January and February pictures get to be combined, since not a lot seems to happen in those months anyway (but mostly I’m just trying to get caught up).
January
One exciting thing that happened in January was that it snowed! Kind of! It was just a little tiny bit (but enough to still cancel school here in Texas). The kids wanted to go out and play in it, but there was nothing to really play in, plus it was freezing outside, so I said no. I felt like a mean mom, and like my kids were going to be deprived like that girl in that really old movie who used to live on Earth, but then moved to some planet where the sun only came out once a year, and so she was so excited to see it, but then on the one day it came out, all the other kids locked her inside and she missed it. Does anyone know what that movie is? It used to make me really sad.
Anyway, I did tell my kids they could all go out and touch the snow, and then they wanted pictures to document this crazy event:
I don’t know why Henry doesn’t have a shirt on. I can’t keep a shirt on that kid. Even in such treacherous snowy weather.
Here is Tristan with his friend Drew the next day, about to go on an overnight scout campout in the snow and ice. 
While Tristan was on his campout, Oliver and Rachel took over babysitting duties so Daniel and I could go out on a date. I love having kids old enough to babysit.
For reasons that still have never been explained, this is what we found when we came home: The younger 3 all upstairs asleep in their beds, and Oliver and Rachel asleep downstairs on the couches, each of them with a weapon by their side, and a note on the floor that said, “Dad, we fought bravely.” Haha. We have such weird kids. 
And speaking of weird kids, here is another funny babysitting incident that happened. We came home from a date one night to find that Tristan, who had learned some sort of swing dance at a church mutual activity, had taught all the kids this special dance, and they had it all ready to perform. Notice 3 of them are wearing fuzzy pajamas (I will explain more on that later).
You might find it hard to believe, but this dance actually went on for more than 4 minutes, with no variation at all – they took it very seriously. Lucky for you, I trimmed it down a little:
It really has been awesome having both Tristan and Oliver old enough to babysit. Daniel and I go out every weekend, and they handle it like pros. (And by handle it like pros, I mean they handle it by fighting bravely with nerf weapons, having swing dance lessons, and usually getting by with no major incidents, although mostly every week we get a phone call about 20 minutes into our date from one of the kids tattling on one of the other kids about what a disaster they are being, so we tell them to work it out and not to call us again, and then it’s always all worked out with everyone asleep by the time we get home.)
Two last January pictures:
Cindy and Henry at the table with legos and a puzzle. This is what their standard day looks like.
A tackle Daniel pile when he gets home from work. This is also standard. 
February
A Saturday bike ride to the park: 
Spiders: 
Underdogs: 
The Superbowl! Go Seahawks. Happy day for the Mott family. 
And here’s Henry after beating me in a game of Battleship. I had tried a little experiment to see if Henry would be able to figure it out if I put all my ships together in one little corner. Once he realized what I had done, he was so excited. He kept saying, “Oh, boy, Mom, I’m pretty sure I’m going to win this!” And he did. 
Here are some of the kids after performing a little play that Elizabeth wrote. 
And Cynthia posing in some sort of dress-up outfit: 
And Tristan posing in his fuzzy pajamas. There is kind of a story with these fuzzy pajamas. Daniel’s dad gives all the kids pajamas every year at Christmas. This year it was fuzzy-footed pajamas for everyone, even the new teenager. At first Tristan thought he was a little too old for them, and guessed that he might not wear them that often. And then he tried them on. And didn’t take them off for the next month. I’m kind of serious. He thought they were the coziest thing ever. He wore them for all of Christmas break, and then once school started up again, as soon as he’d get home from school he’d go take a shower and get in his fuzzy pajamas. At 4:00 in the afternoon. This led to some teasing by some members of the family (Daniel), which wasn’t really fair seeing as Tristan directly inherited his sense of comfort over fashion directly from certain members of the family (Daniel). It also led to some embarrassing situations. Like the time when Tristan was vacuuming the hall in his fuzzies and I heard a knock on the door and went and opened it, and it was one of the mothers from the baseball team Daniel coaches, only she had brought along her son, who happens to be in 8th grade at Tristan’s school, and was about to become a teammate of Tristan’s. So that was how they met – me letting him in the door, and Tristan vacuuming along in his fuzzies, and then panicking and trying to run and hide before he was seen (too late). Even though he was mortified, Tristan was not only a good sport about it, but he also kept on wearing the now- famous jammies. He even let me take these pictures of him. 
Valentine’s Day fun:
Lizza in all pink: 
Henry being super proud of his decorated cookie: 
But I can’t post a picture of Henry on Valentine’s Day without posting this one from a few years back:
That was him at age 1 1/2 after discovering sprinkles for the first time. Ha! It gets me every time. I can’t handle the cuteness. Any time I feel like being mad at Henry, I should come look at that picture. You are welcome to try it, too.
This year we tried something different, and instead of sending decorated cookies to all the kids at school, we made fancy white-chocolate pretzels. It was fun and mostly easy.
Also fun and mostly easy – heart braids for the girls. Thank goodness Valentine’s Day only comes once a year. 
A few days later, Daniel and I celebrated our 14th wedding anniversary. Crazy! I feel like that makes us officially old people, because in my mind, I feel like I was still in high school maybe only 5 years ago. I guess it’s been a little longer than that. 
Then a few days later we went to another Imagine Dragons concert (last fall we drove to Houston to see them; this time they came to Austin, and we took Tristan and Oliver with us). 
We had general admission tickets, and somehow we made it to the very front row, which was so great for the boys, because we were right by the stage and they didn’t have to see over anyone’s head.
Oliver had worn his BYU shirt, and once when Dan Reynolds (the lead singer, who also went to BYU) came over and was singing right by us, he noticed Oliver in his shirt and gave him a big smile and salute and pointed right at him. It’s right at the end of this video clip:
Ollie was pretty excited about that. 
Other February things:
Battleship matchup between Daniel and Henry, with a lot of spectators.
Rachel and Elizabeth at gymnastics. They are still enjoying the little class at our rec center. We just do a few sessions per year, and it works out great. 
February was also the start of baseball season for Tristan and Oliver. Here are some pictures of Ollie with his team at the beginning of the season. Ollie’s the one in the black hoodie, because I forgot to send him to practice with his team shirt:
Cynthia always insists that she’s not tired at naptime, so I say, “that’s okay, here’s a big pile of books, and you can just read the whole time.” And sometimes she does, and other times this happens, which I love. (I just noticed she is clutching a Princess Leia toy in her hand. I’m not sure how that snuck in there.)
I also love this: 
The end. I am kind of catching up!
