Halloween Preview

Here are the kids in their Halloween costumes. We just bought them the other day, and of course, we had to try them on to make sure they were keepers.

It was nice to finally get L to be something other than a princess or fairy. She liked this witch costume because it was not scary looking, the skirt glows, and it reminded her of the witches at Gardner Village that we go see each year.

Q does not like to dress up, and I was nervous that we would not find a costume he would like. Internet searching uncovered this fabulous SuperWhy costume at Halloween USA which is over near FYE on Redwood. How perfect!! SuperWhy is one of his favorite shows. I did not even have to show the costume to him...he saw it on the rack and started to yell Super why! Super why! He even let us try it on him. how cool huh????
Anyways, Halloween this year should be fun!!

So, we tried to go out swimming the other night, and found out the pool is closed for maintenance, so we hit up the local Chili's (on dad's wallet, naturally) instead. While we were there, some pretty cool things happened with the kiddies! Quinn ordered his own dinner...he looked right at the waitress and said 'ee sanwich ee fries, ah muk'. translated, this means a sandwich and fries and milk. It was just too cool!! He got a grilled cheese, and fries and milk, and ate well! Lily also had some fun things go on. Her daddy drilled her on her math facts and we found out that she can add double digit with single digit math problems with little to no error, and she is fairly good at the lower double digit plus double digit problems as well. Then she shocked us when she said she could spell Mississippi. All fired up to show us, she said "m, r, s, period, s, i, p, i. See? Mrs. Sipi!" That one could not keep us from laughing right out loud. Just too cool.
Anyways, that is all for now! Going to Swiss Days in an hour. They have the best bbq beef dinner. tradition!

Kids and their crazies

This is just a quick little update on the fun things that have been happening at our house lately!

First, Lily is absolutely loving 1st grade, she reads like a champ, gets 100% on her spelling tests, and was recently moved to the top tier group in her class. Go Lily! She is also great at helping mom and dad with both of her little brothers. She holds Quinn when they go for SHORT motorcycle rides with daddy, and she gets things for mom when our 'other little brother' is kicking or sitting on a nerve, or whatever it is they do while they are cooking! The first pic is of Lily and dad and Q going to the park in our neighborhood. The next pic is of Q. He decided to be mr. domestic and do the dishes! He opened the dishwasher and stood up on it to reach the top rack. From there, you can see what he did. Then he proudly told me 'a diss ah done!' Yes, Q-B-Doo, the dishes are all done. Such a helper! Lastly, I was telling Q to bring me a diaper since Lily had noticed that he was not smelling the greatest, and instead he said 'way down bear. Iss a good bear, way down', and when I looked, he was trying to put the diaper on his teddy bear! It was just too cute. Did he not realize that HE was the stinky one? Bear was clean. Needless to say, I helped him change bear, and once we were done, he realized the diaper covered the tag on the bear, and that was just not going to work. So, off came the diaper so Q's fingers could wind around the tag. Too much fun at our house today!!

Lily's first day of school!

Today was the first day back to school for miss Lily. She is a 1st grader now!! I didn't even need to get her out of bed...she did it all on her own, and was dressed and waiting for me when I got up. (I guess she was excited or something.) It was awesome!!

Here are some pics of her first day. Running to line up, waiting in line, at her desk already working and one of her name tag and pencil box, that she was very proud of! Too cool! She also had her lunch money in her back pack, and I can't wait to hear how her day went! School gets out at 3:20, and I can't wait to get her so we can talk!

Doggie-sitting Sophia

We got to watch Bon and Jer's dog Sophia for a night and the kids loved it! Quinn would run around with her yelling out 'Sophy! Sophy!' and the dog would come running right at him and lick him, and then they would do it all over again. Lily loved to put her on her little leash and go for walks around the house and yard. At bed time, each kid took turns 'putting the puppy to bed' and then Lily fell asleep with Sophy. I woke her up and we put the little critter in her kennel for the night, but what a fun time it was when she was awake!! Now that Sophia is back at home, the kids keep telling me that they miss Sophy. It is really cute!

Bonnie and Jeremey, thanks for letting us watch her for you!!

New Baby Brother

We had our U/S today and all is well!! Baby is healthy, about 8 inches, and about 10 oz. All 10 toes and fingers are there :)

We came home with the profile pic and gender pic, and had our little 'sit down' with Lily. Just as an FYI for those who don't know, Lily has been praying every night that our baby would be a girl. Since we found out it was a boy, I was just praying she would be ok with it. We had gotten her to admit that she really wanted a sister, but that if it was another little brother, that would be ok too. So, there we are, sitting on the couch with Lily and the pics. I showed her how to tell what was what on the pics, and she determined for herself that it was a boy. We said "Yes, Lily, it is a little brother again". I waited, while she told me she hoped and prayed for a girl, but that it was a boy instead. We quietly discussed how she said she would still be ok with it if the baby was not a sister. She said she remembered, and we started to make calls to other family members. While I was talking to others, I looked around the room for Lily since she had moved from the couch, and I found her sitting in the rocking chair, on her daddy's lap, with tears streaming down her face. Not good.

Poor girl was really really sad that it was a brother. Well, we did the only thing we could think of and began telling her reasons why it was better for her that it was a brother. This way, she would not have to share her polly pockets, her bed could stay right where it was, she would not have to wake up at night because the baby woke her up, and when we changed diapers, it would not be her room that smelled like baby poop. She started to laugh, looked at Quinn, and said "stinky boy! stinky boy!"

Then I told her that if she wanted, we would go to Walmart and she could choose some new clothes for baby brother, and she agreed. She picked out a very cute little sleeper, some warm socks and a fuzzy blanket because she realized that baby brother would be born in winter and would need to stay warm.

As the day went on, we let her do the calling to other family members. I could tell when they asked her if she was happy because her response would be 'sort of' or 'a little'. But after we let her choose some new clothes, she said she felt better than she did a few minutes ago. She even chose clothing new baby brother could wear home from the hosp.

All in all, a challenging but wonderful day! The pics are the basics...profile, gender...the gender pic shows one leg, and then the essentials. The one leg is not a complete pic, but is just the top half. The short white line near the bottom half of the pic is the femur bone, and essentials are right above. The other pic is of the baby's arm and hand.

Anyways, that's all for now!

Lily's revelation

We were at daddy's work today, and he was out test driving a bike he was working on when we drove up. While we were waiting for him to get back, Lily asked what all the other bikes out front of dad's work were for. So, we had the good ol' talk about how dad fixes all those bikes, and he gets to ride them when he is done to make sure he fixed them right. Jake rode up at that point on what looked to me to be a blue dirt bike of sorts. Lily saw her dad and yells "Whoa!! He can ride that kind of a bike with no training wheels?" Ok Lil, how long has daddy been riding bikes with no training wheels? What a nerd she is sometimes! Good comic relief. What would we do without the humor of young children? (the pic is of jake on his old bike in AZ, but it was a pic of him on a bike, so I thought it would work!)