Happy Birthday Ivy!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY IVY GIRL!!

It's so hard to remember that Ivy's birthday is so close to Christmas. In fact this is the first year that we did anything special for it. The other years we figured she just wouldn't remember it at all. But this year she was so excited and planning it for weeks!

The tradition in our family is to wake up and first thing in the morning and have a crack of dawn celebration. Dave introduced a 6 verse birthday song that does NOT sound great with our early morning voices. Luckily the kids love it anyway.

Zach loved Ivy's Mermaid barbie and took some time to play with her pretty hair before going to work.

Ivy's birthday was on Sunday this year. So I forced her into a pretty dress and made her do her hair. I barely got a smile out of her for this picture because she was ramping up to a good sized fit because she didn't want her hair in ponies.

We even let her have a birthday party this year. She was pretty excited. It was nice and simple. Each kid got a cupcake with their own candle that they got to blow out and a balloon as a party favor. They all loved it! That's totally my kind of party!

Thanksgiving 2011

I have been a little lazy about posting our Thanksgiving trip to San Diego. But my sister-in-law Wendy got hers up right away. So I pretty much just copied and pasted her blog and plan on making minor adjustments. I think I'm brilliant!

This ranks among the best Thanksgivings we've ever had! They're all good (how could a holiday centered around food be bad?), but this year was extra special. We got to go to San Diego to crash at Dave's sister Wendy and Paul's house. It was really awesome because Ryan and Liz got to come too (they've been in France for the last two years so it's the first time we're really been able to spend a good chunk of time with them.)

We got in Wednesday night, and the kids hit it off immediately. We were lucky that we have such great cousins. Owen was happy reading and drawing with Eva while Porter Ivy and Reese took advantage of every square inch in the apartment to leave toys around.

I lucked out and got to play with Amelia the whole weekend! She is so happy and smiley and I LOVE those chubby cheeks. I can't get enough of them!!!

While everyone else was busy making dinner, I took the kids to the park to play. I was so excited because they have trees there and the leaves are changing colors!! I had forgotten how beautiful the leaves can be! It was awesome because there were a ton of leaves on the ground. So we put them all in a pile and spent a ton of time jumping in the leaves. My kids LOVED it! They see it on the movies but never really get a chance to play in them.

Of course we can't be within 5 hours of a beach and not go. So Friday we hit the beach. Luckily it was only a 15 min drive and so AMAZING! We went to La Jolla Shores and let the kids run wild while the boys braved the freezing water to do some boogie boarding. Dave was a little disappointed that Beach Bumm Teresa didn't jump in the water...but I'm just not that crazy...the water was COLD! Porter couldn't get enough of it though. He spent the whole afternoon jumping in the waves. He would only come in to warm up when we yelled at him. Eva and Ivy were more sane, they were content to run away from the water and play in the sand. Dave was a super hero and got in the water to play with the kids and try his skills with a boogie board.

We went to Balboa Park to look at the trees and see Santa. They had the best Santa in the world. He was REAL! Eva didn't get a chance to tell Santa what she wanted for Christmas. She was in tears. So I whipped out my cell phone and called Santa on my phone. Eva asked if it was the REAL Santa and I told her it was the Santa that brought me my presents every year. So she was able to tell him what she wanted and to feel very special and loved.

OK so I didn't end up stealing EVERYTHING from Wendy's blog, but I'm glad she got me started. I love you all and am so grateful for the blessing of family and friends in my life!

Pumpkin Patch

The last night that Kiley and Brent were here we went to Schnepf Farms to the pumpkin patch. It's such a fun place to go play. They have a bunch of fun rides the kids can ride on, a corn maze to get lost in, face painting, dirt to play in, bugs to catch, and bats to watch. Needless to say we ended up not getting home till about 10:00 that night. The kids were exhausted...or maybe just the grownups were. :)

Brent and Kiley Visit

Dance Party!!!

Brent and Kiley had a conference here in AZ this fall. We had so much fun with them. The kids LOVED having their cousins all to themselves. I was a little nervous that Kayden and Ivy would throw a lot of fits because they're both three. Luckily they are both an old enough three that they just had a lot of fun playing dress up and dolls with each other. It was so cute because they would come out in their princess costumes and want the radio on for a dance party. How could we say no to a dance party?! So we totally rocked out. Of course Colby wanted in on the action so he would party in his heels and hair flowers. Who says girls get to have all the fun?!

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Glamour Shots!!

In addition to our dance parties, Kiley pulled everyone outside and did a photo shoot with the girls. Poor Kiley didn't know what she was in for, once my kids get someone taking pictures they NEVER stop posing. Needless to say they LOVED it! She even got some awesome shots of Dave SMILING in the pictures! She is truly a gifted photographer. :)

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Crazy Spooky Crafts

After a quick trip to Micheals, we helped everyone make Halloween necklaces for a quick and easy craft.

And of course you can't be this close to Halloween without decorating something with candycorns. We frosted cupcakes and decorated them with eyeballs, candycorn fangs, and licorice legs for spiders. It looked so easy in the pictures online, but our spider cupcakes just turned into scary monsters. Mostly scary because the kids all carefully licked the frosting off their fingers and each piece of candy before decorating them. When they present you with their decorated cupcake so happy and proud it's impossible not to eat it.

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Book Worms

Eva is at that fantastic age where she loves taking care of little kids. She spent hours reading to Kaedyn and playing dress up. It was awesome because it kept both of them really busy for nice big chunks of time.

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Turtle Time

One of the coolest things about living in Arizona is that we have two turtles as pets. These desert turtles just roam free in our back yard eating little bugs and grass. They are totally easy pets to have. Colby was super pumped by them. It took him a minute to be brave enough to touch the shell, but once he figured out they were real he loved hunting for them around the yard.

Bathroom Remodel

I have been getting a lot of comments about how ugly the kids/guest bathroom was so I decided to work on remodeling it. It was originally painted a light yellow with a whitewashed oak vanity. Definitely not the cutest room in the house.

To begin with, I repainted the vanity to a nice pretty black. Instead of painting it with a paint brush, my friend suggested we spray paint it. I was doubtful, but decided to go ahead with it. It was AWESOME. Because it's spray paint, I didn't have to sand or anything! I just covered the vanity and floor with plastic and threw a garbage bag over the toilet. It took about30 minutes to put two coats on the whole thing. It has held up really well and is super easy to clean. Then we added a new mirror with a nice big frame that I found at a salvage yard for $20.

I wasn't loving my towel rack, so Zach made me this cute shelf with wood we had around the house. We pulled the hooks off of an old bashed up shelf and it is perfect for hanging towels.

I found some pretty dusty purple towels and sewed a piece of ribbon in the middle for hanging from the hooks. I chose some cute ribbon with fun sayings like, "Journey, Cute as a Button, Love, Follow Your Dreams, etc. With the left over ribbon, I sewed a length of ribbon across the bottom of the towels to finish it off. I think they turned out really cute, and the ribbon helps kids and guests keep track of which towel is theirs.

I added a few small black mirrors from Ikea to finish the look and Viola! My super cute new bathroom. The kids LOVE it! Eva keeps going in and saying, "It looks SO FANCY!" I agree...now I just have to find the perfect mirror for MY bathroom and I'll make it just as beautiful...some day.

Trip to Sedona

For our Columbus Day celebration and to kick off our Fall Break, we headed north to Sedona, Arizona. We love Sedona. It's a beautiful place to get out of the city, hike around, and play in the forest.

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Pool Play Time

We usually just head down for the day and come right back. But this time we decided to get a hotel room. We had a great time in the pool. Zach and the kids spent the whole time doing crazy tricks that gave me a heart attack!

The pool was too cold for our little Arizona gal, so she spent most of the time in the hot tub with mom.

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Lucky Lizard

Zach found a little lizard floating in the pool. I thought it was dead, but once it warmed up in Zach's hands it was definitely alive. Zach is determined to keep it for his little brother Christian. I told him if I found it, I was going to throw it away. So Zach has been very careful to keep the little guy hidden away. Crazy boys!

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Tuff Stuff

The first day Zach was here, he was wondering around the house without his shirt on. One of the kids asked him why he didn't have a shirt on, and his answer was, "Cause it makes me feel tuff." Now I can't get ANYONE in the house to wear shirts because everyone is walking around feeling tough, especially Ivy!!!

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Wading Woes

We found a super cool creek to play in. It was perfect for wading and throwing rocks in. Needless to say, nobody stayed dry for very long...it was awesome!!

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Spidey Man!

Turns out Zach considers himself to be a bit of a Spiderman. The whole trip he was climbing trees and encouraging the kids to practice their Spiderman skills every chance they got.