Trick-or-Treat at Nordstrom

The story is: The kids and I were killing some time while waiting for Ryan by pretending to shop the Nordstrom downtown. (The closest I get to Nordstrom is the clearance racks at The Rack. I do wish I could get closer. But there's a big fat budget in the way)

Anyway, the kids happened to be dressed up for trick or treating at Daddy's office and a lady approached and said we should have our picture taken. Assuming nothing is free, I politely declined. She approached us again later and asked again, I was a little annoyed at this point, which I apparently didn't hide very well because she said, "it's free!" I said "sign us up!" So we got this picture and got to be chic models for sperry topsiders. I think Kate hit the mark with her faux fur jacket, Robby might have been just a little too high fashion for topsiders in his care bear costume.

In other halloween news: we dressed up 5 of 7 days in Halloween week (my enthusiasm to dress up the kiddos waned with each event, by the last time Kate simply had on leotard with raincoat as a Oregonian ballerina), heavily stocked the bribe box, saw a great halloween puppet show, and Robby was the cutest little care bear you've ever seen. You should have seen him walking in the costume, it was somewhere near a cross between an e-wok and a puppy. CUTE! Kate was simply glamorous as Cinderella. Even with all this cuteness, I think I'm done with Halloween.

Oh and here's Kate's preschool class. The little Barney in the front is her best buddy.

You just have to...

Post on 10-10-10, when does that happen? Besides today I mean.

Eat one ( or two or three) of the warm cookies that come out of the oven on Sunday morning.

Some mornings don't allow any other option, you just have to go back to bed.

Sometimes you just have to rock your baby to sleep and hold them for a long, long time after they've nodded off and drown out the voices from your fear-mongering parenting book saying you'll raise an incompetent, overly dependent child if you do.

Fall asleep on the couch.

Clean the ailing corners in your bathroom. Those dark-looking ones.

Buy the pair of boots you've been eying your whole life, or at least a year or two.

Come to grips with the fact that couponing is not your calling.

Eat the last container of homemade raspberry jam from the freezer, knowing it is the very last one until next summer.

Say happy birthday to your sister. Happy birthday Gabe!

Until next time...

He's the ONE!

Robby turned one on Friday, September 24. This one little sweetie boy has 8 teeth, walks on 2 feet, goes down the stairs backwards on all 4's, is growing an innumerable amount of white hair, rides the trike on 1 bottom, sleeps 10 hours at night, naps for 3, bites 3 times a day (we're working on it), gives 15 hugs all the time, sniffs every flower he sees, raises two hands in the air whenever he's proud, drinks 12 oz of milk at every meal, eats all the groceries (not joking), spins in 15 circles when the music is on, and ate 2 cupcakes on his birthday. Oh and loooooves is 1 sister. Happy day to our little boy, the sunshine.


Here's breakfast in bed for Robby, a little long, but cute.

These are the fun little monkey cupcakes we had. We had lots and lots of other treats too, I wish I had pics of all of them!

Robby got a little banner for his b day. It's right above his high chair and he loves looking at the pictures of himself as he eats.

Rob's b-day was great, with lots of sunshine, just like him.

Livin is Easy

Summertime is messy.

Summertime is little dresses.

Summertime is corn on the cob.

Summertime is smiles.

Summertime is messy.

Summertime is birthdays for Kate and Ryan.

Summertime is fireworks.

Summertime is fresh berries. mmmm.

Mode switch: a few highlights from the last little bit.

We made this badge for Kate for the times when Ryan works from home. She is the protector of his office so no intruders keep him from brining home the bacon. She would never dream of being one of those intruders, that's why we put her in charge :)

Playing the piano while Grandpa works.

Kate made a hummingbird feeder.

Peek a boo. Kate and Robby are beginning to play so well together. Robby is definitely beginning to have his own agenda and voicing his opinion more and more often. Kate's not sure what to think of someone else having an opinion.

The undisputed champion of tough

Kate explains it well here. But what she didn't tell you is that she ran, jumped on trampolines, skipped, hopped, slid, danced, and climbed trees on her broken foot for a week before her dopey parents got her in to a doctor. But to our credit, it didn't really swell until 4 days after the injury and she never uttered one word of complaint unless we asked. She slept through most of the casting process and it still doesn't slow her down one iota. We went to the mc donalds playland today and she played tag with the other kids with no problem. I think she might be the type to have 5 kids with no epidural and come out smiling at the end. She sure is cute with that little cast on!

I don't know how it happened

Last week I did a trial run as a mother to three when I cared for my sisters baby, Luke, for a couple of days. I don't think it was really a fair run as Luke is made of pure sunshine and gumdrops. Seriously, the only sounds he made would be sounds that could be recorded and used as a track on a relaxation cd. Anyway, I was still very proud when on 2 of the days all the kids slept at the same time for at least 15 min. So what did I do? I went to the bathroom and ate a sandwich, luxury.

Here is the proof! It really happened!

You could actually call it vacation

Precursor, I wrote this a loong time ago and then went into stall mode for blogging. Hope you still enjoy and I will catch up soon!

In most cases I hear the word vacation and I think... hmmm bad sleep, germs galore, cranky kids, bad sleep, spilled drinks (at restaurants, on airplanes, etc.) lots of apologies to the people in front of or beside us for the spilled drinks or for the kid sticking their spoon in a drink that's not ours, and bad sleep. But, undoubtedly, there are fun times to be had and great life lessons to be learned for sure in between those moments and I know I have it better than many who never get a change of scenery.

Somehow I have great memories of family vacations as a child. Probably due to the fact that I wasn't the one entertaining, cleaning up the puke, and making up beds on the floor at 2 a.m. and then washing up the "wet" sheets in the morning. Additionally, my mother was the master of creating wonderful, enjoyable vacations for us with no dvd players, a minimum of many hours in the car to get anywhere (living in Kalispell, MT does sound metropolitan, but is actually very remote), and 5 kids by using creativity, positivity, and lots if singing. I recall the arsenal of weapons my mom used to combat boredom and mutiny in the minivan. We each had a 9x13 pan with a lid stashed below our seats filled with sundry entertainment possibilities: stickers, crayons, coloring books, stencils, etc. The lid was essential to contain each rolling crayon and to function as a desk. We each got a pillow, mostly for sitting on if you were the pip squeaks. If you were older than 14, you slept with your pillow not only as padding for your head, but as a buffer to all the "entertainment" going on in the background, at least that's what I saw :). And the occasional book on tape. I loved the book "Herself, the Elf" but I think I was herself's only admirer, lots of buffering going on during this one. Also, we left for our trips just at the moon was departing and yellow dripped into the sky. Sometimes we left long before the sun would appear and spend half the night in the car, all of us asleep, genius.

The point of the rambling and recollections: vacations are so much work for the parents involving late nights or no nights, hours of preparations, dealing with all the kids excrements on a moving vehicle of some sort, etc, etc, But I loved family vacations. I love that my parents extended themselves immeasurably to fertilize my little garden of experiences. And I am just about crazy enough to want to give that to my children as well. I am sure I will, and I have, but this vacation we just returned from was not that one. It was cush. Granted, the sleep was still not amazing, but everything else was just that.

Google "Aspen Grove" and you will see, "an actual vacation for parents of young children. or parents of any age. or people who are not yet parents." This is where we went last week for the Morgan family reunion.

Re-hash

Ryan in combat

Kate with Jamisyn, her leader of the little play group she was in, "Rompers." Kate got to play in that group from 9:30-12:30 and 1:30-4:30 everyday! She loved it most of the time!

Ryan saw one of his professors from BYU there. So did I, but we didn't get her picture! Where else do you go in the world on vacation and see your professors from college?

Maybe Ryan's not a billiard man.

The little Morgans. Look at Ryan, look at Robby, good family pictures are for the birds.

The big Morgans.

Ryan's dolly, he borrowed it from Robby.

Me and Rob at the pool. This is Rob's default face. He looks sad, but really he's just thoughtful. He'll flash a smile at you at lightning speed most of the time too.

On the foot bridge. It was pretty ugly, good thing they had lots of fun activities.

The fam trying to convince Kate of something. Maybe it was not to jump from that high thing, she's very daring if left to her own devices.

MMM.

Ropes course. I'm going down while Ry's going up, hope there's not a metaphor there.

Look-a-likes. Ryan's Dad at his age.

My baby at the pool. Look at those chunks! (Robby's that is)

Sweet, sweet, sweet, sweet, sweet

Just five words to say about our little boy. He is the sweetest thing.

My good friend Meg is amazing and took these shots.
Check her out here Megan Elle Photography

Been busy mothering

Here's a look back at Mother's Day. But first, an explanation as to why it has taken me so long to post on this day:

I realize this is not a great picture, but oh so natural. Both trying so hard to do what they think they should: Kate trying to pose (at least her eyes are open!) and Robby trying to get Kate, and of course Kate has some form of dress-up on.

Have I not said a million times how much I love these kids? Well, I do.

Mothers Day: Ryan took me on a full-day shopping adventure for m-day... to get a new bed, bedding, pillows, etc. It was, and has been, the best thing ever. I love, love, love my bed. For someone with chronic back-problems, a good mattress adds smiles to the morning and enables me to stand erect in the evening.

Here she is:

Love my bed, love my card hand-made by the skids (Ryan), and love my family.

Happy mother's day to all of you moms out there!

Oh and Ryan made a knock-off version of our favorite drink from our favorite Peruvian/Portland restaurant for us. It was absolutely incredible. Basil, pineapple, mango, mojito. One word, supercalifragilisticexpialidocious.

Breastpump of Righteousness

When reviewing the story of the armor of God the other day, this is what Kate called the "breastplate" of righteousness. Can you tell we have a baby at our house?

So since Robby can't tell funny jokes to make me smile, I'll put a picture up of what he does to light me up.

I'll plant my tulips next to yours

The title is the punch line of a cute joke my sister-in-law Cami told me. It starts like this: "When I plant a garden ... insert punch line." I thought it was pretty cute.

I thought these pics were pretty cute too, of the little ones at the tulip gardens. We visited two this year, and each had a windmill, that's fun. The gardens in Woodburn were gargantuan and had wheat fields which makes for great hide-and-go-seek if you're 2 1/2, although not quite as fun when the seeker happens to be me and the hider happens to be Kate who didn't really inform me we were playing hide-and-go-seek. Anyway, we hit one of the few gorgeous days in the month of April to travel down to Woodburn with my sister Robyn, sis-in-law Maile, and her friend Jen. I love when we get to do fun things like this that make all the gray and rainy days seem worth it!

I love this shot, i think it should be a world-peace promotion poster. What says love and peace more than a little girl in a field of tulips?

Abode a la mode

We have new digs! Living in this new house is like topping each day with a little scoop of ice cream. My days are generally good; great husband, great kids, health, job, car, etc. But this place just adds a little more pleasure to the moments. I'll list my favorite things: Jacuzzi tub. Two kitchens. Central vaccuum. A backyard. Cul de sac. Nice neighbors that don't do drugs or beat each other up, a huge step up. In fact, one of our neighbors actually offered to pay her daughter to come and be a mother's helper to me, free help, wow! Our own walls. One set of stairs. A/C. I could probably just bold that whole list and I could probably just keep going, but suffice it to say, I'm very, very happy to be here.

Before you go thinking that we could actually afford such a pleasurable house, I'll tell you that we are so blessed to be the lucky ones to rent this place from a lovely couple while they serve a mission for our church. I hope they extend their mission. Three times. We will be very sad to go! But living here will give us something to shoot for in the future!

Here's my favorite room:

As you can see, the kids love it too.

I'll post more pics soon, but not every room is totally settled yet. Come visit us anytime, we have a guest room waiting for you!