Pumpkin Carvin'

We had a couple pumpkins this year. I got 2 big ones and one of them rotted, so I had to replace it. Callie needed one for preschool, and she got to paint it there. That is the slightly icky looking little pumpkin below- she used lots of black paint and most of it rubbed off... so we carved it too.

Joshua really just wanted to use the knife. I did not really want to let him. He did try his hand at scooping pumpkin guts, but he didn't last long.

(Again, the black is paint!) Marian didn't realize you have to scrape to get the pumpkin goobers out, so she was not an effective helper here. She sure was cute though!

Yeah, I got stuck doing most of the work. Joshua did the littlest pumpkin- I just helped a little with the fangs. They will look marvelous all lit up tonight!

And Delaney had a little temper tantrum yesterday, so I took her picture, because that's the kind of mom I am!


See, she's not usually cranky! Since she is not going out trick-or-treating tonight, I let her wear her costume all day today. Such a cute ballerina!

Tagged by Savannah

Well, Savannah Tagged me, so I am passing it on. Mostly because I have nothing else of interest to post today.

The rules:

1. The winners put the sticky sticker of uber stickiness up on their blog to say "Look at me! Look at me! I'm COOL... or at least someone else thinks so!"

2. Then they get to link back to me.

3. Then they get to nominate a few of their own winners! Spread the love!

4. Then leave a little note on the chosen blogs so they aren't left in the dark.

Okay, I love my friends who blog. I love being able to keep in touch and see what they are up to. sometimes I am quite jealous of what they are doing without me, but life goes on. So I have had Callie randomly choose 3 blogs for me to honor here today. And the lucky winners are:

1. Jen & Chris- I must say, your last post had me laughing out loud. You have the funniest kids and I am so glad you blog so I can see what you are up to. Plus, you always have a great attitude and you are up for whatever life throws your way. You are such a strong, amazing woman and mother as well. I'm glad we're related!

2. Becky- You are the coolest person I know right now! For those of you who don't know her, Becky ran the Marine Corps Marathon this past weekend. (She stopped by to see me too, since she was in the area.) Even more amazing is the fact that she had to prepare for it with no husband (because he's in Iraq) and 5 children. Yes, she is the superest-super mom I know. I am always impressed how together you are and how much you do. You take on things that have me shaking in my shoes and you just step up and get it done with a smile. And you look fabulous.

3. Kelli- Despite the fact that you have been slacking on posting lately, I absolutely LOVE your blog. I love that you post so many pictures- that's partly because I love your children and miss them, especially the ones with attitudes. You are a great mom and I don't know how you manage to get everything done. Keep it up because I always look forward to reading your posts and I'm so sad when I have to wait. It makes my day better when I get to see what you've written. I miss you.

(I had this all nice looking, but I cannot seem to get spaces between my paragraphs! Aaargh!)

Broken or not broken?

Let's begin with a funny story. Okay, not so funny, but still slightly amusing. Callie bonked her head. She then proceeded to have a tantrum because she couldn't see a bump on it when she looked in the mirror. So she ran to her room screaming and slammed the door. Then she really started screaming, since her finger had been in the way of the door slamming. Sigh. It was funny till she hurt her finger.

This is what her pinky finger looked like. It swelled up and the knuckle area turned purple. You can't see the lovely color here, but it was. It also looked a bit crooked, but I couldn't tell if it was because it was swollen or something else.

See, it does look crooked! And slightly bruised. It really was more purple in real life. She consented to have ice on it, so it must have hurt. I put in "Cinderella" and snuggled her on the couch with her blanket and ice pack. It didn't get worse, but it didn't get better.

At 4 I woke Dan up from his nap and asked if he would take her to the ER. He agreed with surprising good nature. I packed a bag of snacks and activities and sent them off. He called at 6:30 to tell me she'd just been X-rayed. Then nothing. 8pm rolled around and I partly watched "The Amazing Race". Still nothing. 10pm came around and I finally called the ER. The abrupt lady said they were on their way home. After she hung up I thought maybe I should have asked how long ago!

It was 10:15 before they came home. Nearly 6 hours!!!! Ug. Callie was asleep and Dan took her right to bed. I asked how it went, sonce she had a ig purple wrap on her finger. He said, "Not broken". That's all he said. They were gone for 6 hours and all he says is, "Not broken." ?!!

Here she is today, wearing purple lip gloss and chocolate chip muffins on her face. I did force Dan to tell me more, but getting info from him was like pulling teeth. They waited a lot, the ER was busy (note to self, if the kid's not screaming and/or gushing blood, don't go!), they waited some more, They got x-rayed, they waited, the doctor gave them a tube of bacitracin, they waited, they came home. Now I am a little confused still as to why the doctor gave them the bacitracin. She wasn't bleeding! At least, not when she left the house, who knows what happened once they got to the hospital. Dan's theory was that the doc didn't want them to walk away empty-handed after such a long wait. Hmmm, nice consolation prize!

So, Callie has a sore finger, but she is going to live. In the future, when I do NOT go to the ER and it turns out I should have, please remember this posting and know that there was a reason!

Time at the Temple

We tried to be a good family today. We dragged the kids to the Temple so that we could help another family go for the first time together. It didn't quite go as planned, but the children had a blast running rampant through the visitor's center. I'm sure they were glad when we finally left!

Here is our happy and eternal family. I will mention that it alternated between drizzling and downpouring all day. Thus the picture of us under the awning, with the reflection of the temple behind us.

Runaway Delaney had enough other friends to chase that she mostly stayed in sight. You see that I was able to get all the green marker off her nose from this morning!

Marian loved posing by everything. She especially liked the Christus statue, but the lighting wasn't good there for a picture.

This was Callie's very concerned face. We were looking at a beautiful display of pictures of Christ, chronicling the events of his life. When she saw the painting of Christ on the cross, she became very distressed. She was so concerned about Him. It was very sweet.

Playing with Markers... again!

Three guesses who found an unattended green marker this morning.

Oh yes, she had a marvelous time. She would not, however, show me her belly for a picture. It too was covered with green. And when I found the culprit marker, I discovered that Delaney had also colored all over my formerly white socks! Aack! Time for a bath and a load of laundry.

Optometrist

I finally got in to see the optometrist today (Thank you Lanie for watching Delaney!). I have been wearing my current contacts for nearly 2 months- well past their "good for" date. I must say, I loved the place I went in Havelock. Dr Banks. Wonderful, thorough man. He's the one who finally explained that I had a minute astigmatism, and that I didn't have a freaky large optic nerve, just a freaky curved one. Anyway, I really liked them for many reasons. Unfortunately, I wasn't due for an eye exam till after we moved.

So I went in today. Very nice lady, took forever, and wanted to do more tests because of my freaky optic nerve, despite the fact that all screening tests were normal. And then, I was charged $155. Aack! The very same thing I use to get, that cost me $60 in Havelock, is costing me $155! Are you kidding me?! The inflation here is that bad?! I don't think she did any tests out of the ordinary, so why was it $100 more?! And, she recommended a new (expensive) type of contact. After wearing the sample ones all day, I must say I am not impressed. I'll stick with my cheaper ones, thank you!

Tricare pays for the standard eye exam, so this exorbant amount I paid was just the contact lense exam stuff. How much are you paying to get a contact lense prescription? Was $60 really low, or is $155 really too high?

Catching up

I hate it when my friends don't post for a while. I want to know what's going on! I seem to have missed a few things, so here is what's happened quite recently....

Our fabulous Primary president decided to take the kids to the Temple for an activity. They LOVED IT! Joshua and Marian really enjoyed it and talked about it for a while. Dan and I gave talks in church on Sunday and Joshua wanted to speak as well. He was still on fire from his Temple trip and gave his talk on that. It was sweet to see that the children were impressed with it.

My cute little man, in the same spot I hope he will be in another 12 years!

My beautiful Marian, who loves pretty dresses and posing for pictures. And I hope she also is wanting to be here, but in 20 years maybe!

This is what Callie did on Sunday. The nursery leader brought her to me just as RS was starting and said Callie had scraped her leg. There was no crying, so I assumed she had knocked the scab off her knee again. Nope, she'd done this and was bleeding all over her fancy pink dress, and my skirt. Poor thing. This picture was taken 2 days later, when she would finally consent to let me get a good look at it without a ton of drama. It was much nastier looking.

For preschool yesterday we went to the pumpkin patch at a local church. They had a marvelous selection and the kids had a blast checking them all out. Here is Delaney, one of the few times she was not hoofing it accross the parking lot. I got distracted once and Delaney had dashed accross the pumpkin patch, accross 2 sections of parking lot and nearly made it to the busy street before I sprinted accross the parking lot and nabbed her. She'll kill me yet!

My cutie Callie, posing for me. She got to pick out a pumpkin and painted it at preschool. We do also have two large pumpkins for carving next week.

And that's the recent activities from this here part. The kids are fantastic. Joshua isn't complaining about Spanish all the time. Marian enjoys school and seems to be doing really well. Callie is incredibly social and loves to play. Delaney just loves to run and run- preferably down the center of the street! Dan is happy with work and already talking about extending our time here and then getting out and becoming Civil Service. Say What?! We'll see.....

Fabulous Callie and Crickets

The other day I was in Walmart and Callie got her feelings hurt. She was whimpering and making life difficult, so I was trying to cajole her out of it. I asked if she was my cutie Callie. She said (very emphatically) "No! I Fab-u-lous Callie!"

She sure is my fabulous Callie!

Now for my story. Joshua is learning about crickets in science. He had a homework project to build a 3D one, at least 3 inches long, but no more than 2 feet long. I finally decided to make play doh and let him sculpt it. I got talked into a homemade clay recipe and tried that out. I'm not sure if I can't follow directions, or if it really was suppose to be that thick and crumbly, but it was an interesting medium. I thought Joshua did a marvelous job sculpting a cricket out of it.

The darn stuff didn't want to dry and when it did, it wouldn't stick togther. The legs and apendages were falling off and if I glued them back on, they just shaved off another layer of the clay. grrr. I finally stuck tooth picks into everything and sent him off to school with it. He had come home with 3 different due dates and I wanted it to be in on time.

Aparently it went in a week early. Worse, the teacher didn't take it and hide it or grade it or whatever they plan to do. The crumbling mass of a once-cute cricket sat on his desk all week. What do 30 second graders do when they see such a thing? They must touch and poke and prod. And the once-cute cricket no longer resembled a cricket or anything cute. Joshua brought it back home on Friday and its due on Monday.

It was truly a lost cause. I gave up on domesticity and got play-doh at Walmart.

Yep, whatever one does, all must do likewise. Marian made a pretty cute cricket herself, modeled after Joshua's. (but the picture including her creation was not as cute as this one!)

Callie was there and had a great time doing what the bigger kids were doing too.

I tried to talk him into a uniform color, but he wanted each part to be visible, so the teacher could see it. Did he not do a fantastic job?! That is the cutest little cricket I've ever seen! And I learned some fun facts about them. Yep, now I know how to tell a boy cricket from a girl cricket.

This one is definately a girl cricket! Delaney had her own lump of play-doh and she had a blast hanging out with her bigger sibs.

Especially for Lenette

I got this from my uncle and immediately thought of Lenette. And so I just had to share!


A little Military humor here.

Years ago, there was an old tale in the Marine Corps about a lieutenant who inspected his Marines and told the Gunny that they smelled bad. The lieutenant suggested that they change their underwear.

The Gunny responded, 'Aye, sir, I'll see to it immediately.'

He went into the tent and said, 'The lieutenant thinks you guys smell bad, and wants you to change your underwear.

Smith, you change with Jones, McCarthy, you change with Witkowskie, Brown, you change with Schultz. Get to it!'

The moral: The political candidates may promise change in Washington but don't count on things smelling any better...

Those crazy kids!

This is what I found in my room when I went to go to bed last night. Count 'em... one in the bed, one at the foot of the bed, and one on the side of the bed! They are so silly. But at least they were alseep!

I voted!

Yes, I voted. I requested my absentee ballot and it came and I filled it out and I voted! Whoopee for me! I am such a good citizen.

Once I had it all sealed up and off to the mail, I realized I shouldn't have been so hasty. I am the Activity Day's Leader and I should have used it as a demo for the girls tonight. I spent way too long online today searching for some sample ballots for them to examine. A-Days is tonight! I found a few ballots, but none were as good as mine. Most didn't have any ammendments or anything. Mine had several. I had hoped to find some with good stuff- mine has the lottery on it again! (Hello! idn't we vote no on that already?!!) I wanted stuff that required thinking about, but that made sense. Anyway, that's not your problem. I did get some nice sample ballots- thank you NC, and LA for being so helpful on your websites!

Double Tagged Tagged

I've been tagged twice. The first one is 5 things most people don't know about me. This is a problem, since I will tell anyone anything about me. And the stuff I am not willing to share, I amd REALLY not willing to share! I do love pictures though, and I'm now in a sharing kind of mood. So, let's see if I can come up with 5 things non-family members may not know about me....

1. I raised a pig for 4-H. Yep, I did. His name was Pantry Pride Bacon Bits and I auctioned him off at the Orange County fair.

2. I was a pretty good horseback rider. I did4-H in California and Pony Club for the 3 years we were in NJ. I did my first year of school at the College of Southern Idaho and majored in Equestrian Studies. It was a blast!

3. I graduated high school in Okinawa, Japan. Yes, that is me in the red shirt on the right.

4. I was a total tom boy with zero fashion sense. Okay, maybe that's not news!

5. I had my first car accident when I was 18, driving on Okinawa. This was my car. Her name was Shelby and I loved her.

I tag no one. And to accomplish my next tag, I will go to my 4th folder and select my 4th photo.... drum roll please!

This was May 2003, when Dan graduated UALR law scool. Joshua was 20 months old and Marian was 8 weeks old.

TOFW

I was going to sit down and critique my Time out for Women experience, but I've pretty much got it all out of my system! I typed up half my notes, but Dan and I are speaking in church next week and I had to work on that for a bit, and I had to write my weekly letter, and I'm actually tired of sitting at this computer!

So, the short-short version is this: Don't like Philadelphia, Loved TOFW, city traffic sucks, friends make the time go faster

And I will share one little thing with you. Last time I went to a TOFW, I was all alone- didn't know a single other person there. Yesterday, I went with my friend Andrea and it was so nice. As I was sitting there with 2,000 other women, I asked Heavenly Father, if there was anyone else in the room I knew, could I please run into them. I know, silly thing. And yet.... I saw my friend Sasha, who I haven't keept in touch with. (She looks great, by the way!) Also, at lunch, the lady I sat next to turned out to be the sister-in-law of my friend Lonie, and I'd been hearing about this woman for weeks! I know, small, silly thing to be excited about, but I was!

That's all the enthusiasm I can drum up right now. Perhaps I'll get motivated and post again later. If you have any interest in my notes from Time Out for Women, let me know and I'll post them. It really had some amazing stuff!

Ready for School!

We were all ready for school at 8:22 this morning. Since they were so cute and matching today. I took their pictures. I will mention that I only picked out Delaney and Callie's clothes. Joshua and Marian got dressed on their own, and I don't know how all 4 of them ended up matching!

Yeah, they weren't that thrilled about pictures. But they were pretty cooperative. Mostly because I let them do silly shots.

Silly shots like this one! They are such funny kids and they make me laugh.

And how could this face not make you smile. I love these guys! And they had a great day at school. Just in case you were wondering!

School Daze

Why is it that last year, Joshua could roll out of bed at 7am and get on the bus at 7:15, all dressed, breakfasted and ready? This year, we get up between 7 and 7:30 and by the time we race out the door at 8:29, I've been rushing non stop! Ug.

Actually, I guess I DO know why it takes so long to get ready. Last year I only had to get one ready and Dan did it a lot of the time! This year its all me and I have to get everyone ready! 1 kid vs 4.... I guess its okay to take 4 times as long. And I can't very well walk down to the bus stop in my jammies. We sure were spoiled with a bus that picked him up right in front of the house in NC.

And while I'm on this topic, let me tell you about this afternoon. It was 3:40 and Delaney had just awakened and she was saturated through her pants. I didn't have time to change her, so I simply took off her pants. Since I didn't have time, I parked Callie in front of the tv to watch "Super Why" and told her not to let Delaney out while I went to the bus stop.

I walked down the 3 houses to the corner and waited. Then I heard giggling. I look down the road and here is Callie, racing toward me, with no shoes on. I look behind her and see Delaney scooting along on her little trike.... right down the middle of the road. Then I see the bus coming right behind her. AAACK! And did I mention that Delaney is wearing a shirt and a very wet diaper and socks, no pants? A red letter moment for me, as I bolted down the street to remove her from the path of the school bus.

Why I love being a mom!

I love that Marian makes me laugh as she gives herself a soap beard in the bath tub.

I love how much fun Delaney is having on her trike, feeling so independent and just like the big kids. And I especially love the pizza she's sporting all over her face!


I love that my kids are adventerous and ready to try new things. I love how much fun they are having climbing this tree. they are pretty high, too. Can you see the house behind them?!

I love that Joshua is so social and friendly. He's trying his friend Usman's skateboard here.

I love the creativity I get to see every day. Callie had a blast with the sidewalk chalk and it was so fun to see what she drew!

Well, I'm not so thrilled about the chalk IN her mouth, but I love that she is having such a good time! Just looking at this picture makes me smile. Looking at my children makes me smile. It makes me happy. They are so cute and funny and interesting and fantastic! That's why I love being a mom. Plus, who wants to go to a job all day?! Not me! I love my work as a mom!

Fun with Hats

I have been going through all the pictures, scrapbooking them into a book. I really enjoy doing that and I love going through old (okay, 3 months ago!) pictures. I love having the memories. One set of pictures I went through were these!

The kids had found Grandma and Grandpa's collection of hats. They thought they were pretty cool and a lot of fun. They spent the afternoon trying on different ones. then they asked me to take pictures. Joshua especially wanted to have a different hat and a different expression in each picture.

Classic Joshua pose, and a rare unposed Marian. I love these kids!

Callie and Delaney want to be just like their older siblings. Callie has a sweet tender heart and tries hard to include Delaney too. As I may have mentioned, I love these kids!

When they are silly it cracks me up! Look how her whole face is alight with mischief. That's my girl!

Ah, now Marian is posing. She had a blast with the hats. I did not include the 10 other shots of Joshua making horrible faces for me. Maybe some other time!