Happy Birthday Mark

Today my baby brother turned 22. I can't believe it! I was old enough when he born that I still remember the night he was born. I used to take Mark everywhere with me and of course everyone thought I was his teenage mama instead of his big sister. A few of my favorites were the cute Chinese ladies at the dry cleaners who never believed my mom he was hers no matter how many times we told them, or when I took him with me to register for a few classes at the community college (they were so mean to me that I spit on the ground and swore I would never take a class there...and I didn't).

One of my all time favorite stories though was when my boyfriend "big Mark" came to visit and we went up to the airport to see his dad (who was a pilot). I was babysitting Mark so we took him with us. The only car available was mom's RX-7 so we took that and Mark laid down in the back (it was a 2 seater) the whole way up to the airport (30 minute drive) then big Mark's dad asked little Mark (about 3 at the time) if he wanted to see the cockpit (things were different back then without a lot of rules) and Mark said to him "No. I know you kill birds". It was so dang funny. Then on the way home he fell asleep in the back of the car and when we stopped to fill up the car with gas I was going to run in to the gas station to get drinks so I popped the trunk to ask him what he wanted (I got some serious dirty looks). Of course now looking back I realize he shouldn't have been riding in the back like that ... but there weren't a lot of rules and he loved it.

I love that Mark lives so close and that I get to see him on an almost daily basis.

Happy Birthday Mark! I love you!!!

Flashback Friday - Future Missionaries

Mark

Timmy

These were taken when we dropped Heidi off at the MTC. Neither one of them went to where they pointed (but they both went to So. Cal). I can't believe how little they were!

He's Home!!!

I can't believe it 2 years is over and gone and Mark is home. His flight got in this morning at 8:45 am.

Mark looks great and it was so fun to be there to welcome him home. There were 7 (maybe 8) missionaries from his mission on the flight and Mark led the way down the escalator. I of course cried (so did Heidi and my dad and maybe a few others that hid it well). The kids were so excited and held up the signs they made yesterday. By tomorrow night all of us will be together!!!

here we are waiting

coming down the escalator

I'm pretty sure my dad was the most excited

Mark, Claire and I

The whole welcoming committee

Two funny things about the signs:

1. The kids are holding the ones they decorated. Notice how neat Luke colored his and how crazy Tayson did his. Tayson put BYU all over his even though we told him Mark went to the U. And Luke put a b-day cake on his for some reason.
2. On the back of one we wrote "Pwned" it was supposed to be "pwnd" I guess. Some gaming thing that means owned. Anyways...Todd, Timmy, David and Mark understood and got a kick out of it.
   

**funny side note about his flight: My parents were gone until about a week ago so we weren't sure exactly when Mark was getting home so I called the mission home to ask them for his flight info. I explained who I was and that my parents were out of town for 7 weeks but she was still hesitant to give it to me. So I told her I would go check the mail at my parents house and then I asked if it wasn't there should I just call back. So she said "just a minute" and then came back and asked me a bunch of questions. "what are your parents full names?" "who is Mark's stake president?" "What is his middle name?" I of course knew all the answers (thank goodness Mark is in my stake or I wouldn't have known that one) then I asked her if she wanted to know how much he weighed at birth. I shouldn't have said it and I didn't mean to sound sarcastic it was all just so funny to me. But in the end she gave me the info.

He's Coming Home

I can't believe it! Tomorrow morning I will be at the airport with a BIG smile on my face and a sign in my hands to welcome Mark home. I am 100% sure that I will cry (I'm about to just thinking about it).

Here are a few of my favorite memories of Mark's mission over the past 2 years:

• His first Christmas out he sent home 1 Christmas card to my house that I was supposed to share with everyone (including family members out of state...what in the world?)
  
• Seeing Mark both years on our drive to Cali for Christmas. We ate at Chipotle both times (according to Mark it's a tradition if you do it more than once)
• Mark's final email (word for word..."Family 2 John 1:12 Elder Schultz"
• His hilarious emails about biking
• The amazing letters that came home from people who's lives he has touched
• Knowing that he was out there doing the Lord's will and LOVING it
• Hearing my kids pray for him
  
• The fact that 6 kids were born while he was on his mission

I know there are a million more things that I love and want to document but I'm just so excited it's hard to remember....

Here are a few of the things we have planned for the next few days:

• Going to the airport bright and early in the morning
• George, Sherry and Danny all coming in town
• All 10 kids together again (it's been sooooo long since we've all been together)
  
• Family pictures
• Volleyball
• Boating/Swimming
• Going running with Sherry and/or Danny (everyone's invited)
  
• Hopefully going on a bike ride
  
• Lots and lots of computer gaming and board games for the boys (all night every night is what I've heard)
• Mark speaking in church on Sunday
• Heidi blessing baby Josephine on Sunday
• I get to have about 10 extra people sleeping at my house and couldn't be more excited
  

All the meals are planned and food assignments are handed out...all that's left to do is decorate signs and clean my house! WOO HOO!!!!!!!!

Flashback Friday - Mark and the Chairs

There are so many great things about this picture:

• Mark is too cute and so little
• The Cookie Monster chair is mine (I got it for Christmas when I was 8)
• Big Bird is Heidi's
• The eyeballs are already missing and these chairs are probably just under 10 years old in this picture.
  
• I remember seeing the big box with the chair in it hidden in my mom's shower the Sunday before Christmas when my mom was fixing my hair
• The mini-tramp in the background. My mom would do her exercises on it, but we kids really knew how to have fun with it.
• The awesome pink pictures on the wall in the background. Especially the fact that the big one has some award just put on top of the frame. Classic.

These pictures were taken Easter 2009
28 years and 2 houses later the chairs live on...

you really can't beat little tikes for a long lasting product.

6 more days

In only 6 more days Mark will be home from his mission. I am beyond excited for him to come home, and right after he gets home all my siblings are coming to visit. DOUBLE WOOT!! I know I'm crazy how excited I'm getting about this...but I can't help it.

In preparation for Mark's return next week my dad went shopping today. He bought a new computer for Mark (which Todd is putting together for him) and a new TV for his room since the one in there didn't work well enough. So I asked my dad if Mark even watched TV and he said (without missing a beat) "Yes. He loves the Disney Channel". Todd and I laughed so hard when he said that and he was cracking up too. I think Mark might have outgrown the Disney Channel in the last few years :) hee hee

My kids prayers have changed from blessing him to be safe and work hard on his mission to blessing him to come home soon or come home safe. It's not that far of a trip.

Flashback Friday - Mark

This post is inspired by the email I got from Mark this week. He is on a mission in California (only 9 more months to go). Every once in a while I attach pictures to my emails for him to keep up with my ever-growing kids and fun things we do. So this week to spice up my email I sent him the picture of my new hair do. Here is what he wrote in response (exactly how he wrote it grammar and spelling unchanged).

"haha, When I was looking at the picture my comp looked over and asked "is that your mom" and I was like nah dude thats my sister, my mom is alot older than that. It just reminded me of all the times that people thought mom was grandma and it made me laugh. but dont tell mom that."

I am kid #4 and Mark is #10 we are just under 16 years apart in age. I have so many hilarious memories of Mark as a baby since I was practically his mom. George and Steve were both on missions and Sherry left for BYU soon after he was born (I think he was a week old at her graduation) so I was the oldest kid at home.

Once I went to the grocery store with my dad and we took Mark (just the 3 of us). The checkout gal thought my dad was some sort of pervert hanging out with a high school girl and "their" baby until I called him dad. Then she prolly thought he was so sweet to take care of his daughter and "her" baby.

When I took a year off from BYU I thought I should take a class or two at the local community college so when I went to find out about classes I took Mark with me (as always) and the lady helping me thought he was mine and treated me like some dumb high school drop out - I was SO MAD that I practically yelled at her as I walked out and no I didn't end up taking any classes.

And there were the sweet Chinese ladies at my mom's dry cleaning place who NEVER believed my mom and I when we would tell them he was her baby not mine.

I'm sure I could go on forever with stories. I was at Mark's birth and don't mind at all being confused for his mom. I sure hope my kids turn out as great as he has.


Mark with Dad and Mom
Seriously could he be a cuter kid?


Mark, Me, Jeannie and Timmy
This was the summer after my freshman year at BYU.


Here I am with my "boys"


Jeannie, Me, David and Mark
Nice muscles David...look at his ribs you can see everyone of them
I'm not sure why but we always made silly faces in pictures.

eLDER sCHULTS

This is Elder Mark Schultz (notice the Z at the end of our last name). Mark is a very smart kid - pretty much got straight A's his first year at the University of Utah. However, he like many his age relies heavily on spell check and types faster than he should. When he was in the MTC and sending hand written letters it took several attempts to figure out his words (between handwriting and spelling) so we were very excited for him to start emailing his letters so they would be legible. But....this didn't help because he types fast and doesn't proof-read and can't spell worth beans. Here are some of his best spelling errors.

eLDER sCHULTS - yes that's right he did caps locks wrong and spelled his last name wrong. I had no idea someone could misspell their own last name.

Weelky Letter - about half of his emails say this instead of "weekly"

"other side of the tracts" - funny since he's on a mission but I don't think this was done on purpose

take them for granite - yes that should be granted

her boyfriend/pheonca - this is the best of all misspelled words! I actually couldn't figure it out until Kami told me it was fiance.

Here are some other gems that I grabbed out of 3 different emails....notice that 2 family members names are misspelled:
deffiently (definitely), meating (meeting), deppresing (depressing), compaion (companion), sutes (suits), Jeanie (Jeannie), streach (stretch), werid (weird), campions (companion's), mussles (muscles), chuch (church - spelled twice wrong in 1 sentence), phiscialy (physically), Christene (Christine), policties (politics), quieting (quitting)