the past 14 days of blurriness

On the 18th day of December... Max's class went on the Polar Express Ride

On the 19th day of December... Max was student of the month, got the PE award and then we drove all the way to CO

On the 20th day of December... I went shopping with my dad and ate at Simply Sloppy Joe's (yep, that's all they serve; Nate was jealous)

On the 21st day of December... we drove up to the mountains and stayed in a cabin at the YMCA of the Rockies

On the 22nd day of December... the boys walked across "frozen" Bear Lake but one of Nate's legs ended up in the icey water while the girls walked around downtown Estes Park; Nate, Dave, Bekah and I had a failed attempt at ice skating due to the extreme darkness and the lights not working at the pond

On the 23rd day of December... we drove home from the mountains and Adam and Leah flew in to Highlands Ranch

On the 24th day of December... we celebrated my Mom's birthday, Max lost his 2nd tooth and went to the candlelight service at church

On the 25th day of December... we celebrated Jesus' birthday with presents and good food

On the 26th day of December... we went after Christmas shopping and watched the kids play with their new toys: marshmallow guns, lots of Diego, bb gun, and a lion cub while sweet Ava got a doll to balance out the boys weapons

On the 27th day of December... the boys went to the shooting range while we dressed Ava up in her new clothes then went to visit the Walkers

On the 28th day of December... we spent all day driving home

On the 29th day of December...looked at suitcases that need to be unpacked

On the 30th day of December...celebrated Christmas with Nate's family

On the 31st day of December... we paid off "Complete" Restoration and our lawyer fees!

Good riddance trials of 2008!

G-man's Program

Grant has been practing for months at school for their Christmas program. Since they began he has consistently said that he isn't going up on stage and that he doesn't want anyone looking at him. I knew these statements could very well be true and we could have a long night on our hands with them lying on the floor, refusing to go up on stage while punching anyone within reach or screaming and crying while running out of the church. Fortunately, my worst nightmares were not reality and the little guy was very sweet and cooperative. He sang his songs and even smiled. Such a cute little guy.


He spotted us walking out.

Grant and his buddy, Cameron. Looks like trouble.

The amazing Ms. Mary who is uncomprehensively patient and has worked wonders with our high-strung child.

Rub a dub dub

Much to Nate's disgust, the boys are all growing their hair out. Max and Grant have both said they want their hair longer...Grant points to his chin if you ask him how long he wants it. Jack says he doesn't want a hair cut (which he always says) but to group him with his brother's I'm just going to go ahead and say he wants to grow his out too. All this hair and a little soap makes for some great styling in the tub.

This reminds me of the creepy Saturday Night Live guy with his pants pulled up really high.

Bring on the brushes and detangler.

niner

9 glorious years ago Nate and I got married. Today we get to share our anniversary with Thanksgiving. My sister wondered how I felt about having a whole parade in honor of our anniversary. I should have thought to ask Macy's if they'd put in big balloon people of me and Nate. Maybe the next time our anniversary falls a Thursday I'll remember that...

Happy Anniversary, Natey! I love you!

Bait for Papa

When we were raking and cleaning up the yard a few days ago I discovered some incredibly large worms. I think they could technically be considered small snakes due to their size. The boys thought they would make great bait for fishing with Papa. The only problems with that are: a) Papa lives in Colorado b) we won't see Papa until December c) lakes are frozen in Colorado in December d) I don't know the life span of a giant worm in a jar but I'm guessing it's less than 1 month.

Grant was not discouraged. He found a jar, filled it with dirt and matter of factly said that Papa would just have to break away the ice so they could fish. Such a determined little fella.

Thanks... for helping

Today our No-School-Must-Have-Activities craft was making name place holders for Thanksgiving dinner with Nate's family. This required 17 turkeys (they are attached to clothes pins that will later hold the names). Here's the rundown of the creations:

Jack- 1 turkey
(his handprint was used for 3 but he actually only attached eyeballs and a beak to 1). He was then discovered sitting in the living room, watching Dora and cutting holes down the entire front of his shirt with scissors he snatched from the table. Nap followed.

Grant- 2 turkeys
He made 1 turkey, took a break of playing on lego.com and chasing after the mouse that Leo caught on the backporch. Max convinced him to help him make another which brought his total up to 2.

Max- 5 turkeys
We originally agreed to split the difference of the remaining turkeys when Jack and Grant stopped helping. He was a trooper through 3 turkeys but needed pleading to finish a couple more (one of which was pawned off on Grant as explained earlier)

Sarah- 9 turkeys.
I am already tired of turkeys and it's not even Thanksgiving yet!


HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

love letter

Tonight Grant came out of his room with a piece of construction paper he had written random letters all over. He asked me what it said. I read, "My mommy is the most amazing, beautiful mommy in the whole world and I love her very much." He looked at me with his eyes wide open, jaw dropped and said, "I didn't know I could write all that."

K-I-S-S-I-N-G

Friday night while hanging out with the Nelsons and the Loibners our multitudes of children were playing in the boys' rooms. Poor Emma and Brooklyn were seriously outnumbered but were holding their own by being the princesses amongst the warriors.

At one point Emma came running out to the living room to report that the "boy in the blue shirt" kissed her. I went to find my little Romeo and took Grant out in the hall to explain to him that he was not to be kissing girls.

Grant: But I can kiss you.
Me: Yes, you can. But I am your Mom.
Emma (listening from the doorway): It's OK. I like it when he kisses me.

Seriously? 4 year olds!?!

Priorities

Overheard by Grant's teacher at school on Friday while playing house:

"Yeah, I'll marry you but I won't be able to help with the kids because I'll be too busy out on adventures."

Indy Party

Max has chosen his birthday party theme since he was 3 years old... we've done motorcycles, a camping trip, crocodile hunter, army and now Indiana Jones. This year his parentals had a momentary lapse of sanity and even agreed to do a sleepover. Yes... we know.

Since Indiana Jones is an explorer the boys spent their evening on an adventure to locate the Arc of the Presents that the Nazis were trying to steal.

First was a Mummy wrap to find a clue hidden in a roll of TP. (The clue was actually just taped to the inside of one of the rolls because I couldn't figure out how to get it under the actual toilet paper).

The clue led them to the spider cave where they had to crawl through, collect a big, disgusting spider while looking for the clue.

Indiana Birthday Boy on the hunt.

Next they were directed to the snake forest where they had to capture 5 snakes and find the hidden clue.

They had a hard time locating this clue. Anyone see it?

On to Crocodile Creek where jewels were to be had for those willing to stick their hands in the cold, murky water.

Pankot Palace was the place to dig through eyeballs, monkey brains and gopher guts in search of the clue. You'd think boys would have liked this more than they did. Most of them were disgusted.

Max didn't mind the monkey brains.

Aftermath of the mine field. I got distracted by all the balloons popping and forgot to take a picture.

The adventurers with their big find... the Arc of the Presents.

The golden treasure.

Finally in pajamas watching a movie.

I went to bed around 10:45 pm. I woke up at midnight to Nate saying, "No, we're not going to put in another movie." One un-named party goer woke up at 6:00 am and started waking others up. Nate quickly put an end to that....7 & 8 year old boys have endless energy and vocal skills.

Just two more months until our next party. I'm praying it's not at our house.

7

Max turned 7 today.

I'm a little bit in shock that my first baby is suddenly such a big kid. He got to choose where we ate dinner tonight and he didn't choose McDonald's. He chose AQ instead. If that's not old age for you, I don't know what is...

Happy Birthday, big boy.

Sweet Dreams

After 30 (yes 30) years our mattress has finally been replaced. My parents got a new mattress right before Nate and I got married so they offered us their old one until we could afford a new one. Little did we know it would be 9 years (and even now it was with significant help from my parents as our Christmas present)! It served us well but is long past due a trip to the dump. Here is our new and very tall mattress that doesn't cave in the middle.

During a little mattress shopping one of the salesmen asked me how long we'd been married and if our mattress could stand on it's own. He assumed when I told him we'd been married right under 9 years that that's how old our mattress was. I didn't have the heart to correct him and risk him having a heart attack but I did tell him that most assuredly our mattress could not stand on it's own. I stopped short of telling him that I was pretty sure I could fold our mattress in half like a taco. Apparently, if your mattress can't stand up on it's own it's "dead". Ours probably needed a funeral before it came to us...

(For the record, I think with some help I might have been able to roll the mattress up like a burrito. The box springs even folded a little which I'm pretty sure explains some of the lower back pain I've been having.)

The boys think having the old mattress and box springs propped up on the back porch is the greatest thing ever. If I'd only known I'd have waited and given it to them as a Christmas present. They run up it as if they are mountain climbing and when it falls they jump on it like a trampoline. This is recycling at it's best.

Halloween

Friday was CRAZY around here. I had tons to do, lots of places to be plus some neighborhood craziness I don't even have the time or energy to get into right now. All that to preface my horrible mom award for day because I only got pictures of Max and Grant in their costumes- none of Jack, none of the boys together and none of Nate who, of course, dressed up too (to my credit the camera battery died but still, I should have made sure someone took pictures!)

The little guys dressed up as 3 ninjas:

Max, the camo ninja.

Grant, the red cobra ninja.

Jack, the blue ninja who called himself a power ranger and roared like a lion. Very confusing. (It's a good thing I took this picture of him a month ago so he can be represented.)

Don't worry. I'll make Nate put his costume back on for a pic because I know you don't want to miss him as a desert prince (or as Grant called him: Jesus).