Sydney's Birthday

Sydney had such a fun, little birthday this year.  She was so excited to be able to celebrate in school.  On a kid's birthday, we let them wear a birthday crown, sing happy birthday to them, let them blow out "candles," and let them pass out birthday treats if they want.  We've had a few birthdays in our class already, and Sydney was really looking forward to being able to do this on her birthday.  The only problem was, she wanted to turn 5 instead of 4, like all the other kids in her class.  I told her that she'd turn 5 after she turned 4, and she seemed ok with that.

Wearing her birthday crown

Blowing out her "candles"... each friend is a candle and when Sydney blew on them they fell to the ground.

Passing out her treats

We let Sydney open a few presents the night before her birthday, and she was excited.  On her birthday, we decorated with balloons and a banner.  And Sydney helped me make her birthday cake.  She wanted a purple cake with flowers.  It was fun to be able to work on it together.  In the evening, we had a little party with my parents, Allie, Nana, and Jonne.  We had cake and ice cream, and Sydney opened presents.  It was a perfect little celebration.

the cake... it kind of looks blue in the pictures, but it was purple

Singing "Happy Birthday!"

We love you Sydney and had so much fun celebrating your big day!

Halloween

Since we have had so much going on in the past little bit, I had decided to make Halloween pretty low key around here.  I went through my mom's old Halloween box and found a cute witch that would fit Sydney and a pumpkin that would fit Cooper.  I thought it would be perfect, because the two costumes looked really cute together, and then I wouldn't really have to spend time/money trying to find/make costumes.  So I told the kids what they were going to be for Halloween, making sure to make the costumes sound extra cool and fun.  They both seemed fine with the ideas, so I was excited to be done with my Halloween preparations.  

As Halloween got closer, we started talking about it a lot in preschool.  Sydney would excitedly yell, "I'm going to be a witch!"  While all the other girls said, "I'm going to be a barbie-mermaid/barbie-fairy/rapunzel/princess."  So Sydney got the idea in her head that a witch wasn't a very good costume and decided that she wanted to be Cinderella.  One of Sydney's best friends, not in preschool, was actually going to be a witch, so I kept telling her, "Kate's going to be a witch!  You two will be the cutest witches!"  Sydney would seem ok with the idea for a little bit, but always kept going back to the idea of Cinderella.  Sydney does have Cinderella dress ups already, so it was an easy costume to pull off, but I really wanted her to dress up in something that she didn't already wear every day.  I kept trying to push the witch idea.  As I was pushing this idea, Cooper got it in his head, and he decided that he wanted to be a witch.  (I guess I was very convincing... just to the wrong child!)  Then I had two kids who didn't want to wear their Halloween costumes.  Finally the night before Halloween, I caved and decided Sydney could be Cinderella.  I just wanted her to be happy on Halloween, and happy she was.  Then I had to figure out how to make Cooper happy.  Luckily, his pumpkin costume is made out of an orange fabric with ghosts, pumpkins, and witches on it.  So I showed him the witch on the pumpkin costume and told him he could be a "pumpkin-witch!"  He loved the idea.  So for Halloween 2011 we had the pumpkin-witch and Cinderella!

We had preschool the morning of Halloween and it was such a fun day.  The kids were so excited about their costumes and our little party, and they actually did really well.  It was probably one of my easiest days teaching, which isn't common.  Halloween can be a pretty difficult day for teachers.  It did help that Lindsey and I were both there, and we had a mother helper :)  We did a little costume parade, where the kids would come out, stand in front of all the parents, say what they were dressed up as, turn around twice, and shout out "Happy Halloween!"  Sydney loved it.  She wasn't the least bit shy.

We didn't have a ton of time for trick-or-treating that day because Matt was working at the greenhouse and worked pretty late.  But the kids did go to a few houses and loved it! We also visited my parents and the Walch family. Everyone kept telling Cooper what a cute pumpkin he was and he would get mad and say, "No! punkin-witch!"  So funny.  I'm sure he's the only pumpkin-witch there ever was.  It was a great Halloween.  Kids really make it so much more fun.

Our pumpkin-witch... he never lets go of Bootsy

Beautiful Cinderella

Sydney even dressed her baby Abby up

That smile made it all worth it!

Our House!

We got the keys to our house the evening after Alex got home, October 20th, and when I say evening, I mean last possible minute... 5:00.  We were expecting to get them bright and early, but it didn't happen.  So moving in was quite the hurried hassle, unlike how I had envisioned it.  It didn't matter though, because I was just so happy to be moving into OUR house.  

We've been in almost 3 weeks now, and have seriously been loving it.  I'll just say I'm in Love with it.  I am so beyond excited that we don't have to move again in a year.  I'm so happy that we were able to stay in the ward.  And I love the fact that I can do what I want with it... if I want to paint a wall, I can!  We've had requests for pictures so here they are.  It obviously looks so much better in person, but the pictures give a basic idea.  And we pretty much have zero decorating done, so it's pretty sparse.  Just imagine it with some pictures and stuff on the walls :)  I also thought I'd post the floor plan, because I think it helps the pictures make more sense... (but the floor plan is a little bit different.  The laundry room is in between the two bedrooms, instead of walk-in closets.)

This is the view from the front door...

If you walk down the hall, you will see this...

Oh you love the wood floors?  Me too.  My uncle did them.  Turn and see the kitchen.  And yes, I LOVE the white cabinets too...

Turn some more, and you'll see the pantry and half bath on the left wall of the above kitchen shot...

Then you can turn around and see the family room.  It's pretty crowded right now, but as soon as we finish the basement, the tv and couch are going downstairs and this will be a little piano/sitting room.  It will free up a lot of space.  (Oh and yes there are balloons/decorations for Sydney's birthday)

The door on the right leads to...

The dark and dreary wilderness (for now)

That's it for the main floor.  Go back to the front door, and we'll head upstairs...

The top of the stairs.... door to the left leads to the Master Bedroom...

Looking at the closet and bathroom...

Master Bath

Views of the bedroom from the bathroom...

The good sized master closet...

And the view from our bedroom... looks even better on a clear day :)

Now back to the top of the stairs...  There are two doors to the immediate right.  First Cooper's room, then laundry.  Down the hall, you can see the bathroom door, and to the right of that is Sydney's room...

Let's start with Cooper's room...

(all the rooms upstairs have vaulted ceilings)

Then the laundry.  And our new washer and dryer :)

Sydney's room...

And last, the kid's bathroom...

So, hope you enjoyed the grand tour.  We really are loving it and think it is just perfect for our little family.  We welcome visitors, so if you want to come see it in person, please do!

Alex is Home!

Alex flew home from his mission in Salta, Argentina on October 19th.  We were so excited to see him!  It was another pretty crazy day for us.  We signed about a hundred or so papers that day and closed on our house (yay!)... actually right before we left to drive to the airport.  Alex's plane was supposed to land at 4:40, and with everything going on with closing on the house and getting to the airport, our kids unfortunately didn't get naps.  They slept in the car for a little bit on the way to the airport, which actually made them more tired and ornery.  Matt was in charge of taking pictures on his mom's camera, which left me in charge of our camera, while trying to juggle two crying kids.  Needless to say, I didn't get very good pictures.  Don't let this face fool you...

Now when I say, "Alex flew home"  I actually mean, "Alex made a pitstop in SLC for a day before flying home."  Oregon is really home for him, although I'm sure Utah holds a bit of home nostalgia for him since he did live here for so many years and has so much family here.  We were so glad that he was able to fly here and spend a little bit of time here before heading home to Oregon... Otherwise we still wouldn't have seen him!  And it really was SO GOOD to see him!  There were lots of hugs...

And smiles... (except from my kids)

The kids finally cheered up when Grandma bought them some juice... that'll do the trick!  After that, they both were more willing to be nice to others and see Alex.

I just hope Alex knows that our kids aren't always like that... After the airport we headed over to Nana and Papa's house, where we had pizza and met up with more family.  It was so fun to spend the night with Matt's family.  We've been able to see them a lot in the past couple months and it has been nice.  We especially loved seeing Alex's pictures, souvenirs, and tasting the candy he brought back.  It is so fun to hear mission stories and learn more about the culture from other countries.  We only wish we were able to spend more time with him, instead of just a few hours! We know that he was such a great missionary and are so grateful for his example and service, and we are so glad to have him home safe and sound.

On a side note... the other day Sydney pointed out an airplane in the sky.  She asked where it was going, and we told her the airport.  Then she asked, "Oh, do we have another missionary coming home?"  I thought it was pretty funny!  And now when she prays, she'll bless the "missionaries that are home now."  We are trying to teach her that there are many other missionaries who are still serving, even more from our family :)