Jeremy's birthday

Jeremy turned 29 yesterday. Sadly, he celebrated without us, but we sent him some gifts, so it was kind of like we were there. Jeremy told us that Kaitlynn got to choose everything for his special day so we had chocolate chip pancakes for breakfast:

And then for lunch she wanted mac and cheese but wouldn't eat anything because she really wanted the (princess) castle cake. We all pitched in to decorate, as you can see. (watch out for Cody's side. He really likes frosting.) Also, I don't keep candy in the house so we had to use Trix to add some color and Walnuts for bricks. We have a gingerbread competition every year. This cake reminds me why the girls always lose the competition.

Nana and Papa came over and brought dinner. We called Daddy to sing to him and then she got to eat her cake.

Happy Birthday Jer!

Our Seattle Trip

So we went to Seattle. This was Cody's first time on a plane. Surprisingly both kids were good. Turbulence doesn't phase them so I was content with the way it all went. Our plane was 25 minutes early into Seattle and a little early on the way back. (Yea Southwest!) I took a couple pictures on the plane but it is really hard to hold a 1-year old and take a self portrait at the same time, so here is what we got:

We had lots of yummy food to eat while we were there and it was made by the best chefs in the house, as you can see. Kaitlynn and Christian played "all da day" as we say around here, and had a great time. Cody played too but wasn't quite as involved as the other two. Kaitlynn and Christian are couch potatoes so they were the best of pals.

I made Callie and Katie go to Zumba - which is my new obsession and we had a great time. We had a conference call (led by task-master Joni) to coordinate Katie's Hawaii wedding. We also ate at an expensive fancy cheese restaurant. I felt very cultured.

It was a really great weekend. Thanks to all my family who helped make it happen.

Halloween Time!

We did lots of fun things to lead up to Halloween and on Halloween. Here is our collection of pictures and stories for Halloween 2009:

We went to the The Farmstead Corn maze and activity place. We ate some burgers and dogs and played in the corn box. (sand box but instead had hard corn kernels). We also went through the corn maze. I stuck the kids in the carts you are supposed to use pumpkins for and wheeled them around. They were really cute. We went with Amy and Lee Carter and had a great time.

On Halloween, we decided to make sugar cookies at Grandma's house. This is a really silly idea when you have things to get ready for and don't really have the time, but, as you will see...They loved it. Smiles from both kids. Cody thought this was the greatest thing ever. He loves standing on that stool and being involved. Kaitlynn was asleep at that point so she wasn't there to take it away from him. I wonder if that is why he is laughing.

Now we are getting ready for trick-or-treating and a trunk or treat. Kaitlynn wanted to be a princess but then she saw Melissa being an Indian and changed her mind. She loved Melissa's face makeup so she asked Grandma to make her an Indian too. This is her cute curly hair.

It is hard to see but she has lipstick on and eye shadow. She was a cute little princess. We went to the trunk of treat first with Grandma and Grandpa. She got used to the idea of saying "magic words" and getting candy. Cody just went with the flow. He looked pretty cute as a pumpkin and all he ate all night were his suckers. In fact, he lost that one in the car and I figured he dropped it. When we got out of the car, I looked over and it was stuck to the back of his head. A smart mom would have taken him inside to wash it out. What I did was see the problem and want an immediate fix, thus a good yank on it. It ripped out his hair and he cried. Duh!

And here we all are before we go trick or treating: (Kaitlynn wasn't smiling in any of them so this is the best pic we got.)

So here is how trick-or-treating went: Kaitlynn had it figured out from the trunk or treat. We went with Abby, McKenna, Carson, Cameron, Ammon, Cody, and Amelia. She is the youngest of the four kids she walked (ran) with (Abby, McKenna, Carson). Despite that fact, she was the one who had to wait for the other kids. She would run to the door, say trick-or-treat and then "Thank you". Then she would come and tell me she said "thank you" and run to the next house. She was a model trick-or-treater. Cody, on the other had, cared nothing about going to the door. I gave him a sucker and he loved that but insisted on wandering around in the middle of the street. Of course, this was not going to fly. So Charise and I would carry him while he fought to get out of our arms. This led up to him screaming incessantly and I had to take him home before the police came and asked whether he was mine or if I was trying to kidnap him.

We had a great Halloween. Thanks to all our friends who invited us to things and kept us busy this October. Can't wait for next year... in California...but at least Daddy will be there.

random updates because I don't scrapbook.

Here is where our summer went: I will post a pic and tell you about it. Hopefully, things will be in chronological order. If Cody looks older and then a baby again, well, then you know they aren't.

Family Reunion 2009. Honestly, I am rooting for Cody on that one.

Kyra and Anna (Kaitlynn is in there too.)

Uh, who's going to clean that up?

Kaitlynn and mommy working out.

My little guy in the tub at Great-Grandma and Grandpa's house. This is a tradition for all children.

Happy Cody. You can't beat that.

Beautiful Stanley Lake. This is what we spent our whole time doing - trying to keep Cody out of the water. If we weren't doing that, we were trying to avoid the rain that fell the whole time we were there. We all agree that a cruise sounds like a better idea next year.

This is a little long but it shows you how we got to here:

Happy First Birthday Code! Unfortunately Mom and Dad were mad at each other and we just wanted you guys to go to bed. We did celebrate at Stanley on the real day, however. And you share your birthday with Grandma and Grandpa Roderick's wedding anniversary.

You got some matchbox cars, a ball from Kaitlynn, and a few other fun things.

Next year will be better.

Summer fun.

Christian (Joni) bought Kaitlynn and Gracie these cute princess outfits. They were begging to wear them and carried their boxes everywhere we went. Finally we got back home and they could open them.

She says to me all the time "I look Good."

Here we went to the fair and had a great time:

And then our Portland trip which was awesome. We all agree that we need a bigger car, however. We drove to Portland on Wednesday, went to the zoo on Thursday, drove to Seaside, Tillamook (which was my favorite thing, I think. It was 4o'clock when we got there and we had ice cream and it was amazing.), and stayed at a beach house in Astoria on Friday, drove to Long Beach, WA and played on the beach then drove back to Portland on Saturday, and drove back to Boise Sunday. We stopped at a thousand rest stops because this is all she could say "I have to go potty" and then she would spend 10 minutes looking at all the new features of this rest stop compared to the last one. It took . When we stopped for dinner (at McDonalds) in La Grande on Sunday night I told Jeremy that he better get us home now or I am going to start crying. We had an awesome time with Kristi, Jason, Madeline and Abigail. There was a lot of driving but a lot of downtime too and we just had a really great visit. Here are some pics:

And , of course, football season. Not the same without Daddy, though.

Quick story about Cody...We had a few "say goodbye to Jeremy" parties and whenever I couldn't find Cody I would just have to look for any food that some kid abandoned and that is where he would be...eating the remains of whatever was left. You can see that whatever he had here must have been really good.

So this blog just took up 2 hours of my life. If I kept on top of things better, it wouldn't have to be so bad. Hopefully this won't take you as long to view. Now I have no catch up, though. Life is good.

Weekly updates

So I have a goal to update this weekly while Jeremy is gone so he can see what we are doing each week. He has been gone almost 2 weeks and this is my first post. On top of it. I know. I just have a couple pictures and a few stories.

Kaitlynn has been busy trying to be a teenager. She is sassy and always wanting to call a friend over. She also wanted to watch the Hannah Montana movie. Here is her interpretive dance of "Hoe Down":

Cody has developed a love of shoes. Girl, boy, doesn't matter. He loves trying them on and wearing them as far as he can get before falling down.

We decorated for Halloween yesterday. I was pretty proud of myself. It actually turned out pretty cute. At night, the orange lights in the window look great.

I ran my race yesterday (Women's Fitness Celebration) - and that's all I'm going to say about that. No pics either, thank goodness.

A few weeks ago, Jeremy got sworn in. (the room is ugly and this picture is shiny and weird)

Jeremy and Stoney took Kaitlynn and Callie on their annual daddy-daughter camp out. Here are the girls afterwards while the dads unloaded the truck.

And last but not least, It is football season. Not the same without daddy, but on the bright side once it is over, Daddy will be home.

So here we are. Surviving. And today, that will be good enough.