Utah schools

Got back from my (long) trip to BYU on Saturday. Spent an evening with the Utah Jeppsons. On Saturday morning I had some extra time, so I went to the SLC temple and also took some pictures of "the U" that I couldn't the first time.


We now have UofU and BYU magnets on the 'fridge, right next to each other. It's a beautiful thing.

Real quick

I finally uploaded the pictures from my personal camera, and found this one of my mom opening her GPS that all of her kids got her for Christmas. Thought I'd share it so my siblings that weren't there could see her reaction.

BIG BOY!

So, Roy left today and I decided to take matters into my own hands and make some changes around here! :) I posted our crib on craigslist: "Free if you come and disassemble it". I got a phone call within 10 minutes and within 30 minutes after that the crib was gone! Yay! I then proceeded to assemble the toddler bed we bought a couple of weeks ago. I managed to do a pretty good job without killing the "helpful" children! Here's a picture of Blaise sleeping blissfully in it.



Now, you'll remember that I have weaned him now, so at night we usually get him to sleep by rocking him in the dark. But, tonight I told him to climb into bed and go to sleep, and he did! He fussed a little and messed around a little, but he stayed lying down the whole time and fell asleep within 10 minutes! I'm truly shocked. And then he didn't even stir when I put Rae to bed a few minutes later. What a peaceful night to end a not-so-peaceful day. Oh, did I mention that the kids have pinkeye? It'll be fun to do eye drops every 3 hours without any help! Just 68 more hours to go without Roy! Sigh.

Our trip

So, as Roy mentioned, we went down to Yorba Linda for his mom's 60th (!) birthday party. We arrived late Thursday night and went straight to the hotel that his mom had so generously provided for us. :) Friday morning the kids and I went to Dennys for breakfast so Roy could get some more sleep. Then we all went to Target to pick up little things we had forgotten. After Baerbel (Roy's mom), Dale (her husband) and Sonja (Roy's sister) got done getting their nails done we all went to the Santa Ana Zoo. It's a great little zoo, and the weather was amazing. Then we went out to lunch and dropped Roy and Blaise off at the hotel for a nap (just for Blaise) and hung out at Sonja's house.

Saturday morning we all went to Dennys for breakfast again. Barb and Dale took off to get some glamor shots done. We just chilled and dinked around all morning. Roy took the kids to the park in the afternoon and then we all got ready for the party. We went to Claim Jumper for dinner (YUM!) and then back to Sonja's house for cake and ice cream. It was fun. And Barb was all dolled up for her pictures!

Sunday we went to Sacrament mtg and then hung out at Sonja's house all afternoon. Rae had a blast with her cousin Catrina, and Blaise loved the cats they have and all the toys. It was a lot of fun. We left around 3:30 and the kids were asleep by 4:00! Rae slept the ENTIRE trip and Blaise slept till 6 and then was back asleep by 7 and slept the rest of the way. It was a great trip home. We are glad to be back, but sad that Roy is leaving us tomorrow :(

Rae started a "mommy and me" preschool today. She liked it a lot. I get to host next week. She's going to the doctor in a few minutes to check on a possible bladder infection or UTI or something. I'll update later about that.

Blaise is an AMAZING sleeper now that he is weaned. He is a much heavier sleeper and he slept 8 hours straight last night!!!! WOOOOOO HOOOO! Then I got him back to sleep in his crib at 3:30 and he slept till 4:30 and then I just brought him to bed with me. He didn't get up till 7 this morning, and he still took a 1 1/2 hour nap this afternoon. And this is all while teething! I'm loving it and just enjoying it while it lasts!

Anyway, I better get going to the doctor. I'll post some pics from our trip tonight.

Black and White Blaise

We went to SoCal for my mom's birthday. Blaise and Rae were photogenic. Going to BYU tomorrow and another school next week, so I bet the Wrightblogging will remain light for a while.

The time has come....

It's been about 40 hours since I last nursed Blaise. I didn't want to wean him in a "cold turkey" sort of way, but that's just sorta how it happened. The plan was to start nursing him less during the day to see if we could night wean him. But once I started refusing to nurse him and saw how easy it was to distract him, I wanted to go all the way. Lately nursing has become a huge chore and not enjoyable. Blaise nursed ALL night long and ALL day long but never really seemed to be comforted by it. He's getting his molars, so he's just all around miserable and using me as a teething ring wasn't working for either one of us. The first night went okay. He had about a two hour stretch where he was fussy (first with Roy for an hour and then with me for the second hour) He didn't really seem that angry or distraught, just unsure of how to fall asleep without nursing. I finally brought him to bed with me and just held him and sang to him and he fell asleep. I don't mind him sleeping with us, I just mind him being attached to me (literally) all night.

Last night went even better. He slept from 7-12:30 and then Roy got up with him and changed his diaper and then I got up and helped him fall back asleep (in our bed again) This time it only took an hour and he slept soundly till 6-ish (when Rae started making a racket!). Today he's doing pretty well. I haven't really felt any regrets (except that I'm in so much pain from engorgement - one downside of cold turkey!). It feels right and it feels so free and positive. I would have liked to nurse him longer, and maybe even after he starts sleeping better I might start letting him nurse a couple of times a day if he seems like he needs it. His appetite is way up and he eats everything we put in front of him!

I wonder if it's something about January that makes me feel like I'm suddenly trapped and NEED TO WEAN. Rae was weaned about this same exact time 2 years ago. All the rain and being stuck inside is taking a toll on me. And with Roy out of town last week all I could offer Blaise was to nurse to sleep and it didn't work out very well. And since he's going out of town again next weekend (and probably a few more after that) I really needed to have that freedom from nursing. I don't know how my sister nurses so long...was it easier because your kids just nursed a few times a day or were you just more determined than me? :) I can handle the all night nursing - it's the all day nursing I can't handle.

Anyway, what a long and random post. Just thought I'd keep ya updated. Oh, and to my sisters - now I know what it feels like to have huge boobs like you guys! LOL - can't wait for the milk to dry up!

The U

Snowy.

More pictures

We went to the "Dolphin Habitat" at the Mirage. The kids loved it!


Us on Christmas Eve

Rae and Blaise and their cousins

Some pictures

I wanted to write a bit last night, but Blaise was having trouble sleeping, so I just brought him to bed with me and went to bed early. I always have about 15 minutes in the morning when the kids play nicely before breakfast...so I'll post as many pictures as I can before they find me!




Rae loves her grandpa!




Rae wanted to take the boat out by herself.



Blaise was introduced to fire...and...guns...



No lectures please...it was just a BB Gun and Roy was just posing, not actually shooting something. :)

Updated links

I updated my sidebar links. Sorry Audra, I had been meaning to add your blog (and others) for a long time now but never got around to it. There ya go.

Jobhunting

A little rusty

I'll have to get back in the habit of blogging. I'm not sure I'm going to be able to back-track and update you on our past month. I started a draft all about Roy's birthday so maybe someday I'll finish that, but for now I'm just going to say that we had good birthdays in December and good vacations. We went to Vegas from the 18th-26th then Blythe from the 26th-Jan 2nd. We got a lot of awesome stuff for Christmas and enjoyed time with the family. I was going to post some pictures, but I'm using the laptop and can't find them anywhere- I think Roy deleted them when he put them on the desktop computer.

In other news:

Roy: Leaves on Thursday for an interview at University of Utah. (This is for a post-doc position.) Then he has an interview at BYU 2 weeks later. (Also a post-doc) He applied to something like 45 positions, so hopefully we'll be hearing from a lot more in the next few weeks. Right now he's a TA (for the same class he TAd last quarter) so other than a few hours a week for that he spends his time preparing for interviews and trying to come up with new ideas.

Ashley: Is sad that Roy leaves on Thursday! Ahhh! I've never been home alone before, so this should be interesting. I started Weight Watchers when we got back from vacation. I lost 3lbs my first week and I weigh in today and I think I've lost about 3 more pounds. If I ever manage to squeeze in some exercise I'm sure I'll do even better. But last week I had some back problems and now it's raining, so there is always an excuse. I'm seriously looking into joining a gym (one with babysitting) so I can just go in the middle of the afternoon without taking up Roy's time. But I'll have to see if that's going to fit into the budget!

Here are some photo examples of some goals of mine:



This is the skinniest I've been since having kids. This was when Rae was 8 months old (March 2005) and I was almost in, maybe even in the top of my "ideal weight range". Unfortunately this didn't last very long. I've got quite a bit to lose.




I also want to grow my hair this long. Right now it's to my shoulders and it's driving me crazy. I want to cut it but I'm holding back.


Rae: Is now officially potty-trained! She hasn't had a daytime accident in more than a month!!! A couple of weeks ago she asked if she could wear underwear to bed, so I let her and she went about a week without having an accident! But then she had a few accidents in a row, so we are back to pullups until she can show me that she can keep dry at night. She's in Sunbeams now (a class in church) and she likes it a lot. She loves to sing the primary songs even if she doesn't know the words. She'll sing just about anything and put her own words into it. For example (not a primary song) she likes to sing "John Jacob Jingle Heimer Schmidt, That’s my name too" but she sings "Don jacob dingle pirate ship". She's so much fun!

Blaise: Is getting two molars! He has his four front top teeth and three bottom front teeth, and now he is skipping to his molars. We didn't even notice they were coming in, but now we know why he's been so IMPOSSIBLE lately! He went to the doctor for his 12 month checkup last week and he's a measly 21 lbs but he's 32 inches long. He's just so long and skinny. He just wants to nurse all day long and won't drink any whole milk, so it's going to be tricky to get some meat on his bones.

I think that's everything going on right now. I'll try to post pictures later today.

Happy Birthday Chad!

All day today I've been thinking to myself "Jan.20th, what the heck is happening on Jan.20th - why does that day seem fairly significant?" Then I check my sister Katie's blog and remembered that it's Chad's birthday!


Happy Birthday Chad!

Ugh

So, here's the deal - on Nov.20th the university shut down our internet. We had a virus on our PC and it's the second virus we have gotten since we've lived here, and therefore our "second offense". They told us to fix the problem and then wait for Student Judicial Affairs (SJA) to contact us (since it was our second offense). We fixed the problem and waited and waited. Finally Roy replied to the email (on Dec. 13th) and told them we had fixed the problem. They emailed back and said we needed to meet with SJA. Well, now it was winter break, so we decided to just wait till we got back from vacation. When we got back Roy went to the SJA office and asked them what the heck he was supposed to do. They set him up with an interview with like the top guy. He finally had that interview today and the guy pretty much said that it was ridiculous that we had to meet with him since our first offense was like 3 years ago and he's sorry that we got lost in the paperwork and that we'd get our internet back. He actually apologized a couple of times. Argh. Oh well. The good news is that we have internet now! Okay, technically we've had internet this whole time because we can pick up our neighbors wireless (and they are our friends, so they don't mind) but that wasn't always a reliable signal and it was only for the laptop and Roy needs the laptop at school and most of the time that he is home. And I just like the desktop better. I'm so happy to have it back!

And so, my fans, as soon as I figure out where I left off and where to begin, I will update you on our birthdays, Christmas, etc, etc, etc :)

Does Bobby read my blog?

I doubt it. But Happy Birthday to ya anyway! (Bobby is my oldest brother)

Friday's storm

(click for awesomeness)

We had winds up to 60 mph, and some parts of town lost power for a couple of days. I guess it was about as close to a hurricane as we'll ever see over here (news story).

Okay, Roy changed the link to "James Marsden" in the previous post. It's a small clip from the trailer. This is why he thinks of Chad when he sees the commercials for 27 Dresses.

What do you think?

I'm in a blogging rut. Don't feel like blogging. But here's a little something.

Everytime we see a preview for 27 Dresses, Roy talks about how much the lead guy looks like my brother-in-law.

Chad (bad picture - look at other ones on the blog for other poses) looks like James Marsden from 27 Dresses.


What do you think?

Om nom nom nom...

(click for awesomeness)

Slickdeal

I don't know if this will be interesting to anyone out there - but Fisher Price's nativity set is on sale. I want one of these but will probably wait till next year to get one. Here's the LINK

Freebie

I'm breaking my silence to tell you about a new freebie. We have had very limited internet the past two weeks (long story) and it's just not very fun to blog when you can't do it whenever you want and when the internet access you DO have is pretty slow. So, check out THIS FREEBIE It's pretty cool.


Oh, and we are all doing fine. Not too sick, not too busy but a little busy enough.

Just had to do it

Have you seen this? Fun stuff. http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=9550719588

Some things I love about Rae

I feel like I've been writing about Blaise lot, so here's a post dedicated to Rae (with an update of Blaise at the end)

Here are some things about Rae that make me smile:

--When she takes her shoes and socks off (like at the playground) she always puts her socks in her shoes. I only had to tell her to do that like once and she started. That's my girl! I don't know why this is so delightful to me :)

--She likes to tell me that she'll take care of Blaise for me. Today I showered while they were both just hanging out watching cartoons (this is the first time I've tried and it worked okay!) and she let me know that she would watch him. (she's even mentioned before that she'd nurse him if I needed her to!)

--She wants to follow the rules. I like that she actually looks torn between following her friends and doing what is right. A lot of kids don't even hesitate. Hopefully as she gets older she'll really recognize the consequences of following your friends instead of your parents. I hope she becomes more of a leader.

--She has a very cute wave. I can't explain it, but it's adorable.

--She likes to read in bed after I turn off the lights.

--She sings along with songs even if she doesn't know the words. I do that too :)

Okay, I think that's enough now. She just lights up my world and makes my days more pleasant (and stressful, but I'll try to block that part out of my mind right now).

Blaise was quite a bit happier today. Still not completely normal, but really getting there. He went to sleep without any fight. (which is amazing, because Roy isn't at home tonight and I thought it was going to be impossible!)

I got to wear an orange vest and a hardhat and work on the highway today. We would drive along the shoulder and look for young trees that had been run over by highway workers and we would drive stakes into the ground and tie neon ribbon to the stake so that they don't get run over anymore. There were too many of us out there, so there was a lot of standing around and talking, so it was fun and felt good to help out a bit. Next month I'll be doing it again, and hopefully I'll actually get to plant some trees! (This time they needed people who had a car to go on the highway but next time it is just planting)

Anyway, all in all a good day and I am ready for bed!

Dairy overload

Blaise seems to be a lot happier today. He slept fairly well last night. I still feel a little tired, but I'll probably be able to take a nap later today (between going to get flu shots for the kids and then planting trees for 3 hours) Things are looking up.

I'm finally starting to notice a pattern with Rae's eating habits and her poop. Well, I've noticed it before, but today I know for sure. When she eats too much dairy her poops are explosive and messy. I woke up to the sound of her saying "Mama, I pooped. It's on my hands." Not something you like to hear before the lights are even on. It was all over her body, pajamas, bed, floor. Ugh. But it was a fairly easy clean up and Roy got up for a minute to hold Blaise and start some bath water for Rae. 15 minutes later it was like it had never happened.

But it has to be quite a bit of dairy to this to her. Yesterday she ate like 3 bowls of cereal, lots of cups of milk, probably 3 string cheeses, and almost a whole box of macaroni and cheese (that was her lunch and dinner). Makes me a bit sick to think about it. She loves milk and cheese. I, on the other hand, do not enjoy explosive poops. And I wish she'd stop pooping in her diaper before even getting out of bed!

Update

Blaise's fever went away. No other symptoms emerged. Teething maybe? I have no idea. He's now super cranky and is sleeping badly. He yells when anything goes wrong for him and when he doesn't get his way. He yells after I stop nursing him even if it's been 20 minutes. He was up for 2 hours last night just yelling. He wouldn't fall asleep nursing, in my arms, in Roy's arms, nothing worked. We finally just gave him some Tylenol and he fell asleep, but it was within 10 minutes of giving it to him, so I don't think it was the medicine that did it. Just now we were trying to get him to sleep and he just kept yelling and yelling so we put him in his crib and he fell asleep after about 10 minutes. I think he got so much holding and cuddling while he had his fever and now he's not ready to let that go. And I'm willing to cuddle and nurse him a little bit extra, but the way he yells and screams about it is just insane and there is just a limit of how many hours a day I can sit there nursing him. And he never seems sad when he is yelling -never any tears or anything -he's just really pissed. My heart doesn't ache like it does when he is really crying. It is actually kind of amusing.

Anyway, I can't even think clearly enough to write anything else. I am exhausted from our horrible night last night. And I've gotta go babysit for my friend. It was our turn to go out tonight but Roy has midterms to grade and we are all just so tired and just wanted to save our date for next week. Anyway, more later.

Don't you hate it when...

...you take your kids to the doctor because you think something is wrong with them, and when you get there they stop crying and start acting all playful and happy? Well, that almost happened today. Blaise's fever started yesterday afternoon and continued all night and was a little higher in the morning. So I called the office and spoke with the advice nurse and she said I should bring him in. So she checked the schedule and said "can you be here in 5 minutes". Ahh! I grabbed the kids (luckily Roy was home to help me out, but he couldn't come along or stay home with Rae because he had a phone interview) and we dashed out the door. Blaise had just woken up from a nap, so he was rested and feeling a little bit better, and I was just like "ah, crap...we are going to get there and they are going to say there's nothing wrong with him". Well, that's what they said. He did still have a fever, so at least I'm not completely retarded. But nothing else is wrong with him. He just has a fever and incredible moodiness. But he's asleep now. And so is Rae. Delightful! (yes, it really is 6:45 and they are both asleep!) I'm sure Blaise will be up a lot tonight and Rae will probably wake up at like 5am, but oh well...I have some time to myself!

Roy's phone interview with University of Nebraska went okay. He feels like he gave good answers. It's just hard to tell on the phone I guess. I'll let you know if he hears anything more from them.

Not much else is going on around here. The weather has been beautiful and hopefully we'll be able to enjoy it more tomorrow. We are still trying to decide what we are going to do for Thanksgiving - either go out somewhere or try to make some sort of homemade meal. I'm looking forward to Roy having a little bit of a break and enjoying some beautiful fall weather. Maybe we can jump in some leaves or something. I remember enjoying last Thanksgiving so much and I'm hoping it will be as great this year. I guess that's all I have to blog about for now.

Last Thanksgiving - check out that belly!

One more thing

Today is Dale's birthday! (Roy's mom's husband) Happy birthday! It is also Sabina's birthday! (My brother's wife) Happy Birthday to you too! What a great day!



This is Dale in Germany. He's fun guy!



Sabina and Rae in Blythe June 2006

Tagged

My sister Katie tagged me:

5 Things I was doing 10 years ago:

1. Crushing on Andy, Abraham, umm, probably about 5 other guys
2. Growing taller than any of the guys and my friends :(
3. Attending Blythe Middle School
4.Listening to my "Language Arts" teacher compare me to Katie
5. Spending the night at Cami's a lot

5 Things on my to-do list: (some of these are for tomorrow)

1. Clean up the kitchen
2. Watch Heroes (if I manage to stay awake long enough)
3. Find letter from Medi-cal to find out who my new case worker is
4. Take laundry down to dryer, then bring it back up and put it away
5. Call the doctor in the morning if Blaise still has a fever. :(



5 Foods I enjoy:

1. Chocolate (although I have been so good the past 2 weeks and haven't had any)
2. Lasagna (sorry mom, I've found a new recipe and it's replaced yours)
3. Steak
4. Ribs
5. Ice cream

5 Bad habits:

1. Spending way too much time on the computer
2. Biting my nails
3. Not answering my phone and not calling people back
4. Yelling at people (mainly Rae and Roy and probably Blaise soon)
5. Watching TV instead of going to bed
That made me feel great listing all of those! :(


5 of my favorite toys:
1. My van - love it
2. Computer
3. Immersion blender (it's fun to find new things to use it on)
4. Can I list toys I'd to have someday when we have money? DVR
5. Umm, no, seriously, we have no money.

5 People I tag: (I don't know how often these people check my blog and if they will even respond to this "tag" - I think they actually have lives)

1. Paola
2. Sarah
3. Rachel
4. Cheryl
5. Andrea

Germany pictures

We just posted 300+ pictures from Germany on Shutterfly. Leave a note if you want to see them and didn't get an email.

Milestones

Blaise is 11 months old today! I can't believe how many things he can do. I'll try not to brag, because I can't remember when Rae started doing these things and I don't know if he's as extraordinary as I think he is!

Of course he's an excellent walker now since he's been walking for 2 months now. He's starting to run and it's a pain to be constantly chasing him.

He uses a fork better than Rae does. He won't eat unless he has a fork.

He likes to imitate so many things. The other day he saw Roy brushing his teeth, so he ran and grab a crayon and pretended to brush his own teeth! He's done it again on several occasions, and now we give him his own toothbrush to use.

He likes candy - especially suckers.

He likes to dance.

He'll walk up to us and give us something and when we say thank you he grunts and nods and walks away. Then he'll come back and take the item from us and then do it all again.

He's starting to say "yeah" when we ask if wants something or wants to do something.
He's also starting to say "mama" and actually mean it.

He yells (not just a cry, but a really angry scream) if I do any of the following:

Take away something he shouldn't have
Refuse to nurse him
Leave the room when he's not distracted
Put him in his crib when he's awake
Refuse to pick him up
If Rae is trying to do something specific with her toys and won't let him touch them

He likes to attack Rae. He's not a very nice brother. He attacks her when she's vulnerable - like when she's a zombie watching tv.

He just brought a book over to me for me to read to him. He's starting to enjoy books

He's a pretty fun little boy. He's high-maintenance though. He wakes up at least 5 times a night and takes a long time to fall back asleep -even if I nurse him in bed. Last night Roy took care of him till about 2:30am and then I finally gave in and nursed him. He seriously needs to be night weaned. He'd be a lot happier during the day if he slept better at night. And so would I.

Anyway, I just can't believe he's been around for 11 months already. Where did this year go?!

New Freebie

Check it out

Not much to report

Yesterday I washed a used disposable diaper. Yes, in the washing machine. Yes, with a load of laundry. Must have missed the trash can and went into the hamper. That's the kind of day I had yesterday. But the laundry smelled fine and the diaper stayed perfectly intact, so I didn't bother to re-wash the load.

Kids slept in till 6:00 this morning. We are making progress! Actually, Rae went to bed extra early last night because I had an Enrichment activity at my house and Roy doesn't get home till 9 (which is why the activity was at my house - so I could actually attend) and I needed Rae to get to sleep so I could try to get Blaise to sleep in time. Roy usually gets him to sleep, so Tuesdays are always a little difficult. But I did it! And I got my house all cleaned up (even vacuumed - which is hard because both kids are scared of the vacuum) and I got my soup made (it was a cooking club Enrichment) all with a few minutes to spare! I was pretty proud of myself. The kids didn't get baths though. Just a wipe down with baby wipes.

Anyway, I should be taking better advantage of Blaise taking a nap and Rae watching a movie. Anymore suggestions on a humidifier?

I want

My favorite Slickdeal of the day: This mirror I wouldn't have anywhere to put it in our apartment, but someday when I have a house I want something like this.

Need some advice

Even though we've been here for several winters, we don't have a humidifier. I really think we should get one soon - especially since we've all been so sick already. Once when we were at my parent's house we used their humidifier because Blaise was all stuffy and it worked miracles. But I don't know what kind to get. I know cool-mist ones are safer for in a kids room. But what if I put it up high and Rae is not the type to ever mess with it - and I pretty much ALWAYS know what is going on in their room since our apartment is so small. Do cool mist work the same as warm mist? I know you have to make sure the cool mist ones stay really clean because it doesn't warm up the water and kill off the bacteria in it. I've done a little bit of research, but I just don't know what to get. And should I just invest a lot of money into a really really good one, or are the cheap ones okay? I need YOU, my lovely readers, to enlighten me with your experiences and opinions! Thanks in advance!

Oh, and the kids were up at 4:45 this morning! Maybe they will sleep in a little each morning and we'll get back on track sometime.

Are you kidding me?!?

We turned our clocks back last night. We figured Rae would wake up around 6:30 or 7 the old time, since she usually sleeps 11-12 hours. Well, no, for some reason she woke up at 5:30 the old time!! So, 4:30! And Blaise woke up at 3:30 (the new time) with a leaky diaper and general grumpiness. I finally got him back to sleep just seconds before Rae started waking up. I would have made Rae stay in bed, but she was saying she needed to pee (she's never done that before- she still wears a diaper at night and often poops in it before even getting out of bed) so I really wanted to encourage this new behavior. And when I got out of bed to get Rae, Blaise woke up too. So it's friggin' 5:45 in the morning and cartoons aren't even on yet, we've already had breakfast, and I think Blaise is ready for his first nap. Sigh. I think I can wake Roy up in about an hour or so, and I can probably get a nap before church (hooray for 11:00 church).

I stayed up to watch Spiderman 3 last night. It was good, but a little cheesy. Topher Grace is way cute. Blaise wants out of his high chair...better go.

Happy Birthday Bryce

I don't know if you ever read this, but I hope you had a good 18th birthday. Don't forget to register to vote! :) I can't believe my baby brother is 18!!

Halloween

On Tuesday we went to the party here in the apartment complex. Rae wore her cowgirl costume because it was pretty warm outside. I don't have any pictures from that day. I dressed up like a pirate. I just put on some black capris, a black and white striped shirt, a red tie around my waist and a red scarf. Oh, and I had an eye patch, but I just kept it on my forehead the whole time. The party was fun, but we stuck around the whole time waiting for the university's pep band to show up and they never did. That was a bummer.

Halloween morning we dressed up and went to Music Makers - which is always a ton of fun. And we went straight from there to Nut Tree Family Park because they were letting anyone wear a costume ride for free. (It's always free to get in). We stayed there for like 2 1/2 hours. Rae's friend Natalie showed up too and they had a blast together. Usually we go there and Rae gets to pick one or two rides to go on, but this time we rode each of the rides (well, the 3 that she is big enough for and that she likes) at least 2 times.





I forgot Blaise's costume, but I had an extra scarf from my pirate costume, so I just tied it around his neck and it went well with his white shirt and blue jeans. While Rae was on a ride he got a turn with her hat. :) What a cutie!



I couldn't seem to get their attention. Rae cried on this ride. It looks mild, but it jerks you around each corner. She tried it a long time ago and cried that time too, but this time she wanted to try it again because Natalie was going on it.





The "Rescue Squad" ride. It's a great ride because each rescue vehicle has room for 4 kids and each kid gets a steering wheel and a button that makes noise.

After we got back we rested for a while and then I took Rae trick-or-treating around the complex while Roy stayed home with Blaise and handed out candy. Rae got a ton of candy (I took care of all of the good stuff last night). Then we bag up some of it and gave it to the guys who have been cutting down all the trees near our apartment (they are always really friendly to Rae). Now we just have some of the nasty stuff that doesn't tempt me too much - like suckers with a hand as the stick, and eyeball bubblegum and gummy brains. I do have some M&Ms left, and Blaise has discovered that he loves them. He yells at me when I won't give him anymore. And Rae talks about candy all day long and is constantly asking to "just hold some". Hopefully she'll lose some interest soon.

Anyway, we had a lot of fun but we are ready to move on to Thanksgiving! Bring on the turkey! Oh, wait, does anyone want to come visit and cook us a turkey? Looks like we'll be having Dennys or pizza or something. Hope everyone had a fun Halloween!

Trunk or Treat

Here we are at the ward trunk-or-treat Saturday night.



Mother-daughter witch team!



That is one cute devil! The broom is turned around the wrong way. He was carrying it because it says "dirt devil" on it. Heh.



The Halloween costume Rae was most afraid of? Spiderman (it was the full head-covering mask that really bothered her)





Helping himself to some of the loot.

Festivities leading up to Halloween

Here are some of the things we did "Halloween week"



Picking out a pumpkin at "Grandpa's Barn" (We didn't end up buying one because the line was really really long.)



Rae pointing out a rotten one.



Blaise thinks he's pretty strong.



This was the best we could get of them together.



Rae brushing a horse.



Rae's favorite part of "Grandpa's Barn"...the hay pyramid.




Practicing for Halloween. We play dress up on a daily basis around here. Check out his eyes - this was when he still had pink eye.

Long time no post

Things are going pretty good here. We are all relatively healthy and happy. We had fun at the trunk-or-treat Saturday night and I will post pictures later today. Rae doesn't like her witch costume very much, so I think she'll be wearing her cowgirl costume from last year for the rest of the Halloween festivities. And my witch costume is a bit warm, so I'll be dressing up like a pirate. Today there is a party in the apartment complex that should be a lot of fun. And then tomorrow we will wear our costumes to Music Makers and from there go to a nearby "amusement park" that is offering free rides if you wear a costume. And then we'll go trick-or-treating after dinner (just to a few apartments) I think I am going to dye my hair today...haven't decided yet. I bought the hair dye yesterday. Hmmm. That's all for now I guess.

Past Halloweens

Last year








2005 - She had two costumes



2004

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uISuvTiTYJA

Very sweet. Really sums it up.

Pink eye update

So, apparently Rae didn't have pink eye. Her eye discharge cleared up without any medicine, and her eyes never got pink or itchy. Blaise's eyes got worse though, and after finally getting the antibiotics Monday night we gave him his first dose, and in the morning we could see that his eyes were significantly better. Now they are pretty much completely better, and I don't think he's contagious anymore. My theory is that both of them had bacteria in their eyes (the greenish stuff) but only Blaise's eyes actually had a bacterial infection. I don't know if that is medically correct, but it makes sense to me. So, you don't necessarily have to worry if you were exposed to Rae.

And that's all the time I have for now.

Counting blessings

Now I'm a little more sick. I've got a bit of the stomach bug that the kids and Roy had. Nothing too bad though. But as I headed for the bathroom I thought to myself "are you kidding me, what else is going to go wrong around here!?". I went to pick up the prescription for the kids and there were problems with their insurance, so no medicine yet. I have to call the insurance in the morning and figure out what the problem is. But they are both acting happy and "un-sick", so I'm not too worried about it. Maybe this way is better, because maybe they can actually be seen by a doctor before starting the antibiotics.

Anyway, I started feeling like I was complaining too much. Things really aren't that bad around here. The house was a wreck today, but I was able to get it all cleaned up while Roy bathed the kids. Now there's just one more (huge) load of dishes to be done and things will be pretty much back to normal. And it is hard to keep the kids away from other kids, but we can go for walks and I have a couple of "rainy day" projects tucked away that we can do tomorrow. And I am definitely grateful for all the great stuff we have to do when the kids aren't sick. And I'm grateful that Roy has a pretty flexible schedule (ahh! what am I going to do when he's not a student anymore?) and can help out so much. I'm very blessed and actually have it pretty easy compared to a lot of people.

I don't know if any of you have heard some of the criticism going around about Sister Beck's talks from the General RS Broadcast and then from General Conference. If you hadn't heard any of it, sorry I brought it up. But I had, and was pretty bothered by it all. Well, I finally got a chance tonight to sit down and listen/read to both talks, and I found them really humbling and inspiring. I really, really enjoyed them and have this renewed energy and confidence in my capabilities and I just want to do better and really be the best that I can be. I really felt the spirit and really needed to hear those words tonight.

And now I am going to go to bed. Ahhhh, being in bed by 8:30 is delightful. Goodnight.

The dreaded "pink eye"

Late yesterday afternoon I began to suspect that the kids had pink eye (one word or two?). They woke up Friday morning with colds and lots of discharge from their eyes. Saturday it became apparent that their eyes were actually getting pinkish. This morning it's for certain that Blaise has it but I'm still not completley sure about Rae. She has had soooo much green discharge from her eyes but they aren't nearly as pink as Blaise's. I just spoke with a doctor and they are going to call in a prescription for both kids. Blaise is pretty cranky but doesn't seem like he's in that much pain and Rae hasn't complained of any eye pain. But I'm going to go ahead and do the drops today and the doctor said if they aren't showing any improvement by tomorrow then it may not be pin keye and I need to take them in to see their doctor. Now I have to start making the call that no one ever likes to make... "hey, sorry, your kid was exposed to pink eye".

Rae is very sad that we are missing church today. Especially since Roy had to go and prepare the sacrament and Rae is like "can I go to church". Poor gal. Roy is going to come home after sacrament meeting so we can go get the prescription (well, and mainly because I don't want to be alone with the kids for 3 hours while he's at church) I'm feeling pretty sick too. No pink eye (yet) but I had a bad headache and a cough that hurts my chest. :( I just want to cuddle up in bed and watch all of the conference talks that I missed. But Roy has to finish grading midterms by tomorrow (he has to go today and trade stacks with another TA) so I think we will have a pretty boring, tiring, patience-trying day. Sorry if you are reading this and were exposed to Rae on Friday or Saturday! :(

Pictures

We received these beautiful flowers from Baerbel and Dale last week. Thank you so much!



Did you know these exist? It's Mr.Potato Head pieces for your pumpkin. Turned out pretty cute, huh?





The kiddos being cute this morning with a cheerio snack. Blaise was amused that he got to sit on the couch with his sister.

SO SICK OF BEING SICK!

Well, no, not ME being sick...the kids. I did have a cold for a couple of days, but nothing too bad. (I'm exhausted enough every night that nothing can keep me from being able to sleep peacefully - except Blaise)

But this has just been a month of illness! First in September the kids had bad colds. Then we got a break for a couple of weeks and then we had the nice barf, fever, diarrhea fest. Then Roy got it. And then I got a cold and now the kids have it. But it's not the nice kind of illness where they just want to lie around all day - they are just sick enough to sleep badly and then whine all day. AND, since they are sick I can't just send them over to a friend's house so I can have a break. Ah! It's times like this that I wish we lived a little closer to a grandma! :(

The good news - I've managed to keep the house pretty darn clean. Last night I went to bed at 7:30 with the house completely trashed. But when I woke up this morning I was able to get it cleaned up really fast. Now I just need to do dishes and laundry - and since we'll all be stuck inside today that should be pretty easy to do. Oh, and another bad thing...when the kids are sick we don't really have anywhere to play because other moms don't really appreciate you bringing your sick kid to the playground. Having our own backyard will be nice.

Oh, today is the anniversary of Roy and me meeting in person. Six years ago today he made that first trek to Blythe to come and meet me, and we began to fall in love. I had planned to do something special for him since a friend said she would babysit for us - but now since they are sick I guess he'll just spend the day grading quizzes. Fun. I've got some cute pictures to post, but I'll have to do that later when I can use the other computer. Maybe I'll have something more upbeat to say too :)

Things I keep forgetting to mention

Blaise recently went through an obsession with the phone, and anytime I used it he would want a turn. Well, the other day I gave him a turn (so I could get some computer time) and he called 911! What the heck!! I didn't notice, so I just hung up and then of course they called me asking if everything was okay. Good thing Rae wasn't throwing a tantrum in the background or something! Needless to say, he doesn't get any turns with the phone anymore.

Roy found my first gray hair a couple of months ago. And then a few days later I found another. Well, yesterday I found one more. I don't know why, but I'm already struggling with the idea of getting into my "mid-twenties" and adding gray hairs to the mix doesn't help at all!

Blaise claps and waves all the time now. And he babbles a lot, especially first thing in the morning when I'm begging him to go back to sleep. Notice that it's 6am as I write this. He woke up at 4:30 and has pretty much been awake since then. I'm about to go wake Roy up so I can get a few more minutes of rest. Oh, and Blaise loves to stack blocks (that's what he's doing right now.) It's so cute. He makes up for his grumpy moments by being so expressive and entertaining when he is happy.

Rae is a crack up as always. She's always doing something to try and get Blaise to laugh. She's constantly talking and is now using some of my favorite phrases against me ("don't aruge with me", "can you just not talk to me right now", "don't say that to me", "say you're welcome".) Fun stuff. And she's awake now, so I better go.

Check it out

Go to this blog and enter the "freebie of the month". I've won twice. They give away really cool stuff.

Cleaning

I love to clean. Well, I don't actually like the cleaning part, but I love the way I feel afterwards. I just my microwave super clean. I don't know how long it had been since I had cleaned it, but I think maybe my mom was the last to clean it back in Feb or maybe even in December when Blaise was born. Sorry to anyone who has used my microwave since then - that's pretty disgusting. But I read somewhere I really great tip for easy cleaning. Put some water and lemon juice in a mug and microwave it for a few minutes. Everything will wipe right off. After getting that done I looked around and decided I need to clean my cupboard doors. It's nice when the rest of the house is clean enough that you can do some of the deep down cleaning. I'm amazed at how much I can get done lately. Blaise entertains himself pretty well. It's really nice - and life is pretty stress-free (at least today) :) I'm no longer feeling so antsy about going somewhere. We'll be pretty busy around here and I'm going to keep finding little projects to do. Anyway, I got on the computer to look up a recipe and got distracted so I better go tend to the kiddos.

Forgot to post this one

I guess it can get cuter than that last picture!!

Videos for your enjoyment

Sometimes Blaise makes messes....




Sometimes he cleans them up....




He has been so much fun lately. He's really learning a lot and is beginning to communicate in his own little way. And he understands a lot more of what we are saying. He definitely knows what "no" means, but it just makes him crack up and try to be faster at whatever naughtiness he is trying to commit.

Rae is doing a great job with potty-training (we went a few steps backwards when she was sick). She's always trying to get Blaise to play games with her and can rarely get him to cooperate. It'll be so much fun when they can really interact (and a lot of trouble too).

Anyway, things are good. I'm antsy (very antsy) for a change of pace (IE: a trip to Blythe) but I haven't figured out a way for that to work, so I'll try to just stay busy around here and come up with things for us to do. Any ideas? :)

More pics

Do I look bored?











Rae "helping" Blaise down the hill.