Sweet Sadie

She just loves our little man. She takes really good care of him.

Tummy Time is Torture Time

None of my kids has ever liked Tummy Time. It's a scream-fest, every day. A gal I worked with when Dylan was a baby told me that Dylan wouldn't be able to say his /b/ sound later in life if I didn't give him tons of Tummy Time. I wonder if that is a bunch of crap. I'll never know.

So yeah. Tummy Time is a scream-fest, but I still make them do it, because I don't want them to have pancake heads. However, my precautions have mainly been in vain. Micah has a total pancake head. And Gage is heading in that same direction, too. Sigh.

This was when Gage was only like a month old. I had him doing tummy time, and he was screaming, of course:

And then he randomly rolled over onto his back. He was like, ah, well, that's more like it:

But then he realized that being on his back wasn't that great, either:

What he really wanted was Mommy Time. And he got it. How can you not pick up a cute little fuzzbucket like that???

Easy Adjustment

Xena is thrilled to have Gage in our home. It means all of these new spots in which to lounge.

Not pictured - the baby's changing table and the rocker in the baby's room. I'm pretty certain she thinks we got these things solely for her benefit. Cats are funny.

Ben's School

Ben wanted me to see how the school he designed was coming along - this was at the beginning of September. School started three weeks later, I believe.

It was looking great. They just needed to finish up a few things. I was checking out this stuff on the outside called Hardy Board:

They call the guys who come and install the Hardy Board, The Hardy Boys. That makes me laugh really hard.

Some inside views of the classrooms:

I love the color scheme, inside and out.

When Tim and Brenda (Ben's dad and stepmom) came to visit us at the beginning of October, Ben took them to see the school. (I stayed at home with the baby man.) This time, it was finished, beautifully:

Tim, Brenda, and Sadie:

Tim, the man with the plan:

I wish I could just thoughtfully and pleasantly stare at the camera like that. I get really embarrassed when Ben takes pictures of me, and I can't keep a straight face. Something I need to work on.

Anyways. Isn't the school just beautiful? I'm so proud of Ben. Someday he's going to design our dream house, and that makes me excited. Remember how I said, like a few entries ago, that I don't ever want to move? I have amended that statement as of last night, when our main sewer line backed up yet again because of tree root penetration. We're talking little pieces of poop and who knows what all, flooding our laundry room. I think I have PTSD from cleaning that up. Ben rented a thingey that unclogs sewer lines, and it pulled out a huge clump of tree roots, dirt, etc. We had this same thing happen just a few months ago, as well. It costs $8,000 to dig up the yard and completely replace the plumbing. You may guess that we don't have $8,000, so we just have to keep getting flooded, and routing it out. Getting flooded, and routing it out.

So yeah, Ben, go ahead and design us a new house. Feel free.

Me, Fair Lady - 2010 Edition

Da Fair.

Soooooo hot. Soooo expensive. Soooo fun. Sooooo yummy.

Micah at the petting zoo:

I loooove that picture of him. It's like he's saying, "Heyyyyyyyyy!!!" He adores animals. He has zero fear of animals. A dog could come up to him and knock him over, and he'd giggle. It's so great. I love animals, too. I just don't like cleaning up their poop. Thank goodness Xenie doesn't even use her litter box. All her doings are outside, and I haven't found them in my yard at all yet. Hopefully she's pooping in the nappy neighbors' yard, or in the drug dealer's yard. I'm so vindictive.

My mom's favorite part of the fair is the petting zoo, too. I don't have any pics of her from this year, because she was in a different section than my kids. What she does every single year is she finds a puppy that's for sale, and she cuddles it for like an hour and talks about how much she wants to buy it. And then she doesn't. And dad always heaves a sigh of relief. This year, she found a shi tsu that actually seemed normal. (Her current shi tsu, Daisy, is extremely abnormal. The weirdest animal this side of the Pecos.)

Shi tsu is fun to say.

Dylan and Sadie wanted to go into this Fun House thingey. Sadie took three steps in and was overpowered by the loud music playing inside. She fled, screaming. We had to stand outside the Fun House until Dylan came out, and this is how she stood the whole time:

It was really funny. She is extremely sensitive to loud noises. So am I. Her theme song should be that song by Pink: "This used to be a FUN HOUSE... but now it's full of EVIL CLOWNS..."

I love Pink. Her voice is so husky and cool. Like she has a cold. I love my voice when I have a cold. (Which means I like it right now. I have a killer cold right now.) Like Kathleen Turner. Or Demi Moore. Or Jessica Rabbit. Who was voiced by Kathleen Turner.

Poor little Troy, a.k.a. Stumpy:

He was too short for many a ride. I feel bad for him. He really was a good sport about it.

This is how Ben and I feel about taking the kids anywhere:

It's a nightmare. Especially when it's in the nineties outside. We ate in this tent pavilion thingey, not because the food was especially nice, but because it had seats and was shady. That takes precedence. The only good thing I had this year was a chocolate covered, frozen piece of cheesecake. Dang, that was good. I missed out on my apple dumpling and my piece of bread from Bread Barn. Our money ran out fast. We joked that we should start a savings account just for the fair. We should save all year long for two events - Christmas, and the fair.

The fair is so expensive, it's just not... FAIR. Get it? That reminds me of what my friend Cecily's mom used to tell her when she said something wasn't fair: "The only fair is in Blackfoot." I say that to my kids all the time now. It's one of my favorite retorts. Along with, "Dial Whine-one-one. Someone call the wahmbulance."

I'm such a loving mother.

Nat, Mom, and I love going to the quilting building. Not that I am a quilter. Trust me, anything involving sewing is far beyond me. But I appreciate any kind of art form. I decided to pose in front of my favorite quilt:

See? I'm pretending to ski. Isn't that quilt the greatest? Isn't skiing the greatest???

Nat posed in front of a cross stich that she actually has a pattern for:

You should do that during all your free time, Nat. Oh wait. You don't have any free time. :)

I wanted to go to the photography and art buildings, but by then, I was about ready to pass out from heat stroke. I was carrying poor Gage in the Baby Bjorn, so our combined body heat was more than either of us could bear. Sooo hot.

I had fun, though, during the time when I didn't feel like I was going to die. Thanks so much, Mom and Dad, for taking us. So, so, so nice of you. Our kids would never do anything fun without such sweet grandparents. Kissy, kissy. And I mean it.

Megs' Shower

My friend, little Megsie Pooh, had a baby shower oh... maybe a month or so after Tinian was born, I think. Gage was only two weeks old, I believe. Which is why I look like this:

Yeah, pretty fluffy. And my boobs were still huge. Postpardem bodies are fun. That's what I've discovered. I'm right in between jean sizes right now, and it's so frustrating! Size twelves drown me; size tens suffocate me. I bought a brand new pair of jeans on Saturday (size 12) that fit great in the store. Today, my first day wearing them, they are falling right off my body. That is not an exaggeration. I was emptying garbages at work, and whoop, the pants fell right off my flat butt. (As I have told you before, my butt is very, very flat. No matter how fat I get, my butt remains flat as a pancake.) It's a good thing it was night time and nobody was around. I already took the tags off and stuff - I wonder if the store will let me exchange them for the tens, which felt wayyy too tight in the store, by the way, but I think too tight is better than falling-off-the-hiney.

See? This is why I wear pajama bottoms inside my house all day. No falling off issues; no tightness issues.

I need a personal stylist.

Wow. Big tangent. I think Dylan's ADD comes a little bit from his mama. Moi. Back to the subject at hand - Meg's shower, honoring this little man:

Gosh, he is so cute. That was a picture from late August. Here's one from October:

He just keeps getting cuter and cuter. Look at those cheeks. Gage needs to take how-to-get-pleasingly-plump lessons from Tinian, Kole, and Marlo.

I got to hold the teeny man during a lot of the shower, which was so fun:

He smells so good, and his head is so soft and fuzzy. I love babies so much.

This is me and Karlene, from my ward:

Our ward is funny. We have a Karlene, a Karleen, a Karlenn, and three Carolyns.

A few of us went in together on some formula for Tinian:

That stuff is like liquid gold. Seriously.

The Diamond Party

Sadie talked all year about having a friend party with a Diamond theme - a Diamond Party, she kept calling it. When Sheila offered to throw Sadie's friend party, I didn't want to force the Diamond issue on her. Beggars can't be choosers, you know? Sadie was pretty disappointed that she wasn't going to have this long-planned-for diamond party, so I decided to make our family party the Diamond Party.

Um, it was hard to come up with stuff, but I managed. First, I had the kids play Pin the Sparkle on the Diamond. Pete would spin the kiddos around:

And then the kids would pin the sparkle onto the diamond. The goal was to get the sparkle as close to the red X as they could. Sorry you can't see very well - I ran out of time, so I didn't get to color the diamond a kind of light blue. The sparkles are white:

Then I found some crafts at Michaels, where they could color these wooden things, and then decorate them with diamond stickers. I was worried that all of the boys would find this activity really girly, but they LOVED it:

I tried to find wooden pictures where a little sparkle wouldn't be out of place, like a pirate's ear, a shiny car, etc. Things that were manly but still were at home with lots of bling.

Our guests had lots and lots of fun with the diamond stickers:

I found those stickers all over my house for weeks and weeks afterward. :)

Then it was cake time. I literally made the cake in like half an hour. It's supposed to be a diamond, but it looks like a clam, or a football or something:

Sooo ugly. But I had no time. Sadie thought it was the greatest, so that's all that matters:

Then it was present time. I didn't have time to wrap our presents, either, so she just pulled them out of a big bag:

Life with four kids is so busy. Thanks for the gifts, Nat and Pete and Mom and Dad. Sadie desperately needed clothes. Your gifts were just the ticket.

I was soooo sick that night. I felt really, really gross. I think I was snappish to everyone, and I feel badly about that. It turns out that I had a UTI. I got it tested a couple of days later. UTI - my alma mater. Sigh.