Trimming the Tree...

I know it is not even officially December yet, but our REAL tree is up and it looks amazing! We put on some Christmas music and started trimming the tree (literally). The first thing Sadi did when we got it in..... She could not stop smelling the thing. There is just no duplicating that aroma, I love it! Every time you go out of the house and come back in Pow! You get that beautiful smell. After we decorated the big tree it was time to bust out the kids trees and all of their ornaments.

A few years back we decided to let each of the kids decorate their own tree with their ornaments. Hey with 4 kids that is alot of homemade ornaments! Here is Sadi's tree..

Chase's which he was mad that he didn't have more ornaments so we had to find some extra for him.

And Kelsey's which has mostly all Rudolph ornaments, she loves Rudolph! It is always fun to see the ornaments they have made and picked out the previous year, it is like opening a little Christmas early!

I think it is time to get the cookies in the oven to complete that "Christmas" smell!

Gobble Good Turkey Day!

Hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving, we had a nice relaxing day at home. The kids made these turkeys using their feet/hands to make them. They turned out pretty cute. I made the whole dinner myself this year (yea me). As soon as you could smell the turkey cooking here was Sadi saying she was hungry and wanted to see the turkey. She wanted to sit in front of the oven and watch that big boy baking!

I guess my kids were super hungry by the time we ate and asked the kids what they were thankful for Chase immediately yelled "THE FOOD!!'" It was delicious!

Hereditary...

Ever found yourself watching your kids being weird or okay let's just put it out there "dorks"? And you of course blame it on your spouse's side of the family? You know you have...well for once I have hard evidence that my kids dorkiness I believe is hereditary. The other morning while sitting eating breakfast I look over at Sadi who is quietly eating her breakfast....with the bowl on her head!! I immediately started laughing but also remembered a photo my mother in law had showed me some years before. This is Matt when he was a kid about the same age.....

Need I say more? Of course it is a Denning Gene!!!

New Moon

Alright as much as I want to tell all about the "New Moon" premiere last night, I will refrain from spilling anything for those of you who did not get to see it yet! It was to be a fun night out for both Kelsey and I, she has been waiting forever for this movie and has had a countdown in her room for 100 something days so I knew I wanted to make it an extra special day for her. The morning began with a little surprise. I had made wolf tracks that led from her room out into the kitchen.There waiting for her was a photo of Jacob (below) which I added a title for her that read: "I'll see you tonight...".

She needed a good breakfast as she would be facing the Voltori later that evening, one last warning as she left for school on the outside of the front door I left one last footprint she would see that said "We'll be watching you". (You will get this if you have read the book). She was soo excited to get home and then the waiting for time to go. I had planned to take her out to dinner and a little shopping before the movie so we got ready to leave. I told her she didn't look quite ready to go and that her outfit just seemed to be missing something but that I had just the thing to complete her outfit. I had found this cute charm bracelet for her that has all the cute charms to represent all the things in the movie/book.

I then told her to check her purse to make sure she had everything she needed before we left. I had hidden one more little surprise in there. Some chocolates for the movie that were individually packaged in Edward and Jacob wrappers! Finally we were off!

We went to Chili's for dinner..yummy! A little shopping and then to the theatre to join the madness. They were playing the movie in 10 packed theatres, I chose smartly and walked to the very end theatre to find it less packed than all the rest. Then we waited anxiously!

Finally Movie time, this girl smiled I think the whole movie! As I promised I won't spoil anything, I will just say it was Awesome!!!

Sowwy is that my dwool?

This week I faced my biggest fear! I have been avoiding having my wisdom teeth removed for like 7 years. My top two came in painful but I endured it over the years, my bottom two were much more painful but I am so terrified to go to the dentist I thought I could deal with the pain. The dentist had assured me that although when I looked at the x-rays and one of them looked like it would be coming in crooked and push my other teeth that they would straighten out. LIE!! I woke on Tuesday and realized one of my front teeth had moved! Not drastically to anyone else but to me it might as well changed zip codes! I immediately called the dentist to schedule an appointment to just talk about what I could do (no need to get drastic right?). Well shockingly they said we could get you in on Thursday to have those extracted....I immediately panicked and tried to think of a reason why I couldn't make it..she then offered Friday as well! Well I managed to make the appointment for Thursday, I was confident something would come up and I would have to cancel, my tooth all the sudden didn't look as though it had moved that much. Came the next morning and I realized now they would not have 24 hrs. notice to cancel so I would be going. I knew it was very unlikely they would be able to remove them, it is unusual for a regular dentist to remove wisdom teeth. I made it to the appointment barely. First thing to do...get an x-ray the nurse said would feel like she was strangling me...okay now I am freaking out!!! She did tell me how rare it was for the dentist to remove wisdom teeth so that if he agreed it should be very straight forward. He came in took a LONG look...blah blah blah (I was paralyzed with fear so heard some of what he said) "Okay it looks like we can remove those for you today". FULL ON PANIC....embarrassing really, my whole body was shaking. "Okay let's do it!" Who said that? Oh crap it was me!! I knew I would not have the nerve to come back so they might as well strap me down. I did ask him "How skilled are you?". He laughed which I say as a good sign. They more than offered me nitrous oxide (AKA laughing gas), I have never experienced this before but they said it would calm me down...all I needed to hear, I was on board...crank it up!! It is the weirdest feeling....I LOVED IT!! I didn't hear alot after that, I had the I-pod blaring so loud even they could hear my music. Over an hour later DONE!! As I was leaving, I am pretty sure I was drooling, but sooo happy I felt no pain. I couldn't make complete sentences for many hours later, and was happy for a drive thru pharmacy to fill my pain meds. I am very proud of myself for facing my fear...By the way I purposely told no one of what I was having done, because if you have noticed whenever you tell someone what you are having done they automatically feel it their duty to tell you a horrific story they experienced. You know it's true right?

Straight A's

Yesterday was PTC (parent teacher conference) for Kelsey. Of course all her teachers raved about what a great student she is and how they wished they could duplicate her. She started off the year great...straight A's!! A few of her teachers admitted they don't like to give out A's at all but she really earned it. Matt told her if she gets straight A's for the next 3 years he will buy her a car. She is REALLY working for that. (Hey we never said it would be a new car right?..he he).
Way to go Kelsey one quarter down, only 3 quarters and two more years to go!

Happy Halloween!!

Trick or Treat!! Halloween was a really fun night. It was a loooong day waiting to go trick-or-treating. Finally the time came to get in our costumes and head out on the streets to collect some candy. My little ghouls in their costumes....Isn't this the cutest little scarecrow you ever saw? What made this costume so cute is watching her in it, she wobbled around just like a scarecrow. This is the first year Sadi really got to walk and knew how to say trick or treat. She did a couple houses and then was ready to sit in the stroller and ride around for the rest of the night.

My spiderific Spider man had the energy of an army...this kid went till his bucket was full!! I mean not one more piece of candy could fit in that thing. He was running to every door, he would complain his bucket was heavy but he was not going to stop until he had no more room literally.

Dr. Denning in her scrubs got some extra candy from the elderly people I noticed, I think they appreciated her costume....or else they had a lapse and thought she was their nurse!

When the night was done it was time to head home, light up our pumpkins and dive into the candy!

Chase sat patiently this year sorting and looking at every piece of candy.

Sadi couldn't wait to open her candy she wanted to eat everything! She wanted so bad to eat all these jaw breakers (I wouldn't let her have them...those things are dangerous!). She was watching Chase and every time he would look away from his candy she would casually sneak a little more of his into her pile...she ended up with quite a pile! What a little stinker! It was a fun night! Hope everyone had a nice Halloween!!

Pumpkin Carving!

This year I had planned to let the kids use those cute little button faces you just poke into our pumpkins....apparently they thought that was just not as fun. So the night before Halloween we set to work carving those happy and scary faces. Seems like Matt misses out every year on helping me carve those babies! Here they are with their pick of the lot. Sadi made one attempt to pull out the pumpkin guts...and then she was done.

Chase did a little better....he tried it umm maybe 2 or 3 digs.

Kelsey has become a pro now so she set right to work on her masterpiece.

The finished projects! Kelsey got creative and added some pumpkin hair, and look at Sadi and Chase, of course they did all the work right?

Grandma and Grandpa Smith

Grandma and Grandpa Smith came to visit us for Halloween. Chase has kept Grandpa busy playing since he walked through the door. We have had fun shopping, making homemade ice cream, visiting the sites and of course sharing all of our Halloween fun with them.The morning after Halloween Grandma was having some really bad hip pains and so we rushed her to the emergency room to get checked out. We found out it was her Sciatic nerve. She is doing okay now but still not feeling back to normal. So, although they planned to stay for just the weekend, we will be keeping them for a bit longer!

Grandma resting after she came back from the E.R.