Lunch with the princesses at Disneyland

This trip we tried to do different things that we haven't done before, just to change it up and have it still be fun. We even staked out our spot on the parade route and sat for over 2 hours just so the kids could see it. Well, at least my sister-in-law Heather and I did while the rest of the group went and rode some more rides. We also had lunch with the princesses and her cousin Chanel came along. It was a great time had by all. Even Katelyn got in on the fun.

Kelsey would have nothing to do with her picture being taken but Katelyn like it. That is, until Cinderella came along.

Cinderella was the first to come around and the girls just loved it.

Just look at that smile.

We left Katelyn in her seat during the whole thing, but she was just amazed at the dresses they were wearing. I think she was in awe and overwhelmed at how sparkly and beautiful they all were.

Katelyn was very upset when Sleeping Beauty wouldn't share her crown. More like give it to her.

I think that's a princess in training right there!!

Help with the lights, anyone?

Do you ever feel like what you do is completely in vain? One step forward, two steps back? Our little helpers as we'd like to call them. Our help usually comes in the way of a missing toothbrush or comb, keys or cell phone. But most recently Dave's alarm clock, which we found in the trash, headed out to the street and now the thermometer. We've looked everywhere, virtually torn the house apart for it and have come up empty handed. I'm not really sure how many things we've had to replace because of our little helpers, but I've lost count by now. Anyway, here are some cute pics of them "helping" with the Christmas lights.

The candy canes were so nicely laid out so all I had to do was come along with a stake and pound them into the ground. But the girls had other plans for them!

They're just conversing on what do with them firstWho's up for a game of hockey?This one's my favorite, because one minute she's down in the garage, again "helping" and the next she's hanging out the window trying to get up to help Dave on the roof. I think she would've been out had I not looked up at Dave just at the right time.The finished product ... Well not really, we've only just begun.

We're outta here

We're leaving for California today for a little Disneyland trip and some yummy Thanksgiving food. Hope you all have a safe and fun holiday and I'll be posting more pics when we get back. See you in a week!!

I've been tagged!!

Tag, you're it! Here's how to play: Once you've been tagged, you have to write a blog with 10 weird, funny, random things, facts, habits, or goals about yourself. At the end, choose 10 people to be tagged, listing their names.



1. My sister is one of my closest friends. It hasn't always been that way for us. She was always the "annoying" little sister that I always wanted when I only had brothers. It's only been recent since she went off to college and now we talk more than we ever have before. It's great.


2. I have a room full of fabric and scrapbook supplies that I will never get to. I have good intentions of getting to it someday, but frankly, I just have too much stuff and it's very overwhelming. But I love it anyway.


3. I'm an ebay finatic. Buying, selling, love it all.

4. I hate the park. I go for the girls, but I just don't like it at all. They're either so busy that I get paranoid immediately upon losing sight of one of them or they are empty and they get bored just playing with each other.

5. I've been to France twice and it's over rated. Of course you have to go there, but I didn't love it.

6. I'm a reality tv junkie. My faves are Survivor, Amazing Race and Next Iron Chef. Not so much, Next Food Network Star.

7. I secretly love Grey's Anatomy and Private Practice. I have to be because Dave calls it my nighttime soap opera. Ok so maybe it is a little but who doesn't think Patrick Dempsy is hot?

8. I don't call Las Vegas home. I love the snow and want to live in Colorado. We will eventually and we're only here temporarily.

9. I don't like BYU. I know, I know, I'm not a true Mormon however, I just never got into that whole meat market scene.

10. I have a feet fetish. I can't stand them. That's why I have to have my toes painted at all times just to tolerate them.

Sorry, guys I was tagged twice, my brain hurts to come up with anymore on a whim.

I tag Debi, Micaela, Susan, Brianne, Kaylene, Stephanie, Camille, Jessica, Rob, and Nikki.

A mother's intuition

You can call it whatever you like but I think I'm finally getting better at this mom stuff. Some of you may know, I'm not one to rush off to the doctor for a stuffy little nose or the slightest cough. No way, they're not getting my copay just for some prescription they think might clear it up. But I think I deserve a pat on the back for this one (well, sort of).

Katelyn has had a runny nose for a week now, and her pour little face is just rubbed raw from always wiping it away. She is teething (6 coming in at her 1 year appointment) so I just figured it was a side effect of that. However Tuesday it turned green so I promptly made an appointment for yesterday because we are leaving for Disneyland in 10 days and don't want anything like that for Thanksgiving at all. Sick kids are hard for holidays, but traveling with them is almost unbearable for me.

The doctor walks in the room, and Katelyn immediately tugs at her ear and coughs. Neither of which she has been doing at home. It couldn't be more on cue at all. That never happens, the symptoms usually go dormant at the sound of walking into the doctor's office. Anyway she gets done doing all her inputting and starts to check her over. She discovered she has a slight ear infection (which she said has only been about a day or so) and her cough is not in her lungs yet, but gave me a prescription for it if it dropped any lower. Since she had RSV last February the slightest cough goes straight to her chest which she said will happen till she's about 2.

So for once I got it right. She will be done with her meds just in time for the trip, hopefully with a clean bill of health. It was more of a precaution visit than anything but it finally paid off. And the best thing is that I was in and out and back home in an hour. That never happens either!!

Sidebar: At her 1 year she weighed in at 17 lbs 12 oz. And at this visit, 18 lbs 2 oz. That's a whole 6 ounces in 6 weeks. Just a tiny petite thing. Oh well.

A night of tricks and treats!!

It's that time again, when Dave takes a day off work to get our yard ready and looking like an old cemetary with things jumping out around every corner. There are quite a few updates and additions from last year.

She was just fascinated with this rat!! So cute.

She kept poking it to see if it would move. Why not, everything else was!!

The usual carving of the pumpkin. Kelsey just sitting there looking cute and wouldn't have anything to do with putting her fingers inside and pull the guts out. And Katelyn was nowhere to be found. Oh well, there's always next year.

She wouldn't even hit the bottom of it to dump the loose seeds out!! But she'll crawl around in the garage and out in the dirt and get filthy!! Go figure.

Yes, that's right. This is not even our yard. Our neighbor has been asking for a few years now for us to bring some stuff over to her side and this year it just got too big that we took her up on it. She got the coffin, some tombstones (with pop-up skulls behind them) and the bleeding guillotine. Oh yeah, you read that right. I was bleeding!! That's Dave for ya!!

Our yard (one side).

The hang man kicked and the grim reaper came out at you after leaving the door!! Wahaha

The toxic waste dump.

His eyes glowed red, with a fog machine in the bottom.

This guy was stuck under this barrel. The lid opened and shut and he sat up and laid back down.
This was the highlight of the whole set up. Well, this and the blast of air at the front door that shot at you as well.

This was the only photo we were able to get before Katelyn quickly jumped off the bench and ran away. But I think she made a pretty cute little pumpkin. And that hat only stayed on for pictures. Then it was gone.

I love this face.

Her cheek is bulging with food, teddy grahams, I think.

Checkin' it all out. And she couldn't be scared because Kelsey wasn't scared. The competition starts already.

Hmmm, what's in here that looks good?

The pumpkin patch

We took a trip to the pumpkin patch over the weekend and the girls had a blast. It was comical because Katelyn was so mesmerized by everything that she wouldn't hold still for many pictures, but we tried to snap a few.

Katelyn was very frustrated she couldn't just walk through without ducking her head under so she just stood there waiting for Kelsey to come back.

Kelsey loves to have her picture taken but Katelyn refuses to be "posed" for the camera. What can I say, they are about as opposite as they could possibly be.

She did however just sit in the pile of pumpkins to look cute.

She kept picking them up and throwing them on the ground, I think because she thought they were balls, and faster than we could gather them back up again!! Considering this was Katelyn's real trip to the pumpkin patch, she got more photos than Kelsey, truly a first!! :)

Girls & jeans

I'm sorry, but I just love little girls in jeans. And Katelyn is no exception.

She does this thing with any article of clothing with a hole in that she can put her arm through. The most popular however, are Kelsey's panties and I have no idea why, other than she doesn't need them yet.
Check out that cute butt, or lack there of!! The diaper is the other thing holding those things up!!
What up?!

Pigtails

Well, it took quite an effort on all our parts, mainly mine but we did accomplish pigtails for the first time. Doesn't she look so cute?! I know it's just the back and side of her head, but you can't see them from head on.

A conversation I didn't think I'd be having at 3

Judging by the title you may be thinking something else, but please read on for your personal enjoyment!! Anyone who has little girls knows this - they love cell phones. And this is especially true for Kelsey. She has quite a few play phones that she walks around with having conversations all day long. Lately she has branched out and more than just "talking to dad" she now calls her friends and their moms and schedules play dates with them. A couple of nights ago we were sitting down to dinner and here's how it went.

Me: Kelsey we don't bring phones to the dinner table. (I was clearly interrupting an important conversation with someone because the phone was still in the open position.)

Kelsey: Silence, then slams the phone shut.

And, we ate the rest of our dinner in silence. It so reminded me of those commercials you see on tv where the teenage daughter is on her phone and can't come join the family because she's taking a very important call. Oh, the things we have to look forward to. At least she doesn't know about texting yet. And it's still free!!

The ipod dilemma

So for Dave's birthday I got him an ipod and he is loving it. Unfortunately, so are we all, especially Kelsey. After getting music from his brother and creating all our playlists, Kelsey has become quite the little know-it-all when it comes to music now. She even has her own playlist which does not consist of children's songs or anything like it. I know, I know, I'm a mean mom and refuse to play those in the car. I think they cause more road rage than anyone is willing to admit!! They are all songs heard on the radio She hears songs in stores long before I even realize she is singing to them and recognizes songs sometimes before I do, it's just great. Well, this weekend Dave was on a shootout with the elder's quorum and high priests (he's the reason the high priests are even invited) and Kelsey this morning asked what we had at our home. I wasn't quite sure what she was asking until I figured out she meant the ipod because she was listening to Online (Brad Paisley) in my car because that is one of the 16 days worth of songs she can listen to. Anyway, when I asked, "Do you mean the ipod?"

"Yeah, that. I want to listen to it."

"Honey, dad took it shooting with him."

Immediately tears well up in her eyes and start flowing down her face, I kid you not. "But I want to listen to music."

After I got her calmed down, fortunately Dave had left his computer that had all the music on it so she at least got to listen to it from there. She doesn't realize that was dad's birthday present and that he can take it whenever he wants. Or maybe she does and she just thinks he should share with her, which in turn means give it to her.

She's only 3 and her wish lists are already too expensive!!

Oh, and by the way, her absolute favorite songs are Sweet Escape (Gwen Stefani), Online (Brad Paisley), Dirty Little Secret (All-American Rejects), Girlfriend (Avril Lavigne) and First Time (Lifehouse). She knows all the words to the first two and can be heard all over the house singing any of these songs. I think that tops your Fat Bottom Girls Lindsay?

Another Disneyland trip under our belts

These season passes have certainly paid for themselves!! But we've had a great time using them, and they aren't expired for another 5 months!!

The dreaded tea cups.

Everyone gets a turn

Knocking at the white rabbit's door

Posing with Princess Atta.

Kelsey, Mary, Mater and Lightning McQueen

Daddy/daughter campout

Each month Kelsey watches as her dad takes the scouts camping so Dave and a few of the dads in the ward (those who have daughters) decided to go on the first unofficial ward daddy/daughter campout. And they had a great time. Katelyn had to stay behind because she was a little too young, but mainly because she was in the back of the truck eating the firewood and would more than likely fall in the fire. At first Kelsey was sad that she didn't get to go, but by the end of packing up, she was rubbing it in that Katelyn was too little and couldn't go just yet. And at first Katelyn was loving the one on one time with mom and playing in the bath with the toys by herself, until bedtime came. Whereupon she started to cry and cry and cry some more because Kelsey wasn't there and she just knew that she was off having a great time with dad and that she was missing out. Only to find out that she was not the only one having a late night. But she did eventually sleep until about 6. Which is all we could hope for. They had a great time on hikes and making marshmallow sandwiches (s'mores) and playing with her friends. And some pictures Kelsey even contributed to!!

Such a ham!!

Dad's cookin'.
Just relaxing from a hard day.

Such tired eyes!
Great fire, dad.

All the girls are up and dads still want to be in bed.

Kelsey and Abby
This is the best day ever

She even got to bring some "treasured" rocks home with her.

Heading off on a hike.

Not your average outing at the park

Although I don't have any pictures of it, it's gotta be told. We decided to take some old bread and feed the ducks this morning. One of the parks that is near our house is a dinosaur discovery park that is just freakin' awesome as far as parks go, if I must say so myself. There is waterfalls with ducks, turtles, ducklings, (in the spring) and for the first time, geese. So we get out and all the ducks are laying in the grass sunning themselves and they just start walking up to us when along come 5-6 geese. They were about as tall as Kelsey when they stretched their necks and she was unfortunately holding the bread right at the level of their beaks. The ducks are much less aggressive but this one geese was just not scared and walked right up to her. While she was just trying to feed it, it nipped her finger and she started screaming thinking it had taken off her finger, only to find, it took the rest of her bread. And then she started laughing because it was choking on the bread. It had taken a pretty big piece and tried to stuff it down it's throat before anyone else could steal it back. After the commotion had subsided, we checked her hands with all fingers intact and discovered that she was in fact, just fine.

So over to the park we went. Now granted, this is really the first time Katelyn's enjoyed the park because it's just been too hot and now that she's walking better she can climb up and down and go down the slide by herself. She thinks she is so big. So after 1 1/2 hours of digging, playing, climbing, and sliding I decided it was time to go grab some lunch. After lunch we headed home, only 5 minutes away, and that poor little girl didn't even make it home. She was sacked out in her seat. So cute!! It wasn't too difficult though, because after much weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth trying to cut her 2 naps down to one, she finally gave in and has been down to one nap since Friday. Hooray!! And she did it all herself because I just gave up on forcing her. And now she sleeps till 7:30 and is ready for bed at 7!! Life is good