Happy Christmas from Utah's Dixie - Santa Clara Valley! I'm thrilled to say that we've been able to call this our home for 6 years now! Let me explain:
We live in a house where I mention what corner we live on, and people swoon, "I've always loved that house! If ever you wanna sell, let me know first!" It's a big lot and surrounded by trees, which is rare in the desert. I love this house! I wanna die here and have my ashes scattered in the yard. However, Chris is a realtor, People! He can't help himself! He's sick! He put my house on the market in May! I was beginning my 4th pregnancy and cried and whined and refused to clean for showings like any grown woman would do. He felt bad for me, so he priced the house high and started showing me castles that we could live in instead. It was kinda getting fun to think of other possibilities. So then I started to declutter and clean. I even read that stupid, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up book! Which I sorta liked. We did the cutest updates and I spent all summer just cleaning. It was awful! Well, guess what... no one wanted to buy our house after all! It came as such a relief when Chris sent me a text and asked that I take the FOR SALE sign down. "GLADLY!" I replied!
We learned several good lessons through the whole experience though. #1 how to fold my laundry a very special way (the book had a couple chapters on that). #2 Hire a great landscaper! #3 We truly have wonderful neighbors! When we had our baby we were given 7 meals! My older kids have had the best play dates and I've had help with giving them rides to and fro. And so many thoughtful gifts! Calvin has 29 3-6 month outfits! He will literally wear each one 3 times! Haha! It's a very special neighborhood we're in. Even the Never-Get-Emotionally-Attached realtor of the family has noted that we wouldn't have been able to do it without the help from our village. Thank you very much for your service and kindnesses to our family this fall, and always! For the record, I'm about 25 Thank You cards behind so please be patient with me!
Our family had a simple and fun year. With a pregnant, tired mom at the helm we kept things low-key. We went to northern Utah for most of our fun this year because we've got Grandma and Grandpa there to help (the lazy/clever mom's key to survival). We took the kids to Hogle Zoo for Spring Break in March. Then back up again for Easter, Strawberry Days in June, camping American Fork Canyon in July, and a final goodbye summer trip in August. Thanks to my parents for their help with my kids while I slept on their bed! Aren't grandparents just the best! I big highlight for our summer was a trip to Carlsbad, CA with Grandma and Grandpa Potter. Thanks to them we were able to go to the beach, Sea World, and the Mormon Battalion Historical sight.
Our kids are progressing in school and lessons and we have enjoyed recitals, games, and graduations all year. Our home is noisy and bedtime is Hell, but we've got enough snuggles and fun to make any onlooker say, "enjoy it while it lasts..." I love watching Oliver head up a project: he's the most patient teacher and explains things so well to Ruth and Van. I love hearing Van's training wheels when he's riding around like a mad man outside. And I love when Ruth sets up a scene for her brothers when they play pretend. I love when the dog joins in. And sweet Baby Calvin just sleeps so much better when it's noisy in the house! It's not perfect - kids fall and get hurt, and "accidentally" hit each other. But it's fun around here!
Hey, feel free to stop here if you'd like. I'm going to keep writing and try to keep a family history of our year since this is the only journaling I do. If you do read to the end, be sure to hit me up to redeem a prize! Merry, merry Christmas! Lots of love from our home to yours!
Van is a Threenager this year and has mastered the valuable life skill of negotiating. He will still takes naps for me in exchange for a cookie and time to hang out with Dad at the end of the day. He is loud and has a raspy voice that says every word as cute as possible. He got a new bike for his birthday and whips around the yard with incredible strength and speed on that thing. He has a love/hate relationship with the poor dog - feeding her dutifully everyday and yelling at her to come so he can whack her with stick! He would like to be a Rescue Bot Transformer when he grows up. For now, he attends Montessori preschool twice a week and surprises me with how smart and strong he is. Van was running around pretending to be Maui when he hooked our 25 pound dining table bench with his Maui hook and it crushed his big toe. The tip of the toe broke, the toenail died, and the cut and bleeding was gruesome! It's been a long recovery. He couldn't wear shoes for 6 weeks, but you can't slow Van down! Van is a big fan of the new train at the park, Nerf guns, swimming, and Netflix. 
Ruth is our spunky 5-1/2 year old. She had a big year, graduating from preschool and moving on to Kindergarten. I'd like to throw in a little bragging here: Ruth got a perfect score on the Kindergarten assessment! I give most of the credit to an online preschool called Upstart that she loved to spend a lot of time doing everyday. She loves to read and we are reading American Girl books together. Ruth continues ballet lessons and learned to tap dance this year too. She also does gymnastics, music, and swim lessons. Swim lessons are hard and very important for Ruth and she has to go to 2 or 3 lessons a day while our incredible teacher is in town so she can get over her fears. I'm very proud of Ruth's tenacity in so many things - she won't quit! This go-getter also did her 2nd year of soccer on the Purple Lollipops team. She learned to ride her bike without training wheels. She did both cheerleading and wrestling camps.Ruth picked to be Shimmer the Genie for Halloween. She was a mouse in the Nutcracker ballet. And she lost her first tooth this week. A highlight for Ruth this year was her 5th birthday party where I didn't limit the amount of friends she could invite and Moana came! Moana sang with Ruth and got lots and lots of hugs and pictures with all the kids. Ruth is a little overbearing with the new baby, but she is a great help to all of us. She is a very fun friend and has too many requests to play everyday that it's hard to keep track of her social schedule. Ruth's had a wonderful year!
Oliver is 7-1/2 and in the 2nd grade. He is still in the dual immersion Chinese program at our school. It's set up so he has both an English and Chinese teacher and he spends half the day with each. He is taught his math in Chinese at school, and then does the same lesson in English for homework that night. I feel like math is a struggle this year when I try to help him with it, but I don't expect it to be easy either since we're learning a language at the same time. Oliver much prefers reading to math! He loves the Diary of a Wimpy Kid graphic novels and stays up too late reading in bed. He entered a sculpture in Reflections this year and won 1st at our school! The national theme was "Within Reach" and he made a sculpture of himself with a necktie on and money flying out of his pocket. He titled it Getting Rich! When you ask Oliver what he wants to be when he grows up he'll just shrug and say he just wants to be a dad with a lot of money. Oliver got a big bike for his birthday this spring so he has been able to cover more ground this year. He can ride to school on nice days (if we're on time) and go on long rides with Chris. Oliver did a run camp this summer with the high school cross country team. They challenged the kids to run 100 miles this summer and keep a journal of it - Oli did it! I was so proud! I was even more proud when he agreed to try flag football! That was such a fun, cute league and he played on the Broncos with some of his friends. Oliver also did wrestling last winter (taking a break this year), soccer in the spring, gymnastics, and continues his piano lessons. He was a sumo wrestler for Halloween. He's our peacemaker and a patient teacher to his younger siblings. Oliver is very serious about Santa and presents this year. He has a list and a plan and I've never seen this side of Oliver to care so much about getting a RC Helicopter. 
Chris and I are still plugging away. I'll be honest and say that this has been a most stressful Christmas for me. Chris is starting a project in Salt Lake now and he's been traveling up there. He had a fun year in real estate though because he built some new rentals and he bought a house with a pool over the summer. The kids and I were able to go swimming there!
If you are actually reading all of this right now... I'm almost done. This is so long, I know. I will shorten it down and fix things. But it's time to move on for the day! Lots of love!
