Gingerbread Houses...and Graveyards

Alright...so this has nothing to do with Christmas festivities but I had to share... Lillian is in a 4-H sewing club (Sigh of nostalgia...I loved 4-H as a young girl and teenager). Anyway this was her first project. Each member of her club got to put together a quilt block and they were all going together for a quilt for a good cause. Yeah, it's pretty awesome. Lilli has a really impressive sense of what matches. She is my only child that I don't have to send back to change either shirt or pants because they don't quite work!

Of course if chicken fabric is available she will pick it!

Her leader (who happens to be in our ward primary presidency and happens to be a friend of mine). Invited me to make one, so I jumped at the chance. Of course since Lilli has a better fashion sense then I do she ended up designing most of it!

So we made gingerbread houses...and sugar cookies...almond bark...sugar cookie truffles (delicious!!)and about 18 loaves of banana bread for Christmas gifts for Eric's co-workers and a few other friends...I was actually pretty worn out by 8 pm on Christmas Eve...which is when we were finally ready to make gingerbread houses. It got a bit crazy.
I guess Jared was pretending to be asleep...

Carmen getting started...

Lilli made a two story house (with a secret spot inside to hide candy!

The finished product for Lilli...

And that's when things got weird...
Here is how the conversation went:
Lilli: Carmen, what is that pile of marshmallows for
Carmen: Oh, those are the elves that died
Me: Brave attempt to hide a snicker...very unsuccessful
Meanwhile, Jared is using red sprinkles on his "garage" saying that the roof is a graveyard...covered with blood.
The rest of the time spent on this project was Carmen and Jared creating graveyards next to their "houses"
Oh and Carmi put so much stuff on her roof that it collapsed. But it looked a lot like a wagon because of the marshmallow arrangements on the sides that looked like wheels. She was happy with that.
Oh and I laughed so hard I cried.
My children really do have an obsession with Halloween...

Lillian Turned 9

Lilli asked for a KitKat cake. It was pretty awesome.

The chocolate turtles were epic!

Now this is the part where you talk about the birthday girl...how awesome she is...lalala...what a great helper she is...how much she likes turtles, penguins, chickens, and worms (gross)...that she loves pink...except that Lillian has changed her favorite color to purple...she loves all things girly...high heels (she does walk in them really well)...she begs for makeup and pierced ears...we told her she had to wait until age 12 for earrings...15ish for makeup...but I do let her wear eye shadow on random sundays...she LOVES reading. The other night I was tucking her in and she said she had two pages left so I agreed that she could finish. Went upstairs. Came back down an hour later and she was still reading. (I can't get upset at that because I used to read with a flashlight after lights out at her age!!)
She is a massive chocolate junkie. We made a death by chocolate cake for Family Home Evening a few weeks ago at her request...whew...she finished her king size kitkat she got in her stocking within a few hours. (The other kids took several days)
She is AWESOME!

Random Moving Pictures

 I think this was our last Sunday in Blue Springs. We got home from church and the kids crashed on various pieces of furniture waiting to be hauled down to the garage...

 Lilli in the blue chair, Carmen on the dresser...

 Nadia on Mr. Bear

 Lilli's BFF, Jade. She and her Mom (Abra) came to say goodbye several days before we left. I guess every child has different reactions to a hard situation. Lilli just giggled and ran and hid. I guess she likes to hide her emotions. (Carmi was just extremely excited that a friend in the ward brought us Spaghetti and Meatballs to eat in our empty kitchen)

 Can you find Lilli?

Nothing like a pile of stuff to make you realize no matter how organized you are on a move that there will always be crazy amounts of stuff to pile into the car!

The First Day of School 2016

Three kids in school...it's been a few quiet four months for the most part. Nadia no longer has anyone to entertain her, so she has started taking afternoon naps again! Yay!! The first day of school was...a little rough. Being at a new school where there are four...wait...five ways  to leave the building instead of two at our old school got this Mom pretty confused. My plan was to get Jared first, then walk around and find the girls. Well I stood and waited at the door I thought Jared was coming out...he didn't come, and then the bell rang and there were crazy amounts of kids and parents. Luckily Lilli and Carmi managed to find me and I asked a passing teacher if the Kindergarten kids were all out and she found someone that confirmed that they had. I then asked where the kindergarten came out, I was directed right around the corner from where I had been standing (and feeling like an idiot). So there was Jared, sitting with all three K teachers. They were very understanding!
Day two was much better, we still had a few challenges finding each other. But we got it figured out and things have been smooth as silk ever since.

Lilli wanted to sew a new skirt for the occasion. She did awesome (with my help of course!) We made the skirt out of fat quarters (SO FUN!!). So she sewed about five of the pieces together, then I did the waistband and hem. We sewed a little turtle on the bottom. Cute.
The kids were SO excited they were up at 6:00 dragging me out of bed. To bad that doesn't last more then the first four days...granted I don't like getting up at 6. But within a few weeks I was dragging each kid out of bed at 6:50, and even dressing Jared while he slept.
Bribery really does come in handy..hot chocolate did the trick for the girls. The rule is they must be up and dressed sitting at the table by 6:50 to get it. It hasn't worked so well for Jared...I still dress him in his sleep sometimes. Oh well.

Carmi (2nd grade) and Mrs. Hankins

Jared (Kindergarten)and Mrs. Adams. This woman has won so many brownie point!  Jared has been SO hard on her! The first two or three months he was done with the day by 10 am and gave her the evil eye the rest of the day. She has been amazing! He is doing much better now. When I went to parent teacher conference on October she told me about his challenges participating. Apparently he refused to sing in music and was currently getting a 0. In P.E. he would fall on the ground and not get up and would lay on the ground for extended amounts of time. That was until a group of friends in his class decided he needed help, so they would pull him up when he fell and keep him going. (This makes for a happy Mom for sure!)

Lilli and Mrs. Blanco.
It was hard switching to a new school, we loved our old school. But this new one has been good and the kids are happy there.

National Night Out

Oh and just a note...I've decided I want to start fresh on blogging next week, so I will do a post everyday this week so I am no longer posting about stuff that happened months ago!

We took the kids to National Night Out back in August. It's a fun evening...with loads of people roaming a couple of City blocks...and Police/Fire/Ambulance and a lot of local businesses with lots of goodies...

The kids all took the opportunity to sit in the semi...

Lilli wasn't terribly thrilled about me putting the fireman's hat on her...I guess that explains the blurry pic, I took it really fast!
All the kids got to sit in the firetruck...

And the ambulance...

As we were leaving a lady asked if our cute kids could pose with Elroy the Moose... from the Fraternal Order of Moose (Kinda like Elks Club, Kiwanis, Lions Club...)

Fort Collins LDS Temple Openhouse

We had the amazing opportunity to take the kids to the temple open house in Colorado. It was pretty amazing. The kids loved it. They especially loved the oxen and the baptismal font.

We opted to have someone snap a picture for us out front, since the line for the inside pictures by the cardboard temple was really long. The sun was super bright though...don't mind my squinting!

We had to do a couple of coaching sessions to get Lilli and Carmi to take pictures for us with the temple in the background..we finally got one, but the wind was not blowing my skirt in a very good direction so I will spare you...(snicker)

End of Summer Fun

This has been me the past month... I really did forget that I had a blog.

 We were travelling this past weekend and I suddenly turned to Eric and said "when was my last blog post published?" About a month ago he replied...ooops. Many apologies to my lovely Mother. (Hugs!)
But maybe I do have a couple of excuses...
1) I have been volunteering in the child care center at our local YMCA...and LOVING it! Cutest kids and most amazing staff ever! It has taken a lot more of my time then expected. Plus to reward me for my time I get to accumulate free babysitting time...so when I have the chance I can drop Nadia off and get in a good workout.
2) Math homework for three kids multiple times a week. I'm getting to be SUCH a pro!(And they are too I hope!)
3) Netflix and laundry. The end.
We got to know a family in our ward really well shortly after moving here. Lucky for us Tim is an amazing photographer and snaps pics of the kids for me at all our ward events. Our ward rented this pool for a primary activity and the kids had a blast. (I also had a heart attack trying to fish our non swimmers out of the water after they went down the slide. More swimming lessons are definitely in order!!)
It was a very fun afternoon that was made even better with the consumption of popsicles!

County Fair

We took some time to go see the animals at the fair. The chickens and rabbits are a favorite with the kids. We also saw the pigs, cows, and goats.