"all boy"

our boys are "all boy".
Adam passed gas, babbled and started cracking up. As if to say "hey look mom i farted"
Kip just loves any attention he gets from adam. L ast night Adam was swinging a dish towel around and of course whacking Kip in the head in the process. Kip was truly cracking up at this which of course made Adam crack up as well.
IT'S AMAZING HOW DURABLE YOUNGER SIBLINGS ARE!

Where's LaDale?

You might be wondering where LaDale is, since she hasn't posted since the first day. Well, you probably know that LaDale moved into her own apartment almost two weeks ago. She is trying to get her internet up, but (as always) is running into a few problems here and there. She will return as soon as she can!

Updates in the life of Tyler and Telima

Hey everyone! Wow, it's like I turned my back for a second, and suddenly everyone's posted! It's so wonderful. I love hearing about what's going on in everyone's lives.

So, here's a little update on our lives here in beautiful city of Provo. Relia was kind enough to give Tyler my old job, which means I'm now training him. Even though she hired him on a strictly trial period, we're not really concerned. He's already fitting into the office and has my old desk looking cleaner than it ever did before! As for me, a full-time secretary position has opened up on campus, so I'm currently looking into that. I've had to work a lot the last two days, training Tyler and getting the office through registration without too much hassle, so I haven't actually had a chance to apply yet. But, tomorrow, I go to take my Office Skills Test and then I'll put in my resume. So, please keep us in your prayers. This job would be exactly the kind of work I'm looking for and it has the added benefit of being on campus (which also means that I could continue taking classes at the University for free!).

Anyway, that's us right now. We love you all!

Jen's family

We are going to Disneyland next week . I have promised Keryn and now the rest of everyone that I will post pictures after we get back. Jacob is so excited about going. We have some wall maps of Disneyland and he have taken to carring it around and pointing to the attractions that he most wants to see. These include Dumbo, cars, trains, and Whinnie the Pooh.

Benjamin is doing very well in shool and Heather is really improving as well. They both seem to have time management problems. We are working on it.

Erica has discovered "no!" and says it with great gusto and energy over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over again!

A little update on our kids

Kip is 16 pounds 13 oz, adam is 27 pounds. Ya' feed them and they grow. And they both like to dance, especially to CSI ;)
you know the important stuff.

Here's Adam

Okay so now I will put a picture of Adam on the blog.

Samuel's family

I just thought that I would try to post some pictures of Samuel's family, not just for all of you but for Samuel. I love you all. I can only do one picture at a time.

Life as a physics grad

I am taking a classical mechanics course, aka rocket science class, literally, and an electricity and magnetism course. These two and the three hours of research completes my course schedule for this semester. As to the differences in ASU and BYU, where to start,
- No bells, at all, in any building. Fun to figure out who's watch to tell time by.
- Way smaller undergraduate physics department. This means that grad students TA the non physics major classes.
- The lack of public microwaves at ASU, where BYU had at least one in every building, or so it seemed.
- The apparent lack of motivation to do course work. Instead of a tutorial lab for students to walk in at there own time and assk questions they all, and I do mean all the classes, have assigned recitation times to go over homework problems. This, as I have been told, was do to the few students who actually did their homework.
- Here's a big difference for me, I have a desk. I like it a lot. Nice.

That's all I can think of for now. I love you all tons and tons.

RE: Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of a PhD

Samuel, I'm so excited that you are starting your program. What classes are you taking (besides those research hours)? And what is the biggest difference (besides the weather, that it...) between ASU and BYU?

I must admit to the tiniest bit of envy. I hope you are having fun!

Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of a PhD

G'Day to the family,

Life is fun here in Arizona. I love the slow traffic into and out of Pheonix that Jeff and I zoom by in the car pool lane. I love watching our new home slowly get work done on it and the knowledge that we will soon be able to do whatever we want to do with it, at least on the inside. And I love the work involved in the many years of school that I have decided to undertake. I know all this could not have happened to me if I did not have such a wonderful family. I do mean anyone who is reading this. Everyone in the family has helped me to get to the point where I am today. I wanted to tell you all that I love you very much and I am thinking of everyone constantly in my life. I hope you all can find joy in your life today, or whenever you read this.

Harry Potter Site

I discovered a site that ponders some clues in the most recent Harry Potter book. Most of you have read the book. If you haven't, don't visit the site or hover over this link to see where it leads. Here it is.

The joys of late summer

This morning has been wonderful. Our basement bedrooms were just cool enough last night to want a thin blanket, and I woke up at 7:30-ish (positively sleeping in, thank you Mercy and Ezra!). After feeding Mercy and cuddling with Ezra, I got to talk to Jen on the phone for about twenty minutes. Then I put on my sandals, walked two blocks down Center Street to the Farmer's Market, and bought a peck of freshly picked peaches (not pickled peppers), a basket fresh raspberries, and a freshly-baked white sourdough baggette.

I love this town!

New lung cancer drug approved

Here is an article Mema directed me to about a new lung cancer drug, Alimta, specifically for non-small cell cancer. Some interesting points:

The drug, Alimta, in clinical trials was found to shrink tumors as effectively as another cancer-fighting drug, Taxotere. But Alimta did so with fewer troubling side effects, which include hair loss, tingling fingers and toes, depressed blood count, and hospitalizations for subsequent infection.
One in 50 patients taking Alimta had side effects. That benefit came without any lessening of the drug's effectiveness.

But there is a downside:

The Alimta treatment, 500 mg every 21 days, costs patients $3,900 per month, according to the company.

Still, it is reassuring to know that there continue to be breakthroughs.

News about Dad

This is a little update for all of you. Today was your dad's fourth chemo treatment out of 6. He will have the last treatment on September 7. He is really not doing very well right now. He is having lots of nausea problems. He is on all kinds of meds to get some relief from the sickness. He is taking Zofran, it is supposed to keep him from throwing up. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. He is taking campazene (sp??), it is also for the nausea and vomiting. It seems to be working but he only takes it after the first 3 days. He is on Adivan. It is a multi-purpose drug. It is used to help alchoholic and as a muscle relaxant and as a seditive. He is using to help counter act the jittery legs he gets with the chemo. He also has a problem with constipation problems. It is one of the side effects that really bothers him. He now has a hemroid and so they have given him some steroids to shrink that and two different kinds of laxative to try to help him keep regular. It is begining to be like a drug store in our room. I just want him to start feeling better. On the up side of things, the radiation tech looks at something each day which is sort of like a mini x-ray or something like it and she says the tumor is smaller than it was. That is the good medical news. On top of that President Clifford was voice for a blessing which dad recieved sunday. Pres. Clifford said that this would not kill your dad but that he will live through it. I was not there so I don't really know the exact words just what your dad told me.

I love you all very much and I love the pictures of Ezra and Mercy. I will try to post some of Samuel's kids tomorrow.

Mercy E. and Ezra O.

Tomorrow Mercy will be 5 months old--it's hard to believe it has been that long. She now sleeps in her crib in the same room as Ezra--even when he cries she doesn't wake up, and when she cries he doesn't wake up. It's amazing. I do love being their mother!

RE: Announcements

It kind of depends...we're actually hoping that Tyler will get my job. He's interviewing with Relia tomorrow afternoon. I've offered to train the replacement for free, seeing as how I gave Relia all of three days to figure it all out. However, I'm also putting together a notebook of information on how to do my job, both as secretary and as directory specialist. So, we'll see where she wants to go from there. Starting as soon as I can, I'll be concentrating on finding myself a job. Hopefully, I'll be able to find one soon. Anyway, that's the plan!

~Telima

Re: Announcements

Seriously, though, Telima: are you going to be training a replacement? Or is Heather (the girl who did your job over the summer) going to take over?

Re: Announcements

A terrible death to die,
A terrible death to die,
A terrible death to talk to death,
A terrible death to die!

Announcements, announcements, annooooucements!

To all my family,

I have an announcement to make to all of you! I'll also be calling, in case you don't read this, but I thought you should all know. (Now of course, you'll all be thinking, 'She's pregnant!" Well, just put that thought to rest, because it isn't true.)

Tyler and I have decided that it would be best right now for me to work full-time and to withdraw from school. That of course would mean that I would have to quit my job, seeing as how it's a student job and I won't be a student. I'm withdrawing today from the University and will no longer be working here on Monday. This has actually been much harder to do than I thought it would be, but that's beside the point.

The reason we have decided to do this is because we feel it is important to not put off having a family. However, we're a little more than broke right now, even with a summer of saving up. So, we've decided that I'll work full-time for a while and that Tyler will try to get a part-time job so that we feel at least a little more prepared to have a baby. I, of course, will let all of you know when that time comes, but for now, it isn't here quite yet. I wanted to let all of you know so that you're aware of what's happening in our lives right now. I love you all!

~Telima

Crayons

A few questions about crayons:

It's okay for a kid to injest a little crayon every once in a while, right?

How do you get crayon off clothes?

How did people get crayon off the walls without Mr. Clean's Magic Eraser? Seriously. (And how do the kids write on the walls without you noticing? I mean, Ezra hasn't had crayons in days and all of a sudden I notice outrageous orange, radical red, and purple pizzazz marks all over my entryway.)

Chateau question

Does anyone remember what year we gave the wooden sign "Chateau de la Tobler" to Mema and Daddy for Christmas? And, Mema or Daddy, did you know that we were going to be giving it to you, or was it a surprise? And where did the name originally come from?

Just wondering.

It's in the water...

Sorry, but this headline just made me laugh and laugh:

Study: Tap water poses little pregnancy risk

I'm sure glad they cleared that up!

Comments

Sometimes you might want to comment on a post that is WAY down on the page. And maybe nobody will notice that you had an insightful, fascinating, pithy comment. To avert this tragedy, we have changed the way comments work! If you want to comment on somebody's post, just publish your own post! Use the subject line of the post you wanted to comment on, only with a "RE:" in front of it.

For example, suppose Telima writes a post titled "Green eggs and ham". Ezra could respond with a post titled "RE: Green eggs and ham". Then Tyler could respond to Ezra's comment with "RE: Green eggs and ham". Etc, etc, etc. (Thank you Yul Brynner!)

Hopefully this will be nice. We will try it for a while! Keep me "posted".

Jacob's birthday

Well, Jacob turned 4 last Friday! He is growing up way to fast. He had a wonderful day, even if we did put off cake and ice cream until Saturday so he could share them with his cousins. He got a car game and a new car from us all.
All day long he went around sticking 4 fingers in everyone's faces. He was able to take blue cookies to school for all of his friends. His cake was blue with Scooby Doo on it. He had a great time!

Flashback to August 9th!

We missed two August birthdays by just days on this blog, so we're going to flashback to August 9th, Amy's birthday. Amy is the beautiful wife of David and the wonderful mother of 2 and 8/9 kids, Skyler, Ephram, and Arabella. Of course, you already knew that. But did you know:

Amy's favorite restaurant? Macaroni Grill
Amy's favorite movie? The Lord of the Rings Movies (Extended version)
Amy's favorite drink? Chocolate milk shake
Amy's favorite kind of weather? Rainy days
Amy's favorite books? The Harry Potter books and Devil's Arithmatic
Amy's favorite state to vacation in? Hawai'i
Amy's favorite color? Green

Happy belated birthday, Amy!

Moving In

I never really understood what it take to actually move into a new apartment. Tyler and I got here Monday evening and have been working hard ever since just to get our place to look even remotely like a place where someone lives. At first, it was just empty. Then, boxes everywhere! Now, we have so many empty boxes out on that little balcony behind our apartment (you all know what I'm talking about because our apartments looks exactly the same as Caren and Samuel's old apartment) that I'm scared we're going to be kicked out for littering! All kidding aside, we love our apartment, partly because it's actually ours. We still have a million boxes scattered around and we're carefully stepping over everything that doesn't quite have a home within our home yet. However, slowly but surely, we are moving in.

Keryn, I love that you set this up. It's so fun to hear about what's happening in everyone's lives! I love you all and hope you're all doing great!

Love always,
Telima

Love this site!!

I think this is a good idea. We are also working on a way to keep David and Amy up on what we are doing. I love all of you and will keep you informed about what is going on with us.

"About us"

I was just noticing the comments in "about us" that appeal when we read the comments by using the 'view' link. I think it should become a riddle. There should be another line that reads...

"What is the minimum children in the Tobler family?"

This will stump all the grandchildren. Or at least until they realize how many aunts and uncles they have. I just thought this would be an interesting add on. I love you all

Libraries

When I was working at the Rainbow Library in high school, I almost always worked in the children's section. Everyone else hated it, and with good reason. It was always a mess, and no sooner did you clean up an area and get all the books in the right places did some little squirt come and pull books out and push the wrong books in and...you get the idea. I swore that I would NEVER let my child do anything of the sort. If he did, I would immediately fix it.

Well, of all the words I thought I'd eat when I had my own kids, I never thought I'd have to eat those. Pass the salt, please, because these are a little hard going down.

Mercy, Ezra, and I went to the library today. This was a bit more of a production than usual, because Brad has the car today (returning to Telima the boxes she stored here this summer), and the stroller and baby sack are in the car. But we can do anything, right? It even went well for a while. Ezra is obsessed with the drinking fountain, and I was able to get the movies and books that I wanted. The problem came when we were waiting in line to check out. The lady in front of us took a really long time, and Ezra got impatient. Mercy was spitting up everywhere, and flopping around, my hands were full of books, and Ezra walked over to the paperbacks and started pulling them off the shelves. I whispered, "Ezra, no!" He looked at me, picked up the books, and shoved them into the next shelf over, backwards, pushing all the books to the back of the shelf. Making a mess.

And what did I do? I dragged Ezra back over to me, checked out my books, and LEFT. I'm a terrible person.

One reason I love!!! Colorado

Okay, so this week is one of the reasons I love Colorado. When I returned home from church at 12:00 on Sunday, the temperature was 55 degrees. Today we had warmer weather, but a magnificent thunder storm. I went to the dentist and, of course, was sitting lower down in a chair looking at the dentist face for quite a while. Once I was allowed back up again, there it was, pouring rain. Beautiful. I was driving home and had to go out and get a picture of those clouds. They were incredible. They are attached. Anyway. Update on the dentist. It looks like I need to floss a little more, and those cavities from my childhood will threaten me forever. I guess some of those silver fillings are deteriorating and will be causing me trouble. Yuck!!! Other than a popping jaw, and a little wear that might be caused by the jaw not fitting, she says my teeth look great!!! That's good news, I guess. Well, I love you all, my beautiful family and I hope that you will let me all know what it happening in your neck of the woods. I am off to brave the storm and head back to the library.
LaDale
p.s. I've been trying to get those pictures attached and it is simply not working. The computer can't locate some page or other. I will try one more time. If it doesn't work, you'll have to use your imagination. Just remember, they were great.
L.

Celery Rice Recipe

Behold! The recipe for my famous celery rice! (Okay, so it isn't famous, and it's not even my recipe, it's Brad's sister Kim Hannay's recipe. Oh, well.)

1 Cup rice
1/3 cup diced celery
1/3 cup diced onions (I use the Dry-Pack dried onions)
3 tablespoons butter
3 cups water
3 chicken bullion cubes
5-6 good shakes of Morton's Nature's Seasons (you can find it in the spice section)

Saute rice, celery, and onions with butter in large skillet over medium high heat. Stir constantly until rice is lightly browned. Add water, bullion cubes, and Nature's Season (give it some good shakes, now). Cover, let simmer (reduce heat to medium low) for 15 minutes.

Newsweek's cover story--Lung Cancer

Newsweek--Lung Cancer

CNN--Nonsmokers can be cancer victims, too

With Peter Jennings passing away on August 7, and Dana Reeves (Christopher Reeves' widow) revealing that she has lung cancer, there has been a lot of information about lung cancer in the news lately. The Newsweek article was pretty interesting. LaDale told me about the CNN article, which also had some good information.

Welcome!

Welcome to the Chateau de la Tobler!

You know, when I was growing up, I sort of expected I would live in Las Vegas all my life. And so would all of you. Most of Mommy and Daddy's siblings lived in Vegas (at least that was what it felt like), and so I just assumed it would be that way for us. Part of me still wishes that could be true. (Well, not the Las Vegas part of it. I'm pretty sure I would melt.) But I wish that we could live closer together. There are so many times when I think of something I want to tell someone, but it seems too silly or irrelevnt to make a long distance telephone call about.

Hence this blog. It just might be fun to be able to post a comment, a question, an idea, to a common area that everyone in the family could read and respond to. We can use it for posting pictures (especially baby ones!), or sharing recipes (hey, Jen, I'd love your cinnamon roll recipe), asking questions about Daddy's treatments, or just sharing a memory!

I don't know if there is any interest, but I think it might be a fun experiment to try. I'm going to be sending an invitation to all of you through email. Once you have created a "Blogger" profile (it's free), anyone in the family (that includes Jeff, Bradley, Amy, Caren, and Tyler) can submit a post or comment on someone else's post.

I hope that this blog will be a fantastic way to stay in touch. I love you all!