Craft Camp, a flying suit & who I share my bed with

I got a few pictures from Caleb's preschool teacher today.  They are from about 3 weeks ago when they made their cute apples.  

These pictures are from craft camp two weeks ago when they made bird houses.

Crazy to think this one use to see Miss Shannon every day for Kindergarten and now she's going into fourth grade!

This one loves, loves, loves going to Miss Shannon's house for preschool.  He still doesn't know he'll be going to preschool three times a week this fall.  I figured I'd wait to tell him until his first day of preschool.  Otherwise I'm going to have to hear about it every day until then!  I know he's going to be sad when his brother and sister go back to school in about 12 days and he has to wait until after Labor Day to go back.  Maybe I'll have to break the 3 day a week news then to cheer him up!

My mom saw a pattern for a superhero costume about a month or two ago.  She bought it because she thought it screamed Caleb's name.  Caleb's always wearing some sort of "flying suit" or another.  The boy loves his dress ups as much as Samantha does.  In fact, he's worn the pumpkin outfit I made for Halloween last year so much that the velcro has come off!  Mom had wanted to get the new "flying suit" done for Caleb's birthday but her sewing machine broke about a week before his birthday.  She finally got her sewing machine fixed and back and was able to finish Caleb's flying suit.  He's worn it non stop since we brought it home!  Mom is still working on the belt, mask and arm bands that go with it.  When Nash saw Caleb's flying suit he told my mom that he wants one now!  Maybe for Christmas?  My mom said that if she'd have thought about it she would have told me not to get the felt for the dinosaur costume for him for Halloween because he could just go as a superhero.  I told her not to worry, I'm pretty sure he's going to go as a superhero flying dinosaur!

He looks grouchy in this picture because I took away his yogurt and made him get up from watching cartoons to take this picture!

A little while after I took this picture he put his cowboy boots on so he could go to daycare.  Yep.  Snapped a picture of him with the boots on, just haven't uploaded it yet.  In the words of his father, "Cool.  I finally have a kid with an awesome imagination!"

Last week when Travis was home him & Samantha rented Mirror, Mirror and were watching it while I read Witch Born.  Caleb was still up and running around (Nash was having a sleepover at his cousin Kash's house).  I finally got Caleb to come in my room and lay down on my bed with me.  I snapped this picture around 2 am.  Notice the dog?  Yep.  This is what I share my bed with when my husband is HOME!

A trip to the Dr. & the Splash Pad

Yesterday I took B and Caleb to the pediatrician.  I called and made an appointment for Caleb because he's had a yucky nose for at least a week and I figured he had a sinus infection.  I took B with me because she's had this horrible rattle in her chest for the entire summer.  We were there for quite awhile because there was a NICU code that our pediatrician had to respond to.  He later told me that it was just someone in housekeeping had hit the button but they didn't bother to page him and let him know he didn't have to run all the way to the NICU!   

The kids were really good to entertain themselves while we waited though:

Turns out Caleb had a double ear infection (it begins again) and B has junk in her lungs that required a prescription.  So, after we finished up with the dr. we headed to Shopko to pick up two new prescriptions!

 I've been working on cutting out squares for I Spy quilts.  It all started about two months ago when Caleb's preschool teacher asked if anyone wanted to do a quilt block exchange to make I Spys.  I said yes - duh.  I figured that between my mom & I we would have enough scraps to make one.  Lets face it, mom & I have about one of everything in JoAnn's and close to that from the south Walmart too.  You need 144 5 1/2 x 5 1/2 inch squares to do one I Spy quilt.  When I started cutting squares I figured I'd just raffle the I Spy off at Relay next year.  As I started cutting I thought, "You know, I could do one of these for each of the nephews/nieces we draw for Christmas."  I was talking to mom and realized I could make four I Spy quilts for about $60.  That's roughly $15 per quilt.  I'd spend that n a crappy toy so why not spend it on something they'll use?  Once I came to terms with the idea of doing four I Spys, I told myself, "I should do these for Laura's boys too."  So, here I sit, a month later, with 7 I Spy quilts to make.  I decided I'd do the ones for Laura's boys for their birthdays.  That means I've got 5 to make by Christmas, 1 in February and 1 in March.  I have 113 squares left to cut to have all the squares I need for all 7 quilts.  That means I've got almost 900 squares sitting on my table in this picture.  I figured I needed a total of 1008 squares.  All the squares I've cut that I'm not using (there were more than 7 of that particular fabric) I've passed on to Caleb's preschool teacher.  Here's to hoping I get all seven of these done on the time frame I've set up for myself!

Brookelyn has learned yet another trick:

She's dancing on the table in this picture.  Apparently, she inherited the same monkey genes as her brother Caleb.  When he was this size I had to take all the chairs at the table & put them up on the table so he couldn't do this.  My table is pushed up against the stair railing and if they were to venture over to the edge it would be certain death..or at least a broken neck.  It doesn't help that all my sewing stuff has taken over my kitchen table again because that just looks like tons of fun to play in!  Here's to hoping I can keep her off the table!

Cindy called me this morning and told me she was taking her grandkids down to the Splash Pad this afternoon.  I thought that sounded like a great idea.  So, we tagged along.  I was happy B didn't fall asleep in the carseat on the way to the Splash Pad.  The last time we went she slept the whole time!  I took her swim suit & changed her clothes when we got there.  Since she decided she was going to walk this weekend, I let her venture over with her siblings.  She loved it!

I love this picture!

This little boy just so happened to be named Nash!  No kidding.  I pointed him & his mom out to our Nash and told her to go introduce himself to her.  She said she hadn't ever met another Nash.  I told her we hadn't either!

Witch Born Contest

Ok, I'll admit it.  I'm a bit in love with the books Witch Song & Witch Born.  I'll be honest.  I was hesitant to read Witch Song.  I'm not a big fantasy genre reader.  I read it because I was going to CA and my girlfriend highly recommended it to me.  So, I stole her copy & read it on the way home from CA.  After I read it I couldn't wait for the second one to come out.  The second one, Witch Born, will be released Sept. 5.  Because I'm awesome (ha!) and know people, I've already read Witch Born.  Honestly, it was as good (or better) than Witch Song.  I don't say that about a lot of sequels.  I am highly anticipating the prequel and am disappointed that there are currently no plans for a third.  I will however tell you this: YOU can win a copy of Witch Born!  All you have to do is visit the author's site and follow the directions!  You can find her blog here: http://amberargyle.blogspot.com/  What are you waiting for?  Go enter to win!

National Night Out Against Crime

Every year for the last several years Hyrum has done a National Night Out Against Crime on the first Tuesday in August.  I've taken my kids several times and they always seem to have fun.  I had forgotten it was tonight until a friend of mine mentioned she was going to go down.  So, we braved the crowd and went down to the city square.  They always do a free dinner of hamburgers, potato chips and a drink.  I was happy - it's free, my kids (most of them) eat it and I don't have to cook. :)  They have the fire trucks, the ambulance, usually at least one DWR vehicle. Children's Justice Center, Life Flight and several other organizations there.  This year we ate our dinner and then headed over by the trucks.  When we got over there I saw the mom of one of Nash's friends so I sat and talked to her for a long time.  Because of that I didn't get a ton of pictures and I didn't get pictures of the kids climbing on everything they came into contact with!  I did manage to snap pictures when Life Flight came in though!

Brookelyn spotted the helicopter:

The closer the helicopter got the more she pulled this face:

Right over the the field where it was going to land:

Right above us:

I think the pilot hovered over us and came in super slow in order to give more of a wind!  It was crazy!  I didn't anticipate that much wind for that long!  I was impressed Brookelyn didn't cry about it!

After they landed:

Sister wasn't quite so sure she thought the helicopter was as cool on the ground as it was flying in the air:

Before the helicopter came in the officers told the kids to stay back until they gave the go ahead to come up and check it out.  When they gave the go ahead there were kids EVERYWHERE!

I did manage to snap a few pictures of the boys on the fire truck.  Caleb was trying to get to the top but it was too high without mom's help:

The kids were happy because they got to play on all the emergency vehicles and at the park.  I was happy because I had an adult conversation and didn't have to make dinner!  Now, if I can get them all to settle down and go to sleep it will be great!

Wedding cakes, nebulizers, boots & Grandpa's house

The entire month of July I worked on creating gum paste daisies for the tops of cupcakes for a wedding.  The wedding was August 2nd.  Much to my relief, all 100 daisies and cupcakes were made! The only thing I was worried about was the color.  Kiersha had asked me to do a sage green.  I told her I was worried that I wasn't going to be able to make it turn a sage color.  She told me that it was ok as long as it wasn't hunter green.  Well, it wasn't hunter green, but it wasn't exactly sage green either!  It was a pretty bright green!  Thankfully everyone really likes the cake and cupcakes so it all turned out ok!

 For the wedding cake, I did one nine inch and one eight inch cake and stacked them.  Putting the ribbon around the bottoms was tricky because the cakes weren't straight up and down around the edges.  This made it so there was a little bit of a space between the top of the ribbon and the cake.  Luckily I was able to figure out how to make it work so that it wasn't super obvious!

 Set up at the reception:

Brookelyn has had a rattle in her chest the entire summer.  I asked the pediatrician about it at Caleb's well check.  He told me to try giving her some decongestant as it might be caused by the runny nose she's got do to the molars she's trying to break.  Well, I tried the decongestant one night.  She proceeded to cough until she threw up.  Thus, we've been doing the nebulizer.  The first night we did it she wasn't such a fan.  After that we had to have her sit on dad's lap while she did it.

Little sister recently discovered she fits in the drawer below the tv.  Mom is not happy about this one.

I took the kids to Kmart to get a few last items for school shopping.  I saw these sweet little cow girl boots and couldn't resist buying them for Brookelyn.  They are a bit big, but they will be perfect come fall!

Last night we went down to Grandma Terri's and Grandpa Larry's house to make tin foil dinners and home made ice cream.  The kids were in the pool nearly three hours (Jack and Jade were there).  The kids had fun and the food was good too.

Grandpa Larry even did a double ch-da with the girls!  I love the look on B's face!  She does this every single time someone dances with her!  Glad I was able to finally catch it on film!

And, in other exciting news, Brookelyn decided she's going to walk now!  For about two months she has been taking three or four steps and then plopping down on the floor and crawling the rest of the way.  This past weekend she just decided she was ok with going about 10 steps.  Now, she's walking across the room!  She still plops down and crawls after she goes a little way but I think I can safely say she's officially walking!