Happy 2021!

Literally no idea why this picture was taken but it's nice?

Feel like this was early morning wrestling practice drop off:

Catch in the school gym

Instagram caption: Two days until Jack’s birthday aka Seahawks-49ers showdown. In preparation, here’s a Jack Izatt original roast of his dad’s beloved, albeit injury prone this fantasy football season 😭, team.

{49ers} How many ‘on IR’ spots on there again?
[NFL] One.
{49ers} .... can we have 53?

🥴🥴🥴

Attempting to keep the schedule straight to send out to students, yiiiiikes.

Cutie pie child.

Cutie pie kitten.

Soooo many pictures of Mando.

Wrestling meet for Clyde, watched online, no recollection how he did so probably not extremely stellar ;).

BIRTHDAY BOY:

And in exciting news, the Seahawks played against the Niners on Jack's birthday. You know, Jack the huge Seahawks fan who happens to be the child of Chuck, the huge 49ers fan?

Clyde and Jack sporting all of their Seahawks paraphernalia from Christmas:

Instagram caption: The world’s cutest Seahawks fan is nine today: happy birthday Jack! 💚💙

Ohhhh how we love this ridiculously cute and aggravating child. He is fierce and loyal and so clever and devious and funny and SO loving and we would be lost without him... I mean, we would all have some stored patience at our disposal instead of RUNNING COMPLETELY OUT ALL THE TIME, but we wouldn’t trade our Jackers for anything. Love you sweet boy 😘😘😘

All four kids - Carma is, of course, a 49ers fan and Will is, of course, a non-sports fan.

Love trying to get all four kids to smile and look at the camera. I just really love it.

Clyde attempting to demonstrate...

and the results of that demonstration hahahaha:

Niners fans! And Will! Basically the non-Seahawks fans!

Aaaand the whole happy family:

Grandma Pam came over wearing Seahawks colors just for the bday boy!

Not sure why Clyde is on the ground.

Cake decorated by Jack himself:

Oh man he's the best.

I sing this loudly at my house allll the time:

Willy boy getting those laps in.

Oh sheesh, as if Chuck hasn't corrupted enough of my children, Mando is now into Call of Duty:

SIGH.

Random cute picture of Chuck and Jack having lunch together:

Instagram caption: If there’s a spot for “follows directions well” on my job evaluation this year I miiiiiight be in trouble.

Going back to school again (hybrid) for second semester!

Perfect kitten being perfect.

Ugh, January 6th 2021 was... something. Historical. Terrifying.

I obviously handled it like I handle everything, obsessively refreshing NPR and scrolling through memes to cope.

Instagram caption: Carma has been usurped as the spoiled youngest child in the Izatt family. Imma bout to change the Amazon password to ‘stop.chuck.the.cat.don’t.need.more.stuff’ 😅🤦🏻‍♀️😂 We suuuuure love Miss Mando 😻

Another wrestling tournament for Clyde - this one I got to volunteer at and watch some of, super fun.

Coordinating a bit for church.

Okay but the window hammock deal is amazing.

Prettiest sky on the way to work:

... obviously had to get some pictures with Carma and Jack:

Will opted to skip boys and girls club and do online school at home with Mando:

Back in the ol' office!

Wrestling tournament out of town! Dropping Clyde off crazy early so they could load buses and head to eastern Idaho for the weekend:

Last day with some of the kids' favorite boys and girls club staff:

I am still so grateful for our NSD superintendent Paula K and the district for providing childcare options during online and hybrid school for employees and others. Having boys and girls club on site at East Valley was incredible and the staff was amazing. Such a great experience for Jack and Carma especially.

Mando being quite the study buddy for Will ;).

Leading up to my birthday weekend I realized that:

Clyde would be at his wrestling tournament. Chuck would be at work. I would be attempting to keep the other kids quiet and chill at home.

Instead I decided to treat myself (and three of my littlest besties) to a couple nights at hotels and a road trip to thrift stores. It was the actual best. We drove around Twin Falls and Burley and Rupert and Jerome and ate food and shopped and read books and watched screens:

Instagram caption: Our quartet hit the road this afternoon on a quest for adventure, hotel swimming, thrift store shopping, and snacks. Traveling with kiddos is THE best- it’s so neat to explore and ‘gritted teeth angry whisper yell’ in a totally different county than usual 🤗.

{also, do we miss @izattchuck and @clydeizatt? Definitely. Are we complaining about the extra space we had to spread out in the car? Definitely not 😎}

A new hotel opened in Twin and randomly had some rooms priced low of which we availed ourselves and it was the best:

Scrolling while the kids swam and found this and... yeah, it tracks.

We all approved of the continental breakfast.

Laughing at instagram while kids swim? Always a good time. Also, reminder that fries dipped in ranch is how I survived my first trimester with Jack. Only thing that sounded at all appetizing. Probably ate it four times a week.

Picture at every store:

Sooo happy.

Instacaption: I turn 36 on Monday, so to celebrate I road tripped to six out of town thrift stores and spent $6 at each of them 🤗.

Jk, probably $20 at each one 😳. Sorry not sorry @izattchuck 😅

This was the best gift I’ve ever given myself and I feel strongly like I’ll do it again. This time I did six stores (two Deseret Industries and four Idaho Youth Ranches) in 24 hours. I could easily double the stores in double the time? Next year? Sounds good! 🙌🏼

We surprised our buddy Will at his amazing coffee shop/restaurant to get some hot chocolate and it was so so so fun to see him.