Birthdays

It's a few days post birthday, but it's the first chance I've had to write about Seth's birthday on the 8th.

Candace loves to take pictures with my camera, even though she has her own. I think she's been deleting some pictures. She deleted one I know I took but couldn't find. Luckily I was able to just take it again. I've also found some pictures locked. Not sure how she does that but I can't delete them or get them off the camera when she locks them. So after Candace worked her magic on my camera one day she showed me two pictures I have never seen before. Somehow they must have been on the camera hard drive instead of the memory card or something. I have no idea how they came back but I was really glad to see them.

One year ago

Seth's Birth

 

What a sweet little man. I knew we had taken more pictures of him but I never saw that many. Thank goodness.

Now one year later, THE BIG ONE!

 

Man, he's gotten big. And, since Seth doesn't have a preference, the cake was my choice. It was brownies.

What's better than brownies for your birthday, you ask? Brownies covered in almond cool whip, sliced strawberries and fudge topping, that's what. Oh goodness they were good. Seth thought so too.

He was pretty tired so he kept rubbing his eyes, hence the chocolate in his eyebrows. Had to throw him in the bath (his favorite pastime) before present time.

He doesn't really know how to use a hammer. But he does like to bang and make noise, which is the whole point of this thing. He kept trying to bang with the handle on the colored pegs. He's a sweetie.

I've finally finished a couple of my homemade Christmas gifts. This is a weighted blanket. It's supposed to help you sleep for those who like to sleep with heavy blankets on them but without all the heat. It's filled with poly beads so it's washable. Great for little girls who like to get blankets dirty with lots of use.

This is one of several I Spy bags I'm making for some sweet little girls in my family.

 They're filled with the same poly beads as the blanket, along with some little treasures to "spy". Now I need to finish up the other 5...sigh.

Slow and steady wins the race, right? That's what I keep telling myself. I've got one week to finish what I can, then I'll have to take the rest down to Texas with us to finish them up. I don't want to do that when I'm on vacation. I just need a good block of undisturbed time (yeah right, do I ever get that?) to knock out a bunch of them.

Christmas time, Thanksgiving, cutie cute and a little surprise

You guessed it. I'm all alone while Justin's on another scout camp out. So...I'm catching up on the ol' blog that I haven't updated in about a month.

I've decorated for Christmas, even though we won't be here for the two weeks surrounding Christmas.
Christmas lights make me happy. I like to look at them. It's not Christmas without them and a Christmas tree. Here's what I've got so far.

 

Oh, I also made that tree skirt last year. It's white crushed velvet and satin. We've got matching stockings. :) Looks a little funky in this picture though. I've skipped putting the blown glass ornaments on this year. Sethy boy is too dangerous. They do look wonderful sparkling through the lights, though. He won't pull anything off as long as there isn't anything around that he can pull up on to stand.

Here's our little winter wonderland. 2000 lights. I really want to put some giant lollipops or peppermints on stakes in the middle of the yard or something. I love the idea of a gingerbread house, with lots of sweets all over with some frosting or snow to top it off. Not sure how I would do that though. Maybe next year when we'll be here long enough to make it worth all the work. The icicle lights are my favorite. Every 5th bulb twinkles. The rest of the lights stay on. Way hard to find lights like that and pretty pricey to boot. I can only buy a little at a time. Next year I'll add another strand along with some large candy :)

I'm also working on my homemade Christmas presents. I think I jumped in a little too deep with that one. Way too many projects to finish. I've got all of them started and half finished. Now if I can just catch up on the housework I can get this stuff done before Christmas. I'll post pictures of my lovely little creations as I finish them. You'll be amazed. Honestly, you better be.

This was a few weeks ago. Meagan took Seth outside to swing. He really loves her. She's so good with him. He liked swinging too.

  

 

We went to San Antonio for Thanksgiving. One of the Paul's family friend's daughter (wow, mouthful) got married the day before Thanksgiving. They are going to hate their anniversary. I can relate. Ours is December 27. You do whatcha gotta do when you get married as students in between semesters and school holidays.

All-in-all, great food and fun dancing. Meagan was struttin' her stuff all night. She has some seriously funny dance moves. If you need convincing, watch Megadance on my facebook.

Grandma and Seth. Who doesn't love that?

He's so funny lately. Every time there is music playing or a rythm (like me stirring chocolate milk in a glass, tapping my fingernails on the counter, etc.) he starts wiggling his middle and dancing.

He also starting clapping and waving Thanksgiving week. I love to watch babies clap their chubby little uncoordinated hands. It's one of my favorite things.

Okay, one more cute thing. He's been saying "kidta, kidta, kidta..." a lot. I couldn't figure out why he made that particular sound until I was tickling him one day. "tickle, tickle, tickle..." So now every time he says kidta kidta I must tickle him. He asked for it.


This video is from Thanksgiving of Seth and Wagner, Jordan and Alyssa's little dog. Right before I shot this Wagner was following Seth around and licking his face. Seth was getting upset because he couldn't escape. It was so funny and we were all laughing so hard. They are the same size.

This next little dish is something I worked on for several weeks after I got photoshop. I was looking online at tutorials on how to use all the tools in the program and came across a tut on how to make your own Greek statue image. Justin and I have a little joke about Greek statues which I won't go into at this juncture. But it inspired me to create this. Michelangelo's "David". It's been edited to protect the innocent.

Isn't that awesome!? You can see the original online if you'd like. I'm not including it here because it's a nudey so viewer discretion is advised. Just Google Michelangelo's David. I thought about doing one with my head on a goddess statue but all of those are seriously nudey. I got tired of looking at naked statues as I decided on a picture I could use. Thank heaven for the giant fig leaf. What is it with the antiquity's fascination with naked people?

Halloween and photoshop

The long awaited Halloween photos have arrived. 

Meagan as a Queen and Candace as a Snow Princess. These are the dresses I got at the thrift store for $4 and $8 bucks. The face paint added a nice touch and they absolutely loved it. Their hair was really nice too, but you can't see it in this pic. I didn't get any pictures of it, actually.

Labyrinth

For those who haven't seen the movie...you are missing out. We have it if you want to borrow it. :) Great '80's movie. Justin is Jareth, the Goblin King, I'm Sarah and Seth is Toby. Make sure you check out Justin's tight pants. ;P Several old ladies did.

 Justin played the Labyrinth soundtrack in our car as trick-or-treaters came around. He made Seth dance when the "Magic Dance" song came on. I love dressing up for Halloween.

 I'm also trying out photoshop. Way cool features. I can finally take out a bunch of crap I don't want now. I took out a lot of shine on me and Candace and some redness in one of the pics. It's like a magic eraser. I'm not real great at it. More experienced folks can probably see some imperfections but I'm hooked. I'm kind of tempted to make Justin's, um...pants...a little bigger. LOL! Stay tuned. j/k

Update emails

I think I've figured out the update problem for those of you who want to know when I update but don't have a blogger account. I've set it up so you can get an email when I add a post. I just need your email. If you would like this option, send me your email. The only problem is, I can only add 10 addresses this way. But no worries, there aren't more than 10 of you who want this option, as far as I know.

I've already added a few of you who have told me you want an update so you should have gotten an email. If not, let me know your correct email address.

Wow, could I have said the word email any more? I don't think so.

Funny little things

I like to keep track of the funny things the kids say. Most of the time I can't remember them 5 minutes after they say them so I tried really hard this time. These little jewels are from Meagan.

A little background: The girls wanted to know if princesses were real. The only real princess I know about is Kate (Middleton?), the girl who will soon become a princess of England, so I showed them her picture in a tabloid at the grocery store. They were super excited. Then, while we were driving in the car...

Meagan - "Mom, do they have cars across the sea in England?"
Me - "yep"
Meagan - "But I thought princesses only rode in carriages!"

Then last night while we were reading scriptures we were reading the story about Nephi building a ship.

Me- "Their ship was going to take them...where, Meagan?"
Meagan - "To DisneyLand?"

Well, I guess that's pretty close to the promised land.
I love it when they make me laugh.

Crafty Christmas

Remember when I said I had a long bookmark list of Halloween ideas? Well, my craft ideas list is even longer.

I've decided to take the commercialism out of Christmas this year. I'm going to make all most of the kids' presents this year, cut majorly back on the number of gifts they receive (I'm sick of picking up tons of toys around the house) and turn it into a more Christ centered/giving holiday. We've already started giving stuff away for Christmas gifts for less fortunate people this year. The stake was collecting new or gently used toys for the Bishop's Christmas this year and I thought this would be a great place to start. What a great way to teach the girls to give and get rid of toys they don't play with at the same time. They were a little reluctant at first, but as soon as I pointed out that they 1) didn't play with them any more and 2) would make some kid really happy at Christmas they were happy to do it. Problem solved. We'll probably do some more later in the year.

So, after Alyssa pointed out a great craft blog (see list at right) I decided to see what all I could find in the mom-blog-craft world. There are TONS of great ideas out there. I'm not even going to limit it to Christmas presents. I'm going to make all kinds of stuff that will make my life much easier...and prettier.

After extensive searching, I've come up with a lot of things I would like to share with everyone. Why keep it to myself? These ladies were kind enough to share them, why not pass it on?

"I Spy" Bags and here too.
I love the books. I'll be honest, I checked them out at the library feigning an interest for the girls to get into it. They were really for me. Maybe I'll get some for them.

Monogram Taggie
Seth loves tags. He'll be getting one.

Cloth baby rings and cloth baby blocks. I saw these wooden blocks and wanted a little more "chew" friendly blocks for baby. I'm a little concerned about him slobbering on ModPodge. I might make some wooden ones for decoration or a mobile for his car seat or something.

I love this cupcake stand. I just don't know how much I would use it or where I would store it, but I definitely love the idea. I even saw some awesome antique type plates and cups at a thrift store the next day. Unfortunately the cups were too short and fat to pull this off.  This one might me more practical for a specific party.

I can't wait 'til Seth is older and I can make him this car mat. I loved playing with our huge mat and matchbox cars on the floor at home when I was little. Boy toys are just more fun than girl toys. Maybe that's the engineer in me coming out.

I'll also be making this dry erase board soon, I think. Maybe I'll just put a frame around my existing dry erase board for my dinner menu.

Fortunately I don't have this problem with trash in my car but the girls have been collecting trash in the back. I got a center console for the van. I didn't know they even made them. I saw it at Walmart. It's unbelievably convenient. Tons of cup holders, a couple of trays to hold pens, sunglasses and random stuff as well as a little closed compartment to put a trash bag. I think this little car trash bag would be perfect for the girls in the back. They can't reach the front trash and having them hand me their trash with my arm all bent out of shape is getting old. Do you remember that mom? haha, memories.

With all these awesome ideas, you can use whatever fabric you want to make all this stuff really cute and unique, instead of just buying it from a store. Plus, you an make it cheaper in most cases, if you know how to shop.

I think that's enough for now. I'll post some more of my favorite stuff later. In the meantime, enjoy these sites and look around. I have...for hours.

Loves: Halloween and thrift stores.

Alright, it's getting in to the holiday season. My absolute favorite time of the year.

I start thinking about Halloween in September. Can I just say I love Halloween? Not for the gore or the scary stuff. I like decorating with cute spiders and ghosts and lights.

 These little ghosts were preprinted faces on little sacks I bought at the 99cent store. They slowed down the fan enough on low speed that it was awesome! They floated around nicely. I also like spider webbing. This green stuff was supposed to be glow in the dark. It worked better in the black light I had set up under my frame. We also taped up butcher paper to draw on with highlighters, which also looks cool under black light. This was when we first moved into our house and had a big Halloween party.

 These giant spiders were made from balloons and black party streamers. I taped pennies in the middle of the legs to make them hang to a point. The balloons started to lose air and constrict, pulling on the tape and causing them to pop. I won't do them so early this year. They look so cool and kind of creepy. I scared myself once, forgetting the reflection I saw in my metal mixing bowl was the spider on the ceiling and not a real spider.

I also love coming up with themed Halloween costumes and figuring out ways to make cute costumes from stuff I already have or can buy super cheap at thrift stores or $1 stores. I absolutely love 22nd st Thrift Store (for those of you in Tucson). I love getting already cheap stuff at 50% off with their coupons. Plus, they have old, crazy stuff that makes for great costumes.

For instance, a few years ago we did a Lord of the Rings theme. Don't laugh. It was awesome, and yes, we are nerds. (for crying out loud, we've been watching old episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation online...they are quite intriguing). Anyways, half the stuff from our costumes was from said thrift store.

My gown was a spaghetti strap for $2. I added a collar and sleeves to match and make it like Arwen's dress. Honestly I was inspired when I saw the dress at the store. I couldn't pass it up and tried to think what I could do with it. Thus, Lord of the Rings was born. My headpiece was an old necklace I had. It's too fancy and sparkly for practical use, but is nice for special occasions.

The girls' Hobbit costumes were vests and brown corduroy pants from a thrift store. I hemmed the bottoms to make them more like hobbit pants. Justin's costume and the girls' swords and capes were costume sets I bought online. Overall, not a cheap theme when you put it all together, but it was cheaper with my thrift store goodies. And, it was a lot more fun to figure out how to make it cheaper. If you look closely you can see little gold rings hanging from their necks. "It is a heavy burden you carry". A guy at the trunk-or-treat actually said that. It was all really funny and we were by far the best costumes of the night...I think anyways.

This year, I don't think we're going to have a Halloween party. We aren't going to have the money :( But that didn't stop me from looking up all kinds of cool food and decorating ideas. I like to bookmark all kinds of sites and put them in folders on my web browser. Justin totally laughed at me when he saw how long my Halloween list was. He knows I love Halloween, he didn't have to laugh!

By far the coolest thing I found was glow-in-the-dark food and drinks. I'm saving that one for next year's party, if we have one. Another really good treat is pumpkin pie milkshakes. Definitely going to be making those this year. I LOVE pumpkin pie. And, it's a pie in a shake! Can we say clogged arteries? It reminds me of a restaurant here called Something Sweet. It's just a dessert place where you can go and play games and order all kinds of desserts like pie milkshakes. I first thought that was just a piece of pie shoved in a glass with milkshake poured all over it. You're picturing it aren't you? No, Justin ordered one (it doesn't surprise me) and it's all blended up. It's quite good.

For some reason that also brings up a mental image of fish sauce. Do you know what fish sauce is? It's a sauce used in Asian food recipes. I was introduced to it by Justin's roommate while we were engaged. They both served in Cambodia and fish sauce is a staple over there, along with MSG. I love using it. The flavor it creates can't be duplicated. I was a little concerned about what it was made out of though. It smells like dead, rotten fish. I pictured the manufacturers taking little fish and stretching their mouths over a lemon juicer...and twisting. It's actually much sicker than that. They pack little sardine-type fish into wooden barrels with brine (salt) and let it sit. Then they collect the runoff. Needless to say it attracts flies and skeptical children before you cook out the stank. Back to Halloween.

So, this year I will still do my favorite Halloween decorations minus the party. We're also doing a Labyrinth theme this year. It's been Justin's secret desire for a long time to dress up as the Goblin King. He loves tight pants! We have a baby boy the perfect size to pull it off, too. Thrift stores, here I come. I already got some awesome dress-ups for the girls that they will be using as their costumes. $8 and $4. Can't beat that, especially when I saw one of them at Joann's for $50 new. Pictures will be forthcoming...well, as soon as Halloween finally comes around. I'm drumming my fingers with impatience.

Climbing, Crawling and Soccer

Last weekend Justin's mom and brother visited for a couple of days on their way back down to Texas from Utah/Idaho. It was a nice visit but it's never long enough. We took them rock climbing on Saturday. I think we'll eventually take everyone climbing, whenever we see you ;). I like it more and more every time I go. This time we went to the same place, Windy Point, but a different spot on the wall. It was a lot craggier (not sure that's a word) so it was easier to climb. We were there for like 5-6 hours. There was some group training next to us, using the other part of the wall. I think they were either soldiers or firefighters doing emergency response training. They had a lot of equipment and were out on the wall longer than we were.

Anyways, I was able to climb all the way up this time. Yay! Climbing shoes are awesome. It's scary to learn to trust them. I'm finding out that's what's so scary about rock climbing - trusting your equipment.

I was starting to get scared about halfway up when I didn't see a place to grab on to and the wind was starting to pick up. And, of course, I always like to see how bad it could really get. This might be a serious character flaw, or at least a dangerous one. I made myself look down at that point to freak myself out and practice calming myself down. I'm so weird.

It was kind of like the time Justin and I went to the mall when we still lived in Utah. That particular evening was already bad (i.e. losing our keys, crying baby, too late at night, and many others that I can't even remember) but I really wanted to go and get something. I can't even remember what it was. But, when I get it in my head to get something I hate to wait. This is also a bad thing. We decided to go anyways just to see how bad it could really get. Surely it couldn't get any worse than it already had. Bad idea.

Anyways, Justin took Meagan to play at the play place while I did my shopping. The mall was closing but the store I was in stayed open an hour later, so I felt no rush. Well, I told Justin I would meet him at the play place when I was done. They locked the doors to the mall and wouldn't let me in to go find my husband. So, I had to go around to the main entrance to find my way in. It was also locked, and no husband and baby to be found. Apparently Justin went to the doors of the store to look for me while I went around the outside of the mall. We didn't meet up for at least half an hour. I had gone to the car to see if he was there and he went around to the outside entrance of the store to find me. We found each other half way in between that point. I think Meagan was tired and hungry and crying, we were both frustrated, and I didn't find what I went shopping for in the first place. Ugh, it was a really bad night. Never tempt a bad night. So that's what I mean by, "hmmm, let's see how bad it could really get". CRAZY! Now back to rock climbing.

This is on the other side of a huge gap across from the climbing spot. What a cute picture.












Here's the view from where we were sitting. That's Justin and Jared setting up the ropes.

I was making faces at him. He loves me!

Wow mom, I didn't know you had such balance.

Here she is fulfilling a lifelong desire to rappel. Way to go!

Here's Jared scaling the wall like a mountain man. He went up in record time right before this run. Now he's using the raptors. Those make your feet feel oh so nice. They turn your foot into a claw so you can use teeny ledges half the width of your finger to step on. He didn't go very fast this time for two reasons. 1) He was looking for really tiny places to step on to the utilize the awesomeness of the shoes, and 2) his feet HURT and he didn't want to step on them any more. Still very impressive J-Rad.

Candace was brave enough to try climbing this time. I think she was getting a boost of confidence because she was climbing around on a nearby tree and wanted to try the wall like everyone else was. She did really good. She was so tiny and cute. Oh...well...here she was starting to lose confidence and Justin was pulling her up on the rope.

...and here was the rescue. 

She was screaming and crying because she wasn't strong enough to step on the wall, lean back and rappel down. It made me tear up a little because she was so scared. I gave her a big hug afterward and we all told her how awesome she was. That made her feel a little better. I was really impressed that she went that far. I doubt she'll do it again though.

And now, the moment you've all been waiting for...(drum roll please)

Seth can crawl! I love that little baby so much. He's way too cute for his own good. I love picking him up and holding him because he always stops crying and gives me a big smile. Then he grabs on to me like a monkey and bounces up and down and pants like a dog to show me how excited he is.

Now, for the soccer.

The girls have had their first two practices already. We got them outfitted for the second one. They were totally unprepared the first practice. Candace didn't even have tennis shoes. She's been wearing sandals all summer and none of the tennis shoes we had fit her. She even let me put a pony tail in her hair. That tells you how excited they were to practice in their soccer clothes.

She was even happy about the pony tail when we got in the car. She said, "hey, I don't have to move my hair out of the way to strap in!" Yes Candace, doing your hair is a good thing. It's not the torture you think I'm putting you through.

I finally got some recent pictures of them on the wall. The girls' pictures were taken by Aunt Alyssa when everyone was down for Thanksgiving. They were so great, thanks Alyssa. You're a good photographer. Poor Sethy boy only had pictures taken by me. I printed the best ones we had of him. They're kind of lacking.

What a great soccer pose Candace.

Here's some practice time. I love how Candace is so cute and distracted in the video.

They were supposed to kick a "goal" between the two cones.

Meagan is quite good. I'm proud of her. Candace struggled to keep up with everyone else. She was getting so tired half way through the practice. One of the coaches was trying to get her to dribble the ball and she didn't want to do it any more. She told Candace to pretend the ball was a puppy and she could only walk it with her feet, and to stop the ball she had to pretend she was petting the puppy. She totally agreed to do it after that. What a crazy girl.

Labor Day climbing

Who wants to wake up at 6 a.m. to go rock climbing? Anyone? Well, we did. After staying up 'til midnight the night before. I need more sleep.

We got to Mt Lemmon a little before 8 am. Can I just say some bicyclists bug me? We must have passed 30-40 on the way up the mountain. They wouldn't stay in their bicycle lane. Why in the world would you bike on a winding mountain road and not move out of the street when a car was trying to drive around you?! You have your own special bike lane people! Moving on...

Justin was getting scout training for climbing and rappelling and wanted to take us. I wanted to go too, since I've never done it before, aside from a fake climbing wall once.

It probably took an hour or more to get all the ropes untangled and tied up to the hooks embedded in the rock. I went down second, after Samantha. Scariest thing I've done in a really long time.

I couldn't look down. The hardest part was getting over that first ledge. The next hardest part was trusting that rope and my own strength to stop it so I wouldn't go down too fast. Oh man, gets my adrenaline rushing just thinking about it again.

Here I go! I think this was my second time though. I wouldn't have gone down with a backpack my first try. It was a little less scary the second time.

There was this crazy old hippie that was rappelling next to us on the left. I think that guy had a few screws loose but he was a really good, experienced rock climber. He had been climbing for either 15 or 50 years. I couldn't tell what he said. He kept telling me to let go of the rope with my left hand because I didn't need it, I would just use up my strength needlessly. He may have been right, but there was no way I was going to let go for too long, and certainly not while I was descending. My right arm was getting tired and my hand was starting to get rope burn after a while.

You can't see it but there's a hoop in front of me that's got the rope wrapped around it to take a lot of friction and slow me down a lot. You just bring the rope out to your right to go down a little.

This was just a really cool shot, not much further down than the previous one.

Whew, my nerves were tired when I finally made it down. So were my arms.

Here's the master. He was a lot faster than the rest of us. He stayed at the top to belay the rest of us and then rappelled down so we could start climbing. There was a little path off around to the left where we could hike back up, for those of us with babies and strollers and no skill for climbing all the way to the top. :)

Go Meagy, go! Look at that skinny little thing! She loves climbing. She went up several times and would have gone up more but there were some serious rain clouds coming in and we had to go before she could.

Such skill. I can't believe she wasn't scared.

Here she's at the highest she can go, and will now rappel down.

Here's Meagan rappelling. She was so funny. She really liked jumping down and kept telling everyone else to do the same.

Our group, minus me and Justin at the top and Samantha off with her baby.

Here's Justin at the part where I stopped climbing. You can even see the smoother rock up ahead.

Look at that form! He could go higher with those climbing shoes on. Painful things! Well, not those so much, the other pair we brought.

Victory! King of the Mountain. He made it all the way.

And now, for a brief break in climbing for a little spelunking.

Candace was not interested in climbing at all. She did have fun with rocks and sticks though.

Here's my attempt. I got scared right at about this point. I couldn't get my right leg any higher. Plus, my right hand was getting scraped on the rock. Luckily Justin talked me through it and gave me a little more confidence. I'm glad he did. It made me overcome my fear and I was able to go higher when I didn't think I could.

There's my limit. Nice little safe ledge. It was fun to rappel down when Justin had the ropes instead of me.

How we all felt by the end. Poor little guy tuckered himself out playing with all those grapes and crackers. He ate the whole time. What a mess!

We'll go again soon. Really fun. Definitely need climbing shoes, helmets and gloves for the next time. There's nothing like conquering your fear and doing something you didn't think you could do.