Wednesday Baking Day- Spiderwebs

Like a Boss

Don't listen to this song by Andy Samberg, cuz it's horrible. But the first 25 seconds are hilarious, which is all I've ever heard. Anyway, I'm feeling a bit like Andy Samberg's "Like A Boss" today....

-Leaving food on the table until it's too crusty to wash off Like a Boss
-Spending money I don't have on things I don't need Like a Boss
-Haven't done laundry in 3 weeks Like a Boss
-Letting the stickers and coloring books babysit my children while I craft Like a Boss
-Pinning things I'll never do Like a Boss
-Under-appreciating my poor husband Like a Boss
-Waiting to do my Visiting Teaching til the very last minute Like a Boss
-Changing plans on my friends the day of 30 minutes before for the past week Like a Boss

Pretty much, I'm livin it up, Like a Boss!
Ever have this feeling?

Tuesday Art Day- Skeleton Guy

Week #2- yes, I am on a roll!

I was really excited about today's craft because I remember growing up my sister Jen had made this skeleton guy out of paper plates and it was one of my favorite Halloween decorations. I tried to find a paper plate template I liked, but I couldn't. So when I stumbled on this little guy, I thought PERFECT! He's cute, but not too cute. And now I don't have to draw one. So I printed him out on cardstock and Brook cut out EVERY SINGLE BONE by herself- I was really proud! There were a lot of pieces! Then she put the brads in the joints, I closed them up, she gave him a coat of marker and named him "Mr. Bones"

She's very original :)

Brook and her new best pal, Mr. Bones

When Ellie woke up in the middle, she got in on the coloring action too

And if you're tired of the poor quality of my pictures, tell my husband to get me a better phone :)

Hiking, Halloween Cookies, and a Sickie

We drove up the canyon to get to Evergreen last weekend and went hiking at this really awesome place called Alderfer. Ben and Sam were mountain biking, and Jenna and I were dragging the girls around the trails in the bike trailer. Not a good idea. There were roots and rocks all over the trails and most of the time, Jenna had to give me a hand trying to get the trailer over them! It was a lot of fun though! And SO beautiful up there with these fall colors!

 My cuties climbed this rock all by themselves! 

Okay Ellie had help!

 Brook found this rock with the holes in it- Perfect seat!

 This is her "Ariel" pose :)

 Catching Jenna mid-bite.... totally awesome.

 Wow Ellie, that is some great hair....

Fence in the middle of nowhere- so of course I thought, PICTURES! 

For Wednesday Baking Day, Brook chose Halloween sugar cookies. She did such a good job adding the ingredients. She even kept track of the number of cups we were adding of sugar and flour. Then I rolled out the dough and she cut out tons of cookies, being careful to put them close together, but not get any holes in them. She was very precise :)

This is the favorite frosted one... or at least my favorite. We didn't have any ghosts, witches, or bats, so we had to get creative with the helping hand cookie cutter I got from my grandma!

It's a monster hand. Brook was very nervous for me to eat it since it might get me from the inside.

Our poor little Ellie is a little sickie right now- she's done a lot of this and a lot of sitting on mom's lap for hours on end. She's on the mend though, thank goodness for modern medicine!!

Tuesday Art Day

I started something new with Brook this week. We are going to have special Brook activities while Ellie takes her nap every afternoon. I assigned  categories to each day. This is what I came up with: Sunday is Journal day. Monday is PBS kids day, Tuesday is Art day, Wednesday is Baking day, Thursday is TV/Video day, Friday is Social day, and Saturday is Family day. I'm hoping this will help with the begging to play PBS kids or watch a show everyday (even though we never do, it for some reason doesn't keep them from asking about it about a thousand times a day....). Instead I'll just say "Sorry, it's not PBS kids day," and then redirect to the activity we'll be doing. I'm also excited for the one on one time I can spend with Brook by doing it and the skills she can learn. So we'll see how it goes!

Yesterday we made a Halloween craft project:

It turned out even more fun than I pictured it would! We just used what I had on hand. Brook painted the frame and picked out the picture, then arranged the googly eyes on the frame. I hot glued them down, printed and cut the picture out, and voila! I was really happy with it and Brook couldn't wait to show Dad. Ellie loved it so much she ripped eyes off it three times....
nothing a little hot glue couldn't fix :)

Anyway, during this process, Brook and I scoured the web for ideas for baking and art days for the next two months and printed out a calendar off excel to help remind us. Still don't know where I'm going to hang it, but we're both excited to have some more structure in our lives!

Hudson Gardens Pumpkin Patch

There is the COOLEST garden center about 5 minutes up the road from us. This year is their anniversary year, so they have reduced prices to get into their beautiful gardens.1.50 for 2 and up, so we went with the plan to get a pumpkin from their pumpkin patch with some of our friends from our ward and Uncle Sam and Aunt Jenna. However, apparently they are educational pumpkins, so we weren't allowed to purchase them. But it was still really fun and so pretty! We will definitely have to go in the spring!

 Such pretty flowers!

Waiting for our friends and Uncle Sam

 Love her pose! Don't mind the lady in the back...

 Brook, Brystal, and Ellie going through a fun little rock tunnel

 Cool apple pressing demonstration that was not very productive- the amount in the bowl is from like 75 small apples.

 Plating spider plants- so appropriate for Halloween!

 Ellie making a scratch leaf- LOVE how she holds her pencils!

 These were the coolest carvings! We were quite disappointed though when we discovered they were FAKE PUMPKINS. REALLY?!?!?

 It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown!

 Aren't the colors just beautiful!?!

 Ellie in the Hay Bale Maze. The girls made it through pretty quickly, so we had to go through it like 4 times. It was pretty fun, but the corridors were SO tiny, so it got awkward going around strangers at times.

 Sittin on a bronze donkey. I don't know why, so don't ask.

It's Getting To Be Halloween Around Here

 Ghosts in the Dining Room

 Bats and Spiders on the Mantle

And building webs by the ceiling!

Candy Corn (was) abounding

Tricks.... 

and Treats :)

 So from our family to yours:

September in Pictures

Brook's Birthday Breakfast in Bed

(say that ten times fast!)

 Getting a beautiful ballerina magnet doll

 Thanks for the princess shirt Kai!

 Birthdays are the best!

 Ellie's NATURALLY curly hair right outta the tub!

Can you say Jealousy????

 Bandaged thumbs after a run in with the Gillette Fushion... poor girl!

 Sisters are the best.

 Fun at the Lakewood, CO Fire Station

 Rachel, Ellie, and Brook even got to go inside the truck!

 That tire is as big as me mom!

Sundays Are Special

I love Sundays. Ben has the whole day off. We get to go to church and be spiritually uplifted. Then we get to spend the day with family and/or friends or just us. It's just nice to have a day out of the week different from any other. I've been trying to think of activities I'd like to do on Sunday with my family that would bring us closer to each other and to God. Some things I've come up with are:

A nice little walk in nature
Baking a special treat together
Reading the Friend to Brook & Ellie
Playing games together
Write in a family Sunday journal

What does your family do to keep the Sabbath day holy and make it different from the rest? Please share so I can add more to my list!

We sure do miss spending Sundays with our Idaho family!

Everyday After Ellie Eats...

I really wish we had a dog.

My Monkeys

This one keeps me grounded and happy

 This one keeps me busy and laughing

Love these two little monkeys!

Long Weekend

Man, just when you think you're getting the hang of life again or you've just overcome a huge obstacle and you're ready for a nice break for awhile, you get slapped again! I guess it's just life!

Saturday we enjoyed watching General Conference and then Ben washed the car. As he was cleaning up to get ready for the Priesthood Session, he went to unscrew the hose from the spigot in the garage, and all the sudden water is just rushing everywhere: flooding the kitchen floor, the hallway carpet (which we just got the smell out of!), and the basement- water was just pouring into the basement like a waterfall. Well, we not being the prepared renters we should be, did not know where the turn off was, so Ben ran from neighbor to neighbor trying to find someone to help us find it- Found a wonderful man next door who came and helped us shut it off after about 100 gallons had poured into the house. We luckily have a small wet/dry vac, which we used to clean up the kitchen and even more luckily, the basement had a drain about 3 feet from our entertainment center. So no water got to the expensive equipment! Hooray! So we lost a rug and quite a few towels, but that was it! The water cleaned up well, thanks to Sam and Jenna (you guys saved us!). We spent the night at their place since we didn't have water and watched morning conference with them. Unfortunately, we had a little dispute on Sunday with our landlord over the financial responsibility of the incident, but I am happy to say that it was resolved when the plumber came and discovered the pipe had never even been soldered! So they are being very cooperative and will be paying for any damages to the home. We will have to replace the few things we lost, but it is a minimal expense compared to what could have happened! In retrospect (at the time, I was struggling!), I feel very blessed by the Lord that everything played out as well as it did. I can definitely see His hand in the course of events after the incident. We are very lucky for that and for great family and friends here to help us out in our time of homelessness!

Now I just have to put the house back together :).