Catching Up

I can't believe it has been almost a MONTH since I've updated our blog. We have just been busy. For about the last 3 weeks before Thanksgiving, I spent every free moment finishing up my mom's scrapbooks. It took me about 3 years - but I organized and scrapped all my mom's photos from the last 30+ years. Now I just need to teach her how to digital scrap so that she can get all her pictures off the computer. After the holidays, I can start working on my own scrapbooks again. I'm a bit behind now.

Our family traveled to Las Vegas for Thanksgiving. My whole family met up at my parent's time share. We had a GREAT time and enjoyed spending time with family. It was fun & crazy to have the 7 cousins together for 5 days. Thanks to our good friend Tricia, we were able to do some fun family photos. I can't wait to see how they turned out.

Since coming home from Las Vegas, it seems like we've just been trying to keep up and get back on schedule while preparing for Christmas. We've been able to get some fun family activities in there too. Here's a few pictures from the past few weeks:

We took the kids to the Museum of Natural History at the University of Utah.
They wanted to go visit some dinosaurs.

Emily is getting so big. She now enjoys sitting in the exersaucer and enjoys tummy play time of the floor. She likes to sleep on her stomach and can now roll from her tummy to her back.
This is Damien (8-13-08), Emily (8-8-08), & Wyatt (9-26-08) - The 3 youngest cousins. Look how much bigger Damien is compared to his cousins! (It doesn't hurt that his dad is 6 ft 5 in.) Even Wyatt was about a 1/2 inch longer than Emily.
We took the kids out geocaching to Eureka, UT - a semi ghost town. We had a fun day!
Kaya attended a baptism this morning with Aaron. She looked so cute before she left that I had to snap a quick picture!
Kaya asked Santa for a Barbie Rapunzel.
Logan asked Santa for a Brown Train.
Emily just wanted to go home and go to bed. We waited for over an hour at our church Christmas party to visit with the big guy.

Look Who's 3 Months Old Already!

It's hard to believe that our little Emily is already 3 months old. It seems like just yesterday we brought her home from the hospital. She is such a happy baby and full of smiles. I moved her to the big crib this weekend since she had outgrown her bassinet. She's starting to giggle and has recently found her feet. She is also quite fond of her thumb! Here are few pictures from this morning.

It's SNOWING!!

This is the view from our front porch. (I wasn't going outside in my PJ's) This is the first official measurable snow for our neighborhood this season. YEAH!! The kids have been asking all morning to go out and play. I guess I need to go get Kaya some bigger snow boots. I love the silence you hear when the snow is falling. It's a beautiful sight!

Halloween Fun

I should be cleaning the house for our dinner guests this evening, but Aaron took the big kids out and Emily is asleep. The house is quiet and I'll just take a QUICK second to get some pictures on the blog. (Shhh...don't tell Aaron!!) We had a fun Halloween. Enjoy!

Kaya wore one of her princess dresses for her Preschool Halloween Party.

Logan wanted to take his pumpkin with him to bed that night. I did have to say NO to that request!

Aaron making the kids laugh.

We let Kaya "think" she was carving out the pumpkin by herself. She wanted one with 3 eyes.

Kaya drew faces on the pumpkins for carving purposes.

Recognize this outfit? Emily wore the same pumpkin outfit worn by Kaya AND Logan on their first Halloweens. I think we've established a family tradition here.

I threw on a little something for the sake of taking a fun picture. We took the kids trick or treating while Uncle Nick stayed and passed out candy.

Kaya and Logan wore some hand me down HORSE costumes from our neighbor. They worked out great!

Emily crashed hard. All that trick or treating wore her out!

I Do It!!!

Logan is Mr. Independant lately. He will tell me, "No, Mom, I do it!" As pictured above, he got himself dressed this morning. (NICE choice of shoes!) As long as we're not leaving the house - I say go for it! He's officially potty trained but still needs practice getting his underwear and shorts back on. The 70's/80's handbag is a nice accessory. My family may remember it as one of our dress up items from Grandma's house. It's still getting lots of use here!

4-Year Old Logic

"Mom, where does the chocolate milk come from on the farm? Does it come from the brown cow or the white cow?"

Adventures in Parenting

It seems like forever since I've had time to post some new things on our blog. Life with 3 little kids is just CRAZY some days. Here's a glimpse into our wonderful and wacky world:

Logan is about 80% potty trained. We're still working on the poop training part of it. Our son (25 months old) REFUSES to leave a diaper on. Rather than fight Logan with the diaper I decided to break down and just DO IT. This past weekend we devoted 2 straight days to nothin' but potty training. We're on day 7 and he's finally got the hang of most of it. Yeah!! He's getting to be such a big boy!

I went back to work a couple of weeks ago. I go in at night after the kids are in bed. I only work 10 hours a week as the floral manager at a grocery store. It's fun to get out and do flowers to help support our family. The kids don't even know I'm gone most nights. However, last week the local HS had their homecoming dance. I've been building the dance corsage & boutonniere buisness since starting a year ago. My first dance I had 11 corsage orders. Last weekend, I made 55 corsages. My friend, Melinda, was able to come help me for a couple hours one night. Even Aaron's brother Nick helped me some. This week, the store had an open house. Aaron brought the kids down for all the free demos and to visit. Here's one of my arrangments. Some of you ladies will remember these from Mr. Ritchie's class. People LOVE these things:

This afternoon the kids and I made Halloween sugar cookies. Just between you and me....I HATE making sugar cookies. I guess it's because I've yet to find the perfect recipie and I just get frustrated when they stick to everything, get rock hard, or just don't turn out. The kids had a GREAT time though making and decorating the cookies. All Logan wanted to do was eat the cookie dough. (Thanks Papa) Here's a picture of the kids having a grand time:

Below is a picture of Kaya's finished product. It's supposed to be a cat. Aaron said it looked more like a murder victim.

I need to take some more pictures of Emily since she's growing like crazy. I got her to giggle the other night and she's got such the personality. Thanks to the advice from my friend, Lisa, Emily is sleeping an average of 7-9 hours at night. Her naps are still kind of erratic but she's sleeping really well at night. With Logan not taking naps these days - all the sleep we can get at night is crucial.

On another happy note, Aaron got a promotion at work. I won't go into details since this is still a public blog but we're happy for the extra income this will bring in along with the "perks" of the job including a "take home car". With the price of gas these days - having a vehicle from his employer to drive to and from work is a huge BONUS!! (Especially on the pocketbook!)

And guess what? It's supposed to SNOW tonight!!! 2-4 inches here on the valley floor. I'm not ready for the snow yet. I really enjoy the Fall weather. Kaya has been asking me when it's going to be warm enough to fill up her pool and play in the sprinklers. No matter how many times I tell her, the 4 year old mind just doesn't understand that it's going to be MONTHS before it'll be warm enough for that again. Time to break out the winter clothes.