New Things

The past few weeks have been filled with cold-season sickness. Jake got a bad cold with a fever, sore throat, and cough. The cough has been lingering for two weeks now. Stevie and I briefly got the same thing but with pink eye. Fortunately ours only lasted a day or so.

Stevie is really into saying "HI" right now. The grocery store and everywhere else we go is filled with her saying "HI" very loudly to everyone she sees. And she really keeps saying it until that person responds. Funny... She is saying more and more words every day and really tries to repeat things that we say.

Jake's imagination has picked up recently. He has been making things out of his toys and coming up with things like a "spaceship" made of a tennis ball and two tops to Stevie's bottles. He has also started to imagine different animals living in our house like lions, bears, snakes, etc.

Friday night Jake and Steve went to The Bee Movie on a boys night out. Jake loved it and talked about Barry the Bee for quite a while after he got home. Stevie and I had a girls night out at the mall. Beware...holiday season has begun and the mall was sooooooo crowded.

Last night was won our curling game 6-2 (yeah) and then had a great dinner with Cortney and Chris Wessman. Cortney and I were roommates at Ricks College and at BYU. It was really great to see them.

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving! We are headed to Tennessee and we are all excited to spend time with the family there.

Friday Play Date

The Bergs came over on Friday, as well as the Dustmans. Carsten and Jake played with trains most of the time. But eventually got tired of Stella, Stevie and Anneclaire (mostly Stella and Stevie) pulling everything apart. Jake gets so frustrated when the train track comes apart or he gets stuck. But mostly I should feel lucky because he truly enjoys playing with them and spends countless hours arranging and rearranging the trains. His favorites right now are Gordon and the two dairy cargo trains that Nannie brought on her last visit. Carsten seems to enjoy trains just as much.

The boys saw the trampoline in the backyard and decided to brave the cold and go play outside. The trampoline play moved to the sandbox and they had a great time. Anneclaire was content to ride the little bus. Stevie stayed busy in the sandbox after she investigated the entire yard for dog poop and proceeded to pick it up and show me every piece she found. I least she has stopped eating it...

Fish Tank at Wal-Mart

I don't know why I didn't think of it before...but I have been using the fish tank at Wal-Mart as an incentive for the kids to be good while I shop. Before I figured that out, I had several incidents like...Jake throwing stuff out of the cart at people, Stevie finding every way to climb out of the cart, etc. Now when we go to Wal-Mart I prep the kids as we are walking in that they can see the fish when we are done shopping if they are good. It has been working. Yeah!

Old Navy Accident

The kids and I went to Old Navy on Thursday morning to get a few things. While we were there, Stevie stayed in the stroller and Jake was walking with me. I heard Jake say "I need to go potty Mommy." I told him to hold on while I hung up the pants I was looking at. As I turned around to take him to the potty, I saw a very disturbing thing. Jake had his pants down and was shooting a large stream through the aisles. I screamed and ran to him and pulled his pants up. He started crying as I put him in the stroller and gave him a lecture about where he should pee next time. I was mortified and looked around to see if anyone saw the accident. A miracle...no one witnessed it. I was madly wiping up the mess when a worker at Old Navy saw me and said, "Don't worry about that, we'll clean that up. What is it, milk?" I told her what happened as I turned red and she said, "It's okay, we've all been there." Sweet woman.

I will take blame for this one because I have let him pee outside all the time and just tell him, "If you need to go, just pull your pants down and go." I think he got confused about whether he was inside or out. Jake apologized for most of the day...so I hope he has it figured out now.

Johnny & June

Steve and I went to a Rock 'n Roll Halloween party at the Evans house last night as Johnny & June. It's been a while since I dressed up for Halloween. I wore a wig and Steve shaved his beard. He even serenaded me with a few songs throughout the night. We also saw Blondie, Joey Ramone, Ricky Bobby and Mrs. Ricky Bobby, Twisted Sister, Jerry Garcia, Jim Morrison, Britney Spears, and more.

Draper Girls Get Together

I spent a fun night with my sisters, sisters-in-law, Taylor, Mom, and Grandma Lee at the Draper household in Heber. Brady and Casey also decided to party with us for a while. It was fun to catch up, share funny stories, good ideas and food. We had fun teasing Carrie and reading family blogs as well. Grandma also taught us how to make divinity. It will really be a miracle if I can follow her example and make it myself.

And did you know that our angel of a Mother used to sneak out of the house in high school? She said that Grandpa knew about it, but Grandma didn't.

Saturday morning we were able to help Grandma do a few things around her house. She said "Thanks" and "Some worked hard and some didn't." We can always count on her to say the funniest things and we all got a good laugh about that. We drove to Salt Lake and had a tasty lunch and shopping at Gardner Village. The fun ended at Taipan Trading when we braved a crowded store and found some treasures.

Amy says our next stop is the St. George Parade of Homes in February. Will be fun!

Halloween Day

By the time the actual day of Halloween came, I was ready to be done with Halloween. Too many pre-parties :-) We went to a carnival in Heber the night before with the Johnsons and Grandma D. The kids had a blast and I was very tired by the end of the night from running after them. We visted Grandma Lee and did trick or treating at her house a little early. Jake and Stevie ate cookies with Grandma before we left.

We did go trick or treating around the neighborhood at night with the McClellands. The night was considerably warmer than the usual Halloween nights and with the change in Daylight Savings...we were able to get by with a little sunlight. Jake was somewhat interested in the treat thing and Stevie was content to sit in the stroller. We ended the event with a stop at the Evans house and the Dustman house. Stevie and Jake both tried to sleep in a dog bed at one point...so I knew they were tired and ready to be done.

Jake woke up on Thursday morning with a fever and a horrible cough so that explains why he was not all that interested in running around getting treats. After a few days...he is feeling better.