Price

We were excited to see Tati & Kenzie while we were in Price.  Reagan had so much fun with her cousins!!!  When you put these 3 very strong willed girls together there are usually lots of fireworks, but they played really well together.  In this picture they had just finished dressing Reagan up as Ariel (with a bed skirt they found in the attic and the earrings from the tree) and were parading her around the house.

Here they are decorating cookies for Santa.  (Those are potatoes in the picture not cookies.)  Santa ate them all except 2 small bites and drank all the water Reagan insisted that he wanted.  She was right, he just guzzled it down!

Stacey and Kim gladly doing their job as quality control experts.  By the way, while in Price we made 5 batches of popcorn balls (about 100 total) and they were all eaten before we left.  I didn't get even one.

Nanie bought the girls a Cinderella puzzle to do.  They worked really hard and got it done in just an hour or two.  Man, were they proud of themselves! 

Poppy had a birthday while we were there (apparently only his 39th), so we were lucky enough to celebrate with him.  He hooked a toboggan up behind his tractor and spent the morning taking all the grandkids on rides.  I'll post pictures of that when I get them from Nanie.  In his honor I am about to tell you his new favorite story.  

We went to church in Price with Nanie & Poppy the Sunday before Christmas.  As Reagan and I are entering the chapel she starts saying, fairly quietly, "I hate this place."  As we get closer to our seats (which of course were at the very front) she got progressively louder until she is yelling "Get me out of here!  I hate this place!"  I just dropped off the diaper bag, grabbed Nanie's car keys and we kept right on walking out the door with her still yelling "Get me out of here!  I hate this place!"  We had the whole place laughing.  I promise, I do take her to church!  This was not some scary place she'd never been to before.  While we were in the car waiting for her to calm down, I found that she wanted to show Hailey her church, not Nanie & Poppy's.  We did finally make it into church, but not in time for the sacrament and the rest of our time there was pretty uneventful, thank goodness.

I'll post more Christmas pictures as I get them.  We hope all of you had a wonderful Christmas too!

Good Morning Snow

This is what we woke up to.  It only took Nick about an hour to shovel the driveway so he could go to work.  It will probably only take another hour of shoveling when he gets home to get back into the garage.  If you look really close you can see the top of Reagan's head by the garage door.

Standing snow angels

I've fallen and I can't get up!!!  But I have all this lovely snow to eat, yeah!!!  We had to come in shortly after this when Coen did a face plant in the mountain and couldn't handle the icicles forming on his face. 

Reagan was trying to climb the mountain.

This used to be a grill.

Yesterday we woke up at 7:30 to snow.  It snowed all day and this is what we saw when we woke up today.  Apparently we are breaking lots of snow fall records (32 inches in 24 hours).  Reagan was determined to make Frosty the Snowman, but she couldn't make it up the hill to a level spot.  She is now making a snowman out of diapers in the living room. 

Global Warming

I haven't written or posted anything in a million years. I skipped writing about Thanksgiving, because I didn't personally take any pictures and therefore had nothing to show for our wonderful time in Dillon with some of my favorite people in the whole world. Thanks Papa & GG for letting us invade your home. We thoroughly enjoyed it!!!

In the past few days we have gone from reasonable, seasonable, lovely 35-45 degree weather to a high of 8 with a windchill of -15 over night. So I've been thinking a lot about global warming and how grateful I am that it has been occurring so that this arctic blast we are feeling has us at a mere -15 and not -50. It has had me thinking about a little thought Nick had a few years ago that he put down on paper. It made me laugh, so I thought I'd share it with all of you. Here's to Global Warming!


I suppose the general, heart-wrenching truth about global warming has you so spellbound that you keep your eyes glued to the front lawn with the splendid prospect of having beachfront property at any moment. I know I do! The first thing I do every morning is crawl over my sleeping wife to glance out the window. Any day the polar ice caps will melt and send the pleasure of the ocean to my doorstep. In fact, I bought a house with these specifics in mind.
“So, how many bedrooms are you looking for?” my realtor asked me.
“That seems to matter little. What I need is a home with a rubber grate at the entrance to the doorway so I won’t track in too much sand. What do you have for me there” I replied.
She glanced down at her papers and said, without looking up, “How about three bedrooms. And maybe one and three-quarter bathrooms?”
“Perfect!” I said. “But only if it has a shed where I can keep a boogie board, some sun-block, and a metal detector.” When I explained my little scheme she only questioned whether or not I knew Lex Luthor. I don’t.
But the beach seems a long time coming. I was about to give up hope until I got a proverbial slap on the back your ex-VP and mine, Al Gore. It won’t be long now and soon enough my job will be washed underneath the roaring Eastern Idaho surf. Only it will no longer be Eastern but Western Idaho and my closest Pacific neighbor will be Tibet.
Though I am sure to be soaking in the beach-rays by the oncoming equinox, I have the time to ponder some other various “warming” issues. Like, with all the concern over warming and its effects, why can’t I find a toaster that makes good toast? And, why can’t our consumer scientists find a happy medium between the microwave and the conventional oven. What we need is an unconventional oven that does not make a piece of pizza soggy but can do the job in less than five minutes. I bet these things are being considered already because it makes no sense for our capitalist economy to wait a moment longer. I just hope the developmental labs are in nice safe places like Topeka and not Tillamook.
One thing I will be sad to part with upon the wave’s arrival is the higher boiling points afforded us highlanders. Once we are at sea level the entire air pressure schematic will be thrown for a loop and nobody will know how long they should cook their spaghetti noodles for. This will also apply to tortellini.
According to the official Global Warming mantra, the earth has skyrocketed an astonishing 8-10 degrees in the past 1,000 years! Think of it. Instead of the normal –10 degree weather our forefathers suffered through in the winter you are now enjoying a comfortable –2! But any degree now the scales will tip and pour out the delicious smell of seaweed and yield the sweet caress of sand in your trunks. While I wait for that great day I will spend my time getting in touch with the local sand and sailboat vendors. I need to get in while the price is low.

Tagged

SO, I was tagged forever ago and have been trying to avoid doing it, but my conscience won't let me, so here goes. Kim had two on her blog, one was 7 quirky things about me and one was Man Tag. I'm going to do both and then be done for a long time. I'm pretty sure I'm not quirky, just weird. I had a hard time coming up with 7 so you get a pet peeve and some personal flaws mixed in with the so called quirky. Here goes:

7 Quirky Things

1. Nick says I'm very methodical about the way the groceries need to be placed on the conveyor belt in order to have them packed properly.
2. It drives me up the wall when people leave the shower curtain open.
3. I steal Nicks clothes for pajamas.
4. I don't look at or touch chicken unless it's cooked & even then sometimes I can't eat it.
5. I don't follow college basketball at ALL until March Madness and then when one of my teams lose I consider it a personal offense and hold a grudge forever. I'm not sure Gonzaga will ever make it back into my good graces.
6. When I read, I pull out my eyebrows.  I don't know why.
7. I have perhaps an unhealthy love of cold cereal. I eat it all the time, especially when I'm pregnant.

Man Tag

What is your husband's name? Nick
How long have you been married? Almost 7 years
How long did you date? 3 months engaged for 2
How old is he? 29
Who eats more sweets? Me, definitely
Who said "I love you" first? Nick, September 16, 2001
Who is taller? Nick of course
Who can sing the best? Nick, I think, since people never ask me to sing for them. Well, except Reagan sometimes wants me to sing The Ants Go Marching…
Who is smarter? Nick hands down! (Lovely man that he is, he disagrees)
Who pays the bills? Me, if I die, he’s in big trouble!
Who sleeps on the right side of the bed? Nick
Who mows the lawn? Nick- he enjoys yard work
Who cooks dinner? Me- I’m usually, ok always, too hungry to wait
Who drives? Nick- He’s deaf remember…if I want conversation he’s got to drive.
Who kissed who first? Nick kissed me. He’s a real go getter! Lucky me!
Who asked who out first? Tricky… I asked him to my Jr. Prom, but we didn’t really date then. After his mission, he asked me out- after making sure it was ok with my brother.
Who wears the pants? I don’t think we’re a pants wearing couple, I’d say we both wear shorts.

Thinking about the answers to this tag made me realize that I sure got lucky. Nick always washes the big dishes and takes out the trash. He loves being home with us & I love watching him play hide-n-seek, airplane, or caterpillar with the kids. I'm so lucky to have him and to know that whatever happens in the world, our family is safe in the eternities. Thanks for making me so happy! I love you Nick!

Ooh, Ooh This Is Halloween!!!

Here we are, all set to go out.  Nick took the kids around the neighborhood while I answered the door.  Then we switched and I took them to a friends house who was giving out the full sized candy bars.  Coen walked extra slow so everyone could admire him.  We went to a few houses by her and they all had crazy cool decorations, so I kept saying "just one more house" and finally Reagan said "I'm good mama, I don't want any more.  I have enough Halloween."  So we came home and they had a great time helping pass out candy.  Coen LOVES suckers!  

Here's Reagan practicing dressing up.  She carries these flower and butterfly hair elastics around the house like a bouquet and plays tea party with them and takes them to bed and in the car and sometimes in the bath with her.  They are soooo cool and quite unhygienic by now.  We lost only one pumpkin to those evil pumpkin smashing vandals who I'm sure took candy from us first.  We did have a couple of 30 year olds come trick or treating.  

Rocky Road!

Coen's Archive #1

He has started saying everything we say, so his vocabulary is growing like crazy. He especially like socks & crocks. He's got almost all his body parts down. He forgets his shoulders, but I think that's on purpose so I'll tickle him. Unfortunately I think he has a cavity, YIKES. Hopefully he does better at the dentist than Reagan. He loves suckers and has become very attached to his pillow and blanket. He sleeps with one or both over his head. Scares me to death. I go in to check on him and his blanket is wrapped around his head a time or two, but he loves it. He likes to wave bye to people, so all the checkers at the grocery store love us. He's still playing with Reagans doll stroller and her high heels, but hopefully after Christmas that will change.

If you ever need someone to speak goldfish Coen is your man. I'm sure he'll make us millions one day. He can find his teeth and when you ask him what lips are for he gives you a kiss. Today he said very clearly banana instead of manana, plum & wow. He's just started putting both of his hands on his face in kind of an uh oh fashion. I'm not sure where he picked it up, but it's pretty funny. Anything with wheels is a car car and every morning we watch the school buses drive by and he yells car car!

Coen is daily adding to his vocabulary. He now says buppy which is duppy which is sippy cup. He says no, of course, manana & cracker. He say mama & daddy & tries to say Reagan but says ReRe, it makes Reagan really mad that he doesn't say Reagan.

He's working on animal sounds now. I think his first word was Moo. He said it every time we saw cows all the way to Dillon. He also barks, and can do a pretty good meow & cock-a-doodle-doo.

Coen can now find his nose & his belly, he's working on his ears. He can fold his arms, give a high 5 and kisses. He loves to play peek-a-boo, but puts his hands on top of his head. He likes to dance by spinning in circles as fast as he can to get dizzy. He loves cold peas, sausage and noodles. He loves to be outside and immediately grabs the broom, rake, or shovel and drags it around the yard, just like daddy. His favorite things to play with inside are my pots and pans and the baby monitor which he love to drag around by the cord. He also tries to kill himself daily by climbing up on the rocking chair, standing up and trying to surf. He is, though, perhaps the worlds best cuddling baby. What a great boy!

Pumpkin Carving & The Ward Party

Here's our little duck.  It was quite the challenge getting him to wear the feet and hat, but he eventually warmed up to the idea & had fun.  The kids got to go trunk-or-treating at the ward party.  Coen caught on real quick!  Lots of candy never made it into his basket, just straight to his mouth wrapper and all.

Isn't Belle beautiful?!  (She is not a princess, for your information, she's Belle.)  Please don't be so foolish as to use the p word when talking to her about her Halloween costume.  She refused to get her face painted at the party and wouldn't go fishing with me, but she did go with her daddy.  Once she figured out they would give her candy for playing games she was much  more enthusiastic about it.

Carving pumpkins for family home evening.  That one is Reagan's design.  Then my camera ran out of batteries, so I'll get a picture of all of them soon.

Coen's hard at work playing peek-a-boo and eating raw pumpkin seeds.  Good boy!  We have another picture in which Nick thinks Coen looks like Sloth.  Maybe I'll post it later.  We had a chili cook off  at the ward party and I won for the hottest.  My prize was a Palin picture and hot tamales.  Wahoo!

While Daddy Was Away

Nick got to go to Provo for the weekend to watch football with the guys.  BYU won, Ohio State lost.  He got to wander around campus with Dane, check out Tanner's new job & hang out with Dad & Willey.  He saw Ben Guffey at the BYU game.  He stayed with Willey & Rona & their fam which made us jealous since we haven't seen them in forever.  Nick was also the first in our family to hold baby Lorelie which made Reagan very angry.  Coen is finally feeling better and had to get in on the picture action, totally hamming it up.

Reagan and I needed something to look forward to while Daddy was away, so we went to the store and bought puffy paint & an apron for her, fabric and yarn for me.  She got to stay up durning quiet time to paint.  In case you can't tell, there are 4 orange fish and then pictures of me, Reagan and Nick plus two hand prints.  If you look close you can see that she is also wearing very (fairy) wings over her dress over her pants.  I almost finished painting both bar stools and recovered the seats.  Then, because I can't sleep while he's gone, I started knitting again.  It's harder than I remember, but I think I'm catching on.  Of course I have no one to tell me if I'm doing it wrong, so I can pretend I'm perfect.

It's A...

BOY!!!

So I was dead wrong.  I was so sure we were having a girl, but I'm so excited for a boy!  Coen really really needs a brother!  But if this little guy thinks he can lounge about, totally stretched out like this the whole time, we might run into some trouble.  I took some video of Reagan last night demanding that we name him Homer Simson.  It was really funny so I'll try to down load it one day.  Now that she's thought about it though, she thinks maybe Peter Pan would be better.  She has informed me that she is still having a baby girl who will be named Belle, so we'll get one of each and that's nice.

Fall is Here

Holy Sumac!  It's grown so much this year.  We're excited to see how big it gets next year.  Hopefully this year it's big enough to not be completely buried in snow.

Happy Halloween!  We're totally ready.  Coen can tell you what a ghost says and Reagan knows all three Halloween songs that I do.  We've watched It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown and Garfield's Halloween.  We tried to get Reagan to watch Nightmare Before Christmas, but although her eyes were glued to the tv, she said it was scarey so we didn't make her.  It's getting a little too cold to be at the park for very long.  So after about 45 minutes, we went and had lunch with daddy at work.

We don't have a tree in our yard, but luckily our next door neighbor does.  We've been trying to help them take care of their yard this yard because they've had some health problems.  So for Family Home Evening this week we went and raked their yard and then tried to drive home the importance of service and helping others.  Mainly we focused on helping Coen and cleaning up the toy room.  I guess we'll see in the coming weeks if it took or not. 

Reagan had never experienced the joy of a pile of leaves.  We were half way done before she figured out that she could be like Charlie Brown & Linus and play in the leaves.  When she finally did, it was with much sorrow that she continued to help us scoop them up into the bag.  She kept trying to get us to dump it out.  Fortunately for her, there are still tons of leaves on the tree.

Opa Comes to Town

We took Opa hiking up Tubbs Hill.  It's got a great view of Lake Coeur d' Alene.  We also think we could see the floating green of the golf course.  It was perfect weather and Nick took the day off, so it was great.  We went to the beach afterwards, of course, and had a picnic and fought with the seagulls.  Nick got to throw a football to someone who could actually throw it back, so that was fun.

That night we went to an what Reagan calls an "Estrant"  where she got her own play dough.  She's been talking about it ever since.  Then we went to a little fruit stand and picked out pumpkins.

This is Nick's favorite picture.  After the pumpkins, Opa bought some ice cream to take home and eat.  Reagan is completely convinced that Opa will be back on Saturday to buy her more Rocky Road with marshmallows.  I've been trying to let her down easy.  Thanks for coming Opa!  We love you!!!

Halloween Cookies

After having one of those ridiculously bad days, Wednesday, where your children find a way to push every button you ever had and lots that you had no idea could be pushed, we worked extra hard to have a good day on Thursday.  We made these sugar cookies in the morning, watched Charlie Brown and the Great Pumpkin, and went swimming at the hotel in the afternoon.  

After a yummy Thai curry dinner (each of the kids had 3 helpings) we made the frosting.   Reagan got to chose the colors.  Coen just ate the cookies as fast as he could, but Reagan didn't stop until every single cookie was frosted.  Then we had hot chocolate and cookies.  Reagan just licked all the frosting off of course.

Nanie 2

The kids and Nanie playing in the kitchen.

Right before Nanie left we finally got pictures with her in them.

This is at a great little park we found.  You have to live nearby to get access, but Marilyn, who is in the primary with me lives right next to it, so we go through her yard.  It's got just the right sized toys, a huge lawn, that will be great for sledding with little kids and river access.  We love this park.

Reagan will play on this slide all day.

There I am nice and fat!  There were quite a few ducks swimming around, which we always love, and then a huge dog came and Coen thought that was way cool.  He kept trying to go over and play with it.  After playing here, we went to "Old McDonalds" to have lunch and play there too.  Reagan finally climbed all the way to the top by herself.  Usually she gets about half way up and gets scared, but not this time.  Then it was time to say goodbye to Nanie.  We were so sad!!  Reagan was sad all day, she even took a nap.  She has moved on now, about 5 times a day she talks about when we to the airplaneport at christmas and see Nanie and Hailey.  She tries to slip in a visit for her birthday too, but usually I can distract her from that.  Always something to look forward to.  Thanks for coming Nanie!!!  We love you and miss you already!!!

Nanie's Visit Part 1

It started with a trip to Dillon to see Papa & GG, Ben & Kim, Tim & Stacey & Nanie.  We met up to watch the Ohio State/USC game, which unfortunately for us, did not turn out as we had hoped.  The kids had a great time though.

Hailey adopted GG as her grandma, making it a little easier for Reagan to be nice & smile.

Then we came back to Post Falls.  Reagan talked Nanie into making her a Belle dress for Halloween.  Coen was fascinated by the noise the sewing machine made.

Wednesday, we took a trip to the beach.  It was great weather and we found a spot that was shallow forever, so the kids could go out really far.  They played in the sand.  Nanie brought a big floaty for me and the kids to share, but it was obviously not made for such a pregnant lady & I thought I would die of hypothermia before I could get the kids off me and get up.

Nanie has just been crowned queen of the ducks.  Lucky her.  There was a cute little duck that stayed pretty close to us for quite awhile, but eventually Coen scared her off by furiously quacking at her, which does sound kind of like a chicken not a duck and so probably confused her.  Reagan kept giving Nanie the rocks she found and making Nanie put them in her pocket.  When we got home we put them in a bowl and now I am finding rocks all over the house.

Pictures

One of Reagan's first shots.  Very typical.

Coen's first picture not screaming.

He's watching the big trucks move dirt.

After taking the kids in for pictures when Coen was three months, I have kept my vow of never getting their pictures taken again.  However, some grandmas had a problem with that.  A friend of mine takes pictures of her kids that are absolutely adorable, so I talked her into taking some for me.  We went to the park and Coen was all excited to see her, let her pick him up and when she put him down on a rock, he immediately began screaming- and didn't stop.  I took him for a walk and then tried to get him to walk back to me, so she could get his picture walking to me.  He turned around, saw me and smiled, then saw her and screamed and ran away.  Once he saw the big trucks it was all over.  All the pictures had to have him facing the trucks, so while we didn't get many smiling pictures at least he wasn't screaming.  Reagan hammed it up most of the time, but kept doing weird things to her dress or sticking out her tongue.  This should last us for a few years I think.

Nick B-Day & Another Day

I have been sorely remiss in my picture taking lately.  I couldn't find my battery charger.  So sorry Grandmas!  Nick took his birthday off and we went to climb Tubbs Hill and look out over the lake.  Then we went down to the lake and the kids played in the water.  It wasn't planned, but it was perfect weather.  We just took off the kids pants and let them splash around, Reagan was soaked head to toe.  We came home, had a nap & went out for dinner.  Reagan helped me make a birthday cake.  A "brown one with brown frosting."  It was a really nice, fun relaxing day.  The kids gave Nick gummy bears.  I think that's the only thing Reagan thinks is an acceptable present.  She tells Nick all about them as soon as we buy them, so there is never much of a surprise.

I invited Caysen over to help the kids learn how to play in the sprinklers.  They just stand there and look at them.  So Caysen had lots of fun, but not so much for Coen obviously.

I had to bribe Reagan to get her to stand on Elmo long enough for me to take a picture.  I'm not sure why they refuse to play outside for me.  If Nick is home, even if he's not outside, they'll play out there for hours.  I don't get it.

This is basically why I don't buy toys.  Who needs them, when you have old shelves?

The Beach, A Potty Party & Halloween

Pretty hot sunglasses huh?

Just laying out, like the not very covered lady next to us.  We went to the beach the next day with a bunch of friends and the kids got into the water by themselves for the first time.  We had lots of floaty toys and they had a blast.  I even got in- huge sunburn though.  It was really fun.

Reagan is obsessed with birthdays and birthday cakes.  She went to a birthday party the other day and was determined to buy him a cake instead of a toy.  So, after one week of no accidents Reagan got to go to the store and pick out a birthday cake.  She chose ladybug cupcakes and ate ALL the frosting first, she wanted everyone to have mustaches like her.

Brother trying to stick out his tongue like Reagan, good mustache. 

I think he is trying to be a princess pirate.  It could be the latest thing, like the puffy shirt.  I guess we'll have to wait and see if it catches on.  We'll try to find a more manly costume for Halloween.