Enjoying Nature

We were blessed to spend a blissful 3 weeks at home in Utah visiting all our family. It'll take me a few posts to catch up on all the hundreds of pictures I took. We had a wonderful time and were sad to come back to school and life in California. While there, my children were able to play outside every day, which is something new to them. Sad huh? I mean we go to parks alot and find things to do outside, but nothing beats having a YARD to play in any time of day.

We had a serious thunderstorm while in Spanish Fork and Kassidy and Korbin enjoyed the experience of playing in the rain. Who says you have to spend a bunch of money to have a great time?

Cute Grandma Shelly (my mom)

I love this face!

We also took a family bike ride one evening. My sister Jenny had a hard time keeping up, so my other sister Karina tied a rope to her awesome tricycle and towed her along. This worked great until Jenny would slam on the breaks in panic and send Karina careening over the handlebars. We had a lot of laughs over the 3 mile ride, and we all had sore behinds the next day.

Karina the Stinker...

Kevin

Jenny on her awesome trike

Mom pulling the kidlets. She has killer calves, these puppies were tough to pull!

Kevin bbq us some tri-tip steak one night. So yummy!

More Utah posts to come!

Little helper

My kids always love to be in the kitchen when I'm cooking. Probably because they know if they help they'll get fed earlier. It's not like there's a lot of room in the kitchen (look at the below picture--that's it, the entire kitchen!), and extra bodies make the room very squished! But I do enjoy teaching the kids and having them help me. I want them to have an love for cooking and the knowledge to do it for their families one day. Too many kids these days aren't taught the necessary skills to prepare a meal. Sad! Here are my little helpers when I was baking cookies. "Astrid" the Viking girl was sharing chocolate chips with little big-head :) I love the way she did it, by extending the wooden spoon with the chocolate chip on it. It made me smile watching them share.

When in Utah Kassidy would always beg to help with meal preparation. One thing she could do that was semi-safe was cut watermelon. It made me smile to eat VERY bite-sized pieces with dinner. And yes, we give our children knives :)

*Another New Post below

Homemade jammies

So I am WAY behind on all my blogging. After a 3 week vacation to Utah-many posts to come-I feel the need for some of my old routine...mainly, blog updating and reading. So here's the first. A couple weeks ago I was cleaning out the kids drawers and came across this old baggie sleeper of Korbin's. He only got to wear it a couple times before it got to cold for sleeveless at night. So I decided to transform the baggie sleeper into a nice breezy jammy outfit for my little man.

And here are my kidlets modeling. I also made this nightgown for princess Kassidy a month ago. It was a first time try for sure! I'll be trying again and fixing all my mistakes I learned from. But she loves it, which makes me happy!

The Moth that wouldn't die

I've always hated moths. They camouflage and wait to pounce when you least expect them. Their strange sporadic flight pattern leaves you never sure which direction they'll fly next. Those creepy antennae give me the willies, and they are just ugly!! This fear was increased after seeing the movie "Mothman Prophecies" (an admittedly stupid movie, but creepy nonetheless) and after an experience at girls camp where I woke up to a moth in my shirt. I'll never know how long it was in there, but just the thought of sleeping the whole night with that little creep touching my skin was enough to really scar me for life.

Anytime an unfortunate moth happens to find it's way into my home, I turn into "that girl". You know, the one who shrieks and freaks out and runs for a big strong man to "Kill it! Kill it!" Luckily, Kevin humors me and promptly kills the moth without any cruel teasing or chasing me with the moth in the tissue. But after our experience last night, I'm afraid he's joined my team of moth haters.

As I entered my room to get ready for bed, I noticed a little brown creep hanging out in the corner, just out of my reach and above our bed. I gave a noticeable shiver and ran for Kevin. I used the excuse that the moth was just out of my reach (it was) and that I hate them (I do) and Kevin came to my rescue. My hero! He grabbed the moth in the tissue, smooshed it pretty good, and threw it in our bathroom garbage. Done.

Or so we thought.

About an hour later when we go to the bathroom for teeth brushing and face washing and what not, the creepy moth is hanging out by the door! What? I thought you killed it? I did, it must not have been all the way dead. So here comes death number two, into the toilet he goes and FLUSH, goodbye! I can sleep easy now. Then Kevin goes to take care of business and sits on the toilet. All is well for a few seconds, until Kevin's face registers utter panic, he jumps off the toilet, unable to stop the flow immediately, and out flies the moth!! That little creep took a swim back up the pipe and popped Kevin right on the bum before his daring escape and landing up high on the light.

You can image my mixed emotions of fear, hatred for the moth, and sheer and utter hilarity of watching Kevin be kissed on the butt by a moth. He said he expected there was a powder mark on his bum from how hard the moth hit him. It was pretty entertaining, and I didn't even stop laughing to kill the dang thing for the 3rd time. I made Kevin pull up his undies and kill it...AGAIN!

Kevin has now joined me in my hatred and fear of moths. He acts hurt that I laughed at his near death experience, but I'm just glad it didn't happen to me.

Kassidy's 4th birthday party

This year I took on the task of throwing my sweet 4 year old her first friend party. Now normally I wouldn't let her have one until she turned 6, but many of our good friends will be moving in the next couple months (on to new jobs, military stations, and their homes), and we used this as an excuse to have a party!

Kassidy picked the theme of "Tangled" (that's the Rapunzel story for those of you who don't know) and we ran with it. I found so many cute ideas on the Disney website here that I felt like I didn't even have to be creative :) Here's what we did, along with lots of pictures--I even left a bunch out!

My aunt and uncle were so sweet to help us out. They helped set up and take down and wrangled kids and entertain my sweet Korbin, who really just wanted me to hold him through the whole party. I wish my mom could've made it out to the party, but I so grateful to have Scott and Jennette here with us!

When the kids came in they colored printout pictures of Rapunzel and gang.

The food was a hit. We had pulled pork sandwiches, chips, grapes, veggies and dip and some cute jello boats that I stole off someone else's blog ;)

Blue jello with orange boats in them. These were a big hit with the kids!

All the cute princes and princesses. Kassidy is one loved little girl!

We played pin the frying pan on Flynn Rider. Kevin free-hand drew this poster for me. He's the best!

Kassidy ended up hitting the picture dead on the nose on the first try, so we gave the prize to second place. The kids were good sports and seemed to enjoy this. Can you tell where we had our party? He he..

Next we made Pascal party blowers, after the cute chameleon Pascal from the movie. Although most of these were broken from too much spit by the end of the evening, the kids loved 'em!

See?

Last, we opened presents and had cupcakes. I took pictures with each kid after Kassidy opened their present, but there's just too many to put up here. I thought this one was cute. This is Kassidy's new friend Soren, and he dressed up like Flynn Rider. So here's Rapunzel and Flynn.

My little Kass was very sweet, with no birthday girl melt-downs (pheww!). She loved her party, and got home and had to play with everything new once before bed.

Now I don't have to do another party for 5 years, right?

Happy Father's Day!

Happy Father's Day to all the wonderful men in our lives! I am very blessed to be surrounded by wonderful men, some of which are father's and some who are not.

I have a wonderfully creative and inventive father who taught me to have desire to make and create things with my hands. He gave me his creative talents, for which I am very grateful. He is very passionate when he gets an idea and I love watching him work. My father is also a wonderful grandpa and loves my kids so much! I love you Dad :)

I'm also blessed with an amazing father-in-law. Bruce is one of the kindest men I know. He's very generous and always wants to share what he has, no matter how big or small. Bruce is also a wonderful grandpa, and my kids love him, especially when he takes them riding horses or playing in the yard. We love you Bruce :)

We also have adopted my uncle Scott as a surrogate father/grandpa since moving out here to California. He's so sweet to take us under his wing and help us out in times of need. He's such a hard worker and has endless service for those around him. We love you Scott :)

There are many more wonderful men in our lives, including my sweet grandfather's and other men in our church who always lend a helping hand or advice when needed. Here's to you men!!

And last, but definitely NOT least is my sweet husband. Kevin is one top-notch papa! He has a deep love for his children and loves to spend time with them. He is the master at making them laugh and always knows how to cheer up a moody 4 year old (that feels weird to say) or tired baby boy. Kevin is the epitome of "great father" and my kids are SOooo lucky to have him! I'm always amazed by his talent for parenting and he makes me want to be a better mother. I love you honey and I love sharing our family with you. Happy Father's Day!

For Father's Day, I made prints of these pictures and put them in a tri-fold frame for Kevin. He loved it! Although I couldn't make them work side by side for this post, here they are. Happy Father's Day!!

Kassidy is 4

My sweet Kassidy turned 4 this past week and we sure had a fun time celebrating it with her. We did so many fun things that I'll have to break them up into a couple posts. On Kassidy's actual birthday we went to Six Flags with some friends. Unfortunately, the daddies had to work or study :( so it was just the mommies and kids. We have season passes, so it was nice to just go for a couple hours and not feel like we had to make a big long day of it. The weather was very warm, so the kids gravitated towards the fountains. We had a wonderful time!

Here are the kids after lunch. Korbin looks like he's so big!

Riding the Safari jeeps.

Kassidy, Korbin and Finn playing in the fountain.

That evening we let Kassidy open family presents. Grandma Jennette and my cousin Blake came over. We were having a friend party the next night, so this night wasn't too big of a deal. Kassidy sure is a loved little girl though!

Happy Birthday girlie! There are more posts and many more pics to come on her party.