Pumpkins & Pre-Halloween Preparation

We went to Kruger farms this year to pick out our pumpkins. (I'm pretty sure everyone in the greater Northwest area went there this year, thanks to Groupon.com).

We went on a Monday, it was pretty fun to spend Family Home Evening together picking pumpkins and escaping the corn maze.

My cute little pumpkin by the pumpkin bin. She makes me smile.

Sadie and Wesley on the hay/tractor ride to the pumpkins.

Here Novalee is claiming her first pumpkin. There were several more claimed before she picked the best one, which also happened to be the smallest thing ever! :)

Here's probably another claimed and then rejected pumpkin.

We walked around A LOT. Wesley started getting nervous that we would miss the tractor ride back and hurried us all along.

Sadie loved walking around and looking at all the pumpkins. She is really good with new experiences, especially outdoor ones.


Jared's first pumpkin, again claimed and then rejected.

Jared is super friendly and seems to always find someone to hang out with wherever he goes. The pumpkin patch wasn't any different, except I'm pretty sure he chose this certain friend because she was cute. You can always tell when he is digging a girl because he gets very calm and he talks very smooth. I don't think he is going to have any problem with the ladies when he is older. :) Here he is helping the girl carry a pumpkin.


Caramel Apples. They were super delicious and I kept trying to have the kids "share" with mommy. When they kept refusing Wesley said, "Honey just let them eat their own apples." Haha, I guess I'm a piggy. :)







Novalee is buried in hay. We filmed her in it and she jumped out and yelled "Boo" it was super cute! :)




Today we got this really cool surprise in the mail. A package from Grandma and Grandpa Crockett filled with all sorts of Halloween goodies! The kids were surprised and we were grateful that there was very little candy in the box. :) Good job Grandma and Grandpa Crockett!

Wes is super cool in his new glasses.

We wanted to thank Wes' family for the box and show that the things inside were put to good use. So we took a picture. Happy Halloween! :)

Tonight we carved our pumpkins. Jared carved his with Wesley. It was neat to have him actually be old enough to sit long enough to actually help. He carved most of the top and he drew the design. His is the ghost. Novalee and I were supposed to be working together but she decided at the beginning that I could have the big pumpkin (not shown) and she would do the little one. I drew the picture of what she wanted and she carved it. Pretty great!
Mine wasn't in the last picture because I thought I would be cool and try something different this year. I drew a picture of a My Little Pony since it was supposed to be Novalee's and my pumpkin. But I decided not to carve all the way through. Well that took forever and I had to keep thinning it out to make the light shine through. Novalee was in bed and asleep well before I finished. Kind of anti climatic. But I'm still proud of my handy work. :)
Here are all of the pumpkins together. Mines not in the front JUST because it rocks, I'm not that childish...well maybe...I do like it a lot. :) But it was also getting late and I'm pretty sure Wes was hoping I would hurry and finish already and move on with my life so I didn't bother arranging them. :)
Sadie wasn't feeling very well tonight. Which is very sad but on a positive note it does make her super cuddly, which we don't get to enjoy as much of now that she can walk around and explore.

We are very excited for Halloween. We have been having a lot of fun getting ready for it. We hope everyone has a safe and spooky Halloween. :)

Purple Bunk Beds for the Purple Room

This is how it used to look. You can kind of get the idea, it was once all primary colors.


I can't believe how little Jared was! He is such a little cutie!

Anyways, these bunk beds have served their purpose for a long, long time. Up until this last move the two older kids have shared a room and so primary colors were perfect.

But now they are Sadie and Novalee's and the colors just weren't right for their purple room.

So after sanding, and spray painting and more spray painting. 30+ cans of paint later they look like this. I like their room. :) It's just so girly!


Yay! Now the bunk beds are inside and not against the back of the house AND we don't look (too) white trash anymore!

Wesley finished this project (so he should get some credit too), after we found out we were pregnant with baby number 4 and I was too paranoid to spray paint anymore...even if it was outside and I had a mask. You never can be too careful, right? :) So thank you Wesley for all your help. You are great! :)

Two "Practically New" Chairs

My Step-dad, Larry works at Waste Management. He used to work a residential route. On that route he would find AMAZING things! Sometimes brand new things in the box (ex. The Eddie Bauer Full Size Baby Stroller I currently use) and sometimes things that worked just as if they were new.

He would always come home super excited from work, like it was Christmas morning and declare that he found the COOLEST thing today "practically new!"

(Sometimes we had to chuckle a little at his expense because the things he was super excited about weren't exactly "practically new.")

With that said, in our family whenever any of us find a cool thing for free or really cheap, we think of Larry and say we found it "practically new!"

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I feel like that sufficiently explains the title of the post. :)

About a month ago we scored the best bed for Jared. We knew that eventually Sadie would grow out of her crib and need a real bed and Jared would be giving up his bed (that converts into a bunk bed with Novalee's).

So when I saw this bed sitting outside the neighbor's house next to my grandma's I just had to have it regardless of all the kitty stickers from the early 90s and the bright pink drawer handles. I'm not sure what the cost was...my grandma was the one after repeated attempts, to actually get the neighbors at home and then of course she told me not to worry about the price. Thank you grandma. :) I'm going to call it a deal, hopefully it was.

After new handles and a little Goo Gone it looked "practically new."

It is so sweet! It has great storage and made a ton of extra room in Jared's room.

I'm kind of torn about this next picture. Yes, I would have liked to have a picture that shows Jared's room completely perfect and clean but really in all honestly, this is how it looks 90% of the time. Plus I had no desire to clean his room just for a picture. At least you get to see how cool this bed is.



It also has a computer desk and so he needed a computer chair.

I found this one at a thrift store in Forest Grove for $3.50. What a beauty! :) Who can resist weird stains on furniture where your bottom goes? I mean it's just too tempting. ;)



I just took off the old material and replaced it with new blue pleather.



Those old chairs are sturdy! This one was from 1973! The material is actually held on by little chunks of metal they notched out in points during the original construction. Pretty cool!

Jared's new bed is also his dresser. So we got rid of the old one. But with it gone there was a whole wall in his room without furniture. (If you grew up with my family you would know that is just not allowed. Clutter, clutter, clutter is the family motto.)

Anyways, we decided he needed another chair. Wes said maybe a bean bag...but they are expensive and I could totally see Jared bringing it downstairs all the time to play on and I would have to carry it back up. Everyone loves picking up after their kids, right? ;)

Anyways, I got this chair at the same thrift store for the same price.

In case you can't tell, the color is a bright fuchsia. When I showed it to Jared I'm pretty sure he wasn't very pleased. But he liked the idea of the shape of it and how it rolls.

I do have to say that the color didn't seem to stop him from playing on it during the month it took me to change the color. :)

Anyways, I finally finished it today!




It's pretty great if I do say so myself!

(Yes there is pink still showing from the material underneath. Oh well, nothings perfect). :)

Novalee Is Just Amazing!

I love telling people about Novalee. She is just great.

Two things I really love about her. One she is confident. Two she is a self motivated person.

Maybe I love that about her because I like to think I'm like that and maybe I love that about her because I would like to be even more like that.

Here are some examples of these qualities. She never needed or wanted a binky when she was a baby. She didn't suck her thumb. She never had a cling toy. Before her first birthday she weened herself from nursing. She was the one (before the age of two) that wanted to potty train. She was the one that first asked to see her name written out so she could copy it and learn it.

Aren't those all really neat things?

Well she can now add learning to ride a bike without training wheels to her list of accomplishments.

A week or so ago she asked me to take off her training wheels. Yesterday I asked her if she wanted me to take them off. She responded, very rudely, (to be honest), "MOM! I already told you I wanted you too!" Wow, so much for double checking to see if she changed her mind.

I was a little reluctant to take them off because it was serious work to get Jared to ride without training wheels. (Maybe the difference was that he didn't want them off). I worked all summer to try and get him going and finally he got it. I was so proud of him!

I was seriously wondering if I really wanted to try over and over again to keep Novalee up and unhurt while holding Sadie. Was it really a good day to try? It definitely wasn't my best day in regards to patience.

Off the wheels came. Bracing myself for an afternoon of frustrations...(as much as I would like to claim to be the type of parent that enjoys things like teaching the kids to ride bikes, read, write...I'm not. I just think it's work and only really do it for the kids sake. Yes, when they actually reach the point of success it does make the work worth it.) Anyways, bracing myself for an afternoon of frustrations, I had Novalee sit on her bike and as I held onto the back of the seat to steady her, I told her to pedal.

What do you think happened?

Not what I thought would, that's for sure.

Her she is on attempt number two. Seriously, the second try!

Okay so after three hours of waiting for the video to upload I give up. Here is the link to it on youtube.com.

Novalee's Awesomeness!

The cool thing is that the first try was just as good.

She is awesome!

Sometimes Things Aren't So Heavenly

Yesterday Wes signed us up for Netflix on the Wii. It's pretty sweet.

Today it's not working...so while I was trying to figure it out Sadie starting freaking about because she was tired and hungry.

So Novalee decided to "help" me. She has good intentions.

Milk on the counter, floor, rug, walls and less in the sippy than we started with isn't really helpful.


Yep. The container is shot. Three water bottles full of milk later...


I ABSOLUTELY had deep cleaning the kitchen on my list of things to do today. ;)


Of course Novalee didn't find this to be inconvenient for me at all and continued to ask me over and over again while I was cleaning up the milk if I was working on the Netflix and if I was going to get it working. :)

Growth Stats for Jared and Sadie

Yesterday (Tuesday) I took Jared and Sadie into the doctors for check ups. Sadie had to get shots too, poor thing. :(

Sadie was 29.5 inches long which puts her in the 57.45% for her age.

21.12 pounds or 68.49% for weight.

It is so weird to me to have her be very average in height and weight. Novalee was always average too.

I guess it's weird because Jared came into the world a whopping 9lbs.6oz. Since then he as always been at least in the 90th percentile.

Jared was 57 pounds on Tuesday. And 51.5 inches tall. That puts him above the 95th percentile for both. See what I mean? He's a big boy!

Oh well I guess it's okay for the girls to be smaller than Jared. :)

Trip to Utah

This weekend we went to Utah for Wesley's brother DJ's wedding.

This last Friday, September 16th, we woke up early (3am), drove to the airport and flew to Las Vegas, Nevada. We were all so tired. I can't say how everyone else felt but I felt the most tired I've felt in a long time by the end of Friday. Perhaps it didn't help that I woke up at about 1am Friday and finished a book I was reading and never really went back to sleep. :) The idea of leaving it unfinished all weekend when there were only 14 or 15 pages left was too much to handle. :)

When we got to Las Vegas, Wesley's dad picked us up along with Kacie (Wesley's sister) and Sam her husband. We then drove to Hurricane, Utah. That night we had dinner at the Pasta Factory to celebrate DJ and Ashley's upcoming marriage.

Only slightly related, that night Sadie didn't want to go to bed. We were exhausted. When she finally fell asleep she woke up every 2 or 3 hours.

We woke up at 5:15am...

Of course Sadie didn't want to be awake then...


DJ and Ashley got married for time and eternity in the St. George temple. That temple is so beautiful. I love the contrast of the green, green grass around the temple next to the red mountains in the background. The walls of the temple are so white. The ceremony was beautiful. Ashley was beautiful! We were so glad we got to be there for it.

Our family outside the temple.

Jared made an instant friend with Wesley's cousin Corban.

Novalee not wanting a picture of herself again, hence the grumpy face.

Uncle Russell with baby Sadie.

Sadie liked the flowers.

Grandma and Grandpa Crockett with Sadie. She was blowing the camera kisses on this first picture. :)

Look at these handsome guys!

My little ladies.

I should probably have some pictures of the actual wedding party in here somewhere. We don't want to take up too much space with them. ;)


It was nice to see the Crockett/Beatty family again. I even got to meet some new Crockett's at the reception in Pleasant Grove, Utah. All of Wesley's sibling were there except Justin who is on his mission in Guatemala. He was represented by a life size cardboard cut out of him. :) It was a pretty great idea. :)

Our family at the reception.

Jared and Novalee are happy to take pictures when there is someone cool in the picture. Basically they will take pictures with anyone that isn't family.

The girls with their grandparents. I love their little rose headpieces!

In my opinion (not that it counts) everything was perfect! The wedding and reception were both beautiful and well organized.

Congratulations to DJ and Ashley Crockett!

Sunday morning came and we all went back to our homes. Jared and Novalee were amazing on the flight. (But to be completely honest they were amazing the entire trip. They rarely complained, they were extremely patient with their worn out/grumpy parents and there really wasn't much kid stuff on the agenda which they dealt with really well). Sadie on the other hand chose this weekend to cut a tooth. And so she cried almost the entire flight home. (She also threw up from crying but you probably didn't want to know that). I'm pretty sure the people around us hated us and were inwardly cheering when the plane landed. She fell asleep minutes before the plane actually touched ground only to wake up at the baggage claim.

So then she cried the entire way home (45 minutes of torture for both Sadie and the rest of us)...


Notice Jared's face. Poor guy. He really can't deal well with loud noises unless they are coming from him. He even asked at one point if we could cover her face with something so she wouldn't be so loud. Good thing he doesn't babysit yet. :)


We are happy for DJ and Ashley! We are equally happy to be back home. :)