Catch me if you can...life I mean!

It seems like catching up on church, cleaning, laundry, blogging, (or catching RYAN as he runs barefoot and pants-less through Home Depot today for example) is all I ever do--I'm a consistent ball of "crazy mommy" playing catch up on life! So simply for posterity's sake, here is me playing catch up on our last few months...


1. Made a cake for a friend's parent's anniversary...this was a tastey one!


2. Hosted dinner at our home for a few of Scott's Priests and their dates for the 7 stake annual formal dance. Made prime rib, Abuala J's sugar rolls, chocolate raspberry souffles for dessert, yummm!


3. Weather started getting warmer--middle of March and yes, that is a photo of my naked boys playing outside with the hose--creating a slip 'n slide on the tramp. Are boys just born with a chip that tells them to do things like this?


4. Tried to turn back time because my little C-man is growing up toooo fast...try to tell me you've ever seen a kid this cute?
5. We moved...and yes, for those of you counting, that makes 4 times in 4 1/2 years. This was not a planned move, our land lord put our house up for sale and after finding a new place and three straight days of realtors camped out on my doorstep, we bailed. Our new place is still in the ward, owned by friends from our ward who moved a couple months ago. Turned out to be an awesome set up!


6. Made cinnamon rolls--Jenkins fam tradition--for General Conference Saturday morning and delivered them to the families that helped us move.
7. My drunk neighbor--whom I'd never really met before, aside from me knocking on his door at midnight asking him to turn down his BLARRING ghetto music--showed up on my door, pounding so hard he cracked & dented it. He persisted--pounding, screaming profanities, rattling the windows, waking up the kids--and since Scott was out of town, I grabbed the phone, called 911 and they hauled his sorry intoxicated hiney off to jail at 1am. It took 4 officers to wrestle him into handcuffs and then into the squad car, all while his poster-child-for-Corona-of-a-wife stands in the middle of the road yelling at him for embarrassing her and yelling at the cops for laying their hands "on her MAN" (finger snapping, head bobbing, hands on hips--I know you can see it in your mind). I felt like a guest celebrity on Jerry Springer.

Things have calmed down since (we really do live in a nice neighborhood, I think this guy just had a few too many and thought he lived on D-street, not Aliante!) Bring on the 90 degree weather (where did my Spring go?) family reunions, Scout Campouts, and even more days of finding Ryan running around the backyard--playing in the kiddie pool--stark naked. My neighbors think he's an exobitionist--I just think we've lived in "the Vegas" for WAY TOO LONG!

Smells Like Poop!

So I'm sitting in Sacrament Mtg.--Scott is passing the Sacrament because there aren't enough Deacons--we are in the middle of the opening hymn and Jason loudly states "It smells like POOP!" I already have my hands full because Ryan doesn't have any volume other than EXTRA LOUD, Collin wants to stand up and screeches any time I set him down, and Jason is sniffing something suspicious. I start sniffing as well--sniffing Collin, nope, sniffing Ryan, nope, sniffing Jason, better not be him he's totally potty trained. I tell Jason he's crazy but he insists something is STINKY. Pretty soon he is turned in his seat, facing backward right in the older couple's faces sitting behind us. He sniffs loudly several times and -- while looking straight at the couple -- says "I'm right Mom, it smells like POOP. Their breath stinks, they need to brush their teeth right Mom?" He stands up, walks to the opposite end of the bench and plants it there instead of in front of the poor couple--all the while plugging his nose. Bishop sees me wrestling with the boys, red faced, ready to grab them and the diaper bag and high tail it out of there before the Sacrament has even been passed and what does he do? Invites me to bare my testimony before turning the meeting over to the rest of the congregation. When I hear it, my head whips up fast--like someone had YANKED the back of my hair--type of fast--he's still chuckling and I'm vowing to toilet paper his house for family night. I start with something like "Bishop was watching me from the pulpit and figured if he didn't get me out of my seat and away from my children they might not make it through the rest of the meeting alive." Thank you life, thank you so much!

Elder Jenkins Returns

My youngest brother, Scott, just finished serving his mission in San Fernando, CA! From the minute he opened his call, we've been plotting to go pick him up & take the kiddos to Disneyland. He finished up the end of January and off we went. Actually my parents met him at the mission home, picked him up and toured the mission visiting some families and then met us in Anaheim. It was great to see him again! You always wonder what the returned missionary is going to be like? Will they have difficulty adjusting, how different will they be--for better or worse :-) Scotty stayed true to himself--his personality was exactly the same as I remembered and it is great to have him back. The boys were thrilled--especially Jason who remembered him the most--and our little hotel room immediately became a boy's "frat house" with wrestling, eating, teasing, laughing and the "occasional" bodily noise!

As for Disneyland, it couldn't have been easier with several sets of extra hands to wrangle our kiddos. Auntie Weesa (my sister Lisa) flew to Vegas and drove to CA with us. It was AWESOME to have her along--she is a huge help but mostly, we don't get to spend much time together and it was great to catch up. Besides, she totally spoiled the boys and they'd love to have her around anytime!
I think our favorite "kid" ride was Peter Pan's Flight--so cool. And my favorite "adult" ride had to be Indiana Jones. We polished off the last night by walking back to the hotel devouring roasted turkey legs. You know it's going to be good when you first bite into it and juice literally squirts five feet in the air. Oh how I wish a truck would deliver one to me once a week

On the way home from CA, we stopped at Cafe Rio before dropping Lisa off at the airport. Collin was gnawing on the table, bit down hard, jerked his head back and ripped his tooth out of the socket. He had blood gushing down his chin, I was completely freaked out, turned to my little sis and said what do I do???? Being the dental hygienist that she is, she calmly took a look and told me to pop it back in and then called our dad who is a dentist. I don't know what I would have done without her. We'll know it 6-8 weeks if the tooth is ok--if it starts to discolor, I have to yank it out. My poor little boy might have a huge gap until his permanent teeth grow in!

Aside from the tooth incident of 2011, the trip was perfect. We're glad the last of the Jenkins' boys are home from missions--we can finally take a family photo, have Thanksgiving and not feel like someone is missing all the time. So viva Mickey Mouse and welcome back brother!

Last few photos

Our Ugly Sweater Christmas Party--this was a Kingman tradition that stuck around!


Kids kids kids since that is what our life is all about now!


Taking the kiddos sledding--6 hours of work for 20 minutes of fun--& Christmas Eve turkey dinner w/friends, out to a movie with the fam--how Ryan got that much chocolate on his face in a movie theater, I'll never know!


Christmas Day


Aniversary Flowers--thank you dear!