Madeleine Jolie

Madeleine is a really fun kid. She is becoming my best helper. She loves her name. I hope I'll always remember the day she and I were playing and she said, "Mom, you're my best friend and my Mom at the same time. I just want you to call me Madeleine not Maddie or Mad." She has loved every minute of preschool and dance. Madeleine is creative and smart. There are a few words that she can't say yet and they crack me up. Play is "clay," Pinata is "rata," brown is "grown," place is "clace." Right now she loves puppies. I love her determination, sense of humor, enthusiasm for life, and most of all that I get to love her every day because I'm her mom.

A Walk in the Park That Is Our Home

Madeleine is obsessed with puppies right now, so she begged for a puppy party for her 5th Birthday. I've always loved planning birthday parties for my children. It's one of my favorite mom duties. We used mostly recycled, totally free materials to make our invites and the kids seemed to think they were pretty cool.


I was determined not to have cheesy decorations, but then once we got to the party store it was impossible to get out of there without any. One screaming Henry and too much money later we ended up with "Pin the nose on the Puppy," a dalmatian pinata (or rata as Madeleine calls it), little dog bowls filled with candy bones for each guest, rings, bracelets, helium ballons, puppy cutouts, and other miscellaneous goodies.


Our original idea was to have the party at the park, but it had been snowing the two days prior to the party and the day of the party was super cold and windy, so we had the party at our house. When the girls arrived, they stopped at the groomer for some face paint and a party hat. Madeleine had arranged all of her stuffed puppies by the fireplace, so then they all got to play with a puppy friend.


Madeleine's friends are just all adorable and well-behaved. I was really impressed. She was so excited about the presents she received that the next morning she woke up before anyone else to play with them!


This party was almost as much fun as Disneyland. Just look at her face!


I'm a little embarrassed to post these pictures of the pinata because our yard is dead. Why we need the hose is beyond me because it's obvious we haven't been watering any plants. This pinata did not want to break. The girls each got 3 or 4 turns. Madeleine was absolutely tickled that she was the one who finally broke his head off.


After the pinata, we went back inside for more puppy games. We played Trainer Says, Balloon Fetch, Musical Dog Bowls, and Dog, Dog, Cat.


It was funny and maybe a little creepy when the girls spontaneously started chanting a bark (does that make sense?) after the pinata was all said and done. Poor puppy.

I love this girl! I can't believe she's 5 years old!


We ended with pupcakes that had spotted insides. I had a hard time ending the party because these girls were all so cute and played so well together. I've realized that kids just keep getting more fun as they get older. 5 is my favorite age so far. I thought I'd be sad when my kids were all out of the baby phase, but now I think it will be a blast! I'm so glad I get to be a Mom!

A Sunbeam, a Sunbeam

Needless to say, Anna did not like that I walked her up to the middle of the stairs, sat her down, and left to take her picture. Madeleine, on the other hand, loves to climb these steps!

Anna is our sweetheart. I don't know how we are so blessed to have her in our family, but I'm glad we do because we need her.

There is a closeup of Anna's flower that I made for her hair.

Poor Hop Hop got dragged down the redrock stairs by her ears! Ouch!

I can't believe that I have a child old enough to be a Sunbeam! That just seems way too old for me. It's crazy how fast it happens. One day babies turn into kids and it feels like we missed it even though we were here the whole time. I love this girl more than I can say. It's fun to watch her as she transforms into a kid.


This post is mostly for Mom so that she can see the girls in these sweet little dresses she sent. These pictures were taken after church, so their hair was a little wild. I had fun making their little hair flowers. Madeleine did have two, but one fell out on our way out to the car. Mike had to stay for choir practice, so I thought I would take a couple of pictures of the girls on the steps to the chapel. Where is Henry? It was SUPER windy, and he had fallen asleep during primary, so he was nestled into his carseat out of the wind while I took their pictures. My next post will be all about Henry, I promise.

Hot Chicks!

Introducing the newest additions to the Reynolds Family... Ten baby chicks! We have 4 Black, 2 White, 2 Brown, and 2 Buff. Anna says, "I want baby chick on my lap, Mommy. Chick on my lap, mommy." And Madeleine absolutely loves them and is extremely careful with them. Why does Anna look like a little Grandma in this picture? I love her!
I hadn't brushed her hair yet after the bath... And now that I think of it I probably shouldn't have let these freshly bathed babes hold their chicks for some pics... Oh well...
Double trouble... This picture was taken a little later when her hair had dried.
Anna's chick climbed up onto her head, and she was not happy about it!
These girls are good at sharing their chicks. We are excited to build their coop and collect their eggs this summer. We think that they will be fun pets and hope that they will like being in our family.

Their trash, our treasure

Mike and I have recently began shopping thrift stores, KSL.com, and craigslist for used things. It's really fun. We needed a new fish tank stand when we moved to this house because our tank doesn't fit underneath the cabinets here like it did at our last place. We had looked online at a lot of stores and also at pet stores when we would make it to civilization and we decided that we just couldn't afford one... until I looked at ksl and found this one used. After sanding, painting, and sealing, it looks like this. It used to have a lovely 80's oak finish, but we felt this black antiqued look went better with our black and dark furniture.


Our poor rainbow got a little stressed out we think when the tank was cleaned, and unfortunately passed away the day after we had put the tank on the new stand. We loved this rainbow, were happy with his growth and hope that he made it to fish heaven.

Christmas Past and Present

Christmas 2005, Madeleine's 1st Christmas was spent in the Orem Condo. We had just moved from the yucky Provo house that I'm sure all who visited will remember. This year was especially fun because Grandma Laurel and Grandpa Jerry were visiting!
I couldn't resist posting this one of Madeleine playing with her Christmas toys that year in her diaper. Look at those rolls!
Christmas 2006. Madeleine's 2nd Christmas was spent in that same Orem Condo. I wish I'd have kept that sleigh.
She opened the blocks first and really we could've stopped there because she loved them and didn't want to open anything else. We sure do miss our kitty, Cleo. She is the best cat in the world.
Christmas 2007. Our next Christmas was spent in our Loa Apartment and it was Anna's 1st Christmas, Madeleine's 3rd. I don't miss those stairs! We cut our tree down at Fish Lake that year and I hope I'll always remember sliding down the mountain with our tree, children, and saw!
These girls have a great time with pretend play. Madeleine was afraid to come downstairs because she thought Santa would be waiting to watch her open her presents.
Christmas 2008. This Christmas was spent in the Loa "Pink" House. Everyone in town calls our new residence the "Pink House" because although no longer pink, it was for many years.
We had a new addition to our family this Christmas. Madeleine is really into the Elf movie, so she named him Buddy after the main character of that show. I hope our Uncle Buddy is not offended!
Madeleine and Annaleise spent the day playing princess birthday/tea party. Again this year, Madeleine was afraid to come out to see what Santa brought until we assured her that Santa had left to take other kids their presents.
Henry's first Christmas was spent cuddling his presents and watching his silly sisters.
Michael spent a lot of time decorating the living room and it looked great, so I thought I'd share.

We moved ten days before Christmas this year and so we didn't get decorations up until the night before Christmas Eve. When I went to post pictures of this Christmas, I browsed back through Christmas Past and decided it might be fun to take a trip down memory lane. 3 out of 4 of Madeleine's Christmases have been spent in different locations. I hope this isn't obnoxious. I wonder where we'll be next year.

The Musical Weekend

Mike's students performed "Schoolhouse Rock" at the beginning of November. I meant to blog about it sooner, but we're just always crazy around here. The opening night of the play, I covered a shift at the grocery store for one of the cast members so that they wouldn't have to miss. While I was there, Anna fell off of a chair at the babysitter's and broke her arm. Who knew tea parties were so dangerous? My friend who was babysitting didn't realize she was that hurt. Anna's such a sweetheart, she doesn't always show her true emotions. She stayed up all night crying and saying "hurt." Once I figured out what was hurting, we spent the next day at the local clinic and the hospital getting x-rays and a cast, so we didn't make it to the second night of the play as planned.

I had told another cast member that I would work for them on Saturday, but due to Anna's broken arm, I was able to get someone else to work that night and I got the chance to take the kids to the musical.

It was a great show! The kids performing were obviously having a great time with their singing and dancing. They're a bunch of characters. Madeleine's favorite part was when the "scary bear" came out, which due to budget constraints was really the school's badger mascot costume. She kept asking when the bear would come out again. My favorite part was the "Adjectives" song because I remember it from my childhood and the girls that sang it were funny and animated. Anna's favorite part was running out into the hall and flirting with Elvis. Henry's favorite part was taking a nap, which was nice for me because the girls kept me really busy.




















These girls really love their daddy and are very proud of him. After it was all over and cleaned up, we stopped by the cast party and dropped of some Snickers Apple Salad. I give this year's musical 2 thumbs up. It was really fun, the voices were great, and it was the perfect length of time for a crazy mother of 3 really young kids to survive.