Snowy photo shoot, sort of

Before Halloween we got some snow. The kids were pretty excited since they haven't seen "real" snow in a while or not at all. I was just giddy. I bundled the kids all up in hats, gloves and winter coats. When I picked them up from school most of the other kids were just wearing light coats. I couldn't decide if I was just over reacting or what? Before we went back inside I wanted to get pictures of the kids in the snow. You can barely see the snow flakes but believe me there were a lot of flakes.



This is what happens when you tell Sean to "smile"




This is Savanna's confused look that she gives us sometimes. I've tried to get it on camera and finally got it. It's funny because the look kind of says, "You are so weird but I still love you" She looks like she laughing at you on the inside.


They were pretty good when I asked them to sit on the stairs for a group picture. Kaelin has a habit of putting her face toward the camera but then her eyes are looking somewhere else. Sean is still trying to master smiling. Although on Halloween, I realized that if you ask to see his vampire teeth it ends up being a some what normal smile. Savanna, I'm just lucky I snapped the picture in time before she got away. And that Vampire decoration wasn't intended to be a part of our little totem, we just got lucky.

Halloween!!!

I Hope everyone had a Happy Halloween!!!



Daddy and Savanna at the church's "trunk or treat"



I needed to put these two pictures up, because of the Ursula costume. She in the background of the top pictures. She said that her mother MADE it! Awesome!







our little angel, waiting in line for some food






our crazy monkey



our queen bee (minus her crown and antennae, because she said they hurt )

They all have that face because we were waiting for food and in front of us was a witch, and man with blue hair and some kids covered in blood. A little disturbing to little kids.





This was at the beginning of the night, I tried to get her to stand "normal" and she said, "but this is how I want to stand for my picture."



me, or as the Sean kept referring to me, Mommy Wig. We've only been in the ward for a little while but, not many people recognized me, until I started to talk to them.




Boots the Monkey (from Dora, even though the real Boots, is gray )





Brandi was trying to get her attention, that's what Van is staring at. We have a picture with all the grand kids and the dogs but I can't find it. It might come later

Night Pumpkins

I finally got enough lights to put in the pumpkins in order to take a collective glowing picture. yeah!



More list items-

• Had to return a bra and had the following conversation: "Was there any problems with the item?" "No, it was just too big." "Well, do you want to exchange for the right size?" "They don't make a smaller size" This is when the customer service (teenager) opened the bag and saw that it was a bra, and she literally giggled!
• Trying to get my confidence to shop for a bra in the little girls department.
  

Pumpkins!!!!!

Since there is less than a week before Halloween, we got our pumpkins and got to carving. Sean told Rob what shapes he wanted on his pumpkin. Kaelin helped to carve hers. Then, all the kids colored their pumpkins with magic markers. Savanna had her pumpkin taken away after we realized she was licking the marker off of it.

You might have an assumption about what Savanna is doing with that spoon






And you would be right. She ate A LOT of pumpkin pulp.



Kaelin had issues with getting messy, we told her it was all part of pumpkin carving.





left-right
Sean's with different shapes, Kaelin's with a bat stencil, Rob's optometry pumpkin, my tree, and Savanna's colored one. I need to taken one when they are all a glow, so you can see them a bit better.

Our new digs

We are temporarily living with my sister. Here are a few pictures of our area.

We are down in her basement. This is the kids room, smaller than in Memphis, but here they only have their beds, so it's not bad.
Savanna was following me around while I was taking the pictures.



This room is our living/computer/toy room/bedroom. It actually works quite nicely the kids would always take their toys to wherever we were anyway, so now it's already there and we can clean up easier, awake or asleep
Kaelin was making her own bed, just for fun. Since our bed is also our couch, she wanted to use this little bench for her own.
That closet has some storage and the kids' toys. We didn't bring too many but the amount we have seems just right. I'm very tempted to go through and throw out a lot of their toys that are still packed in Memphis. BTW that dark thing over in the corner is a huge bean bag that belongs to my sister Jayme, the kids will lay on it in the morning or while we read books. So I guess you could count that as a couch.





Also, I have a few more to add to my list from the previous post.

• When you spill your food, it actually falls in your lap.
• While sitting in a vibrating, massage chair the only things that jiggle are your shoulders.

these also came from personal experience from this weekend.

Parental Advisory

rated PG-13
may contain light-hearted humor about breasts.






Jeff Foxworthy is well-known for a skit entitled "You Might Be a Redneck..." In this comedic skit he lists actions and occurrences that might indicate that one is a "redneck"





You know you've finished nursing...

• if you could easily dress up as a 12 year old boy for Halloween

• if you can raise your arms above your head and your bra slides right up to your chin

• if both your 5 year old and your 3 year old keep asking why you keep getting smaller

• if you wonder if it's physically possible for you to get a mammagram
  

• if you could go a whole day without a bra and no one could notice

• if you have given away or gotten rid of many shirts because they look too empty and baggy

• if your husband accidentally gropes you and and you have to be the one to tell him, since he didn't realize

I found a candid picture Kaelin took today and thought it would give a good "after" picture. The "before" picture can be seen in the column to the right where I'm holding a fish.


Now I know there are more of you out there in the same or a similar boat. Maybe like me you have had major downsizing or maybe or perky rosebuds are now more like hanging baskets. Either way I would LOVE for you to add to my list. If you prefer you can make your comment anonymous.

test run

Ever since Kaelin was a little girl she has LOVED dogs. She even had a dog birthday party for her second birthday. Which included dog invitations, dog cake, dog bed clothes for her new big girl bed and plenty of dog themed clothes. We had to compromise with her about getting a real dog. The deal was that we had to wait until we had enough money. BUT, as soon as she found any kind of coin she would race to us and ask if we could buy a dog. We therefore changed the deal to, 1. Enough money 2. Daddy graduates. We thought we were in the clear, until we went to Daddy's graduation from the U, where she promptly reminded us of our deal, but how do you explain to a 2 1/2 year old that Daddy still has more school and she needs to wait for a different graduation. We tried explaining anyway, and then we added another requirement. 1. Enough money 2. Daddy graduates from Optometry school. 3. We have a fence. We thought we were in the clear, until we bought a baby gate to keep Sean out of the kitchen. Baby gate=fence=dog. Luckily, Kaelin was now old enough to understand better after we explained the requirements a little further and the reasons we had them.
Anyway, for the next couple months we are living with my sister and her two Boxers. I tell the kids that this is a test to see how well they can help with dogs and be nice to them. Kaelin of course wants to walk, feed, hug, play, and sleep with these dogs. Sean needed a couple days to warm up to them. I worried that Savanna would get knocked over, startled, or more realistically, try pinching the dogs. Savanna probably loves the dogs just as much as Kaelin would have at her age.







if you look REALLY close Kaelin is in the cage too!