celebrating baby

today was my sister's baby shower

my dad made the crib - it's awesome and makes me wish i was having another
4 kids and could ask for one - ha ha!!! just kidding :)
emily picked it out from land of nod and my dad replicated it - wow!

my mom is very much into the small details (ya, that's where olivia gets it)
the cake matched the dessert napkins - which i forgot to get a picture of
but you can see how cute the larger napkins were
(my mom was worried that her church ladies would be offended by the napkins...ha ha)

my mom, emily & i are known for copying each other
today was no exception
as you can see the wrap top/large necklace look was very much in
but emily & i took it one step further...

yes, we both wore a faux wrap dress, lace cami and tall boots!

...
emily is about 3 weeks out from her due date,
so i should be posting little baby white pics soon!

and for the record, i think it's a boy.
...

and now that sarah has given me the crash course in picasa collages i'll post some christmas pictures... one of these days :)

6 yr old logic

last night olivia & i were making a diaper cake for my sister's baby shower this weekend. it was pretty funny b/c the whole concept perplexed olivia. finally i realized she thought people were going to eat the cake. ha ha.

anyhow while making it, we had the following conversation...

olivia: why do we have to do allllll this stuff for emily?

me: because that's what you do when your sister is having a baby. maybe someday josie will give you a baby shower.

olivia: NO. i'm not having any kids!!!

me: why?

olivia: oh man. kids are just so much work. they just junk up your house with all their toys, they leave their clothes everywhere, they make forts with your chairs and blankets. kids are just too much work. i just don't want to be that busy!!! oh and at night you can't watch any parent movies because they keep coming downstairs.

me: kids aren't all that bad. think about fun it is to cuddle little josie and how much you love her smile.

olivia: well, i'll just cuddle my neices and nephews. i don't need my own kids. plus it will give me more time to shop online.

me: what do you need to shop for?

olivia: lamps

and that is how my 6 yr old's brain works :)

a quick hello :)

man, i haven't blogged in forever!

we got back last night around midnight from minnesota

i have lots to unpack!

i have 2 sick kids who are going to the doctor today

i'll be back soon with some stories & pictures (we got a new camera!!! now we just need a new exernal hard drive so i can download the pictures.)

but i'll leave you with one lesson learned from my travels...
you know a pot hole is bad when it wakes sleeping children.

we learned that lesson several times on hwy 94 :)

we're very happy that we won't be driving back to minnesota until next fall :)

oh and if i could figure out a way to get groceries delivered today that would be swell...i think i've forgotten how to take care of 4 kids all by myself!!! everyone here is either naked, half dressed, still in pjs...and all are in need of breakfast/snack/drink...

you know there's a lot of snow when...

you see someone x-country skiing down the street.

wordless wednesday

click on the picture to see why i've recently been saying "ouch" when josie falls asleep while nursing...

salty

as you can see from her face, the green beans had been eaten

the boys were still playing in the playland

josie was getting restless

clearly it was time for josie to try her first mcdonald's french fry!

'tis the season, part II

'tis the season for holiday baking with the kids :)

and 'tis the season for ryan to be...well, just ryan

a charlie brown christmas & polka dots

~ with kindergarteners, 1st graders & 2nd graders ~

our little tree

a little pre-show fun

doesn't her dress look christmas-y?
ha ha
it's a long story that involves a tired girl, tears & lots of drama
the phrase "my friends are going to laugh at me" was heard several times
man, and this is just at age 6!!!

of course she'll smile for grampie & grammie!!

repressed anger

garrett says the most random things. it must make sense in his head, but to the rest of the world it's odd.

take this morning, for example...

this past june we went to disney world. there's a fairly new monsters inc. show in the magic kingdom. basically you go in and sit down and they tell a bunch of jokes and use the audience. it's not the most exciting show ever, but it's a nice cool spot to take a break.

so, when we were there, they used olivia and put her face up on the big screen. she had to answer a few questions. that was the end of it. it was 6 whole months ago.

so today we're in the car listening to christmas music and talking about stopping at mcdonalds for lunch. just a regular old day in the car.

out of the blue, in a very upset & serious voice garrett says "mom, i'm soooo mad! next time we go to monsters inc i'm using the microphone, NOT olivia!!"

that's garrett. totally random. i can only imagine the repressed memories he'll come up with for his therapist in 20 years. and until then, we'll keep laughing at him and wondering what goes on in his little head :)


i should add that as soon as he said that ryan started saying "monsters? monsters?" ...to which garrett replied "be quiet ryan, i'm taking a nap."

the only solution...

the other day i asked ryan if he was going to be so crazy when he went to pre-school next year.

his answer: yup!

then olivia said very matter of factly, "well mom, i think you'll have to homeschool him then."