Hugo Family 2020

We finally did it, had family pictures done! Our last time (besides the short porch pictures last spring) were from July 2018. Davis is still a baby and Lila wasn't here. It was time to get our wall updated. Of course, Ben was less than enthusiastic, but essentially supportive and we made it happen. I am so glad we did! I want to cover every wall in our home with these pictures, I love them so much.

Important to note- the cute photographer who took these did all our pictures (including individual ones of all the kids) in about 40 minutes. It was super fast and she kept things really fun and not stressful. Davis is usually the one who makes pictures hard and she had him eating right out of her hand! He was so cute and cooperative, which I'm thankful for because we got the sweetest pictures of him.

It was an afterthought, but I'm glad I asked for a girls picture and boys picture. Right now, I'm Lila's favorite person in the world. This girl has brought me so much happiness I really don't even have words to describe. I love this beautiful baby girl!

I love how this boys picture turned out! They are all so handsome! The older Chase gets, the more he looks just like his dad! The other two, I can't quite place. I think Hudson has more of a Smith look, although I can't quite place specific features. And for some reason we think Davis looks most like my dad (who doesn't even have red hair). They are all so different and I love them all so much!

This picture of all four kids in my absolute favorite-maybe ever- picture of my kids! I just feel so blessed that they are mine!

I know this is a lot of thoughts about family pictures, but these just make my heart swell with happiness for this crew. I have family photos all over our house- one several walls, in small frames on shelves, dressers, and windowsills. When I go to other people's homes, I love to look at all their photos they have displayed. I just love photos, especially of my favorite people! So maybe there are "too many" in my house, but it's what means the most to me, and my favorite art to see. 

 

Kid Updates

Lila- 8 months

• Cut her first three teeth, all in the same week, just a few days before she hit the 8 month mark. This officially makes her the earliest Hugo baby to get a tooth!
• Started wanting to feed herself. She'll pick up tiny bites of soft food and maybe 20% of it actually ends up in her mouth.
• Mostly just rolls everywhere. She hasn't figured out crawling yet. She will get up on all fours and rock, so it is probably close!
• She's a great sleeper- even with the teething! She sleeps 7 pm- 7 am and then has two naps a day- 1 hour in the mid-morning and a good 2.5 hour nap after lunch. 
• She seriously smiles all the time, but she's pretty conservative with her giggles. She doesn't laugh very often.
• Is still wearing a size 1 diaper (although they are getting really small, as soon as this pack is done I'll move her to a size 2). She still mostly wears 3-6 month clothes, but some of her 9 month stuff works as well (it's still a little big).
• 8 months in to this baby girl gig and I love it more than ever! She has worn a bow every single day of her life and I still just love getting her dressed every day!

 

Davis- 3.5 years old

• It's been quite a month with this kid! In the last month we lost him for a terrifying 20 minutes when he took off on his scooter, he's thrown glass jars into the freezer which shattered and made a big mess (3 times!), and he cut his own hair! 
• Because of the haircut he gave himself, his hair has since been buzzed. His first comment was "oh no, my hair is broken!"
• Feel absolutely no remorse about any of the above mentioned mischief. In fact, whenever I get really mad/stern with him about anything, he looks at me with big, round puppy eyes and the most innocent little face and says "What mom? Huh?" like he doesn't quite understand/hear what I'm saying. It's infuriating and adorable at the same time.
• We've been doing "mom-school" while the big kids are at school. We mostly work on his letters and their sounds. He is picking up on it really well!
• He's the funniest little boy ever, he makes everything into a game and we think everything he does is cute!

Hudson- 7.5 years old

• He's totally nailing second grade. I love hearing the things he tells me about school every day. He is having so much fun with his buddies, Hyrum and Richie. I'm also hearing a lot about a little girl named Cecelia these days!
• I made him a jedi robe for Halloween and he's worn it a lot since then. Sometimes it's a Jedi robe, sometimes it's a Harry Potter robe, sometimes it's a villager robe (from Minecraft). If I would have realized how much joy this would bring him I would have done it sooner!
• His piano skills are really coming along. He finished his first set of piano books and is well into his next level books. I'm so proud of his hard work!
• He bore his testimony at church a few weeks ago and it was so sweet! He said "I want to share that when I listened to General Conference it really made me want to study the Book of Mormon better. And when I read the Book of Mormon and learn about Nephi, it really makes me want to be a better person." Not your typical kid testimony- Hudson is definitely not your typical kid.

Chase- 9.5 years old

• He's doing so well in school, as always, but I have been worried about his perfectionist tendencies there. We are talking a lot about how it's okay to make mistakes sometimes. He's so used to always knowing the right answer!
• He's doing a little basketball clinic weekly at Layton High. It's been really fun and a great experience for him. He practices outside all the time now!
• He bore his testimony a few weeks ago and it was so sweet and heartfelt. He said, "I want to share that when I watched General Conference it made me feel really good. The world has a lot of crazy stuff right now, but I feel like it's all going to be okay. I'm thankful for a prophet and apostles who lead us."
• He's been reading like crazy lately- often finishing a novel in one night! I'm glad he's so eager to learn.
• I've been making him eat school lunch. Apparently now lunch is free for all kids for this school year, and since life is so chaotic here with a new baby and everything I told the boys to just eat school lunch. He was initially so hesitant, but we made him try it. Now he's realized he actually likes it (he's really not that picky of an eater) and it does make mornings a little easier around here. Someday I'll be happy to go back to making their lunches, but it's been a great way to simplify things a little bit. I'm glad he's learning to be flexible.
• We had his annual eye exam- and luckily his terrible vision hasn't gotten any worse in the last year! Now I just need to order him some new glasses (his are being held together with super glue...and have been for six months!)

 

September

As I gathered photos for this post, it became glaringly obvious that I don't have many pictures of Chase and Hudson from the last month, and lots and lots of Lila and Davis. So even though they are pretty unrepresented photographically this month, let me start with a little update on how they have been doing!

September we really got into the groove with school on hybrid schedule. This meant the boys only went to school on Monday and Wednesday and did distance learning on Tuesday, Thursday and Friday.  This was different than our experience with remote learning from the spring. It was so nice for them to get to go two days a week and they always looked forward to those days. I can tell how much they love school! They both have so many good friends in their classes and have really great teachers!

Our home learning days were full! In the spring, they could finish their work in two hours most days. This time around it's a good 4-6 hours of work (and that's with me keeping them moving!). It's a lot of work! But they are doing great with it. I am continually impressed with how hard they work and how dedicated they are. As I've been more involved in their learning I can't complain too much about the workload, since it isn't busy work at all- this is quality learning going on (thank goodness for amazing technology!)

These big boys continue to be so sweet to Davis and Lila- I definitely missed them on the days they went to school. The house felt very quiet (and it stayed so much cleaner!), I do love having them around. But ultimately, I think school is the best place for them and it's where they want to be. 

On days that the boys were home, we also have the Joseph boys at our house! Their mom, Megan, teaches kindergarten in the morning so they come to our house! We do remote learning with the four big boys all sitting at the kitchen table with their laptops. Between all of them we have grades 1, 2, 3, and 4 represented! Davis and Oliver (who is 4) are champs and just play, play, play all morning. At 9:30 we do recess and all the boys go outside for a half hour. It sounds like a lot of kids and craziness (and it is!) but it's been going incredibly smoothly.  All these boys get along great and the older kids love helping out the younger ones with school work and technology issues. It's such a great group!

We wrapped up our swim season with a Labor Day BBQ to celebrate Rosie's birthday! It was a really fun day and we all reminisced about how grateful we are for the pool-especially this summer!

Davis hung out poolside with a handful of veggie straws and a wedge of watermelon. If that doesn't just say "Labor Day" I'm not sure what does!

This is Davis refusing to make eye-contact with me because I wouldn't let him have some of the bread he has hidden behind his back. This kid is a crack-up!

I bought my double stroller back when Hudson was born and I put thousands of miles on it. I used it almost every day. Then the boys got too big for it and I have hardly used it in the last few years. It is so fun to have two tiny ones to put in it again! I feel like I've been reunited with an old friend. 

There is nothing Davis loves more than a roll- look at the admiration in his little face! In September Davis had to have some major dental work done. He has hypoplastic enamel on his several of his teeth, meaning that the enamel didn't form well and has weak spots. Some of those weak spots turned into cavities. Our dentist gave us a few options, and we chose to just bite the bullet and get them all taken care of since he's so young and we didn't want anything to get worse and turn into losing the teeth or needing a root canal. Since he's so resistant to even opening his mouth for the dentist, really the only option was to put him under general anesthesia for them to be filled. It was expensive, but we hope worth it! He was a little loopy after the procedure, but otherwise he handled it great and was thrilled with the tiny red ball he got as a prize.

This was the remote learning set up Davis created for himself. For a few days he sat here and worked on his "computer" quite a bit.

Oh I love our view! During September and October it really shows off for us! Every time I look out our big windows I'm even more in love with where we live.

On this particular day, Davis removed the matching mint green bow Lila was wearing and replaced it with a red one, declaring it much better for her. He loves red so much that he really wants everyone around him to also wear red.

 

Bryce Canyon

It had been way too long since we had been away as a family- pregnancy, newborn stage and Covid really threw a kink into our travel plans! We finally got away for a few days- to BRYCE CANYON! Our kids hadn't been before and Chase gets a National Parks Pass because he's a 4th grader, which he is very determined to use this year! 

It ended up being a really quick trip- just three days, but it was still sweet. In fact, due to lack of sleep cooperation from Davis and Lila, I think three days was about right for us. We spent two days hiking in the beauty of Bryce Canyon. Our first day we did the Mossy Cave hike, which was short and beautiful (and a little crowded). 

We set off early the next morning for our big hike into the canyon. Lila started off in the backpack on Ben's back, which didn't last long. I ended up carrying her in my arms for a lot of the hike while she slept- during which time Davis rode in the pack! Then once she woke up I carried her in on my back in the backpack and Davis hiked and occasionally rode on Ben's shoulders. It was a little crazy doing a 4 mile hike with tiny kids- but they all did great!

This is my hiking with a sleeping Lila in my arms- we've done that a few times this summer.

Bryce Canyon is so stunning- I was in awe of the beauty! We did the Queens Garden/Navajo Trail hike. You can do each hike individually, or take a trail that links to the two together and you get to see a lot more of the canyon. I thought we'd take breaks and take it slow- but since it was heating up and our boys were doing well we just kept going. 

This particular formation is called "Thor's Hammer", which was the highlight of the hike for Chase and Hudson for obvious reasons. It was right at the end of the hike, while climbing steep switchbacks and immediately Hudson declared that it made the whole thing worth it!

 We stayed in an airBNB  in Panguitch which was really nice. It was spacious and clean and comfortable. This trip was a little bit of a learning experience for me, since Davis and Lila were so little, and Lila wasn't too happy to be in the car, we spent more "down time" at the airBNB than we normally would have. I should have brought games and more stuff to do! But there were TVs so we watched a bunch of movies and that was fine too. We went out for burgers and shakes one night and found the greatest little burger joint that was so delicious. Otherwise we just ate at the airBNB.

It was so fun to do this trip together! It was exhausting and exhilarating. It was a great bonding experience for our family and so fun to see more of our beautiful state. We'll see how soon we are brave enough to do it again!