and the mountains have looked gorgeous. We spent lots of hours at the park this week. Sorry, no pictures of that. But here are some pictures of the past couple of weeks.

This is the set-up we have for the kids right now. We tried to put Spencer in a room with Tanner, but he wasn't going to have anything to do with it. He didn't want to be in a room by himself since Tanner isn't going to bed at the same time as them. We got this bunk bed set from the Shepard's in our ward. The top is a twin and the bottom is full. It works right now and then once Tanner is more on the others kids schedule we will move the boys into their own rooms.

I love taking pictures of the kids right after the good after the bath. If only you could smell how good they smell too!

Natalie and Tanner are constant companions. If I am not holding Tanner Natalie is asking if she can. If I walk out of the room, I often come back to her holding Tanner like this. I have tried to get her to stop, but she won't. Any ideas? I just don't want her to think that she can pick him up.
This is a classic Bailey face. She had been crying and I asked her to stop and smile and this is what she gave me. What a cutie!
Tanner and his cousin Dallin (Sarah's newest) who are 5 1/2 weeks apart.
Bailey and Taylor (Sarah's second to youngest) who are just 58 minutes apart.

. . .and our lovely Bailey girl posing for the camera. Brett said I had to include this one.

My name

Sarah Ballio had this link on her blog. Kind of fun to see where you stand as far as your name. Give it a try!

• There are 367,565 people in the U.S. with the first name Rachel.
• Statistically the 156th most popular first name.
• More than 99.9 percent of people with the first name Rachel are female.
• There are 577 people in the U.S. with the last name Bruschke.
• Statistically the 44773rd most popular last name.

HowManyOfMe.com

There is 1 person with my name in the U.S.A. How many have your name?

Five years and going strong. . .

On December 27th Brett and I shared our 5th wedding anniversary. Crazy to say that we have had four kids in those five years! And even more crazy to say that we have moved six times in those five years (ok, not so much more crazy, but still not the norm). Brett surprised me (ok, tried to surprise me, family has a way of ruining surprises) by planning a get away for us. Bruce and Karen watched our kids, even Tanner, so that we could have a night out on the town. Our night started at Rodizio's, a brazilian bbq. It was amazing! It is an all you can eat restaurant were the servers come around with big spears of meat. I don't know how they can cook all that meat and have it come out so tender and yummy. Brett was more adventurous that I was. He even tried the chicken heart.

After dinner we headed over to the theatres to catch "National Treasure: Book of Secrets". It would have been good to watch the first one again before we saw the second. I am one of those people that can watch the same movie over and over and not remember what happened, so I feel like I was a little lost on details. Even with that, it was a great movie though, and it was so nice to be able to watch an entire movie without being interupted by children. As we were walking out of the theatre we ran into Nancy Wood. So fun to be able to catch up on her and her happens! Following the movie Brett drove us to a little bed and breakfast called the "Armstrong Mansion". It was dark when we got there, so I couldn't tell how big it was from the outside, so I was surprise when we had to go up to the third floor for our room. The room we stayed in was called the "August Retreat". The door was open going into our room and the first thing that I saw were rose petals on the floor. There were candles everywhere and a box of chocolates on the bed. (I wish we would have had the camera with us so I could give you the real effect!)

It was a little cozy room and I thought that was it, but when I walked into the bathroom I realized there was another little hallway. I looked around the corner to see steps lined with more candles.

At the top of the steps was a little loft area with a jet tub and table. On the table was two dozen long stem red roses and a bottle of sparkling cider with two goblets. Can you say romantic?
The following morning we woke up and headed to the Salt Lake Temple to do some sealings. What better way can you spend your anniversary than being in the temple and helping others to be able to share eternity together! It was an awesome evening. Thanks for five great years Brett! I am so grateful to know that I have eternity to share with you! I love you Babe!!!

Christmas 2007

(Sorry about the long blog and sooo many pictures)

We had so much fun this Christmas visiting Highland Utah to be with Brett's family. We went up on the 22nd and were able to stay until New Year's Eve. Brett's brother Brian and sister Jill live in the area, so they were nice and close for all the festivities. Craig and his family arrived the day after Christmas to join in. This was my first "white Christmas" (at least that I remember), although it was not snowing on Christmas morning. We spent many days sledding, mostly in Bob Moore's backyard, although we did make the trip up to American Fork Canyon for some awesome sledding.

Sledding in American Fork Canyon

Tradition has it that Santa comes to leave one gift on Christmas eve. It always ends up being pajamas, which is fun for pictures. This is the first Christmas that Spencer really has understood the whole "Santa" thing, so it was so fun to see some of his expressions opening presents and what not. Wish we could have caught them better on camera.

Opening pajamas Santa brought on Christmas eve!

We thought that we had let Santa know that this was going to be a light year, but somehow he still went crazy. It is amazing how the little things add up. Christmas morning was spent with Grandma and Grandpa Bruschke, Brian, Megan, Grayden and Talmage. It was nice to have a little smaller group. Jill and her fam joined us for breakfast and to open presents from Grandma and Grandpa.

Christmas Morning

We also spent a day down in Provo, bowling at BYU and then hitting the Malt Shop. Definitely miss the days of the lunch special, a hamburger, fries and HUGE shake for just over $4! So yummy. While we were down there we visited with Grandma Challis and the Moon's. We miss family more than the Malt Shop! Brett spent a lot of time in front of the TV playing the Wii. He got hooked on some kind of tank game. I guess it is a fun game to play, but not so much to be a by stander.

Random Pics

Coming home from church one day there was a storm going on. We couldn't see too well because the wind was blowing the snow so hard. After attempting to get into the driveway a couple of times we realized that there was about a 2 1/2 foot snow drift keeping us from getting through. For some reason the winds in Highland will cause there to be three feet of snow in one place while you can see the grass in others. Really weird. So Brett jumped on Grandpa Bruce's quad and plowed the driveway so that everyone else could pull in because with all the snow you can't park on the street. He came back in after a couple of hours and informed me that the whole neighborhood had been plowed (I guess Bruce kept telling him to go plow this persons driveway and that persons drive. What a good sport!)

It is hard to put into words all the fun that we had, so hopefully the pictures will do more justice. Thanks grandma and grandpa for the awesome vacation and putting up with us for so long!

So much to blog about. . .

. . .and no pictures to show for it. We downloaded all of our pictures onto Brett's computer from the holidays, so I don't have access to them until the evening. I hate to blog at night because that is the only time I have to spend with Brett, so I haven't posted anything. I will try to get Brett to put all the pictures onto my computer tonight (I will be gone at YW's) so that I can post tomorrow hopefully. To say the least we had an awesome couple of weeks. Can't wait to share it with you!