June 20, 2010

So, the collection of stuffed animals in our house is getting slightly ridiculous (and we don't ever buy any (unless the kids buy one at a garage sale with their own money) - we somehow just accumulate them). I go through the stash regularly to thin it out, and yet it just grows and grows...and each one is "special" to one of the kids (so the soft side in me can't just load a garbage bag full and toss them, as much as I would like to). So I came up with a new idea. We have plant shelves in all of the bedrooms, so I put all of their stuffed animals on their plant shelf. I let them choose a handful of animals each Monday that they want to play with that week. All the rest stay on the shelf until the next Monday, and then I pull out the ladder and they can choose new ones for that week (and put the others back). So, now I'm not constantly finding stuffed animals EVERYWHERE...plus the kids think it's Christmas time each Monday when they get to have new animals for that week. It's a WIN-WIN.


Last week I walked into the bathroom to see this. Ben knows he definitely does NOT want fingernail polish on himself, but that doesn't mean he can't give his sister a nice pedicure. What a good brother.

June 13, 2010

Megan started a little habit that is just cracking me up. I caught a pretty good picture of it during Caelan's birthday party. She likes to take a piece of her hair and then stick it in her ear and twirl it around (like it's tickling her ear). She actually does it as a sort of relaxing or soothing mechanism. I catch her doing it most times when she is pretty relaxed (like when she is watching TV or feeling tired) or when she is really upset about something (then she does it to calm herself down).

June 12, 2010

Caelan had a birthday party with friends last week. We rented one of those blow-up water slides (which was a huge hit). All the kids LOVED it....except for Megan. She WOULD NOT go down the slide - not even one time, not even on my lap. She climbed to the top a couple of times but then changed her mind and climbed back down. She liked wading in the pool at the bottom, but that was as much of the slide as she wanted to do with. She loved eating the fruit skewers though. At one point during the party she got very upset about something (I can't even remember what it was), but Nathan was so cute and got right up next to her and looked at her as if to ask, "What's wrong?" It was a fun day.

June 3, 2010

It's become a tradition to rent a cabin in the mountains of Southern Utah and get together for a little family reunion with Sean's family for the Memorial Day weekend. We left on Wednesday evening so we wouldn't have to make the whole 9 hour drive on Thursday (which isn't really that long, but we wanted to get there earlier in the day). We stayed at Nevada Landing ($29 room with two queen beds - much better than sleeping in the van...HE HE HE). We spent the weekend riding quads and the Mule (4 or 5 seater ATV - slower than a quad for sure, but still a blast, and the kids LOVED it). Megan called it "the awesome thing." Anyway, we also explored Mammoth Cave (Ben was NOT a fan - I guess the cold, dark, slippery, rocky, wet underground cave is not something he considers "fun" - everyone else enjoyed it). Sean went fishing (and unfortunately didn't get a catch, but he got a few bites on his line). We took walks on trails along the stream and through the mountains. We roasted marshmallows in the fire pit behind the cabin and also in this cool log stove. The kids played outside and got dirty and had fun with cousins. A fabulous time was had by all.

The drive home was RIDONCULOUS! I guess we should know by now to avoid Las Vegas holiday traffic at any cost! We thought we left earlier enough to beat it, but it took us 2 hours to get from Vegas to State Line. Holy Moly. But we finally made it home...eventually.