Happy Holidays and Happy New Year!

Here's to hoping that 2011 brings everyone much joy, love, plenty of family time and a plethora of stress-free moments. I am hoping for some free time and room to breathe away from work and school. :) When I look back at 2010, it's been a fun, yet busy year for us.

*I switched teaching jobs and grade levels.
*I went back to school to obtain my Master's Degree.
*Brynn started pre-school.
*Baylen is nearly full-on potty trained (yes he's even pooping in the toilet now!).
*Dj's territory for work changed so he's traveling more, which is challenging at times for the kids and I.
*We went on a couple of mini-vacations to Lake Chelan and Great Wolf Lodge.
*We traveled back to Iowa for a summer vacay and again at Christmas time.
*Brynn turned 4.
*Baylen turned 2.
*Our kids became best buds (most of the time).
*We renovated our upstairs master bathroom, replaced all of our window blinds, the water heater, kitchen and dining room flooring, our dining room table, dining room furniture, microwave, the kitchen sink, and painted a couple of rooms. Yes...all in one year.
*Since the fall, I've been pretty stressed out. If I survive this year alive, it will be a miracle.
*We spent a lot of time laughing at all of the funny things our kids said and did.
*We have had quite a year and it's been pretty darn good!

Here's to a happy 2011!

Meeting Mr. Jackson

We were finally able to meet Mr. Jackson! He is a cute little guy and a good baby. More pics to come later but here's one for now. We were also fortunate to be a part of his baptism on Sunday. Dj took some great pics so I hope to post one or two from that later as well. Happy three month birthday, Jack!

Baylenism #4, #5, & #6

He walks into my parents' living room with a bottle of Jim Beam in his hand...

Baylen to Papa: "I don't want this for lunch. I don't like that!"


During Christmas Eve Church before it began he leans over and whispers in my ear,

"Hey mom, why does this song keep going and going?"


Leaning over looking at the Nativity scene

"Mom, where is the baby sheep?"


And my nephew Parker said this after Baylen's response re: Nativity scene...

"I wish there were bears in there so he could eat them all!"

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas from our family to yours. We have been so blessed this past year with...two lovely children who are so smart, funny, intuitive, and loving, each other, our families and friends, a new job, the same job w/ new responsibilities, a home, and so much more.

Dear Santa,

Dear Santa,

Although I talk about you all of the time and I like you a lot, when I see you in public, I change my mind and I prefer to avoid you. I won't look you in the eye and you'll be lucky if I give you a high five. I definitely WILL NOT sit on your lap, even though I say I will at home. When we went to see you at the mall last weekend, I would not sit anywhere near you or even stand by you. However, I saw a cool rocking horse, so I rode on that near you and pretended I didn't notice you were sitting next to me while we had our picture taken. I really liked that horse.

I would like Cars cars...anything and everything "Lie-king MahhQueen" would be great. KahCHOW! :) Oh, and I really want a monster truck remote control car and a Spider Man.

I will leave you some cookies and try not to eat them myself. I did sample some of your milk though, on Friday night. It was good. I know that you know I've had my ups and downs this year, but I try hard to behave...I like to be funny, and I have a good heart, and that will never change.

Love,

Baylen

Dear Santa,

Dear Santa,

I would like you to bring me everything from the American Girl Doll catalog for Christmas this year. Think you can handle that? Oh, and I'd really like a Rapunzel doll, a Rapunzel dress-up dress, and Rapunzel hair.

I love you and you know I've been pretty good this year. I believe in everything that is magical and I appreciate the little things. I have opinions about everything and like to share my emotions openly. I am SO excited about Christmas this year. Would you like to hear me sing all of the Christmas songs I know? I will start with my favorite..."Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer."

Love,

Brynn

Little Dancer

Oh Little Dancer, here you are all ready to shine
Oh Little Dancer, here you are with your tap shoes tied
Oh Little Dancer, here you are with your green, sequined dress
Oh Little Dancer, here you are with your eyes brightly lit
Oh Little Dancer, here you are with your sweet best friend,
Oh Little Dancer, here you are brimming with every excitement
Oh Little Dancer, here you are with a smile filled with sunshine
Oh Little Dancer, here you are with a love for rhythm and the stage.
Oh Little Dancer, how I wish I could take this moment and freeze it in time forever...
Dance, Little One, Dance
In the meantime, I'll take in every moment of it.

♥

Running out of time

I am not finished buying Christmas presents. I don't even know when I can find time to make or buy them. The ones I have purchased, I have no clue when I will be able to wrap them. We were lucky to get the Christmas cards out..some are still sitting on my counter. This year I feel so behind with everything. Boo.

Making Cookies=lots of helpers

Over the long weekend after Thanksgiving, I decided to try and make some sugar cut-out cookies. My cousin, Melissa told me about this recipe and I finally had time or MADE time to try it out. This was a great project for B & B to help with, especially cutting the cookies out once the dough was rolled. Brynn even asked if she could roll the dough, so I let her and she did a wonderful job. Both kids enjoyed helping and Baylen lost interest early and decided taste-testing was much more productive and fun. :)

We frosted some, sprinkled some, and left some plain. All of them were SO YUMMY and addicting! They are the softest sugar cookies I have made ever. Thanks, Melissa!

Elf on a Shelf

The last couple of years, I have debated buying this item. After spending the month of November trying to convince my children that Santa was watching their every move and failing miserably, I decided it was necessary to purchase our own Elf on a Shelf. The kids decided to name him...Spritz! Despite the fact that Brynn wanted to name him Sprinkles, we felt that Spritz we more elf-like and less gender-specific. Spritz has been working wonders in our house since he arrived. Even though the kids saw me pull him out of a sack and knew I bought him from a store, they still think he's magical. Good! haha

he's protecting her already.

This was so cute the other day...Baylen was totally protecting his big sister. It melted my heart. Brynn came over to talk to me and Zoey, our cat was sitting next to me. Sometimes when a person gets in Z's space, she becomes irritated and will swipe whoever it is by biting or scratching. She leaned over and bit Brynn for no reason and Brynn started crying. I scolded Zoey and pushed her off of the couch. As she was passing by, Baylen scowls at her, pointing his finger (and proudly sticks up for Brynn) in a gruffy, snarly, growly voice: No Zoey! You no bitten Bwynna! You get away! That's not NICE!

Then he went up to Brynn and asked very softly, "Ahr you okay, Bwynna?" ♥

What a sweet guy. If they grow at the same rate, he's going to have to protect her from more than a scary old cat.

'Tis the Season to be....deciding on Christmas cards?

Is it that time already? I have been thinking about my ideas for our Christmas card this year and I am excited to say that I think I have found a winner. Whenever I need to make any kind of card to send out: thank you cards, Happy Easter cards, Christmas cards, birth announcements, I turn to Shutterfly. Shutterfly and I have a pretty solid relationship. This year's cards are pretty cute, especially the flat cards, which have become my new favorite the past couple of years. With some of the cards, I wish they had some sort of option where one could email Shutterfly's art designers and ask them to tweak one card specifically to meet an individual's needs. Regardless, I will go with the flow and just pick from one of my three favorites. I have three drafts saved in My Shutterfly account and now I just need to make a decision. Every year, I design anywhere from 3-8 cards and then ask Dj for his opinion, possibly make a change or two, and then order the cards. This may be the year where I order two different designs...I'm so torn between two at the moment that I don't know if I can make the decision. So which card designs are my current favs? They are here, here, here and here .

Designing our perfect Christmas cards have become very important to me. Every year I think about what picture I want to use and what kind of theme I want to try and portray in our card. I expressed my newest idea to Dj last night and his response was, "Why do you always want to try to do the most difficult thing?" When Brynn was born, we just used her picture w/ Santa and a couple others of her because she was still just a peanut then. By her second Christmas, I went with the "J" "O" "Y" idea when she held each letter and we snapped her pic. That was more difficult than we thought it would be, but turned out super cute. Year three brought Mister Mister and we went with a Santa hat theme on the chair...again SUPER difficult but the "unplanned pic" came out to be one of my favs and a great choice for our card--that was exactly our year with them in a nutshell--chaotic! haha Last year, we were able to convince them (barely) that putting shaving cream on your face like a beard was cool but only Brynn would buy into it. Thus, Baylen became the reindeer. I also had some really cute pictures we took of the kids playing with Christmas tree lights, which I loved and may use one of these years when I run out of ideas. (haha)

Here are some of the cards I've ordered from Shutterfly in the past:









This year's idea was easy...so easy, in fact, that I was quite shocked. Let's just say our photo/idea involves me convincing them (or bribing them with popcorn and a movie) to lay down in the snow when it was about 20 degrees outside (they were dressed in warm coats and snow pants, boots, etc.). It was awesome and my first pic of them turned out the best.

I am excited to share this fun idea with you all soon so keep an eye out in the next couple of weeks for your fun card from us. :)

Snow What?!

We had some snow in our area overnight and as a result, school as cancelled today. We were dismissed from school yesterday 90 minutes early and I think that there was a very low level of student engagement during class yesterday b/c the kids were all freaking out about the snow and couldn't concentrate on anything else. :) Today, my kiddos are home w/ me and I have an extra day off this week, for a total of 6 days off in a row. :) It is much-needed. I worked out this morning, corrected a few papers, emailed a few people, read all of my articles for my class this week, watched the videos and took two quizzes. I took my kids outside to pull them around in the sled for a few minutes and then let them play in the snow with shovels and little pails from our sandbox. Brynn wanted to make a snow-angel. After that, we returned to our warm house for some popcorn, M&M's and a movie. It's been a pretty good day off.

Things I am thankful for after reflecting yesterday's events:

1. We made it home after a 2.5 hour drive. It's a 9 mile journey, normally.
2. I didn't crash my car.
3. My car didn't spin backwards down a huge hill.
4. Four lovely gentlemen pushed me up the hill into a parking lot until Dj arrived.
5. We picked up our kids and made it home safe and sound.
6. We didn't have to drive to school or daycare today in the mess.
7. My kids rediscovered their love for snow.
8. My kids' boots and snow pants we purchased last year STILL fit.
9. I have an extra day to get some important tasks finished, including scoping out and planning my Black Friday excursion. This year we're taking iPods for the kids to listen to while we shop...GENIUS!
10. Dj spent half of his work day yesterday driving to drop off, follow, or pick up. ♥

Eyeball!

Seriously, what is up with my daughter's obsession of the word, "eyeball"? She says it constantly and then laughs hysterically like it's the funniest thing she has ever heard.

Awesome Project

Today, these two boys made my day. The kids had to create a comic about a cause or the onset of WWI and also connect it to the M.A.I.N. themes (Militarism, Alliance, Imperialism and Nationalism)...the original assignment asked them to draw it by hand. They asked me if they could use iMovie and I agreed. It turned out pretty darn cute. They did a great job. This is why I love teaching here. Check out their work!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JeJPiqXd00Y

Just having fun

My kids make me laugh every day. They are so smart and intuitive. Not so long ago, my two little ones decided to dress up, so they ran upstairs to change and appeared in this:



Although they make me laugh, they also wear me out. Demanding new job+household responsibilities after work+getting kids ready for bed+getting kids ready for school+correcting papers+Master's homework+little boy who is waking up and coming to sleep with me and tosses and turns all night=super exhausting. This week has been harsh. I can't believe I'm still alive. After they go to bed at night (when they aren't coming down the stairs 3x), I am just spent. But I can't go to bed b/c I have things to do for work or school. My pity party is sounding pretty convincing right now, huh?!

I should have known better...

than to get in an argument (or start one, rather) about politics on Facebook. Yes, that was stupid. I have learned my lesson. Although, I must say, I did not appreciate the fact that he called me a political conformist, misled, misguided, and uninformed...oh and that I couldn't think for myself. Me, not think for myself???? Hmmm.

I did call in some reinforcements to help me out until I could respond, but jeez...he was pretty condescending and I did NOT appreciate that one bit considering we were pretty good friends for a good couple of years in college. Plus, I found him a couple girlfriends here and there...*sigh*

Girly Girl Party

One of Brynn's good friends from school, Colby, had her 4th Bday party at a nail salon. The girls had a wonderful time and B was so excited to get her nails and toes painted. It's been awhile since she has had the opportunity to go somewhere and have someone else paint her nails. She is a nail biter, so she didn't have many nails left on her fingers to paint. Nonetheless, she asked for pink nail polish and they were colored and she loved them for a few days until she chewed them away. I was hoping that the nail painting would encourage her to stop chewing and keep them nice, but not so much. She has been asking me to paint them again, so maybe she will come around to keeping them nice. She chose a fun glittery blue for her toes and has been proudly showing them off. Thanks, Colby, for a really fun party!

Alpha and Omega

We took the kids to our first family of 4 movie two weekends ago. B & B saw a commercial for the movie, Alpha and Omega and decided they wanted to see it. It was still in the theaters and Dj found a time for us to go on a Saturday morning. Both of them sat and watched the entire movie and then the next 4 days, I had to hear them howl like wolves. It was very cute. We were excited that we now have another fun thing we can do together as a foursome just to get out of the house on a rainy day.

Obligatory Pumpkin Carving

I don't know about you all, but I always THINK carving pumpkins sounds like a fun idea until all of a sudden, it's the last week of October (two days before Halloween, in fact) and you realize you still haven't carved them. In reality, it's a lot of messy work and takes a good chunk of time to carve them. If you're like me, you can convince your husband to buy two pumpkins, have ideas of what you'd like to carve into them, and then ask your husband to do all of the cutting, tracing, and poking. :) The kids enjoyed cleaning them out this year, although Baylen decided he was not a fan of the "insides" and spent more time watching or playing with his cars. Brynn enjoyed helping me pull out the seeds and picking out the design she wanted her dad to carve into the pumpkin. Maybe next year I'll remember how much time it takes/work it requires and find those pumpkin decorating kits or we'll paint them...

Halloween Part 2

Another Part 2 today, but had to share updated, clear photos of my two superheroes. They went ToT'ing in the rain today and didn't mind it. Brynn and Baylen went into a haunted house and it was kinda scary for little kids, I thought. Anyway, Brynn said she wanted to go in and I think she was traumatized by the time she came out. I was with her, and I held her close to make sure she was okay. She did not like most of it. Baylen, on the other hand, was laughing, saying it was scary but wanted to see what was up next. He liked it!

Dj sprayed Bay's hair with some black hair spray and combed it so he really looked like Superman. It was awesome. The kids enjoyed walking around in their costumes. Round 3 of Halloween festivities is tomorrow with actual REAL houses to walk up to and ring the doorbell. This is actually the first time we will be REALLY trick-or-treating.

Lake pics...part 2

We took a few pictures w/ Dj's camera while we were in LC this summer. I was able to get them from Dj so I decided to post a couple of my favorites up. We are hoping to head to LC again this summer with the entire Fitz family if it works out.

What's the Difference?

Lately, a lot of people have been asking me what the differences are between teaching 8th graders and teaching 10th graders. What was my answer at the beginning of the year? "Not much." Truly, it wasn't much, especially with my boys in class. However, I do admit that as time has passed, they are coming around. I like high school kids. They are fun, they engage in a lot of the work and see relevance in it, they take more risks, are dependable, and they try hard. I can talk to them like adults and many of them are working through some adult problems.

Others have asked me what the differences are between my new school and my old school.

1. I am a different kind of tired when I come home from my new school. I am learning a lot of new content, teaching differently than I have in the past (which I am not a complete fan of at this time...it feels too traditional for me in some respects), and have to be prepared for questions that I will have to answer that I might not know the complete answer to.

2. 98% of my students turn in work on time. That means I have a LOT of paperwork to grade CONSTANTLY. I am going to spend my entire Master's free weekend grading a shit ton of papers. This has been overwhelming and even though I had many kids who turned in papers in the past, these are more sophisticated and take careful thought on my end when I provide effective feedback. The class that is turning in the least amount? LEADERSHIP....the older kids are blowing off their elective a little bit. This is the case across the board in most afternoon electives. When they see their grades next week, some of them are going to freak. But I won't. They have had time to do this and they chose to waste time in class.

3. I have many more BOYS than I do girls. This does matter in my 3/4 block b/c man they can get wound up and loud fast. Girls chill out the boys. A few girls and a lot of boys=the boys all vying for attention.

4. Boys tend to be weaker writers than the girls. They struggle with explaining, justifying, analyzing and sometimes synthesizing. They want to write one-sentence answers and call it good and then don't understand why they don't earn full points. However, I do have some amazing male writers who do turn in better papers than some of the girls.

5. 96% of the kids care about their grades and care about doing well.

6. 98% of the parents care too. And I receive multiple emails a day inquiring about behaviors, improvements, work they need, kids who are sick, make-up work, grade questions, homework, and more. Man, these parents are ON IT. They get it and it's nice to have this much involvement, but it also can be overwhelming at the same time b/c we have so many other responsibilities too. Some parents are patient, while others are ruthless about wanting an email back from me right away. I guess they don't think I work w/ kids during the day at all...

7. I felt our Professional Learning Community was much more developed at my old school. At this one, it's like pulling teeth to get people to try something or work together collaboratively. :( It's kinda sad. And soon enough, I won't be able to keep my mouth shut about it.

8. There is less support for our struggling students...this is b/c we are a small school with limited funds.

9. I'm not coaching. I'm not coaching. I'm not coaching. I miss this...I do, but not as much as I thought I would.

10. ASB: it is a big time suck. And it has been full of drama already this year and is guaranteed to have more drama as the year progresses. Regardless, it is fun and I do have a good group. It is hard to get everyone together sometimes w/ all of their job schedules and outside of school responsibilities. I do like it though, and feel like I am "in the know" about what's going on regarding activities at school. I feel like people appreciate all that I do even though a couple of older teachers are total schmucks and are fun-haters.

11. I came from a school where I developed a lot of ideas for my classroom and my kids. I had samples, I knew how to get kids to the level I needed them to work at in order to produce that final piece well. I knew how to scaffold and give them the right steps to take. I gave them the tools to build their "product."

I went to a place where I did not develop anything until I started meeting with my partner. The curriculum work I did was great and we used it. However, I don't feel like I have as much flexibility or time to teach it the way I want to. I feel like I have to abandon some of what I want to do in order to meet the same deadlines as my partner, which I don't like. I am not good at sticking to a calendar. If my kids need an extra day to learn a new skill or practice a strategy for another day, I want to give them that extra practice. But apparently at the new school, there isn't much flexibility in our calendar right now. I do feel a little constrained b/c of that. I also feel like I am going into a lot of the content blind. I have asked to see several samples of the work the kids are doing (final drafts, etc.) and apparently, my partner doesn't keep any of that stuff. The kids are all complaining how they don't know how to do a project but part of that is because none of us know what it should look like or sound like. Best teaching practices prove that using mentor texts, teacher texts, and samples can help students produce higher quality work. Um Yeah. That is why I always saved my best samples and some of the worst so kids could see the difference and recognize the quality I was looking for in a project. So that has been a bit hard too. But I am trying my best to stick with what is given to me.

Happy Halloween

This picture is not the best, and I hope to post better ones soon...the kids the morning of their Hallween Party at school yesterday. They had a great time. I had to fix Brynn's wristbands so they wouldn't fall off of her by re-sewing them and tomorrow I need to fix her headband b/c it's way too tight. She couldn't wear the boots that came with it b/c they were wayyyyy too big. :( I could probably try and re-sew those, but I found red tights at Party City that work just as well...although the boot/legging/shoe cover things are much cooler.

Tomorrow we have a few more accessories/plans in store. :)

My Husband is the best

he bought me Usher tickets. :) geeeeeeeeeee!

Christmas Lists...

Ahh I love that as my kids get older, they want more and more for Christmas. When I was asking Brynn what she wanted for Christmas, she said, "I want a REAL firefighters costume with a REAL mask and REAL boots." Then she added, "Mom, do you know firefighters save peoples' lives?! Yeah, they go inside houses that are on fire and they pull people out." Then she said, "Oh and when there is smoke, you crawl on the ground under it so it doesn't get on your clothes." Finally, she added, "And if your clothes catch on fire, you stop, drop and rollll." haha

haha (the firefighters came to visit daycare today)

Oh MMMM GEEEEE

My son is throwing tantrums non-stop. All.of.the.time. It started about two weeks ago and hasn't stopped. It is driving me nuts. This child has been in multiple time-outs, sent to his room to cry it out, and still we are struggling. I gotta say I"m not liking this 2.5 age of his if this stuff sticks around. He kicks. He ignores. He screams. He cries super loud. He throws himself on the ground. He yells. He growls. He runs everywhere, bulldozes everything, and has forgotten his inside voice exists. Yep. Fun times. :0

I miss that ornery but sweet little boy from the photo above. :) Hopefully he'll come back soon.


Baylenism #3

Bay: "Mommy went to Iowa State. Daddy went to Iowa State. I want to go to Iowa State."

OH YES! :) No brainwashing there, this child came up with that statement on his own. Brilliant! :)

Brynnisms #20

This girl: so analytical these days...

Me: Brynn, what are you going to take for Show and Tell this week that starts with a C?

Brynn: Hmmmm....how about a cow?

Me: Yes, that would work. What else could you take?

Brynn: Hmm...how about a cah-cah-cah-car? That starts with the letter C.

Me: True, but don't you think one of the boys will bring that?

Brynn: Yeah...hmmm...I know! How about cah-cah-cah-Cammy our cah-cah-cat?

Me: She does start with the letter C and I bet no one else will bring a real cat!

Brynn: Yeah, but will she stay in the car? Does she like to ride in the car? What if she tries to jump out?

Me: True..maybe we better leave her at home.

Brynn: Yeah...but then can we bring Zoey cah-cah-cat instead?

:)

Sassy Pants

"But Mom, they aren't leggings, they're PANTS!"
"Brynn, are you arguing with me again or are you making a statement?"
"I'm making a statement!"

Brynn turned 4 and with that came a whole lot of sass. Seriously, overnight, she has turned into this little Miss Opinion about Everything and acts like a little Miss Know-It-All. She will argue with me about EVERYTHING just to argue, I swear. I will ask her or tell her to do something a certain way and she will argue and tell me she needs to do it a different way even when she has no clue. We are threatening the Sassy Sauce much more often these days and eventually, I'm going to have to follow through on that.

She cares about what she wears. She cares about how her hair is pulled up or what bow to put in. She has an opinion on the shoes she wears and which toothpaste she wants to brush her teeth with. She informs me what jewelry she'll put on and what presents to buy her friends for their birthdays. Sometimes she even tells me how to drive. Go figure.

Little Sassy Pants has also claimed perfection about a million times especially when it comes to comparing herself to her brother. This earned her the name "Miss P" and we will call her that now and again and she gets a little irritated, but I think she understands that it's not always okay b/c Baylen is a different kid than her.

Brynn has many funny expressions and uses them whenever possible, such as "I'm bored." or, "This is boring!" Seriously? Thanks, older kids at daycare! LOL At the dinner table, she's getting more vocal too, declaring things are "gross" or that she doesn't like them and won't eat them. Bee claims things are "so awesome!" and uses the phrase, "That's weird!" constantly. She begs me to tell her stories at night while she's lying in bed (mostly to waste time so she doesn't have to go sleep) so I will think of funny made-up stories to tell her. One night I told Brynnie a story about a frog family and after I finished, she goes, "Mom, that was a WEIRD story." LOL I was cracking up!

Miss P has rediscovered her love for puzzles, and now, she can put together 30-piece and some 50-piece puzzles. She is really good at figuring out how they fit together and seems more interested in them than playing games. Whenever we read books, I tend to ask her about the story at the end to make sure she's comprehending. Now, when I read, she will interrupt me in the middle of a page and make some statement about an observation she's having why something in the book doesn't make sense or inquire why it's happening in the first place. She's a thinker.

Finally, Miss Sassy and I have had some pretty interesting conversations about what she is learning in pre-school. She can tell me what they learned about and will also tell me if she answered any questions or if she volunteered to help the teacher. Last week, she was picked first to use the Smart Board, showing the kids how to match, and she was pretty excited about that. I told her I was so proud of her for being a good girl in pre-school and her comment, "I try really hard in school, mom." I'm not sure where that came from, but man, this girl is definitely a first-born child of mine. :)

Brynnisms #19

I was reading the book, I'll Love You Forever to Brynn tonight and I turned to the page where the mom "picks up that 9-year-old boy and rocks him back and forth, back and forth, back and forth..."

Then Brynn interrupts my reading and points out, "But mom, you can't rock a 9-year old! They are TOO BIG!"


Also, anytime she hears an Usher song on the radio, she goes, "Hey Mom, it's Ushern, your second husband!" And then I say, "Yes it is, dear it sure is Ushern!" LOL

Funny stuff!

Brynnisms #18

Brynn: Mommy, Elsa said she would be my friend forever!

Me: Well, that's a long time, Brynn. She is a good friend.

Brynn: Yeah, she said she would be my friend for the whole week!

Sneak Peak

At the Halloween Costumes...the kids are super excited about them. :)

Baylenisms #2, 3, 4

Mister Mister is full of funny comments lately so I better start writing them down.

#2

Preface: Baylen is really into the CARS characters and he owns quite a few of the Hot Wheels size cars and knows all of their names. Anyway, two of them, Leak Less and Mr. the King were missing. Dj and I were looking for them every day trying to figure out what happened to them.

One night before bed about 3 days ago:

DJ: Baylen, what happened to those two cars?

Baylen: I don't know, daddy.

Dj: We need to find them.

Baylen: Ok, I keep an eye out for them. ;)


#3

The other night before bed, I was telling Baylen to lay down and go to sleep b/c he was wasting time. I was getting frustrated with him screwing around so I told him, "Lay down and put your hand in your pants and go to sleep!" (He always puts his hand in his pants to settle down and go to sleep...gross, but we can't break the habit so we stopped trying.)

Anyway, this happened 2 nights later:

ME: Good night, Baylen. I love you. Have a good sleep.

Baylen: Okay mommy. I tired. My hand is in my pants. And he GRINS this huge grin. LOL little stinker!

I just laughed and laughed.


#4
Last night we were out eating dinner and Baylen stood up and turned around to see who was sitting behind him. In a booth a little further away, he sees a guy with a long, dark, pointed beard...

Baylen (pointing at the guy): LOOK! LOok at that guy over there!! He is Santa Claus! (Grins and laughs)

hhhaaaa

Me: Baylen, turn around and please stop pointing.

Crawling Along

Pub Crawl was fun last weekend but not so fun in the morning. LOL

Singing Eminem

Yeah, we expose our kids to lots of music. That's just us. Brynn loves Rihanna's part of this song and when she hears it on the radio, she always sings along w/ the chorus.

Bday pics are UP

Check my Mobile Me Gallery to see pics from Brynn's 4th Birthday Partayyy. It should be teh first album listed in my gallery. Lots of pics to look through. Dj took lots of great ones and I snapped a few later on in the evening that turned out cute too. I wish I would have taken a pic of her plates, balloons, etc. b/c they were cute--little Hula Girl themed paper products. I posted a pic of what they looked like below:

First Day of Pre-School

Today was Brynn's first day of pre-school. She had an opinion about what outfit she wore and which jewelry she added. Bee also told me this a.m. she wanted her hair in twisties. If you look closely, you can see her "Silly Bands" on her wrist--she had to wear ALL of her Princess wrist bracelets and there were so many of them that they went half way up her arm. Bee had a great day and said it was SO much fun. She was really excited to talk about it when I picked her up today. I also noticed on her sheet that she didn't take a nap today, probably b/c of all of the festivities.



Brynn and her teacher, Ms. Kim

P.S. See, mom and dad (papa, gramma: the outfit FITS! she was really excited that she was able to wear it today, along with all of her silly bands)

Baylenism #1

This was SOOO Funny...

All of a sudden, the room smelled of nasty poop smell.

DJ: Baylen, do you have poop?

Baylen: NO!

Me: Baylen, do you have poop? It stinks!

Baylen: pretends he doesn't hear me.

Dj: Baylen, eww, do you have poop?

Baylen: I not telling you guys!

WE LAUGHHHHHHHHH

ME: Baylen, you have poop, don't you?!

Baylen: GRINS Yeah!

New Pictures

We took the kids in to get some new pictures taken at the mall b/c they were having a special on color enhancements and even though I know how to do it on PhotoShop, it takes a lot of time and they seem to be able to do it a lot faster. I think they turned out pretty darn cute.

I didn't put all of them up here but will post a few more throughout the next couple of weeks.

Baylen had a really hard time sitting/posing for more than 2 seconds. He was all over the place and Mr. Crazy Man. It was really hard to get him to sit/stand/look at the camera. He was really wound up too, and I thought he was going to knock down the white pull-down backdrop. LOL

In the last picture, Brynn is wearing a hat my mom made for her at my request. It is perfect. :)