A BAT!!

We had a bit of commotion at our house today. I was laying on my bed after church reading a book. Alexis and Tori came up to talk to me, and then proceeded to go down the hall to go downstairs. As I was reading I could hear a slight hissing sound that I assumed was a wind up toy or something. Then I heard the girls saying, "What's that? and then, "Its a frog!!" Well that caught my attention! How could a frog be in the hallway?? I jumped out of bed and told Tori to go get dad. I peeked around my bedroom door not really knowing what I would find, or what might come leaping towards me. Towards the middle of the hall was something brown, which actually looked kind of like poop, lol. I reached over to turn on the light right about the time that Brandon go there. He quickly determined that it was not a frog, but a BAT!!! And a terrified one at that! As soon as we heard this, Alexis and I went screaming into my room and up on the bed. Tori and Levi went running downstairs, and Brandon went to get some gloves. A few minutes later he came back up and proceeded to pick it up. He called to me to come and take a picture. I wasn't about to go out there, but after he promised me that he had a good hold of it, I came out from under the covers where I was hiding and snapped a quick picture with my phone.

Brandon took the bat downstairs and let it free. We decided that it must have fallen from the attic fan, because it was laying directly underneath it. Brandon has been in California working for a friend this past week. I am so glad that he was home when this happened, because there is no way I would have gone near that bat! the kids have told us that they want to move, and that there is no way they will ever be able to sleep at night again. I have to say I agree!

Fashion Show

A few weeks ago, the kids decided to have a fashion show. It started out with them just trying on different outfits in the basement, but then they decided they wanted to set up a red carpet and model for the camera. They found all of the red blankets that they could and spread them out to make their red carpet. Then they called me in to be the photographer. They really got into their poses, lol. The first few pictures are when they were just playing around with dress up clothes and costumes.

Then, the real show began. Alexis was so serious with all of her poses!

Poor Jasper!

Tori was a little shy with her poses at first, but it didn't take her long to get right into it =)

Levi was hilarious to watch. His first two wardrobe changes consisted of just changing into a different shirt. This skeleton shirt that he is wearing is his current all time favorite. He would wear it every day if I let him, and believe me, he has tried.

Then he decided to get a little more daring......

This picture of Alexis and Tori cracks me up!

I am glad that I took the time to take pictures of the kids just being silly and having fun. I know I will love having these pictures in the future! haha

A Winner!

I wonder if I will ever be good at keeping my blog updated. I have so many pictures that I want to post so that I will have them for my blog book. I will try to get caught up, but since one huge post is way too daunting for me, I will just post little ones here and there =) I can't let this fun experience go undocumented! About a month ago, a friend of ours gave us free tickets to the Shrine Circus. We went last year and so we couldn't pass up the opportunity to go again. It is definitely not your Barnum and Baily, but the kids love it and always have so much fun. When you walk into the Circus there are clowns handing out programs to everyone. They are so big, more like a magazine or book, so I almost didn't let the kids get them, but they really wanted to so they did. Well at intermission they announced that 12 of the books had a special stamp in them, and then told us which pages to look on. Brandon and I started looking through all of our books with no luck. We didn't even notice that sweet Tori was diligently looking through hers too, until we heard her say, "Look! I found it!" We both looked over to her, and sure enough, she had one of the stamped programs!! We couldn't believe it! Her and Brandon ran down there to the front not really knowing what was going on. When they got down there they saw several bikes lined up in a row. The ring master guy said, "Pick a bike!" This first picture is so funny. When they told her to pick a bike, Brandon said, "To keep?" To which the ring master said "Yes!" and then Brandon paused before saying..."Forever?" Haha it was so funny! Since Tori was the first one down there she got to have first pick of the bikes. It was such an exciting moment! What makes it so much more special, is that this year when we got out the bikes to ride, it was obvious that Tori's was too small for her and that she needed a new one. She was such a good sport on our bike rides, but always fell behind because her bike was just too little and made it hard for her to pedal. We promised that we would get her a new bike as soon as we could, (knowing that it would not be for some time, because business had been so slow and we were barely getting by as it was) So for her to win this bike, to me, was a sweet tender mercy from Heavenly Father. I know I am always saying that, but I really feel like it was. I was feeling so bad about not being able to get her a new bike. A friend that was there with us, and I had tears in our eyes as we watched the excitement on Tori's face as she picked out a beautiful bike. She was smiling from ear to ear. It was such an awesome night =)

Here she is showing the stamps on her program =)

Tori has been having so much fun riding her bike since she got it. She is becoming such a good little rider and now when we got on our bike rides she's always in the lead =)