Happy Birthday Leifer!!

Today is my Leifer's Birthday and he is the special age of 8!!! He is doing excellent in school, has great friends, great memories, and is very excited to be baptized in 2 weeks! Here is a sample of his life so far-we didn't get our digital camera until he was 3 so I don't have baby pictures of him to post but here is what I have so far---


Trip to Sacramento to visit Grandpa Sprague 4 months before he died


Sacramento Zoo

Famous Grandpa Robinson hair-cut

He was obsessed with trains until about a year ago

Proud new big brother to Macy

Easter egg hunt in Salt Lake


Huntington Beach a couple of weeks ago-notice the bare feet!! We are getting there (he has a sock fettish if you didn't know)

Awsome train bridge at Letchworth State Park in New York

Proud new big brother to Gage!

This is for you Raina and Wendi-remember the days!!

Cowboy Days at Newcastle pre-school in Salt Lake. Teacher was Miss Mindy.

Eight years ago at 3:36 pm Leif Verdell Robinson was born. It all started at midnight on the 25th when I went in to be induced by the late Dr. Fielding. By about noon that day the inducing medicines were not working and they were talking about starting me again at midnight later that night. After hearing this Cole went home to get some sleep leaving me with my parents, sister, and cousin. About 1:00 contractions came on their own and before I knew it I was closing in on dialating to a 10. People were frantically trying to call Cole but he wasn't answering. My parents got his dad to stop by the house but he didn't answer the door. My dad got his brother to try calling but to no avail. When I got to a ten my mom was preparing to be my pusher and I really didn't care if Cole was there or not I was ready to push and nobody was going to tell me to stop. At 3:30 I started pushing and Leif starts to crown. No sooner did Dr. Fielding say"I can see the head" did Cole walk in all bleary-eyed and wondering what the comotion was all about. Leif came out 6 minutes later and Cole was then wondering why nobody called him until the last minute!! Despite his dad's absence through the painful contractions and pushing-Leif loves his dad and wants to be just like him. We love you Leif. You have brought so much joy to our lives and we are so proud of you.

LEIF VERDELL ROBINSON
September 25, 2000 3:36 pm
6 lb 15 oz

New Perspective!

I have had an aha moment. I have decided that it is OK if parents embarass their kids when they are teenagers because kids embarass their parents all the time while they are younger. Case in point, Macy is doing an 'All About Me' unit at school and yesterday someone traced her body on a big paper and their assignment was to color themselves in. Macy showed me the folded up paper in the car and I told her we would look at it at home. I totally forgot about it until last night and I layed it out so I could have a look at what she had drawn. I said " Wow Macy this looks great! Your face and your bracelets are so pretty. Your shoes and socks. Why did you draw polk a dotted socks on-you don't have polk a dotted socks?" Macy answered, " Mom, those aren't socks, those are my owies on my leg!" Are you serious??? She drew bruises up and down her legs. I am sure her teacher will be looking at me differently from now on.

It's OK Macy, I have at least 10 years of thinking of different ways to get you back-and you won't be able to have the-it's not fair-argument.

New story, also about Macy. Yesterday, again, when I picked her up she was non-stop talking about her new friend, Jeremy. It was all about Jeremy said this and Jeremy did that. This morning while I was doing her hair she said (very seriously) "Mom, you have to do the same fashion as yesterday. Jeremy liked my fashion yesterday." I rolled my eyes and proceded to do her hair, but when it was time to put the bow in her hair she started freaking out that it wasn't the same fashion-to which I replied " Macy this is a new clip, Jeremy hasn't seen this one before. Maybe he will like it too!" She agreed and yes, Jeremy did like it also.

Honestly, what is going on here? My kids are getting older, which I enjoy, but they are old enough to speak for themselves and form their own opinions and make their own friends and say words like fashion, actually, awesome, cool, etc. I heard a comment before by someone in the church-I don't remember who-but he said that a parent needs to teach their child everything they need to know by age 8 because after that it has either sunk in or it will not sink in. I think I agree with that. Leif is getting to the point now where he knows what is right and wrong. He is making his own decisions now on a lot of things and I am glad that he seems to be solid. These kids are so moldable when they are younger but, as I see with Leif sometimes, grow out of that and go on their own and what they have been taught. Scary!!!!

Legoland!!

Gage got his turn for a date with mom last week! Kate has a pass to Legoland in San Diego and she had a free guest pass she let me use. Gage is only 2 so he got in free and we had such a fun time. Kate says she usually only stays 3 hours or so but we stayed 6 hours, hence, the many pictures following. The weather was absolutely perfect. The sun came out for maybe 5 minutes and the rest of the time it was overcast and never getting over 73 degrees. I miss that coolness. I wonder if San Diego is too far of a commute for Cole :) There were so many rides for the younger bunch. Gage and I could have gone on more because my little guy is over 36 inches tall, but alas, Kassidy is not, so out of respect to the short person, we only went on the rides that she was limited to. Legoland is really amazing! It is full of figures made of legos that are just incredible to see. They have a mini-city area where they recreated Las Vegas, New Orleans, New York City, San Francisco, etc. I should keep pushing Leif into his lego craze he has right now and maybe he can build legos professionly when he grows up-what a job!!

This picture was at the end of the day when the two warmed up to eachother, AWHHH!

Again, AWHHH!

This picture was a must, but we have to keep it hidden from Macy and Leif. They would be sooo jealous!

Isn't it amazing?

We only saw 1 character, but, hello, it was the lego-man so that's OK

Kassidy was occupied elsewhere for this ride so Kate caught us on the heli! Gage kept swinging his leg over the bar and tried to stand up. It was freaking me out because we got pretty high!

Gage is a smart man-let the woman do the controls. Good, Gage, good!

Genious!!! Disneyland take note--the kids have areas in each ride line to build legos while their parents stand in line-genious!!

Kate an Kass were behind us but finished ahead of us thanks to Gage's steering efforts. I had to take over after the second time we caused huge traffic jams.

Bob the Builder

It says no climbing but yeah right! This is the ultimate figure for kiddos-they have to get up close and personal!

My future Jedi kicked Darth Vader's butt!

This was taken about 15 minutes after we got Gage changed. He, apparently, had to scope out the scene before he jumped in and.....

sat on a shooter. Then he was ready to get changed back into his clothes. Anyways, the day was just perfect. I know Leif would totally freak out if he went here. There are lots of roller coasters for the taller people too, so really the whole park is appropriate for all ages. Plus there is plenty of shade should the sun peak out one afternoon.