MIA... playing catch up

It has been a long while since I have really posted to this blog. A lot of my time has been sucked up with the Christ Centered Christmas blog. If you haven't checked it out recently, I will say you are missing out. My mom and I are adding new stuff regularly and thanks to sugardoodle and my new button the word is getting out there. I'm very excited about it! There are also new recipes up on Everyday Recipes including a really yummy recipe for Strawberry Cream Puffs.

Thanksgiving was wonderful other than we were unable to go to Utah and see our families. My dear friend Christina was able to come out, kid free, and we had a grand girls weekend. Thanks Josh for watching the boys! We basically ate and shopped the entire weekend and had a lot of fun. Thanksgiving dinner was made by my amazing husband. Everything turned out so delicious and we timed it pretty well. We had some friends over from our ward and they brought the most wonderful recipe for sweet potatoes with a coconut topping (I'm still working on getting the recipe, I'm not usually a fan of sweet potatoes but these were SO good). We just lounged around the afternoon, looking at Black Friday ads and plotting the next morning. Sam was so tired he fell asleep in the middle of the living room floor amidst all the bussle with his bum in the air. I was worried he would have a hard time going down. We had transfered him to a toddler bed the weekend before and he takes advantage of the new found freedom of being able to leave his room when he is supposed to be sleeping. The poor kid was so tuckered out like the rest of us after such a large Turkey dinner, that my problem was solved.

A couple nights ago the boys decided to sleep together in Elijah's bed. Melt my heart CUTE! Most of the time they just play together and make a mess in their room when they are supposed to be sleeping (Sam did it until 9:30 last night) but there are those rare nights when they are just cute and go to sleep so well.

One of the random things I picked up at Walmart on Black Friday was a Eureka lightweight vacuum cleaner. It was $9 bagless, lightweight, telescoping handle, lime green vacuum so I grabbed it. I love it! Mind you it is not a Dyson (which I also drool over) but it is so light and agile that I can whip it out and get most of the mess off my floor in nothing flat. Another big plus is that my boys love it. Unfortunatly I have yet to have them push it around while it is on, but they are practicing by running it along the floor. The telescopic handle makes it the perfect size for them. Sam is really good at moving the chairs around to get under the table. I'm trying to catch a video of them doing it. I'll post it when I do.

Elijah has been making more labels. The other day he asked me how to spell butterfly. I then found that he had done some other labels by himself and that Sam had gotten in on the action and done one too. I think it's great practice to get Elijah to learn how to control and contain his letters while writing.

We had a really cold day last week. Temps in the teens with powder snow on the ground (and all over my car). We trudged out in it because Elijah need to go to school. When I got home to put Sam down for his nap and took his hat off I had to grab the camera and get a shot of his crazy hair. He was less than pleased with me, but what else are mom's for.

Giveaway WINNER

Sorry I'm a little late doing the drawing and it has been awhile since I have posted anything at all. I had a wonderful Thanksgiving full of eating and shopping. The last few days have been the after vacation low. Yesterday was a crazy day full of Christmas decorations, a disastorous house and Enrichment stress. Today started off with a call to poisen control because Sam smeared diaper rash cream all over his face, ears, and hair getting it into his eyes and possibly eating some of it -oh joy-, but things have settled down enough for me to announce the drawing for the crocheted monkey.

Drum roll....

Elijah assisted me in drawing the number and the winner is Maren!

Send me an email, Maren, with your address and you will soon have a little monkey for one of your darling girls.

I appreciate those of you who commented and I know there were many more who didn't. I hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving with your families and friends.

The Christmas season is now in full swing! Sugardoodle has put the Christ Centered Christmas blog on her Random 10 list and we have been getting a lot of hits. It's pretty exciting. One of the links on her random 10 is to a photoshop template for a photo book using the Family Proclamation. It's free to download and pretty amazing. I got into a little bit of digital scrapbooking to do the banner for Christ Centered Christmas and was excited to see these templates that all you have to do is add your photos and then print it through one of the many photobook sites online. It would make a great gift, though I'm not sure there is time to get it done before Christmas.

Sam the Helping Man

Sam has become quite a helper around the house lately. Last week he discovered that he could get the broom out all by himself. He then preceded to sweep (aka push around) all the floors in the house, carpet included. He was even thorough enough to move all the chairs and push around under the table (which happens to be carpet). He was really good at hitting the walls with the long handle of the broom while pushing around all the crumbs in the house.

Last week he also helped me with the laundry. I handed him a pair of my shoes (my nicest pair, I might add) to take from the living room into my bedroom. He promptly disappeared and I assumed he had completed the job as asked. Later that night, after I had run a load of laundry, I discovered my shoes soaking wet in the washing machine having gone through a complete cycle. Not the recommended way to get your shoes clean, by any means, but my helper made sure that his mommy would have clean (and wet) leather shoes.

Funny stories aside, Sam really is a good helper. He is always willing to set the table, loves to help stir anything I'm making (and unfortunately insists on doing it even over the stove), helps me find his shoes and my keys, and much more. He's turning into such a big boy and I'm very grateful for my little buddy and helper.

Elijah is 4!

It occured to me that I haven't posted pictures of Elijah from his birthday yet. It is amazing to me that he is actually four years old. The time has flow by so fast. He is a smart, sensitive, observent little boy and I am so grateful to be his mother.

He was so excited for his birthday and kept asking if it was the day yet for days before. He had to wait patiently though all the festivites of Sam birthday and the joint party before it was finally his day to turn Four. By then I was pretty partied out, and very caked out so we went to the store and Elijah got to pick out his own little cake and they wrote his name on it in Green (his most often favorite color that changes periodically depending on his mood). He was very proud of that little cake and excited to put in his special #4 candles. Sam was also very excited about the cake because by then he knew how all this partying worked. We sang happy birthday with the candles lit and Sam jumped the gun and blew out the candles before Elijah could get to them. We ended up doing a do over and that time (as shown in the video, sorry about the sound I seem to have a habit of covering the mic) Sam sang and pointed to himself claiming the song for himself.

Elijah and Sam are great buddies. They have become better friends in the last month or so and spend a lot of time playing together (about as much time as they spend fighting with each other). They do the sweetest hugs with each other that often end in a giggling mass on the floor. It is wonderful to see them love each other so much.

Blues Clues Birthday

Elijah and Sam (Sam especially) are really into Blues Clues. It's one thing they both agree on so for their joint friends birthday party this year we went with a Blues Clues theme. The party was a success!

The day started off with pancakes (like most Saturdays) but we added a little twist to these pancakes. We poured them in the shape of Paw Prints in honour of the party day.

For the party we had two families over that each have two kids my boys' ages. The kids were so cute in their dog ears and painted noses and we all had a lot of fun. By far the biggest stress was the cake (I have frosting issues!) but other than that everything went pretty smoothly.

Sam was glued to his Handy Dandy Notebook. He spent the entire party with that notebook in his hand wandering around the house looking for clues and he was pretty good at spotting them too. He was pretty serious about the whole thing and super cute. Elijah actually did well at drawing the clues in his notebook. You can actually tell what they are. He's becoming quite an artist.

Thank you mom for all your help. Thank you friends for sharing in the festivites with us, you made it so much fun.

The details and party plan are in a post to follow soon!

Just like Grammie

While my mother was here Sam noticed her book and glasses on the couch and proceeded to mimic his Grammie reading. He was also willing for me to take a lot of photos of him being as cute as can be.

p.s. that's my afghan on the couch. It is basically done. I still have a few threads to hide and I need to wash and block it. But the crochetting is all done!!

Sam's 2 Years Old!

Sam absolutely loves making pancakes and waffles for breakfast with his daddy. We spiced up the pancakes for his birthday by adding blueberries. Sam is getting super independent. He wants to put the syrup on, smear it around, and cut the pancakes all by himself. He does a fairly good job but comes out very sticky!

Sam also helped me make cupcakes for his birthday. He is totally hands on in the kitchen. Both Elijah and Sam enjoyed putting the sprinkles on the cupcakes. They especially loved eating them after Sam's dinner of choice, Little Ceasers Pizza, which he got to go get alone with daddy. He's got the blowing the candles thing down (in fact when it came time for Elijah's cake Sam jumped the gun and we had to do it over again so Elijah could blow them out).

Sam's also got the unwrapping present thing down. He was very good a ripping all the paper off and his reactions were super SUPER cute. Below is a video of him opening his new baby. He is the sweetest boy with it. He hugs it and kisses it, tucks it in, wraps it in his blanket, etc... It melts my heart.

It is so hard to believe that my baby is all grown up. Elijah was his age when Sam was born! Time flies so FAST! I am so grateful to have sweet little Sam in our family. He is such a blessing and brightens every day.

Birthday Week

This week has be a week full of birthday celebrations. I have had enough birthday cake to last me til next year! We had Sam's birthday, then a joint Blues Clues party, and then Elijah's birthday; each with their own cake and presents. The boys have had great fun with all the festivities. To make the week even better, my mother was able to come out and share in the fun. The boys were super excited to have her here and we were sad to see her go this evening.

I have gobs of pictures to go through. I think I have over two hundred photos! So needless to say I have some weeding down to do, and slide shows to make, before I post about everything here.

But to appease those who have been waiting patiently to see pictures here is a darling video of Sam and Elijah playing with the Playskool Honeybee Hop. The idea is that the bee goes around and they are supposed to jump over it. It even plays Flight of the Bumblebee at two different speeds. Well, watch the video to see what the boys end up doing.

It's like a mini dog track for toddlers. Sam is especially funny to see running around with his little elbows pumping. They do this over and over and over. I got 10-12 video clips of them doing it today (I know it's pathetic) and they played with it a lot yesterday too. It's great; it wears them out. I can see this being a lifesaver this winter, if it survives that long.

Check in later for more stuff on the boys. Thank you to everyone who made my boys' birthdays happy.

Thankful Turkey Count Down

Tonight with it being Fast Sunday and Daylight Savings, we had dinner early and had time after dinner to do something as a family. I had read yesterday about a turkey feather countdown for Thanksgiving and decided it would be fun for the boys to make and do throughout the month. (I found the idea that you are slowly plucking the turkey in preparation for Thanksgiving to be amusing.) As I was getting my craft supplies out some popsicle sticks caught my eye and the gears turned from there. This is what we ended up making.

We ended up coloring enough popsicle sticks for everyday until Thanksgiving with markers to add color. It was something that Sam and Elijah could both do. I threw together a turkey head and feet and attatched them to a small teracota pot with hot glue. He's a bit of a funny lookign turkey, but you get the idea. The idea is that each day we will take out a "feather" and then write something we are thankful for on it and place it in a jar near by. There are also additional blank sticks in the jar for additional thankful notes.

Tonight Elijah picked the first feather and said "I am thankful for my SELF." So Elijah's name went down on a stick. Then Sam wanted in on the action and we put his name on a stick too. (That crazy kid can't say his name but he recognizes many letters and can SPELL his name, it seems a little backwards if you ask me.) Anyway, I'm excited for the opprotunity to share what we are grateful for as a family throughout the month. We truly have a lot to be grateful for.

I put a stick in tonight too. Mine said I was grateful for testimonies. Every first Sunday of the month members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have the opprotunity to share what they know about the gospel of Jesus Christ. Today's meeting was particularly moving. Strong witnesses were born, I felt the Spirit, and my own testimony was strengthened. There were a few children that bore their testimonies. It's kind of a Mormon joke that the kids always get up and say "I know this church is true, I love my mom and dad, I love my brother's and sisters... etc." But today it hit me differently. Last week I read an article by Elder Oaks of the Twelve Apostles titled "Testimony." He talks about how it is that we can KNOW.

"What do we mean when we testify and say that we know the gospel is true? Contrast that kind of knowledge with “I know it is cold outside” or “I know I love my wife.” These are three different kinds of knowledge, each learned in a different way. Knowledge of outside temperature can be verified by scientific proof. Knowledge that we love our spouse is personal and subjective. While not capable of scientific proof, it is still important. The idea that all important knowledge is based on scientific evidence is simply untrue."

Anyway, the talk goes into some good detail, but I was struck today by the simple connection of the love for our family and the love of our Heavenly Father. That we can come to know of our Heavenly Father's love and feel it- like and through the love of our earthly family.

There are many things that I do not know, but I DO know that there is a God and that he is my Heavenly Father, I am his daughter. He loves me, he knows me and he has provided a way for me to return to live with Him again. I know that Jesus Christ lives, that He is my Savior. The Atonement is real. I know that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has His priesthood authority on the earth today. I know that Thomas S. Monson is a prophet of God. I love my family and know that we can be together forever. And for this knowledge I am daily grateful.

my little Dino-mites

We had a great Halloween. We went to our ward's trunk-or-treat which turned out being a little slimmer than we anticipated (Halloween night probably being a factor in that) but there was enough of a turn out to keep the boys occupied and for me to bring home the extra chocolate. Sam was really into the trick-or-treat get candy part of the event even though the silly kid doesn't talk and can't say "trick or treat". Good thing Elijah is his side kick and does all the talking and they both got the goods.


















Our friends have the cutest little 11 month old and they came up with a super creative costume for her. She was a fire hydrant complete with leg lifted dog. It was the cutest thing to see her waddling around. Man, she makes me baby hungry! especially for a girl.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN

I hope you Halloween Day is going well so far. It's be a bit rough around here. Josh is sick with some cold bug and has been mopeing around the house. Other than that, Elijah is SUPER excited that it is Halloween.... FINALLY. Our ward is doing a trunk-or-treat tonight (where everyone meets at the church parking lot and gives candy out from their car while the kids do the rounds). I've got my chocolate stocked up and I'm crossing my fingers that there will be leftovers.


Last night we finally got the chance to carve our pumpkins. We got one of those silly books at Walmart and Elijah picked out the "Pirate" one with the skull and cross bones. Josh did an amazing job carving it out and Elijah even pitched in cutting out a few pieces, which he was excited about. I did a silly face pumpkin for Sam. He's super proud of it and keeps making sure that everyone knows that it is "mine?". I ventured out and made my own copy of an owl. It turned out better than I hoped.


After we were done we had to light them and see what they looked like. I was really impressed with our handy work. The boys were in awe. The cool thing was that with all the lights off you could see the silouette on our vaulted ceiling. We ended up lighting each pumpkin individually to check out the full effect of each pumpkin.
Very COOL!














I also got to test out the "candlelight" mode on my camera and I'm excited that the pictures worked.

Have a safe and HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

Pumpkin Ranch

We made it to the local pumpkin ranch a little late this year. They had packed up most of their rides and activities -Sad- but we did get to see the animals and run around the hay bale maze, which the boys loved.





Elijah and Sam did most of the maze by themselves, running around like crazed boys. The maze was just the right hight that they couldn't really see where they were going. In all they did the maze probably five times. There was a huge pumpkin at the end of the maze that Sam had fun playing peek-a-boo in. Cute crazy kids.

They also had a bouncy toy thing. Sam is now big enough to fend for himself in those things. It's fun to see him and Elijah get excited about it and crazy bouncing around together.

In all it was yet another wonderful FAll outing. The weather has been GORGEOUS this week with temps in the 70's and clear sunny days. Anyway, I'm feeling really blessed right now and grateful for my fun, crazy family and the time we get to spend together.

Boo at the Zoo 2008

The Denver Zoo does a Halloween event annually called "Boo at the Zoo". The kids (and many of the parents) get dressed up and go trick-or-treating around the zoo. They boys both got dressed up in their dinosaur costumes and we did the rounds. It was the most perfect Fall day and we all had a blast. Sam kept turning heads, he was just so super cute, and Elijah was very good at saying "trick-or-treat" to get his candy. By the end we had two very tired dinosaurs on our hands and a load of candy.

I think it is official... I have the cutest dinosaurs on the whole planet!

Let's go fly a kite

Yesterday Josh came home from work a little early so we could have some daddy time (which has been in short supply lately). It was a beautiful fall day with the weather having warmed up to around 75 this week. We decided to head to the park and try out a kite I found at a garage sale this summer but hadn't had a chance to try yet. There were a few cursing mumbles of "easy assembly, my eye!" from Josh as he tried to put it together, but eventually he got it together and it was very impressive. The kite looks like a boat with multiple masts and sails and a long rainbow tail. Well, it turned out the wind wasn't steady enough to actually get the kite up for any amount of time, but we had a lot of fun playing together in the waining fall sunlight.

While Josh and I were struggling to get the kite together I looked over to see Sam crawling around on the basketball court. I went over to see what was going on and found that he had noticed a lone little ant treking across the cement. He would point at it and say "bu', bu'".

After the kite flying prooved unsuccesful , Josh and the boys started rolling around in the freshly cut grass. They were kind enough to pose for me a bit. At one point Sam was having fun putting grass clippings on Josh's face. Elijah and Sam also enjoyed playing with their long shadows.

I'm grateful for my goofy fun boys who know how to enjoy life and make my life enjoyable. I am grateful for the time we have to spend together.

Boy am I grateful...

...that the paint all over my son's face is watercolors.

His mother had the brilliant idea to let the boys paint bones for a skeleton (I guess actually it was my idea to color the bones and Elijah's idea to paint them). Sam did more painting on himself than the paper. That silly kid.

I found the pattern for the skeleton HERE though I wasn't excited about the size so I photoshopped it to make the body fill an 8.5 x 11 and the limbs on another sheet. I also whited out all the back ground junk. (silly design in my mind, not economical for printing.)

Anyway, Elijah loved painting his skeleton (in the rush to get Sam cleaned up before he spread the rainbow to other areas of his body or the house, I didn't get pictures of Elijah doing his). We then assembled the bones together with mini brads. I punched the holes and Elijah spent the longest time working on getting the tiny brads in place. When we were all done the skeletons went for a dance.

Today I attempted to make skeletons out of pasta glued to paper. Mine turned out alright but the boys just messed around without making a massive mess which is all good by me! Check out Crafty Crow she is doing a series of Halloween posts with party games, crafts, decorations etc.