Slightly Crazy

My favorite thing about Black Friday: JoAnn's Flannel sale.

I'm one of the sick customers that has a full cart of reams of fabric. Some people would consider it not worth standing in line for two hours (more or less) to get their fabric cut but seriously besides sleeping what else are you going to be doing the day after Thanksgiving?

It was so fun to come home, wash all the fabric, fold it up in stacks and just admire it. I know, is that really fun for me? Yep. I might need to get out more. :)

Anyways, I bought some boy flannel for future baby. If this one is a boy or maybe, just maybe, if we have another one. :)

A couple of weeks ago I started putting a blanket together for "a" (hopefully this one) baby. I was just going to make it very simple but then decided to add a little fun.

This is the material.
I love elephants. I used to collect little elephant figurines.

Well I decided to make a large elephant applique to match the pattern.

This is how it ended up.



I kind of already added a name on it. Can you see it?

No, how about now?




Hyrum?

I know, I'm crazy, especially since we don't plan on finding out what gender the baby is until it is born...unless of course it is completely obvious. :)

Can I just say, hopefully it is a boy since Wes told me the other night that the name I have had picked out for a girl, since Sadie was born, isn't really his favorite. :)

If it's a girl, she might be nameless for a few days but I guess we have months to figure out a girl name.

Forest Grove Christmas Parade

A few weekends ago here in Forest Grove there was the Annual Christmas Parade. Last minute we decided to go since it was only a street down from our house.

It was pretty fun. Mainly because the floats gave out candy. I used to love that as a kid! My kids are a whole new generation of crazy candy lovers. When I was a kids and candy was tossed it was a made dash to get as much candy as possible before either by brother or sister or the kids around us would get it.

This is how my kids do it. The candy is tossed. Then both Jared and Novalee quickly grab the candy they can see that is their favorite. Then they both stand over the rest of the candy, kind of moving it around with their foot determining whether or not it is worth the effort to collect. When we asked them why they didn't get ALL the candy they baffled us by replying "We don't like that kind of candy." What?

At one point Wes and I just told them that if they didn't pick it all up we would leave. It was kind of driving me nuts to think of all the candy just being left on the road as trash. Granted a lot of it just went into the garbage at home but at least it's not on the road. Phew, okay I got that off my chest, I'm okay now. :)

Besides the candy drama (spoiled babies) it was fun to see the Christmas lights.

Of course I have no idea how to capture lights in the dark, so here are some of our family. :)

The kids waiting right before the candy started getting tossed their way. I realize Novalee looks like she is not enjoying herself. I'm pretty sure she didn't want to get her picture taken, yet again... :)

It was kind of freezing.

Even our future candy junky got some sweets.

Appetite

So today marks the 18th week of this pregnancy.

I use babycenter.com to read updates each week about the baby's growth and changes I might also be feeling.

Excerpt #1 from this weeks update:

"Hungry? An increase in appetite is pretty common about now."

If I swore this next question might have ended differently but I'll just say it my way,

What the freak show!?!

This week!?!

Really!?!

I'm pretty sure that increase hit at like week 8 or 9. Hence the gut that isn't baby bump.

On a side note: Last night Wes said I was looking pregnant and suggested that we should take a picture. No thanks honey. We're good. :)

K, Excerpt #2:

"Make it count by choosing meals and snacks that are rich in nutrients instead of empty calories..."

You know what, that's great! I love healthy foods! Especially oranges, apples, finger veggies. But there are two problems with this; one, the healthy stuff is so freaking good and guilt free that I eat it all super fast and two, it's the holidays, crap food is everywhere! AND when the healthy stuff is gone, I don't really have the energy to go get more and so I eat the "empty calories." Poor little baby. :(

This morning I was looking at my face wondering why it looked so swollen.

It might be because I have almost single handily finished off an entire package of Oreos (purchased yesterday) including the six I had last night in the middle of the night with my Root Beer Soda. (Mid night eating, not just a pregnancy thing for me). Plus the other Oreos I ate right after breakfast. :)

Self control, please come back, I'm pretty sure I enjoyed you.

Jared's Birthday

On Wednesday we celebrated Jared's birthday. It was pretty fun. Jared requested crepes with strawberries for breakfast WITH whipping cream. :)


Of course him and Novalee just ate the strawberries and whipping cream. I'm not sure why they say they like crepes. They should just ask for strawberries and whipping cream, it would save me time.

For dinner he requested McDonalds Happy Meals. If any of our kids are going to push boundaries it would be Jared. :) When I said he could request ANYTHING for dinner I really only meant something I could make at home but of course Jared thought that to mean ANYTHING in the whole world. Good thing he requested something so close to home.

(No pictures of us at McDonalds. Lets just say we oinked out.) :)

Then we came home for cake and presents.



Jared said he wanted a "Green Lantern" cake. So I went to the store and grabbed cake mix and what I thought was the green lantern only later to discover it was a bad guy. Oh well. I don't think Jared cared.

I made this buttercream frosting that I found a recipe for on my go-to website that I use for just about anything I need a recipe for.

It was really different than any frosting recipe I've made. It had you boil milk and flour until it gets really thick. The first batch was super thick and chunky which made the frosting look weird on the top of the cake but then the second batch turned out well.

We were all impressed with how light and non-sugary the frosting tasted. The cake was gone before Wes came home the next day. I kind of lack self control around sweets. :)

Here are some photos of Jared opening his presents. He gave us a pretty good laugh when with every gift (even clothing) he would say, "Awesome! That is exactly what I always wanted!" :)



Yes. A certain person (cough cough Wes) got Jared a bow and arrows for his birthday. :)
While I think it is cool, I hope Jared listens carefully to Wesley when he is teaching him about safety. :)


Today we are taking the kids and a couple other boys to Chuck e Cheese. Wish us luck for survival. Just kidding I'm sure it will be great! :)

While I love Jared to pieces, I kind of wish he wouldn't grow up so fast.

Seven!

It's crazy!

Jammies

I loved the pajamas that I made for Novalee. And even better, she loves them!

So I wanted to make some for Sadie. But since she is little and she falls down a lot I thought a pajama dress would just get in the way.

So I made her these. :)




She was pretty tired when I finished them (nap time).

Isn't she pretty creative? She tips over the baby stroller on purpose so she can lay in it. :)


None of these are great shots of the pajamas but I think you can get the idea.

Fire Station with Novalee

This happened months ago. I kind of haven't really been doing much these last few weeks or maybe 15 weeks... :)

But it was a fun experience. Novalee kept telling me she was going to go to the fire station. On the day that she was going to go she said, "Mom today I'm going to go to the fire station." Which I'm sure I just said, "That's nice honey." But didn't really listen since she is four and still struggles with the concept of time. Yesterday is tomorrow, last year was a couple of months ago, you get the idea. :)

In my defense can I just say I never got any information about a field trip? I guess that is what happens when your kid misses the Friday before.

Then I got a text from a mom of one of the other girls at school asking me if it was okay if she drove Novalee to the station.

Holy freak out! I guess Novalee was right. So I told her that it was fine and I should probably come too since it was her first field trip.

So I quickly got myself ready and Sadie and drove the couple minutes over to the station. Anyways, crisis diverted. :) I made it, even if I had stank breath.

They first had a meeting and talked about fire safety. At one point Novalee raised her hand to ask a question and of course when all eyes were on her she took the opportunity to tattle on her brother. "Did you know my brother the other day played with matches?" Great... I'm definitely not winning the "Mommy of the Year" award.





After the trip through the fire truck they gave everyone a chance to hold the fire hose. Novalee did what she does best and upped the fun a little and tried to make the water go back and forth instead of just straight which quickly brought her turn to an end.


I guess fire stations disgust Sadie? Here she is gagging herself??? :)

Novie with some of her friends.

Jared's Soccer Season

We signed Jared up for Soccer this year. We thought it would be a fun outlet for him and he would enjoy getting outside, doing something physical.

I had no idea that he would learn so much.

He is our firstborn and so life has been a little catered to him. He struggles with not getting what he wants, when he wants and when he has a grand idea (like going to China for the day on an archaeological dig) he has a hard time understanding why a family with limited means and four other people in it would have a hard time dropping everything to just do it.

It was really very cool to see Jared have to learn through soccer that it wasn't ALL about him. The coach didn't play favorites and when Jared had a side ache or came late, the coach still expected him to warm up with or without the team. He expected him to work hard and play as a team member.

It was pretty cool. I think a lot of what he learned carried over to family life as well.

Plus he had the added benefit of picking up the soccer skills fairly quickly thus building up his self esteem. It was really just a great experience and I look forward to him doing more sports.

Here are pictures of him throughout the session.

Relaxing during a break at the last game, eating his baby sister's snack. I'm not sure about that face. :)



A friend from another team he played that he goes to school with.


Jared getting his award for being a team player. :)





Good Job Buddy we are proud of you!