Found

My sister in law Marcia had them! From now on I will make more of a note of who I loan movies and books to, especially family. I usually pay pretty good attention to it unless it's family because you see them and, I don't know. Anyway, they are back on the shelves for us to watch or loan again. I now also have Monk (1st season) thanks Marcia, to borrow. I am excited to watch it and hope it will be a show that I can enjoy WITH Tyler.

I have so many great pictures on my camera to upload and I like so much better to have the pictures to go along with my blogging, so...I hope to get to that soon. I have too many responsibilities and interests that some have to fall by the wayside from time to time. Recently blogging and photo organization have been the ones to go. Well, more later!

2008 Scrapbook

Click here to view this photo book larger

Flag Football

Ben is playing Flag Football right now. His last game is this coming week. It is so much fun to watch him. He really goes after whoever has the ball, he wants that tackle. His favorite part however is throwing and catching the football which they don't do much of. I hope he'll stick with it a few more years so he can get to the "fun" stuff. Not sure I really want any of my kids playing football, but it is fun to watch, but when it's my child out there I'm not sure I'll be able to get past the worry enough to enjoy the game!

Oct. 2nd Tyler was out of town for work, so, once again he missed picture day, sniff, sniff. Micah and Jacob didn't want to play until we got out there the first night and then they felt a bit different. They are looking forward to baseball though, and now that Micah is in 5th grade he can play for the school (yay FREE!).

Potty Training and catching up, somewhat.

My life for the past few weeks has been somewhat consumed by potty training Miss P, exercising and meal planning. I think I can say now that my sweet little girl is potty trained! A few weeks ago I thought she was NOT ready, and now it's been something like 6 days since her last accident. She tells me when she needs to go potty and sometimes goes all by herself! Happy Day! 4 down, none to go! I hate potty training and P made it easy, as easy as can be anyway. I am so proud of her.
This, above, is my latest favorite way to do her hair. She has super curly, ringlet hair, but only underneath. The topmost layer is pretty straight, so I have found that if I wash it and brush it with a wide tooth comb it dries in perfect ringlets underneath and on top I can just curl it, about 5 additional ringlets. So Cute, and pretty quick and easy (as long as she can watch in the mirror!).

I made Peyton and my nieces these dresses and matching baby clothes for Christmas. I wish I had a pic of them all together in them.

Sept. 6th was the last Grizzlies game and we went, minus Jake who was hanging out with his cousin Essien. I now love baseball, go figure. I'm working on football, well, planning on it. I just need someone to take the time to explain all of the many details. You cannot love something you know very little about. So, do you notice how old Micah is looking? He's almost 10 now!

Peyton is pretty girlie in some ways, but in many ways she is very much a tom boy. Micah asked if she was going to be a cheerleader, she said no, she was going to play football.

The first month of school both big boys at the first awards rally got Sparthenian. It's basically like student of the month. I was very happy for that. They are good kids and I am lucky to have them.

Many years ago I did a Rainbow Fish craft with Micah and he loved it. We read the book and then made a rainbow fish. I decided to repeat it with Ben and Peyton. It was so fun to watch Peyton glue on the scales. She was so precise with where she placed each scale and she did such a good job, reminds me ever so much of Micah.

Ben wasn't nearly as particular about the placement of his scales, he was more interested in cutting out his own scales. He is learning tons in Kindergarten and enjoying school quite a bit.

Ben is playing flag football and Tyler is helping coach his team. Ben is very good at throwing and catching the football. I enjoy watching him dance around the field during his games. I think we need to get that boy in a dance class. His latest is break dancing which I think he actually has some talent in.

Peyton often joins me in my exercising. She is so cute. She now has graduated from Girl Pushups ( like Anita) to Regular Pushups (like mommy and Natalie). If you have ever done Jillian Michaels 30 day shred these names would mean something! CHECK OUT HER FORM!

Here she is, watching my dvd while EATING CHIPS!

Notice the diaper? I no longer see that anymore!

This picture I love, it's old news too, she likes to use the "Big Potty" now. Life is good, busy. I'm going to attempt to be better at blogging, but who knows.

Anyone have...

Our Narnia movies (1st and 2nd), or Star Wars Episode 4? I lent them out and can't remember to whom.

Happy Birthday to me!

So, this was about a month ago. I don't know why, but blogging has been at the bottom of my list and I have just not felt like doing it. My birthday this year was pretty great. Tyler bought me a red velvet cake from Costco. Red velvet is one of my favorite cakes, but really, red velvet cake ice cream from Maggie Moo's is the best. I intended to get a Hot Genoa Sub (the best sandwich ever) from More Than Pizza for lunch but forgot about it and ate a piece of cake instead. If you couldn't tell yet, I used my birthday as a whole cheat day:) We had 3 free kids meals for Logan's Roadhouse so we decided to go there for dinner. It is definatley not a very family like environment, it's kind of like a bar environment but the kids didn't seem to notice. They could have been pretty noisy and I don't think any other patrons would have noticed or cared.
One of our favorite things at Logan's are the peanuts. You can crack them and eat them and throw them right on the floor. See Peyton in the background? She was going for more nuts.

This is all from me, and I was far from done.

I wanted to include a picture of all of us and this is the one I had of Ben. He is always doing something strange it seems.

I'm pretty sure that Ty doesn't like to be in pictures because he always makes faces.

I got a really yummy burger and fries (it had been a LONG time since I'd had fries). I had root beer too.

Micah got his first adult meal, chicken fried steak, onion rings and mashed potatoes (he loves mashed potatoes).

Jacob had fun eating peanuts too, oh yes, and I'm sure he had at least 3 of those huge buttery rolls they serve before the meal comes.

I wont bore you with my gifts, but they were all very fun this year and my loved ones were much too generous. I did get the book I have been wanting, Mocking Jay. I haven't read it yet because I have a few others to get through first and I know I need to read those because they will not be as good as Mocking Jay. My mom has it right now and if any of you want in the rotation for it just leave me a comment or call me!

Thanks for all of the birthday wishes I recieved and to my sweet friends who took me out to lunch and bought me high quality toilet paper, you're the best! Tyler, thank you for the date before my birthday and the fun goodies I got to pick out on our date, (stretchy ring and silver hoops and black flower earrings) that was really fun. I learned that I do like to shop. And if anyone is wondering, I am now 32. Feel free to tell me I look much younger than that if you think that, please don't hold back. It no longer bugs me to hear I don't look as old as I am, it's hard to believe I used to hate hearing that!

More of Family Fun Week, days 4 and 5.

Since I did days 2 and 3 first, now we're on to days 4 and 5. Thursday August 12th we spent at the water park. I didn't even bring my camera. The kids and I all have passes, but Tyler was going to have to buy one. Well, he got into the wrong line, I told him to ask if it was the right line to buy a ticket, someone up ahead heard him and gave him an extra ticket they had! Yay! We rented a tube and took Micah and Jacob on all the "big kid" rides. The Black Hole, Vertigo and Vortex were among the favorites. Morgan was able to drive out with Dustin since she had just gotten her Drivers License! The Dockstaders had brought Essien and we were able to steal him when they left. It was a long day in the sun, longer than we spent at the water park any other day this summer. I haven't been wearing sunscreen the last month or so and I almost got a burn, I looked pretty pink for a few days. It was a fun day though.

Day 5, Friday the 13th! Oh what fun, one of my favorite days. It was miserably hot and somehow I still had a smile on my face at the end of the day. We went to StoryLand and PlayLand. Let me just say, they have done wonders with that place! I hadn't been since they put the Splash Junction in at PlayLand, so it was a pleasant surprise to see how good everything looked.
We got a great deal with a Groupon and we all had all day ride passes. Let's just say that we got more than our moneys worth with those! I also learned that my 2 youngest kids are my most daring. Ben will for sure be my ride partner for the most thrilling rides. We were in line to get on the train (from PlayLand to StoryLand) and go home. I really wanted to take Ben on the Ferris Wheel with me. I had just gone with Jacob and he wouldn't let me flip us over (it was a cage-like one that you could use a bar to make the cage flip). Ben said that he would let me flip him once and if he didn't like it I wouldn't do it anymore. So, we determined we had time for us to go. Ben let me flip him 10 times! He was a little scared but never cried or whined. He told me a few times that we had flipped enough. I said "Can we do it one more time for mommy?" He was such a great sport and he let me, more than a few times. It was so much fun.
Peyton went on the same Ferris Wheel with me but I didn't flip us. At first she was scared, then she said, "It's scary...I like it.!" I rocked us back and forth a bit and then I used the lever to hold the cage still but let go before we flipped. She will be a good ride partner in a few years too.

We all took took turns in Pirates Cove on the paddle boats.

After the first ride, the ferris wheel, we took Peyton on a kiddie roller coaster that was incredibly rough. After that she was done with rides for the next few hours and it took about 3 rides on the Merry Go Round bench in mom or dads arms until she would even sit on the small non-moving pony. After a few rides on that she finally wanted on a big up and down pony, yay! Then she didn't want off.

Splash Junction was a nice cool off break for the kids, minus Jake who hung out with Mom and Dad in the shade. I kind of wanted to chill out in the water too!

If Peyton is happy, in the least bit, she's jumping. Here she is, mid jump.

The biggest hit was the Tilt-A-Whirl. I rode it with each of my boys, many times. Many, many times. I don't get sick on rides and even I started to get a bit nauseated. If you ever go, buckets 4, 5, and 7 are the whirliest.

No idea why this picture loaded this way, but I had to get a picture in action. we laughed so much on this one.

Peyton kept wanting to go on the bug ride until we took her on the roller coaster. Somehow we finally got her on it and she DID NOT want to get off. She rode it at least six times (each ride is about 3 minutes)!

The race cars were a hit too.

The kids can't wait to go back and neither can I! I hope I can get them all to let me flip them on the ferris wheel! Tyler said he wouldn't let me flip him, but you know what? There isn't really any way he could stop me if I got him in it with me....