Good Days

This is what a good day looks like around here:

Figuring out it's faster to just walk to the grocery store than it is to load and unload 3 babies. Though I don't know how long this is gonna fly...

If I had a dollar for every time someone stopped me to say "omygosh twins!" Or "wow, you've got your hands full!"...

Mud pit yard after non-stop rain over the weekend

Hours with the train set (best $5 I ever spent at a garage sale)

Doing things ain't nobody got time for because Christmas is coming!

And so I don't forget, cute and/or funny and/or brilliant things Clark has said lately:

- after I said "come help me pick out some clothes", he said "church?". Guess he thinks Sundays are the only days I get dressed. Fine, he's right. 

- while watching a horse-drawn carriage on tv: "horsies driving car!" 

- whenever he sees a butterfly these days, he recites the last few pages of "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" which ends up being something like "babble babble two weeks! And then.... butterfly!!!"

I can't remember any more right now which is why I need to start writing them down! 

Halloween '13

Well I was in no mood to be creative or elaborate with costumes this year, so we whipped out the old Mario and Peach costumes from 5 years ago, rounded up a Luigi costume for Clark, and made some little mushroom hats for the babies. Lucky for me, Amy also lent me this glorious wig to complete the look.

We went to our ward trunk or treat on Tuesday night where I forced Clark to do the cake walk and go from car to car begging for candy...for him of course (no). I guess I'll never be a day older than 12 at heart. By this point he had erased his mustache and refused to keep his hat on, so pretty much just looked like a kid wearing overalls. Jacob pushed the girls in the stroller at a distance and pretended he didn't know me.

On real Halloween we went to the annual Halloween party put on by my sister. Ate soup and bread bowls and amazing homemade donuts and then all the kids went out trick or treating. Jacob took Clark along while I stayed with the babies. I was so excited that he was old enough to justify trick-or-treating but young enough to not know that I would be eating most of his loot. So I was genuinely upset when all the youngins came back with buckets of candy and Clark was empty handed! Apparently Jacob did not feel Clark was old enough to actually participate in the candy-getting part of trick-or-treating. Grrrr. Lesson learned. And I still have the next 2 months of holidays to get fat.

Easter

This year Easter was the day after Clark's birthday, and he and I were both feeling pretty sick so we didn't do anything too exciting. We did manage to color some eggs and let Clark crawl around in the backyard finding them. He was kind of into it until he licked one and decided it didn't taste very good. Then he was over it.

I watercolored these cups for the birthday party, but then I thought about what might happen if people had sweaty hands. So we used them for dye instead.

my prettiest rainbow egg

The Birthday Party

So I had planned on throwing Clark's party at a park so the kids could just play (and I wouldn't have to entertain them) and blow bubbles and it would be a beautiful day. But as the day approached, the weather kept saying "rain!". So I finally gave in a moved the party to our little house which we then had to clean. Uhhh. By this point, all hope of making it a real cute party had pretty much gone down the drain because I'm tired and sick and don't have to be a cute over-achiever mom if I don't wanna!

Clark was also pretty sick. So basically the whole time, Jacob had to hold him and keep him away from the other kids. We felt so bad for him by the end of the day; kid spent his birthday watching all his friends play with his toys without him. And before that he was pretty much neglected while we ran around like headless chickens trying to prepare for the last minute change of plans. Poor guy. So here's a sad little boy's sad little birthday party.

Back when I was feeling ambitious I made these wrappers to match the party...and cover up the really ugly wrappers that come on bubbles. 

Luckily, it was just a nice laid-back time for the most part, good company, and my mini fruit pizzas turned out pretty tasty (everyone gets to eat whatever the pregnant lady's craving). Clark was much happier after going at that cake and got totally spoiled with gifts from friends and family. Oh, and what do you know? It didn't even rain! Of course.

Around the Nursery

I keep thinking I should get pictures of our home, but the I think "no, I'm not done decorating yet." But I'm guessing I never will be, and I always regret not documenting the places we live--not to show off how stylishly we live (bahaha), just for memory sake. Hopefully someday when we're LOADED, we'll look back sentimentally on our humble beginnings. That's a joke too.

For starters, here are some details of Clark's nursery. I just wanted it to be kiddy and bright and make him happy (despite the tan walls that we can't paint over). Seriously, I see babies with fancier rooms than I'll ever have as an adult. Gag. So here's some nice phone pictures of my son's very cheap room.

I slaved over every one of those pom-poms

I like finding nursery art online, and then shamelessly copy-catting it. 

These were way harder to make than they should've been, but they're nice and soft so it's ok when he pulls them down on himself when he should be napping. 

stuff I found around my parents' house and garage sales

What else am I supposed to do with stuffed animals?

December

Here's what we've been up to over the last month:

Getting our house all festive. I finally finished with about 3 days left of us actually being here. Oh well.
(Side note: As I've had an actual home to decorate, I've learned that I'm really bad at decorating. I just assumed I would be good at it, because I like nice-looking homes and have lots of good ideas. But I'm bad at putting it all together/don't have money to spend on nice things. Maybe some day!)

Sewing up some little gifts for all of our playgroup friends. And there were two more skirts that I didn't get pictures of! I'm proud that I got them all done in time.

Working on/shopping for gifts for everyone else. 

Taking walks down "Candy Cane Lane" which is actually a lot cooler at night (shocking), but I forgot to take pictures that time. And it was COLD.

Baking lots of bread.

Learning how often wanna-be-toddlers get hurt and trying to find new ways to trap him in the one "babyproof" room in the house.

Lots of other stuff, I'm sure, but that's all I can remember for now.  

Halloween 2012

Over the weekend we got Clark into costume and took him to the stake trunk-or-treat. When I first saw the carnival that had been created in the stake center, I got really excited. Then I remembered that I was too old and my child was too young to participate. So we grabbed some food and left.

When I was making his costume I forgot that babies grow really fast, so it's just a little snug

On real Halloween Clark had playgroup, and all the little babies came in costume. It was a whole lot of cute to take in!

Princess Leia, gnome, robot, tiger, ladybug, owl, frog, ballerina

I think Clark's trying to pick a fight.

Last year at this time, while dressed as "16 and Pregnant", I couldn't wait to have a baby to get me free candy. When it actually came down to it, I just couldn't quite justify using a baby that everyone knows is way too young to eat candy. So instead I put Clark in his costume for our normal evening walk, and we went down the streets that were especially decorated. Lots of people here decorate their yards for Halloween; it's marvelous. I hope they get this into it at Christmas!

Music Video

Me with an afro. Enjoy.




Maybe next time we'll try to learn the words.

Dabbling

I used to wish that I was really super amazing at just one thing, but I've learned to embrace the face that I'm just ok at a lot of things. I think this transition happened around Sophomore year of high school when I decided to quit going to ballet for 3 hours every day and just be a kid and have a social life. Then I reached my peak of hobby exploration. That year alone I was in dance, orchestra, and ice skating classes, culinary club, the ski/snowboard club, badminton team, and a few weeks on the tennis team (I think I quit after I got my fingers stuck in the strings of the racket when I was supposed to be listening to a lecture from the coach...or because if I did manage to hit the ball, it hurt my little wrists real bad). I even got the boy I liked to teach me and a friend guitar lessons.

Snowriders

Badminton

obviously

orchestra trip

So my latest hobbies are learning to use Adobe Illustrator to make the blog all cute (could you tell?) and penmanship. I just decided that being able to write really pretty would be a good skill to have, so I got this book last time I was at the library:

I guess if I can't be in school (I miss it so bad), I'll just teach myself anything and everything. Except sporty things. No hope there.

Baby Announcement

We got our friend from work to take some pictures of Clark and quickly threw together an announcement to be sent off with our graduation announcement (heavens no, we're not paying for double stamps).

We just couldn't decide between these two, so we printed off some of both. I know people want to see his precious face, but who can resist a little curled up ball baby (or "pod" as Jacob calls it)?