Belnap Family

The Belnaps are back!

2010-12-05T16:30:00.000-08:00

So, I tried to log in to my blog a month ago with no success. It has been over 2 years since I have blogged (according to Garron) and I forgot my password! Now that is just sad! Well, I'm going to attempt the nearly impossible and find the time to post every once in a while, so here we go. To give a short update, Garron graduated from Dental School, and we now live in Farmington NM where Garron works (as a dentist!) at KidsKare. I never expected our family to end up in a smaller town in New Mexico, that up until 2 years ago I had never heard of, but we are loving it.

We are buying the home we live in now, we have made good friends, and all of the boys are happy to be here. Best of all is that we now can drive to AZ in 6.5 hours instead of trying to haul a young family of 6 through the airport! Also on a happy note, we are just 45 minutes from Durango, CO! I still get to have a piece of the Colorado with me that I miss so much. So, to sum up 2 years of absence, these pics are of our last trip to AZ for Thanksgiving where we have the tradition of going to My Grandpa Kempton's ranch near Tuscon, the day after Thanksgiving and picking the apples off of the trees that grew only after his passing. A special gift to our family that we treasure every year! After picking the apples we go to the river, and then back for a campfire dinner and some smores. We top it all off with games at the nearby hotel where we invade their lobby and make all sorts of racket. To all my girls out there, you know thats true! I would like to brag for a moment to say that I was first place winner at our second game of Ticket to Ride America, coming in ahead of Mark and Brenda and my Dad! Thank you very much! More to come in the Belnap news later! I think I put exclamation marks at the end of almost all of my sentences - that's embarrassing!

Torture or family pictures?

2009-10-18T20:34:00.000-07:00

We did our family pictures of the year and had
as good a time taking a family picture of six as
is humanly possible! We went to Golden Gate
State park, and we traded the boys cupcakes
and toys for nice smiles!

I just have to point out that above there's a G+A
carved in the tree on the very right. We noticed it
after we got home. How very special is that!

At the end of the day we asked the boys if they had
a fun time and they said no, because mostly we took
pictures, and Jerdan said he never wanted to do that
day again! Aparently we torture the kids.

Our favorite things about Elich's 09

2009-09-20T10:17:00.000-07:00

We went to Elich Gardens with the kids, and it was a big hit!

They loved every minute of it. Here are a few of our favorite

things. Everybody loved the merri go round, and it was the

only ride that we could all go on at once!

Layton's favorite ride was the airplane ride.

Jerdan was so cute on the rollercoaster. It was surprisingly

fast and it had a good drop on it, and he absolutely loved it.

The coaster goes around three times and inbetween each time

the worker askes the kids to put their thumbs up if they want

to go again, and thumbs down to get off. Layton was

thumbs down after the first round, and Jerdan was thumbs up!

He loved the thrill of it.
Paxton loved Bob the builder. They pointed at each

other for a while when the other boys were on a bigger ride.

He said "Ooooooohhh" over and over.

Porter's favorite ride was the bus that went up and

around in a circle. That smile makes all the fuss of

dragging 4 kids around the amusement park all worth it!

Porters other favorite ride was the boat ride. He kept

getting in trouble for putting his hand in the water.

Our all time family favorite thing from Elich was the hat

with the light on it that we got suckered into buying at the

end of the day. Layton was beside himself with desperation

to have it and he said "but if we get the hat with the light

on it we won't need to use the bathroom light when we

go to bed!". We made the boys promise to share it (which

they actually did) and Layton loved it so much that he fell

asleep wearing the hat with the light still on!

Porter loves everything his brothers love!

Road trip to Estes

2009-07-15T08:12:00.001-07:00

Truly, who dosn't love a good stick for banging out in

the wilderness. I swear Layton gets a kick out of

everything he does, and Jerdan enjoys his amusement.

I loved having my parents here for a visit, and the

kids did too. One of my favorate parts was having a

birthday celebration with my dad and taking him

shopping for jeans. He seriously hates shopping but

the trip was a success, and also very amusing to try

and entertain him while he tried on all of the jeans

that Garron picked out for him.

Jerdan searched for squirrels the whole hike we took.

I was so grateful that we finally found one!

One of my favorite memories of Estes Park was the

buggy bike ride we took around the lake. The kids

loved it, and we had some good laughs!

Of course Grandma got all of the boys a stuffed animal

at Noah's Ark. Jerdan and Layton are so attatched to the

squirrels that she got them.

The tramway gift shop had some lovely apparel!

Please notice the surprise party decorations that my

mom and Layton created. One of a kind for sure!

After an awesome tramway ride to the top of a

mountain we all got to feed the chipmunks, which

we pretended were squirrels for Jerdan's sake. I've

never seen him so thrilled.

2009-06-26T10:10:00.000-07:00

On 6-8-09 Layton graduated from joyschool!

He has loved every minute of school, and he

was so cute at graduation, and did all the hand

motions to the songs they sang. He is so looking

foreward to Kindergarden.

Masquerade Ball

2009-06-26T09:56:00.000-07:00

So I've been busy lately, but I have a lot of fun news

I was invited to a masquerade ball in honor of

Julie's 30th birthday(she has the golden sash in the

middle of the pic). We all dressed up and crashed

her house and dressed her up in a great ballgown.

We all went to Outback Steakhouse in our outfits

and got lots of weird looks. The resteraunt manager

loved our outfits so much that he gave us appetizers

and desert on the house. We also had an older

gentleman pay for all of our drinks. His wife came

up to our table afterwards, completely drunk and

told us to make our drink orders good! We had so

much fun. After dinner we all met at Ashley's house

and everyone got an award and walked down the

runway. I got best overall ensemble. I was so proud,

and I gave a very moving speach! I highly recomend

this kind of thing to anyone!

Mother's Day pics

2009-05-13T10:30:00.000-07:00

Time to vent

2009-04-22T16:35:00.000-07:00

So I'm pretty much in a foul mood by now. Today has been one of those days with Porter. I have learned about one more thing that dosn't wash out of hair very well - deoderant. It was in his hair and eyes when I got him up this morning. He had taken it out of Garron's bathroom cabinet and stashed it in his room for later mischeif. He followed that up with a box of Cheerio's on the couch and floor, a strawberry mashed in the rug, and then he stood on the second step of our stairs and peed on the floor, which led to time-out and more of the hidden deoderant in his eyes and hair and the carpet. Wow. How proud of me are all of you that I didn't beat him today! Tonight is yoga at mutual, and I'm looking foreward to some relaxing Porter-free time. Oh yea, and yesterday he colored his legs and his boy parts pink, and smashed strawberries on the floor and in my cooler. I have a pic - of the cooler, but I am too anoyed right now to fuss with it.

This week has been NUTS! Literally!

2009-04-20T10:01:00.000-07:00

So this week we got the hugest spring snowstorm ever, which brought us our two little snow friends holding hands and sitting in our lawn chairs out back. I thought they were very cute.
What really made this week literally nuts was of course Porter. He apparently found a huge bag of my chopped almonds and dispersed them around the kitchen. What a lovely surprise!

Around every corner I find evidence that Porter has been there! A half eaten cheese block in the sink and soap on the floor.

He also has an obsession with toothpaste, which is what he is sporting in his hair on this day! He not only uses it for hair-gel, he likes to make art with it in the sink, and he eats it every chance he gets!

This pic is photography by Layton. Garron has been studying every possible minute this week for the 5 finals coming up, which wasn't very good timing because I gave a talk in church yesterday, and had to prepare it during the day with lots of helpers. I also had my spa day Saturday which was so much fun for me, and yeah for everyone who braved the storm to come!

This week Jerdan planned a stairs sleepover, which means they set up their beds on the stairs. Layton actually fell asleep there, but Jerdan was up ALL evening long being silly, and telling us very helpful stories about the house that he's going to build for all of his animal friends once he gets to heaven!

Who can guess why Porter's hair is cut so short?

2009-04-13T19:11:00.000-07:00

Well, the answer is that for the last 3 days we have been washing Porter's hair non-stop to try and get greasy things out of it. This stuff doesn't wash out. Even with corn starch rubbed in to soak up the grease, his hair still looked greasy, so on Saturday night I just cut most of his hair off! I have no frigin idea how he is finding all of this stuff, but first it was Palmers Cocoa Butter, then baby vasoline, and today he found a sunscreen stick, and some chapstick in the drawer. He was kind enough to show me exactly where he found it today. He had smeared it into the sides of his hair, which was a big improvement on the episode where he covered his entire head of hair in cocoa butter! This kid is nuts!

Also, just in case you didn't already know, Porter loves gum. Aside from strait sugar, it's his favorite thing! It works great for good behavior bribes at Wal-Mart, but at home when he finds a stash, he eats every single piece he can fit in his mouth. The ones that he can't fit in his mouth go in the candle and the blender along with all of the wrappers!
Another trick Porter does is to fill his bevereges with toys or other food he doesn't want. It's so very helpful, and it's usually not this clean around the area he eats!
So, this afternoon I made Porter a berry, spinach, flax seed, and sesame seed smoothie, which he loved. He loved it so much that after he was done making a mess with his own smoothie, he started dipping his corn dog into Layton's drink. Porter said " It's yummy!". That is one of the most disgusting things I have ever seen! On a cuter note, at bedtime tonight when I asked him which song he wanted he asked for "a Gog", which means Child of God. It's his favorite, along with "a song a spider" (the itsy bitsy spider) and "a walkin" (teach me to walk in the light). He is so stinkin cute, and so full of it!

Birthday Weekend!

2009-04-11T15:14:00.000-07:00

So, it was Garron's birthday yesterday. The camera died, so I have no pics of Garron, but Jerdan, Layton,

and I had fun decorating and making a cake. I made a small cake for them to taste before Garron got home from school. They totolly devoured it! I think I strained my neck trying to blow up these really

long balloons that the boys like to use as swords. They are meant to be filled with a little pump. Anyway,

It was Paxton's Birthday today and Garron and I were so excited to celebrate it. Jerdan and Layton were actually probably more excited than we were. Jerdan thought Paxton should have a "Sonic" bday, and this morning Layton was talking about Paxton and said "I see him the same little". I think Layton was expecting Paxton to look different and more grown up on his bday!

Baths are one of Paxton's favorite thing, and he was begging for one this morning so we started out his bday with a nice bath.

I made Paxton's cake and put a heart on it because Paxton is always loving everybody up. He is so joyful. So I know my cake isn't nearly as cute as it would have been if Kristy had made it, but she moved away, so what was I to do? Paxton didn't seem to mind my home-made creation. He ate more cake than any of our other boys. We were so proud of him.

Paxton plays with a present from Grandma!

Showing off his new outfits!

Paxton thinks his new shoes from Grandma are fabulous. He was banging his foot on the floor, and enjoying the sound it made.

Spa day!

2009-04-04T19:14:00.000-07:00

So, I have people ask me who cuts my hair

and then I tell them that I cut my hair, and

then they want me to cut their hair, and I say

no, because I have four kids, but guess what?

I'm doing my first spa day on a Sat. so that

Garron can be there to help with the kids!

2009-04-01T12:07:00.000-07:00

Just guess who is causing trouble at our house

this week? While I was getting ready for a

physical therapy appt. Porter got out the

mascara that he has kept hidden from me for

2 weeks, and painted himself and poor Paxton.

Now let me tell you that this mascara is not

the cheapest ever, and it makes tubes on your

eyelashes. I love it, and it slides right off of

my lashes when I take it off, but I discovered

today that it does not come off of babies

very well! Also, guess who peed on the new

wood floors on purpose yesterday? I think

we all know the answer by now! I put him in

time-out, and when I went to get him out,

he had peed on his bed! Please tell me what

is going on here! Two weeks ago we made a

family goal to be kind and patient with Porter

because he was driving us all crazy!

My day has finally come!

2009-04-01T11:33:00.001-07:00

A huge storm came in last Sat.

and we went for a family sledding

outing. That's me, Layton and

Jerdan going down the hill.

Guess what? I finally got my

turn to try and snowboard! I have

been waiting for this day for years b/c

I have been pregnant or recovering

from pregnancy for almost 6 yrs!

Garron has a snowboard that I tried

out on a hill by our church building.

I loved it. I loved it so much that I

got a babysitter the next day so

Garron and I could go out and board

without the kids. I crash landed

almost every time but it was so

worth it!

Snow Day!

2009-03-26T13:05:00.000-07:00

It is the first day that school has been canceled because of the snow, and it inspired me to take some winter pictures. I have to give huge credit to Jerdan for taking the pictures of Paxton and me holding hands. Jerdan did an impressive job! By the end of the photo shoot Paxton was really ticked off about his hat!

Kristy comes to town!

2009-03-24T18:46:00.000-07:00

So I think the highlight of my weekend with Kristy had to be our trip to WalMart, and how out of control we were once we put on those Hannah Montana helmets. After we left the biking section we had a security guard following us around the store. When we were checking out he said that he had never seen 3 girls have so much fun at WalMart! I have never laughed so hard for so long!

These girls are some of my favorite people in the whole world! Kristy, how proud of me are you? I am totally blogging your visit!

Porter is a disaster = new wood floors!

2009-03-23T15:49:00.000-07:00

Guess who urinated on our carpet on purpose at least twice in two days? If you're not sure, you should know that the answer is always Porter when it comes to disasters at our house. Layton finally outgrew his naughty phase and now Porter has taken his place x10!
So the carpet was already at least 10 yrs old and badly abused and I just couldn't handle it anymore. Garron's dad was nice enough to come help us put in the laminate over a month ago, and even though we haven't finished all the baseboards I am so glad to have the carpet gone. It was horrifyingly dirty. Thanks Porter, and thanks to the garbage man who got a new load of carpet pad and carpet to dump every week this last month!
I would also like to point out the green paint that is smeared on the corner of the loveseat. Layton is responsible for that one when he hand painted our entire kitchen and family room with green kraft paint. It won't come off of the couch. Oh well, at least it kind of goes with the knobs in the kitchen, and coordinates with our plants!
I put up these pics a few months ago after Kelly took these pictures of our family. I found the knobs at Anthropology and I love them. The pictures are pretty dang cute too if I do say so myself! Thanks to Kelly for that one!

Happy happy birthday to you!

2009-03-17T09:49:00.000-07:00

Your birthday prize today is a selection of pictures of the boys during the last couple of months! Your card from me is in the mail with prize. I love you!

While Jerdan and Layton were in AZ Porter and I played clay and learned our colors. Porter would tease me and say the wrong color and start cracking up!

Jerdan, Layton, Garron, and I have pillow fights and games at night after the babies are in bed, and they were showing off their muscles!

Porter applied lipgloss when I wasn't looking, and he thought it was terrific.

Happy Birthday Mom!

2009-03-17T09:37:00.000-07:00

The boys wanted to make you cards to post on the blog for your happy birthday! This is the card Layton made for you. Everything about this card was his idea and design.

This is the inside of Jerdan's card. He also had specific requests about what the card should say and how it should look!
This is the front of Jerdan's card. he inked and stamped everything himself!

beware!

2009-01-08T20:12:00.000-08:00

The pictures below will have more meaning if you put your curser over the slide picture to see the caption!

Some favorite holiday moments

2009-01-08T20:10:00.001-08:00

Art

2008-11-24T19:44:00.000-08:00

Oh, I forgot to post the picture that Jerdan drew as a gift for Dad during finals. We were all thinking of nice things we could do for Garron, and Jerdan drew this picture of Garron(the dentist) and his patient spitting water into the sink! The rectangles on the top are the lights. What a cute little boy. Garron loved his picture, and requested that I put it on the blog.

Porter poops!

2008-11-24T19:38:00.000-08:00

Porter pooped a couple of days ago for the first time! I had put him on the toilet before just for fun, but nothin happened, so when I knew he had to go I put him on the pot, and wha-la! There was so much cheering, and I gave Porter so many "huckers" to reward him. He also pooped again today! Yay - I never knew a bowel movement could be so exciting!

Layton's new trick!

2008-11-24T19:35:00.000-08:00

Layton taught Jerdan how to do this cool new trick at bed time. They were laughing so hard!

Some days you just want to scream, but you smile and laugh instead!

2008-11-24T19:30:00.000-08:00

I woke up to find my glasses lying on the bathroom floor with one of the lenses popped out, and one of the earpieces torn off. One of the boys stole them from off of my dresser. Now when I need to wear them at night I have to hold them up or else they go crooked and fall off of my face! Rediculous!

Paxton's first tooth!

2008-11-24T19:28:00.000-08:00

I know you can't even see it, but it's his bottom right tooth, and it's tradition to take a picture like that!

Jerdan's talents for the week

2008-11-24T19:14:00.001-08:00

Jerdan also drew a picture of arial the mermaid, and learned how to do a handstand this week! He begs to play "old maid" every day, and he tries to get all of the immodest matches. He thinks he is so funny!

Things we did this past week, waiting for the drywall guy to call back!

2008-11-24T18:43:00.000-08:00

So I found the picture that Jerdan drew of the immodest girl from his dream. How funny is that?

November 10th at 3:30 in the afternoon

2008-11-14T16:18:00.000-08:00

Our first snow!

2008-11-14T16:17:00.001-08:00

For my number one fan. You know who you are!

2008-11-12T11:42:00.000-08:00

artwork description

2008-11-09T16:18:00.000-08:00

This picture is of Grandma Bushman (on the left) with 10 points, and Jerdan (on the right) with 43 points! He is such a good little artist. If I can find it, I'm going to post the picture he drew of the immodest girl that was in his dream a few nights ago - it's pretty much the funniest picture I've ever seen!

Jerdan's artwork

2008-11-09T16:12:00.000-08:00

Beautiful Day!

2008-11-09T14:28:00.001-08:00

Last week Jerdan came into my room in the morning and said "Mom, come look out my window, it's a beautiful day outside today! He was so enthused that I went into their room expecting to see something unique out of the window, but it looked no different than any other day. I said "What do you see that is beautiful?" Jerdan said "The sky is beautiful. What do you sink (think) is beautiful Mom?" I told him that I liked how the sun hit the leaves on the trees. Every morning since that day, Jerdan and Layton tell me that it's a beautiful day again today, and I find them both sitting on the dresser looking out the window and talking to each other about what they see. It is so sweet.

How do we fix this?

2008-11-09T13:54:00.000-08:00

So we have more drama at the Belnap household. Last Thursday night what started with one clogged toilet upstairs turned into two

clogged toilets, two tubs filled with black water, and then water leaking through our kitchen ceiling and flooding the floors! The plumber came in the middle of the night and fixed the clogs, but what do we do with our sagging kitchen ceiling? Well, Jerdan has been wanting the guy who fixes the houses(Tye from extreme makeover) to come fix our house, but we always tell him that our house is fine, so when Garron got up Friday morning Jerdan said

"hey Dad, look at that hole - I told you our house was falling down"! When I got up that morning, the boys had the solution to all of our plumbing problems!

Jerdan: "I know how to fix our wall"

Layton: "Put tape on it"

Jerdan: "No, we're going to cut out the paper and then put tape

on it"

Layton: "But we couldn't reach the roof. Hey, we could call the

building guys who build the houses and then we were gonna ask them if they have a ladder to touch the roof!"

These have to be the cutest boys in all the land! They always keep me laughing in the most miserable situations. So, we didn't think that paper and tape would hold our ceiling together very well, so after talking to some plumbers and drywall guys, I decided to cut a hole in the ceiling myself to dry it out and save some money. Next we are going to have some professionals put up new drywall. I can't wait, because the smells that are coming from that hole are just not right! Maybe we need the guys who build the house to come over after all!

My little trick or treaters!

2008-11-06T16:17:00.001-08:00

A moment of clarity

2008-11-03T18:42:00.000-08:00

As most of you know, I have been in melt-down mode for months now trying to deal with my life with four boys in it. Tonight when I was tucking the boys into bed, I had all of them together around the bunk beds while I was singing them songs and playing. Jerdan and Layton were talking with Paxton and making him laugh like nobody else can, and it hit me so hard that my Paxton needs to be here on earth right now because of the conection he has with his brothers. Nobody can make his face light up like they can. I had to explain to Jerdan and Layton that my tears were happy tears, and that they make me so happy. I am so grateful that Paxton is part of our family. Right now he is learning how to sit up!

Halloween Highlights

2008-10-31T12:55:00.000-07:00

Halloween is in my top three favorite holidays. I love watching the boys get excited about dressing up. Jerdan and Layton are still so into Mario and Luigi, and they feel so important in their "moostaches"! I finally caved and bought a costume for Porter that matched his personality perfectly. He's a skunk that says "lil stinker" on the behind! He felt so special when we first put the costume on him, and gave him so much attention. Paxton is a peanut, and he hates his costume. My friends Kelly and Kristi threw an awesome Halloween party which is where many of the slide show pictures were from. Garron made an awesome John Mcain, and Kristen happened to show up as Sarah Palen! We had such a fun night. Jerdan had me roaring at the donut eating contest. He was laughing so hard. Layton tried to eat the donut twice, and then yanked it down with his hands. Porter just went around stuffing his cute, chubby little face!

2008-10-31T12:51:00.000-07:00

Things I did not get done while blogging

2008-10-30T20:56:00.000-07:00

packing away Halloween, dishes

This is all your fault Kristy!

2008-10-30T19:46:00.000-07:00

I am going to be hooked on blogging, and it's all your fault Kristi! This girl ignored all my protests, and set me up a blog so we can keep in touch. I love it, and it is so cute, and fun, but I think my next post is going to be pictures of all the things I'm not getting done while I'm trying to figure out how to get everything set up!