Always the bridesmaid....

 So, I know this is totally inappropriate..

Really.

Don't be mad at me.....

Its just that I honestly couldn't help myself.

At my cousin Franki's wedding they served Martinellis in these fancy glasses.

Tatum could not get enough of it.

Every time I looked at her she was drinking more..

And being at a wedding and all.... Dressed up like a big girl.....

I couldn't help but laugh and take another picture...

Don't judge me.

I'm a good mom.

Most of the time....

Pajama Day!

Lucky Tatum!  It is pajama day at her school.....

I wish it was pajama day at my office.

Oh wait..

It is.
Really though, how cute is she?

You cant really see because her hand is in the way, 

but Tate likes to pull her shirts to the side (80's style) and put it in a little ponytail over there.

I love it!

You remember those circle thingys that have a bar through the middle?  So you can loop your shirt through it?

I need to find some of those.

Tate would love them!

Watching Elf....

Today Steph's kids came over after school.  Tate has been home sick for the last 2 days so she was super happy to have someone to play with!~  They decided to watch the movie Elf

 Don't mind Tatums cluttery room of things she loves..

And don't worry that they are all smashed together on her bed here.. 

Watching this tiny TV 

(which is only allowed in her room on sick days.. FYI)

It's not like we have 110 inch projection screen in the basement.

Weird kids.

PS.. Have you ever seen Elf?  Tate made us watch it the other night, and it is hilarious!

"Buddy the elf, whats your favorite color?"

I laughed my head off.

Happy Halloween Party Edition - Family

I really try hard to do what I can to make good memories around our house.  

I think that having consistent traditions and warm fuzzy memories will make Tatum be a stable, happy, person.

Freak.  I hope so.

I work really (semi) hard to see that these "family nights" take place, and usually, it ends with some sort of melt down, or chaos. 

Fun chaos, or loving melt downs of course.

Our caramel apple tradition is a work in progress.  We ended up just having to cut the apples up, and scraping the caramel off of the wax paper because it all just slid off the apples.  

Next year will be better maybe.

We had a good time trying though!

Then we carved pumpkins.  See how much fun?

And we had a surprise visit from Ian!  

Yay!  

He moved back to Idaho, and we haven't seen him for a long time.  

He's Ryan's old roommate, and "wingman" if you will.

We strong armed each other for a little while.  

But after I won, (suckaaa) we became the best of friends.

Plus, I let him date Miranda for a little while.

Tatum absolutely adores him.  He teases her relentlessly.  She loves it.

We were happy to have him surprise us!

I love my boyfriend.

Naturally

See how much fun were having?

I wanted a picture of the beef stew!  

It was my first time making it!

Oh ya, I made corn bread too.

See that little piece?  Tatum llooovveesss corn bread.

And we baked yummy pumpkin seeds.

Me and Dev made a perfect pumpkin roll.

If you have never made a pumpkin roll, you should. They are to die for delicious

I made two and kept one for myself.

Don't tell Ryan

Oh ya.. And something cute that happens in our neighborhood every year is getting "booed"

Its where someone knocks and runs and leaves treats on your door with a copy of this letter.  

You then post the sign on your door, and boo 3 other neighbors that don't have a sign on their door.

Its really fun.  

Above is some of the loot that we booed our 3 neighbors with. 

The people that booed us left us home made suckers.

Adorable ones that matched the little boo monster, and purple and green theme.

They were wrapped in plastic baggie thingies and tied with ribbons, and left in a cute little ghost shaped box.

But

Because you don't know who left this on the door, I couldn't let Tatum eat them.

How was I to know if they didn't poison those darling little suckers?

Or worse!  

What if they open cans of cat food and put them on their kitchen counters and then let their cats jump up on the counter to eat their dinner?!?  

Eeewwww.

I couldn't do it.

Tatum was super mad.

Devyn ate one anyways.

Yes, I'm that mom.

Happy Halloween Party Edition - Kids

So.  Tatum really wanted to have a Halloween party this year.  Since she was all but abandoned and neglected for the entire summer due to "delicate way" I decided what the H.  Lets do it.  

Lets have some pizza, witches brew, giggle, and decorate some sugar cookies with sweet little girls.  

Sounds harmless enough right?

Well, then, Ryan got involved and started making all sorts of promises.  

Then I got involved threatening him not to disappoint her.  

Then he got vveeerrryyy involved and took things to a whole new level. 

He even took a whole afternoon off of work to make good on his word.  

I am thankful that the makeshift Halloween stores don't offer lines of credit.

So what started as a sweet tea party turned into the party of the hood.

This is a picture of the group that was invited, eating my cute little pumpkin shaped pizzas on the front lawn.

Then some neighbors rode by on their bikes and decided they wanted to come.

They went home and threw on some costumes.

 My idea of making sugar cookies turned out to be a disaster.. 

Rolling out the dough, cutting shapes, all of that, was to much.  

So I took the kids outside to play red rover and freeze tag while my sister, and sister in laws started shaping and baking sugar cookies as fast as they could. 

(I (Miranda)had already made the dough and frosting)

 There are about 5 kids missing from the frosting extravaganza picture above.

Really. Maybe more.  I didn't even know some of them.

 This is why we L-O-V-E miss Rylie Hanson.  

She is a bestie of Tates.

 Honestly.. Who would eat this?

 This is where Ryan comes in.. He honestly built the most KILLER haunted house in our basement. 

Our niece Regan was dressed as a witch "haunted day care" 

The items in the bowls above are body parts of kids that have misbehaved.

Pistachios - Finger Nails

Oatmeal (cooked) - Guts

Spaghetti - Brains

Candy corn - Teeth

Gummy eye balls - gummy eye balls

 2 of his brothers, and Regan had to aid in this haunted house being appropriately carried out. 

The kids had to crawl threw a cave (J's crib box) with spiderwebs and spiders everywhere.

Walk through a graveyard (living room)

Visit the daycare (bathroom.  I wish I had a picture of the possessed zombie babies that Ryan purchased)

and see where some guy died.. Where Steve the clown would jump out and scare the bejeezes out of them.

And Tates playroom was something else too.  I cant remember.

It was a huge hit.  

There wasn't a wall, door, or corner that wasn't covered in some sort of creepy blinky eyed wall covering.

And scary music.  And fake rats. And dead old ladies. And it was all done in black lights. And strobe lights

It rivaled the Sigma Chi haunted house in Cedar if you ask me.

 Ryan would come upstairs and get the kids in groups of 3.  He never came out of character.  

I tried to keep the rest of the kids entertained by watching Beetle Juice on the upstairs TV.  It didn't work.  They were all screaming, and yelling, and gathered around the banister trying to hear what was going on downstairs.  

It was a honest to goodness mad house.  MAD HOUSE I SAY!

After the party I said NEVER AGAIN!! 

Ryan said, I think this should be a tradition!  

Honestly.  Mars and Venus.

 I can take credit for this great idea.  

Earlier in the day me and  Dev and Mir made two great big bowls of Jello. 

In it, we put all kinds of treats and toys and stuff.  

Good idea huh?  

The kids get to dig through and take home their goodies.  

Well, according to the package it takes about 3 hours for Jello to set up.  

I don't make this disgusting crap on a daily basis okay?  I followed the instructions.

Well, it should say this somewhere on the package..

"If you are timesing this recipe by 10 please allow at least 10 hours to set."

But it didn't, so when I pulled out the bowls for the kids to sift through, it turned into a bloodbath.

Really.

I don't know how many neighbors I pissed off by sending their kids home with ruined costumes, but it was a few at least.

There is still some Jello behind Tatum's bathroom door.  I saw it the other day.  

And there is still a stain on the garage floor where the murder scene took place.

Never again.

 Tate and her two besties.  Rylie and Porter.

 And no Halloween evening would be complete without Ryan and Tatum trying to scare me.  

This guy was waiting for me in my bed after I was done mopping the garage floor.  

I'm tired just typing about this party. 

Bye.

Happy Halloween!!

Below is my little beauty queen all ready for Halloween parade at school

She can be so sweet sometimes.

Also, can you believe how beautiful the weather was this late in October, and this early in the AM?

Of course the weather stayed nice until about 3:00 on Saturday and then it started pouring.

Tatum boycotted trick or treating. 

Can you believe that?  She stayed home and passed out candy!!

What the?

She did end up hitting a few houses later that night with Eric and Hayley's nephews

but seriously, she only had like 8 pieces of candy.

Oh well, I guess its for the best. (for both of us really) except that it means that she is way to big.

Sad.

 

See? See how sweet she can be?

Gosh I hope little J has me wrapped the way this one does.

He will.

On Halloween someone pumpkin smashed our pumpkins.

Tatum was beside herself.. 

Until the next night when Ryan took her to do it to someone else..

We are naughty around here during Halloween. 

Something mischievous happens to us.

Don't ask questions, just know, we are not totally in line with the law during this time of the year.

Look at me!

 So, I took pictures this morning to document that I didn't buy the finished product that I am about to reveal.  

You will really need proof when you see what I did, just this morning! 

Its beautiful, breath taking, spectacular.

I maintain that people that are untalented can brag when they pull off something that requires talent.

You don't see me going around bragging about being tall do you?  

No.  

That would be rude because being tall comes so easy to me. 

See?  Construction?

 See? Happy finished product?  And chubby, no make up, happy my face?  

And Jack?  

He's coming right along eh? 

FYI  I'm 30 plus weeks.  For men, that translates to about 7 months.

Also, I don't know if you know, but when little kids feel like their life is changing, or spinning out of control they pee themselves.  Its actually really sad. Nothing to make light of.  Sorry.  I'm rude.

But, when I am feeling similarly, I cut 6 inches off of my hair.  Or make it black.

My hair is not behind my back in the above picture.  

Now I look from Debbie from Channel 2 news.  Shoot.

Even more shoot is that I look 50 times better.

 

*Also, like I said, these pictures were taken this morning.. It's not 5:30 at night, and I'm still wearing those same pajamas, and I haven't brushed my teeth.

Now, that I type that out, maybe a few daily tweeks, and I could have found some cosmetic joy without cutting off all of my hair.

Just a thought.

Tt Time

Last weekend we had little Tt Jo over.  Tt (Talitha) is my friend Heather Jo's little girl.
  It was much needed to have her over! We haven't seen her for a little awhile.  

While I didn't document most of the girl party, I snapped a few shots the next morning while we made tt's gingerbread house and had breakfast.

 Okay, so see how beautifully put together this gingerbread house is?  I found this bad boy at Costco!  

It comes totally put together!  You just get to decorate it!  Isn't that awesome?

Please remember the picture of this perfectly constructed house in future posts.

I almost threw a knife, and Tatum's Wal Mart gingerbread through my kitchen window last night. 

This Costco house is the way to go.

Another cute little item of interest.  Talitha is naturally more toe headed that Tatum.

She and her daddy have decided to have a "year of color". 

Every few months, Talitha is changing her hair color. 

Next I believe will be turquoise.. I don't remember for sure.  

Isn't that cool?  They are a neat little family.

So, here we have sweet little Talitha, and my sassy little girl.  

Cant you just see what Tate is going to be like as a teenager?  

Seriously, teen years are seeping out of her pores.. Right... Can you see it?  Or is it just me?

P.S.  While I don't eat french toast, because its just bread slathered in scrambled up baby chickens, 

I made this for my family, and these girls.  It got rave reviews.

Well, see you later.

Darn It.

Last Saturday Tatum came out of her bedroom totally ticked off because she had found these snow pants under her bed.  She didn't know she had snow pants.  Why you ask?  Because nobody would have taken her outside to play in the snow around this house.  Ryan works super long hours and psshht if I'm gonna do it!

Darn it.

Isn't this the saddest thing?  Tatum happy as a lark all by herself. 

Really, kids need siblings.  While I am soo happy to be having this baby, it makes me feel so sorry for Tate. 

I wish I could have had this baby 5 years ago so that Tatum had a rowdy little brother is this pic with her. 

Kicking snow in her face, throwing icicles at her, possibly causing stitches..

Ya know, the good stuff.

While I am so blessed to have even one (and a half) healthy child(ren), its just sucky.

Its her that I am complaining for.  You always want the best for your kids, and while Tatum is spoiled to death, and has received tons of attention and material benefits due to being an only child,

I cant help but think how priceless siblings are. 

 Hopefully Jack will be able to catch up quickly. 

From damage this bruiser is doing to my tail bone and rib cage, I would say the odds of him causing her stitches at some point during this lifetime are pretty good. 

I hope she appreciate them.