Non-sanctioned Sleepover!!

Micah told me to go check on the boys before I went to bed. Having checked on them himself I wondered what it was he wanted me to see. Didn't expect this! Big pile of boys camped out on the floor! Makes my heart happy that they love each other so much!

Mobile Blogging!

Been trying to figure this out!! So I am posting a pic of this SUPER cute coaster I made! The idea being that everyone will have a spot for their cup to go and then I won't have 36 cups to wash at the end of the day! I made two and LOVE how they turned out!

Summer Dress Re-Do!

Ella has a summer dress that I LOVE LOVE LOVE!!  It is super cute and easy to wear.  Ella loves to wear skirts and dresses, but this dress was on the verge of being too short.  It looks just fine from the front, but frequently we could see London, France and Ella's underpants.  It would be cute with jeans or leggings underneath, but it is quickly becoming warm around here and soon those won't be very comfortable options.
I had some red fabric in my stash (been there longer than I've been married!) and  decided it would make the perfect ruffle so that we could get some more life out of this dress.  Usually she wears it with a white t-shirt underneath.  She was being a reluctant model in the before pictures and didn't want to "show her shoulders."  I took the pictures with my phone, so they aren't the best, but they are still pretty cute!!

And Ta-da! Not the perfect color match, but it will do! She quickly got into the idea of modeling and was striking pose after pose. "Mom, take a picture of this!' "And this!" My favorite is the last pose. Hilarious!!

Who Needs Flowers?

Super Bowl Sunday always brings lots of interesting entertainment.  The football, the food and the commercials all are excessive.  I loved watching Seinfeld and his car commercial, the dog and the dorritos, in fact I laughed out loud at the Voice's ad with Betty White.  Teleflora had an ad that caused some controversy implying that if a man were to get his woman a bouquet of flowers that she would do anything for him.  This suggestion was presented by a gorgeous supermodel wearing next to nothing and the tag line was, "yes, it's that simple." 

Beyond the whole conversation of what is or is not appropriate for family time television (I think this was hugely inappropriate for my little boys who happened to NOT be paying attention at the time) I did snicker, look at my husband and say, "yep, it's just that simple."  We had a good laugh about it.  I happen to love fresh flowers, whereas my husband thinks they are a waste of money.

This morning while I was out walking my husband picked up the house, cleaned up the kitchen and straighted up the whole main floor.  Yah...who needs flowers?  Just do me some housework!  ;)

Fun At The Park...in JANUARY!!!

After much blogger inactivity....I updated!  Miraculous, I know!  The kids and I had a spectacular time at the park today.  The weather was a perfect lazy slightly cloudy but mostly brilliant blue day.  I wish I could have lain in a hammock with a good book, but instead I had a great time watching my hooligans tear up the playground!

We packed a picnic lunch, played, went for a walk and then hit the cupcake store where I watched as my children devoured some pretty tasty looking treats.  Okay, maybe I mommy-taxed them a little. :)  Then we came home and played some more!  Now we are watching Kung Fu Panda 2 and having popcorn.  Pretty good day...

   

 

I LOVE these two photos of Harmon and Porter.  Such buddies!!  

My baby is getting too big! 

 

 

 

 

A Day at the Beach

Micah had a post-deployment doctor's appointment.  Lucky for us this appointment was at Tyndall Air Force Base, which just happens to be right next to the beach and all the beautiful white sand, blue skies, and green-blue ocean that only the gulf coast can offer.  So we took the kids out of school and headed to the beach. 

Tyndall has a private beach, which is AWESOME.  There aren't any crowds, the sand is gorgeous white fluff, no trash, lots of shells and sand dollars.  It is heavenly!  The only downside is that you have to walk on a 1/2 mile boardwalk to even get to the sand.   Hauling gear for 6 people to spend 5 hours on the beach with no facilities is ridiculous, but we did it!  Or should I say Micah did it!  Here are a few pictures of the highlights of the day!

 Porter was in love with this knee board. It was the perfect size for riding the waves with!

Sam was fearless and tried to drown himself a few times!  We had to keep an eye on him because he kept trying to go for a swim on his own.  He also had an affinity for dipping his chips into the water and sand.  Gross!!

I have no idea what ella was doing.  She kept doing all these funny poses when I tried to take her picture!

Harmon was showing me his hand stand.  The water was a bit shallow but he was getting pretty good at it!

Harmon is like a little fish.  He loves the water and I had a hard time getting a picture of him.  He and I had a great time looking for shells.  We found a lot of sand dollars and really big shells that day.  It was perfect shell-hunting conditions.  We put all of our sand dollars into a pocket of our beach stroller, only to put a bunch of stuff on top of them and we ended up smashing them.  Oh, the disappointment!  I think 3 little ones survived. 

I thought about not including this picture, but I just loved the chubby buns too much!

 

Here is a good picture of some our our shells and Ella's foot.

When Sam was trying to drown himself he would hang out with me under our canopy.  I was reading a book and just taking it easy.  Ella was a bit skittish about the water and spent a lot of time under the canopy playing with the sand.

Sam with sand in his hair.  He had sand everywhere!  When it came time to eat both he and Ella had a hard time keeping the sand out of their food.  Gross.

 

As we reached the end of our half-mile hike the sea oats and shrubs open up to reveal a massive stretch of white sand.  Ella inhaled quickly and said, "SNOW!  Look at the snowflakes!"  It was too funny!

After Ella had been down to the water she promptly came back up and told me that the water was "yu-ee"  And kept spitting everywhere.  Apparently she wasn't expecting that salty taste!   Sam thought it was pretty yucky too!

Harmon's handstand.  Harmon, Sam and I were out in the water jumping with the waves that came in.  While we waited we could feel lots of fish swarming our feet and legs.  They especially like my toenail polish.  It is a bit unnerving to be constantly assulted by 6 inch fish.  Harmon had his goggles on and I asked him how many fish were around my feet.  He dipped his head in to take a look.   When he came back up he was grinning real big and said, "There are hundreds of fish all around your feet, following your feet everywhere.  It's like your feet are famous or something!"  HA HA!  I got a good laugh out of that!

Porter and Harmon

Anticipating the waves!

A Clever Duck

Kids say funny things don't they?  Here are a couple of funnies my kids have said lately!

Sam is 20 months old and isn't really talking too much yet.  He likes to point and "ooooh" his way to getting what he wants.  Sometimes he will say a word or two, then clap and smile.   Yesterday I asked him for a kiss and instead he said, "Ahn-nee."  No momma, mommy, mom for this kid.  Annie.  He is a big goofball! 
Even though he isn't verbal, he definitely understand everything being said to him.  This morning I was getting him dressed.  I had taken his pajamas and dirty diaper off and was putting his new diaper on.  While I was strapping the diaper tabs down he said, "ow."  Off-handedly I asked, "Did I smash your weiner?"  He started to nod his head up and down.  I was surprised that he had picked up on what his "weiner" was.  It isn't a phrase I usually use.  Of course he does have to older brothers though!  I kind of laughed and asked him the same question again to see if he really had understood.  He gave me a pathetic "ow" and patted the front of his diaper.  I laughed and said, "Oh aren't you a clever duck?"
Ella had been overseeing this interchange between us.  She looked at me and in all seriousness laced with a twinge of rebuke said, "Sam not a duck, he a boy!"


Porter and Harmon LOVE the Star Wars Wii game.  They play it whenever they are allowed and whenever they think they can sneak off to do it.  They also enjoy watching the Living Scripture Book of Mormon movies.  We only have a couple of the videos, but they will watch them over and over.  It had been a while since they had seen Journey to the Promised Land.  In this video Nephi is bound by his brothers and stetches forth his hand to shock them with the power of God so that they remember who is suppose to be in charge.  The kids were watching this in the van the other day.  It came to this part in the movie and Porter, with a laugh in his voice, said, "Look Harmon, Nephi is going to use the Force!'  They then laughed and wanted me to repeat the scene so that they could see Nephi "force" them again.  LOL!!

Best Friends

I have the most FANTASTIC friend named Amelia.  We have been friends for 15 years!!  We both have had four kids spaced about the same time frame apart.  Ella and Liesl are the closest in age.  They are only 2 weeks apart although were due nearly at the same time.  It is so fun to see these little girls becoming best friends just like their mommies!  Amelia will make you feel like you are the most amazing, smart, talented, perfect person that she knows and then will also tell you when you are being a complete moron. I love her to pieces!!!
 

Liesl and Ella

Ella and Liesl age 2, sitting on a stool sharing a bag of chocolate.  Don't they look guilty?  They were being oh so quiet!

Ella and Liesl at 4 months old.

Feeling Fierce

Sam took a nose dive off the swing last week. His tooth was impacted and had to be removed and he had about 5 stitches in his lip. I have some other pictures and I might post more about it later. We had a crazy trip to the ER the night before we left town. Very glad that he has recovered so quickly. As of this morning he has only one stitch left to dissolve.

Happy Easter!!

HAPPY EASTER!!  We tried to capture a few pictures before church because we were all looking oh so dapper and I knew that we wouldn't look nearly as lovely after church.  I was right.  Sam slobbered all over his clothes and Ella threw a fit during church and pulled out her hair ribbons.  Oh well, we tried!  As you can see we having a fantastic addition to our photos...MICAH!  He has been home for 2 weeks now.  We are enjoying every minute!!  I will post his homecoming photos later.