Time Flies

Well, I am really far behind on my blog. It seriously seems like time vanished. I first wanted to post about how big Averi is getting. She has decided that she will go ahead and try to be big. She is already thinking she should try to crawl. She is getting pretty good at getting up on her hands and knees and she even rocks back and forth but she hasn't successfully crawled yet. It is so strange to me that she is doing this already. All of my kids have been really late crawlers so for this family this is early. It is fun but it also makes me so sad. It seems like once they are mobile they just aren't a "baby" anymore. We will see how quickly she progresses into a full crawl. I think the other kids may be worried because they will have to be way better at picking up their things if we have a baby moving about.

Canning

So I had to post a picture of the fruits of my labor. I decided to attempt to can. Now I have never done this before but I figured it would help out my food storage. My neighbor helped me get a great price on chicken and so i went to work. And let me tell you, it was work! Courtney helped by cutting up all of the chicken while I prepared the bottles and lids. When I was done with all of it I had canned 36 pints. I am so relieved to be done with it. The only problem is that I am not really wanting to eat it. I am afraid I am going to poison us all. Now I now my pressure was high enough and it went long enough so hopefully I will be able to get over it. It is a little funny because I don't really even think about it when I open a can of chicken from Costco...Anyway, I am way excited that I was able to learn this skill and I know it will be delicious when I get to eating it.

Wrestling

Let me start this post off by saying that little kid wrestling is super funny. We get such a kick out of it. They don't really know what they are doing so they basically just roll around kinda hugging. Jaxon decided he would give it a try. I still don't know if he is that into it but he keeps asking to go to the tournaments so I guess he must think it is ok. The first tournament Courtney was out of town and Jax was pretty nervous not having his dad there. So we are waiting for it to start and he is walking around the outside of the mat and a little kid grabs him pulls him on to the mat and tackles him. He comes back up to the stands and starts crying and says he just wants to go home. I convinced him to try one match. Well he wrestled two and got pinned both times (I am not a very good wrestling coach). He then decided he was done and we forfeited the last match. I thought maybe he was done with the wrestling thing but he has since wrestled in two more tournaments. In both tournaments he has won on his weight class paper and received two gold medals. It seems all he needed was his dad coaching him. Oh, and knowing he gets a medal doesn't hurt anything either.

Fall/Halloween

I am really far behind. So I am going to back up a bit and try to catch up. We went out to the pumpkin patch the week before Halloween to get our pumpkins. Rylan was positive that he could carry his by himself. I was actually very frightened for the pumpkin. But, alas, it did survive. We had a good time. The kids all got their pumpkins and then we played at the kid play area. I think they all would have stayed all night if we would have let them.
Here is Kambree at the Halloween carnival at the local grocery store. We went and ate there and played all of the carnival games. The kids got little prizes and thought life was perfect. Seriously, did you know that a little plastic slinky is all a child needs to be happy. Kambree was a Vampire. I made a little tutu for her and she insisted on having little plastic snakes and bugs in her "scary" hair.

Jaxon was our little frankenstein this year. He thought his green makeup was stinky and so we had to take it all off. We then resorted to an idea one of my neighbors gave me...chalk. It worked out pretty well and it comes right off when you want it off. And it is non toxic. We just sat down outside and scribbled and then got the chalk dust and rubbed it on his face. He thought that was much better.

Averi was my cute little ducky. Just look at those cute cheeks. She didn't know what the heck was going on but she was pretty sure it was ok because she was getting carried all around the neighborhood. She didn't cry the whole time we were out trick or treating.

And Rylan was a horse. He got the first picture in the pumpkin patch because apparently his mom gets the worlds worst mom award. I can't find a picture of him in his costume. In my defense, we know we took some but my camera had an accident (it fell off my car and I almost ran over it) and I think we lost some stuff that was on it. I will have to post a picture when I get some from my mom. He was a cutie. This is the first year he understood the whole Halloween thing a little bit. He was up at a door and we asked him "what do you say", and he told the guy "TWO". That wasn't the answer I was looking for but he did get two treats at that house. We had a great Halloween.

Pay It Forward!

So, my sister got a fun gift in the mail and was then supposed to pay it forward. Well I entered and this is what came in the mail today. It is just so fun. So now it is my turn to pay it forward. If you want to enter to win my pay it forward just leave a comment here. On November 5th I will put everyones name in a box and I will draw three winners. Then you can be looking for something fun to arrive in your mail box. (I don't know what it is going to be but sometimes surprises are even more fun.) Let the comments begin.

2, 2, 2!

Happy Birthday to you Rylan. This is way late but I couldn't forget my little Ry guy. Rylan turned 2 at the first of the month. I can't believe he is already two. Two is always a kinda scary age but at the same time he is just so funny. He makes us laugh everyday. In this first picture he is showing off his new backpack. He is always stealing the older kids backpacks so they decided they would get him one of his own. He loves it! It now goes everywhere with us which is kind of nice because I have it stocked with toys, crayons, and coloring books.
The other thing he got was a hot wheels race track and more cars. He plays with cars all day long so this was perfect. Of course he also received great stuff from the grandparents. He loved his big day.
Here is his wonderful cake. Beautiful, I know. I made it myself. He didn't know the difference though--it was still cake.
We love you so much Rylan and can't wait to see what this next year has in store for you.

Eat up

I was pretty excited that it was time to start Averi on some solids. I figured it might help her space her night feedings out a little bit. But...I was mistaken. On a daily basis she is not going longer at night. Anyone have any suggestions? I really am not complaining because overall she is definately my best sleeper at this young of age.

I just think it is so fun to watch the kids figure out all of these new things. She was so funny to watch eat, especially the first few times. They just can't figure out what to do with it at first. But by the fourth time, she was a pro. She is just eating rice cereal but she doesn't seem to mind. (my other kids were not such fans of rice)



As you can probably tell in the last picture, she gets quite the audience. For some reason everyone decides that I need help. Even the dog has to hang around. I think the dog is just hoping that she spits some of it out so she can find it.


I was just getting ready to say that I love this age. And I do. She is smiley, she likes to make the cutest sounds, and she is just always so curious. But I was just telling Courtney the other day that it is so fun how every age seems to have its own fun stuff and of course the trials. I feel so lucky to be a mom and get to learn from all of my sweet kiddos.