Molly pics

Our new puppy!!!!

This is our new puppy!!! She is 4 weeks old in this picture. She is a goldendoodle and will be joining our family the week before Christmas. Right now her name is Ginger, but we haven't come up with a new name for her yet. The kids just love her!!!

Kendall's conscience

Kendall (age 9) - "I was going to go to sleep because I thought you guys were mad at me. Then I had a good discussion with myself and myself made me come down and say I'm sorry."

It is so nice to have a daughter that is so trustworthy. Thank you Kendall for being such a wonderful daughter!!! We love you!!

Apple Hill!!

Saturday was a beautiful day and we were sick of cleaning our house, so we loaded up the kids, left our messy house behind, and headed up to Apple Hill. We have decided that we need to do things on the weekends besides clean our house. If we were to spend all day cleaning, you know what?? Our house would look exactly the same the following Saturday!! Right now we are in a tough situation. Our kids are young, I am working from home, I have preschools, elementary schools, therapies, and doctors appointments to go to and I spend much of my day dealing with Landon's meltdowns or trying to prevent them. Things are getting better and they will continue to get better. We have just 2 1/2 years until all 4 kids are in school all day. Until then, we are going to enjoy the wonderful place that we live and all of the things there are to do here!

We had a great day at Apple Hill. The weather was really nice and I think all of Northern California also decided to go to Apple Hill that day!! But we were in no hurry and really enjoyed ourselves! I got some great pictures of Carson, despite his long hair!!!

Missing 3 top teeth!!

My cute boy!

Karate Kid

Carson went to his first karate class today. He LOVED it!! Derek said he was beaming during the whole class. He loved the exercises and really paid attention and tried hard to learn the moves. He was in a class with 7-12 year olds. Since he is just 7, they are going to move him down to the 5-6 year old class until he gets caught up and then they will move him up to the more intense class when he is ready. I have been wanting to get him into karate for a long time. It is a perfect sport for him. A sport where he can advance at his own pace and not feel like he has to compare himself to others. I am so happy he has found something that he seems to really enjoy that doesn't have a joystick or screen attached!!

Picture post

Presley

When I resize my photos on Flickr so they will fit on my blog it reduces the quality. Is there a way to resize them and keep the quality? You would think if I was making the pictures smaller and not bigger that the quality would stay the same?? Anyone know??? Here is the original size down below. You definitely see that the quality in the photo below is MUCH better, but it is too big to fit on the blog. I am copying and pasting the HTML. Should I use the photos URL instead?? What does everyone else do??

Our first broken bone.....we think!

Almost 2 weeks ago I was trying to get the all the kids and I down for a "family nap" in my room. Whenever we try to do this there is way more noise and giggles than resting. Landon was running around the room like a mad man when he tripped on a stuffed animal and fell right into the box spring of our bed. Blood was gushing and he was crying. I cleaned him up, he cried for about 10 minutes and then laid down and took a nap. When he woke up this is what I saw and I decided to take him into the ER.

In the ER the doc looked at him for about 60 seconds and told me to try and put ice on it, that he would probably get 2 black eyes, not to worry, and made an appointment for the ENT for 6 days later.

Here he is on Friday.


On Saturday, the day of our neighborhood 4th of July parade he looked like this.


This is on Monday, probably the day it looked the worst.

I took him the the ENT last Wednesday and the doctor looked at it, felt it a little bit, and told us that it was probably broken but that it was healing well and looked like it would probably heal straight. A week later and the swelling has gone down. It is still green and he still has black eyes, but they are finally starting to fade some. He has bumped it a couple of times in the past couple of days and it has bled a little. But he started to look like himself and not Rocky Balboa!!

Oh, and if you're wondering why he has blood coming out of his nose....he wouldn't let me touch it. I gave him several baths to try to get the steam to clean it up a bit, but he wouldn't let me go anywhere near it and the doctor said to try not to touch it so that it wouldn't bleed. So he looked a little gross for a few days!!

Photogenic

Some kids are just born photogenic. I am not a not a photographer in any way, but I don't think H-man could take a bad picture!!

Just because.......

......she's so stinkin' cute!!!

Happy Gotcha Day!!!

Two years ago yesterday we first met our precious Presley!! Can you believe it? On Saturday I took a picture of her in her Gotcha Day clothes. I had to bribe her with a lollipop to even get her to try them on. So I didn't get a great picture, but you can tell how much she has grown!! She tried really hard to put her shoes on. We love you sweet Pres and couldn't imagine life without you!!

Fun at Grandma's!!

What is it about swings that bring out the pure joy in kids? The kids love the swingset in Grandma's backyard. Landon especially loves to swing. It is really good for his sensory issues. Speaking of Landon, check out his hairline on the last picture. My little bald man!!!

Pocatello Zoo

We had a fun day at the zoo! It was the perfect size for kids. The group picture was the best I could do. Someday I WILL get a good shot of all 4 kids!! We are having fun in Pocatello!!

Home Improvement!!

We have been busy working on our new house. We flew my step-dad out and put him to work on lots of home improvement projects! Here are some pictures of what we have been doing.

First of all were the kitchen appliances. As you can tell, they were really ugly. I didn't get a picture of the dishwasher before, but it was super ugly too. We brought our stainless steel fridge with us, so now everything is matchy matchy!!

Next was this crazy wasted space we had. I also didn't get a picture of this before, but you can tell about how big it was. We opened up underneath the stairs and were hoping to make a huge pantry, but the way the stairs were framed, it would've taken a very long time to make it usable. So instead, we were able to get a very small section underneath the stairs that we will use as Landon's chill out room. He really likes enclosed spaces. Now he can open our new pantry door and crawl through his secret door and into his little room. There is a light in there and it is about 10 feet tall. We need to get some carpet in there and we will put up a little curtain over the door of his little clubhouse.

Next came Presley's room. At first it was a loft that we really didn't use since we use the formal dining room downstairs as a playroom. Now Presley has a new room. We still have to put on door knobs, paint, and finish above her closet, but she is loving her new room and Kendall is really happy to have her out of her room!!

We also put a door on our master bathroom, which I don't have a picture of. When you were in our shower and the bedroom door was open, you could look straight down the hallway!! HELLO!!!

Our favorite project of all has been our yard!! It was full of weeds and now we LOVE it. Along the fence you can see 5 small fruit trees. We have a plum, granny smith apple, peach, cherry, and mandarin orange!! They are teeny trees, but our peach tree already has little peaches on it. I can't wait until we have lots of fruit!! We can't walk on our yard for 3 weeks, but soon we will set up our new trampoline and buy a play structure!! Next up, we hope, is new carpet. Boy is our carpet a mess!!!!

Here is cute Landon helping grandpa. He loved watching the construction and liked to help whenever he could!!

When you are upstairs and look out the big windows and over the freeway, this is what you see. Cows!! That is an environmentally protected area, so nothing will ever be built over there.