Excavating!

Since we were cooped up in the house all week, I let the kids do their dinosaur excavation kits or as Aussie says, "Dinosaur pound site".

I really wanted to wait and do this activity outside, but it just seemed like the right thing to do yesterday. So I cleared the Kitchen and let them go to work. This is a really cool kit and HEY guess what? You could buy it from me if you're interested! (click here for more details)

So after you excavate it, you put the bones together. This kit is the T-Rex and the kids have already begged for me to get another dinosaur. So maybe in the Summer I'll get them a different one. That way we can do it OUTSIDE! And I won't have

um.... footprints on my table?

Good night and update

I'm not really up this late...I mean I didn't really STAY up this late. I fell asleep on the couch and now I've come upstairs to shut down the pc.

But first wanted to give an update.

We all have a lingering cough, but we are doing great!

I had CABIN FEVER bad bad bad today.

I almost begged to get out of the house and then realized that it was ME who was the sickest yesterday, so I thought I better suck it up and stay in for the allotted 24 hours after a fever.

But tomorrow....Baby we are SO OUT OF HERE!

I did decide since we couldn't go anywhere, that i would let the kids do their dinosaur excavation kits. I took pictures, but I'll have to upload/download the pictures tomorrow.

Goodnight!!

sickies

Ay Ay Ay!

I don't believe I have ever had this happen.

Our family is SICK!
Friday we took the kids to the doctor. STREP! UGH!
So me and the kids got on so antibiotics.
We started getting better, but then Tuesday night we took a turn for the worse.
Mason woke up with a very scary cough and having a hard time breathing.
Back to the doctor's office on Wednesday.
Diagnosis: the flu DOUBLE UGH!
All of us including hubby has the flu.
So as we were there...
they told us about a doctor, one of his staff members and a receptionist were all sent home
on FRIDAY because of the flu.
Hmmmmmm.....We have not been anywhere after being diagnosed with strep. So where do you think we picked up the flu?

Greg was really bad yesterday. Today is my day I guess. I'm tired, but really tired of being in my bed!

Snowflake layout and sickness

Hello out there!

This is the layout I did today. The paper with the bird on it is actually from a gift bag. And let me just tell you I LOVE Un-du for scrapbookers! I heard they pulled it from the shelves. Is that true?

Greg is sick today. If you read this please say a little prayer for him. He can't sleep and he went to bed around 7:30.

Homeschooling: I love to hear the kids read. All of them are doing well. Mason is excellent with math. He just whips through it with little or no instruction and he does it all in his head. The boys are really fast with their work (when they want to be). It really bothers Ashley that they get done so much faster than her. I'm not quite sure how to handle it. Ashley just cried and cried today because I made her finish her work. I even let her sit on my lap. When she was finished she went upstairs and took a nap. (EXTREMELY RARE) I guess she is still not feeling well. Did I tell you our family has Strep? We've been on antibiotics for 5 days. She had it the worst though.

Scrapbooking Marathon

I had such an awesome time scrapbooking on Saturday. We played several games, 4 round robins and a game I don't know the name of. This first layout was a round robin layout. There were 5 people in our group and we each took 5 minutes on each layout. When the timer went off we passed the layout to the left. This one I changed a bit when I got home. I needed to move some things around so that I could put my journaling on there. Then I took off a yellow button. Now if someone else would have added yellow it might have worked, but they didn't so I took it off. I was going to replace it with a white button, but Mason said, "look...It looks like a mouse." So I took that and ran with it. I added the whiskers and tail. This layout I scraplifted from one of my scrapbooking magazines. Unfortunately, I did not write down who did it, to give her credit. But I just love how it turned out!!

This is just a fun layout I did using my USERNAME. I haven't done that before, so I thought I would on this layout.
I found a white pen I just love. So this layout is basically of experimenting with the pen.
This was another round robin and I simply adore this layout! There were 8 of us in this round and each person again took 5 minutes. I got the date wrong on my journaling so I will have to go back and change that.
This is the layout I did with the fun game I don't know what it is called. We got a picture, an adhesive, scissors and a pen. Then someone else picked out 5 things from my stuff that I had to use to make the layout. The 5 things picked out: 1. black paper 2. blue/white lace paper 3. black letters 4. ribbon 5. a pack of fancy black embellishments. Then we were allowed to pick out 1 item to use. I picked out the journaling box. We had 30 minutes to complete the layout. For those of you who are NOT scrapbookers that is not really a long time. I just love how it turned out. The word charmer was blending in too much, so I used the transparency from what the ribbon was wrapped around to make it have a little depth. I also used a little piece of packaging from one of the things i had and put it on the bottom, it says Remember When.

This layout was another round robin and there were 9 of us. This was so much fun!
Again this was another round robin with 9 people.

This last layout is of Aussie and Uncle John. I was SO surprised to actually find paper that would go with this bright red Chuck E. Cheese picture and other picture of Aussie. I think it turned out pretty cute.

So that's it. Thanks for looking!

First Snow this Season!

Can you see these gorgeous BIG white snowflakes? The snow is so pretty!

The weather people say it should snow all night long. I'm hoping that the ground will be covered in the morning. I told the kids if it is, we should get out there first thing in the morning to play in it, because by the afternoon it will probably be all melted.

It wasn't really cold until you stood out in it for several minutes. So I was casually taking pictures thinking that it really wasn't that cold. Then all of a sudden, I was freezing. I feel bad that I neglected to zip up the kids coats. But to my defense, I literally parked 5 feet from the door and our intentions were to run to the car and get in. I'm writing my apology publicly b/c I know I'm going to hear it from hubby!

2 more layouts

Here are 2 more layouts for the Get A Load challenge. I thought I would try to use up some of my stash.

This next one? Well I'm entitled to an easy one every now and then. :) Sorry the picture is blurry, my camera's batteries were dying and it was acting up.

Precious Aussie

Ok so an update...

Saturday I took the kids to the indoor playground. Aussie met a girl there named Madeline. He was smitten. He asked me for a piece of paper. I gave him one and he wrote his phone number really big on it and tried to give it to the little girl. She played hard to get and wouldn't take the paper, so Austin gave it to her mom. It was so cute! But I couldn't help think how his heart is going to be broken when she doesn't call. (The Mom gave me the paper back when he wasn't looking.) ~Wow starting young!!!

Aussie has been so polite and sweet recently! He has been telling me, I'm the best Mom in the whole wide world etc. Then he would turn to Greg and say, "I like saying things that will build people up!"

Last night we got to see Dirty Rotten Scoundrels the musical. It was good. Not as good as the movie, but I enjoyed it. Before we left...Aussie said, "I don't know why we need a babysitter". I said, "Well why not?" And he said, "because we already have the best Mom!"

Oh I forgot to say in the previous post that I scraplifted the cat page from Scrapdolly on the Get a Load of This challenge.

layouts

I missed Sunday's layout. So here is Friday, Saturday and today's.

LOST

Hopefully I'll have some time later today to really blog a bit. I have been busy busy busy!
Greg and I have decided to watch Lost. Season 4 starts on January 31. I don't think we will be able to get caught up by then. We have been staying up late at the end of our busy days and watching anywhere between 1 and 3 episodes. I don't think we are even 1/2 way through the 1st season. We did 2 nights in a row to 2AM. I don't think I can handle that anymore. It makes me so tired the next day.

Anyway, I need to start school. I just thought I would pop in real quick to give you a short update.

Ha Ha missed me!

Well the layout was a quickie tonight. I must have done it in 10 minutes, but looked at it for an hour trying to figure out what else to do with it.

Ashley didn't want me to take her picture so she kept closing her eyes. I thought if I took enough pictures I might capture her with her eyes open. She is so silly.

I plan to do some layouts of the boys-eventually.

Ashley's Prayer layout

Well here is today's layout:

I'm happy with it. I used one of those scrapbook recorders and captured Ashley saying her prayer. She says it in her sweet high pitched voice.

Ok so now for a question: When writing Ashley's word I'ma. How should I write it? It's pronouced I'm uh. So should I write 1. I'ma 2. Im'a 3. Ima 4. I'm uh?

Thanks for looking!

Rocket Shoes layout

If you look close you can see Aussie has his pants on backwards. That seems to be a common thing around here.

Dentist

Picture #5

We went to the dentist today. The boys did excellent. But this little girl-even though she appears to be great right before the cleaning- had a meltdown! By the end of the appointment I was sitting in the chair holding her down while the 2nd hygienist tried to give her a fluoride treatment and while the 2nd dentist tried to look in her mouth. I tried bribery, I tried threatening a spanking...she was horrendous!!!!! And it looks like she has 2 cavities, so I have to find a pediatric dentist who can take care of her.

Today she had to dress up like Harue (It's probably spelled differently in Japanese). She has been watching a movie called the Cat Returns. So she was a little distraught that the shirt we had was long sleeves instead of short sleeves, but Aussie and I think I did a good job finding an outfit similar to what Harue was wearing. I really wanted to get a picture but my camera batteries died. So immediately when we got home I tried to take a picture, but she didn't want her picture taken so she had those clothes off in no time. Can we say B.R.A.T?

UGH!

Truth layout

I just loved this paper and HAD to buy it and use it! I'm afraid that it overpowers the picture though.

The journaling reads: I asked Ashley what she was thinking in this picture. Her favorite new word "EMBARASS!" came out. After a few hours she reluctantly told me what she thought of the picture. So here it is in her own words:

~ how pretty she dances

~Her eyes twinkle

~She has a pretty dress

~Her necklace is pretty.

~ Her long hair is really pretty

~ And her hair is so long.

~She has a pretty ribbon

~She has some gloves that make her so pretty.

~She has a piggytail in her hair.

I think she knows how beautiful she is!

It's all about Daddy!

They picked a small booth in which to sit. And they all had to sit by Daddy. {boo hoo}

two layouts

Even though I picked out the papers, etc., I just didn't get a layout done yesterday. I was just too tired!!! So I finished up two today.

Out of the mouth of babes!

Last night Ashley and I were talking before she went to bed. She wanted to die so that she could see God. Then she wanted to know what Heaven was like. She said maybe we can call mee-maw and ask her. I tried to explain that we couldn't call someone who had died. She said, "Well we won't know unless we try!"

Then this morning, Austin was talking to Greg. He was being very serious and sincere and he said, "Dad, I'm sorry that Mee-maw was terminated."

...Out of the mouth of babes!

Greg proves he can still do it.

Project 100- Day 3

Titled: Left Turn

What do you do when you've had a busy day and haven't taken any pictures? Well you get out the camera while your driving.

Riding ponies layout

I'm attempting to do a layout a day in January. I won't cry if it doesn't work out.

Project 100- Day 2

We went to Target today. You can't beat $1 for a bag of popcorn and a drink!

A couple of layouts

Project 100- Day1

My friend over at 3 peas-project 365 has just completed a year of taking pictures every single day and posting a picture a day. Her photographs are amazing! So she has decided this year to make it a project 100, which makes this much easier. So I plan to join her. Would you like to join us in a project 100?

Since I don't have the top quality cameras and such, mine will be more for memories than photographic talent. (That's my disclaimer.)

Here is my first contribution:

How Great is Our God!

Sunday was such a wonderful, worshipful day. It was family day, which means no classes for the kiddos. They came into BIG church with us. We came in a little late, so we ended up sitting on the front row. The kids were really good! I was so proud of them.

(Several people commented on them being good too!)

But it was a very special time. When we were singing I looked over and Mason was trying to follow along with the words, and Aussie was looking right at me trying to sing the same words I was singing. I was so excited to see him sing! (He is sporting a new sweater to look like Uncle John.)

Then we sang the song "How Great is Our God". I was holding Ashley and she was singing at the top of her lungs and she was doing the sign language to it, that they had learned in class. So I did the sign language too and just cried because it was so BEAUTIFUL!! I had someone comment on that too. They said they wish they had a video camera then.

Wow it is SO amazing to watch children worship, especially your own!

Then we came home and Ashley turned into Anya the dancing fairy. This costume and the outfit she wore to church today were hand me downs from another triplet family. :)

Unfortunately, she refused to dance for us on video.