Rae's birthday party

Since we are moving before Rae's birthday, she got her party early. We had a pretty simple pool party at the park with pizza and cake. The hardest part of the party was tracking down phone numbers for friends from her kindergarten class. But I was able to get a few and I think Rae was really happy to see them again before we leave!



The cheesy birthday girl!

The boys had fun too

These little guys love the wading pool!


One of my favorite things about Kirksville are these little wading pools. They have them at 3 different parks in town and they are free to use. They even have a lifeguard on duty. This one is right down the street from our house and was open on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. There is another one that was open everyday (except Sunday) but it was always really crowded. This one was perfect, never too crowded, but always enough kids to play with. We will really miss these pools!


Getting ready to pull the pinata
(Which I got for free at a health expo)

The loot!

Blaise and his buddy! I bought rings for each of the girls to take home.

Just hanging out on his own.

Keeping with the "pizza" theme - we sliced up some giant cookie!

I think it was a success!

Random Rae Dialogue #2

(Yeah, it has been a long time.)

After watching this video...

Rae: Is this real?
Me: No.
Rae: Because a cow can't go into the butt of another cow and come out like that.

The latest

I know most of you have already seen these events/pictures on facebook - but I like to be able to refer to my blog to remember dates/events, so I'm recording it all here too. I know the camera must have some more recent stuff on it, so I'll try to transfer those and blog about them tomorrow. Nothing creative coming from my mind this week - all I can think about are all the little things I have to do for the move!

One of the counselors in our primary presidency lives on a farm and does all of the work herself (milking cows, butchering lambs, feeding chickens, making cheese - just thinking about it make me feel so lazy and unproductive!) We had a primary activity there a few weeks ago. Rae liked to get up close the the animals, but Blaise did not (and Isaac stayed home with Roy, thankfully)


Feeding a goat

Blaise wanted to wear his "farmer hat" which is also his "cowboy hat", depending on the situation. He was excited to pose in front of some horses with his hat on!

Uh, yeah, I dyed Rae's hair. I found some hair dye on clearance at Walmart, so I bought it for myself. Then I convinced Roy that he should dye his hair. I didn't feel like using the remaining dye on my hair because I had done my recently, so I thought it'd be fun to do Rae's hair! Judge me all ya want!

For the 4th of July our city had a cupcake contest again this year so this time Blaise entered too. I showed both kids a bunch of different cupcakes on the Family Fun website, and Blaise chose this one. I thought it was a good choice, because he could actually do most of it himself.

You are supposed to have 5 cupcakes for the judges to taste and 1 that you put on a special display for the judges to look at. For Blaise's we put his in a flower pot with some fake flowers. I wish I had taken a picture - ergh!

Rae was actually able to do most of her cupcakes by herself as well. They looked a LOT better in person and her display cupcake was REALLY cute. I'm so angry that I didn't take a picture! We put a cupcake in the middle of a paper plate with some rocks around it like a firepit. Then we took two polly pocket girls and sat them on the rocks and one of them was roasting a marshmallow. I think that extra effort probably got her a lot of points. She tied for second place! Her friend Franny won first and her friend Corinne got second along with her. It is an honor to be winners with these girls - their cupcakes were amazing!

This kid....

....is such a rascal! He likes to be like the big kids and likes to cause trouble. Here are a few pictures to illustrate what life is like with him!

We had to take apart the VCR to retrieve the DVD he wanted to watch....

....and then we had to re-arrange the entertainment center so that he could no longer reach the VCR. Now he has a nice little play space!


Rae and Blaise love to help him be a big kid!

"Hey, do you see what I'm doing?"

"Hahahaha, I'm so hilarious!"


Helping himself to some fruit. I let him keep the plum and he ate every last bit, except for the pit.....smart kid!
We've been doing lots of packing and the full boxes are put back onto the empty bookshelves - Isaac made it up onto this box but couldn't get down!

I'm tempted to pack him up and ship him to the grandparents!

He has also learned how to push the kitchen chairs over to the kitchen counter. Ugh. I swear that Rae didn't figure out how to do that till she was like 3! The other day Roy fell asleep on the couch in the morning when he got up with the kids, and when I got up later I discovered a huge mess in the kitchen. He had put a couple of cups in the microwave (luckily he doesn't know how to turn it on) and he had opened the baby formula and the scoop was in the living room. He's just pure trouble He's lucky he's so stinkin' cute too!

This video was taken almost a month ago. He gets real serious about yummy treats!

So much on my mind

I've been neglecting my blog lately. Seems like every time I sit to write a post I get distracted by something else, or one of the kids needs me. But there are so many things I want to write about, so I am setting a goal to write at least 4 posts a week for the next few weeks. I've gotta write about how grown up Isaac has become and how much trouble he gets into during the day. And about how similar he and Rae are and how different Blaise is from the two of them. And I'm way behind on pictures. So, yeah, keep checking back and bug me if I'm not posting! :)

Why I'm glad my firstborn is a girl

Sometimes Rae is a little smothering with her mothering instincts - but most of the time I'm glad I have someone around to help me out and keep an eye on the boys! Just now I realized things were a little too quiet (Rae was still asleep) and then I heard Blaise say "we are cutting the banana". I had been using a knife to slice some banana into my cereal and left it on the table. (I forgot that Isaac can now climb onto the chairs to reach things on the table - ergh!) Isaac retrieved the knife and banana and was helping himself to a snack. Instead of informing me that his little brother had a SHARP KNIFE, Blaise decided to get a knife of his own (just a plastic one) and help mush banana into the carpet. I'm so glad that no one got hurt. Most of the time Blaise is just totally oblivious to what Isaac is doing. Even at age 3 Rae was a mini-mommy and now at almost 6 I can trust her to keep an eye on the boys while I run into the house to do a quick chore, or I can close them up in the playroom while I shower. I know that some boys, especially firstborns, can be as attentive, but Rae has the desire and love of caring for others (and tattling!)

Oh, and don't worry, it's safe for me to be at the computer writing this, because Rae is awake now! :)

Getting creative

Since our nice big house is gonna be an extra $200 a month in rent, we are trying to find ways to save money. I decided that our grocery bill has been way too high, and that we shop way too often. We've been going to either Walmart or Aldi at least 4-5 days a week. It's easy to do because they are so close by. But in Fayette our shopping will be 25 miles away - so either we need to learn to shop once a week or we'll be wasting a lot of money on gas!

So this week I gave Roy $20 and told him that was his Walmart allowance for the week! He is pretty much on his own for his food - he does his own weird thing. But for me and the kids I decided that I was going to go as long as I could this week without going to the store. I usually try to go on Mondays and stock up on food for the week, but I always end up making more trips. So this time I'm trying to use up all the stuff in our cupboards, fridge and freezer. I probably won't go to the store until we run out of milk!

Yesterday, since we were low on our basic staples, I had to get a little creative. Oh, and another part of my goal is to make sure I use all of my produce before it goes bad. So I thawed some salmon that I had in the freezer and grilled it on my foreman grill. Then I flaked it and mixed it with Wacky Mac, raw broccoli, red onion and baby carrots and some parmesan italian dressing. TASTY! It was even better today after sitting the fridge overnight. The kids didn't like it, but I put some of the wacky mac aside and mixed it with butter and parm. cheese and they ate that along with a little bit of salmon.

I've been trying to get my kids to eat cooked carrots, but they hate them, so today I blended them up into a puree and mixed it with their mac and cheese. Hahaha :)

For dinner we are having homemade pizza. It feels good to use up the mozzarella cheese and pepperoni that has been in the freezer. And it's always fun to use my bread machine :)

Anyway, I know it is only Tuesday, but I'm feeling good about this new goal. I've been relying heavily on prepared foods for the kids (like chicken nuggets and tater tots) so it's good for me to learn a few new recipes and cook from scratch. I'm hoping that when I do go to the store all I'll need to buy is milk, eggs and some fresh produce. I'll let ya know how it goes :)

Movin' on up! *Edited to add picture*

Ladies and gentleman .... for the first time in the 8 years of Wright family history....we will be living in a house! Still renting, but at least a house that doesn't share walls with any other houses!!!! I am beyond excited. When we first found out we were moving to Fayette we looked for places for rent and just couldn't find anything. So we considered living in Columbia but really felt like we should give Fayette a try. So we started looking at houses for sale, but really didn't feel like we could make that commitment. We finally found a few things up for rent, but two of them were disgusting. So we settled on a 4 bedroom house that is way bigger than we need and is at the top of our rent budget, but it is really our only option. We first saw it a few weeks ago and signed the lease agreement last week, but yesterday I was feeling like I needed to see it again so I could get a better idea of where we'll put things. I forgot my camera, but we took down measurements (I forgot the measuring tape too, but we bought one) and Roy put together this floor plan.



I am a little overwhelmed with the amount of space! I know that we can't get enough furniture to make it the way I want it, because we'll probably only stay in this house for a year or two, and our next place is not likely to be as big. But here are some ideas I have for it:

-The kitchen is huge and has a nice little corner nook and I want to put one of those nook tables there. We'd probably eat most of our meals there. And then in the dining room we can put our current table, but with the leaves in it so that there's actually room for all of us! Then there is still room in the dining room for a computer desk or something.

-Front room 2 will be a playroom I think. I wanted to make front room 1 a playroom, but it has a better layout for the couch and tv. So I think front room 2 will have a futon couch and a few toys and maybe a table for school work.

-Front room 1 will have our couch and our entertainment center, and maybe a bookshelf. The window sill is awesome and we will put some cushions there for extra seating when we have company.

-Unfortunately the only shower is downstairs, so Roy and I will probably keep most of our clothes hanging in the laundry room. But fortunately the laundry room is nice and big and has shelves and hanging rods.

-The basement is icky and really scares me, but we'll be able to store a few things down there - like our camping equipment or something. Most of our other outdoor stuff we will probably store on the HUGE front porch. We will probably do most of our playing out front. There's a nice big tree that gives great shade, and maybe sometime we'll be able to get a porch swing. The back yard is nice too, but the front yard and front porch are just so HUGE.

-Upstairs, the first bedroom is pretty small, so that will be our spare room. We might just use it for storage or we might end up putting the computer and school work table up there. We haven't decided yet. The other bedrooms are nice and big and the master bedroom is bigger than we'll ever need. I'm giddy about the fact that we'll able to walk around our bed without bumping into things.

-The attic has lots of room for storage and isn't as creepy as the basement :)

-Oh, and upstairs the hallway goes all the way down past the bedroom doors and it's just this huge empty space - practically big enough for another bedroom! If we were buying this house I'd probably make it into a huge storage closet.

So, yeah, I'm totally excited. It's not a super nice house - it's pretty dingy and has a few structure problems, but it's totally great for renting for a year or two. And I think that after 8 years of married and move number 6, we've definitely earned ourselves a nice big house!! I can't wait to move in and get some pictures of the "finished" product!

Here's a picture of the outside - from Google Maps


View Larger Map

Isaac's birthday

Isaac had a pretty uneventful first birthday. Actually, we celebrated his birthday on the 9th - Mother's Day, because we knew that on his actual birthday (the 12th) we'd be busy packing and getting ready for our trip. Plus, I wanted a cake for Mother's Day and I didn't want to make another one for his birthday :) Here are some pictures:


Isaac had no interest in opening his presents


Rae got him some mini-bath toys. Perfectly bite sized!

Blaise got him a shark stuffed animal. Hmmm, sharks just happened
to be Blaise's favorite animal that week.

Isaac was pretty sick and grumpy.


But some chocolate cake makes it all better!

On the 11th we took the kids to the circus for Isaac's birthday. I thought Isaac would enjoy the different animals, but he wasn't very interested. Rae's friend Sarah came with us. It was a pretty ghetto circus.

Our Charlotte visit

Here are some pictures to look at until Ashley gets around to blogging again.

Rae's dance recital

I know the video is long, but Rae is in the front row in the very beginning, so you can just watch that part. Rae did so much better during rehearsal...I wish I had that on video. I think she was a little more nervous this time around. I like the fact that their teacher actually taught them a lot of real ballet moves. I think they are pretty good for a beginners ballet class - they are all 5 and 6 (well, some of them have probably turned 7 this year - and Rae is the youngest) Her kindergarten teacher came to watch her and she sat with us. That was a lot of fun for Rae. I hope we can find a nice dance studio when we move.

Buried treasure

Today I turned on my cellphone, which I haven't used in a year, and noticed that there are a bunch of pictures on it from around the time Isaac was born:

Uhhh, I dunno

Not sure why I haven't been blogging. Part of it is the fact that there's no job news to share and it's a frustrating time of year. Sigh.

Another reason is that every time I sit down at the computer Isaac ends up trashing the house. That boy is crazy. I'd like to attach a camera to his head so you could see the world from his level. He wanders into the kitchen several times a day and gets food out of the cupboard (stupid rotating cupboard that I can't lock, but it's the only decent place to put food) then he takes that food and puts it random places in the house. Then he wanders into the bathroom and gets his favorite hairbrush and puts that somewhere random. He's always so busy. I can't clean up fast enough!

Last week at church I had several people comment that they can't believe how big Isaac is and that he's not a baby anymore! He is such a toddler now - he's learning how to communicate, he has opinions about everything, he's learning how to run and he loves to play! Last week we got him an early birthday present.



Aldi had these for a good price and I thought the kids would all enjoy it. I wanted to get it now since the weather has been so nice and they are outside so often. I put water and sand in it the first time we used it, but it immediately became mud, so I emptied out the water and just put sand. When it gets hot I'll put water in both sides.

This afternoon we made grahmn cracker houses. I wanted to get rid of some frosting that I had in the fridge and we have way too much Easter candy, so we did these. The kids had a blast.






I threw away the leftover candy, so now we just have a few Peeps around here somewhere, and a bunch of Valentine's Day candy still - ugh!

If I don't blog again for a while it's just because I'm waiting for some news to share. When we know where we are going (or staying) we'll let ya know!