Pumpkin Carving...

We finally carved our pumpkins for Halloween, I didn't want to do it to early so they wouldn't get all moldy and yucky. Here is the before....It will be nice when they can all carve their own, Sadi wanted to help...She did well helping make a mess.Kelsey did the most work digging all the guts out of the pumpkins. She still likes to eat the seeds straight from the pumpkin, yuck!! We did toast a whole bag for her this year from her pumpkin.Chase was not really into touching it this year, check out his face!The finished products.... Of course he did it all himself, look how proud he is of his little pumpkin..

I made Sadi's have 4 teeth just like her.

What a difference a year makes, Happy Halloween everyone!!

Cookie Fun

I thought it would be fun to decorate some pumpkin cookies with the kids just to get them excited for Halloween. So I baked some cookies and bought some frosting and candy so they could make some cute little pumpkin faces. I miss calculated how fast they would eat them. This is the first time Sadi was actually big enough to do anything like this but I thought it would be fun to test out since we always decorate cookies on Christmas eve. I gave her a few pieces of candy and a cookie to entertain her while I got the other kids set up. Once she tasted the candy, it was gone!! Didn't care so much for the cookie. This is as close as I got to a picture of any of Chase's masterpieces. He was so fast it was put candy on, inhale, gone, start over. I think he ate like 4 cookies!

Kelsey of course took her time and made all kinds of different designs.

And Matt made well, some cookies that I could say the kids made? He is such a kid at heart.

Kelsey's night

Last night was Kelsey's first Young Women in excellence program where she got to show off some of her talents. Her big project was her rag quilt that Aunt Susan and Tori helped her make up in Utah. It turned out soo cute. Bogies you got all the praise last night. She got so many compliments, and people wanting her to make them one. She was really nervous but did a great job, she is such a good girl and growing up so fast. We are very proud of her.

How fast can you type?

Everyone knows you don't leave a toddler alone for 5 seconds (everyone except for Dad's). In the time it took Matt to come tell me something, Sadi had bolted down the hall into the computer room, climbed on top the chair and bang bang banged out some reports!!! Check out how many pop ups she gave Matt, and how fast her hand is going!! She's for hire if anyone needs a secretary.

Diaper Duty Minus One!!

Check out the "big boy". I can confidently say he is now potty trained. Once he got it, it did not take long to master. We are over a week with no accidents. He is very proud of himself as am I. Here he is with his completed chart that I made him. Matt bribed him with candy bars, only now he thinks he needs a candy bar every time he does a "big one". He is happy that now he says Uncle David has to take him....sorry David this kid forgets nothing!!!

How do you eat spaghetti?

I know you have all been here with your kids at one time or another, you know teaching etiquette for dinner, Ha ha. If you think about it everyone has their own method of eating spaghetti, some use a spoon, some bite it, and some do it the right way, they slurp it. I think this is the first time I have given it to Sadi to just feed herself. Really you can't feed someone else spaghetti it just doesn't work. She loves it!! She had an entire adult portion and then finished Chase's. I tried to get her picture while slurping it up but she sucked it up to fast.

This may be her favorite food thus far, or maybe it is just so darn fun to eat!!

Best day of the week

There is no question what Chase's favorite day of the week is...it is trash day, which for us is Tuesdays. He looks for that trash man all morning. I know I can never go anywhere on Tuesday mornings because there is no tricking him anymore, he knows what day it is by seeing every one's trash cans out by the street. Even our garbage men look for him now if we are not out there before he pulls to our house.

Will it be his future job, who knows but no one but him is allowed to take that can up from the street. For now it is HIS JOB! Works for me.

A TRIP TO THE PUMPKIN PATCH

Yesterday we took a trip out to Fallon to visit Lattin Farms pumpkin patch. Kelsey had the day off from school and Matt had taken the day off from work to go with us. It ended up being a beautiful day, I think it may have even got up into the 80's. It is such a cute little family owned farm that grows organic produce and has all kinds of fun things for the kids to do. It is where we sent our rescued chicken and duck a few years ago to live. We started the day off with their corn maze. The kids were really excited. Here is Kelsey and Sadi getting ready to head in. Check out how tall that corn is, there is no cheating with this maze, it is huge!I had a hard time getting any pictures of Chase, he did not want his picture taken at all. He was our guide through the maze (well at least for awhile, his direction is about as good as Matt's). He thought that was so cool picking which direction we should go. I snapped a shot of him showing us which way we should go. There are so many twists and turns in there, we got lost many, many times.Here are the girls catching some quick shade from the corn before Chase was yelling which way to go again.I cannot explain how huge this maze is, it took us over an hour to find our way out. It is actually 5 acres in size. Here we are finally at then end, going over the bridge to get out...check out the background, that is all maze!! They actually make you have a cell phone because some people just cannot find their way out. It was so hot in there!! It was funny when we got out Chase said yea were finally out of the woods.We took a breather and fed the kids some snacks before we were off to the pumpkin patch.Here is Chase on the hay ride which is a big trailer filled with bails of hay that they pull with a tractor. He was so mad I was taking his picture again!Sadi was ready for the ride!Here's Kelsey trying to find the perfect pumpkin for carving. It was hard to pick one, they were all really nice. I don't know what the secret is for growing perfect carvers but whatever it is, they know the trick. Chase spotted his perfect pumpkin before we ever got off the hay ride. He wanted this cute little one and no one (not even Daddy) could talk him out of his little pumpkin. Sadi wanted to pick them all but we decided on this one she sat down by.

It was a fun family day! The kids cannot wait to carve their pumpkins, but I think I will make them wait till Dad is home one night so we can all enjoy the mess!!!

First Snow!

October 10, 2008...the first snow!! This is some crazy weather we are having (like always I guess). Just a few days ago we were wearing shorts and the swamp cooler was running, now here we are heater on and watching the first snow of the season. Chase had to get out there and taste it, I love watching him catch the snowflakes on his little tongue. I thought it was just going to be a little flurry but we woke up on Saturday to about 3-4 inches on the ground! Watch out Utah, your next!!

He can fly!

Chase got these new PJ's which he wore last night for the first time...loves them!! I personally would not have picked them out for the reason below you will see, but Matt had to have them. Just as I suspected the first thing he did.....saw if he could fly. And the answer is YES! He fly's all night and morning over, and over, and over. I had to end the flying when he tried to fly over his baby sister...AHHHHH!

Taking time to smell the flowers..

I took Sadi outside this morning to show her my Mums that are in full bloom and looking so beautiful right now. I knew she would appreciate them because they are her favorite color, YELLOW of course. She thought it was really funny to touch them, I think they kind of tickled when she touched the petals.Anyway, I was trying to show her how to smell them (which to tell you the truth if you have ever got really close and sniffed one it does not smell that pretty which I discovered). She took one sniff, and then....Went for it!!! She tried to eat it!!! I think the neighbors heard me scream "DON'T EAT IT!!" Then it was funny and she tried again and again to get it in her mouth. Everything she touches goes straight to her mouth.I finally just ripped one off the stem and sat her down to look at it. I love watching them at this age learning how things work. She decided it was just as fun to pull the petals off. It was cute to watch. We finally went inside but not before she somehow snagged the smallest pebble and shoved it in her mouth. I found that out later after we had been in for awhile. What a stinker!!

And the winner is...

The winner is Sadi!! I entered Sadi in a baby pageant here locally that was held at the Governor's Mansion on Friday night. I always wanted to do it with Kelsey when she was a baby but never did. My intention was just to try it out, I thought it would be a lot of fun, turns out WINNING is REALLY fun! She looked so cute. Here is a recap of the night, again I probably have entirely to many pictures, but I figure this is my scrap booking for now so oh well. We got there and checked in and got her number, I could tell it was going to be disorganized when the lady said "oh we decided to put the babies with the big girls since there isn't very many". Seemed like a little bit of an unfair playing field but we went with it. Here she is all ready to go...

It was hard to keep her entertained while we waited for it to start. I have to give Matt credit on this one, he picked her dress, it's hard to tell but it really makes her eyes stand out.They took the babies back into a small judging room and had the existing royalty play with them while the judges watched.She didn't cry which to me was great since here was this room full of strangers.After the playtime we waited to be announced, I was her chaperon. I was kind of nervous because they tell you okay you go to this spot on the floor then move here then move there then back here and oh by the way we play music so just listen for the ding to move to which spot. Got it? Umm NO. Oh well good luck! go!Here we are being announced by the reigning royalty. It was very cute, they tell things about her while we move from spot to spot. They said here's contestant number 8 Sadi Denning, Sadi is 13 months old from Dayton, NV, Her parents are Matt and Karen Dennning. She has 2 brothers and 1 sister supporting her tonight. Sadi has brown hair and blue eyes. Sadi's favorite thing to do is collect yellow things, and her favorite food it bananas.After doing this twice, which was one thing they messed up on, we were suppose to model casual wear and then party wear but ended up just modeling one it was time for intermission and then they announced the winners. She won 3 trophies!!! She won a trophy for "Best Party Wear", a second for "Personality Plus", and then the big title of Miss Northern Nevada Overall Baby. I could not believe she beat out the older girls on personality and party wear! Wow, I was blown away. Here she is being crowned and given her sash. She also won a partial scholarship to compete in the State pageant in Vegas this summer but I don't think we will go. Hey if your already a winner do you need to win more? Here she is with all her trophies.

After the trophies and crowning, it was time for official pictures.

I wanted to get some really cute pictures after it was all over but she was not interested, notice the crown is gone and she is trying to stack her trophies.I had to surrender and let her be done, it was a looong night! She was ready to go bye bye. I couldn't resist getting one with crown on even if she was asleep by the time we put her in the truck.

I had planned to go out to dinner after to celebrate but she was just to tired so I tried again the next day to get some cute shots, once again, she did not want to wear the crown, so this is the best we could do. We took her to McDonald's the day after to celebrate and bought her her very first Happy Meal and to let her play in the play land. She loved it!!