Halloween 2009

This is Treven trying to get Ellie to look at me instead of eating the leaves! She was determined to eat anything and everything on the lawn!

Treven dressed up as a guy off G.I. Joe. I thought he looked like a ninja, but if you look closely at the cover of the new G.I. Joe movie, there is a guy that looks just like this. He had a sword type thing that he carried around and was a huge hit with all the kids at his school.

Chelsey decorated our trunk for the Albion Trunk-or-Treat. She did such a great job! We had these Styrofoam headstones and the bones. I bought this great fabric that looked like dirt and she topped it all off with some spiderwebs and some real leaves for authenticity. She was so proud of her design and felt bad when we disqualified all of the planners from being able to win the $50.00 top prize. We also had a spooky cd playing. We passed out full-size Nerds, Chewy Sweettarts, Mini Chewy Sweethearts, and something else that I can't remember. I bought 80 and we had quite a few when we got home. We also passed out Spongebob Halloween Fruit Snacks for some of the smaller kids. I had several kinds of candy bars at home for the trick or treaters here, too. A little overboard, I know, but Halloween is only once a year.

More of Miss Ellie-Funt! She is a little get-in-sky already! Everything goes in that little mouth of hers.

Gary went to Annie's dressed as a mobster (although he kept saying he was a pimp and I was the ho) Not funny, I know! I was dressed as a flapper girl so we kind of went together. Everyone really liked his costume and he played it up! His mom and dad came up to see the kids' costumes and they stopped in the bar to see us before they headed home. His mom told me to make sure I got a picture of him! He did look awfully handsome that night..glad he came home with me!!! LOL

Also new this week:

*Ellie cut her first tooth on the 14th.

*Mikayla's first basketball game against Gooding today at 4:30 in Declo

* I'm going Christmas shopping in Boise exactly one week from today!

*Treven's school is selling RADA knives of anyone is interested. They are awesome knives- I've had a set for close to ten years and I love them. They aren't really that expensive either!

*I'm off to work on some decluttering- hope you have a great day and thanks for stopping by!

Treven's Room

When we moved into our house almost three years ago, it was with the intention that we would be converting our garage into a bedroom for Treven. Never happened.....until we discovered we were having another baby and we really had to do the room. I waited and waited for Gary to get everything out of the garage, and finally at 7 months pregnant, I took action. Mikayla and I spent a whole Saturday sorting through things for the DI, the dump, and the keep pile. My friend, Diana brought her truck up and we loaded it three times for the dump. It was crazy how much crap you can accumulate! Anyway, construction finally got started and we were told it would be over before the baby was born. Ellie was two weeks early, but let me tell you, we were NOWHERE near done. In fact, I dropped the check for the carpet off on our drive home from the hospital!!!!

The room got somewhat finished about two weeks after Ellie was born and Treven immediately moved his things in. Well, there was still the closet to do, the trim, the windows, and the new door that led to the outside of the house to finish, all things that were livable. Last Thursday and Friday, my father in law and the contractor ( my f-i-l's friend) came and got the rest of the windows, the door, the trim, and the closet doors on. It looks so much better. All I have left to do is retouch some paint and a little more trim that we didn't have enough of for the inside of the closet. Gary will have to hang a closet shelf and a rod. We had a plastic type closet organizer, but it looks kind of cheap so he wants to take it back and get a better one. Still, the room is done for the most part and we're loving it.

Finally updating

Wow, I guess it's been nearly a month since I last updated! Shame on me- I really get annoyed when people don't update their blogs and now I find myself in that same category.

Braquel is busy doing all the senior things. She had some senior portraits done by my fabulous sister-in-law, Robin! They turned out great! I've tried uploading them three or four times to post, but they never seem to upload...(I am about ready to trade in my new computer...I am so frustrated with it!) We ordered her cap and gown and all that good stuff. It's really starting to hit me that we are losing her. All she wants for Christmas is things that she will need for her own place. I keep telling her that she is a bad daughter for wanting to leave us, but she keeps telling me that it's part of life and I'll survive. I guess it means we've done a good job raising her, she's independent and ready to be on her own, but it's killing me! I don't even remember life without her. I don't even want to think about our family without her here with us every day.

Mikayla made the freshman basketball team so we've been getting her to Declo every morning by 5:50 am! Not an easy task for anyone that knows me! I've had a screaming headache for three straight days and I'm sure it's from the lack of sleep. I can't go back to bed when I get home because I'm afraid I won't get up to get Treven to school on time! Anyway- she has her first game on the 17th in Gooding. I'm going to try to go watch and maybe Lindsay will be cheering so we can see her, too!

Chelsey has been babysitting up a storm! Seems like she's always got someone here or she is going somewhere. She is determined to be Ellie's favorite sister so she stays busy playing with her and loving on her. Even when it's someone else's job to stay up with her until I get home, it's usually Chelsey that stays with her. Ellie will reach for Chelsey over most everyone else. She loves her so much!

Treven already hates to go to school. The boy just wants to play all stinkin' day and night! He barely gets through the door and wants to know if he can go play with his friends! He's such a sweet boy, though. He is so quick with that cute smile and deep dimple that it just melts his mommy's heart.

Ellie has learned so many new things. She says da-da all the time. She has learned to clap and she rolls everywhere now. She ends up in the weirdest of places! We took her to Kiddie Kandids at the mall and had some pictures done, but I have to say they really didn't capture her personality very well. I kind of feel like I wasted my money because I have better pics on my camera. We are having her dedicated this Sunday at church. I bought her a beautiful long white dress with lots of emboidery on it. She's going to look like a little angel.

Gary took the girls hunting most of last month. They all three ended up getting their deers. He's been cutting meat and smoking jerky for two weeks straight, I swear! It's nice to be done with it and knowing there is meat in the freezer. Braquel and Mikayla aren't too sure they want to go next year, Mikayla just cried and cried when she saw Gary gutting the deer. They both have pretty tender hearts and it really bothered them to watch an animal die. Braquel shot hers and it didn't die right away. She didn't have the heart to shoot it again, so she made Gary finish it off so it didn't suffer anymore. Keven told her it was a good thing she was hunting with her dad because if she goes with him, she has to gut her own deer. Dad just knows he has to do the really gross stuff (getting the fish off the hook, gutting deer, etc.) It comes with the dadddy territory!

I was really busy doing Halloween stuff. A couple of gals and I planned Albion's first Trunk-or-Treat. We took 5 days to throw the whole thing together, but it turned out great. We figure we served about 100 people dinner. People were really involved and came dressed up and had their trunks decorated. We even had several businesses donate for the cause so we can make next years bigger and better. I also was asked to do Treven's school party. There are roughly 25 kids in his school. I brought in sliced apples with caramel dip, juice, and dirt pudding cups with gummy worms. We played a Monster Mash game (everyone ties a balloon to their ankle and you try to pop everyone else's balloon without them popping yours first) and I had six paper bags with various foods that represented body parts. The kids had to feel the food and guess what the food was and what body part it was supposed to be. I laughed and laughed at their reactions!
We had cooked spaghetti for intestines, pretzels for bones, popcorn kernals for teeth, a dried apricot for skin, peeled grapes for eyeballs, and the best of all- smooshed bananas for brains! They all were just sickened when they reached in that bag!!!

I'm glad October is over and I am anxious for Thanksgiving. I have been so blessed in my life and I really like taking some time to focus on my blessing before the craziness of Christmas starts in. I am looking forward to the annual sister shopping trip. I'm about halfway done with my shopping and I plan to really trim the rest of the list up that day. It sure takes the stress out to be close to done!

Update for October 12-19th

Well, it looks like fall is truly here. The leaves on our trees turned orange overnight and are starting to fall and make a mess everywhere. Worse yet, it rains just enough at night to make them wet and sticky and really hard to clean up!

Gary and the girls spent a little bit of time this last week in the search for deer. Braquel and Mikayla both drew for either sex so they shouldn't have to spend too much time looking. Braquel shot at one last week, but it was too far away and she missed. Most of the deer they have run into are on private property, but several guys from the bar said they were welcome to hunt at their places so I am expecting a couple of deers in the next few days. It will be an interesting adventure for both of them. Chelsey was really disappointed that she didn't draw since she is the only one that really wanted to hunt anyway!

Treven had his last soccer game on Saturday and they did really well. He was glad it was over (as was I since it will be getting cold soon). He learned a lot this year and I hope he will want to play again next year.

Mikayla's volleyball season is over!!!!!!! We get two weeks off and then basketball season starts. Soon after that will be softball. I'm not sure when she is ever going to find the time to take drivers ed. With Braquel leaving next summer, I'm going to need another driver! (I never in a million years thought that I would be saying that!!! LOL) It would be nice not to have to drive her to practice at 6 every morning. She would be able to take herself!

Ellie finally got the hang of sitting up by herself. She would do it before, but only if she was distracted enough to not realize she was doing it. Now she just sits there until she gets bored and then she falls over and rolls wherever she wants to go. It makes me so sad that she is growing this fast.

We took the kids to Lagoon yesterday for one last outing before winter. The weather was so perfect- about 70-75. We all wore sweatshirts (except Gary) and just about sweated to death. He was smart and just wore a tee shirt. Treven was big enough to ride all the big rides so we all got to ride together. It was so fun! Ellie stayed at Grandma Lois's house all day so we didn't have to worry about diapers and naps and stuff. We went on the white roller coaster, Collosus, Wicked, Wild Mouse, the go-carts, the bat, the spider, the samurai, the parasols, the rocket, the swings, most everything we wanted to hit except my favorite the Tidal Wave. We were all set to get on and in line for the back two seats. Braquel looked down and in the third or fourth seat forward was a massive amount of puke!!!! AAAGGGGGGGHHHHHHH....nasty. I wasn't about to get on. Even after they cleaned it up, I couldn't bring myself to get on it. Too gross..... we left Lagoon about 6 and took the kids to Red Lobster for their first time ever. They all love seafood and we had a wonderful meal. We all passed around bites of our plates so we could all try everything! Salmon, coconut shrimp, scampi, lobster, shrimp alfredo, popcorn shrimp, you name it and we tried it.....love that place. We can't afford to go there often, but we didn't get too crazy with money at Lagoon so we splurged. All in all it was a great day. Wish we had infinite money and time so we could do things like that more often!

Well, I better get back to the laundry and things. Hope you all have a wonderful week!

Update Finally

Well, fall is officially here in Albion. The nights are cold as can be and the leaves are turning colors and starting to fall off the trees. It's really pretty to see, but I sure hate to think about raking all the leaves and then shoveling the snow!

We've all been sick around here. Gary had a cold and then Braquel came down with something that was a cross between a cold and the flu. Then Ellie got it, and then Mikayla and I both got it. Chelsey was right behind! I had to take Mikayla to the dr last week. She nearly passed out at school and was very sick. The dr asked if we had all been sick and I told him everyone but Treven and since he eats dirt, I doubt he will get sick! The dr. laughed and said there was probably something to that! We are all starting to feel better, but this darn cough just wants to linger around. Apparently there are several cases of swine flu in the area so I am praying that we don't get worse.

We have gotten most of the wood for the winter now. I think we are going to try to go one more time and then we should have enough. It's always adventurous when we go out. Treven has so much fun entertaining himself in the mountains. He builds teepees and forts out of the trees and is always stacking and collecting things he finds. His favorite thing to gather are rocks.

Mikayla has one more volleyball game and then she tries out for basketball. Declo had a pretty good season. They only lost one or two teams and at tournaments on Saturday, they only lost one of the five teams they played. The girls work really good as a team and they will be a force to be reckoned with as they grow older and get better.

Chelsey tried out for girls basketball for the 7th grade, but she didn't make the team. She had a great attitude though and didn't seem too upset. Secretly, I am kind of glad. She's my best babysitter and Ellie would be miserable without her all the time. If Chelsey leaves the room, Ellie will cry. It would have been insane here with Chelsey being at practice and games every day. I'm very proud of her for trying out though. It takes a lot of courage to step out of your comfort zone!

Braquel is still working hard at JB's. She has been getting out early every other day and I've really enjoyed that little bit of extra rime with her. She keeps telling me she's leaving soon and I'm incredibly sad about that. It kills me that she doesn't want to stay with our family forever. It just won't be the same without her sweet little face around all the time. She's such a joy to have around.

Ellie went with me to a scrapbook retreat this last weekend. She got so spoiled by the 20 ladies there that she won't behave now. The girls are having trouble getting her to sleep and she doesn't want to sleep in her crib now. She really got off her schedule so I am working hard to get her back into a normal routine. She was such a good girl at the retreat, she didn't hardly ever cry and she won everyone over with her smiles. She has learned to reach for people and the ladies really loved her game of going from one to another!

Speaking of the retreat, I had such a ball. I did 13 double page spreads plus four more for the challenges. We also put together a cookbook with the recipes that the women brought for the retreat. We had a wonderful time and it was fun getting to know the ladies there. What a talented group of women. It was neat to see their ideas and creativity. Definitely doing that again!!!!

Well, I guess I better get something done today. My list is a million miles long and no time to really catch up on anything! Hope you have a blessed day!

Update for September 6-13

This has been such a hectic week! It seems like I have had to go into town every day for something or another. Our Grand Am broke down and in the process of trying to figure out what was wrong, Gary broke a part for our key switch. A new one is $270 and the factory has to code the new part for another $80! I had to show them proof of identity, our vehicle registration, and take them all sets of keys for the car before they would even order the part! That was a two day process since we didn't know we would need all of the other stuff when I tried to order the part the first time!

I made 10 batches of freezer jam this week. I still have 4 more batches to go and I will be done with that. I have done red raspberry, black raspberry, marionberry, boysenberry, and a mixed berry set so far. I still want to do some peach and some strawberry. I also bought a case of peaches and a case of pears that need canned this week.

We went to get our first load of wood for winter yesterday. It was an all day job, but we got done in pretty good time thanks to our friends Jesse, Tracey, Kevin, and Diana. We had three chainsaws going and four wood packers so it actually went faster than I thought it would. There was a nice breeze so it wasn't as hot as it could have been. Going again next Sunday so hopefully it will go as well as yesterday did.

Treven had his first soccer game on Saturday. His team won 4-3!!! We had to go buy some new running shoes and some soccer pants for him after the game and I also bought him a soccer ball so he could keep practicing.

Declo had their first home football game on Friday. They whopped Kimberly 62-7! Mikayla said they scored a touchdown in the first 12 seconds.....I hate to say anything too early, but this year State is ours! We lost by 1 point at state last year so it would be really exciting to win this year!

Mikayla had her first home volleyball game on Thursday. They won both of the first two games so we didn't have to play a third. Mikayla did a great job on her serves and scored us quite a few points!! She's got another game Tuesday at home so we'll be going to that tomorrow!

Well, the dryer just buzzed so I had better get the levis folded. (Only four more loads to go today and the laundry is caught up again!)

Have a great week!

Update for August 30-Sept 5

Well, I still don't know what is happening with my computer. I have tried three different memory cards and none of them will import so I don't think there is anything wrong with the cards. I also went to Wal-mart and put all the pics from my memory card onto a cd so I could upload my pics that way, but when I put the cd in the computer, it doesn't let me import from the cd either. It's got to be something in my memory card reader. Hopefully I can get it taken care of soon.

Braquel has been working weekends again. She is really glad that school's back in and she doesn't have to work everyday anymore. The money isn't so great, but at least she has a little time for herself now. She is getting ready to have her senior pictures taken so she is busy putting outfits and jewelry together. We went to town the other day and I told her I would buy her something for her pics, but she said she wanted to wait until she knew exactly what she still needed. She's such a smart girl and so good with money....must get that from her mom!!!

Mikayla made the freshmen volleyball team in Declo and is very busy with that. She has to be at practice every day at 6:00 in the morning. They were supposed to have two games this week, but Tuesday nights game was cancelled due to double booking on Aberdeen's part. I took the night off to go watch, but instead we had a nice dinner and sat on the deck enjoying the evening. I forgot how nice it is to be home during the evenings!

Chelsey signed up for Honors Geography. Along with the regular classroom work, she has to do some extra projuects. Should be great fun! She also tried out for and made the Yearbook staff at the jr. high. I'm really excited that one of my kids finally followed in her mom's footsteps and went into annual staff. I loved it in high school and I think she will like it too since she likes to take pictures.

Treven is having a rough couple of weeks. He is not used to getting up so early for school and somedays I have a terrible time getting him out of bed and into the tub. He had back to school night on Thursday and they learned some new songs for the cook that retired and the teachers aide that moved away this summer. He dressed up in a button-down shirt and his black slacks- what a handsome guy he was!

Ellie turned six months old today. She also is rolling front-to-back and back-to-front like there is no tomorrow. She rolls until she can't go anywhere else and then she gets so frustrated. She's also doing pretty well at sitting up- she tips sideways a bit still, though. She came down with a cold last night so she was pretty miserable. This is really her first bout with a cold and she's not too sure what is happening to her.

I did a couple of scrapbook pages last Sunday for the retreat challenges and I did one more layour yesterday. Today, my neighbors and I froze corn. We had quite the assembly line going! There wasn't a whole lot of corn ready, so when we do it again in a week or two, I will take some pictures and post them...if this stupid thing gets fixed!

Have a great week!