KAI AND AMY...this one's for you

OCTOBER

October was a fun month for us.

Mason is in LOVE with the season. We would all have to look at every "haunted house" along our path as we went about our day, we spent HOURS looking at Halloween decor at every store that carries it, Mason spent everyday creating more "decorations" for his room, and he has planned out his costumes for the next 15 years. (Mason even cried one day because our house "isn't scary at all".)

We also spent most days in October with painted faces. Don was kind enough to allow Mason to paint him as a Vampire one afternoon. What a good Dad.

Morning Breath...

Kennedy hates my morning breath.

The kids always come and snuggle in my bed with me in the morning when they wake up. (Don is already gone for work, he likes to get there early so he can be home early.)

On Saturday Morning when they got up and came down, Don was still in bed so we had so squeeze in tight and I had to scoot Kennedy really close to me.

She gagged.

Thanks K.

Sneaky...
There is a no gum rule at Mason's Pre-school. I knew this, but I forgot. The other day Mason asked for a piece of gum, I got him one and rushed him out the door for school. Upon his return home, he asked for another piece because he had to get rid of his at school.

Mom: "Oh, that's right you had to spit it out because you can't have gum at school."

Mason: (in a sneaky voice) "Yep, but I got really far with it."

Mom: "Really far with it?"

Mason: "Ya, I had it all the way until the end of the day when we were watching the ballerinas." (the nutcracker dancers came for a visit this day)

Although Don and I had a good laugh about this, I was disappointed that he was so proud of sneaking his gum most of the day. He is my sweet little boy that wants to please and USUALLY follows all the rules. I know its just gum, but I hated that he was sneaking.

The sneaking didn't stop that day.

I have told him he can't take toys to school. (I am assuming this is a rule.) Well he made a treasure map this morning and took it in his pocket to use at recess with his friends. He told me he pulled it out and showed everyone "where to go" and then folded it back up really small and put it back in his pocket. Mmmmmm.

Stay tuned for more sneaking at our house....I'm afraid it is just beginning.

Summer Swimming Lessons

(August)

Mason loved swimming lessons this summer. He finally got over his fears and so he had so much more fun playing at the pool this year. Thankfully he is such a good boy that he usually follows directions and so when I wasn't in the pool with him he would stay in the shallow end like I asked him to do. (Then I didn't have to worry.)

I also think that it helped that I got him goggles. I always thought goggles were for wimps. I don't know why I thought that, but I'm over it and he swims much better now that he has them.

(One evening we were all getting together at Don's sisters house and I arrived after everyone else. My Mother-in-Law said "Wow, Mason is swimming so well, you didn't tell me he could swim all the way across the pool." Oh, I didn't know he could. Apparently he wanted to show her so he jumped off the diving board and swam all the way to the shallow end. I was so proud of my little 5 year old.)

His two "best moves" off the diving board this summer included this...
and this.
Pretty fancy stuff. :)

Kennedy did not enjoy lessons this summer, at all. She was used to the warm room that she swam in during the winter and spring that this going outside stuff was no fun to her. I have to admit the pool was pretty cold. She would lay on the concrete to get warm while she was waiting for her turn.
On the last day of swimming lessons this teacher makes them go off the slide and Kennedy was having no part of it. Here she staying as far away as possible.
Here she is after the teacher "helped" her up there...
Kennedy decided she would be going back down...
Stefany says....no way...I'll go with you then.
Kennedy was so ticked and still tells me she hates the slide. Hopefully next summer will bring more luck with her.

It's a Boy...

Don and I could not decide if it was a good idea to take the kids to the ultrasound with us. In the end decided we would take them....NOT a good idea.

I had forgotten that we were really going to see if the baby is developing normally and not just to find out the gender. I had also forgotten how long they actually spend measuring everything. As I laid there just waiting for the moment when the doc would let me go pee, Don struggled to keep the kids quiet and respectful.

So after about 45 minutes the doc finally said well here you can see, it's a boy. I looked down toward the end of the bed at my family and realized they weren't listening and I said, hey guys did you hear that, it's a boy. Kennedy was DEVASTATED! Tears started streaming down her face and she said "No, I want a sister not a boy!". She carried on for some time, it was really sad.

I think more sadness will come after the baby is born and Mason discovers that this brother that he has been waiting for isn't going to be a playmate for some time and once he is old enough to be a playmate, Mason won't be interested anymore.

At any rate, I am excited for the new little one that will be coming into our home.

Operation: Pile o' Thank-yous

This post is copied from my sister, Amberly. I have a portion of it here, but check out her blog for the full deal. I think this is a great idea!
http://jasonandamberly.blogspot.com/

"I think it is polite to send a thank you note.

(Even if I have failed to send you a much deserved thank you note I still think it is polite to send a thank you note - hey, I'm not perfect.)

And seeing how it is November and all - the month for gratitude - I decided to send my Commander-in-Chief a little thank you love. I was thinking about this quote, "...The world has enough women who are tough; we need women who are tender. There are enough women who are coarse; we need women who are kind. There are enough women who are rude; we need women who are refined..." (full article here) and I thought what, my friends, is more tender, kind, and refined than a lovely homemade thank-you card with a thoughtful expression of gratitude?

By the by, I called the White House today to make sure that mail can really get to the President and I was assured that it would. I am not kidding, I really called the White House and I even blushed a full crimson blush as I talked to the switchboard operator. So get going, send a card, and pass this on."

I too hate that President Bush is being blamed for things that are not in his control. Check out the following article....I found it interesting.

http://www.meridianmagazine.com/ideas/081017light.html

Now go check out Amberly's blog... http://jasonandamberly.blogspot.com

(Libbie...just copy and past the URL in your browser) :) :)

Mowing The Lawn

Mason loves to help Uncle Kevin mow the lawn.

As soon as he hears the mower out there, he hurries out to "help".

(On this particular day he wasn't dressed and I told him to get some clothes on before going out. Stripes and plaid....)

GOD BLESS AMERICA.

I've been emotional today. Like many of you, I am concerned about the election today and the future of our Country. Let's keep praying.

Babies and Irvine Lagoon

Mason: "Mom, we can keep having babies because when Kennedy gets bigger she can start having them for us and I'll be the Dad."

So after some explaining, and me thinking that he understood, we dropped the subject.

About a week later...

Mason: "So what is Jer (his cousin) going to do because he has 2 sisters, so will he just have to choose 1 to have his babies?"

I guess I didn't do a very good job explaining the first time. The only thing he DID remember is that he can't have babies until AFTER his mission and AFTER he is married.

So I took a new approach. We talked about different girls that are his age now, that maybe after his mission he could date and if he fell in love with one he could ask her to marry him.

One of the girls that I mentioned is THIS CUTIE who is one of his friends. A few minutes later he informed me that he doesn't think he'll ask Edyn to marry him because he thinks she'll say no. I let him know that she'll be chasing him around in a few years.

So then he wanted to know who Kennedy can marry. I already have him picked out and Kennedy likes him as well. Here they are... she is flirting already.

You can find HIM and his family HERE. Aren't they great?!

Blogging Hiatus

You may have been wondering where I have been, or maybe you haven't wondered since I have never been that great about blogging. Since it has been so long since my last post, maybe you have given up on me my dear friends. Hopefully not, because my BLOGGING HIATUS is because I have been hoovering over the throne for the last 7 weeks....

Liam's Blessing Day

We were so glad that we were able to be there for Liam's blessing. The first picture is us with my sister Megan, her husband Tyson and their 2 boys.

(My kids wanted me to take hundreds of pictures of them in this tree. I even have pictures of Kennedy crying after I told them I was done taking pictures of them. )

Where Do I Start?

So where do you start when you haven't blogged in 2 months. It feels so overwhelming that I don't even want to catch up. So I could start from today, but then I wouldn't have on record all of the fun and not so fun things that have been happening in the last 2 months.

So here is a quick run down and then I will will follow up with pictures and more details in the days to come.

-Went down to California to attend my nephew's baby blessing
-Met some of our favorite people in the world at Disneyland and had the best time
-Attended my baby Bro's Graduation from University of Seattle
-Went to the Seattle Science Center
-Painted our new house for 6 days (Many thanks to my awesome friends who helped)
-Spent 5 days cleaning/painting/finishing old projects at our old house (again thank you friends)
-Moved (Thank you friends)
-Swimming lessons
-Quick trip to Boise to visit my sister before the move to Utah (or Metah as Mason used to say)

So we have been busy and have had a great summer. Don is already saying we need to go back to Disneyland. We had so much fun.

Busy, Busy, Busy

I know it's been almost 2 months since my last post. Just give me a couple more weeks. We are moving and I am too busy. But when I get back, I have plenty to blog about.

Memorial Weekend

Dad and Kennedy

(She is holding her favorite toy she owns)

These kids played hard all weekend. So Fun

(Don't mind Mason's PJ top)

Kennedy and her friends playing in her bed.

(After a few minutes the other two girls came out of the tent and Kennedy stayed in there crying and one of the girls went up to her Mom and said Kennedy wasn't sharing her toys. I went in and asked Kennedy what was going on and she was sobbing saying "My friends won't play with me.". So I guess she expects her friends to sit there and watch her play with her toys. I hope she learned her lesson.)

Loving those marshmallows

She played in this mud all afternoon. I swam here at the river all growing up and now I can't even stand to get my feet in. So gross.

We didn't take enough pictures so we don't have everyone here. (Sorry). Even though it rained all night one night, and we had earwigs in all of our stuff, we had a blast camping.

Thanks friends for an awesome weekend.

Fingernails...

Kennedy, like all little girls, loves to have her fingernails painted. Today she saw some polish on the desk and asked me to paint her nails. When I looked down, I saw that she had clearly been biting her nails. I haven't seen her do this and we clip her nails often so it must have just been in the last couple of days. So I asked, "What happened to your fingernails?". Kennedy said, "I don't know.", while glancing down at her hands. Then I said, "Did you bite them?". Her response...."Noooo, I ATE them!".

hmmmm.

God Bless The USA

Don was on a business trip a couple of weeks ago and when we went to the airport to pick him up there was a Soldier returning home from IRAQ. I was so glad that we were there at the airport at that time.

There were all these people (that didn't know the soldier) there to welcome him home and thank him for his service. They had lots of flags and they had the song GOD BLESS THE USA playing while he was shaking hands. I was standing there crying like a baby, so proud to be an American.

I was impressed by all the people that took time out of their Saturday to drive over to the airport to let this serviceman know that they appreciate him. I am thankful that people are willing to serve and sacrifice so much for our Country.

There are lots of people in our government that are corrupt, I know this. But I feel like one of the luckiest girls in the world to live in this great Country.

Mason was so curious about the whole event. He has asked many, many times about where he was fighting and why. It is very hard to explain to a 4 year old. Mason is so blessed and he doesn't even have any idea. He has a home, a bed, toys, all the food he wants, clean clothes, fancy pre-school...the list goes on and on....

GOD BLESS THE USA

Just a Spoon Full of Sugar...

Mason was singing this song this afternoon and I thought it was cute. He is always dressed up in some way or another, he LOVES costumes. I love this boy.

ANNOYING...

Okay, so I just wrote the post below and the top picture you can click and enlarge and the bottom one you can't. What the heck?

WORKING HARD OR HARDLY WORKING

The weather here in the TC has been so wonderful. I LOVE springtime. We spent all day Saturday working in the yard and I have to say that I don't mind yard work on a beautiful spring day. I actually enjoyed myself.

Kennedy doesn't mind bugs if she sees them from a distance and then she will walk up and take a peak, as long as she feels totally in control. However she gets just a little frightened when one surprises her. There is always surprises when your doing yard work so she spent a chunk of time here and there in her car seat in the car. She felt more safe there. (Don't worry, we had all the windows down and it wasn't too hot. Oh, your probably wondering why she didn't just go inside...we were at one of our rentals.)

I tried to take a picture of the little rascal after a day in the dirt. She was sticking her face up really high and I said, "Can you hold your head just a little lower for me.". Below is the result. :)

THE HAIR
I know I have brought this up before and its a little embarrassing to even be bringing it up again....Mason has had several trims, but never a big cut. I finally decided it was time. My stomach hurt and I walked into Monkey Dooz and saw the lady working, and asked, "Is there anyone else working?" Why would I say something like that? So rude.

She said "No, just me". I actually told her we were in a huge hurry and would have to come back. What an idiot. So I had time to go in and then suddenly, I didn't have time anymore. Whatever. I never had to see her again and my boy still had his hair.

I did take him to my friend and his hair has since been chopped off and I don't like it. I think I will just wait until we go down to Disneyland and my awesome haircutting sister can fix it.

So, yes, his hair has been chopped off. You can see a picture on the next post down. I have to say though, now that it is cut, when I look at some of his old pictures, he looked a little like Billy Ray from the back....whoops. Sorry Mason.

THE POINT OF SEPARATION AT COSTCO

Costco can be so traumatic for young kids. You go all through this HUGE store that has tons of fun things, lots of food, and fill your cart to the brim, usually having the kids hold some items, (nothing that they asked for of coarse) and then.....you get up to the front.

The kids start getting a little anxious, they know whats coming. "Mama? Mama? Mama, hold me?" They know that they are going to be pushed onto the other side of the aisle and some strange man or woman is going to touch the cart and talk to them. (When you have 2 kids, you can't hold one and send the other alone, so I just let them suffer together). My kids hated this when they were younger (they are thankfully, fine with it now). They would put their head down and hope that no one talked to them and then when the boxing/bagging lady or man would excitedly say hello, the tears would come. They would sit there in total fear with huge tears streaming down their faces.

Well last week at Costco there was a black guy working. And he had dark, dark black skin and the little girl in his aisle was going crazy. She was so scared and anytime he came even close to the cart this girl would start screaming hysterically. "MAMA, MAMA, MAMA." She was kicking her legs and thrashing around. When he was done filling the cart and pulling the cart around to the end, she was so loud that no one else in the store was making a sound. I felt so bad for the bagger. He was smiling and trying not to look at her, but she would turn around and see if he was still there and scream louder. (Yes, I was trying to act like I wasn't staring just like everyone else in the store, but I totally was, just like everyone else in the store.) Apparently she has never seen a black man before and the line at Costco was not the best place for her first experience. We need more people of different races in our little community.

On another note....be proud my friends, very proud. As I was walking past the camera's at Costco I grabbed one and put it in my cart. No consumer reports reviews (yes, I have an online subscription) with me or anything. I just grabbed it. I was so proud of myself. Hopefully I don't regret it. I just bought the $170 nikon so not a huge deal if I don't like it.

First picture with my new camera. Kennedy did not want her picture taken....

I bribed her with a piece of candy....what a turkey

Does anyone know why sometimes when I upload pictures to my blog you can click on them and make them larger and sometime you can't? This drives me nuts.

HELPING A GOOD CAUSE

For every vocab word you get right 20 grains of rice are donated to the UN World Food Program.

Go to the website and start donating. It is fast and easy, I have been trying to donate one full bowl a day. You can do it very quickly.

http://www.freerice.com/

(Thanks Amberly for the information.)

Kennedy

-Sweetheart - Little Monkey -

-Rootin' Tootin' Fartin' Girl - Kenna - Princess-

It seems that I often post about all the bad things my kids do because I am so nervous about my blog being too braggy. But, I guess it is MY blog. So here's to being positive...

I love this little girl. I love her sassy little attitude and her sweetness. She is so cuddly and is just like a little monkey. When you pick her up she is so light and she just clings to you. Everyone loves to hold her.

I love when after I put her down for a nap and I leave her room she always yells 'I love you more!". I love how she looks over at me during swimming lessons when she knows she did a good job and she wants to see a thumbs up from me. I love seeing all 24 lbs of her floating in the water unassisted.

She can play well independently and that is so cute to watch. I love how she looks at her older brother to make sure she is doing things correctly.

After she would open a present on her birthday she would say, "Is this for ME? It's my FAVORITE!". So cute. I love how when she feels cute she walks with long strides, her head held high and smiles. (Don't we all do that a little?)

I love watching her little hand wipe her hair out of her face. I love how she puts her lip gloss ALL over her upper lip.

I am going to miss her sweet little voice when she gets bigger. Tonight we got home from the gym and Don had gotten home and cooked Spaghetti and when we walked in the door she said in her cute little high pitched voice, "Dad you cooked us SGHETTI?".

LOVE HER.

Random....

-Still searching for a camera. I need to do it. I have got to get myself a camera because not only is it effecting my blogging, but I have no pictures of some important recent events. (... Kennedy's 3rd B-day, Easter, Mason's soccer team, Don's b-day,....I could go on and on.) Do you want to know why I haven't found one yet? I always have to make sure I get the best deal for my money. Need a stroller? I'll tell you the best one, because you can believe that I researched it for hours. Car seat? Same thing. Washing Machine? You bet. Baby gift....I drive myself crazy! Libbie (who's baby was born March 2nd) has still not received a gift from me and I have gone looking 3 times. I have spent so much in gas that I could have gotten her my favorite outfit at the GAP full price....I annoy myself. :)

-Mason wants a new baby in our family, he has mentioned it several times lately. This morning he asked if the egg in my belly was cracking yet.

-Lately if Kennedy is doing something she shouldn't be and you correct her she says, "Stop talking to me".

-Kennedy got a doll house for her birthday and she loves it. It still doesn't top the princess's that she got for Christmas though. (Thanks for the idea Laura). They were $10 for 8 or so little plastic princess's at Target and she LOVES them. She has a little Dora lunch box that she keeps them in and they go everywhere with us. She even takes them to bed.

-I'm so glad it's Monday because Don and I had to speak in church on Easter and then I had to teach combined YW yesterday and I'm glad it's over...I can start getting my house back in order.

-My MODBE BOUTIQUE went great!! Thanks to all my friends who came and spent their money. This is what I got for FREE - 2 swim suits, 1 swim skirt, and 2 shirts!

modbe boutique

I am having a modbe clothing boutique Tuesday from 6:30-8:30. Everyone is invited and if you live to far away you can still place an order. Just email me and let me know. taramhatch@hotmail.com

Check out their website. They have such cute swim suits....I can't wait to order one.

http://www.modbeclothing.com/

Derek and Lacie

Here are a few pictures (stolen from other people's blogs) from my brothers wedding. He got married February 2nd in the Seattle area. Lacie is so cute and we are excited to have her in our family.