If only all of our wishes could be this simple....

I bought a huge box of Fruit by the Foots at Costco today. Tori was very excited to have one when we got home:

Tori: " I really want a purple and red one" (you can't tell what color it is going to be by the wrapper)

She then went and got one and unwrapped it

Tori: "A purple and red one! It's like a wish come true!"

This was too cute not to post. =)

Lost No More!

My camera has finally been found. You will never guess where it was. Are you ready for this....Brandon's car! He just called me and told me that he found it under his seat. He actually thought that I planted it there for him to find to prove that he had it! haha! I am sure some of you remember a previous post concerning the matter. But I won't go into that. I am just glad it is found, and just in time for our family reunion next week. Woohoo!!

Sunburn

I mentioned in my post from earlier that we went to the sprinkler park today. It is always a big ordeal going anywhere with kids, and especially when you are going to go swimming (or running through the sprinklers). There are so many things to remember to bring. Towels, swim diapers, swim toys, lunch, ect. As we were waiting for my sister to come over so we could drive there I decided to put sunscreen on the kids so I wouldn't have to do it when we got there. I called the kids over one by one., and generously put it on each of them. It was very hot there, so I was really glad that I had smothered my kids in SPF 50 sunscreen and would not have to worry about them getting sunburned. When we got home we went about the day. My girls kept their swimming suits on, and as I looked at Alexis I noticed that her back looked really red. She had gotten burnt on the fourth if July, so I thought that it was left over from that. Upon further investigation, I realized it was a brand new sunburn, and a bad one. But how could this be I thought. I put tons and tons of sunscreen on them before we left. My mind then began re-playing putting it on each of the kids. I remember calling Alexis over, but not actually putting it on her! She has this new thing latley whenever I ask her to do anything she always says right away, "one minute mom". This must have been the case when I called her over, and then I must have gotten distracted and totally forgotten. I didn't put any sunscreen on her on this hot hot day! I quickly got the aloe vera and began smearing it all over her back, all the while saying, "I am the worst mom ever! I can't believe I did that". Later on I was getting after her for something she had done, which I can't remember at the moment. She interrupted me and said, "Mom...remember the sunburn?" Talk about bringing up the guilt again! I quickly said, "oh honey I am so sorry, go have some marshmallows. I have a feeling she will be using this against me for a while.

Baby Kittens

Three weeks ago our cat, (Sarah),had kittens. We knew that there was a chance that she would end up pregnant since we had a boy and a girl cat. We did end up getting the boy (Ash) neutered. But obviously not soon enough. It actually has been a pretty fun experience for our family. I knew the day was going to come soon, and I didn't know what to expect, so when all of a sudden she was obviously not pregnant anymore a little bit of panic set in. We noticed that Sarah kept jumping up into our hall closet. Brandon started digging around and sure enough, there were 4 baby kittens back there! They were sooo tiny. I took tons of pictures, but they are on my missing camera. Since then they have grown so big, and we finally are able to hold them more. Last night I took a bunch of pictures of them. This little blonde one is our favorite: I can't believe how small they are. If only they would stay this small!


This afternoon I walked into the girl's room and found this:

The kids decided to make a house for the baby kittens. I lifted up one of the blankets and saw this.
They set up their pony castle and put their umbrellas around it, and then covered it with blankets. We will have the kittens for another 5 weeks, and then they will be going to new homes. (Although Brandon and the kids are trying very hard to talk me into keep the little blond one, because "Levi needs his own kitten") Why do they have to be so dang cute!
On a side note, today we went to the coolest park. We call it the sprinkler park. IT is off of Belleview and Windemere. The kids had so much fun, and are already talking about going back. I got out the camera at the beginning to take some pictures. All of the kids were running around so much that this is the only good shot I got.
It's been fun to try out a bunch of new fun places to bring the kids. Levi crashed when we got home. I found him sleeping like this in the doorway of the girls room. He set up this little bed all by himself.

Ladybugs!

A few friends of mine from church and I decided to plan weekly themes with our kids and give each other different ideas for little lessons and activities to do to go along with that theme. The first theme that we picked was "Bugs" It has been fun to learn about different bugs and do different activities and crafts about different kids of bugs. Today we decided to all get together and do some fun ladybug activities. I was watching Mason so it was fun to have him join us! The first thing the kids did was paint rocks to look like ladybugs. They painted them red and then dipped q-tips in black paint to make the spots.

Then they painted sugar cookies to look like ladybugs. They frosted them with red frosting and then added chocolate chips for the spots. Here is Levi frosting him. He had a bit of a meltdown at the beginning, because he thought the frosting looked pink, and he doesn't like pink things. (Brandon has him trained well). He finally came to terms with it, and then enjoyed making his cookie, and more importantly eating it!
Here are some pictures of the other little girls that were there. They all had so much fun playing together.


There were 14 kids total, and it got a little crazy, but the kids all had a blast. It's always fun to get out and do fun things with other mom's. It helps me keep my sanity!

4th of July Weekend

My camera is officially missing. Brandon promises he didn't take it. The last time I had it was three weeks ago when I took pictures of the baby kittens that our cat had. (They are so cute by the way, and I was planning on posting about it, but the pictures are on the missing camera!) I was really sad this past weekend thinking about all of the cute 4th of July pictures that I would miss taking. Then I remembered that I forgot to give my sister, Cindy's, camera back that she loaned me. I was glad to be able to take a few pictures of the end of the day. Our 4th of July celebration started on the 3rd, with the "Red, White and You" celebration at Clement Park. We have gone the past few years, and have always had fun. This year we met Kristalyn and David there around 6 pm. We all got wings from Buffalo Wild Wings, and then had a little picnic. Then we just hung out for the next few hours. They had a bunch of bouncy houses, and huge slides for the kids to go on. I remember a few years ago having to climb up the big slide with Alexis. It was so hard, and I was anticipating having to help Levi this year. After waiting in a huge line with Kristalyn, Mason, and my three kids we finally got to the front. Levi hoped right up there and climbed all the way to the top all by himself. I was very proud (and relieved). After that Brandon and I took the kids and walked up Rebel Hill. It was neat to stand on the top and see the hundreds of people that were there. We could also see the Columbine Memorial from there. Brandon has never been to see it yet, so we took the kids down and walked through it. It is always emotional to go and read all the quotes and tributes. It always gives me a feeling of great sadness, but peace at the same time. I was glad to be able to go there with Brandon. He was very touched by the things that he read. After we were done there we went back to relax and wait a little bit longer for the fire works. My mom and Dad and Katie and Michael joined us. Around 9:30 the fireworks show started. It was a pretty good show. It could have been longer, but it still was really fun to watch. After it was over Alexis said, "We waited 6 hours for that?!" We got a good laugh out of that. We didn't wait 6 hours, but I guess it felt like that to her. The next day we decided to take the kids to Pirates Cove. We got kind of a late start in the day and didn't get there until after 12. We invited Katie and Michael to go with us. It was so crowded when we got there and we could hardly find a place to sit. We finally found a little patch of grass. Even though it was really crowded we still had fun. We are looking forward to going back in a few weeks to my parents ward activity there. Now onto the few pictures I did get. After we got home we went over to my parents house for a barbecue. My mom made tons on yummy food!
When it started to get dark we headed outside to do some fireworks. Here are the kids waiting to get started.

We did sparklers first. Levi and Tori were both a little hesitant, but they both ended up holding a couple. The next few pictures are kind of blurry from all of the smoke.

We took the kids to pick out the fireworks before we went to my parents house. They picked out a bunch of little ones including little teapots, frogs, and tanks. They weren't too exciting to watch, but it was fun to watch them each get excited when we were setting off one that they picked out. Tori made me go and get the tea pot for her after it was cooled down so she could take it home and play with it. She slept with it under her pillow that night. It was a nice relaxing fourth of July. The next day, Brandon's brother, Jeremy, and his family invited Alexis to go to Water world with their family. She had an absolute blast with her cousin Tallyn. We promised Tori that we would take her somewhere fun, since she was kind of sad that she didn't get to go. I have been wanting to check out this place called, My Art Work Shop, so we decided to head there and see what it was all about. It was the neatest place! I highly recommend it. They have all sorts of different crafts to choose from. You can pick wood to paint, pottery to paint, sand art, tie die, and so much more. The best part is the area they have there called "My Preschool Workshop" You pay eight dollars and your kids have unlimited access to everything in there for as long as they want. They had about a dozen age appropriate crafts that you can choose from, play dough, paint, glitter, and everything imaginable. Tori absolutely loves making crafts, so she was on cloud nine. She kept on saying, "I am going to make tons of stuff" and that she did. Levi loved it too. Here are some pictures.
You can see all of the paint on the walls in the back round. They pretty much let the kids do whatever they want there. The owners are so nice.
Not the best picture of Tori, lol. She looked so cute in her little apron.

I think Brandon and I had about as much fun as Tori and Levi. We actually ended up buying a year membership to the preschool workshop, so now we can bring the kids back whenever we want. They also have a story time there every week. What a fun place! I only wish we had discovered it sooner! So that's how our weekend went. I really hope to find my camera soon, but until then I will use my sister's (thanks Cindy!).

Just for the Record...

.....I planned on spending the next hour updating my blog, but when I went to get my camera to upload pictures it was no where to be found. Brandon has been sneaking it with him to work to use to take pictures of roofs he is bidding. I assume that is the case now, and since he is on a scout camp out right now, I can't ask him. Life has been very busy around here with me starting the child care. It's definitely been a learning experience. I just wanted to let certain people, who have been asking for a new post, know that I tried! =)