TRICK or TREAT

I love Halloween! I mean I REALLY LOVE Halloween!!
Obviously it has become an economic cash cow but the reason I love it is because I love seeing my kids get excited about who they get to be! I love finding things that get us a little scared! I love finding something beautiful in things that are a bit macabre :)
I told Justus that I think if I were a teenager now, I probably would have been Emo. I'm a fan of color and pattern but there's something about Halloween that draws me into its dismal nature. I think its wonderful to promote creativity and imagination. And I think it's really important for my kids to find beauty in things that may not be considered traditionally "beautiful".
These are some of the things we LOVE about Halloween!This year our highlights were going to Aunt Karie and Uncle Randy's annual Halloween Bash. It was fabulous as always and has become one of the kids favorite family traditions.

like mother, like daughter :)

It's actually a family affair - me, aunt Teena, Ima, mom

Aunt Teena & Sofia

Marsha and cutie patootie Mia

Lola and her millions of grandkids (minus Cooper and Chasey)

Since Koa was a little turtle, the boys decided they wanted to be Mario and Luigi. Dax vascillated back and forth between being baby Luigi & baby mario - ultilmately Baby Mario won :). I was a little late in shopping so we ended up making our own. The boys LOVED that (despite it wasn't exact as Kai was very firm in pointing out). It ended up saving me like $60!! So next year, I think we will be making more of our own :)

Ahhhhhh, the trick to getting Rex to smile in pictures is to tell him to act like he loves that darling little ladybug Mia

Karie always has such awesome food and treats. This is my favorite! Uncle Randy got out of line ....... can you blame her? He tasted good anyways :)

Our very manly little KoaMy favorite - Karie's homemade cheese dip

Dad and our little turtle Koa

Tinkerbell Maya!! (One of three costumes this halloween :) We tried spraying her hair yellow but it ended up looking flourescent green..... oh well, it all worked out :)

And another tradition that has been developing, is trick or treating with our awesome neighbors! Everyone came out with the kiddies and trick or treated around the circle. Then we loaded up into Dallas & Arlynn's truck. And I mean EVERYONE!! The Brothersons, Oldhams, Barkers, her sister Lindsay, the Diaz's and both sets of Lawrence's! There were literally 30 parents and kids, in and around the truck as Dallas drove us around the ward. It was sooooo much fun :)


i




The final tradition, a trip to Lola's for some yummy Sinagang and a chance to check out all the cousins costumes. I love how our family is growing. Conner is getting older and more and more babies keep coming! This year we were joined by Mia and baby Koa :) Wonder who is waiting to join us.......

In matching "I Love my Mummy" shirts - I couldn't resist! I just love cheesy logo'ed shirts! Especially when they are on clearance :)

I adore that sweet little Kallie enjoys my ridiculous halloween decorations - she was walking all around talking and visiting with this creepy skull :)

"I wish my eyes looked like poo"

Dax was asking what color his eyes were. I told him they were green, he said
"no mom you are WRONG, they are brown!"
I tried to talk him into the fact that they were hazel, when Te chimed in,
"I wish my eyes were Brown, like the color of POO!"
I said,
"Te, you have such nice blue eyes, why would you want them to look like poo??"
"Because I hate when ladies always say 'ohhhh you have such BEAUTIFUL eyes'!!"
I just wanted to be sure I have proof that I know one day you are going to LOVE that the ladies like looking into your BEAUTIFUL blue eyes :)
That's how dad got me suckered in..... ;)

Happy HaLLowEen!!!

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the kids doing The Monster Mash

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Gabriel iKoamano

oh yeah, we had a baby recently ;)

Yes, I'd like to officially announce on our sadly neglected blog (primarily due to this sweet little thing) that our family has increased in size, love, and chaos :D

welcoming Baby Koa
born July 29, 2009
8:30pm
6 lbs 10 oz
19 inches

We have always named each of the kids after various family members. I don't know, I guess I just feel that there are different things you give to your children from the moment they are conceived, from before you even get to know them. You give them their genes, their heritage and you give them a name. I just felt that to pick a random name, seems so general. I just want the name to be something we can tell them about later.

GABRIEL

This is from my little (well I guess not so little anymore since he's taller than Justus) cousin Gabe. We've always had a soft spot for Gabe. I was babysitting him since he was a baby - one summer aunt cindy even flew me out to come and watch him in sunnyvale (that was sooooo exciting for me at the time) and then when Justus and I were dating we'd take Gabe, Jasmine and Leah around with us all the time. Once we were married they spent many weeks while they were off track down with us and Baby Kai in St. George. We love Gabe and we loved the name :)

iKOAMANO
Yeah, you got that right - that is a lower case "i" at the beginning of his middle name.....just like an iPod or an iPhone.....yep :)
OK so our poor little baby was nameless right up until 15 minutes before we left a 3 day stay at the hospital. This turned out to be the perfect example of how opposites attract because Justus and I couldn't have been further apart on name choices. From the time we found out I was pregnant we had hotly debated what his name would be. Justus tend to lean more towards video game names (like Halo!!) and movie names (Vin, Neo, etc) where as I preferred just really cool names ;).
So while at the hospital we decided to throw out to the Facebook world what names we were debating. It was a lot of fun to have our friends from all over the country help chime in on a name for our new little guy. It seemed appropriate as everyone in the Facebook world saw pictures of the baby before my parents did who were in the waiting room because Justus was uploading images IN THE OPERATING ROOM!! (it was kind of funny because people thought it was me since he was doing it from my phone :)

These are some of the names we had on the table:

Ace
Jett
Jag (my fave)
Taj
Koa
Rok
Ash
Mano

And then uncle Dallas came to the rescue with the suggestion of Koa. I really liked that and the more I looked at this sweet little kid, it fit. So with the help of our good friend Auntie Sandie we came to a decision.
His middle name is:
i - (like an iPhone ;)
KOA - which is Hawaiian for "warrior"
MANO - which is Hawaiian for "shark"

So our little iPhone, shark warrior finally has a name!

I was hoping for KoaMalu - which is peaceful warrior but to be honest, I was just happy to leave with a name and even happier to leave with this ADORABLE new addition to our family.




welcome to the wacky bunch!!

KAI'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY

I went to Kai's IEP for this school year. What a wonderful team they have! And what an amazing blessing to have so many people involved in helping our little Kai to succeed. He loves going to see each of his teachers and by the comments they make, you can see how much they care and love him.
His teacher Miss Poole is helping him write his first autobiography. It has been a struggle helping him to express his thoughts in writing (well we are working on that with him verbally too:) So reading this was such a treat! Love the insight it provides into our sweet, unique little guy.

KAI's AUTOBIOGRAPHY

(as written by Kai)
My name is Kai.
I was born March 24, 1999 in St. George, UT.
I am the oldest in my family. I have 3 brothers named Te Dax and Koe and I have 1 sister named Maya. My favorite video games are Sonic Unleashed and Super Mario Galaxy. My favorite place to go is Disneyland. My favorite t.v. show is Tom and Jerry. I like it because it is funny. When I grow up I want to work at Wendys. Then I can make lots of money so I can buy special stuff for my kids if they do a perfect job in class. Another job I want is when my sister is having a baby I will help her get the baby out. I used to have 3 pet hermit-crabs but they died. I like walk my neighbors dog Buddy. And finally I like to play the x-box 360 and the wii.

Now I don't know how Maya feels about having her brother help deliver her babies but I definitely would rather the Doctor option over the Wendy's worker option :)
LOVE this little boy!!

Get RID of them

BACK TO SCHOOL 2009

After getting the kids off to school, I asked Dax at lunch "do you miss the kids or are you happy to get rid of them?" His response (with a smirk) "get rid of them!"
Wow!! Where did summer go??? It's amazing how quickly life zooms by :) But it was nice to see how excited they were to get back to school (even when Te's favorite shirt screams "allergic to homework"). They were up and at it with the first beep of the alarm.
I'm not domestic, really in any sense of the word. I don't take huge pleasure from doing the everyday house things :). I think every mother brings something unique and special to their children. Some are great homemakers, patient teachers, or wonderful cooks. I think oftentimes as parents we try and give our kids the things we felt that we "didn't have" or at least I do :). My mom was busy working to help support her family so she generally wasn't able to attend our school activities or serve as a room mom. So I have always tried to be sure to attend their activities and parties at school. But something my mom always took special care with is feeding us. As a kid, I just thought that was annoying. I definitely was her toughest critique. She had to work to get me to eat, if I didn't like it, I just wouldn't eat and I remember sitting at the table for hours refusing to eat the vegetables and food that I was supposed to. Finally my mom would give up and clear off the table.
It really wasn't until I was an adult that I realized how much she showed she loved us through her food. I always thought that Filipino food was amazing until I went to the Philippines. Don't get me wrong, the food was... good, but what I found was amazing was my mom's cooking. I realized how much she had to americanize, well actually "katrina-ize" things for me to eat it!
So this year I tried to be sure to give them some of the things that she gave me. I felt great this morning because I feel like this is the first time that I've really given them the kind of "back to school" experience they needed. We got ready for bed early, talked about what their goals were and then this morning made sure we all got up on time and to a French Toast and Bacon breakfast. Te was so excited and asked "will you do an end of year breakfast too??" Poor kid gets fed by me so infrequently that he's just excited for this to happen one more time in the next 9 months :) It made me feel good and it reminded me how much I love the way my mom loves me.

We decided to switch them to the early 8am time vs the 9:15. Anyone who knows us, knows that we (and when I say we, I mostly mean ME) are not really morning people. So this is a stretch for us but we decided that this was the best way for Justus to see the kids more. We are so grateful for the karate school and to have work at this time but part of that work is that he is gone all afternoon and evening, so he doesn't really get any after school time with the kids. We felt this way, he would have an hour with them before he went to work.
I was so happy to hear Maya say this morning "I'm so excited for school! I'm excited to make new friends! I made so many friends last year :)" This had me thrilled because she forgot that at the beginning of last school year she would came home crying that she didn't have any friends or anyone to play with at lunch. Which of course breaks any mother's heart. I talked with her about the best way to make a friend is to be a friend! I asked her how she felt when someone was friendly and nice or even just smiled at her. She said she liked it and I told her other people did too. I was so shy as a kid, I remember being paranoid about that - friends, being alone. So it made my heart sing to hear her turnaround this year :) Love this little girl.

Little Te has my worry of being embarrassed at school - like not standing in the right line, getting in trouble by the teacher, doing something that makes me stand out. He still struggles with that but we are working at helping him to feel more confident and not to take things so serious or personally. And that if you make a mistake, no big deal :) Just learn from it. I do smile when I see how easily he makes friends. He's so friendly and fun loving! He just takes such pleasure in being with people and having fun!! What a great talent!!
And my dear sweet Kai, he had such a great summer. He's been talking and engaging others in ways that I've never seen him do. His relationship with his brother Dax has been one of the funnest things to watch grow. Dax looks so much like Te but his personality is all Kai. They are the funnest little anal things, what a great joy to watch as a friendship grows between brothers. I hope that Kai can keep that interest he has had in others with those he goes to school with.
Here's to a good school year :)

RILED UP IN THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT

Ok, so for those of you who know me well, you know I can be a bit fiesty (alright so that may be a little mild ;). I had a rough day and somethings been bugging me so bad that it's keeping me up at night. It's also got me back into the blogging world. What a nice way to step back and gain perspective while getting updated on all my friends and loved ones lives.
I was sooooooo sick the first 4 or 5 months of this pregnancy. It really was kicking my butt like no other pregnancy has (although I remember being downright dog tired with maya) but this one.... I just feel like an old lady, old, old, old at 32 ;).
I am finding that I really have missed the chance that a blog gives me to reflect on life. As a kid, I was pretty good about keeping a journal, for a long time Scrapbooking was my release and then after LP blogging was a great fit.
So something happened yesterday that has had me so worked up, I felt like I needed to write it down to try and purge it from my system and more importantly to gain some clarity. I wondered whether I should just put it on my personal blog but decided I really would love some other mommy advice - if nothing more than some honest friends who can tell me if I'm just a crazy momma bear or if there's a reason I'm feeling so impassioned.
So the kids have been taking these "survival swim lessons'. They are intense, one-on- one lessons where they focus on really getting them to swim - no floaties or anything. They have you come everyday for the first 2 weeks (monday-friday). Dax started the first of May and it was so tough watching him struggle. The first day I was in tears and Justus was laughing but I could see why they are strict and he survived. The other kids were in school, so Dax did the lessons with his cousin makeila. I have really enjoyed watching his progress and have told many people about the program.
Kai, Maya and especially Te were so jealous that Dax got to go. They were excited for when they got a chance to learn to swim too. Te was even trying to talk me into checking him out of school so he could go to Dax's lessons :). They started this week. I knew that Te would struggle because the poor little kid is so like me. He doesn't like his head under water and gets a little panicky. He's also such a people pleaser, I knew it would stress him if he had a hard time. But Maya and Kai have always been such fish, just like their dad, so I figured that they would take to it all pretty well.
The first couple of days went like I thought they would, it was a challenge for Maya and Kai but they were enjoying it and Te was having a bit of a struggle. He was now trying to talk me into just one week of lessons "it'll save you money mom".
Then today came :(. Te was at karate kamp with uncle dallas and his lesson was during the very last hour of kamp. We went to pick him up and he was so sad to miss out on the final part of kamp, we decided to let him stay and decided to have Maya just do 2 classes (her swim class and Te's).
This was the first time Justus came to see the older kids and I'm glad he was there. Maya was with Te's teacher today and part way through the lesson she started floundering in the pool. Her teacher started aggressively working her and forcing her to put her head under for 4 seconds, then up for 1 to catch a breath. She started screaming "mom, mom, help" which is so hard to hear. But I know that part of their process is being forceful and partly breaking them down to be receptive to learning. I started getting teary eyed and then it just kept going. I heard her saying "please stop, I'm scared" and I was just dying. It just goes against every mommy instinct in my body to not jump my big fat prego body into the pool and pull her out.
But like I said, Dax had gone to over 20 classes, I had watched numerous other kids and had grown to trust the process. This time though, I just couldn't shake it. She had her start swimming back and forth and would make her restart if she didn't do it the way the teacher wanted and I could tell maya was so scared and so tired. This is my tough kid, this is the one who thrives on a challenge. At this point I was really trying to do everything I could to not just fall apart.
Is this mommy hormones I wondered?
Don't make a scene!
Be strong I kept telling myself.
Once the poor thing got out of the pool, she looked like a drowned rat. Her cheeks were flushed and she was breathing so hard that I thought she would hyperventilate. I wrapped her in a towel and then just held her. As soon as justus had kai out of the pool, I handed him maya and had to head out to the car. I was a mess and knew I couldn't hold it together any longer. I got into the back seat so I could hold maya. As soon as the door shut I just started sobbing but trying not to let her see me so upset. I need to get my barings and try and understand if I was overreacting and just being a momma bear.
But an hour later her cheeks were still flushed and I was still disturbed.
The more I thought about it the more confused I was. I know this was just her 4th class and her first time with this teacher, maybe the teacher thought she was being defiant but I know my Maya and know that she was trying her hardest AND was scared to death.
As I lay in bed I just kept replaying it. I feel it is so important to not just let my kids give in because something is hard. There's the saying, sometimes you have to hurt to grow. But the feelings of protectiveness, confusion and guilt just keep nagging me. I finally took a sleeping pill at midnight but then on my nightly 4am pregnant trek to the bathroom, I was dreaming about this swim lesson. After my potty break, I was all wound up again.
I know some of our instincts we have to overcome, as they are part of the "natural man". But does this keep nagging me because it's some other more powerful instinct or even the spirit telling me to not let it go???
We try and teach our kids to be respectful to teachers, adults and others but am I teaching her to not respect herself by encourage her to going through that experience again? I don't feel that I trust the intentions at the swim class yesterday were so much to help her in the long run as they were to try and break her spirit and for the teacher to exercise control. In life I don't want her to just sit back while someone is mean to her or bullying her. I don't want her to just fight or lash out at anything but she also needs to trust herself and her instincts to get out of a situation that isn't healthy.
I also know that she is going to have to deal with people and situations in life that ARE hard and unfair. We can't shield her forever and I don't want to. I want her to be able to take a tough situation on and not let it defeat her.
We also try and teach the kids that they need to follow through, even when it's tough. So am I teaching her the wrong things if we quit this?
It seems so trivial and I feel that I should be grateful if these are the things I worry about but it's been a LONG TIME since I have been this torn up about something. I just can't shake it.
Am I letting my prego horomones get to me?
Am I just a bit to fiery of a filipino to think rationally?
Should I be stressed?
If you made it through this far of this insane post, any advice would be so appreciated by your little (well not so little 7 month pregnant) brown friend.
Confused in Orem,
katrina

IT...IS...

Ok, so it was very clear that the baby was
not
a
GIRL :(
so we are sure it is either a
Boy
or.....
an alien.
Until the baby arrives, we will never be sure ;)

I got to admit, I was a little sad. Ok, a lot sad. We really were all hoping for a girl but our spoiled little Daxy once again received his hearts desire :D.
So after some retail therapy - some baby clothes shopping and MORE bulbs (I had already exhasuted my summer flower budget so this was a splurge), I was feeling better.
Thankfully the baby is healthy and Justus is one step closer to his own basketball team :)
Thanks for sharing in our excitement.

Girl, Boy, ..... Alien??

We had our ultrasound this morning - which was fun. I brought the oldest 3 with me because I thought they would enjoy it and also because Justus and Dax were equally grumpy and happy to sleep soundly at 8:30 this morning.
Sooooooooo, despite the local peer pressure (those darn Barkers, Becks and Staynor's with all that patience!) I knew we would be finding out what we are having.
So we did.
What do you think??
GIRL?
From the outset Maya and Kai have always wanted a little Girl.
Justus too has wanted another little girl to spoil but I also think he has a dual motive in that he thinks he can convince me to be done if it's a girl :D


BOY??
Te initially wanted a boy but soon joined the girl band wagon.

or ALIEN??
Dax was very adamant that he didn't want a baby but when Te mentioned the possibility of it being an alien, he was soon on board. Then once he realized that he would now be a big brother, he has decided he would like a little brother.

I have to admit, I'm in the girl camp - they are so darn cute to dress up :)
So 5 votes for a GIRL, 1 vote for either a boy or an alien.
hmmmmmm..... what will it be :)

Happy VALENTINES

I hadn't done anything "crafty" in such a long time, it made this really fun. For Valentines, the kids needed little bags to put their valentines in for school. I saw this cute pattern at Pebbles in my Pocket. and thought they'd be perfect and easy. I wasn't quite sure if Te would want to throw up at something so cutesy but he love it best of all. The kids picked out the clothes and hair color and then we tried to make them look like them. It always makes me laugh that Te considers himself blond - not sure he realizes how much Dad's regular trips to the Salon help to keep his brown hair bleached.