Welcome to my home

I finally put up my Christmas stuff. It's nothing to shout about, but I'd thought I'd share anyway, since we don't get a whole lot of visitors.

So come on in! My stockings are actually hung in the hallway, and not over the fireplace. Kaylee is a bit put out about that one, but I didn't want to put nails in my mantle to hang this cute board. Yes, if you're counting, there are 7 stockings. We had to put up a stocking for Coal. He is family after all. (Plus, when you buy your stockings at the dollar store, it's not a big deal to throw in an extra one for the dog).

I made this snowman a couple of years ago. He's been loved a little too much. Every time I turn my back the little girls feel the need to pick him up and dance with him.

A few dollar store Christmas signs:

We put up our big tree in the family room, since that's where we spend most of our time, so I put up my cute little alpine trees in this corner in the living room:

Here's the family room. I completely gave free reign to the kids and let them put up all the ornaments on the tree. Needless to say, we have a lot of ornaments that are all clumped together:

Here's a bigger view of the family room. Complete with a cute little black dog:

Thanks for coming to visit!!

When Sophee gets angry . . .

Last month Sophee's teacher let her borrow this book:
Or maybe she specifically sent it home with her for a reason. Hmmm. Possible.

Anyway, we read the book that night. It's a cute book. Basically the story line is about a little girl who gets really angry when her sister takes a toy away from her, and how Sophie runs and runs until she finds a nice little spot to calm herself down. Then she goes back home and everyone loves her, etc. It was a nice 'warm fuzzy' moment book.

So we finished reading it, and were gathering up blankets and things for bed when my Sophee says, "This book should say 'When Sophie gets angry, really really angry . . . She beats her sister up'!"

Yes, maybe her teacher did mean for her to take the book home and read it.

If your little boy loves hot wheels . . .

You really have to check out this site! It's a tutorial on how to make a 'car cozie'-a place for him to keep and play with all his cars. It's so adorable. Go check it out.

Look what I made!!

We recently had a 'Super Saturday' craft day at our church for anyone interested in making some super cute crafts. I was in charge of coming up with some fairly inexpensive things for the ladies to make, so here's what I did, a simple way to display the proclamation (only $2):

And some temple blocks for $5. If you're interested in printing some temple pics out just go here scroll down until you see 'temple printables' then click on it. They have a bunch of different temples to choose from, and a lot of them also come with the saying 'Families are Forever':

The following pics are of things I just made, that I wasn't in charge of. Obviously they are way too cute of projects for me to come up with.

Here's a festively decorated star. I love stars and have quiet a few scattered around the house to add to my "Texas Decor" (as my sister says):

"Home Blocks". Inside the 'O' it says " . . . is where our story begins" :

I love this next one. Our Homemaking leader actually found this online here. It comes as a kit that you paint, then assemble. It was the most expensive item that we offered-at about $28, but I think that's an awesome price for such a durable nativity set!! The metal pieces are already cut out and sanded for you. I love that I now have an 'almost' indestructible nativity set. I say 'almost' because, as my loving SIL pointed out, with my kids there is no such thing as 'indestructable':

And last, but not least, some seasonal blocks. It's a set of 3 blocks that you can rotate for different holidays:

Aren't these just the cutest projects you've ever seen?

Halloween

This year for Halloween Kaylee was a vampiress. This is her at the church carnival. She claims she couldn't smile because of the fangs, but I think it had more to do with the fact that I was trying to get a picture of her while she was 'hanging' with her friends.

She also got ready at her cousin's house, so she wasn't in the group shot below.

Audree was little red riding hood, Josh was a storm trooper, and Sophee was Snow White.

Going Camping!

Last Thursday afternoon-after I finished up with my Chemistry lab-we loaded up the van and headed to the mountains to do some camping and get some much need rest & relaxation.
Here we are, on our way-we even took Coal.

Dad decided that we were going to stay in a little cabin, instead of a tent, which worked out really well. Flushing toilets, running water, now that's my kind of camping. Here's the cabin, it had two little rooms-one with double bunk beds, and the other with a little kitchen and table:

By the time we got there it was already about 5:00 so Kory immediately started the fire and we cooked our dinner. The kids were really thrilled about roasting hot dogs and marshmellows over the fire.

Shortly after we got there Sophee asked me, "So where are all the animals?". To which I replied, "I don't know honey, they don't just show up as soon as people get here". Not even a minute later she walks outside and yells, "They're here! The deer are here!" Sure enough 2 deer had wandered into the camp and got within a few feet of us. The kids were pretty excited and got a little rowdy, which quickly scared them off.

Later on they came back and I was able to get a couple of pics. Here's Kory with one of them:

We only saw 1 male deer, but he didn't stick around for very long. The second night that we were there the kids fed a couple of female deer some bread right from their hands.

We went on a couple of little hikes around the camp and found this teepee. The kids thought that it was pretty cool:

We spent a lot of time sitting around the table playing games and doing puzzles-no electronics for us, even our cell phones were dead.

Sophee:

Audree:

Kaylee:

Joshua:

My pictures seem a little fuzzy. Maybe that's because it seems that there are always some grubby little hands all over the lens.

Anyway, we had a really good time just taking it easy-and the weather was completely perfect! Even if we weren't totally 'roughing it'.

Pumpkin patch . . .

. . . sort of. As much as a pumpkin patch as you can get in the desert.

Anyway, my kids had all of last week off due to Fall Break. I, unfortunately still had to go to school, so we were pretty limited on the activities that we could do.
Last Monday morning my SIL calls me on a whim and talked me into going to Vegas with her.
We took the kids to this little pumpkin patch that was in a casino parking lot. They got to ride some carnival type games:
(That's Kaylee up front next to the #4).

Audree, Josh, and Sophee in the bounce house:

Sophee coming down the big slide:

Audree coming down the big slide:

Feeding the goats:

Posing for some cute pumpkin pics. Sophee:

Audree:

Kaylee:

And Josh: