Skating Party

Annabelle had a birthday.  For her party, she wanted to have a skating party with cousins and then have the girl cousins sleep over. What a fun day! I somehow have completely forgotten roller skates still exist.  Haha!  This was the first time for my kids and they loved it.  We need to remember this. Isabelle wanted to use real skates first and fell all over the place.  We talked her into using some toddler ones for a bit and she got better and then put back on the other skates and was really picking it up. She had fun and is asking for a pair of skates.

Michael was a little trooper and got right out there.  He liked it, but wanted to go faster than he could without falling hard.  He ended up following around strangers at the arcade area watching them play. 

Luke made a couple of laps before he called it quits. 

Michael wanted to go on the big parts but I didn't have skates. Jonathan, being the awesome cousin  he is, took him on a few laps.  Jonathan is such a good kid and is always so helpful with my kids! 

Once he was done, Luke just layed around on the floor being a content spectator. He liked the weight of the skates on his feet and didn't want to take them off.  He had fun experimenting with them and watching the color changing rope lights tucked under the skating area.

Spencer like the lights too.  He was grouchy until he got fed, then he was a busy body that wanted to be on the skating area. 

The girls went out to the middle and danced a few times.  Such a fun birthday party!  

Happy Pie Day!

We had a great Thanksgiving!  Mike's sister, Jeannie's family, hosted Mike's folks and sister, Sharon's family.  It's always fun to be together with family.  The kids played and played.  We ate and ate.  All the food was DELICIOUS!  I didn't take many pictures with my camera, but I did get a pie picture of each of my kids. 

These girls are so cute and fill the role of "sister" for each other!  For this reason alone, I would make the decision to move again in a heart beat.  

Apparently, there was a green food coloring clump and it was in Isabelle's piece.  Her mouth was green forever! 

Thanksgiving is FULL of dairy.  I caved on a few things for this little boy expecting to have a fussy one the next day.  Sure enough, he was, but he loved getting to enjoy some stuffing and pumpkin pie. 

This Thanksgiving, I looked back at the year we have had.  Last Thanksgiving we were at my folks house when they found out they were moving to Delaware.  My last trip to my childhood home. We were pretty sure we were moving back to Utah and I had a newborn.  Life is so different now than it was. I'm grateful we made the changes we have made.  Mike is happier.  Nothing makes me happier than seeing my husband happy.  He loves his jobs.  We both love that we live by lots of family.  Our kids have so many friends their own ages and in our neighborhood. We are back with dear friends and have so much to be grateful for. We have been so blessed. 

Turtle Sitting

We turtle sat for a neighbor while they were out of town for Thanksgiving. I thought this would be fun for the kids and seemed low maintenance enough for me to support.  Feed every other day, let out of the tank to wander around the house once a day for a bit, little to no poop involved. I can totally do that!  Isabelle and Spencer LOVED it!  They are both so obsessed with animals.  Luke and Michael like it, but it was nothing special.  Red eared slider turtle is on my list of approved pets. It's active enough to be fun to watch, but low maintenance enough.  She didn't smell, make a mess, or make noise.  Fun! 

This one's not exciting, except for Spencer standing.  He takes a few steps at a time and then sits down and crawls. 

Food Stuggles

The spoon self feeding has begun.  It's so dang cute. Which end do I use? :)  However, in all this we are definitely struggling with food.  He's been extremely fussy lately and I'm pretty sure it's ALL related to food! He decided he was done nursing, so we have been trying lots of different milk options because he is still struggling with dairy.  He can have a little, but too much gives him a rash and he has a difficult time getting it out the other end and is very grouchy in the meantime, which is about a day.  So I have tried almond milk, rice milk, coconut milk, etc....the works. I don't love any of these options because the fat content on them is almost zero and he needs it for brain development, so my favorite option is goats milk and that is by far his LEAST favorite option.  He is now getting to the point, he is always leery of any cup I hand him.  He usually spits it all out unless it's water, which he LOVES. I'm definitely starting to stress a bit about it.  I'm a pretty easy going food mom, but when it comes to brain development, I'm starting to get worried. I tried even adding chocolate syrup and strawberry syrup to mask the flavor.  My next step this week is mixing the goat milk with some rice milk (the one he drinks the "best" which still is not great).  Until then, we are using coconut oil, avocados, mayonnaise and other fattening non dairy options to help with some fat. 

He is also just wants to eat what we are eating and most of it he can't eat.  The only thing that is saving me is he LOVES baby food. None of my other kids still liked it at this point, so I'm glad he is hanging in there.  He's at least getting fruits and veggies. So we are hanging in there with lots of tantrums and frustrations. Hopefully he will continue to grow out of it. 

My Blessing

Ok, so we aren't still swimming, but this picture was taken on October 14. (I actually am that behind I guess!)  The weather this fall has been SO fantastic!  I told someone it was my blessing. Utah is easing me into being back. This true southern girl really does not like the winter weather around here.  I was in a bit of heaven in Florida.  However, this year, we swam til the end of October, wore shorts and t-shirts on Halloween, and then while it got chillier, we were still in short sleeves and flip flops on Thanksgiving.  This last weekend we almost hit 60! I still feel like I live in Florida (in fact on Saturday we were 10 degrees WARMER than Florida).  Now, there were some COLD COLD days in between there.  Definitely plenty of days I bundled Isabelle up and happily sent her along her way to the bus stop alone. I felt guilty and went along with her a couple of days, only to come home and remember, I don't love the cold and I don't need to go every day. ;) I'm sure this is the end of the super warm weather, but I'm enjoying it until then.

Party!!!

I took the plunge and threw a birthday party....my first real one.  Isabelle picked out everything and we kept it under budget.  She had so much fun, so I guess that's all the matters!  They wore dress ups since it was the day before Halloween.  When they came in, I painted nails while they had a dance party.  Then we made bracelets and necklaces with beads.  We finished off with decorating their own cupcakes.  They LOVED that part!  I stretched out the bead part longer than necessary worried I would run out of things for them to do, but then we ran out of time for presents because they spent so long on their cupcakes. It was fun!  

Top Gear Auto

So this happened. The first couple of months of the Baskins he spent lots of time figuring everything out, was really busy and loved it.  One store was already a smooth sailing ship, he got the other one running really well, and then they weren't enough to fill his time. So, he did a bunch of research to look for something else. He decided on a car dearlership.  He's sold everything else, why not add cars to the list? Ha!

Doesn't look like much yet, but it takes time to get going. 

Got his dealer's licence  

Started buying cars.... 

Now to see where things go from here!  He's enjoyed figuring out all the nitty gritty of the car world. Mike never ceases to amaze me with his drive to learn.  He always wants to be figuring something out.  He's going to be the 60 year old man going to back to college just for the heck of it.

Brotherly Love

How cute are they? Seriously, adorable. :) 

Isabelle Joy

Isabelle's birthday was definitely drawn out.  She got lots of chances to celebrate. Her actual birthday was after 1 1/2 other celebrations and she still got a birthday party. 

She wanted banana muffins for breakfast. I love the "obviously just crawled out of bed" look.

She loves non-fiction animal books and requested a rabbit one.  She got a pack of animal books as her birthday book.  

For her birthday dinner she requested Ramen noodles. I have a dish I make that has chicken and veggies in it, but she wanted JUST the noodles.  Corn, jello, and apples with caramel sauce.  The EASIEST birthday dinner ever. :)  The jello is in the shape of rabbits. 

She had an Elsa cake 

She got some beads and playmobile 

And a pink lamp and bookcase for her bedrooms so she could read at night.  Mike joked she must be my kid. :)  

Lots of fun putting it together. 

Good old Luke put his new set of tools to work helping Mike.  It was adorable.  

Spencer was adorable that evening walking around and getting in the way, but being unbelievably cute while he did it.  I need a 12 month old around all the time. :) 

She looks so different than she did as a baby, but she's getting prettier and prettier by the day (yes, I'm biased.)

Oh I love this girl.  She continues to amaze me with her maternal instincts.  She's bright, kind, responsible, thoughtful, silly, creative, and fun.  She is such a great help around the house.  I have officially given her a made up middle name.  Joy.  She brings me so much joy.  She is a joy to have around our home and in general she brings joy with her wherever she goes.  Her favorite show is Pound Puppies.  She LOVES to read anything about animals.  She's specifically obsessed with rabbits right now.  She is still her Daddy's girl. She is loving dance and the piano.  She loves to read and do anything artsy. She also still loves to play mom and with her dolls. She's happy to help usually, and is so cute when she takes care of the boys.  She wants to be a ballerina or a vet when she grows up.  She loves anything pink, purple, or girlie blue and it's a definite plus if it's splarkly. She loves to speak Chinese even when no one around her understands her, but is teaching the boys as fast as she's learning.  I feel so blessed to be this wonderful little girl's mother. 

Pumpkins and Donuts (And a Birthday)

Fall (specifically close to Halloween) means carving pumpkins and homemade donut season in Mike's family.  His sister Jeannie hosted it.  We had delicious soup, kids played, carved pumpkins, and waited for donuts.  I had a few glitches with the dough and the cooking this year, but all the donuts were gone, so I guess it was ok. Haha.

A counter full of donuts

A floor full of people and pumpkins.  The kids always love this part.  The adults...... ;) 

Isabelle is in that big teeth fake smile stage that every kid goes through.  Can you tell she's 7??  Haha

I never got a picture of the boys finished product, but here's Isabelle's.

We also celebrated Isabelle's birthday with the extended family with some candles in a donut and presents.

Spencer was tuckered out.

She got an awesome pillow project which she LOVES, her Elsa dress up and a new dance leotard that was both sparkly and flowy. :) 

What a fun, delicious, night with family.