preschool halloween fun

cullans preschool had a halloween party with trunk or treating. it was a lot of fun. they had all kind of fun games for the kids to play. cullan had a blast. my impromptu trunk or treat. i decided to decorate at the last minute..pretty obvious i am sure.here come the trunk or treaters!can you spy cullan? he is the fireman.fire fighter cullansome of the kids from cullans class. cullan did not want to stand over there. there are actually only eight kids in his class but all of the kids came from m-w-f also.pin the face on the pumpkin.playing pass the pumpkin!decorating cookies.
cullans was full of stuff. he had so much fun. i am glad we got to spend some time together and enjoy all the halloween activities they had.

trunk or treat!

last night was our church's trunk or treat. we had such a good time. there was an ugly tie contest for the men, costume contest for the ladies, and trunk or treating of course. everyone was dancing and having a blast. these are some of my favorite costumes from the night.

chris b. (garran made that head thing.)

cullan with his wild eyes on being a fire fighter.

miss b as her cute witch self.

miss haley...she is so cute.

such a cute Hannah Montana

more cute kiddos!

i love his cheeks.

miss lucy..she is adorable.

briea with daddy!

last but not least..Jaren!

costumes

here are our Halloween trick or treaters.
after multiple costume changes and some very long discussions...


our fire fighter..half ready

our clown

our little witchy woman

then for the group shots...

my kiddos acting like they have never seen a camera before...

getting antsy..they really wanted to leave.

good enough for me ...2 out of the 3!
we are have to have some halloween fun!!

pumpkins

here are our family pumpkins for this year!!
happy halloween!!

pulling up

look who is pulling up..she has been for a few days. this is just the first chance i have had to catch it on camera!! she can step all the way around. it won't be long until she is taking steps. I am not sure i am ready. i need her to stay little just a little longer!

A Halloween Laugh!

Try JibJab Sendables® eCards today!

sweet

three things i love.
my sweet baby girl. first time pony tails. candy corn.
could it get any sweeter than this?


thanks for the outfit grandma moe!
we love it!

halloween mom school

today was mom school. it was my turn to teach. i read a few books about Halloween and then went on a Halloween Hunt for a lost Happy witch. can you guess what my letter was? you guessed it H!! how perfect to get it the week of halloween.

anyways, the kids all wore their costumes. they were so cute. here is kael as a clown, carley as snow white, and tui the ghost.

kael says that carley is "his girl". so cute.eli the lion, addy the dalmatian, neldon the elephant!
of course we had the tag along cuties that came too. the little brothers and sisters of these guys came dressed up. ammon is his halloween gear, breia the princess and josh the lion.
(i hate the lighting in the gym. it always makes the pictures look yuck!)
the kids had a lot of fun, running around after the lesson and playing. for snacks we had halloween hands filled with popcorn and candy corn!!here a couple group shots of all the kids. i love the bottom one. eli is so cute!!

time out

is this considered time out?
i don't think so.

advice

surprisingly i have had a few conversations with a few different friends lately about life's struggles. i was reading a friend of a friends blog and came across this. i thought it was great! exactly what ya need to hear sometimes.

"When Things Go Wrong"

When things go wrong as they sometimes will,
When the road you are trudging seems all uphill,
When the funds are low and the debts are high,
And you want to smile, but you have to sigh,

When care is pressing you down a bit,
Rest, if you must, but do not quit.
Life is strange with its twists and turns,
As everyone of us sometimes learns,
And many a failure turns about,
When he might have won, had he stuck it out.

Don't give up, though the pace seems slow -
You may succeed with another blow.
Success is failure turned inside out,
The silver tint of the clouds of doubt.

And you never can tell how close you are,
It may be near when it seems so far.
So stick to the fight when you're hardest hit -
It's when things seem worst that you must not quit.

anon

stick with your gut

today garran was working in the studio. the kids and i decided to meet him for lunch, due to the fact that he was going to be there most of the day. when we met up with garran we were discussing when and where and how to eat. by how i mean should we go in to a place and sit down or just drive thru and figure something out. garran suggested that going in might not be the best idea but then we both decided on a place that is attached to a local grocery store and so our only option was to go in.
i decided i would order if garran would take the kids and go sit at the table. on their way to the table i hear garran say "NO NO NO". he was pushing briea in the stroller, only to turn around and see that cullan had helped himself to an apple from the grocery store. arrggg. this should have been our first warning sign that we should have just left then.
we order the food and the kids are just super restless for some reason. we are trying to eat and the kids speed through their food because they were really hungry i guess, so then there is idle time while garran and i are eating. the kids are playing with chop sticks, which are dropping on the floor, which of course in their minds requires them to go under the table to get them.
finally garran and i decided it was time to go. kael was carrying a drink and garran was pushing the stroller. cullan asked if he could push the stroller. (it was just our little umbrella one that we sometimes let him push) garran at first refuses. cullan starts to get upset and garran trying to be nice said he could help. well, his helping resulted in this. when he started to help he pulled the stroller a little in the wrong direction. by doing so he tripped kael. not only did kael fall but dumped his full drink all over the floor. did i mention cullan is still munching his stolen apple at this point!!!
so i just start laughing. really what could i do. everyone was looking at us like we were crazy or something. i just told garran i would go pay for the apple and he said he would get the kids loaded up. cullan asked if he could stay with me and i said yes. i was thinking this would give me a chance to explain to him why it was not a good idea to take apples from a grocery store stand and show him that we had to pay for it. on the way over, i take the apple from cullan so that i can give it to the cashier. of course she smiles at him and asks if his apple is yummy. no big help there. cullan just smiled.
i don't know if this was as funny to anyone else as it was to us. well while it was happening it was stressful..however now we can look back and have a good laugh.

fall is here!

today i took the kids to a park while garran did some work at the studio. it was great to be out in the sun, and enjoy the some what nice weather. it was also great to enjoy the beautiful colors of fall. i decided to try out a newer lens that i had got at the beginning of the year. i have not played with it to much but today i tried it out. the pictures came out ok. i still have some things to get used to with it..practice...practice...practice!! anyways here are one or two but you can see more on my photo blog if your interested.

where i live

where i live has great people.
where i live has some beautiful scenery.
where i live has really started to feel like home...
but it will not be...for the following reasons..
WHERE I LIVE THE WEATHER IS AWFUL.
the nice days are nice but the bad days seem to really stink.
where i live it feels like it is winter 9 out of the 12 months.
I NEED SUNSHINE PEOPLE AND WARM WEATHER.
i grew up with heat and beaches, not corn and snow.
where i live is nice and the people are great but on days like today, this dragging kids in and out of the van in freezing rain, meeting some unfortunately rude people who have either never had children or have forgot what it is like to cart them around in yucky rain....it is enough to make me nuts.
sorry i just needed to vent. I am the only one over 5 in my house since 8:30 and until 7:00 so my blog gets to be my place to rant! ;0)
thanks friends.

when sharing back-fires

today i gave kael a cup cake. he proceeded to sneak it to the living room. he then decided to share with briea. briea smashed it in the floor and i'm guessing got some in her mouth. before i could get mad kael said, as i came around the corner, "mom look...i shared...i shared with briea!". how could i get mad at a face like this!

special boy

today when i picked cullan up from preschool he had this on. they gave him a crown to wear because of his birthday. HE LOVED IT. he wore it for the rest of the day. even when we went to the grocery store. you can not tell he loved it from this picture. he was trying to watch thomas the train.

poor kael

today kael had to stay home sick. brother is at preschool. briea is sleeping.
i think the poor kid is just bored out of his mind.
i asked him if he wanted to go to bed. he said no...just bored.

lusting

anytime i really start taking pictures, i always start looking on the web for different camera stuff.

sigh..
today i can not seem to stop lusting after this..
it's a nikon d90.
for any of my photo friends that are like me, here is a link that talks about it. click here.
the sad thing is, is that there are a bunch of cameras even nicer than this, but for now this is my next step!
for today i can only lust...but someday...maybe i will decide to figure out a way to get it!!
ahh to dream ;0)

the itch

after briea, i kind of took a time out with taking pictures. i just was to busy. but i have started to get the itch again. i don't really take pictures professionally. i have done some for friends but i have a sight of mostly my kiddos and a few friends. i know some of my family looks, so for those of you that do...i am starting to post again. slowly but surely. i miss taking pictures and am starting to get back in the groove again.

in love

my friend introduced me to this song... and I have literally fallen in love with it.
maybe it's because i have little boys, i don't know but i listen to it all the time..hope you enjoy.

fun give away!!

here is a fun website..
mommy diaries
if you hurry up and check it out, they are doing a fun give away.
hurry up and enter!

he's 4

cullan officially turned 4 on October 17th @ 9:13pm.
we celebrated with a big spider man party a few days ago.
last night we just celebrated with him singing him happy birthday and telling him how much we love him. here are a few things we have decided are great about cullan.

1. his great laugh..and his weird one he has just started to do.
2. he is a good big brother.
3. he wants to grow big and tall like daddy.
4. he loves yogurt.
   
5. he is kind.
   
6. he is funny and says some wonderful things to make us laugh.

our list could go on and on but...

we love how perceptive he is becoming and how willing to help fix things. he is becoming a BIG BOY so quickly and right before our eyes. we are grateful for the four years we have had our sweet Cullan boy and look forward to watching him grow into a wonderful young man!

pumpkins~

these pictures were from a few days back. i just have not had a chance to post them yet. I really wanted the kids to be all cute and dressed in cute matchy outfits outside, but alas, we live in a frigid place. so due to cold and sickness i settled for in my living room after dinner. ARG! oh well. good thing the kids are still super cute.

we let each of the kids pick a pumpkin. we have plans to paint them, we just have not got around to that part yet...briea was in love with the pumpkins. she thought they were great. can i just say i love fall. it is my absolute favorite time of year.