A new found way to stop the whining...

Sometimes I get a little desperate trying to keep my kids from being whiny, I can't stand whining. We had several errands to run and the kids were all a little tired. So, when they began their usual list of whiny complaints, I told them to make funny faces, I'd take a picture each time and then I would let them see on the camera...I had about 20 different pictures after Tyler had been gone for only a few minutes.

Needless to say, I will now try and remember to keep my camera with me at all times, especially in the car, because they really like to see themselves on the camera. Plus, the faces they pulled were pretty hilarious, at least Coleson thought they were funny...

Two Peas in a Pod

These two have become pretty good buddies in the last few weeks. (Well, they can either be best friends or worst enemies...there's no in between...)

Addellyn loves to go say "hi" to Coleson when he wakes up. This particular time she decided it would be even better if she climbed into bed with him. From outside of the room all I could hear was adorable laughter from the two of them.

Coleson thinks he is indestructible (which, he pretty much is). He is always attacking his sisters. He crawls up to them, climbs up them so that he is standing, and then he knocks them over. This time, he managed to climb up onto Addellyn's bed and attack her while she was trying to lie down and go to bed. Soon enough they were both giggling uncontrollably. Makinzie quickly joined in, she thought it was very funny, because it really was! Luckily, the camera was close by.

Transforming the pumpkins...

We spent Thursday turning our pumpkins into cats, ghosts and witches. Coleson thought his own face probably needed some paint on it as well as in his mouth...good thing they're non-toxic.

Addellyn decided that just saying cheese and smiling was boring. So, when I said show me your happy face, she said "no, I wana mad cheese. grrr, see?" This mad face wasn't very convincing..she'll have to work a little harder on her mad cheese skills.

Makinzie loves to paint. Her witch was awesome! She got done and wanted to paint pictures for the rest of the night, she was even very disappointed when it was time to eat dinner. Unfortunately our pumkin line-up does not feature Tyler's very well carved sad face pumpkin, but at least I got Ty's silly face in the picture :). (Sorry Ty.)

A visit to the FARM! (don't we already live on a farm?)

Last Saturday Tyler came home from work pretty early so we spent our afternoon at the "farm." The girls wanted to first try their skills through a hay stack maze. Makinzie was a little too quick for Addellyn and she had to turn around at the very end so she could go back and lead Addellyn out. Addellyn was very distracted by all of the other children inside the maze and she was very content just wandering around watching.

They had a huge pumpkin patch and the kids had a lot of fun searching through the vines for their favorite pumpkins. I think Tyler had quite a bit of fun tromping through the vines as well :)...

We took a hay ride around the pumpkin patch and corn maze to get to the petting farm. Makinzie really loved sitting on the edge of the wagon and dragging her feet through the pumpkin weeds. The other two enjoyed picking at the hay bales we were sitting on.
Coleson really loved seeing live animals! The big horned sheep gave him a bit of a fright when it came up to the gate and licked his fingers. He quickly fell to his back pockets and looked at us with great concern. Addellyn was super excited about the random zebra among the farm animals. She screamed and pointed and made the zebra, who was at the very front of the pin, slowly back away. Addellyn likes her animals from a distance, the zebra must have known. The only animal Addellyn liked up close was the "beebee doat" which Coleson kept making his puppy dog noise at and pointing with great delight.

Happy 18th BiRThDaY!

We just needed to say happy birthday to a sister that has given up a lot this year for our CrAzy family to invade! Chantelle, we hope all of your best wishes come true! Most of all, we hope that the very best blessings come to you, the ones you may not have thought to wish for, in the many wonderful years to come...We love you!

Again, the kids could not be happier that yet another birthday party is taking place. And, they are always a lot more fun when Grandma and Grandpa can join the festivities as well. (Life will be very different when we have to leave all of this family behind...)

Addellyn requested the pom-poms be brought out for the party. They definitely added some "much needed" excitement!

Makinzie is 5! (and so grown-up)

Makinzie really wanted a "flower party" and so that is what we had. They made pictures out of flower stickers and created their own boquets of tissue paper flowers.

She has found wonderful friends at church (but only a couple go to school in the morning, like Kinzie, instead of the afternoon). She has also been lucky enough to keep a friend, Cate, who moved with us out west! They had fun opening gifts, dancing with scarves (which somehow turned into some very creative and beautiful dresses), and just playing together.

They especially LOVED decorating their own flower cookies...they really liked to clean their knives during and after frosting their cookies :).

After the friends had gone home, we celebrated with family. What a lucky 5 year-old!

The best part was watching her be a loving and sharing big sister. She asked Addellyn to help her open every gift and she gave everyone big hugs and said thank you for every gift! She is turning into such a great little lady :)...

Coleson and Addellyn were so happy to share the spotlight. They are really loving all of these birthdays! With so many people around it seems like we are AlwaYS celebrating :)!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MAKINZIE! We love you and we are very happy to have you in our home. You are a wonderful daughter, sister, and friend. We love you for being so smart, creative, thoughtful and for always singing happy tunes! You are so beautiful, inside and out!

Utter Chaos! (sorry, more words...)

I am going to attempt to paint a picture of our Family Home Evening with words, because unfortunately, I did not have my camera... First of all, my day was a little out of control, mainly because my kids have been really crazy the past few days! Tyler was on call (at the VA). My dad was attempting to explain the importance of remembering the Savior, especially while we are at church and taking the sacrament to renew the covenants we made at baptism. (Great lesson Dad! I think I at least heard a few things and they were very helpful, so I was grateful for what you had prepared.) While Papa is trying to be spiritual and very sincere, my children are:
Coleson- walking around the couch with a Halloween leaf decoration draped over his head so that he can barely see out one eye. He is jabbering his incoherent jabber, giggling to himself and when he gets close enough to where Chantelle is sitting he drunkenly lets go of the couch and runs/dives at her...He is way too tired and has been cutting 4 molars this week!
Addellyn- bouncing on and off of the couch singing what sounds like a mix of “I am a child of God”, something about wearing shoes at church and the “love somebody song” from our kid CD in the car, all in a very high “nice” Addellyn voice (which is very funny since she usually has such a low raspy voice.) The song at least shows she is hearing a few words here and there. Probably because, intermittently, she is stopping and coming to put her elbows on the coffee table to stare at Papa and play with his scriptures and his notes, obviously interrupting his concentration, but it’s almost as if her energy and movement is beyond her control…
Makinzie- doing her best to sit still, this involves: randomly throwing her legs in the air, biting her pajama sleeve, and giggling at the other two (very entertaining) children. She also raises her hand every few seconds, dying to tell some story about what she learned in primary or what she thinks about any church related story that comes to mind, thwarting Papa’s attempts to be sincere and to even be able to think clearly…(And we didn’t even have sugar for dinner, not even juice or fruit!)
Meanwhile, I am trying to stop from laughing or crying. The night was a pretty good depiction of how my entire day/weekend had gone with the three of them. And I’m sure if anyone could have looked in on us today they would have wondered what in the world is being taught/fed to our children…It was utter chaos! So now, I am trying to decide whether to think I am a total failure or just to laugh at the chaos and start all over again tomorrow…I believe I HaVe to choose the latter, otherwise, I would not be able to function tomorrow and the chaos could possibly triple in size…YiKes, scary thought!

TRUE LOVE

I seem to not be a girl of many words. For the most part, my blog is full of the joys of our children expressed mainly through photographs. Rarely do I write a whole lot. I love pictures, I think they usually speak for themselves. However, I am feeling the need to express a few thoughts...I do view this as my journal/memory book (since I am not good at keeping up with either). Plus, I don't get to see/talk to my husband much these days but I know I can communicate through the computer :), he's usually close to or using one all day and I think checking the blog is his way of feeling like he's seen his kids during the day (poor guy!) Wednesday Tyler came home from work with a beautiful bouquet of daises, I love them! But more than anything, I love him! He used them as a symbol of his deepest feelings and desires to be better. Ty has not had the best time here at the VA. The past two weeks he has put in over 160 hours at the hospital and he has been very tired and frustrated with himself and his circumstances. We have felt his lack of sleep and frustration at home, and I have really wanted to fix it for him and help him feel better, but instead I just get worn out and grouchy too (which is super helpful!) If anything, I should have been the one to buy him flowers (or something more manly:)) Wednesday, he definitely deserved it more... In spite of how awful he'd been feeling he came home happy and determined to spread joy through the home. Even at his "worst" Tyler has a way of spreading light and love. I love him for his optimism and his desire to be a good dad and husband. He IS an awesome dad and a wonderful husband, ALL of the time, even when he may not thinks so. I know I don't show or say it as much as a should, but I love him and I think he is an amazing person. I hope to be more like him in many ways! We had a blast walking to the park and playing together as a family that afternoon. Thank you Ty for helping us all feel better about life. We love you! I learned a great lesson from you this week (hopefully I can prove it to you in our years to come). I want to be more selfless and lovable, even on my "bad" days! Thank you for the flowers, you're the BeST!

A Busy (wet) Day...

Tyler was on-call Saturday the 20th and my parents had just gotten home from their trip the previous night, but my new friend Maria had called me weeks in advance to do a 5K women's event with her. My parents were great to watch the kids and I was excited to get a morning off and exercise at the same time! However, I woke up to gallons of rain, East Coast rain! I couldn't believe it! We were very wet before the race even started...

Afterward, we were even more wet! It was still really fun. I was able to get to know some girls in my ward a little better and being soaking wet was an okay price to pay for friendship, freedom, and a work-out! However, I was REalLY, ReAlLy, WET!

That same day Chantelle went to homecoming. Her dress was perfect and, in spite of an ear infection, she looked awesome! (Chris looked pretty good too I guess :))

MmMmmMmm, chocolate cake!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU, COLESON BUDDY!
Mom and Dad had been on a week long trip to the Oregon Coast and got home just in time for dinner on Coleson's Birthday, the 19th. That night we opened a couple of gifts but we didn't truly celebrate until Monday (once Tyler was finally home from call for the weekend). I love this picture of all three of them, who looks the most excited? His sisters LOVE birthdays!

Addellyn was bursting with birthday excitement all weekend long. She picked, (proudly) wrapped, and then decided that she owned this super soft rhino ("yinosus") for Coleson's Birthday. Coleson was very mad at Addellyn for taking his new gift away, as you can see! Coleson has been screaming at Addellyn like this LOTs lately, especially when they are in the play room and she steals a toy, so I was glad to get this snapshot for the memory books.

Coleson has been very into throwing trucks/cars or balls and then he chases them and throws them again, chases, throws, chases, throws, etc. all around the house, it's the best game! So we made him a truck cake, not that he would care what it looked like as long as it was chocolate cake covered in frosting (chocolate and sugar are Coleson's best things in life, can you tell?)

Coleson enjoyed playing with all of his new toys, and fighting his sisters for them, but he was pretty quick to find his favorite toy: the high chair, buckeling and cleaning/eating the crumbs from beneath it. His favorite part of the night was eating the cake! I don't know if it's easy to tell or not but he was super excited to see the truck and the picture is blurry because his arms are flailing out of anxiousness.