September 1st, 2010

Singin’ in the Rain

A few days ago the kids were SO excited to wake up to rain.  Rain means puddle-jumping and umbrellas.  I took the kids and ran some errands around town–they brought their umbrellas everywhere we went, but to their disappointment the rain stopped everytime we were outside.  Mary was practically devastated.  “I want to walk in the rain with my umbrella!  [sob, sob]“  I promised the girls that if they were good in the store, the rain would come back (maybe I shouldn’t have said that, but I could see more rain clouds headed our way…).  So when we got home, they played outside dancing and singing in the rain.  It was so  adorable.

August 30th, 2010

Happy National Toasted Marshmallow Day!

Yes, you read that right. This really is a holiday!

About a week ago the weather started getting a bit colder and I got a sudden dreadful feeling of winter coming soon.  I’m really not a winter fan.  So I decided we should have more celebrations during the winter to get us through that season.  All I did was google “Unusual Holidays”  and found a whole dandy list of cool holidays to celebrate.  There were some fun ones in August and September too, so we are starting with this one…National Toasted Marshmallow Day!

We were planning on going up to the mountains and toasting marshmallows around a nice fire and such, but today ended up being rainy.  Mark’s Aunt came to town so we ended up expanding our celebration and making S’mores with extended family at my Mother-in-law’s house.  It was really fun.

Did you know that there are different kinds of marshmallows now?  While the kids and I were shopping for marshmallows and chocolate today, we were excited to discover pink Strawberry Marshmallows and Caramel Vanilla Marshmallows, as well as the regular plain white ones.

Since our bonfire didn’t work out, we were discussing several ways to toast the marshmallows–over the barbecue?  On a cookie tray in the oven?  After consulting with the Sweet’s Expert (Aunt Heidi)  we decided the best and easiest way was just to make S’mores in the microwave.  According to the expert, 12-13 seconds in the microwave is the perfect amount of time to make the perfect S’more–not to stiff, and not too exploded.  BTW, Heidi is the Sweets Expert and she is also very sweet–maybe that’s why she gets along so well with those sugary confections. :)

So yummy!

Baby Carter liked ‘em too…

Kate even made a marshmallow graph–she took a survey of everyone’s favorite kind of marshmallow.  What a great idea!

My sister-in-law pointed out that a marshmallow graph would be a fun thing to do in school or for a homework project to teach kids how to make tables.  Yes!  Good idea, kids would just eat that up!  haha, I know, bad pun.

Looks like the Caramel Vanilla Marshmallows were the most popular.  Good graphing table Kate!

So although our “toasted” marshmallows were really just microwaved, we still respect the marshmallow for all it’s worth and thoroughly enjoyed this day of celebration.

BTW, there is an unusual holiday almost every day.  Most of them really are official, meaning they required an act of congress.  Our family went through the calendar and chose about 1 or 2 a week to celebrate.  Coming up September 5th is “Cheese Pizza Day.”  September 9th is “Teddy Bear Day” or some call it “Teddy Bear Picnic Day.”  (I like the second one better).

August 30th, 2010

“The Hills Are Alive”

Albion Basin

I feel like the luckiest person to live so close to these gorgeous mountains!  We actually made this excursion when William was just three weeks old!  I needed to get out and see some nature, so we took a scenic drive to see the beautiful Albion Basin wildflowers.  It was a refreshing retreat!

We walked this little trail and found sort of nest-like areas in the grass, where very large animals must have slept the night before.  We guessed maybe it was from some moose.  Investigator Anne was especially excited to find that place.

 

We all wished we had brought some better hiking shoes.  When William is a little older we’ll go back for a good hike.

Since moose and chipmunks can’t take photos, we had to do a family photo in two parts.  This is part one…

…and this is part two. I almost left part two off, but then William looks so cute. :)

August 29th, 2010

A Week at Grandma’s House

My sweet mom took care of the girls for a week while I spent some time recuperating with William at home.  (Big thanks Mom!)

So what is a week at Grandma’s like?  Hmmm.  Well…no rules, all play, and lots of treats. :)

Check this out!  My girls want to know when I’ll have another baby so they can go back to Grandma’s again.

Slip N Slidin’….

Teddy Bear Pancakes…

Playing make-believe Pocahontas and friends…

Grandkids Water Party with my kids and Kathleen’s grandkids

They also went to the park several times, fed the ducks, decorated cupcakes, and made a mermaid lagoon for the girls’ toy mermaids.  Best of all, Eliza came home potty trained!!!!   You’re amazing Mom!  Thank you!  —now I just need to reprogram rules and schedules back into the kids. :)

August 28th, 2010

“Will” Power

Our Little Man

William was born almost 4 weeks ago!  He is such a sweetie and as handsome as his dad.  We are all so in love with him and can’t cuddle him enough.

Proud Daddy :)

So here’s all the numbers:

14 hours of labor

0 Anesthesia

1 tired mommy

1 very supportive husband with 2 sore hands (it’s amazing how strong I am when I’m in labor)

1 awesome doctor

2 nice nurses 

1 amazing and beautiful baby, 7lbs 15 oz, 21″long

2 proud parents

3 excited sisters

10 billion smiles

The kids were so excited when they came to the hospital to see their new brother.  With Grandma’s help, they even gave him a birthday party! –complete with birthday hats and everything!  It was so cute.

And now we are a family of SIX!

July 19th, 2010

37 weeks and counting…

Boys are different than girls…

(I’m sure this will be just the first of many posts on this subject!)

Okay,  here’s the real schmeal…I’m not one of those tiny little pregnant people!  Each of my girls gained me 25-30 pounds during pregnancy–that’s about average, so I’m told.  This time however, this wonderful little boy is throwing me some curves (big curves) here!  I’m 37 weeks along and I’ve gained a total of 45 pounds (and counting)!!!!!  How can this be?  Is it just the boy factor?  Do boys make you gain more?  (and notice the bump–not really roundish…more like squarish…)  I’m not doing anything differently than the other pregnancies…so what’s going on?  Oh well.  It has to be how it is…and soon all of this heaviness will be someone beautiful I can hold in my arms.  It’s all worth it.  I can’t wait to meet this wonderful little guy! ;)

July 16th, 2010

Catch of the Day

The Sweet Spot

Last summer we were at our friends’ house admiring their decorative pond filled with koi.  One of my girls said, “Hey Dad, maybe we could come fishing here sometime!”  We laughed and gently told her that the koi were pet fish and not for catching.  She looked confused and said, ”But we never catch fish when we go fishing…” So that pretty much sums up our fishing experiences with the kids.  The few times we’ve gone though the kids had fun and lately they have been begging to go fishing again.

So  off we went for a fun family night to try out fishing again.  Honestly, I really had to hype myself up–I thought it was going to take some major positive attitude effort for this to be fun…but it turned out really fun on it’s own!

   

After driving around and walking around for quite a while in several different locations, Mr. Everything finally found this little beautiful spot–it was perfect.

Anne patiently waited and waited…

Eliza kept busy by catching sneaky rocks in her net and throwing them in the water.

Maybe the rock throwing wasn’t so good for trying to lure those fish.  So Mark took each of the girls one by one a little further upstream to try out the ‘non rock-throwing’ fishing.

After what seemed like no time at all, I heard excited yelling, “We caught one!”

Good job Mary!  She caught our first EVER fish!

Soon after, Anne caught one too!  I love the expression on her face!

She wasn’t so excited when Mark held up the wiggly fish for her to see though.  She was a little freaked out by the gaping fish mouth.

Eliza’s turn…

This is now our favorite little fishing spot.  But since trout isn’t really our favorite dining fish, we let them go back in the river!

July 10th, 2010

Star Performers

Anne and Mary both love their Singing and Performance classes.  These pics are from their recent summer recital.

My sweet girls really do amaze me.  Here they are singing and dancing on stage, having fun and loving every minute of their shining performances.  It really just amazes me!–My daughters have a mother who is absolutely a wreck in front of a microphone, and I get shaky, nervous and blurred vision on any kind of stage–not to mention my total inability to carry a note.

I think it’s clear that the performing talents definitely came from Mark’s genetics.  And it does help that the girls have the most amazing singing and performance teachers too!  (Thank you Laura and Liz!)

Anne and Mary both told me that they would teach me singing classes.  Hmmm.  Do you think that could work?  Well, I thought it was sweet of them anyway. ;)

I’m so proud of you girls!  You did a great job on your performance!

July 9th, 2010

Pirate Ship Trampoline

“Arrrr Matey!”

Well, it was a beautifully breezy day.  It’s so amazing that these breezes have decided to come our way this July!  The kids were jumping on the trampoline and I was watching their hair blowing around like crazy.  Suddenly I got an idea and ran inside to get a king-sized bed sheet.  I tied two corners to the top of the trampoline poles, and voila!  It was a sudden sail!

The kids decided it was a Pirate Ship sail–and it was awesome!  The girls ran inside too and quickly made pirate capes (do pirates wear capes?)  by putting blankets around their shoulders and tying it with a hair band.

They thought it was fun to throw their toy stuffed animals up on the sail and then watch them fly off.

They took turns “rescuing”  the stuffed animals that got tossed overboard.

I was amazed at how the wind carried it so nicely…

Good day for a Pirate Ship Trampoline.

BTW, the new Angel Street Kids Pirate Backpack, and Pirate Lunchbox are now available and have been sailing out the doors!  Click the link or click on the images to see more!

July 8th, 2010

Library

Today I am sick and I feel pretty run-down, lousy, sore throat, fuzzy-yuck.  I slept in late and told the kids they could watch as much TV as they want today because I had no energy.  (Did I really say that?!–shocking!)  I think all the celebrations, late nights, crazy work load, (and the fact that I’m hugely pregnant), finally took it’s toll.  But now I’m feeling guilty about the whole TV thing, so I was looking through the photos to remind me of the wholesome activities we’ve done the last two weeks to make me feel better. ;)

I love that my kids love to read.  These were some pictures I took at the library last week.

Grandma came with us and so Eliza just had to get this book.

How lucky are we that the beautiful and informative Children’s Librarian happens to be my sister! :)  We get so spoiled with all the attention at the library, and all the great book recommendations!

Counting all the books to make sure we were within the 36 book limit.  (We weren’t.)

To the checkout…

Since we were over the limit, and somehow no one could part with any of their precious books, I thought it would be a good day to have Anne and Mary get their own library cards.  (By their expressions, you might have thought someone just gave them their own pony!)

I set their book limit to 10, but still that means that now our book limit is 56!  I’m going to have to get a bigger book bag…or maybe a wheelbarrow.

Anyway, they did read all of their books this past week…so I guess I won’t feel so guilty about having a TV day.  And my wonderful mother just took them back to the library to get more books.  So now I’m going to finish some work, have a popsicle…and go back to bed.

By the way, the girls were so extremely excited about having their own library cards and when we stopped by the grocery store on the way home that day, Anne said, “Now that I have my own library card, maybe I’m old enough for one of those store card things (a debit card)…”   Ummmmm…. No, not yet sweetie!  ;)