Sophie Elisabeth Claire Roberts Blessing

On February 3, 2009 we had many family members down to Las Vegas for Sophie's blessing. It was a wonderful day filled with laughter and memories. Grandma Barbara flew in from Utah just for the day, and Grandma Julie was certainly there. It was a strange experience to be blessing our last baby...time certainly flies!

Happy Holidays

Sophie Elisabeth Claire Roberts

Welcome our newest (and last) member of the Roberts' clan! Sophie was born on Thursday November 20, 2008 at 9:23 p.m. in Summerlin Hospital. She was 3 and a half weeks early but still came in at a whopping 7 pounds (that's big for Cathy and I).

She is a beautiful little girl! We are so blessed to have our 5 children who are healthy, happy and the greatest part of our lives.

The Last of Our Clan

(click on image to view larger)

On April 9th I was in the check out line at the dollar store and I spotted a pregnancy test. I hadn’t been feeling well and the test was only a dollar so I bought one. When I got home I took the test and it came back positive. It was a test from the Dollar Tree, and since it was only a dollar I went back the next day and bought another one. Both tests came up with the pink lines in the C and T areas. I am pregnant. I told Eric that night when he came home from work.

My first OB appointment was on July 1st. My Doctor performs mini ultrasounds at the first few appointments during a pregnancy, so she took some 1st pictures for me (see above).

TODAY -- The Ultrasound Technician said that the baby measures about 11 inches long and weighs a little over 1 pound. I am approximately 22 weeks and 4 days pregnant, which makes my due date on December 15th. By the end of this year we will have a new baby girl! On the right side of the layout the top two pictures are of the babys side profile. She is cute already. The middle picture is a shot of her cute little foot. And the last ... shows us she is a GIRL !

My WORK trip to Puerto Rico

So, I currently have the difficult task of attending an AIA conference in San Juan, Puerto Rico. I thought I would include a picture of me hard at work.
In all seriousness, this is a great opportunity (again) to represent the state of Nevada with the State Government Network of the American Institute of Architects. I am staying at a great hotel called "La Concha" and it is located right on the beach... I admit, it looks like a great vacation; but, some socially retarded individual put a conference room on the top floor with panorama windows overlooking the lovely beach. I get to spend 10 hours a day in meetings in that room, watching other people have the great vacation I wish I was having!

I also thought I would try another approach in flying out here and took a red-eye flight last night from Vegas to JFK in New York. It is then another 3.5 hour flight from JFK to San Juan. All told, I managed a meager 3 hours of interupted sleep and arrived in San Juan at 10 0'clock this morning ready to attend a day full of meetings. What you see here, is my 1-hour of caribbean pleasure before I passed out from exhaustion!

I'll try to post more pictures throughout the trip.

10 Year Old Christian

We celebrated Christian's Birthday on Monday the 4th of August. I can't believe my little boy is 10 years old! For his 10th birthday he wanted the Indiana Jones Lego video game for the PS3, the Pokemon Diamond game for his DS, and the NERF Long Shot gun. Christian requested that the family go to LaserQuest for some fun, and Panda Express for dinner. After- we enjoyed watching him open his presents, and had cake and ice cream. The next day I took him to Target so that he could buy the Pokemon Ranger game for his DS -with the money he got from some birthday cards. Christian is so animated when he plays. He has a great imagination. He loves, loVES, LOVES his toy weapons, and playing video games. He is one "ACTION-PACKED" boy!!!! We love you-- CHRISTIAN!!!

Visit with Senator Reid

I was able to visit Nevada Senator Harry Reid last week with the American Institute of Architects. It was a very interesting meeting. We sat and talked and shared stories. He is actually very nice and down to earth, I would recommend that everyone take a chance to meet a senator.

I have always been intrigued by politics and this was a great opportunity to lobby our local politicians to discuss issues important to architects. Other attendees at the meeting were the leadership of AIA Las Vegas chapter.

Sydnee goes down!

Scary parent moment yesterday. Sydnee was wandering around the kitchen when she decided to take her adventure to the great outdoors. She walked (or tried to) out of the sliding glass door out to the patio; the only thing I heard was the thud of her face against the concrete!
After picking her up to comfort her, Cathy noticed that she was bleeding everywhere. Apparently she whacked her nose pretty good and she sprung a leak. Having never seen that much blood from any of my children I was somewhat concerned! After some tears and bloody sneezes everything was okay. I'm really glad we didn't have to take her to the emergency room, as I would have missed my fantasy baseball draft...

Lucky for us, kids survive in spite of parents, not because of them!

Sydnee's Chicken Pox

This is a picture of my latest creation. I love the website http://www.scrapgirls.com/. I signed up for their monthly club downloads. I have never actually paid for digital scrapping stuff until now. I loved the kit they put together in February. I am not as enthused about March's though.

Sydnee got Chicken Pox from Abby in December amid the holiday hustle and bustle. It was crazy! Poor baby Sydnee. I guess now she doesn't have to get the vaccination. This was Abby's second time enduring Shingles. She missed school for a week. She needed a doctors note before they would let her come back. This outbreak was nothing compared to her first back in June of 2005 just before we moved. She had big patches of painful blisters on the back of her neck and all along her left shoulder and down her left side. I have some pretty sad pictures of it, but won't post them to save your stomach.

My poor little girls.

Sorry about the picture... I just couldn't help myself.

Cathy's Can of Worms: WoRMs maKe ME cRAzy! CrAzy! I was crAzY once....

I have been playing around with my blog and wanted to post, but was really disappointed in myself. "Cathy.... doesn't have pictures?" People who know me would be in shock. I am a picture-taking FREAK!
I had to laugh when I looked at the pictures that were on my camera. I found some stupid pictures I had taken of my neighbors cars, (in my opinion) overstepping their bounds. It stupidly enough really bothers me. My husband and I are complete opposites in this regard. And how quickly I get aggravated about stuff like this is probably number one on his list of things he doesn't like about me. This subject opens up a big can of worms.
Don't get me wrong--- I love my house. I am grateful for my home. To try to make my point when I say this... I like the (inside) of my house. The whole outside set-up of my house drives me INSANE! I never would have envisioned me in a set-up like this. It was supposed to be temporary. So hopefully it still is. We purchased this home with the intent of just staying a couple of years, and then working our way up in the world.
I can't even start to describe the set-up. To try to put it simply... when I back my car out of our garage-- if I reverse straight I drive on my neighbors driveway. And if he's parked a car there, some maneuvering is in order. I don't have a driveway. So I don't have an option of parking my car in front of our garage, I have to park IN, the garage. And according the Home Owners Covenants (or whatever they are, HOA stuff) you have to be able to park your car in your garage, it is not supposed to be used to store stuff. Funny huh? Or maybe normal. So I believe I am right in being frustrated by my nice neighbors cars! The task of backing up to leave my home isn't as simple as it could be.
Why the pictures? I take them with the intention of writing our HOA board and complaining. But, I don't think that I will ever compose anything... because I think my neighbor is nice, and I would like to be a nice neighbor myself. So what do I do?
I guess I just took these pictures to ease my frustration, and for the most part it did. But then I had to find the pictures on my camera, which unfortunately opened that cAN of wOrMs! AHHHHHH!

Grandpa Mark Stays the Night

Eric's dad stayed the night last night. He came down to visit for Grandma Roberts' birthday. It was sure nice to see him and get to visit a little. He treated us to breakfast at IHOP this morning and then left for his drive home right after. Sydnee didn't quite know what to think of him. It is bitter-sweet living away from family.

Abby's 1st Concert

Eric took Abby to the Hannah Montana and Miley Cyrus Concert. Abby loves Hannah Montana. Her favorite song performed was "I Dance". Abby loved it when Hannah Montana sang with Aly and AJ. Abby says she will always remember the start of the show when Hannah Montana came down from the roof in a pink box showing her silhouette. She says the crowd was going wild.

For New Years Eve we celebrated at my Mom's house. The kids had a lot of fun playing with their cousins and staying up later than usual. When midnight came we went outside and watched some fireworks we had leftover from the Fourth of July. (Why we had leftover fireworks is a whole other story.) The kids were full of way too much energy! They loved running around in the cold yelling and screaming "Happy New Year!" After the fireworks we went inside and played games around the dining room table. I made "Cowboy Caviar" salsa that the family devoured. My mom also serves shrimp and yummy finger foods; a New Year's tradition.

I helped Alyssa make a scrapbook page with all her fun photos. She loves creating in Photoshop and wants to learn more.

Aunt Lisa Biffs it Bad!!

Eric's brother Tony was giving people tube rides on the back of his buggy on New Years Day. Poor Lisa ended the day... WATCH THE VIDEO


Unfortunate for Lisa... but lucky for Eric. Tony took Eric and Lisa out to ride; and Eric being a gentleman graciously offered Lisa the first ride. Lisa never went back for her gloves that flew off over the fence. (it's in the video)
I stayed back at the house with Sydnee and waited for the video camera footage. It was funny to see what us humans put up with for a "rush". We have some funny videos of the kids riding around on the tube two at a time. When the ride was over their legs would be all tangled up in the tube, and they would get up off the tube with no shoe on and limp back to the car with a smile on their face.

Alyssa broke her arm!

Alyssa broke her right arm while “rough-housing” with her younger brother Christian at 9:00 pm on November 14, 2007. We went to the ER that night at about 11:00 pm. The ER Doctor said it was broken after examining her X-Rays. The hospital wrapped her arm in a splint, wrote her a prescription for Lortab, and referred us to an Orthopedic Surgeon. We didn’t get home until about 2 O’clock in the morning.On Thursday the 15th we were lucky enough to get an appointment at the Orthopedic office at 10:40am. Alyssa chose a BLACK colored cast so that her friends can sign in Metallic colored markers. The cast is already irritating her after one day. She has to keep it on for 4 weeks !

Halloween Hooligans!!!

The kids had fun on Halloween. Christian and Abby's school had a costume parade. Sydnee loved sitting in her stroller watching all the elementary school kids walk around the grass outside the school yard. I thought the teachers all did a good job dressing up; Christian's teacher was Pinocchio, and Mrs. Stewart (Abby's teacher) was a scarecrow. When school was over I got all the kids ready to trick or treat at SH Architecture. They get loads of candy at Eric's office because I've got the cutest kids! - And maybe because Christian and Abby know how to work it by going around the office more than once. Then at 6:30 it was off to our Church to "Trunk or Treat". They served chili and hot dogs for dinner. There were games and picture booths etc. set up before the trunk or treat started. Eric and I are on our wards Activities Committee. We were in charge of a game and Alyssa had fun running it for us so we could experience all the excitement with Sydnee on her first Halloween.

Alyssa's costume was thrown together at the last minute. She was a clown/baby. Christian picked out his costume and anything that carries a weapon is cool with him. Abby picked a Devil costume. "Devilicious" I called her. She is shy about wearing it out in public but at home she is all show. I got Sydnee's Octopus costume at this cool shop called Babystyle at Fashion Island while in Huntington Beach with Eric for his office's Strategic Planning weekend. The costumes are reasonably priced for the quality. I might even order one online for next year. http://www.babystyle.com/content/halloween/main.asp?pgmeta=1

Our Family and this years carved pumpkins

Christian as a Ninja and his 4th grade teacher Mrs. Szymanski as Pinocchio.

Abby and her 2nd grade Scarecrow of a teacher, Mrs. Stewart.

Sydnee and her Cousin

Anika, Lisa, and Doug came for a visit this past weekend. Lisa and Doug come down every year around this time to watch the Volkswagen races. Doug helps one of his friends do the car stuff and Lisa will usually stay back and hang with our family for part of the time. It was a fun time.

Sydnee and Anika really don't play together yet. I don't think they know what to think of each other. They were born just a day and a half apart. Lisa was just leaving the hospital in Utah when I was checking in and getting prepped for my C-section in Vegas. Sydnee wasn't due for another 22 days. Cool New Years surprise! Hopefully when they get older they will be good friends even though they live 6 1/2 hours away from each other.

I wanted to make a cute digi-scrap layout with the cute kit I downloaded for free from http://www.peppermintcreative.com/. I love this site. They come up with some really cute scrapping things. Lisa and I bought matching outfits at Costco, and wanted to get the girls' pictures taken professionally at Target. When we got to the store it was a store without a Photo Studio... so we improvised and took the pictures ourselves at the park.
Cute, Cute, Cousins.

Alyssa... in a Million Words or Less

Alyssa's first assignment in her reading class this year was not assigned to her... it was an assignment for the parent. I had to write about my daughter in a million words or less and this is my finished paper.

Alyssa is my eleven year old daughter with brown hair, green eyes, and the friendliest smile. Alyssa was born in Salt Lake City’s LDS Hospital on a beautiful Monday morning in September. I remember commenting on the weather in the car on the way to the hospital. I was going to name her Carly Elizabeth, but didn’t get much response on the positive side. So it quickly became Elizabeth, because I wanted to call her “Libby”. Regrettably, Grandma didn’t like that one. (I am really influenced by others I guess.) So while in my hospital bed, I picked up the name book and didn’t get far … (A’s) when the name “Alyssa” popped out at me. I thought it was pretty, and the perfect name for my new, precious little baby girl. A little into Alyssa’s first year “Lissy” started to catch on. I don’t call her “Lissy” that often, but it does get pretty close to my “Libby” from my baby name list.
Alyssa was a cute and curious baby. She learned fast. She loved the show Barney and sang all sorts of songs by 14 months. At the age of two she was as smart as ever, and very creative. A little story I like to tell is when she was two years old, she had a spell of bad luck that Christmas season. Alyssa had a hand in knocking over, not one, but TWO Christmas trees that season. On one of the occurrences her grandma caught her next to the fallen tree, holding up the string of beaded garland to “Rocky”, her stuffed toy raccoon, and said “Now Rocky, just look what you’ve done!” What a smart and clever two year old just mesmerized by all the sparkles and glitter of the Christmas Holidays.
Alyssa has two brothers and three sisters. She lives with me and my husband in Las Vegas with her brother Christian and two sisters, Abby and baby Sydnee. And we can’t forget the family dog, Gracie, who Alyssa loves dearly. Alyssa’s Dad’s name is Bucky; he is married and has two kids, Ethan and Evelyn. They live in Bountiful, Utah. Alyssa visits them every other Christmas, Thanksgiving and Easter on a rotating schedule, and fifty percent of her summer vacation as well.
Alyssa favorite place is her Grandma Barbara’s house in Farmington, Utah. She has an amazing bond with her grandmother and loves to explore her backyard with its beautiful flowers and lush fruit and vegetable gardens. Grandma Barbara grows Alyssa’s favorite food--- raspberries. Alyssa loves to visit in June and also in August when the berries are ripe for the picking.
Alyssa developed a love for reading and poetry from her Grandma Barbara and her Great-Grandma Helen. Grandma Helen is a talented poetess—thus Alyssa took after her and won 1st place in the city of Moscow, Idaho Pleiades Poetry Contest two years in a row in the lower elementary division. All this while only in the second and third grades. Her first winning poem titled “MeiLing and Me”, and the second titled “Rain”.

MeiLing and Me
MeiLing my Grandma’s dear old cat,loves it when I come to stay.
When I go into Grandma’s room, I brush her then we play.
But sometimes we just like to sit and watch TV a little bit.
I love MeiLing and she loves me, that’s how things were meant to be.

Alyssa is very creative and wants to be an interior designer when she grows up, this may be attributed to endless hours we spend together watching HGTV home improvement television, and the four years that her family lived in Moscow, Idaho while her Dad (Eric) pursued his dream of being an Architect at the University of Idaho. Alyssa loves music and theater. She was lucky enough to see “Mama Mia” in Salt Lake City with her dad this past summer. She has some experience acting in theatrical productions with specific experience in "Scrooge", when she was just four, and "Are we there yet?" this past summer.
Alyssa is turning twelve on the 25th of this month and is looking forward to her favorite meal and birthday cake. She loves mashed potatoes and gravy. Besides, Thanksgiving and a few other occasions throughout the year the Roberts’ household doesn’t serve it because of the preparations that are involved.
Alyssa loves animals; her favorite is the Kangaroo… maybe because she likes to share with others how the animal got its name.
--Some explorers were in Australia, and they saw the kangaroo jumping around, so they asked the aborigine people what they were. The response they got was “Kangaroo”. Well it turns out, that later someone studied the Aborigine tribe and learned the language and discovered that “Kangaroo” isn’t what they called the animals at all. Roughly translated, it means “I don’t understand what you are saying.” So there are a bunch of animals out there called “I don’t understand what you are saying”.

Alyssa is an ever-adoring sister; mom’s big helper. She is an exceptional student; she loves to learn, and always wants to exceed expectations. When Alyssa makes friends it is a friendship. She is loyal and fun to be around. She is the most enjoyable daughter a mother could ask for; and her presence makes our home a cheerful place. I am certain she will tackle this new challenge of middle school as she has tackled past challenges in her life: with a cheerful demeanor, a 'can-do' attitude and a desire to achieve excellence.