Marcus and the Tooth Fairy

Dear Dallan, June 28th 2009

Well we have passed the summer solstice and the days are officially getting shorter. But it still is not dark until after 10:00. You may or may not have noticed the change in the length of the days as close as you are to the equator, but I’ll tell you what the birds singing good morning songs right outside my bedroom window at 5 minutes to 4:00am are a mean thing to do to a pregnant woman who has a hard time sleeping in the first place! I will be very grateful for the days when the sun don’t come up until eight!
Marcus has officially passed out of babyhood. Yes, I know he is six and a half , but this week he lost his first tooth. And then the next day lost another one. The tooth fairy of course botched up a visit the first night. And we had to think up a good story about how Marcus, who had slept on the couch, was not in HIS bed and so the Tooth fairy could not find him, and so would find him when he was asleep in the right bed. The Two dollars that appeared beneath Marcus pillow the second night was awesome in his opinion and he hoped that maybe the tooth fairy might have accidentally left his tooth and he could fool the said fairy into another visit. Always thinking it through those kids. Marcus was quite horrified when I told him about my first tooth losing experience and how my Dad had helped me get my first tooth out and Dad pulled out the wrong one! Jon managed to pull out the right ones on the right days and thus earned a gold star. But I think Marcus will steer clear of Grandpa helping him get any teeth out after I related my story. (Don’t worry Dad I don’t hold it against you, it just makes for a really great story. And the wrong tooth was lose anyway.)
The weather in true Idaho form changed just like that! We have had Sun all week. Although on Friday the south end of Pocatello got pounded with 2 inches of rain and hail. We just got some clouds over here in Chubbuck. I guess that is one of the reasons Pocatello is rated in the top 10 for the most extreme weather. The sun has done wonders for the gardens. My Tomatoes plants, remember I have like 30 of them, really jumped this week and the first rows of corn we planted are now taller than my knee. And the rows we planted later are all pushing up. We have watermelon plants coming up and the cucumbers that had to be replanted are making their appearances as well. We even have Zucchini! (lock your doors at church, It is zucchini season) We have been nibbling at the peas. Now those are yummy! The best is of course the radishes. On Saturday I decided that we would harvest all of the radishes and replant that bed in spices and herbs like dill and basil. So I had all of the kids go out with me and instructed them to start pulling up radishes, and Stiles pulled one up, that no joke, was as big as a softball! For a second I thought maybe we had planted a turnip! All of the other radishes were close in size to a quarter but this one was ginormous! If it was closer to the fair we would have entered it for the biggest radish. But instead we are planning to cut it up and put a little ranch salad dressing on it, and eating it!
Hunter is trying to kill himself I swear! First he knocked the dresser on himself which you heard about last week and then this week I had to do the Heimlich on him. Actually it was one of those, “I know that the Lord was looking out for my family moments” I needed to start dinner and usually that meant that I would have gone down stairs and stood in my pantry and stared at the shelves wondering what I should fix and then I probably would have changed the laundry and poked my head into Stiles room to check and make sure that indeed he did not put away his clean clothes again, but just dumped them in a pile behind the door. Well I just felt like I needed to NOT go downstairs, that I just needed to stay in the kitchen and continue to clean up. And I just stayed there, and stayed there, and stayed there, and the kitchen was getting quite clean. And then I heard Hunter gag and sputter. He was in the living room and had put two nuts, the kind that screw onto bolts, into his mouth. Well of course he was laying down on his back and the one got caught behind the other one and fell back into his throat. I ran over, he wasn’t blue or anything but I knew that he needed help immediately. And since I am a mom I picked him up and carried him over into my kitchen so that he would not throw up all over my carpet. Once I had him safely over the linoleum and I was sure that now a barfing mess would be not so bad, I proceeded to give his stomach a shove. I could hear the bolts dislodge, and then I hit him on the back to get them to rattle out of his mouth and onto the floor. He did not throw up, by the way, but I did have to wipe up a bunch of saliva off of my kitchen floor, and was glad that it was not a bunch of drool in my carpet. Later I realized my blessing in delaying making dinner. If I had gone downstairs, I would not have known that he was in trouble. Truly the Lord has a work for that little guy of mine to do.
William will turn the ripe old age of 1 on Friday. We are looking forward to cake and ice cream and perhaps a BBQ dinner followed by a whole day of festivities the following day. I think the city has even planned some fireworks for the occasion. I know they shot some off last year when he was born. I honestly don’t know how they got the celebration together so fast!
Jon has been busy breaking our horse Mac this week and Mac has put on a pretty good rodeo some days, but for the most part he is a pretty calm gentle horse and is learning very fast.
Stiles has been helping milk the goats with Jon in the morning and getting quite good at it. Jon is starting to take Marcus out as well so that he can learn, but so far Marcus hasn’t quite figured it out yet.
Erica has almost grown all of her hair back that Stiles cut off last summer. I don’t think anybody besides myself could tell that last year she was sporting a very ugly mullet. But it is a delight to have a daughter with hair again. Even if she has some very strong ideas of how her hair should be. Two weeks ago she refused to let me do her hair for church and did it all by herself. She attended church with a headband, 4 different barrettes and her hair in a clip pulled back into something that looked like a pony tail. I was in agony but I still sat by her, and she was as pleased as punch with her “beautiful” hairdo.
The church is true. President Monson is our prophet today. Prayer is a wonderful blessing from our father in heaven. Work hard, the field is growing white.

Lots of love. Monica and her pack of wild monkeys!

Pictures of my Frankenstien

So I know I never post pictures but I love when other people do. Here are a few pictures of Hunter and his Stitches 3 days after the fact. He looks so much better than he did on Sunday!



Yes, I am stupid and don't know how to turn pictures the right way!


Here is one of William after he had managed to get his fingers in the butter. He got his fingers pretty deep into the butter.


Stiles Baptism pictures
Jon and Stiles look so nice! I just love my boys! Can you believe that my baby Stiles is a grown up 8-year old!?!


And I love this stairstep picture of my kids. and yes I am counting my belly as one of the steps!


Hope you enjoyed laughing at my Hunter! You got to read about it and now you have seen it!

10 years of Marriage!!!

Dear Dallan, June 22 2009

So much has happened this week that I am not sure I will be able to do any of it justice. We will start with some of the main highlights and see where it take us.
First of all today is Jon and I’s 10 year Wedding anniversary. And wouldn’t you know it I woke up Puking this morning and Erica was sick all yesterday and last night. So our dinner and date plans have be cancelled to be rescheduled for a later date. Go figure! That is what life is like. But all in all I think that we just might be able to do the whole eternity thing especially if we can continue to look at the bigger picture. I honestly can’t believe that the Woodin’s have continued the put up with me this long, and it is a well known secret that my family gave Jon the 10 cows to take me off of their hands. (and then he gave me back for an 18 month stint, but that is beside the point). I am grateful that he continues to put up with me despite my ever increasing demands for things like a maid, a cook, a nanny, a butler, a gardener, a secretary, a chauffer and so forth. Of course he is sure that he is already paying for all of those things with every last penny he has ever made and the whole eternity thing. I am pretty sure that the maid, cook, and nanny that he keeps on telling me he has already hired are substandard and that she needs some real professional help! Jon keeps on telling me to give her some time and she will come around and get the jobs done right. He has so much faith in his household employees. I’ll tell you what if they worked for his siding business he would have told them to take a hike a long time ago! But honestly if 10 years ago someone would have told me about the 5 kids and the one on the way and the mortgage and the minivan and the deployment and the doctors bill I am not sure whether I would have turn around and run away, or put in a stupid grin and said “bring it on.” But now that I am in it and since the next ten years involves raising teenagers and drivers licenses and a billion pine wood derby cars, I think I will just put on a stupid grin and say “Bring it on.” After all what else can I do at this point!?!
Hunter decided that since it was Sunday and Fathers day to boot that he ought to do something extra exciting- you know just to stir things up a bit. So After breakfast Jon and I had crawled back Into bed to take a midmorning nap before church. Erica came into the room all upset and said something about Hunter getting dressed and I dismissed it and told he that he would be fine. Then she really bursts into tears and Said “No, Mom Hunter knocked the dresser down on top of himself again!” That got me bolt upright and I raced down to check oh him. And sure enough he had pulled the dresser down on top of himself, AGAIN! only this time the dresser had managed to hit him on the face and split him open across his nose right between his eyes. There was quite a bit of blood all over him. I called for Jon informing him that we were going to have to see a doctor and started digging Hunter out from under the dresser. Jon called our trusty bishop and we ran over to his house to have him take a look at it. Their daughter Mckenna, who is Marcus’ age, opened the door and just about fell over when she saw Hunter and the bloody mess that his face was. So then Bishop Thayne who has 6 daughters and no sons said to us, when he saw Hunter, “I’m telling you guys, GIRLS! You just don’t have this kind of problem with girls.” Then we went to his Doctors office and Hunter was a trooper and let our Bishop put 5 stitches across the bridge of his nose and close up his “third eye.” So you have to imagine my Hunter who looks like he has had the worse case of Chicken pox in history and has mosquito bites all over his face which he constantly digs at and make them into big bleeding sores and now he has Frankenstein stitches right between his eyes… Well I really do not want to take him out in public because I know that people are going to call child protection on me. When we got back home and were getting ready for Church it became apparent that Erica was running a fever and was sick so Jon doing the Fatherly thing on Fathers day “Volunteered” to stay home from church with Frankenstein and Erica and I even left William with him. So that is how fathers day went at our house, aside from the amazing rain storm that blew threw, knocked out the power, and shook the church house! It was all in all a pretty quite day at the Woodin Nickel.
So speaking of Sick, I am sick today, Erica was sick all yesterday and is still feverish today. William has been on and of with a light fever all week. Jon stayed in bed all day on Thursday, and I put myself to bed a few times on Friday with feverish symptoms. I stayed up with Hunter until 4:30 am one night this week. He was complaining about his ears. And I am convinced that he has wax blocking his ears. I was using some ear wax Softening drops in his ears and trying to remove the blockage myself, with the promise to myself that if I couldn’t get anything to come out that I would take him to the doctor the first of this week and have the doctor check it out. Well now that he looks like Frankenstein I might just wait until the stitches come out before hauling him in. but them again it might be better to get all of the torture to my son done in one fell swoop.
This week I heard through the grape vine that Libbie was praising my humorous writing ability and that Aunt Leslie made the Comment back that I didn’t have to look far for writing material, “after all I was raising Wolves!” I have been laughing ever since. I know that my kids have given me great material but I never considered them to be like wolves. I compared them to be something more like hyenas. On some days it was closer to monkeys. But I think Aunt Leslie is right, Raising my children is like raising a pack of Wolves!
Anyway It continued to Rain every single day this week. That is three weeks straight with rain every single day. And Seattle has gone for 28 consecutive days without measurable rainfall. Go figure. I guess we swapped locations for the month. Or maybe it is just one of those Signs of the times you hear about in Sunday school class. Mom and Dad Drove home from Florida across the heartland in the worst week of all time for Tornados. 77 were reported this last week and wouldn’t you know it Mom and Dad and Garrett missed every single one. I was going crazy following the weather on the internet and knowing that my parents were somewhere out in it. But the Lord was watching out for those old folks of ours and they made it back all in one piece.
Stiles picked and ate the first peas out of our garden I really wanted to demand tax from his pea pod but it was from a pea plant that he himself planted in the green house and then transplanted outside and put a trellis up by it, and watered, and took care of so I let him eat all 5 little peas. But it made me wish for a split second that Dad still grew peas and we could all go out and sit in the pea patch and eat ourselves sick. The pea pod fights were definitely the best. But I am afraid that you would be to young to remember when we use to do that. It makes me sad that you would have been to small to remember the fights and the awesomeness of the when the great big Pea viners would pull into the fields and, in what seemed like a miracle to a little child who struggled to open the pods one by one and eat the little guys, just ripped up all of the peas and opened up all those little pods and them dumped the peas into a great big truck. It always smelled gross though when they were all done. So maybe it is okay that you do not remember when Dad used to grow peas.
I am finally in a count down stage of my pregnancy. I have 11 weeks to my due date. Laura is considerably closer, and I am waiting for a call from Dan the Man any day. Crystal and Cody are in their count downs as well. And they all have much less to count down than I do. The hardest part is that when I weighed in at my last doctors appointment the darn liar of a scale showed that I am weighing as much as I did when I delivered Stiles and Marcus! NO wonder I feel like I am ready to be done already! So I asked my doctor what I could do to make the next 3 months go by really fast. He suggested that I stay busy. I laughed and said with 5 other kids at home, I was thinking more like checking into a spa! He said that I could do that if I really wanted to. Jon said it sounded like a great idea and that we could set one up here at the Woodin Nickel and other men could send their tried cranky pregnant wives to the ranch and we could charge a ton of money and feed them and let them lay around and whine. I said I am not taking care of a bunch a pregnant woman! He made some comment about how if other women were like me when they were pregnant he was sure it was a golden business opportunity and husband would pay top dollar to be rid of their cranky wives for the last bit of pregnancy. I think he is due for some TLC eventually for putting up with pregnant me for the better part of the last 10 years. But he should put up with cranky old me. It is HIS fault I am in this ever expanding body situation in the first place!
So I hope you have bee entertained at our expense once again The funniest thing Erica said this week was… I had asked her “what we girls were going to do with all of these boys?” and without missing a beat and with a twinkle in her eye and a sadistic sound to her voice said “Have them for Lunch!”
The church is true. Joseph Smith was a true prophet of God. He Saw The Father and the Son in the Sacred Grove and restored this church to the fullness of the Gospel. We Pray for you always.

Marcus wants you to know that of all of his Uncles he misses you the most.

Love Monica and her Pack of Wolves!

Erica said...

I asked Erica "What are we girls going to do with all of these Boys!?!"

Erica said with a delighted smile an sparkle in her eyes "Have them for Lunch!"

RAIN, BARF, & GOATS

Dallan JUNE 15 2009 11: 51pm

So pregnancy has me at the computer at midnight because my body is in a total warp zone and doesn’t know how to get out of it for at least 3 more months. No honestly I was sleeping until my pregnant body kicked me out of bed and then tried to throw up on itself. So now that I have had a midnight bowl of honey nut cheerios and I am still trying to get a very nasty taste out of my mouth I realize that it is almost Tuesday and I have neglected my brother and all of my other avid readers! So I will let you know about my week and you will sit and waste your time reading about it in hopes that there is something great to read about. There isn’t. But don’t let that stop you, come to think of it, It has never stopped you before.
We had a royal barfing party this week. Everybody was fighting for their turn with the toilet. I was even pushing people out of the way for my chance to pay homage to the indoor plumbing gods. Magically the amount of laundry was not staggering. Most midnight barfing episodes made it into the carefully placed bedside barf buckets and the unwanted dinner menu that did make it onto the sheets did not make it onto the floor as well. So need less to say we had a stomach bug go through here. And No I did not food poison anybody, at least not on purpose. Hunter, and Jon were sick a full 24 hours before the rest of us decided to join in their game. And no I don’t think we had the swine flu. My house may look like pigs live here but we don’t allow that kind of riffraff at our house.
We were so excited we had just about finished weaning the baby goat, “stew” off of his mother “Chocolate” and Chocolate was giving us about a gallon a day! “which is awesome for a goat, in case you did or did not care.” And then on Saturday Morning we found her in a big bloody mess out in the yard. Something, we think coyotes or more likely wild dogs, perhaps a big wooden badger, came out and got a hold of her and killed her. We were not happy about this set back in our self -reliance program. Our cheep milk just got very expensive, just when we figured in two months we would pay off our initial investment. So we did what any stupid self reliant person would have done and checked the internet and found a new milking goat, drove to the Preston area, forked over some more of the green stuff ( no I am not talking about hay or grass) and drug a new goat with her two KID goats to the Woodin Nickel. The momma has not been milked before and we did the mean thing and took away her KIDS immediately and started taking all of her milk for ourselves. We should right, I mean it is OUR grass and weeds that she is eating and turning into milk, we should get some of the spoils.
This week It has continued to rain, and rain A LOT! I even told Jon that I don’t remember moving to Seattle! We have enjoyed the blessing of not worrying about the water and the garden is growing great. I have moved every plant out of the green house this week with the exception of about 20 tomato plants. I keep looking for a good home for them but, Nobody seems to want them. I have already planted 30 plants of my own and do not need more to try to weed around or harvest. So now my flower barrels are full of flowering plants and my vegetable gardens are eagerly waiting for the law of the harvest to take place. My kids are thrilled that the radishes are ready to pick already, and have been crunching on them even though they make their little mouths “HOT”. There are pea pods on the vines that look like you could pick them by this weekend and enjoy a very yummy green treat. And Stiles picked a strawberry today and brought it in to me so I could watch him eat it before I had the chance to demand my tax on the product. But don’t be disillusioned by this report. There are thistle getting bigger and pokier with every rainfall. And I have seen some pretty good sized dandelion plants on the premises. I try to put down some weed killing chemicals but it keeps on raining and it is hard to time it right so that I can kill weeds at the same time the sun is shinning.
So my week has thus been summed up for you. Rain, barf, and a dead goat. Oh and Jon caught that gopher that alluded him for quite some time. Now that the clock has officially made it past the midnight hour I might add a quick Happy Birthday to MOM who turned 29 again this year. She will spend the day riding in a car back from Florida on her Birthday. I hope she has a good day! Oh and do you have any idea how hard this week was on me with Mom driving to Florida with MJ, AND Camille on a family Vacation for the week! I mean I have had nobody to talk to! FOR DAYS! I had to talk to Jon and my kids! At least Camille is home now and I can have my hour long conversation with her again.
We love you very much and are proud of you and your example to others.

Love from the Woodin Nickels!

Stiles Baptism

Dear Dallan, and all you other people,
First I must tell MJ that the best laid plans of mice and men often fall flat on their face (or something like that) I hope the rest of your moving plan works out great and that it was great to have Seth for Stiles baptism- Thanks for arranging that before you left.
Last Week I wrote about William’s eating a rock. Well we watched and waited and waited and watched and never saw the golden nugget. On top of the rock Will cut two teeth this week and we had a flu rip through our house. (Stiles was the other Victim) Jon was victimized by holding the puking William and was covered in the puke. I was Victimized by being woken up (yes I was actually asleep for a few minutes) in the middle of the night and was told that Stiles “didn’t make it to the bathroom in time” and the carpet was in need of some attention. Anyway Back to William my happy little guy was very content to cry, fuss, fever and, just lay there, and look like death all week long. Thursday night I asked Jon and his Dad to give Will a blessing and they did and then Friday rolled around and in the middle of Stiles Birthday Party we realized that William was covered in a hive like rash! After a million 7-8 year olds were chased out of my house I proceeded to put William in a bath so as to maybe help with his rash and I noticed that his diaper had something in it that could have been blood. So about then I really wigged out a little bit. Jon calmed me down and suggested we wait until William’s next diaper which I agreed too. In the mean time it was Friday evening and of course all of the Doctor’s offices were “No longer seeing anyone today” So we decided that it didn’t matter if we waited longer or not. If we decided to take him in it would have to be to the Hospital and we would have to Pay for an ER visit. So about 7 that evening Jon’s Mother came to watch the kids and Jon and I took William to the ER. And They X-rayed him and took his blood and checked his Poop and Pee and then they said “HE is fine! Just something Viral, You can give him Tylenol, Motrin, and Benadryall if you feel like it.” So we know that there is no Rock blocking anything inside my little guy and then the next day like magic because he was told he wasn’t sick anymore William perked up started eating again and playing and generally being a happy and playful kid.
I have told my kids that they may have a “friends” birthday party when they are 8, 12, and 16. So since Friday was the magic day for Stiles, We passed out invitations to two handfuls of kids in our ward and neighborhood. We planned on a yard sprinkler game party. Well it decided to rain cats and dogs and the temperatures took a dive. I had many calls from all the mommies wondering if they should send their Kiddos in swimsuits or not. I assured them that the Hot tub was part of the plan and to send their sweet babies with suits and towels. So we threw somewhere around 16 kids into the hot tub and let them jump in and out. Nanette was kind enough to bring her HUGE slip-n-slide and the rain kept coming from the sky. The Kids jumped in and out of the tub a billion times and you had better believe they dumped out half of the water and added enough dirt, grass and leaves to start a small garden. But after an hour we routed them out and sent inside for presents and cake. As soon as the presents were opened the sun came out- of course and I handed everyone a popsicle and sent them out side to wait for their mommies. 15 minutes later the party was over and I made Stiles sit down and write thank you cards. - He did not think that part was very fun and wondered why the birthday boy would be subjected to such torture. But after sitting on him and threatening to take away every one of his very cool gifts he relented and wrote in very bad handwriting thank you cards to the kids who attended his party. I know I am teaching him some thing- Like sitting on someone will get you the results you asked for.
Stiles Baptism the next morning was lovely and I am thankful to all those who made the efforts to be there and support him on his special day. The grub everyone brought was yummy too. And we stuffed ourselves in anticipation of fasting the next day. I was so proud of Stiles on Sunday when he chose to try and fast. Even though he thought He might starve to death 10 minutes after he decided to try and fast he managed to wait until after church before eating. He did get a piece of gum during Sacrament meeting and I think that helped him out.
The Mosquitoes are still out in force but the rain has kept them from biting too much if you go outside in the down pour. We had rain all last week and are suppose to receive another week full of rain. Jon has been grumbling about it since He finally got the irrigation system running and now he has not been able to use it after he spent all that time and effort on it. I am celebrating that the answer to prayers for moisture are making crops all over the area grow like weeds and the weeds are growing too. But we know how to deal with those guys! Oh the downpour/hailstorm that Camille mentioned was not as spectacular when it hit us at the Woodin Nickel but If I didn’t know how cool it was in Blackfoot I would have to tell you that it was a very violent and ferocious rain, hail, windstorm! They even did the sever weather alerts on the TV and Radio and we were all suppose to watch for Tornado type motion in the clouds. Jon was out in it trying frantically to help our neighbors get some couches they had outside -to the dryer insides of their house. When he came back he looked like he had just gotten out of the shower with all of his clothes on!
Well I think I have filled you in on all of the dumb things that have been going on here and no nothing was truly great and funny and maybe nothing worth reporting except that Stiles got baptized and now he is accountable for himself. - I hope that Jon and I have taught him enough to get him to were he needs to go.
We love you and pray for you always. Today Erica prayed that “Uncle Dallan will travel home safely on Hunters Birthday.” (FEB 10) So we will be planning a homecoming/ birthday party for you and Hunter

Love The Woodin Nickel Bunch.