Blessings...

3 of my most special blessings wear me out, talk all the time, follow me around the house, ask a ton of questions, need my attention every minute they're awake, get into everything, and even drive me crazy some days BUT I love them very much and are so thankful they are in my life! As Thanksgiving is approaching quickly, I sit back and think of all the things that I am grateful for. There are so many that it would take forever to list them. I just wanted to list my top 3...

Baylee is a very dependable girl. She's smart, loving, and always cares about others. She helps me with whatever project I have going on. She's very creative and curious, always wanting to learn. I'm very thankful she's my oldest. I can always count on her. I love you Baylee Roses!

Brinley is my laid back girl. Not much bothers her. She is my cuddle buddy. We can't start the day off without our cuddles. She is the quiet one of the bunch and the most like her Mommy. She has a big heart! Always watching out for others. She has quite the imagination. Always making up stories. She's my funny one that always has something crazy to say. She's also my shopping buddy. This girl likes to shop. I love you Brinley Bear!

Rylee is my adventurous one. She is not afraid of anything! She is our family clown. She loves to be center of attention. She will give you the biggest squeeze ever and tons of kisses to go along with it. She loves to follow me around and ask a billion questions, sometimes the same question all day long. She will light up any room with her big smile.

I love you Ry Ry!

May we all GOBBLE 'TILL WE WOBBLE!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!

Twilight Review

My cute hubby and I celebrated our 12th Anniversary last Thursday. He took me to dinner at Geppeto's (that's where we went on our first date). After we went to the mid-night showing of Twilight. He kept telling everyone that he had to compete with Edward on our Anniversary at mid-night and that's why he took me. We both loved the movie. I was disappointed a little though because they left a ton of important (at least I think) parts out of the movie. I saw it again Friday night and enjoyed it more the second time around. I picked up on things that I'd missed. All-in-all I think they did a great job with casting and they did a great job portraying the characters. My favorite though is the fact that it was filmed in Oregon and we were able to see many sites of the beautiful state we lived in for 4 years. In a weird way it made me homesick for Oregon. I'm curious to hear what you thought of the movie! Thumbs up or thumbs down?

PS-The soundtrack is really good--a good combination of music.

A New Trick...

I learned a very cool new trick tonight and wanted to share this cool new trick. When your 2 year old decides to color all over your beautiful kitchen tile with permanent marker and herself, a dry erase marker will take it off. I found my sweet 2 year old in my kitchen tonight looking like this...

And my tile looking like this...

All the way from my back door to the other side of my kitchen table. Not a small area. She worked fast!!

I only panicked for about 5 minutes, screamed for another 5 minutes, then I calmed down a tiny bit and the idea to google "how to remove magic marker" came to mind. I love Google! Thank you Google!! The instructions were right there telling me what to do. It's a good thing they were or I may still be panicking about my tile and maybe even screaming. After about 45 minutes of coloring over the magic marker with the dry erase marker and then wiping it off, I had a pretty good high from the dry erase marker. I felt much better about the situation and didn't care about anything, just flying high. I have to wonder how many more brain cells died tonight while cleaning this up. It worked though. I just need to find something to take it out of my grout. Any ideas??

She was supposed to be on my bed watching a movie with her big sisters, but somehow managed to sneak past them and me and head to the kitchen.

So as of 6:40 tonight, I have a 2 year old for sale. Anyone, anyone?? I might throw in the 4 and 7 year olds too.

And So It Begins...

Rylee has only been 2 for a week now and I wanted to remember her first week of the TERRIBLE TWO's. So we started off at the store shopping for Dan's Birthday. She kindly let the entire store know that she was there by SCREAMING, CRYING, and THROWING things off the shelves. Needless to say I had to leave our shopping cart, which was full of items, and walk out of the store. She reminds me of a Baylee incident some years ago when I was cited for kidnapping my own daughter at Target. Oh the memories!! Then in one week she gave herself a facial with blue toothpaste, emptied 3 brand new Kleenex boxes, helped herself to an entire box of fruit snacks while I thought she was taking a nap, emptied both book shelves I don't know how many times, unrolled the toilet paper out into the family room--twice, wrote on my newly painted walls, sang as loud as she could at church when everyone else wasn't singing and it was suppose to be a quiet time, undressed herself down to the nothings 3 to 4 times a day, she climbed up on the kitchen table and was jumping on it, pulled the bar stools over to the cabinets were the gum is, climbed up on the counter, got the gum off the top shelf and managed to eat half the package, had a few more temper tantrums, came up to me and gave me a spankin' and told me to be nice as I was getting after Brinley for something, she kept sneaking into our food pantry--helping herself to whatever she wanted including Baylee's Halloween candy, gave herself a bath in my favorite lotion, and crawled out of her play-yard every time we put her to bed. She's been sleeping in that because she keeps climbing out of her crib falling to the ground. We figured that with the play-yard she wouldn't have to fall so far. Oh and she snuck outside in the front yard and was in the flower bed trying to pick a dead flower. To top the week off though, she ended up in the Emergency Room getting stitches. She fell at my cousin's wedding reception off a chair and cut her chin. I was helping with the food so Dan had to take her to the ER. The doctor put 4 stitches in Thursday night and by Friday night she had all 4 stitches out. She kept pulling on them and I kept covering them up with a band aid. I went through a box of band aids Friday trying to keep her from touching them. It didn't work. She is only 2 and this is the 2nd time she has had stitches. The first time was last spring when she bit her tongue almost off. She had to have 10 stitches to fix that one.

I have to remind myself all the time that this is only a phase and it too shall pass. I just hope fast!! It's not that I'm not watching her, I am. I have a pile of "stuff" needing to get done but can't get to it because I am always cleaning up a mess. While I'm cleaning up one mess she is into another. I've even tried putting her in her bed to keep her contained but she climbs right back out. I put her upstairs in the toy room and she climbs over the gate and comes back downstairs. She's very quiet and fast. We've decided that she may be the boy we never had.

Soccer

Go Green Sharks!!

Another successful soccer season is behind us and what an improvement Baylee has made. This last season Baylee's team was able to have a goalie. They all loved it and would rotate each game. The field and nets were bigger and the games were much more exciting and competitive. Baylee made huge improvements this season. I'm not sure if it's from everyone offering her a dollar for every goal she scored or her new soccer shoes and PINK shin guards. When she first started playing soccer back when she was 5, she had more interest in looking at everything BUT the ball and skipping down the field (arm's linked) with her friend. We would get so frustrated because some games she wouldn't even run up and down the field. But this season she was AWESOME!! She scored many goals and was very aggressive with getting the ball. She loved playing goalie. We're sad that the games are over until the Spring. We were enjoying cheering for the Green Sharks.



Baylee and Canon after their last game.

OK, then there's Brinley's soccer experience. This was Brinley's second season playing soccer. She reminds me of her older sister. She would run up and down the field but never watched where she was going. There wasn't one game that she didn't run into another player, either on her team or the other one. Yes there were tears either from her or the other player. We finally told her that we would give 5 cents to watch where she was going and 10 cents every time she kicked the ball. She never made it to a dollar. She had fun and enjoyed playing. We loved watching and laughed our heads off at her games. The ball would go out of bounds and all the little 4 year olds would keep running after the ball even onto the other fields with other teams playing. Their uniforms were so big on them that the soccer shorts came down to their ankles and the socks we would have to fold over 3 times. I asked her if she wants to play again in the Spring and she told me she'll have to think about it. Maybe I need to get her some PINK shin guards.

She was more interested in posing for the camera than focusing on her game.

Brinley and her buddy Easton after their last game.

Go Lightning Bolts!! Yes, she was the only girl on her team. That was good because she probably would have linked arms too with the other girls like Baylee did.

We love Archie!

So we scooted on over to our favorite Target store this morning to purchase the long awaited David Archuleta CD. We loved watching him on American Idol. Too bad the wrong David won!! We've listened to it all morning and would recommend it to anyone. It's a great album!

He's such a cutie patootie (those are Baylee's words).

Little Ry Ry

Rylee got this dress for her birthday from Grandma and Grandpa Harris. She wore it to church today and of course told everyone that she is "coot". She also twirled around like a princess too (she must get that from her sisters). I just had to show how "coot" she really is.

"I'N TWO"

Happy 2nd Birthday

Rylee Mae!!
We celebrated Rylee's 2nd Birthday yesterday at Chuck-E-Cheese. What a party! We partied with the Grandparents, cousins, aunts and uncles and of course Chucky himself. We ate yummy pizza, cake and cup cakes, played all the games, and rode all the rides. I think the kids wore the parents out.

Ry Ry loved her pizza and her cupcakes. She kept telling everyone around her, "I'n two". In between bites she would remind us that she is two.

After we had fun watching her open all her presents. She got a new baby doll, books, a tiger that really talks and moves, "coot" clothes that she kept calling jammies, money and a new toddler bed (are we really ready for that?!?!) It's actually back-ordered so we have a few more weeks of her still in her crib. However she climbs out of it all the time-thus the reason for the toddler bed.

We love you little Ry Ry. Thanks for always keeping us on our toes. We never know what you'll be into next. We have loved the last 2 years with you. Your smile brings so much joy to all of us. We think you're "coot" too. Happy Happy Birthday to you!!!

Why??

Why do we love Halloween so much?

JOB SECURITY!!

Need I say more?!?!

Eat up!!!

What a Week!

Wow, you would think it was Christmas around here with how busy we have been. What a busy but very fun week we had. It started off with the Halloween Carnival at the school. We spent almost 5 hours there dancing, eating, playing games, painting and watching magic shows. Then it was pumpkin carving, making Halloween sugar cookies, Primary Halloween carnival, showing our costumes to the Grandparents, Brinley's preschool Halloween party, Kendall's (Baylee's friend) Halloween party, visiting Daddy's dental office in costumes, Baylee's school class party, dance class Halloween party, eating "Intestine Soup" (taco soup) with our neighbor friends, and of course Trick or Treating! No wonder all the kiddos went to bed at 7:00 tonight.

"Coot" Costumes!

Halloween has always been a favorite holiday for me. I love dressing everyone up! I know Dan looks forward to it every year too Ha Ha (I even get him to dress up). What a good husband!! I usually like to have some theme for our costumes, but this year decided everyone could pick whatever they wanted to be. Dan came up with his own idea, what else but EDWARD (for those of you who haven't read the "Twilight" series, he is the main character). If I would have known sooner I could have been Bella (other main character) but instead I was a witch (or in Ry Ry's words a "coot witch" or cute witch). Baylee was Giselle from Enchanted. Brinley was Tinkerbell. Little Rylee was Snow White (or again in her words "coot no white" or cute snow white).