Dashing!

Holy crap! Christmas is next week! This month is ridiculously fast. Remember when you were a kid and Christmas seemed like bazillions of years away from Thanksgiving? Luckily, I have had tons of help preparing for the holiday, enjoy Tink helping me paint, and just singin' along to her own little tune.

Here we are at the Meridian Christmas parade, it's a jim dandy of a parade if you love old cars, fire trucks, marching bands, and trailers with tinsel on them. Lucky for me, my kids do love these things and they had a great time! They got tons of candy, and even a little beanie baby, Tink's was a turkey, and she immediately proclaimed how much she loved her chicken. Kermit got a blue dinosaur and for the rest of the parade, the dinosaur was trying to eat the chicken-good times.Yep, there's the big guy himself-no, not on a sleigh, but a fire truck, Kermit thought that was probably a better way to go, the reindeer need their rest.Her first day of Primary.

How cute is this? I had a moment of shear genius, this does not happen very often, but here we are. The little nursery kids get to come in for singing time now to prepare them for Primary, and it just so happens that since I'm in the front, I had a great view of the little monkeys, and I happened to have my camera (what are the odds?) So, here's Tink on her very first day of Primary...and-might I add, sitting next to a rather dapper young man. Get a load of that outfit! How cute is he?!? Way to go Tink!

Kermit and Santa, here's what I love about taking this kid to see the fat guy: he's all business. This little smile he's giving me-oh yeah, he's totally annoyed that I would interrupt his "meeting".

And, more of Tink, no, she's not dead, she is making snow angels, they are all over my backyard, along with the "prints". She's loving this snowy weather, she was outside for almost an hour before I could convince her to come inside and get warm. Playing on her sled...
....and more snow angels. Look at that red little nose! And her cheeks, I am so in love with this girl.

Kermit and I decided we needed a gingerbread house this year. He was so helpful with all the candies, Tink just ate them, but Kermit-man, Christmas is all business for this guy, it's awesome. Here he is with the finished product, I know it's more of a gingerbread barn, but still, it's our first attempt, and I'm pretty excited it turned out as good as it did. Look at that smile, he lost another tooth.

All I want for Christmas is my six front teeth.

We're so excited for the big day, and not even close to ready, my Christmas cards will finally go in the mail tomorrow, what is wrong with me? And, I finally got around to buying stocking stuffers today, I gotta tell you, I found the funniest thing for Kermit, they're star wars figures, and they have their light sabers and stuff, but instead of a "saber" on the handle it's a candy cane, and the storm trooper has a wreath around his gun. Oh! And Darth Vader is wearing a Santa hat. I can't wait for him to see those! I got them at Target just in case anyone needs to have them. In the stocking stuffer section!

Anyway, enjoy your holidays! And if you don't get everything done, just consider it money saved for a pedicure!

Too sweet

Just a quick little story to tug at the heart strings. Tonight, I was putting the kids to bed, and I've been letting them choose Christmas stories before we go to bed, they usually pick 2 out of our pile of Christmas books. Well, tonight, Ethan chose Grandpa's book. He opened it up and saw the things he'd written to us (he gave us a super duper signed copy with a sweet little message) and he started to cry. I can't say I blame him, he really misses Grandpa, so do I. I don't know what's harder, missing him, or watching my child grieve.

I got him to calm down, and we looked through the book together, and admired all the artwork-E made several comments on what a great artist Grandpa was, and asked how long it took him to become such a good artist. I told him that Grandpa started working on his art when he was E's age. A little later, I went in to check on him and here's what I found...

He's working on -what I'm sure will be a best-seller someday.

Keep on keepin' on little man!

My Girls...

I have impatient little girls.
When I was pregnant with tink, I went into preterm labor at about 22 weeks, it was scary, to say the least. Now, this little muffin thinks it's time for her to make her appearance! NOT YET!
Rambo and I spent last Monday night in the labor and delivery unit of our hospital, and it scared the bajeebies out of me! So, I've been taking it really easy lately, not doing a whole lot, I've got to be in tip top shape for Aunt Sassy's wedding on Thursday! I'm the big fat maitron of honor!
Anyway, things are going well, the nurses at the hospital were awesome. I told them that the office nurse told me I was going to lose my baby, and how upset that made me, and my cute hospital nurse calmed me down and was just so sweet, it was like having my mom there for a minute. They were able to stop the contractions and kept us for a while to moniter us, and then we got to come home.
Thank you again to Jil for watching my babies! What would I do without you? I'm so glad I have a friend like you!
I love babies, but sometimes they are too scary! I had a good long talk with miss impatient so hopefully she won't try that again!
Anyway, that's why I've been M.I.A. for a little while.

Happy Birthday/Halloween!!!

Kermit is 7!!! How did this happen?

First of all, I have to thank Jil and Trish! We were driving from Reno to Boise all day on poor Kermit's birthday, so they came over and decorated our house and made a cake and everything, so when we got home, there were balloons and streamers and everything, Kermit was soooo excited, and to top things off, Grammy showed up!

He got all kinds of great stuff, Star Wars and Bakugans, and Speed Racer, and church socks! Oh, it was great!!

Kermit and his cake, which-by the way was delish! Thank you Jil!!!

All the candles are out, now we eat!!!


Tink and Kermit had a great time with all the balloons, this was actually Sunday morning before church, they were having a good old time!


Tink and balloons, I think that's all I'll get her for this birthday.

Tink sat with Grammy for a picture, but only if the balloons could come too.

HALLOWEEN!!!

We know Jack.

Tink and Kermit ready for some trick-or-treat action! Kermit is our Jedi, I think technically he's a padowan, or whatever they're called, but he looks totally awesome! And Tink, still the spider princess.

More of that...


Sproink! How cute is that? I told you she looked like an adorable little martian, how fitting that she would be one for Halloween! And her cute mommy right there making sure she doesn't fall down our stairs. Love the antennas!
Watch out for this guy, he will use his fake light saber.Okay, here goes Tink down the street to start this business, I wish you could hear her, she was singing as she walked, "Trick or treat, trick or treat, trick or treat for Halloween..." Y'know the Donald Duck cartoon where he's all mean to his nephews and so the witch puts a spell on his feet? She watched that cartoon like 6 times today! That's where that song is from.The Haul. Rambo diligently doing his daddy job and going through all the goodies.What?!?! There was one in Tink's bag and one in Kermit's bag. Who's the cheapskate giving out Arby's mints!? Can you stinking believe that? What a crock of crap!And last but not least, the new little gal, she went as a pumpkin this year, because that's how her mother feels-like I swallowed a pumpkin whole.
Anyway, Happy Halloween! I hope you all had a good one, can't wait to see all your pictures of your cuties!

Love you all!!!

DISNEYLAND!

Well, we made it! This was the hotel we stayed in, it was the Grande California hotel, this was the lobby (pretty grande huh). When we got there Kermit and Tink were off their rockers, they were so sick of riding in planes and cars, so when we got there, they just ran and bounced off the walls, it was great, so I had to get a few pictures.

This was the view after we got into the park, look how cute that great big mickey pumpkin head is! And all the fall flowers, I was in heaven!


Here's my cute little crew with the big micky head, are they not the cutest things in the park? It was really cute, there was a Goofy all dressed up in a skeleton costume, but the line to get a picture with him was ridic-u-lous! So we just looked at him and said, "oh, he's cute" and then moved on.
All the little light posts on main street were all done up too, look how stinking cute!

This was the entrance to the park (only it was night time) Isn't that soooo cute!

There were jack-o-lanterns in all the shop windows all up and down the whole park, even the rides had jack-o-lanterns strategically placed throughout them. Does is get any better than this?

Here we are in line for our very first ride, the rockets! Tink could not wait to go on this ride, it was great.

That night, we went to dinner and there was a balloon man who made this lovely birthday hat for Kermit, doesn't he look handsome?

Of course, Tink had to have a little something as well, so she got this lovely corsage, it matches her sweatshirt perfectly.

The next morning, we got up and had breakfast at Goofy's kitchen. It was really cute, Tink was convinced that they actually made her breakfast for her.

Here's Kermit putting the moves on Belle, watch out ladies!

Tink got to meet Jasmine, she had no idea who she was, but she thought Jasmine was pretty, so we got her autograph.

Here's Goofy pointing out Kermit for his big birthday song, they all sang to Kermit and gave him a super fancy cupcake.

Then, we had to get autographs from Goofy, Tink was pretty amazed at the whole thing.

Good times at Goofy's, it brought back a lot of memories.

After breakfast, we walked through Downtown Disney to get to the California park, and on our way, we stopped in the Lego store, this stuff is all made of Legos! If you got too close to Darth, he breathed his scary breathing at you.
Tink and Kermit doing their very best robot poses with this guy.Once we got to the California park, it was decorated super cute too! It was all candy corns, it was sooo fun! They had it all done up like a garden and the characters were all dressed like farmers. Just cute.
Okay when Tink met Mickey Mouse, she was beside herself. She hugged him probably 3 times, and talked about how much she loved his show, she went on and on. Mickey was adorable with her, he took his time signing her book and gave her lots of kisses, she was thrilled!
Kermit was more like-take the picture, I've got stuff to do here! He was all business.

Okay, this was really funny. We met the Queen of Hearts. Kermit wanted nothing to do with her, but Tink went right over-she didn't hug this one though. After she signed Tink's book, Tink said, "thank you fer manesty" and we bowed a little to her, we didn't want to get our heads cut off-that could have ruined the whole trip.

I had to take Tink to see the Playhouse Disney show, and since I couldn't ride some of the more awesome rides, and niether could she, we went right ahead and saw the show. This is us waiting outside the theatre. We had cotton candy and took tons of pictures and danced, it was great.

This was Tink after the show, I think she was a little bummed it was over. She has a streamer on from Minnie Mouse's surprise birthday party, and she's looking at the stage waiting for more "friends" to come out. It took some coaxing to get her to leave the theatre, but we got there. I just thoght this was cute, this was how Tink and Rambo spent most of their time.

Again, just cuteness...


Tink and Pakkah riding the roller coaster in Toon Town. Kermit was scared to death to do this ride, and we couldn't keep Tink from running through the line to the front she was so excited. After doing this ride a couple of times, Kermit decided he liked it too, and it became his favorite ride.
This was the Haunted Mansion all done up like the Nightmare before Christmas. I have always loved that movie. The funny thing was, it brought out all the weirdos to Disneyland, there were people with like the bridge of their nose pierced (ouch) who came to go on this ride and get some of the super cool souvenirs. Guys (and girls come to think of it) wearing kilts and combat boots with piercings in their dreads...who knew a cartoon could speak to so many people? And it wasn't just the outside all done up, the whole stinking ride was redone just like this movie! It was totally awesome, I loved it!
Me and the monkeys on the tea cups.
Tink had to make suer Pakkah didn't get chappy lips.Dumbo-I'll let you all make your own jokes at this point.After our Disney fun, we made our way up through Sequoia National park and Yosemite. It was some of the most beautiful stuff I've ever seen. The trees there were crazy! They were humongous, the oldest tree there was 3,000 years old.

Here's Rambo and Nana enjoying their scenic day.

Tink, just happy to be out of the car, she is such a cute little nerd, what is with here little poses these days?
Kermit and Tink enjoying a doughnut on our trip through Yosemite. Kermit was totally into climbing rocks-go figure...all the rides at Disneyland scared him, yet wanted to climb all the rocks in these parks.
This was a tree that fell over and no one bothered to clean it up! Slobs! But the cool thing is, we got to get a cool picture, check out those roots baby! Wowee wow wow!
This was an amazing trip, we had such a great time!

Thank you Nana and Pakkah, you are so generous to our family, you've given us some wonderful family memories that I don't think Rambo and I could have accomplished for quite a few years! Thank you thank you thank you! We love you!