Here's our Boy!

Introducing the newest boy in town...

Jaxon Sparks Mavity"JAX" He has filled our home with so much happiness and even lets me sleep most of the night!Blake is thrilled to have a brother and is always wanting to help.Raegan LOVES having such a tiny baby around and can't wait until she can push him in the doll stroller. Don't ask her to throw away diapers though...yuck mom!Sarah asked if we really are going to keep him and she feels slightly displaced but loves to give him kisses. Dad is so proud of his new little guy and is the greatest helper and snuggler. We had an appointment on the 26th in the morning and my doctor asked if we wanted to have the baby that day. Of course I was ready, but only dilated to a 3. He instructed us to go walk around the mall for an hour and then meet him at the hospital so he could break my water. We got to the hospital at 1 and he broke my water at 2. I got an epidural soon after and Jake and I just hung around the rest of the afternoon trying to decide if we were actually ready for number 4 to come. By 5:45 the nurse checked me and I was only at a 4! I thought we were in for a long night. Then I started to feel pressure and the nurse checked me again at 6:15 and I was ready to push! $ pushes later and what felt like forever, (that's the longest I've had to push), our sweet (but large) baby boy was born. We are so excited to have him join our family! For those of you wondering: Yes, he is our largest and baldest baby.

IT'S A BOY!!!

Hello Family and Friends.. The Mavity Family is pleased to announce the arrival of "Unnamed" Mavity boy... Stats: Born 12/26 @ 6:36 pm 8lbs 15oz 22in You can take a look at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O9szptm7S0U&feature=channel_page Or just search MAVITY BOY on You Tube. Love you all, Jake

The best Christmas ever...

Our very favorite Uncle Al-Pal comes home from his mission on Christmas Eve and we can hardly contain ourselves! The kids are so excited I don't think they've even realized that Christmas is so close! We're just hoping that the East coast weather co-operates so that he can actually make it home and not get snowed in!

We've been busy, who hasn't?

The things that have kept us busy?...

one dance-less dancer on parent day by Sarah....

beautiful dancing on parent day by Raegan...

another terrifying Santa encounter at the ward party...

notice who's NOT smiling...

undeliverable Christmas cookies...why?

we like to lick everything! Sorry, no Christmas goodies from the Mavity's this year, but have a very Merry Christmas and know that we like you a lot anyway!

Blake lost a tooth!

So Blake finally lost his first tooth last Thursday. He had been showing me how wiggly it was and when Jake got home from work, I told him about it. Well, Jake convinced Blake to let him pull it out with his pliers and he was so brave! I came out really easily and didn't even hurt a bit. The next morning when Blake woke up, he proudly showed me the dollar that the tooth fairy had left him. I exclaimed, "Wow! A whole dollar!" Blake looked at me a bit confused and said, "A dollar? Only 8 cents, mom!" Puzzled, I asked what he meant and he showed me how he had counted all the ones on the bill and came up with 8. Poor kid thought he had gotten stiffed by the tooth fairy!

Wow! It's been a whole week!

Well, we haven't been up to too much,

but this is what we have been doing...

We went to a work Christmas party for Jake's sister Shannon where Santa showed up. Blake colored him a picture and gave it to him when it was his turn to visit. I didn't get a picture when Sarah was on his lap, and for those of you aware of Raegan's phobia, yes, she is still terrified of Santa. We were hopeful that she had grown out of it, but as he entered the room we watched her whole body tense up and she completely froze!

The weather has been absolutely beautiful and we've enjoyed playing outside every evening waiting for dad to get home or just to be outside. yesterday I drew hop scotches on the ground and taught the kids a little old-school entertainment.

Sarah LOVED it! That's the first thing she wanted to do when she woke up this morning at 7 am. It was still a bit too chilly to head outside in jammies and no shoes though!

Blake has been wanting a skateboard for Christmas so he borrowed one from his cousin to get really good at it before Santa brings his.

Hopefully Santa doesn't let him down.

And last but not least, here's Frost at the mall. These d-u-m-b balloons were being made by a lady in the mall, so my kids ran up to her and wanted one where she quickly informed us that we could buy them. These were the $1 balloons. The flowers were $2, so my girls got a sword and a poodle. Some people.

Last night's bag...

One of my favorite simple traditions that I started with my family a couple of years ago is making snowflakes. Each year we take a night and cut out a couple of snowflakes each and write our name and the year on them. Than I use my fabulous laminator from my incredible mom and I laminate them to add to the collection. Than we hang them from the ceiling all over the living room.

So fun and simple.Please ignore the dusty fan and the tape still on the ceiling from last year. Contents of last night's bag: white paper scissors spool of curly ribbon hole punch tape

We need YOUR help!

Yes, that means all of you! We're getting to the end of this pregnancy with no gender of the baby and not a clue what to name it! So we've narrowed it down to, umm, nothing and we can't decide on anything. Basically we're at square one. My grandpa had a contest in his seminary classes when my mom was born and that's how she was named. I figured, hey, there are a lot of creative people in blogdom, why not try my hand at the baby naming business. So here's the deal: :: Submit your name choices in the comments. :: It has to sound good with Mavity. (that's the real challenge) :: You can submit either boy, girl, or both. :: If it's a boy, his middle name will be Sparks, so keep that in mind. :: If your submitted name is chosen, you will receive adequate compensation. This may include, but is not limited to: blog updates on the child's well-being, an occasional Christmas card (not likely), birthday party invites, an opportunity to contribute to the college/mission/wedding fund (not offered to all participants), and a phone call when this baby arrives. Winners will be chosen upon baby's arrival and will be contacted in a timely fashion. Start submitting, people!

For your viewing pleasure: I give you the 35 week belly~enjoy!

Countdown to Christmas!

This year with the holiday feeling over shadowed by certain events , I decided to copy an idea that my sister is doing in Indiana. Last week I put together 25 gift bags for each day leading up to Christmas. Each one contains either a craft, a story, a lesson, a small gift, or a treat. It's my way of doing an advent calendar, but really taking time together each night and focusing on the season. It's been exciting so far for the kids and a nice way to end the day. What have we done so far, you ask? On Monday, the bag contained our angel for the top of our tree and some packets of hot chocolate and marshmallows. Jake gave a great lesson on why we put an angel at the top of the tree and then we had the kids come up with ideas on how they could be "angels" this holiday season for other people. After that, we made the hot chocolate and drove around in our electric car looking at Christmas lights. On Tuesday, I had enrichment night and Jake had softball, so the bag contained a softball (as a hint) and a new seasonal night light for each of their rooms and the bathroom. So, what did the bag have tonight? I thought you'd never ask...cotton balls! And this is what we did with them... We made snowmen, Arizona style. The kids got super creative and Blake actually told me that it was fun even though "I thought it was going to be boring." Thanks for the faith, dude. If you click on the picture you can see just how creative they got! Raegan's has ears, Sarah's has a belly button and a shiny baby in the tummy, and Blake usually doesn't venture too far beyond what his perception of real is. Very straight forward.The snow people even got names. I give you: Frosty the Working Snowman, Emily, and Kyleeah. I think they're just the most creative holiday decorations I've ever seen, don't you? Our day also had another surprise when a package arrived in the mail from Grandma and Papa in Idaho. Every year at the beginning of December they send each of the kids a book to enjoy throughout the month. The kids were so excited to see what they got and have LOVED reading their books. Thanks so much, Grandma and Papa. We love you!

HaPpY ThAnKsGiViNg!

Turkey Day 2008

I decided to take some last minute pictures once we arrived at my parents' house for Thanksgiving dinner since we were all happy and clean. I hope you all had a wonderful day. We feel so overwhelmed at this time of year for the many wonderful blessings that we have been given. If I'm looking a bit large it's because I only have 6 weeks left. Don't be a hater. If you can't say something nice...you know.Sarah wasn't cooperating, so I'm glad she smiled in the group shots.

I think this is my favorite picture that I've ever taken of Blake.

Raegan is just a sweetheart and really wanted to have this flower in the picture. You'd never guess that she had thrown up all night. This was her third year in a row to be sick on Thanksgiving and the only two days out of the year that she has ever thrown up. We just expect it now. And, like I said, Sarah wasn't cooperating, so no individuals of her.

Oh, Sarah!

So I was just sitting at the computer and my belly was bugging me so I had my shirt pulled up so that it could 'breathe'. Sarah just walked in to talk to me and proceeded to pull my shirt back down over my belly without saying anything about it. Curious, I asked her what she was doing and her answer?

"I'm just modesting you up." Yay, she's 3 and she gets it!

picture from family night at Bounce U

HELP!

Every day I find myself going through the same routine. It's not just any mundane routine, although I am getting tired of it quickly. I have reached the point in my pregnancy where I have an insatiable thirst and there is nothing, I repeat NOTHING I can do to quench it! Not only am I extremely thirsty, my only source of satisfaction is ice. I am personally keeping Sonic in business buying their ice by the bag-full. I find myself many times a day standing with the freezer door wide open, shoveling ice into my mouth as if I were a chipmunk storing up for the winter. I. cannot. eat. it. fast. enough. I'm sure I'm driving everyone crazy with all the crunching and I realize it's totally rude, especially in public, but at this point, I really don't care. So love me in spite of my rudeness, please. I also have been "enjoying" 2 1/2 weeks of bed rest. That's the part that I'm getting tired of. For some reason my doctor thinks that it's too early to have regular contractions and already be dilating. Ok, I'll go with it. It's humbling, and VERY hard to watch as the ladies from the relief society show up to clean my house. They did EVERYTHING, people! They even moved the microwave and cleaned my fridge! What a wonderful group of ladies, it was rough to just sit back and watch them work so hard.

From Sarah...

Yesterday as we were driving in the funny car, Sarah yelled, "Mom, hornk the horn!" I thought it was very cute. Isn't that what a horn should do? Hornk. Hornk.

My blonde moment....or year!

In my defense, the husband was just as clueless as I was! About a year and a half ago, we bought a digital video camera that was pretty inexpensive, but worked for the time being.

Well, about 6 months after the purchase, (last November)the camera unexpectedly quit working right as we were starting to record Raegan's very first ballet recital! I was so sad! We didn't have any kind of power cord or anything to charge it with so we just chalked it up to a really lame sauce purchase and left it at that. Throughout the year as it has sat at my desk, there have been multiple times where I have almost thrown it away...Jake too. He HATES clutter! Saturday night as the kids were eating dinner and the husband had run to the store, I was thinking to myself, "Man. These kids are so funny right now. I wish I had a video camera!" I proceeded to take out the old camera and I popped the side of it off and there were two AA batteries staring me in the face that needed to be changed! In the 10 minutes that Jake was gone, I had fixed the camera and made some really great videos of the kids. He was totally impressed by my battery changing ability! In our defense, what video camera needs AA batteries? That's right, we're cool.

Halloween 2008

This year was a lot of fun because the girls ventured away from the

traditional princess costumes and opted for these:

a "cute witch" which I think she pulled off perfectly... she's even beautiful as a witch.

and "Thuper Tharah" which was another winner and totally her own idea. Doesn't everything about her just scream, "super?" Blake chose this costume...a Storm Trooper (TK421), which he bought in June with his very own birthday money from Grandma Sparks. This Halloween was so easy... no sewing, pinning, painting, etc. LOVE IT! The kids got so much candy that we even handed out half of it and they still each have a full bucket! This is at the end of the night ...checking out their loot, way past bed time..

and one very sleepy super girl, minutes after being tucked in!

Catch up, part two...

Every year my Mom does a Halloween party for the younger than school age grand kids.

It always consists of making haunted houses and a few games or activities. She usually goes a bit over board on the haunted house accessories, but that's half the fun!The kids all had a great time and got pretty creative with their houses...Raegan Sarah cousins Rachel Hewson and Kyler and Laura. Obviously I didn't get pictures of all of the kids...just way too many of them now. My mom also made the traditional Bat's Brew and amazingly, it was pretty hard to convince half of the kids that it was safe to drink! Very funny!

We've been busy...

About two weeks ago, my family had an adult Halloween party where costumes were mandatory. I wasn't getting any inspiration as to what I could be with such a huge belly, so I stopped trying to work around it and decided to dress up in spite of my size. This is what we came up with...

Popeye and Olive Oyl.

It almost felt like a cop-out costume because I was so comfortable all night except for the fact that I was wearing Jake's hiking boots. Other attendees included: Raggedy Anne and Andy Little Red Riding Hood and the Wolf Hula Girl Bob Ross and his Easel Barack and Michelle Obama A Hunter and his Catch and my parents, Kent and Dottie. I promise, we had a great time. We played a little,okay a lot, of rock band and a few other games and enjoyed food and each other. We're so excited for next year!