Flagstaff, AZ

We enjoyed an especially long weekend, by giving ourselves Friday off. We used Friday to drive north to Flagstaff, AZ. We enjoyed the change of scenerio to enjoy lunch at Olive Garden with 3 members of The Drako's and Duwayne & Shal.

Afterwards, we cheered our hardest at the NAU Sky Dome for the WRock Fighting Scouts. I should say, Mom and Dad cheered hard. Layla and Zack spent the whole game trading off playing the DS/Super Marios Bros. They simply didn't care what was going on around them. At one time, Zackery even told us, "Mom, Dad, you're too loud!" At the end of a frustrating game, we chatted up Grandpa Lloyd and Grandma Max. They even scored themselves some ice cream money for later.

We hung out outside the dome for a few minutes and Layla and Zackery took advantage by playing in the pile of snow. They climbed the mini mountain of snow. Making snowballs and throwing them at each other. After about 5 minutes, Zackery screamed in agony, "AHHHHHHHH!!! My hands! They're HOT!" His hands froze quickly from forming snowballs and couldn't quite articulate the freezing hands he had in front of him. That was our cue to leave....we said good-bye to everyone and immediately drove home.

We stopped shortly to enjoy the view and take in the fresh air....then onward we traveled back to the city.

Hello!

Greetings!

Kindergarten is Around the Corner

Zackery attended Kindergarten Round-Up with Daddy and Layla on Thursday, February 2nd. Can you believe it? He'll be going into grade K this upcoming school year.

To help him get ready we told Zackery he needs to practice writing his name. If you ask him, he can tell you the letters in his name sequentially. However, getting him to write it is another story. If you look closely, you can see ALL the laughters to his name faintly written in pencil. I modeled using a pen. We closed the activity by painting his handprint to put this in his time capsule to enjoy later.

He's such a great kid! We love him with all our hearts!

Cookie Thief

Tonight, Zackery decided to go to bed with a cookie is in his possession. Layla not missing a beat took the cookie away and brought it into Mom and Dad's room. "Look what Zack had under his pillow," as she unveiled a cookie with one bite in it.

I, of course, was curious how he got the cookie since we placed the cookie package on top of the fridge and asked Layla, "Did you give him a cookie?" She quickly yelped, "NO!" However, her body language told a different story and we had to bring in Zackery to ensure she was telling the truth. So 1 long minute, Zackery comes in, cuddling his teddy bear in his arms. "How did you get a cookie?" "I wanted it." "I asked how did you get it?" "I had to climb up." "So YOU climbed up there and got it?" "Yes." Layla was dismissed back to bed and Zackery had to go talk to dad. Dad had to take him back into the kitchen and talk to him about not climbing up the kitchen counters and he is NOT allowed to eat cookies without permission. He, of course, cried at the realization that he cannot eat cookies as he pleases and got sent to bed cookie-less.

Ending note: It's hard to believe that January has flown by! The Boye Family continues to trek through the ups and downs on their daily lives and enjoying all that we are involved in.

Highlights:

• Mom is 12 weeks away from the end of her ASU semester.
• Dad is making positive changes to his work day.
• Layla is tackling harder texts to challenge herself in reading.
• Zackery is getting ready for Kindergarten round-up.

Bring it on February! We only have high expectations!

Friday Night-Family Night

Zackery grabbing my leg as I walked into the house this evening.

The plan for tonight: drive over to our friend's neighborhood school and attend a Sock Hop

What we did instead?

Go to Dinner at Mimi's Cafe and enjoy each other's company. Mom got home too late for us to make it to the Sock Hop, so we made adjustments to our plan. On the way to the restaurant, Mom was talking to Dad about the current situation: she's had a very busy week and feeling overwhelmed by all the things on her list to do. "If I spend my free time grading, planning and reading then you and the kids are losing a part of our family time and that makes me feel horrible. Then on the other end, if I devote my energy on just us, I'm losing out on reading, grading and planning. It's a no win situation." Luckily dinner with the family helped Mom feel so much better.

We had a great night of sharing our highlights of our day and some disappointments. Layla delivered some jokes. Zackery entertained us by simply being himself. There were lots of hearty laughs and the food was fantastic.

Our highlights:

Zackery: "making my penguin at school"

Layla: "keyboarding class"

Mom: "spending time with you (pointing to Layla, Zackery and Dad)

Dad: "finishing up on my project at work"

Zackery led us in a vote.

Our disappointments:

Zackery: "my DS is dead. Dad you need to charge it"

Layla: "since I went to keyboarding, I missed the spelling bee I was practicing for"

Mom: "having so much to do in a small time frame"

Dad: "having to go to work."

Sometimes, all you need to do is stop for a moment to breathe to get it all back into perspective. I'm glad I took a moment to breathe.

Other moments worth of sharing:

Zackery offering a bite of his grilled cheese sandwich to me and Dad. He gets to Layla and offers it to her then as she is going in for the bite, takes it away and says "No! You can't have it!" We asked him, "Why?" Z: "Layla is dangerous, Mom! She can't have any!"

Layla taking a big bite of her "worms in dirt" and looks at us with her front teeth blackened from the chocolate pudding. She was trying to say something serious and we couldn't help but laugh at her. We couldn't get one word out and ended up pointing at her mouth to let her know what we were laughing about.

On our way home, we started talking about the new Muppets movie and Zackery says, "IN CONTROL! Dad say it!" Dad: "IN CONTROL!" Z: "AGAIN!" D: "IN CONTROL!" Z: "ONE MORE TIME!" D: "in control." Z: "Please one more time!" D: "NO!" So Mom chimes in: "ONE MORE TIME! ONE MORE TIME! ONE MORE TIME!" Layla and Zack join in, "ONE MORE TIME! ONE MORE TIME! ONE MORE TIME!" Derek had no choice, "IN CONTROL." Uncontrollable laughter ensues....Z: "one more time! one more time!" (all alone)

One last moment: Zackery and Dad hiding behind the building and scaring Layla and Mom as they left the restaurant. Z genuinely scared us and got some screams from Mom and Layla that it scared him.

Lies! Lies! Lies!

We took the kids to eat at Panda Express this evening. It was "Salk Elem" night and 20% of our total was donated to Layla's school. Since we can't make it all her school events, we did our part. While at dinner, we chit chatted about each family member's events. Mommy was in the middle of sharing stories from her first grade adventures, when she looked over at Layla's fingers. She, of course, forgot to use her fork and was using her fingers to slurp up noodles when I noticed a "blue" forefinger.

"What happened to your finger?" *shrugs* "What finger?" *points* "That finger? Why is it blue?" "Ooooh that finger....nothing!" (LIE #1) "Nothing?! It looks like you've been eating kool-aid." "Eating kool-aid?! What?! No. I didn't eat anything." (LIE #2) "Well it's stained from something, how did it get stained?" "I don't know." (LIE #3) "You don't know, huh? Well I know that's what a finger looks like when you eat kool-aid. Were you eating kool-aid?" "No." "No?! Hmm...well you were eating something that stains your finger. Was it some type of candy?" "Umm...." "Oh yeah, like Fun Dip?!" "No...but okay Tomi and I like to trade things so she gave it to me." "Gave you what? Kool-aid?" "No. This bottle where I dip my finger in...." "Oh the candy you're not allowed to eat. The candy that is just flavored sugar." *head goes down* "Yes." "You know you're not allowed to eat that candy, it's really bad for you. So you took candy you're not allowed to eat and tried to lie about it." *silence* "Wow Gurly! You lied! That's worse than just saying, 'Tomi gave me some candy.' You knew it was wrong by taking the candy and then you tried to hide it." *shakes my head* "Yes I did." "Well that candy goes to the trashcan, where is it?" "At home." "Okay well when we get home we'll throw it away and we'll need to have a talk in your bedroom." *head down*

All the way home, she tried to distract me by talking about everything she learned in Navajo class and her plans for the next day. She admired the stars and moon. She talked about her DS. She rushed into the house and tried to race to the bathroom for shower time. But Momma didn't forget.

"Zack, you need to get out. I need to talk to Layla. Where is the candy?" *she pulls it out from beneath a pile of papers, concealed.* "Wow! You tried to hide it. That tells me that you knew it was wrong and still did it. You were willing to lie about it and hide it. How am I supposed to trust you if you can lie about the small stuff?" "I know it was wrong. I shouldn't have lied. I will take the consequence for my actions." "Okay, that means a spank."

As it pains me to do so, there we were mom and daughter. It hurts me more than she'll ever know and all it took was one. She knew what she did was wrong. I walked out of the room, crushed. She didn't see the tear that fell down my cheek, but she learned a very valuable lesson tonight. After a couple of minutes, I returned to the room and hugged her. Told her I love her, she tried hard to be resistant and continued to cry and try to hide under her pillow. She needed a little tickling and a quick chat on how to get control of our emotions. I told her, "Why hold on to anger now? It's over, you know it's wrong and you won't do it again because I believe you when you said you would." And it was done!

*I'm so blessed with a church who teaches me the value of disciplining in a Godly manner. I'm so happy that I took those parenting classes because I really think this structured method of spanking does more wonders than just having a go at it. Tonight was only Layla's 3rd time ever getting a formal spank from me and/or Dad.*