Dear Bloggers

Instead of a Dear Abby in the newspaper, I am asking all you fellow bloggers for advice.  Gracie has a serious hair twirling problem.  I can't find a solution to help her quit.  As you can tell her hair is suffering.  She has major hair loss on the twirling side.  Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.  (Disregard the crazy bangs.  That is from a unrelated hair cutting incident)

What happens when your 1st grader is mad at you?

Christmas Shopping

I had to take a picture of my boys looking through the Lego catalog working on their Christmas  wish lists.  

Sharing

I cut up some apples for the kids to snack on while we were playing outside.  After running around together a bit we came back for more and a bird was sitting on the apple eating it.  Layla said look mom we are sharing our apples with the birdies, birdies like apples too.  

My kids....

I wonder what they are thinking ........

On our way home from preschool, Gracie told me that she had corn stuck up her nose.  In class they did a project where they took corn cobs and rolled them in paint and then rolled them on paper.  Anything involving paint Gracie totally loves but apparently some of the dried kernels fell off her ear and they just needed to be in her nose instead.  I was worried because they were dry and I didn't want them expanding in her moist nose.  After a lot of hard blowing and serious praying they came out. 
Crew was complaining of pain and Gracie said"maybe it's hurting because of the silver thing you ate" Don't swallow things that you aren't supposed to and your stomach won't hurt.  I tried to figure out what it was that he had swallowed.  When Aaron came home from work Crew was still complaining.  Aaron thought maybe it could be a battery.  After looking at lots of pictures online of button batteries we found one that Crew identified as what he had swallowed.  Aaron called poison control to see what they had to say.  I had no idea swallowing a battery was so dangerous.  We had to take him to the ER immediately.  After two hours batteries start to corrode and start burning the esophagus either by the acid leaking out causing chemical burns or the electrical current causing electrical burns.  The plan was to knock him out and go down with a scope and tongs and pull out the battery.  The anesthesiologist had finished explaining to Crew what was going on and Aaron was finishing up all the paper work.  Just before the Dr. put the needle into Crew's IV  he told the Dr he felt like he was going to throw up.  The Dr. said that is a common feeling when you have something stuck inside.  Crew started throwing up and miraculously puked out the battery.  The Dr. didn't even know what to do.  He said this has never happened before I guess we will do an x-ray again.  We were so relieved that he didn't need surgery.  They still had to keep him over night for observation and insure there were no complications or infection.  
Here's the battery on the right.  It was lodged behind his heart in his esophagus. In the x-ray he looked like Iron Man.  So now Crew has a new nick name to add to the list.  When he swallowed the battery it was shiny and you could even see the words on it.  After about 4 hours inside it was almost completely black.  He was sore for awhile and couldn't eat much but thankfully he was fully recovered in time to enjoy a fabulous Thanksgiving feast.  

Aviation Nation

For Veterans Day we celebrated by going to Aviation Nation.  It's the biggest air show in the world (ok maybe not).  It was so awesome that Crew couldn't even take his eyes off the action long enough to get his picture taken. What would an air show be without the Thunderbirds, which were completely unbelievable! 

Our Air Force is Amazing

I just have to say that I am totally impressed with our military and am sure proud of them.

The things these pilots can do is astonishing.  Most of the things I saw I would have never believed planes could do or pilots.  I really can't figure out why I have never been to an air show before.
My favorite plane in the air show.  It was so awesome!

C 5 Galaxy

I don't know what this little expression means but it sure is cute
Here we are inside this huge airplane.  Crew was totally fascinated to learn that tanks and hummers are flown around in these
Of course this one is from Wright-Patt  where my dad happens to work.  

Pumpkin toss

We had to play pumpkin toss on Halloween.  With no school for Nevada Day, we had fun doing lots of Halloween activities.  This was one of the kids favorite.  We made little ghost and threw them in the pumpkin.  Crew happened to get his ghosts to go through both eyes on his first and second toss.  I couldn't believe it!  He was pretty excited too.  

The Harvest Carnival

Crew's school had a fun little carnival and he was so excited to go.  We had a fun time playing the games and running around on the playground too.  Crew and Gracie went through the haunted house with Aaron and maybe that wasn't the best idea.  Both the kids were pretty spooked afterward.  Gracie was really scared for several days and kept saying "Haunted houses are just people playing dress up and pretending huh mom" 

Layla didn't want to stop playing and let me get a picture of her


Gracie won the cake walk and this is the cake she picked.  I wasn't expecting her to pick this one.  We had so many Halloween treats that we ended up just throwing the cake away after taking the spiders and bugs off of course.  

It's Halloween!

I really love Halloween!  Nothing says it's Halloween more than carving pumpkins. 

 The kids had fun picking out their pumpkins at the store and helping to design their pumpkin, however, the actual work fell to the parents and grandparents.  Thanks Papa for carving Crew's pumpkin.  Crew refused to clean the guts out of his pumpkin.  He couldn't handle the slimy goo at all.  He really loves his pumpkin though.  Last night as I was tucking him in bed he told me he has the best pumpkin ever!  Gracie at least helped clean hers out.  Thanks for doing all the rest Gigi.  I got to carve out mine and Layla's.  For Layla's, we had to make her pumpkin just  say "No" since that is her favorite phrase right now and her pumpkin needed a grumpy face too. 

Fall is also the perfect time to enjoy some carmel apples.  For our family home evening treat we had to make some.  No one enjoys treats more than Layla.  (p.s.  I used a double boiler for the first time and can I say I am totally in love.  It made making carmel apples the easiest.)

Hauted Harvest

The Springs Preserve hosted a Haunted Harvest event that we were really excited to attend.  We got to dress up in our costumes and head down to the Preserve to hear Halloween stories, walk on spooky trails, color some Halloween pictures, dance to a live band, and of course go trick or treating.  It was a perfect evening.  We all had a great time!  I am already looking forward to next year.  

Baby Betsy

Betsy's long awaited arrival happened on Wed. Oct. 22.  Jamie is the best sister -in- law ever, and not just because she always does a fabulous job on my hair.  She let me come to her delivery.  It was the most amazing experience of my life.  I still can't stop thinking about how incredible it was.  Jamie did  a fabulous job with her baby too,  Betsy is adorable.  I totally love babies and so do my kids.  They could hardly wait to go to the hospital and see their new cousin.  

Layla was much more into the baby than I anticipated which meant we had to keep her away from Betsy.  She loved feeding the baby.  All the way home she kept saying she wanted her Betsy.
Gracie is pretty motherly.  She was the most attentive and had to hold the baby as soon as we got there.  She did a really good job with Betsy.  I was afraid we weren't ever going to get her out of the hospital.  Gracie loves babies and already talks about when she gets bigger and has babies.  
Crew was pretty amazed at how small Betsy was.  He couldn't believe that at one point he was that small.  He was also pretty interested in all the buttons on the bed and how everything in the hospital room worked.  

We didn't get to stay as long as Gracie and I would have liked but we did get to play with the Purel dispensers a lot.

Skooter

Crew finally got his Lizard (over a month ago).  He is totally in love.  I am proud of what a good pet owner he has been too.  

It cracks me up how they are looking at each other and then they both look at the camera at the same time.  They are soul mates.  

Who could have taken 98 photos on my phone?

soccer mom

Well it is official, I have reached true mom status. I have 3 kids, am almost 30, have a mini van, and now I have kids in soccer. Gracie is really excited about soccer but not for the reasons that one might think. She is on an all girl team (she didn't want to play with any boys) and she and the girls like to chat and play a little soccer on the side. I did manage to get some pictures of them playing soccer.

Gracie was really excited when she scored a goal in practice and immediately ran over to her coach to give him a high five.

We are hoping that soccer gives Crew an outlet for his competitive nature. He loves it. He even got to play goalie the second half in his first game this past Saturday, which he was really excited about. Since then all we have heard is "remember in my game when .... "
I am liking soccer because it wears them out a bit. These kids have too much energy. Even though it is time consuming to go to 3 practices a week and 2 games on saturday, I am actually quite pleased with our soccer experience so far. I couldn't ask for better coaches either. I really love both of their coaches and attribute much of our satisfaction to having such great men coaching my kids.

Oh so Pretty

Layla was very proud of herself for putting on lipsmackers all by herself. We have a ways to go if she wants to be a makeup artist when she grows up.

First Day of School

I know I'm a little late with the back to school photo but better late than never. Here is Crew on his first day of 1st grade. Now he goes to school all day. I really miss him. I can't believe how old he is already. As my wise mother says, "The days are long but the years are short."

How old are you?

If you ask Layla how old she is, this is what you get. She can't figure out how to hold up two fingers on one hand. That's a highly overrated skill anyway.

Layla is 2!

Layla is really excited about her cupcakes!


Layla had 2 parties for turning 2. We had one in Utah while we were visiting my family. They were dropping off my sister Kelly at BYU. I don't have any pictures of it though because I am a negligent parent. I didn't bring my camera because I forgot it in Mexico (thanks Karly for bringing it back for me) and I didn't remember to have Aaron bring his. Hopefully my mom has some of those on her blog. I'll have to check. We had a really cute cake with Hello Kitty on it and of course presents. These pictures are from our little celebration in Vegas. Karly made some cupcakes and a really fabulous homemade chocolate icing or frosting, I don't know what the difference is. Layla really appreciated the cupcakes and so did the rest of us.

My Girls

I don't know if the sand tastes better in Mexico but both of my girls said it does and they kept eating it. I don't even know what to say.

Fun in the Sun Mexican Style

Who can resist a day at the beach?



and after a day at the beach who doesn't want to curl up and go to sleep in the closet