How could you not love this face?

Halloween

The other night we decorated our pumpkins. I love these Mr. Potoato-Head type pumpkin faces. They make decorating pumpkins so much more fun and kid-friendly.

Here is Tommy with his alien. He did another face on the backside and will turn his pumpkin around every morning. Variety is the spice of life, right?

Hannah with hers. She wanted the bow tie and hat. What can I say, the girl loves her accessories!

Jake even got one of his own.

Here is Hannah just before our church's annual trunk or treat. Unfortunately a cold front blew in that morning and froze our little buns off. Usually we're in short sleeves passing out candy on our neighbor's driveway on Halloween night. Here's hoping we get our perfect "fall" weather back before the "real" Halloween!

Hannah wanted to be a ghost for one party and Aurora (Sleeping Beauty for all of you who don't speak fluent princess) for her preschool party this morning.

California '09

Over fall break, we decided to get outta town. It kind of made up for being able to do absolutely NOTHING during the summer. We headed over to California to meet up with some of Tim's family and enjoy great company, Disneyland, and the San Diego Zoo.

Here is the crew that made it for the final night at Disneyland. Boy it was crowded. I think all of AZ came for fall break and all of UT came for the BYU San Diego football game. Luckily there was good company to wait for rides with.

As you can see, the cousins LOVED spending time with each other. After we come back from most vacations, Tommy is so distraught and does NOT want to be home. Too bad we don't live closer.

Poor Tommy got sick during the trip. He had an ear infection and was pretty miserable for a few days. He and I got to spend more time than we wanted inside of the hotel room.

He lost one of his teeth on the drive to California and is showing his "Jack-o-lantern" smile just in time for Halloween.

Thanks to Nana Jane and Papa, the girls got to go to the Princess Breakfast. Hannah is in LOVE with Aurora and although her face isn't showing it, she was so delighted when Aurora came out and when she signed her paper for her. She says that when she has her princess dress on she's Aurora, and when she doesn't she's just Hannah.

Tim and Hannah got to meet up with Tim's grandparents. Unfortunately that was one of the days Tommy was feeling miserable, so he, Jake, and I didn't get to visit with them. We were really bummed we didn't get to see them.

We made a trip to the San Diego Zoo and were amazed at how well you could see the animals and how many animals were there. It really was pretty neat. Here is Hannah following Daddy and Jake up one of the many hills.

And us chillin' in the polar bear cave.

There were peacocks just wandering around, and one came right next to us.

And I just loved this picture of Abby staring down the albino python.

Hopefully next vacation we won't be so weaksauce, but we are glad we went and saw family and did some fun things!

More Random

Okay, so I've totally been off the radar lately. I guess having a baby will do that to you. We have been up to some fun things lately though. Tommy and Tim went to a Diamondbacks game.

Here's the obligatory "baby in the bath" picture. It only took three and a half months to take. Jake does love his baths. Here he is giving me a raspberry.

Tommy just loves his little brother. Tommy is already excited to play catch with him.

Today at school Tommy read Dr. Seuss' Bartholomew and the Ooblek. They made ooblek at school and as his teacher brought him to the car I heard her give Tommy an assignment to find out more about ooblek. So when we got home we made the goo and talked about how it acted. Tommy (you know how he loves anything science) played with the ooblek for probably half an hour or more. Ooo Ooo Ooblek.

Misc.

Jake is 11 weeks today and he is changing so fast! I love how he is growing. He gets cuter and more fun every day.

And here is Hannah, just a sweet, big sister.

Ratatouille

Good luck Chef Lizzy! We hope you enjoy being Remy and that you make us lots of treats.

Birthday and Back to School

Hannah had a great birthday and got the princess bike and princess helmet she's been asking for. This little girl loves everything pink princess and when she saw her "princess" cake she said "Oh! That's so pretty! I love it!" Needless to say, that made me feel pretty awesome.

In other big news, Tommy went back to school this week. Our days have been much quieter but still busy. Tommy has come home happy every day so far. Here he is ready to go.

Hannah's pretty excited for T's first day too!

Lining up and ready to start!!!

Jake's Blessing

Basketball Anyone?

Tommy convinced Hannah to dress up in one of his old uniforms and play basketball with him.

Hannah still found a way to accessorize with a pink necklace as Tommy sports his unique sense of style.  Nice socks, dude!

Lookin' good.

Enough b-ball.  I'm going for a drive.

Summertime

Well, the summer as we know it is soon to be over.  Not that it's getting cooler by any means, but school will be starting in just two short weeks.  Unfortunately this summer has been fairly lame-o.  There's only so much you can do with a newborn in tow.  However, aside from way too much tv, we were able to get the customary swimming lessons in, visits from cousins, a trip to the art museum, and Tommy even made a quick trip to Seattle.  And on these hot summer nights, the kids even got homemade popsicles in their pj's (okay, frozen kool-aid hardly counts as homemade, but I'll take my props where I can).

I just love these sweet faces!  Thankfully Jake has been a little happier lately and we have been able to enjoy more of his smiles.  The kids want to smother him with their love any chance they get, but luckily they know not to mess with a sleeping baby.  However, that means that the minute he wakes up, he has two faces right up in his grill.

Here are my boys!

Just Experimenting

I'm trying to figure out how to make my pictures bigger on here and wanted to see how it worked.

Clean Sweep

Have you ever seen the show Clean Sweep?  You know, the one where they take a cluttered space, clean it up, and redo it?  Well, Tommy's room was in desperate need of a clean sweep.  

Since Jake has been born, I have been in survival mode.  I am not known for having good, easy babies, so Jake has understandably been taking up a lot of my time and energy.  Because of this, I have had to let some things "go."  Well, one of the things to go was my enforcement of Tommy picking up his room.  After 5 and a half weeks, this was the result:

Closet.

This is the view from the doorway.  When I went to check on him at night, I would see this and often opt not to enter his room to tuck him in and give him his customary kiss on the head.

The Corner:  When I would tell Tommy to pick up his room, his solution was to throw all of his toys up in this corner.

Honestly, I'm a little embarrassed posting these pictures.  The rest of my house doesn't look like that---really!

This weekend my boys went to Seattle to be with Tim's family because his parents just came home from their mission.  Yay!  I took this opportunity to get this room cleaned up.  it took 3 days (remember, I'm working with a 2 year old and a newborn here!), but I got it done!

I got rid of an almost full black garbage bag of trash filled with old broken toys and "collections" of paper, wood, etc.  I also got about half a bag of things to donate to Goodwill.  I raised his bed and put more storage under it.  And finally, I got new shelving to keep his toys organized.  Here is the after:

Closet with new shelving.

Ahhh . . . isn't this so much better?

See the corner in the back?  Is it the same one as before?

Now we just need to make it stay this way and I will be able to tuck him in without worrying about tripping over something!

Baby Blue

Jakers is growing bigger and bigger every day.  I can't believe its been over three weeks already!