Nice Weather!

We had a couple nice days this week and I'm  really glad we got outside and enjoyed them a little since it snowed shortly after.  I have really enjoyed the time I have with just the three younger ones at the end of the school day.  They've been so much fun together lately.  Especially since they all love being outside so much!  We even got Lukey outside on this wii day to enjoy the sun with us :)  He had a lot of fun!  They love following "Stripe" around ("Kelly's kitty"), he comes over to hang out every once in a while and the kids give him more attention than he can stand and leaves.  Erika squeals and screams and claps her hands when the cats in the neighborhood come by.  She LOVES to look at them.  She really doesn't like to get too close to them though.  It's almost funny how freaked out she gets when they cross that line of being something to look at into the "too close to stand it" zone.  But she's learning.  Kelly helps her when she's around.  The boys like to ride their scooters around the backyard and down the ramp.  It's fun to watch them.



Erika has really enjoyed these old dress up clothes I pulled out of storage the other day.  It's fun to see her in the cute little dress up stuff the girls had.  Brad's even gotten into the dress up spirit by wearing his old Ninja Turtle costume.  Kinda funny, but whatever floats their boats!  This Ladybug costume was given to us by the sweet Mather family.  They shared a lot of their little girl clothes with us when Charity and Kelly were little.  I think Kelly wore this costume 2 years in a row.  It's adorable!
















Wednesday we met up with Sarah and Charlie and Alvin at Rocket Park.  It's always fun to go to the park when Winter is coming to an end.  Erika was really nervous at first but then resumed her old position at the little slide.  She still loves sliding down and then walking back up afterward.  No matter how hard it is!  She actually grunts when she gets near the top, to kind of pull herself that last little bit.  She's funny. 





Noah was right back to throwing the woodchips around.  Someday he'll stop.....
He was pretty fearless on the playground, that was cool.  He loves the steering wheels at parks. He spent a good portion of time there, and trying to get me to buckle up so we could go to the movies.  He's SO imaginative!!!  He didn't want to leave the park at all.




Luke was a pro at the twisty monkey bars by the time we left.  Shows how big he's getting!!  I couldn't get him to try out the handle ones though.... maybe next time.  He's been growing up so much lately!







My kids get so excited to see Sarah and Charlie!  Oh, and Erika just about fell over from excitement when she saw Baby Alvin.  She loves him so much!!  She holds her arms out like she wants Sarah to hand him to her and then raises her shoulders a little with her back curved when she realizes that that's not going to happen.  But she totally has a huge smile on her face and she's mumbling some exciting words.... it's really just so cute, you have to see it probably :)  It's fun that they are close with some of their cousins and get to enjoy that time with them.  I love it.

Future Memories

- Friday was birthday tables for March birthdays.  How nice that Sarah would watch our kids so that Nate and I could both go and have it just be the three of us!  Charity bounced into the room with a big smile on her face.  She just lights up my life so much.  I love her energy.  She just couldn't make me more proud.  We had a nice lunch and kissed goodbye.  I love birthday tables.  It's just such a fun little opportunity.  I love having that time.  3-18-11

- Sunday we finally gave our talks that we've been preparing for the last 3 weeks!  I've never had that much time to prepare a talk and it helped a lot with finding information, but then I had too much information to really condense it to a short enough talk.  It felt a little too condensed by the time I got done with it.  I think it went well, but I always wish I could redo it.  I left out a lot of things that I wish I hadn't.  Nate did an AWESOME job as always.  He's just amazing.  I don't know how he keeps himself so composed and with it.  I love it though.  Ends the meeting on a high note I guess.  All of a sudden today, I keep thinking of things I should have added to my talk.... Nate says that's normal.  I guess I need to just lay off it and think about something else.  3-20-11

- Monday was Charity's big Dentist appointment.  She was SO nervous!!!  It was so sad!  I feel kind of bad that I passed on the valium they offered to have me give her before coming.  I just don't like drugging my kids.  I think it probably woul have helped her though.  Though now we can say, "She did it!"  It was also a day off from school.  Kind of a lame one.  We didn't do anything real exciting.  I wish we had.  But that's that.  3-21-11

- I missed Luke's well child visit for the second time on Tuesday.  I'm still beating myself up about it. 

- Wednesday night I was feeling really down, kind of frustrated with where I'm at in life right now emotionally and spiritually and just feeling like I'm not meeting my own expectations.  I prayed a lot during the day and kept trying to ask for help with it.  I kept getting these thoughts that I should be working out daily and that morning might be the best time for that even though I am horrible at waking up.  That just seemed crazy, so I decided to just ask for a Priesthood blessing.  Nate was so sweet to sit and talk to me for at least an hour while I cried and complained.  He's so good to me.  Then he gave me a blessing.  This blessing was awesome.  I felt so rejuvenated afterward and there was just so much guidance and helpful advice from my Heavenly Father.  It was incredible.  In my blessing Heavenly Father told me I need to get up before the kids in the morning.  And that that would really help them and me with things.  I decided to take this a step further, and decided I am going to start waking up at 5:00 (this is HUGE for me, I usually sleep in til 7:30ish, as embarrassing as that is, probably a habit I started with all my pregnancies) and go to the gym and work out for an hour.  This way I get home by 6:30, about a half hour before the kids wake up and I'm all refreshed, and they have a happy mom to wake up to.  It was really neat to have it work out on Thursday.  I couldn't believe how easy it was to get out of bed!  Heavenly Father had to pretty much drag me out of bed though :).  Then Friday too.  I really loved it!  I snuggled with my 2 littlest when they woke up, had a nice breakfast made for the big kids when they woke up.  I had plenty of time to bathe the littles and get them dressed before it was time to take the big ones to school.  I was happier, we had nice music going all morning, everyone seemed a little more cheerful.  Luke asked me, "Why are you awake and Dad is asleep?"  When he got up :) It was adorable!!  This has been monumental though, and I hope to keep it up.  This was probably THE toughest weekend to start something like this, so I know that if I was able to do it this weekend, then surely I can keep it up.  I do think I am going to shake things up a big on Saturdays and go to the temple instead, but we'll see how that goes!  I love it!!  I love that Heavenly Father answered my prayers before the blessing, but then didn't stop and aswered with more during it.  Helps me to see that I am actually hearing the promptings of the Spirit, I just need to have more faith in that ability.  3-23-11
- Friday was a fun day, we went to Discovery Gateway just for fun after the kids got home from school.  It's funny how much Charity and Kelly have grown since we had our membership two years ago.  They really don't enjoy it as much as they did then.  Erika had a personal escort through the whole place.  Kelly made it so much fun for her.  I love that she would give up finding fun for herself and do what Erika loves.  Although, I do think that being with Erika is one of the things that Kelly loves too :).  The boys were out of sight almost the whole time.  I really need to get Noah one of those little cars to drive on at home, he loves those there.  Luke has a little difficulty playing pretend.... he always has.  And when he does, he looks like he's like compromising his standards or something :)  Or stooping to a level that's just so below himself.  It cracks me up.  And he doesn't like it when we look at him while he's pretending :)  Brad seemed entertained, for the most part, but he's just getting bigger too!  He loved the construction area this time.  The little boys there were all bowing down to the mighty Brad (it seemed like it anyway), he's just so big!  It was a lot of fun.  I just sat there. :)  Oh, my favorite thing there was when Luke went to the bathroom and almost left the door open!  HA!  Funny boy.  3-25-11

- Saturday was a total bum around day.  Thanks to Nate the house stayed mostly under control while I napped and sat around.  I started feeling sick on Thursday and then I looked a the calendar and realized what time of the month it is..... I have wanted to die ever since. I know I keep talking about this, but it's UNBEARABLE!!!!!  And feels like it's way more often than it should be.  I was actually 2 days early this tim which is a total rip off.  Just sayin.  3-26-11

Rewind to Swimming at Heidi's House (loving that I can post as many big pictures as I want!)

Brent set up his flashes all around the pool so that we could get these amazing pictures.  THey really are just so cool looking!

Rewind to the Hatch Family Campout

Thinking about planning this year's campout made me want to post these pictures from last year's.
These all came from the DVD that Sarah gave me.  This was such a fun campout.  I just wish we'd all take our cameras out more!  Looks like all we did was sit around.  Which was nice, but why didn't we get any of the raft?!  Anyway.  Can't wait til this year's!


SO MANY squirrels!!!!

Baby Erika looks so young!

I'm pretty sure Heidi and Kelly had to be surgically separated at the end of the campout.



We had some of the best food while we were on that campout.  Good stuff.







This is soooo cool with the corn spraying out....




I'm not sure what I like more about this picutre, the fact that I just got done nursing my baby, or how chubby my arms are..... it's a toss up.






These are just amazing.  My brother takes some really nice pictures.  They're professional photographers by theway if anyone wants to know of a good photographer.... they're the best!