Our Budding Artist!

I have begged him, bribed him, forced him, have done whatever it took to get him to color or paint or do anything slightly artistic, it's just not his thing... So imagine my surprise when he asked me to help him move his easel into the play room so he could paint!

Apparently he had an itch to paint Sonic the Hedgehog and his friend Tails or Fox Tails, not sure what his exact name is.
After painting Hayden cut them off of the easel, got some tape and hung them in the hallway. Andy and I are so proud, I think we have a little Picasso on our hands! I know this is probably not typical 5 year old art, there are many kids who are far more advanced than this but for Hayden, this is a huge milestone! I will keep these hanging in the hallway as long as he wants them up!(I think the little spatters and scribbles were care of Brynley!)

A Quick Tag Post

Okay, so I was tagged a few weeks ago by Erin, but it's kind of a hard tag, I'll get to it. Meredith just tagged me and this one is much easier. So, while I get all my pics from Disney downloaded, I will at least post a little tag:

Four Jobs I have had:
1. Elementary School Teacher
2. Kinkos of Orem - the best Kinkos ever!
3. Server at Newport Bay - the best seafood ever!
4. Cleaning Cabins in Island Park, ID for the summer with my husband!

Four Movies I have watched more than once:
1. Trouble With Angels
2. Parent Trap
3. Goonies
4. Steel Magnolias - This is also on both of my sister's lists but I remember it as being a favorite I watched with my mom a ton! I also watched it late one night over the weekend after getting in from Disneyland!

Four Places I have lived:
1. Aloha, Oregon
2. Provo, Utah
3. Peoria, Arizona
4. Gilbert, Arizona

Four TV Shows I watch:
1. The Office
2. Amazing Race
3. Top Chef
4. ER - One of the only people who has held out the entire life of the series!

Four Places I have been:
1. New York!!! - I can't wait to go back!
2. St. Maarten
3. Napa Valley - Gorgeous, amazing, even if you are not a drinker!
4. Hawaii

Four Celebrities you have met:
1. Marie Osmond
2. Figure Skaters - Caren Cadavy, Brian Boitano, Brian Orser
3. Pat Sajack and Vanna White
4. I love celebrities and I always want to meet them but it never really happens, so unfair!!Celebrities I have had brushes with - meaning I have walked past them, said hi, waved, etc... but not actually shaken hands with and said good to meet you - Adam Sandler, Hayden Panatierre, Regis Philbin, Kelly Rippa, Martha Stewart, Lindsay Lohan, Robert Redford, Joey Lawrence, Howie Mandell, 2 American Idol contestants, Jon Stewart... Maybe more but I can't remember!

Four of my favorite foods:
1. Mashed Potatoes
2. Bean dip and tortilla chips!!!
3. Anything Mexican
4. Ice Cream

Four Places I would like to visit:
1. Ireland
2. France
3. Africa
4. More of the East Coast

Four Things I am looking forward to in the coming year:
1. Finishing and moving into our new house!
2. Spending Thanksgiving with Andy's Family
3. Brynley going to Preschool
4. Continuing to workout more, get healthier, and be more active as a family

Four Friends I am tagging:
1. Toni
2. Wendy
3. Cara
4. Misty

This is why they usually don't get to lick the brownie bowl...

She's caught!
Hmm, she has help...
I see those looks of guilt!
Aah, sisterly love, how nice...
Brotherly love... need I say more?

Are you kidding me???

This happened a few weeks ago and I forgot to post the pictures. Picture this, Zac, Brynley , and I are going to JoAnn's and Ross, I pull into the Ross parking lot and I turn around in the car to see this.

Not sure where the marker came from, thankfully she couldn't reach Zac or any part of the car so the marker was contained to her body. I called Meredith to ask if I should just go home or take her in the stores, the verdict: take her in. And so, we walk, holding hands into Ross and everyone just starts cracking up. There was much more marker on her face, we went to the bathroom to wash some of it off and these pictures were taken when we got home.
At least we amused a few people that night!

Need your opinions...

This is another picture of the house as of today. If you're the type to get annoyed with this sort of thing, just ignore these posts, I am mostly doing it for my own record keeping. But I do have a serious question that I need opinions on, I have been going back and forth about something I want to do in the house and I am having a hard time convincing Andy of it...
Here it is: Our house has 3 1/2 bathrooms, more than we really need quite honestly. There is a full bath downstairs plus a powder bath under the stairs. The powder bath kind of makes an L shape if that makes sense. The powder bath is very close to the kitchen (this is important) and the full bath is just about 10 feet down the hall. In our last house we had a small freezer in our laundry room which we won't do in this house because the laundry room is upstairs. We planned on putting the freezer in the garage, however, we still only have a 2 car garage so space could be tight, plus we'd have to have an outlet put in after the fact. So my brilliant plan is to turn the powder bath into a room for my freezer, food storage, and canning equipment. I am big into buying food ahead when it is on sale and so we always have a large stockpile of food, plus I have really gotten into canning. In our last house, we had a huge master closet and turned a large portion of it into an extra food storage area, not going to happen in our new closet.

We would cap off the toilet as well as the sink and keep those stored away so that we could easily turn it back into a bathroom anytime and then use all that space for what I have mentioned. So, am I stupid for thinking of doing this? Be honest, totally honest, I won't hold it against you, I promise!

Shelly's house in progress:

Weekly House Update

There's nothing too exciting to report... The framing of the house is in progress as you can see from the picture. Hayden is excited because the just put the stairs in yesterday. He keeps telling everyone that there is a small rectangle window in the middle of the upstairs. Technically we aren't allowed to walk in the house right now but I did and it was a good thing too because I found a mistake in the framing in the kitchen... Good thing I don't read signs telling me to keep out! Shelly's house has the foundation poured, I couldn't get a picture of it from the car because there was too much in front of it. I am sure they'll start the framing on hers in the next few days.

Cousin Sleepover

On Sunday night, we had Lindsay and Caroline spend the night. We always set of the airobed in the playroom and let them watch movies until they fall asleep. Brynley is usually banished to her room because she doesn't understand the laying down part but to our surprise, she was the first one to fall asleep that night. Andy took these cute pictures of the siblings cuddling...

Shortly after these pictures were taken, we woke up to Brynley crying hysterically, thrashing around, and kicking Caroline. That was the end of the sleepover for Bryn but at least she made it to 1 am!

So Proud!!!

I have to brag here for a minute, if you hate brag posts, don't read!

We had Hayden's parent/teacher conference last week and I have to say, we were very pleasantly surprised. Many of you know that we struggle with Hayden some times, his ability/inability to focus on things, his listening and following directions skills, etc. To my surprise, his teacher gave a glowing report, not to say Hayden never gets in trouble, he does. About once a week he gets a "yellow" stamp on his behavior card, so we talked about his behavior and she assured me that there are MANY kids way worse than him in the class. Hayden's problem is that he is chatty, he really likes to talk and he really wants to be friends with everyone! She says he is never naughty on purpose or malicious, he is just social! (That's my boy!) Andy and I discussed this and decided we'd rather he be a little over social than anti social, right??

As we discussed his abilities, she says he is probably the best reader in the class and has far surpassed the baseline testing they have done thus far, yay! She says she is constantly amazed at the things he will randomly read and recognize. I'm not surprised, he's been memorizing logos and signs since before he was 2. She said that Hayden will notice if anything is changed in the classroom, a picture on the wall moved, the tables in a slightly different place, you get the picture!

School funnies:

Hayden asked to have a girl moved from his table. When he asked Ms. Tapia asked him why and he said because she wasn't writing her name straight on the line and therefore wasn't doing her work right!

He has a girlfriend, her name is Kristen!

Last week he told Ms. Tapia that his last name is pronounce differently than it really is. After a few days of her pronouncing it the way he told her to, he decided she was right pronouncing it the original way. This is actually a really funny story that I can't explain so if you're interested, ask!

We are just so proud of our sweet Hayden and glad that he is holding his own at school, I was worried about him but I know he is thriving and loving it. In fact, we're on fall break right now and he keeps asking when he gets to go back to school!!!