Look What I Made!

When I was not quite 9 years old, my family took a trip to California. My Grandma Potter joined us on the journey and she brought her crochet stuff with her to pass the long hours. By the time we were headed back home I had sat watching her work for quite some time and finally decided I wanted to give it a try. Grandma seemed absolutely delighted that I was showing an interest in one of her favorite hobbies. She gave me some extra yarn and a hook and gave me a very basic crochet lesson before she turned me loose to practice while she went back to her work. A little while later she happened to glance over to see my progress and expressed her surprise that I had caught on so quickly. She showed it to my mom who also seemed surprised. And after the lofty praise I received from both, I was "hooked". (Pun intended.) After that first experience, I had a few more formal lessons from my mom (my first attempt was impressive but far, far from good, much less perfect), and eventually I made my first baby afghan. Over the years I have improved quite a lot and added dishcloths and scarves to my small repertoire, but I've never tried anything truly difficult and usually stick with the patterns that say Beginner on them. My guess is, I will continue to stick with those easy patterns since they are super cute and I can do them without a ton of counting or major attention to detail. I mostly just like to keep my hands busy when we are watching TV or something.

Well, last year we aquired some really darling crocheted hats out of a box at the hospital where Kayleigh was staying. Lynnsey got a cute pink and white one and Kaya got a little purple and pink one complete with a pink flower. Both girls get compliments whenever they wear their hats and people always ask me if I made them for them. I always wish I could say yes! Anyway, Lynnsey's best friend absolutely adores Lynnsey's pink and white hat and Lynnsey, who knows I can crochet and therefore figures I must be able to make anything, told her friend that I would make her one for Christmas! So I decided to give it a try by using Lynnsey's hat as a model and I found out that making hats is not as hard as I had always assumed it would be. This is the hat I managed to make for Lynnsey's friend: It was so much fun and so satisfying to make something and have something to show for it so quickly that I decided to try a few more. So I made some for me:

And finally, the other day I was trying to figure out what kind of gift to get for the little girl I babysit because she honestly has EVERYTHING. She is an only child and is extremely spoiled by her doting parents. It was as I was pulling Kaya's little flower hat off of Lilly's head for the hundreth time (to keep it from getting too stretched out by her much larger noggin), that I had the idea of making her a flower hat of her own. I knew it would be a much harder project, especially the little crocheted flower, but I decided to give it a try. I ended up having to start over about 4 different times because I couldnt' get the size quite right, but finally it came together. When it was finished a relatively short time later, I decided that I had reached the pinnacle of my crochet career! Seriously. I've made some very nice blankets and dishcloths and scarves and even those other hats you see above. But this little hat is probably the cutest thing I've ever made. Sorry to toot my own horn, but really it is:

Isnt' that adorable? I can't get over it! I want to make another one but I'm afraid to try for fear I won't be able to measure up to this one. I'm sure Lilly, at 2 years old will not appreciate all of my work and effort, but hopefully she'll catch on pretty quickly how cute it is!

Oh, and my apologies for the way I always have to give a whole life history for one tiny little blog entry. I should have just said "Look what I made!" and have done with it. Ah, well. Now you know more about my history with crocheting than you could ever possibly want to know. And aren't you just so glad for that (useless) information? Actually it's just my way of procrastinating all the stuff I really need to be doing to get ready for Christmas: gift wrapping, sending packages, the newsletter....*sigh*...guess I'd better get back to it all.

Just Don't Ask Him to Keep a Secret

Every year the elementary school here offers Santa's Secret Shop where the kids can bring in their money and shop for gifts ranging from a quarter to five dollars for their families and friends. Spencer was SO excited to be able to pick out gifts all by himself and he came home just bursting to tell me what he bought for everybody. I told him he could tell me what he bought for the rest of the family but he needed to keep mine a secret. After revealing the fantastic treasures he purchased for everyone else he said: "I will not tell you what I bought for you but it does look--it just looks like a horse. But it's not one." I immediately tried to tell him not to give anymore hints but later he did tell me it was soft and is a kind of animal and that it is something I will just love. I'm sure that when I open my stuffed unicorn on Christmas I really will be thrilled.

My Sweet Little Loopy Girl

Awhile back I had blogged about Kaya needing to see an ENT for her recurrent ear infections. She saw the ENT and what we learned was that Kaya is absolutely terrified of doctors now and even more afraid of the otoscope! Basically at the first appointment, Kaya's screaming and a whole bunch of ear wax made it pretty impossible for the doctor to see what was going on in the ears. So after two weeks of ear drops meant to loosen up wax she went back for a hearing test to measure the fluid in her ears and another check of her ears by the doctor. Both were a failure. Again, too much screaming. So they determined that it would be best to put her under general anesthesia to check her fluid and then if it was indeed a problem, they'd be ready to put tubes in at the same time. That was today.

I took the day off of babysitting to take Kaya in to the surgery center while Kalen stayed behind to have the "easier" job of getting all the kids off to school. ("You do this EVERY DAY?, he asked me when I got home. Yes. Yes I do.) We arrived at the center at 6 a.m. (nothing like yanking your sleeping baby out of bed at 5:15 in the morning) and they called us back to the room at 6:30. Kaya immediately recognized that she was in a medical facility and began crying. They got us all checked in and asked me the exact same questions that they asked me on the phone for pre-registration yesterday. We got Kaya into her little hospital gown and then the anesthesiologist came in to ask me the same questions again. But he gets points anyway because he pronounced Kaya's name right.

Then came the fun part. They brought Kaya her little pre-surgical cocktail of medication and told me in about five minutes I'd see a difference in her behavior. Sure enough, it kicked in when they said it would. Kaya went from tense and fussy to very relaxed and thinking everything was hilarious. I was bouncing a beanie lion they gave her on my lap and Kaya was watching and laughing like it was the funniest thing ever. Then I noticed a speck on Kaya's nose and said "You've got something on your nose there." Kaya responded by putting her finger on her nose and saying "BEEEEP!" I laughed and she did it again. I laughed again and so she stuck her finger right up inside of her nose and then she laughed. It was just so funny to watch her getting more and more loopy and silly. By the time they came to take her she was really, really mellow and went right to the anesthesiologist without a fuss.

I went back to the waiting room and about 15 minutes later the doctor came and said they were done. She did have lots and lots of fluid and so they went ahead with the tubes, but everything went great. A few minutes later they came to tell me she was waking up. When I got back there she was very cranky, which they said nearly always happens when kids come out of general anesthsia. While I was trying to get her to calm down, the nurse came over to take the blood pressure cuff off of her leg and when she did, Kaya stopped crying for one second, touched her nose and said: "BEEEP!" then started crying again. Silly kid. They let us go right after that. Kaya cried the whole way home and was fussy for about half an hour after that. I was rocking her hoping to get her to nap when suddenly she wiggled off of my lap and said: "Done!" and so she was. She's been playing and happy the rest of the day and now is finally taking a long overdue nap. And now so will I.

The Big One-OH!

Impossible as it may seem, and I know it seems impossible to me, Kendall is a whole decade old!He had his birthday on December 7th and was so excited to be turning ten. We celebrated at with a small family party on the 7th.

One of Lynnsey's gifts was a big wet smooch on the cheek. I love the resignation on Kendall's face. It was a fun night but what Kendall was really waiting for was his big friend party on the 11th. We came close to having to postpone it though when Kendall spent Wednesday morning at home with a stomach bug. Luckily it was short lived and by Friday he was as good as new.

He invited 11 kids to the party and the boys had an extra invitation to stay for a sleepover afterward. We ended up with 10 kids able to come to the party and three boys at the sleepover, so it worked out pretty well.

The evening began with a pizza supper followed by a fun game of Bunco. I had been trying to figure out what we could do with the kids since it's winter and outdoor games don't work but 9 and 10 year olds would probably tire easily of something like "Duck, duck, goose" and those sorts of games. It was Kendall's idea to play Bunco and it was perfect. We had two tables full of kids who ended up loving the game.

The winner got a prize and the losers got smaller prizes.

Then we opened presents. He got some really fantastic gifts that included lego sets, Bakugan balls (the newest rage among that age of kids apparently), books, a remote control vehicle,

and even a very cool replica of Voldemort's wand that lights up at the tip.

Kaya enjoyed sneaking up on the table to find all sorts of goodies while everyone's attention was on Kendall, but of course the eyes in the back of my head caught her at it right away.

Presents were followed by cake and ice cream and then the parents arrived to take kids home. The sleepover was a great success. They watched a movie and then played with all of Kendall's new gifts. Finally at about 11:30 I couldn't keep my eyes open any longer (Kaya had a bad night the night before and I had gotten a total of about 4 hours of sleep), so I told them I was turning out the lights and they needed to get in their sleeping bags. They complied for about 15 seconds. I hadn't even made it all the way upstairs before I saw their flashlights passing by the stairway door. Oh well. I'm told that they stayed up till about 4:00 a.m. although Kendall said he only made it to 2:30. They had a ball though and Kendall is already asking for another sleepover sometime soon.

We're so glad you had a happy birthday Kendall! You are one of the greatest blessings we could have ever asked for.

Finally--Thanksgiving

We had planned as early as last summer for my sister Alison and her family to spend another Thanksgiving with us. And right up until a week beforehand that was the plan. Then my grandpa who has been in hospice for months longer than anyone thought he would be, finally took a turn and quietly passed away. It was decided that his funeral would be the Saturday after Thanksgiving which meant either Alison would not be coming to Michigan after all and would instead be going to Kentucky or they would do both. (Which I would not have wanted to do with all the extra driving that would involve!). They decided to do both! We are so thankful they were able to join us after all.

In the meantime, my brothers Jonathan and Nathan had planned on joining us for Thanksgiving too. They still came and brought my mom and Susannah with them so that Mom could take her own car to Kentucky. I can't imagine how miserable Susannah must have been making that long trip after having a c-section just a couple of weeks before, but we are so thankful that she did because we got to see her tiny sweet baby Rebecca. They had to leave for Kentucky the very next day, but we got a bit of time with the baby. The kids LOVED her--except for Kaya: I think she really thought Rebecca was a doll so when she was moving and making noise, Kaya was a bit freaked out.

The kids were thrilled to have a few days with one of their all-time favorite uncles. (He is a huge kid magnet !)

Alison and Mike arrived very early Wednesday morning and it was so great to see them again. We took the kids to Kids 'n' Stuff for the afternoon. I'm always thankful to have such a great place for our kids to explore that is only a couple of minutes away.

It was a fun afternoon except for when I left for a few minutes to mail some packages at the post office without kids. I was in a hurry to get back and I'm still not sure how it happened but I pulled into the spot just in front of another car but must have been a bit closer than I thought and ended up scraping her front bumper with the side of my car. I have never been chewed out so throroughly! You'd have thought I had totalled her car as upset as she was. In reality she had two small white streaks of paint on the corner of her bumper. That's it. I apologized profusley- but she was hearing none of it. She insisted on calling the police to the scene. In the meantime, I realized that in my flustered state I had locked my keys in the car with the car still running! I had to call Kalen at work and have him run (literally, on foot) to the post office to unlock the car for me. After the policeman arrived (and had to nearly kneel down to see the "damage" on the woman's bumper), he wrote up a report for the insurance company. Kalen arrived about this time too and after he saw the "damage" he was really not happy. Just as the policeman was finishing up, the woman's husband showed up. It was a ridiculous scene in which Kalen finally lost it with the lady and said "it's a bumper! BUMP-er! That's what they are for!" The officer was still there and I was worried that Kalen's scene would get him in trouble but I think the guy was actually biting his lip to keep from laughing. Anyway, we finally were cleared to leave and I took Kalen back to work and rejoined the family at the museum. I'm just thankful I didn't really wreck her car and I'm so thankful that my husband was so understanding of my carelessness.

On Thursday we had a lovely Thanksgiving dinner. Kalen made a fabulous turkey again and Jonathan's candied yams were a big hit. I'm so thankful for such yummy food and for the wonderful blessing of family to enjoy it with.

We awoke early on Friday and made the long journey to Kentucky. In spite of the long drive we had a peaceful trip--Lynnsey and Isabel switched places for the trip and Taylor rode with Timothy so there was no fighting! We arrived in the middle of the viewing so Kalen and Mike dropped Alison and I off at the funeral home and then they took the kids to the house to avoid all the disruption that 8 energetic kids would have caused after being cooped up for over 9 hours in the car.

When we arrived at the house the kids were all fed and happy and ready to fight over their newest cousin Rebecca.

Thankfully, even Kaya had decided that Rebecca was pretty special and our next challenge became watching her every second to make sure that she didn't pick the baby up by herself!

We had a fun night together, especially when Andrew, David and Samuel joined the crowd. I'm sure it must have been quite a sight to see 22 people crammed into that tiny 2 bedroom house. But we made it work and I am so thankful for that time that we had to spend all together as a family to visit and enjoy each other. We were only missing my dad and Melissa (and family).

The next morning began early since there were so many of us and only one bathroom but we managed to make it work and even made it to the funeral on time.

Two handsome boys, Bentley and Spencer even had time for a pre-funeral DS tutorial.

The funeral was really nice. Grandaddy looked so at peace and I am thankful that his suffering and pain has finally ended. The pastor gave some really nice remarks and the only thing that made me sad was when it finally hit Spencer that Grandaddy was gone. He looked up at the casket and asked "Who's that?" I whispered that it was Grandaddy and that he had died and was now with Heavenly Father. He kind of gasped when it hit him and then spent the rest of the the service trying unsuccessfully not to cry. I mentioned before that when Spencer was two, Grandaddy and Grandma came to visit and Spencer and Grandaddy had an immediate connection. I've actually never seen anything like it. Then last summer at Grandma's funeral they saw each other again and Spencer went right to Grandaddy and sat on his lap. I don't know what is was, but I love that they hit if off like that and I'm grateful that Spencer will have at least those few memories of his great grandfather.

The funeral was very nice but the graveside service was absolutely amazing. Because of his service in the military, a couple of marines came and did a service at the grave with Taps and the flag folding and presentation to my mom. It was so moving. I'm thankful for my grandfather's service to our country and for all the men and women who are serving our country in the military currently, including my brother's and nephew. I'm also thankful for the priesthood and for the blessing that my brother Andrew gave to dedicate Grandaddy's final resting place.

After the funeral we were treated to an amazing feast at the Baptist church where my grandparents attended so faithfully for so many years. Wow! I cannot even begin to describe how wonderful it was and how thankful we all were for the time and energy that some of those church ladies sacrificed to feed people that they didn't even know. (And for the lady who took our picture afterward):

We all enjoyed some time at the old playground where we used to play as kids. I'm thankful for all the great childhood memories I have of that place and all the vacations we spent in Kentucky.

Since this is most likely the last time most of us will be in Kentucky, we decided to do another favorite childhood pastime and visit one of the many caves in the area. We headed for Diamond Caverns. I had called ahead and was told that if we arrived by 3:30 we would make it in to the last tour at 4:00. They don't take reservations or we would have made some. But when we arrived, we were told that it was sold out! We were so devastated and a tiny bit angry to have driven an hour up there for nothing. The lady at the counter called her boss to see if they could make an exception but she was told no. So we decided to stretch our legs a bit and look at the gift shop before heading home when the phone rang and the boss had called back to see if the tour guide would be willing to stay late and take us through. She said she was happy to and they opened up another tour for us! I'm incredibly thankful that she did that for us and stayed late just to accomodate us. And boy was it worth it. It was so beautiful and so incredible to think of the things that take place right underneath our feet. We live in such a wonderful world.

The kids loved getting "cave kisses" and they started counting how many times they got dripped on.

Taylor was in his element in this place!

I am so thankful for the miracle of this beautiful earth and for the time we were able to have to enjoy a piece of it.

We spent one more night in Kentucky and then drove home the next day. We encountered a lot of holiday traffic and some really heavy rain that slowed us considerably. We had our second traffic accident of the weekend when a girl rear-ended us on the slippery roads. Thankfully, no one was injured and we only had a small dent in our "bump"-er, so we were able to continue on our way without incident. I'm sure the girl that hit us was also thankful that we didn't get upset with her, unlike SOME people I know.

We were happy to return home and in the days since we have been busy getting ready for Christmas. The kids had a ball putting up our tree this year and it was fun to see them remembering the stories from each of our yearly ornaments.

I am so thankful for the coming Christmas season (and for the moments like these where my kids actually adore one another!)

Not my Thanksgiving post yet

Okay, I know I still need to do some major catching up, but for that I need Kalen's computer to upload photos which I can't have access to until tomorrow at the earliest. But I thought I'd share another funny Spencer moment.

This morning he was drawing on the magnadoodle and he came running to me and triumphantly exclaimed: "Mommy, look what I drew!" I looked. I saw a tiny little cirle with a tinier black dot in the middle. Before I could think of a creative way to ask what it was, he said: "It's a black-eyed pea!"

School Pictures

Kendall, Lynnsey, and Spencer got their school pictures back the other day. I always dread getting them because you just never know how they are going to turn out. We usually end up getting retakes of at least one child. But this year they came out alright. Kendall always takes a great picture no matter what. I really wasn't worried about him at all.

Lynnsey thought about getting retakes because she doesn't like that she's hunched over being shy. But then she decided she liked her smile a lot and the bow in her hair so she decided we should keep them after all.Spencer's crack me up. I had told him the day of pictures to make sure to look right at the photographer and smile. (He has a tendency to turn his head for pictures or look out of the corner of his eye). When he got his pictures, he was so proud of himself for how wide his eyes were and how he was looking straight ahead. He most definitely did open his eyes wide and look ahead. Too cute.

Taylor missed his pictures completely. The teacher who was supposed to hand out the order envelopes forgot about it so an entire class wound up having no idea about it being picture day. Taylor was wearing one of his rattiest t-shirts that day and didn't think to call me and have me bring a change of clothes or money for the pictures. Oh well. Retakes are this week so we'll have to make sure we get those done.

Just What We Need: Another Specialist

Last night I had a visit from my wonderful visiting teachers and we were talking about differences in raising boys and girls. One of my teachers remarked: "Plus, your boys are the ones who get all the problems. The girls are so healthy". I agreed completely. Taylor, who has Sensory Processing Disorder has had to see both a behavioral and an occupational therapist. Kendall, with his congenital heart problems, regularly visits his pediatric cardiologist. And Spencer who has life-threatening food allergies and asthma gets to visit a pediatric allergist. But Lynnsey and Kaya have only ever had to see their regular doctor and usually only then for check-ups.

Until today. I had to take Kaya in for a recheck of her ears since she had an infection a couple of weeks ago. I thought it would be a quick in and out and on with our lives. As it turns out, not only was her ear still infected but so was the other one--and both are severely infected. It started back in October just before Kalen and Kaya's trip to Utah. Kaya had a runny nose and a low grade fever but otherwise seemed fine. But since she was going to be traveling, I decided we'd just get her checked out. It was good that I did because she did have a mild ear infection. The doctor actually debated whether or not to give us antibiotics but since Kaya was going to be flying, she decided we'd better do it. She gave her amoxicillin. When they came back from the trip, Kaya had a bad cough. We let it go for awhile because she had just finished up the antibiotics so we assumed it was just another cold and would go away. It didn't. Another trip to the doctor and she was diagnosed with bronchitis plus her one ear was still a bit red. This time it was Zithromax. We finished that round and her cough improved somewhat but didn't go away entirely. Then a few days after the antibiotics were completed, the cough was back with a vengeance. Back to the doctor we went and we were told she still had bronchitis and that it probably hadn't ever gone away completely. Also, her ear was very infected at that visit. This time she gave us another antibiotic, the name of which I can't really remember. We set up an appointment then for two weeks to have the ear rechecked. We finished up that round of antibiotics and really thought that would be the end of it when we went in today. Nope. With both ears now very inflamed, the doctor thinks it will be best if we visit an ENT to see whether we should continue antibiotics or look at putting tubes in Kaya's ears. They tried to get us in this week but the ENT's office said it would most likely not be until the week after Thanksgiving that we can be seen. So the doctor, not wanting to leave the ear infection untreated for that long, gave Kaya an antibiotic injection that supposedly will tide her over until we can have her seen by the ENT. Poor baby. That shot was a bad one too because it's a thick medication so they have to use a pretty big needle. It took both me and the doctor to hold Kaya down while the nurse stuck that big fat needle in her little leg. The crazy thing about all this is, that Kaya seems well! If she has a fever with it, it is so mild that I don't even notice she's warm. Her sleeping is good. Her appetite is fantastic. She plays and smiles and is generally her normal happy self. You would never know that she had anything as miserable as bronchitis and ear infections going on. Anyway, so I guess she will now get to join the ranks of our children who have to see specialists. Luckily this is for something relatively common and shouldn't have to be a continual thing. I'll update once we get in to see this guy.

And here's a completely unrelated thing. As I am typing this, Spencer has been in here jabbering away at me and he just said: "Mommy, I just always want to live here. But also I want to go to Pennsylvania. That's such a funny place huh? That's because it has the word Pencil in it. That's how come I want to go to Pencilvania." I could listen to him talk all day!

Swinging With His Eyes Closed

The following is another interesting conversation that I had with Spencer yesterday as I was pushing him on the swingset:

Spencer: I'm swinging with my eyes closed!
Mommy: Really? What does that feel like?

Spencer: It feels like I'm heading off to dreamland. Or like I'm going to fly up and crash into the tree.

Mommy: (laughing) You are so funny. I'll have to write that down.
Spencer: Yeah, that would be good. And also I feel like I'm gonna land in the garden or the compost. Is that funny too? Are you gonna write that down?
Mommy: If I can remember it all I will.

Spencer: Yeah. Try to remember because that is so funny to write down. Only if you do write it down, do not send it to school with me to give to my teacher because I do not know what she will think about me then.

This and That

*Yesterday I did something that it has been way too long since I last did. I played with my kids. And I mean I really played with them. Sure, I take them outside everyday and push them on the swings again and again and again. I follow behind them when they ride bikes. I keep an eye on them when I'm weeding the flower beds and they are playing nearby. I sit and do puzzles or board games with them indoors and I'm usually near to participate in a tea party or race a car along a track. Most people watching would think I do a pretty good job at playing with my kids. But if you want to know the truth, most of the time that I'm "playing" with them, I am thinking about the other things I should be doing or planning things in my head like my primary lesson or figuring out how I can get to the bank, the post office, and the grocery store all before 5:00. I'm just not very engaged with the kids a lot of the time. But yesterday, I looked out the window to see that Kendall had set up a little soccer field on the lawn and he and Lynnsey and Spencer were playing soccer. I watched for a long time because it was so fantastic to see them playing so well together and having such a good time. They would even do a group hug every time one of them scored a goal. But after watching for awhile, I suddenly wanted to PLAY too! I went out and asked if I could join them. They looked at each other in surprise but agreed that I could play. It was so much fun. FUN I tell you! At one point Lynnsey sighed happily and said: "You need to do this more often." And I really do. My new goal is to really play everyday with my kids no matter what we're doing. I will pay attention and be engaged with them. Thinking about the laundry while I'm playing a board game doesn't get the laundry done, so I just need to stop thinking about it and enjoy all the time I have with my children.

I didn't get pictures of the soccer match, (by the way, Kendall says I have a great drop kick, thank you), but I do have some cute pictures of Kaya and Spencer playing with the box of tinker toys that my dad gave us a couple of years ago. This set has had the most use of just about any of our toys. All of the kids play with it. The other night while I was trying to get Kaya to go to sleep she wiggled down and went into the other room, which was completely dark. I heard the box of tinker toys being dumped out and a few minutes later she came back with a little creation that she had put together in the dark. I don't know how she managed to get those skinny sticks into those tiny holes, but she can do it.

*We had parent teacher conferences last week and they all went well. I managed to visit with all 6 of Taylor's teachers this year so that was good. They all said he was doing fantastically well. His science teacher told me that he is one of the most intelligent children she has taught in her nearly 40 years of teaching. Another teacher I talked with for all of 30 seconds. She said there is nothing she had to say to me because Taylor was the perfect student. He ended up with three A+'s and 3 A's and one A-. Kendall, who was nervous about what his teacher would tell me because he thinks he is not smart (kinda hard to follow a brother like Taylor), is also doing a phenomenal job. He had all A's with one B in Art which his regular teacher said was the grade that all her kids got from that teacher. I have lots of opinions about that art teacher but that's a post for another day. (Let's just say she is the teacher that wants things done exactly her way and allows for no creativity at all. My kids do not like her and I don't blame them.) Lynnsey in first grade doesn't get letter grades yet but she is also doing well and got all O's (outstanding) and S's (satisfactory) in all her subjects. Her teacher says she is really creative in her writing ability and that she is becoming a little math whiz. Go Lynnsey! (She didn't get the math talent from me!) And we even had a conference with Spencer's preschool teacher who raved about how far he has come since he started. He's been a little shy guy but she says he's finally coming around and starting to join some of the other kids in their play. He is getting better with his pencil grip and is now writing his name. He can recognize nearly all of his letters now and is very into counting and sorting. He also got all S's and a few O's. We're really proud of all the kids and all their hard work!

*Lynnsey recently lost another tooth but unfortunately the tooth fairy that comes to Michigan is a real scatterbrain. Lynnsey isn't the first of our kids to be devastated to wake up in the morning and see that there is still a tooth and no money under the pillow. I need to call someone about this because it is just unacceptable. Anyone else ever have tooth fairy troubles?

*Kaya is really beginning to talk a lot more. Some of her vocabulary includes: Mama, Dada, baba (bottle), ba (ball), baby, wa (water) and gagua (agua), no, gucka (sucker), angy (candy), go, ma (more), and done. She also mimics some of the other words we say too but hasn't used them on her own quite yet. This is always a favorite time of mine to watch their language taking off and see how they learn to communicate. She's such a cutie.

*I'm envious of my mom who is right now on a cross country train ride to go and help with my sister Susannah's brand new baby girl. I've always thought it would be fun to travel by train. And I'm just aching to see and hold that new baby!

*There's lots more day to day stuff happening but I smell a stinky diaper that needs attention and then I have to put together a quick lunch for Kaya and the little girl I babysit before we go and pick up Spencer from preschool. I'll try to do better at keeping things updated.

Trick or Treat, Gosh! (Plus some creepy crawlers and Doctor Who?)

Halloween is always a favorite around here. We especially love finding fun costumes and the past few years we've done a themed Halloween. But this year, with the recession and all, we decided to recycle some of our past costumes instead and let the kids do their own thing. It kind of worked out. Exept Lynnsey didn't want to not have a theme so since Kaya was going to use an old bumblebee costume, she thought that she and Spencer should do a bug theme with her. Fine except we didn't have a butterfly or spider costume so we ened up spending money for those. Kendall decided on Napoleon Dynamite which of course, we also didn't have. More money. Taylor, who is completely and totally obsessed with the BBC Doctor Who television series decided to be the Doctor. Again, no costume. More money. In the end, we should have gone with a theme. It may have been cheaper. Or maybe we should have turned to Kendall's skills at costume design. He spent half the day on Halloween designing costumes for some of the stuffed animals. From Right to Left: A Dementor Lion, Sith Lord Teddy Bear, Nephi the Husky, Lynnsey's Princess Puppy, a spotted Pirate Pup, and Superdog Maverick. Not too bad huh? My favorite was the pirate.

Friday night we had a great Trunk or Treat at church to which I neglected to bring my camera. The kids had a ball eating a kid-friendly dinner and participating in some really great carnival games including a cake walk in which you could play and win as many times as you want. And our kids did. And won. A lot. Anyone need some cupcakes or brownies? And then of course loading up their bags with junkfood is the best time ever! Kaya has discovered candy and can now be found chanting constantly: "Gucka, gucka!" (Sucker, if you can't tell). That night after we got home we tried to get the candy all out of her reach. But later, after getting the other kids in bed, I returned to find what she'd been up to during that time.

Of course, she got to keep the darn sucker. How am I supposed to resist that face?

Finally, the big night arrived and here are the fantastic costumes:

I warned Taylor that no one would know who he was. Would any of you know? I didn't think so. But even so, we did a great job at putting his costume together by copying a picture. (I did find a more authentic costume on eBay but even I draw a line at spending $165 dollars even though Taylor was begging for it. Seriously, the kid is addicted. I can totally see him at a Doctor Who convention someday. At least he'll have a costume!) I found his jacket at Goodwill and had to buy him a pair of brown pants online to match. He bought his Sonic Screwdriver with his own money because I suggested gluing a jewel on the end of a regular screwdriver from the tool box. Both Kalen and Taylor looked at me like they couldn't believe I would even dare suggest such a thing! (Yes, Kalen is the reason that Taylor is hooked on the show.) Taylor also made his police box tartis (sp?) to hold his candy in. We gelled his hair into a messy do, added tennis shoes, a dress shirt and tie and voila! He was The Doctor. I actually found myself doing a double take a few times because he really did look like the David Tennant character he was emulating. But no one knew who he was. Well, one person did. And a few others got it after a couple of hints. But mostly no one got it. Now, had he been in England...

Next is a kid with some pretty sweet skills. In addition to his costume designing skills, this kid does a great Napoleon Dynamite impersonation. We found his costume on eBay and there was no mistaking who this kid was dressed as. Right down to the moon boots and half-closed eyes. He even made his voice deeper and talked like Napoleon: "Give me some candy, gosh!"

Years ago I saw a cute idea in a magazine for a butterfly costume. I cut out the picture of the costume but neglected to cut out the directions. So for Lynnsey's costume, I ended up guessing my way through it. It turned out really cute though and she was thrilled. And chilled. The temperature was a brisk 40 degrees out that night so most of the time she kept her wings wrapped tightly around her and no one really knew what she was. When we visited her first grade teacher though, she wanted to take Lynnsey's picture and was so impressed with the costume that she asked her if she would be willing to wear it to class in the spring for their butterfly unit. Lynnsey was pretty excited about that. Mostly because it is bound to be warmer then!

At first Spencer wanted to be a caterpillar but I was having a really hard time finding an affordable costume on eBay. So he decided to be a scary spider instead. I found lots of spider costumes but most of them looked really kind of dumb to me. I was pretty sure he didn't want a costume with a top hat and bow tie with white gloves on all of his hands. I found a cute Pottery Barn costume though--for around $50. So I gave up on that until I saw one that was identical to the Pottery Barn costume but the lady who listed it said the tags had been removed so she wasn't sure what the brand name was and listed it for much, much, much less. I bought it. Spencer loved it. Even if he looked more adorable than scary.

And Kaya was the easiest of all. Kendall wore this costume when he was little and I hung onto it but because of our other themed Halloween's no one else ever got to wear it. It seemed fitting that our busiest bee of all got to have a turn in it. She hates having anything on her head so she wasn't a fan of this costume, but after being out in the cold I think she decided it was better to keep the hood on.

I tried to get a picture of the group right before we headed out trick-or-treating but Kaya was trying to escape and everyone was just anxious to be going, so this is the best we could do:

We had a fun time but hurried through it and didn't go to as many houses as usual because Spencer was only just recovered from the flu and wound up getting exhausted early on. But apparently the people we did visit were incredibly generous with their treats. Multiply generous times five kids and our usual community candy bowl became a community candy 5 gallon bucket!

Isn't that insane? (And guess what I do every time I walk past that blasted thing?)

We made sure to count out the "tithing candy" for our branch president's office again this year. He ended up with a good sized bag of candy. But it barely made a dent in the bucket:

(And yes, that is Kaya in the background sneaking more "Gucka's). It's a great object lesson on how little ten percent really is. And now we'll be eating candy till Christmas. Or at least until next week at the rate I'm going... Hope you all had a great Halloween too!

Fall Fun

Fall in Michigan is very beautiful. I love the brilliant colors and crunching leaves under foot. I love apple cider and pumpkins and Halloween. But fall is not my favorite season for several reasons, the biggest of which is that after autumn comes winter! Every week at soccer games we get colder and colder where in the spring we may have few chilly games but they progressively get warmer and warmer. Another thing that we dislike about fall is that we end up with at least 20 tons of leaves carpeting our lawn that we have to rake up. Luckily I've escaped that chore this year because we've had two boys that were wanting to earn a little cash. Anyway, after one of the biggest raking sessions of the season we went out and took a few photos of the kids. This pile was a little deeper than it looked so you can barely see Kaya sitting in the middle of it.

Once we got her to stand up in the pile it worked out better.

Poor little Spencer had spent the week holed up inside with a terrible case of the flu. He stood at the window watching all the kids playing in the leaves. When I went back inside he was very sad that he didn't get a picture in the leaf pile either. So we brought him out for a turn.

He's really trying hard to look "not sick" in this picture. He was opening his eyes wider than I had seen in days so that I would think he was just fine. But shortly after the picture was taken he asked to go back in to the couch. Poor kid. (This flu is a complete nightmare!)