Brooklyn 6 months

I can't believe our little Angel is 6 months old! This has really been the fastest year of my life. It feels like I was just putting Christmas decorations away and now here we are pulling them back out again. Brooklyn turned 6 months old on December 5th. Her 6 month checkup was on December 8th. Her stats were:

Weight: 15 lbs 14 oz (50%)

Length: 25 in. (25%)

Head: 44 cm (75%)

So she's still smaller than our other 3 kids. But her head is getting up there, just like the other kids, but is still little compared to the boys' heads which were off the charts until they were over 1.

She rolls all over now and laughs the cutest little laugh you've ever heard! Her eyes twinkle when she smiles, which melts my heart. She's had yet another cold which brought on another ear infection, so that would make 4 ear infections. We have an appointment with our ENT doctor in a couple of weeks to talk about tubes. Her Excema is under control with just Aquaphore, which is good.

She moves all her bed now. The other day I went in to see if she was awake and she was quietly playing with her toes. I called her name and she looked up at me and smiled. Such a doll!

She has been really funny about baby food. She LOVES the vegetables and was refusing to eat the fruits for quite a while. Just this past week, she started opening her mouth when we gave her applesauce. This picture is her first time in her high chair. Looks like she likes it!

Michael Jackson cookies

So my good friend Ginger makes the best Oatmeal/Chocolate Chip Cookies. They are so good that at my monthly girls night we always ask her to make them. And I usually try to bring a few home for Dan to thank him for taking care of the kids while I'm out gallivanting around with MY GIRLS! I got the recipe from Ginger so Dan could bake them. Yes, I said Dan. I don't like to bake or cook for that matter. But I do usually cook dinner by force, but Dan usually bakes the goodies. In fact, there are many times late at night Dan will say, "I need a treat." Then he breaks out all the stuff to make cookies or snacking cake or brownies. The last time we made the Oatmeal/Chocolate Chip Cookies he decided to name them "Michael Jackson Cookies". I didn't get it at first. Then he explained that they have both Milk Chocolate Chips and White Chocolate Chips, so they are Black AND White! I laughed my head off. So that is what the kids call them now, not really understanding why Dan named them that....so we thought. The other night Dan was making them and I was in the kitchen with him. We overheard Lindsay telling Zane why they are called Michael Jackson cookies. She said, "See Zane, there's white and dark chocolate chips in them. And you know how Michael Jackson is black, but then he put white powder on his face to make him look white? Get it? That's why." Then they laughed. So I have NO CLUE where she got the whole "white powder on his face" bit, but Dan and I couldn't stop quietly laughing in the kitchen. Then Lindsay wanted to turn on the song "Thriller" and do the dance while Dan was baking them. Where do they come up with this stuff? (I posted the recipe on my family's recipe blog)http://itsachuckroastyoustupidox.blogspot.com

The kids doing their Thriller dance while eating their cookies

Ouch!!!

(These pictures were taken before it got really swollen!)

So Dan isn't very graceful sometimes. He plays soccer almost every Tuesday and Thursday morning with some guys in the neighborhood. Then they decided to do Thursday nights as well (twice in one day? I don't know why). Anyways, last week he went to play Thursday night. About 10 minutes later, he came limping into the house. He'd been playing for only about 3 minutes, when he planted his foot to kick the soccer ball and rolled his ankle! He said, " I didn't even get to break a sweat yet!" I'm kinda mean and laughed at him at first. Then the next day I saw how swollen it was. It's been almost a week and he's still limping. But the swelling is going down. A few years ago he pulled a ligament playing soccer and he often re-pulls it when running. So I guess he's not playing soccer for a while so it can heal!

All she wants for Christmas is her two front teeth.....

And a little purple convertible with 4 seats so she can drive her siblings around the drive-way and an Ipod, and a Zhu-Zhu pet Hamster and a fishing pole and an Easy Bake oven....the list goes on. So Lindsay lost her 4th tooth on Sunday, November 29th. This one she pulled out all be herself while Dan and I were still asleep. She had Zane in the bathroom with her as her support. They used about 40 tissues trying to pull it out, but she finally got it out! The tooth Fairy left $2 (because she pulled it herself she got more money!).

So the list above is really what she wants for Christmas. She's only 6 1/2!!!!! I told her Santa has a budget too and he usually doesn't bring kids $300 gifts (that's about how much the little convertible is) and mom and dad don't spend that much either . She said, "we'll just have to see". She wrote her letter to Santa the day after Halloween and mailed it. I keep telling her that she will need to be grateful for what she gets. We'll see what happens Christmas morning.

Thanksgiving 2009 aka Skousen-palooza!

This year we celebrated Thanksgiving with my family. EVERYONE was able to be here so of course we tried to cram as much as we could into one day since we're not all together very often. We ended up calling it "Skousen-palooza" because of everything we did. Thank goodness we were able to reserve my parent's ward house or we would have never fit everyone! We started out Thanksgiving morning around 10:00 with family pictures. You can imagine with 38 people what mayhem that was. But I think they turned out pretty good. (thanks to "Beans" for coming and taking the pictures!)

This is what happens when you have 8 kids!

We bribed the kids....we told them we'd do some goofy pictures if they would smile good for the other pictures. It totally worked!

Granny Annie and Grandpa Harry with all 21 grand kids!

Top left-right: Jennifer, Karen, Melissa

Middle left to right: Me, Laurel, Amy, Heidi

Bottom: Matt

After like 4 hours of picture taking (I'm not kidding either) it was time for the feast! It was delicious!

Andrew was falling asleep!


Mary, Harry, Riley and Brooklyn



Matt, Lauren and Mattison live in California. This was their first time meeting Brooklyn. Matti loved her!

Jenny, Ben, Noah, Mollie and Carter live in Arizona. This was Mollie and Noah's first time meeting Brooklyn


So after dinner, we did crafts, games, movies a fish pond for the kids and few people actually got a nap (I was not one of them). Then we spent a few hours filming "Skousen's got talent.......or do they?" Everyone did something and it was a lot of fun. By then it was around 7:00 pm, so we got out leftover turkey and made sandwiches, etc.... then dad set up a big screen in the cultural hall. We watched "Skousen's got talent.....or do they?" and all of out Christmas videos that everyone made early so we could all be together when we watched them.(ours is posted below). That was the highlight of the whole day! Everyone's was so clever and funny! That is such a fun tradition.

THEN (sigh) we celebrated November and December birthdays with cupcakes and birthday wishes. We also decided that since we were all together, we would do our Christmas gift exchange a little early. We picked names (couples choose another couple and grankids choose another grandkid).

We also decided we would get our parent's gift early so we could see them open it together. We got them a Scanner that scans negatives and pictures and makes them digital. They loved it and of course we children will get some use out of it too (snicker~SNICKER!). after clean-up we were out of the church by 11:00 pm!

So it was a very busy day but it was so much and we made a lot of good memories. We better start planning Thanksgiving 2011! Hahahahahaha!

Christmas Video 2009

Well here it is........many of you have been waiting all year for this! Hahahaha! Just kidding! For those of you that don't know, this is a family tradition that my family does. Every year (click to watch 2007 and 2008) each family (including my parents) puts a video together (usually humorous) and we watch them on Christmas Eve. Well this year we were all in town and together for Thanksgiving so we decided to do them a little early. They were all so dang funny! It amazes me how everyone can still come up with new ideas year after year. So sometimes we have family inside jokes in them and as you will see at the very end of ours there is a picture that doesn't quite make sense....family joke. So sit back and enjoy, then scroll down afterwards and I'll explain a couple of things!



So, during the Doney Dance Party, we were all just dancing around when suddenly I look down and Gavin has pulled his pants down is just dancing like nothing is wrong! I lost it! I almost wet my pants I was laughing so hard. So the footage you see is him running out of the room and in slow motion you can hear the end of the Lindsay saying "our video". She was yelling "Gavin is ruining our video!" Then Gavin turns around and screams at Lindsay for being rude to him, so that is that really ugly, low, scream. Hilarious!

Then the picture at the end is of my mom and Lindsay at one of her soccer games. After my sister Jenny got married last year, my dad added video footage and pictures of her wedding to the end of her wedding video he had made. He had asked me if I had any snapshots that I had taken from her reception, which I did, so he downloaded them to his computer. Later as we were watching what he added to Jenny's wedding video, we started noticing weird pictures. Turns out, my dad just threw all the pictures that were on my camera onto the video without even looking at them. Then the very last picture (remember this is a wedding video, so there was a sappy, love song playing during these pictures) was of my mom and Lindsay at her soccer game, then he faded out. You would have expected a picture of Jenny and Ben on their wedding day! We died laughing! We love you dad! So there's my long explanations!

12 years and counting!

On December 1st, it will be 12 years ago that we all became friends. We celebrated early because Jenny and Heather A.O. (that's what we call her to distinguish between the 2 Heather's) are here this week for Thanksgiving. Who would have thought 12 years ago we'd all be where we are today.....together we all have 14 kids!

Scotland the brave!

Dan came home from his mission in Scotland 10 years ago on September 9th (the day he came home it was 9/9/99). We've had a couple of visitors the past few months from Scotland and last week one of Dan's mission buddies and his wife and baby came to visit from Louisiana.
It is fun to see Dan resort back to being in Scotland and even hearing his accent resort to Scotish!

Back in May, Charles Gibson (on the left) came to visit from . Gordon McVey (on the right) moved here to America and married a woman who lives in Lehi last year. Dan baptised his daughter Charris 11 years ago.

Last month, Charris McVey (Charles' daughter that Dan baptised) came to visit. She brought all the kids some really nice gifts from Scotland.

Shane, Kim and Nathan Porter from Louisiana

Shane has the most hilarious laugh and it was so fun to listen to him and Dan talk and laugh about stories on the mission!

Trevor and Liz's Wedding

On Saturday, November 21st, Dan's brother, Trevor, married Elizabeth (Liz) in the Draper Temple. They dated for a LONG time and we are so glad they finally decided to seal the deal! We LOVE having Liz in the family. She is so sweet and she adores our kids.
So between my family and Dan's family, we've had 5 weddings in the past year and a half. And we both still have one sibling left to get married!

I think they are a pretty dang cute couple!


Ma, Trevor and Pa

She's beautiful!




Most of the Doney family. Sis flew in from Chicago, but Zach and the boys stayed behind.

Evvi (Mike and Brie's baby) and Brooklyn (2 months apart)

Brooklyn

Lindsay

Gavin

Zane

Lindsay caught the bouquet and Zane caught the garter. They were so excited!

Pa and Ma changed into comfy shoes after the reception!

Congratulations Trevor and Liz! We love you!