Christmas Decorations

Every year I think this is going to be the magical year that everyone will help me put up christmas decorations and the tree. I envision my kids looking back fondly at these memories I'm trying to give them. I picture movies where families are drinking cocoa and laughing and hugging. Then reality sets in oh so very quick. So quick it just smacks ya in the face.

It starts out just lovely. Everyone is happy!

Then it's time to get the tree set up. Time to open boxes full of shiny and sparkly things. Excitement levels are starting to rise. The stockings come out of the boxes, books and movies that the kids haven't seen come out and by this point OVER excitement is an UNDER statement. 

As I am trying to wrangle the christmas tree lights, I try not to get frustrated at the fact that last year I just threw them in the box in no real particular order. Ok cool, untangled. plug them and they work. YES! Get them on the tree, a bunch of them go out. Are ya joking me? Ok...fix it in a way that you cant tell. Then more go out. GR! Take them all off the tree and magically they FLIPPING work again. Twist every dang light to make sure none are loose. Put them back on the tree, another section turns off. AHHHH!!! Tell the kids to go play for a minute while I cuss and scrooge my way through the stupid lights.

So while in angry land, I didn't mention tp the kids what exactly they should play with. They decided to choose some wonderful breakable, fragile decorations to jump around with. They're so excited right now, if they were adults you would be certain there were substance issues at hand. Perfect.

Eventually decided to get a new string of lights and finish decorating tomorrow. Maybe everyone wont be so hyped up! Sent the babies to bed. Then I thought it was best that I hang out with an understanding friend for a bit. No, not Mitch. (He of course doesn't bother trying to convince himself that any such perfect memory making occasion will occur and ducks out of sight). I'm referring my pal sauvignon blanc.

But seriously thinking about it, I wouldn't trade my wild animals or crazy family for anything. Who wants that boring movie family anyways? We're loud. We're nuts. We love each other. I also love wine. What are we talking about? :)

Oh, May!

How is it May already?

It's been so sunny and awesome this spring. Washington is awesome that way. My yard is so pretty with all the blooming plants and flowers :) Except for all the dang moles that live under my grass that are turning my beautiful lawn into mole hill freakin city....

Family updates-

Me- Same thing as always. Moming, wifeing, running and besides that my life is a never ending load of laundry. I saw a quote on pinterest "sort-today, wash-tomorrow, fold-eventually, iron- ha. ha. ha." That's pretty much what I go by. Seriously, I almost don't want another baby for the simple fact that I dont think I can do that much more laundry haha. Any hoo..

Mitch- He's rugbying quite a bit again. It's very awesome that he has that outlet and has enjoyed making new friends. Work is the same...blahhhk. Something dug a hold under the chicken fence and ate two of his chickens :(

Edo Burrito- She is now a "starfish" in swimming class. Pretty advanced swimming..at least by my standards because I suck at swimming. She's a little mermaid in the water now. She's at the point now where if she fell off of a boat she could survive...which is exactly why I wanted her in the lessons. She has started gymnastics now too. She's coming along...but right now it's more for fun. We have to work on the "focusing for a whole hour" thing before we can expect the next Shannon Miller haha. She's all registered for Kindergarten next year. I feel like it's such a big deal. She's excited. Right now Hello Kitty, Junie B Jones books and putting on puppet shows are the center focus of Eden's life.

Mitchell the Tank- He is running and jumping and a wild little thing. He is talking up a storm and is the funniest, goofiest little babe ever. When he's not being cute and adorable, he is steadily working his way into the terrible twos...yyyyaaayy (*yay said without any enthusiasm and with a solemn facail expression). His favorite things include doing EVERYTHING Eden does and stalking her every move haha. He looooveeessss his big sis. She loves him too but I feel like little siblings at this age are kind of looked at like an science experiment or a pet...or both. It's like I wonder what he'll do if I spray him in the face with the ice cold water from the hose or I'll make mom mad and tell him pick his nose or spit at the grocery store...It's funny because I yell at her when she does stuff like that but I tooooottalllyyy did the same things to my younger brother. Sorry, Zach. kind of haha :)  He's really into books and is obsessed with vehicles. My house looks like the DOT. At any point in time you will find at least 3 trucks, cars, trains etc. in every room of my house. Match box cars are a lot of fun to step on. NOT.

We've had Mitch's brothers, mom and sister in law and our little Brookey baby niece and Tanner man nephew visit within the last couple of months too. The visits were very fun and we did some great stuff. We went to a Mariners game, the zoo, toured around Seattle, hiked and drank a lot of wine :) It's sad that we don't get to see our family very much but when they come out we definitely make the most of every single minute.

twins

at the mariners game with uncle ryno

Nana Judy and my freako kids haha

hiking

wine :)

on the ferry into seattle

Ta ta friends xoxox

February Update

We've done a bunch of fun things this month. It's gone by quick! The first 3 weekends we went snowshoeing and sledding down at Mount Rainier. My kids are total outdoors kids. They do great. Eden is a little pro snowshoeing up the slopes! It takes about 2 hours to get down to Rainier National Park, but it's worth it. Washington is great. No snow at my house which means no shoveling :-D Buuutttt when I want snow, I drive 2 hours and there it is.

nutcracker

Baby boy not digging it

Taking in the mountains

Mitch, the baby and I went to a play at the community theatre here too. It was really funny! We're going to go back when there's a new play. I painted Mitchell's room and got some new things for it. He's got the best room in the house now! Eden wants purple, pink and blue stripes. I told her no, but Mitch told her she can have whatever she wants. She's got someone wrapped around her little finger haha. For Valentines day we made a trip to Seattle to ride the Great Wheel! It was scary for me...because I'm a giant chicken, but we all had fun. We went out to dinner afterwards too. Eden's Valentines were pretty cool. We printed a picture of her sticking her arm out and then stuck a lollipop through the picture to make it look like she was holding it :)

That's cupid in the corner :)

yikes

Sleeping loves on the ferry ride home

Eden has also started gymnastics! She's gotten better each time she's gone and she has sooooo much fun. Mitch and I hope that she wants to continue doing it as she gets older so we can watch he compete :) I think it's about time to call in Bele Karolyi!

Other than that, same ole school, work, chicken farming blobedy blah blah!

Here's a few pictures of the best buds in their polar bear jams to end the blog :) xoxo

Winter Things

So it's already almost February.  I haven't typed anything on here for even longer than I thought. Oopsie.

Summary of December and Janauary ...ready go.

Christmas was very just chill and low key, which was what we wanted. We miss our family and friends but it was so nice for us 4 to be together and not have to rush from one place to the next. We received a lot of really heart felt and personal gifts and it was really cool. Our new years started off with running out of oil for our heat and freezing our butts off for like a week. Then Mitchell and myself and then Mitch getting a terrible stomach bug. I felt like I was dying, seriously. It was so bad. I don't remember being that sick ever. My cloroxing and quarantining must have worked a little because Eden didn't get sick. I feel like that was a miracle.

Mitchell was REALLY mad that the Grinch was in the picture too. In this picture he's trying to rip it out of Eden's hands and bite him. I have no clue why he got so mad but Eden and I thought it was funny...mean Mommy.

Candy and toys all day!! Wooo!

Sitting in the Christmas wreckage, combing her new Eloise doll's hair.

   Mitch has been working like crazy and hating his job still :/ He's still enjoying riding his bike and being a chicken farmer. I got a job! Woop woop! But I don't start until the Spring but it's something right? I'm going to be an instructor at the YMCA.
  Eden is still doing great and swim lessons are going well too. She is on a waitlist for gymnastics, which stinks, but hopefully they'll call soon. She's loving little chapter books and writing  a lot too. She's getting smarter and more mature every day. She's insisting on continuing to grow despite my best efforts to get her to stop :)
  Mitchell is saying a lot of stuff now. His personal favorites are of course are: no, mine, cookie, rice (he loveeessss rice), Mommy (also known as help, get me something, I'm tired, I'm hungry, I'm bored ect.). He says "ee-oh" now for "Edo" which is freakin adorable. He's a climber and climbing up everything he possibly can. He can use a spoon and a fork very well now, so there's a lot less mess for me to clean up at meal times! Small victories for mom, yesssss. I've tried introducing the little potty, but he just thinks it's the chair to get naked on and doesn't quite understand the point yet haha.

   He hates, hates, hates the doctors office. The only thing he likes about it is the giant fish tank in the waiting room. He hates sitting on the paper on the exam table, he hates sitting on the scale (no idea why?), he REALLY hates when the Dr checks his ears and obviously hates getting shots. The Dr was talking to him and he was just glaring at her and not answering her questions at his last visit. Their conversation went something like this. "Mitchell, do you know where your eyes are? (glares) Do you know where your belly is?(glaring still) Do you like to eat lots of food? (stop glaring for a second because he loves food and then remembered he was still really mad and glared again) Mitchell, are you going to talk to me today?" "NO!" Poor guy haha. 
  
I have friend here who has a little boy, who is month younger than Mitchell. He's really allergic to milk. I started looking up some non dairy things to cook so I could have them over for dinner. I then started doing some research on healthy diets in general. After reading and documentary watching, I've decided to try out a plant based only diet. Also known as vegan. Before you jump on the judge me wagon, do your own research. Do not come at me with the "humans are supposed to be carnivores" argument. It's bogus. I don't think I intend to cut out all meats and dairy forever, but I'm going to give it a shot for the health of myself and my family. I've been trying out vegan alternatives and they aren't that bad. In fact they're pretty tasty.

That's all that's new for now I think :)

ta ta friends xoxo