Vivikins

Vivs, Vivster, Vivikin floor walker, Vivi Kay, Vivi, Vivienne Oh how we love this girl. 

1. What do you like most about yourself? 

Giving people their toys. 

2. What do you think your future job will be? 

Going on walks

3. What do you love to eat? 

Mac and Cheese

4. How do you like to spend your time? 

Play with somebody

5. What are you good at? 

Playing 

6. Who are your best friends and why do you like each other? 

Porter, because I like him so much. (She talks about Porter all the time, cousins are the best)

7. Who is someone you look up to? 

Jack

8. What makes you sad? 

When people hit me. 

9. What is your favorite outfit to wear? 

Minnie Mouse outfit 

10. What makes you really annoyed? 

Ladybugs (We get those awful Asian ladybugs and they annoy me too)

11. What makes you feel proud? 

When people be nice to me. 

12. What makes you happy? 

People play soccer with me. 

13. What do you do when you feel sad? 

Play with my teddy bear or cry on my bed. 

14. What's your favorite thing to do with Mom? 

Clean the dishes

This girl is becoming more independent and doesn't follow me around the house as much...which is sad but not sad at all if that makes any sense. 

15. What's your favorite thing to do with Dad? 

Wash the floor

16. What's your favorite thing to do with Mariah? 

Clean her bedroom (Mariah comes up with fun scenarios that Vivi can do with her toys, making playtime so much more magical.)

17. What's your favorite thing to do with Chet? 

Clean his bike 

18. What's your favorite thing to do with Austin? 

Clean his fan (Vivi likes to say that when she grows up she's going to marry Austin.)

19. What's your favorite thing to do with Eliza? 

Make her bed (Apparently I should be giving her way more cleaning assignments, I didn't realize she was such a fan.) 

Eliza and Vivi have so much fun together. 

20. What's your favorite thing to do with Asa? 

Play (If Vivi is playing with her toys and sees Asa approach she quickly throws her body over her toys so Asa can't take any of them. Someday they will play happily together.)

21. What do you want to be when you grow up? 

A tiger, Elsa, I want to be a girl that has long hair. 

22. What is your favorite color?

Purple and blue and also pink. 

While talking to her Dad: I'm a kitty and you call me "stupid cat". Not that she has heard that from anyone in our house...ahem. In my defense, they can be pretty stupid. 

She loves being a kitty or cheetah or tiger and she gets really into character. We have to reminder her that even if she's a cat, it's not ok to lick people. 

One day when I told Vivi she should ask Eliza if she could wear her dress she said, "She'll say no so let's not ask her." And that is how Vivi gets what she wants. Better to ask forgiveness than permission. Other times she feels really optimistic, "Let's ask him, he'll say yes!" Which makes it that much harder when the answer is no. 

First time she said a prayer by herself: "Dear Heavenly Father, thank thee for Jesus, please bless the cows and the pigs that snort and the elephants. In the name of Jesus Christ Amen." She'll make a great farmer one day, already praying for her livestock. 

"Mom this is my Book of Mornin', I love my Book of Mornin" Her Book of Mormon is actually a small New Testament, but she won't be convinced otherwise. 

For a while she called snoring "sneaking". "Mom, I was sneaking like this." 

There were a few days where Vivi's excuse to not go to bed was because "it will tangle my hand". I never figured out exactly what she meant by that. But it was worth a try to get out of bed. 

One day she brought me a bug and said, "Mom! Look at this baby bug! It said (said in a high voice) save me save me!" Good thing that bug had Vivi to rescue it. 

Vivi started pretending she was going to Africa. She wasn't really sure what she was going to do when she got there, but that never seemed important. 

One day I asked Vivs if she wanted to go upstairs with me and she replied, "Yeah but, I'm dying" in the most forlorn voice. She can be a little dramatic. 

For a while she had an imaginary friend named Strawberry that went on lots of adventures with her. She also would talk about Blueberry at times. And then we realized that Blueberry was our contractor Barry. It blew her mind when she realized that was his actual name. But he is her good friend. She loves to sneak up and "scare" him and Ethan and they do a good job of acting scared. 

She also has a friend in the mirror named Anna, our own little Anne of Green Gables. Her last imaginary friend is Lydia, the Hyde to her Jekyll. "Lydia doesn't try new foods and Lydia doesn't go to bed when her mom tells her too." Good thing Vivi doesn't do that. 

One day Aunt Heather asked Vivi, "What does Eliza say?" Vivi quickly responded with, "No Vivi no!" We all hear that quite frequently. 

One day I was complaining about all the flies in the house and she said, "I'm sorry mom, we'll get you a new house ok?" If only it worked that way. 

Vivi: Eliza! Get out out of the way! Me: That didn't sound very nice, can you say excuse me please? Vivi (in her sweetest voice): Excuse me please. (And then under her breath) Poopy pants. Which is the worst thing she could call a person; you know you've really disappointed her when she whips that one out. 

"Mom, I want my hair turned and turned and turned." Meaning she wants a french braid. 

She calls germs turtles. "I didn't brush my teeth but the turtles just fell off!"

After she had been running hard in the house: "Something's patting me in my body!" She was talking about her heartbeat. Probably the cutest way I've heard it described. 

One day we were talking about a miracle we had experienced as a family and she said, "That makes our hearts get big!"

One day she came to me and said, "Mom, my heart is attacking me!" 

I came downstairs to see how Tanner's painting project was going. All the kids were telling me what their assignments were and then Vivi proudly piped in with, "And I'm a horrible painter!" 

During our tea party with Grammie, Vivi was speaking in her best British accent: "More sugar and tea please." When I told her the tea was all gone she followed up with, "Just sugar then." 

After picking up Vivi she said, "We don't want Asa to find us." When I asked what happens if he finds us she fiercely declared, "We attack him!" Just a little sibling rivalry going on between those two. 

When she's really proud of herself she'll say, "I'm a good job girl!" 

Vivi struggles with picking on her face. But with the help of "princess gloves" and fun face stickers, she is looking much better. A lot of the older generation ask if she has chicken pox...I felt like I had to tell everyone that she wasn't contagious. 

Here she is sporting some of her favorite face stickers 

She still loves to be naked, especially if she can relax by the fire while doing so. 

We are trying to transition out of naps. Which means she can get real cranky around 4. If we leave her alone too long this is how we find her...and then she's up half the night. Fun times. 

She loves making people laugh

She is the master of funny faces  

I mean, come on...

Vivi wanted a "unikitty" cake and I was not prepared as far as decorations go. Tanner decided he would take over the decor...Let's just say he was humbled. The ears and horn are flat on the top of the cake, but his decor was all edible, I was going to use paper for the ears and horn. We had a good laugh and Vivi didn't seem to mind too much. She wanted a "marshmallow cake" so I did a s'mores one. It wasn't til later that she told me she wanted actual marshmallows all over her cake. Whoops. 

We celebrated her birthday early because Tanner's Mondays are really long and it was a good thing we did because Vivi was sick all day on her birthday. She slept on the couch most of the day, sweet thing. She ended up having an ear infection and started feeling better after she got some medicine. 

The birthday girl

We are so grateful to have Vivi in our family. She is the comedic relief and either leaves us laughing or shaking our heads in disbelief, but that is why we love her. She has an imagination like no other, she loves to be with her family and we're excited to watch her learn and grow this year. 

February

We had quite the February. 

We had to say goodbye to some of our church friends. While we were so sad for them to leave, it was great having so many friends at our house to send them off. 

Mariah made a cake for the party, Chet gave them a going away gift that he had made with his 3D pen, and Eliza drew them a picture of gymnastic kitties. We are really going to miss the Hulets! 

Asa really enjoyed the chocolate frosting rings that I kept giving him while helping Mariah with the cake. 

Terron came up with Heather for a sleepover. The boys had so much fun the short time he was here. They decided to go on a bike ride and about froze and they made sure to teach Terron how to drive the new ATV we got. 

We finally got some more snow which we were all excited about. 

And then it got dangerously cold so there wasn't as much playing in the snow as we hoped for. But they got two days of sledding and thats better than no days of sledding. 

We had our second annual family Valentine's Day party. This year I decided to try chicken parmesan and it was enough work that I won't be adding it to my rotation...but it was good. Everyone worked hard writing letters for each other and we enjoyed reading them together. Tanner started saying "Awwwwwweee" after every card and by the time we read Asa some of his he was finishing it up with his own "Awe". It was pretty cute. 

Mariah made some pretty amazing pop-out cards and Chet made everyone something with his 3-D pen. Austin hand wrote everyone's letters and considering how much he dislikes writing that was a real labor of love. And Eliza was so excited to write all her letters by herself. 

We ended the night with cheesecake. Even Josie got some, as you can see from the chunk falling from Eliza's fork. The timing was too good. 

And after I already made the food I realized I had made most of Tanner's least favorite foods...why did I not think of that before? In my defense I intentionally got angel hair pasta because I knew it was Tanner's favorite pasta (Or the pasta he hates the least?) I blame it on the constant demands on my time... But like the amazing husband he is he ate it and told me how delicious it was. Except for the cheesecake, he ate a sliver...but there were no praises for that. I deserved it. 

Asa and Vivi's new favorite snack is frozen blueberries...and Asa is sporting a black eye in this picture too. 

He hit it on our couch of all places...must have been the one hard spot. I took this picture to send to our doctor but he just said it wasn't a big deal. I'm grateful for his patience with the texts I send him each time I'm worried about something. We have a great doctor. Asa looked like he had an impressive cat/smokey eye makeup job for a few days. 

We went on a field trip to the Childrens museum and then followed that up with some ice skating. 

These three...trouble I tell ya. In truth they were so helpful keeping an eye on Asa and Vivi. 

Asa had a blast trying everything out and never wanted to leave a room. There were lots of epic meltdowns cut short when he realized there were other cool things to see/do. 

In between the museum and ice skating, Mariah felt like Vivi would really love to do the carousel. So we headed over there. 

After seeing Mariah's face I think she really wanted to do the carousel too. You go girl. 

I forgot our stroller but my good friend lent me hers so Asa could get a nap while the big kids were ice skating. After that we headed to Costco to get a few things and enjoyed Costco pizza on the drive home. I may or may not have found a pizza crust in the back of the van a couple weeks later...

Josie is very helpful with the school work. Mariah had another choir concert and got to sing a group solo. Singing brings her so much joy and it brings me joy watching her sing. We make a great team. 

Chet had his last archery tournament of the normal season and scored high enough to make it to state! He has really enjoyed archery and we're so thankful for all the people who work so hard to make it possible. 

Alice got this picture at church. Asa should be in nursery, and he gets excited to go sometimes, but he hasn't lasted the whole hour yet. Here's hoping it happens soon. 

Tanner decided to improve the picture. The more I look at it, the more funny it is. 

Asa looking all GQ with his sunglasses. 

Tanner's almost done with his epic basement project. The kids are already planning on a sleepover down there. We just have to get healthy before that happens.