Family Pictures 2009

A couple of weeks ago we got our family pictures taken. I had my friend Mariah Baddas take them. I met her through Modbe, she signed up under me to be a consultant, but wasn't one for long because she took off on her photography, which of course was the right move, because she does an amazing job. Here are all our pics. Marriah's Photography website is http://www.mariahbaddasphotography.com/ so go check out her amazing talent.

My favorite of Brock

My favorite of Daxton

My favorite of Mckynlee

And I love this one of Clint and I

I didn't think she got a good shot of my kids together. Mckynlee would just not cooperating. So I was pleasantly surprise when she sent me this one.

Mckynlee loved this little rocking chair, the minute she saw it she wanted to sit in it. I'm sure she would have taken it home if she could.

Cheesy boy

Modbe Is Going Out Of Business

Ok, I know my family and friends are going to kill because this isn't a family post and I'm way behind. But this post is going to be really quick and my others will take awhile, I'll get to them eventually. Anyways, as you all know I have been a consultant for Modbe Clothing for 2 1/2 years. I love their clothes and have enjoyed being a consultant. Friday they just let us know they are going out of Business and will be closing their doors on Dec. 31st. I am really sad, I love their clothes, I will miss looking forward to swim season and their cute jeans. Some consultants have already closed down their sites but I will keeping mine open until they close and shut it down. Every goes on sale starting today. So if you love their clothes as much as I do or your looking for gifts go check out my website here for your last chance to get theses items ever. I will be going through my personal inventory soon (which is very little) and I will post what items I'm selling, they will be highly discounted. I will also be wanting to get rid of my dress racks, so if anyone is interested or knows someone who would me let me know. Happy Last Shopping.

Only One More Week of Soccer!

My boys have loved this soccer season, but after taking them to practice twice a week and doing two games every Saturday for the past 3 months I'm ready for a break. They only have one more week and then we're done for the season!
Mckynlee pulled the camera out of the diaper bag and handed to me and said "cheese". So I guess she wanted her picture taken and then once I turned on the camera the boys wanted to be part of the kodak moment too.

This was taken just after Brock's game. Mckynlee's hair did look really nice at one point of the day. Clint even did it today because I was gone at Super Saturday today and he did such a good job. Too bad I don't have a picture to prove it. Her cute hair usually only lasts an hour if we're lucky.

Simply Irresistible!

This girl does wear me out sometimes. She is into everything and climbs on everything and I feel like I need eyes of hawk to make sure she doesn't injure herself. But when you look at this adorable little face you just don't care about what a little mischievous little thing she is. Isn't she simply irresistible?!

Halloween 2009

We had a great Halloween this year, besides the fact that Mckynlee got sick later in the day. We started off the day with both the boys soccer games. Then we came home and carved pumpkins. We would have done this on family night, but the pumpkins go rotten within a couple of days here so we wanted them to last until Halloween. So Thursday was when we were going to do them instead, but then we ended up going to the Pumpkin Patch since we couldn't go there on Monday. I know now I'm just confusing you. Anyways it ended up being perfect doing them today because it was Saturday so there was no school so we had the whole day to hang out as a family. The boys couldn't wait to do it.

Here is Clint helping the boys with their pumpkins. I cleaned out all the pumpkins and then we had the boys draw their own faces on their pumpkins for us to cut out. Daxton drew his and decided it wasn't scary or mean enough so he made Clint carve him a mean faced pumpkin. But, Brock traced his own face and I just cut it out for him. Then Clint did a pumpkin and I did one for Mckynlee and then I did mine. I like to use the patterns you get from the store to trace and got on mine.

Our mess.

Poor Mckynlee started getting sick right about the time we were carving pumpkins. She had a fever and just looked miserable. I wasn't surprised she got sick with Dax being sick earlier in the week, he was always touching her and she was always touching him. So she just conked out on the couch while we were carving our pumpkins.

The finished product: Mckynlee's, Daxton's, mine, Clint's and Brock's.

Her nap gave her a little boost but not for long. Here she is in her cute little monkey costume. She looked so adorable and I felt it was the perfect costume for he since she is our little monkey and she climbs on everything.

The kids before they went out trick-or-treating.

Mckynlee starting to feel miserable again and not wanting us to take pictures of her.

Well Dax changed his mind like twenty times this year on who he wanted to be for Halloween. First he wanted to be a Ninja Turtle, then Wolverine, then a Jedi, then a Power Ranger and then Iron Man. I'm pretty sure there were a few more. I finally made him decide and told him he couldn't change his mind after. Well he ended up officially wanting to be Wolverine and has been obsessed with everything Wolverine ever since. He looks pretty tough to me.

Brock decided to be a cowboy 6 months ago and didn't deviate from that. Even when we suggested other ideas he would change his mind. I was glad, no stressing about his costume.

Our pumpkins all lit up. It was kind of windy that night so it kept blowing out the candles in the pumpkins, that why you only see 4 lit pumpkins.

The kids out trick-or-treating. They didn't last very long. All they were willing to do was our block and most of the homes on our block are empty foreclosed homes. They were more interested in handing out candy than getting it. I guess they did the trunk-or-treat the night before so they got their fix. So after we did our street we came home and checked out all of their candy. I had them pick out all of the candy they wouldn't eat and we put it in our candy basket to hand out to the rest of the trick or treaters. I hate having that gross candy just laying around the house. So, after we did that they didn't have a ton of candy, plenty, but not like previous years. I'm glad about that, this way we'll get rid of it sooner. So anyways after that we just let the boys stay up to pass out candy until trick or treaters stopped coming.

Our poor Mckynlee was wiped after trick or treating and as soon as we took off her costume she fell asleep on the couch. Besides her being sick we had a pretty good day. I love Halloween!

Trunk-or-Treat

Our ward trunk-or-treat was a hit this year. Our new activities commitee chair went all out and the church was decorated to the max. There was a costume contest, and a chili cook-off and lots of fun activities for the kids including a bounce house. Clint had a softball game that night so I was juggling the kids by myself, that was kind of a pain. He showed up right before we were done trunk-or-treating. But, the kids had a great time.
My kids in front of the Halloween Picture display.

Miss Koo our little Monkey!

Dax is Wolverine!

Brock was a cowboy!

Dax playing Halloween Bingo!

Brock playing pin the eye on the monster.

The Pumpkin Patch

Every year the boys get so excited when they see the pumpkin patch being set up down the street from our house and they can't wait to go. This year we decided to take them for family home evening the Monday before Halloween, but then Dax got really sick and we couldn't go. So instead we went tonight. They were way excited and they had a great time.
I think I have several pics of them posing in these koala heads from previous years, but they requested another.

The place is kind of a rip off for rides, so they got to pick 2 of their favorite. This one, the mickey castle play land, is their most favorite. So, of course they had to do this one.

Mckynlee was content to roam and look at everything.

The highlight for her though was the bubble falling from the sky. She could have stayed all night playing with the bubbles.

I just liked this picture because she is playing with Clint's face, this is something she always does the minute he picks her up.

My three kiddos at the pumpkin patch!

Citizenship Award!

Every month at Brock's school each grade has an awards ceremony. Kids are awarded certificates from everything to memorizing sight words, doing well in math, doing service, most improve and citizenship. Well, this month Brock was privileged to get an award. He got the citizenship ward for his class. I was so proud of him. Here he is at his awards assembly!

Daxton's 4th Birthday!

Daxton turned 4 today! He has been looking forward to turning 4 for awhile now. He was really sick earlier in the week so I was so happy when he woke up on his birthday feeling better.

He was so excited to see his balloons over his bed, his special reminder when he woke up that today was his special day!

Here is is waiting on the stairs to see his presents.

Opening his presents from us. He was very excited to get a Spiderman dress up.

Another reason I was glad he was feeling well was that I was planning on taking him to Disneyland just me and him on his birthday. As many of you know Disneyland is letting you go free on your birthday and since we have season passes they let you get a $62 gift certificate. That's more than we spend on him on his birthday. I was out of town on my birthday and Clint and Brock's b-days were on black out dates, so this was the first time we could take advantage of it. So just him and I got to go to Disneyland. We didn't stay long but I had so much fun spending time with my little guy. He went on Space Mountain for the first time. After the ride was done I looked at his face and there was no expression, same in the picture the ride took. I thought it was so funny, I assumed he would be either upset or smiling, I didn't expect a straight face. But he said he really liked it. He just didn't like the ghost/monster and the scary music (something they do just for Halloween). I told him next time that wouldn't be there. So, he is excited to go again. We went on a couple more rides and then we went and got ice cream and then we went shopping with his gift card.

When we got there he they gave him this special badge that said "Happy Birthday Daxton" on it. So, of course wherever we went in Disneyland people were wishing him happy birthday. He would get all shy and hide behind my leg.

Dax was such a sweety. Everything he picked out to use his gift card on he got Brock one of too. The first thing he wanted was a light saber, so I suggested he get one for Brock too so they could play together. After that everything else he picked out he wanted Brock to have one too. So with his $62 he got 2 light Sabers, 2 pirate swords, 2 light up necklaces and 2 Star Wars Disney character action figures. You can imagine how happy Brock was when we got home and Dax had gifts for him too. The picture above with all their gear.

Mckynlee liked the light up necklaces, the picture doesn't show the lights though.

After we got back we went to Chick-fil-a for his birthday dinner, his choice, and his grandpa and grandma McDowell met us there. The kids played in the play area, the main reason they like chick-fil-a so much and then ate their dinner. Clint's mom brought everyone these cupcakes from this place called "Frostings" that is by their house. This was what we had instead of cake since I already made Dax a cake at his birthday party. Here's Dax with his cupcake, isn't it huge? They are so good, but you can usually only eat 1/2 of one.

Dax with his grandma and grandpa McDowell. They got him the Wii Resort game which he was super excited about. Dax had a great birthday! Dax, we love you so much, there would be a great void in our home if you weren't in it. You love everyone in your family so much and are always concerned about us. You are full of questions constantly about everything and though sometime you wear us out with them, we still think its the cutest thing ever. You are super tough and can outlast the whole family when it comes to energy. You are such a blessing in our lives and we love you so much! Happy Birthday!

Love,

Mom and Dad

Halloween Party

So, last night our friend Kyra and Matt hosted what I'm pretty sure has become our Annual Halloween Party. We had so much fun at the one last year that the Robinson's threw and I was so excited to go again this year. I thought Clint would totally let me take our costumes up a notch this year from last year. But, he proved to be difficult. Again he really didn't want to dress up and not matter what my suggestions were he turned them down. I finally took him to Party City to look at all the costume they had to offer and I was going to let him pick. He finally agreed to be a pirate but as we were tallying up how much a pirate costume was going to cost to buy I was stressing out. So I had to make us the costumes. Wishing I had more time and being totally stressed I got them put together and it ended up not being to bad. We both had old black sweat pants that I had ready to throw out and I just cut them up. I went the the dollar store to buy pirate accessories. Then got cheap black and red fabric and made us some very mediocre vests and bandanna's and sashes. But all together for last minute I think the costumes turned out well. Here are pictures of what all our friends dressed up as.
Me and Clint - Pirates.

My favorite costume of the night. Mikey and Coral - Octo mom (Nadia I think her name is) and her sperm donor. I wish I had thought of this first. With Clint fighting me to dress up this outfit would have been painless for him.

Kim and Clint - Gothic Couple. They were the most unrecognizable of the night. Kim normally has reddish strawberry blond hair and Clint is blond, so they looked totally opposite of what they normally do.

Kyra and Matt - Daphne and Fred from Scooby Doo. (for Halloween their kids will be Shaggy, Velma and Scooby Doo)

Sarah and Kip - An Army Couple

Melissa and Ryan - A dead bride and her next victim

Don and Sara - A scarecrow and a witch

Heather and Seth - lets just say I can't tell you what this costume is because then I would get unwanted traffic on my blog. But they are dressed up like some characters in a Saturday Night Live skit with Justin Timberlake. And what was inside the box must also not be mention, lets just say it was Heather's twist on Bakerella's cupcake pops.

Josh and Vanessa - Harry Potter Characters

Kara and Todd - A pregnant nun and a priest

Susie and Brandon - A fairy and Michael Jackson (Brandon played the part well and was hilarious the whole night acting like Michael Jackson).

Emily and Todd - A moose and a hunter

Amy and Rich - Princess Leah and Darth Vador

Katie and Todd - Rocker couple

Melissa and Greg - "Wicked" witch and Andy Bernard (from the office) and their little baby boy.

Melissa and Ryan - Cowgirl and Cowboy

Kim, Emily, Katie, Susie, me and Melissa waiting to get our food. For the Halloween party we had our homemade Cafe Rio night and made sweet pork and their yummy tomatillo dressy with fresh cooked tortillas and all the fixings.

Chowing down on our grub! Clint had a baseball game and Melissa's husband Ryan was just coming back from being out of town so we were without hubbies for the first part of the night.

More of the crew enjoying their food.

All the girls.

Coral and Kara, the two prego's of the group.

Sara, Amy, Kyra, Melissa and me.

Heather was in charge of the games. This was a game that she saw played on Ellen. All of us decorated paper grocery bags with our faces on it. Then first we had the guys go. You had to put the bag on her head and wear oven mitts and then everyone had to try and take off the other bag off their head. It was a pretty funny game. Here are Mikey and Brandon going at it, they were the finalists of the boys.

Melissa and Emily going were the finalists of the girls. Heather cracks me up in this picture. I think she is trying to guide Emily but afraid she is going to get whacked.

Egg relay. We had to take an egg on spoon across the yard and back. We had so much fun. I'm excited about this tradition. And though Clint always fights on the costume thing, I know he has a good time too. Thanks Kyra and Matt for hosting this year.

Daxton's Birthday Party

So yesterday Dax had his birthday party. I couldn't do his party on his birthday because I'm on Jury Duty next week and I didn't want to chance be called in when I was suppose to be throwing a birthday party. Dax wanted to do a super hero themed birthday party so that is what we did. We asked all the boys to dress up in their favorite super hero costume if they had one (we had plenty of extras if they didn't) and then we had the girls to dress up as princesses so the super heroes could save them. Dax had so much fun, but it was super crazy and I'm so glad it's done! He invited 11 friends plus we had 4 siblings there, and 3 extra moms so we had a full house.
First I had the kids play pin the spiderman on the poster of the bad guys (a game I got at the party store, who knows what the real name of it is). Here is Dax trying to find the poster.
(By the way he is dressed up as Wolverine, that is his Halloween costume)

Checking out where he ended up putting his spiderman sticker.

All the kids waiting their turn to play.

Becca playing the game.

Then the kids played "Sandman, Sandman, Spiderman" (or as we all know it, "duck, duck, goose").

Then we played the spiderweb game. The kids really liked this one. You take a ball of yarn and each kids throws it to another in the circle and they have to wrap it around themselves and they keep doing this until they make a spiderweb.

Then we did bad guys fight the good guys with silly string. Note to self: horrible idea. Luckily my friend Kyra talked me into having the kids do it in the kitchen. But I only got 6 cans of silly string, with the idea of the kids taking turns. So of course there was fighting over who got them first. Then kids would cry once they got shot with silly string and then those same kids when they got their turn were ruthless with it. It was horrible to clean up and I will not do that again unless it's outside. In the end though the kids enjoyed it.

Then it was present opening time. This is always crazy. All the kids want to give Dax their present at once, so we have no clue who gave him what. But the kids are in heaven, not just Dax but all of them. I have always found it amusing, even though other kids are getting the gifts they are just as excited.

More craziness of opening presents. He sure got spoiled.

Then it was cake time. I wish I got a picture of the cake close up, but I didn't get a chance. It wasn't fancy at all. I just made a yellow cake and put chocolate frosting (his request) and then bought a bunch of superhero action figures for him to keep and I put them on top. He had a great birthday party. Brock was sad he couldn't be there, but I had to do it during the day or I would have had even more kids there. Brock was ok once we told him we would be apart of the family birthday party. I wish I had gotten a picture of all the kids that came, so for memories sake and since I didn't get one here is a list (for my own benefit) of those who came: Davis, Eli (and his mom and sister Macy), Brendan, Carter, Jackson, Tera (and her mom and baby sister Mazy), Mckenzie, Becca, Abby, Will and Jonathon (and his mom and his brother Joshua and his baby sister Brooklyn).

Playgroup Outing To DeJong's Dairy Farm

I know I just recently did a post about us going to the Dejong Dairy Farm. But I'm doing another because this time we went as a ward playgroup and got to do the tour. We did this several years back for a preschool field trip with Brock. But Dax was pretty little so he didn't remember and Mckynlee of course wasn't there. They really enjoyed the tour. They enjoyed seeing the cows.
Mckynlee really enjoyed and now knows the cow says moo, though now I think she thinks every animal says moo.

I tried to get a pick of both kids, but Mckynlee wouldn't cooperate. Do you think Dax needs to go pee?

This was one of the baby cows that I think was only a week old. Mckynlee liked the baby cows and would get up close, but as soon as they would stick their head through she would run back to me. She liked that the lady was feeding them with a bottle, she seemed pretty interested in that.

Dax loved feeding the cows. We stayed there forever just letting the kids feed the cows. We tried to have Mckynlee do it, but she was too scared and just kept a safe distance. She would see the other kids do it and she would pick up some hay but when I would put her close to the cow she would start crying. After we saw the cows they showed us where they milk them and then where and how they package the milk. Dax thought part was pretty cool. After the tour they gave all the kids their delicious chocolate milk and some oreos cookies. That was probably Mckynlee's favorite part.

Dax, me and Mckynlee got a picture taken in front of their little Halloween display they had before we left. You can tell the kiddos are tired and ready for a nap.

Crazy Hair Day

Today was crazy hair day at Brock's school. Friday is flag/spirit day at his school. So he gets to wear his school shirt every Friday. But at least once a month they have the kids do a fun thing on a Friday like pajama day, or sports jersey day. Well today Brock got to wear his hair crazy. At first I didn't think I could really do anything because I keep his hair so short. Plus, I didn't get a chance to by some hair spray paint which a lot of the kids did. So I got out some powerful hair gel and tried to do some chunky spikes. He was unsure about it at first. But, once he got to school and saw that everyone had crazy hair, he warmed up to the idea. Though he didn't make me wash it out that night when we went out with the family.

A top view. I thought he looked cute with crazy hair.

Fire Station Field Trip

We had the chance to go to a local fire station for Daxton's preschool field trip. It was kind of funny, my friend Melissa (Daxton's teacher) has taken her preschoolers there for 3 years. The first year was when Brock was in her class and the firemen did such a good job, they gave them a tour of the station and their rooms and explained what they did when they stayed there. They showed them fire safety and had the kids practice crawling on the ground as if there was a fire so they could stay below the smoke. Then they showed them the fire truck and how everything works on it and they showed them the fire suit and let them each try it on and use the fire hose and they all got to climb in the truck. The guy did such a great job. Well, this time we get there and we just stand there in the most awkward silence. Then the firefighters ask us what we want them to do. They were clueless. So Melissa had to like guide them on what to do. They didn't seem too happy that we were there. Melissa had to ask them to let the kids do the hose. They didn't even pull out the fire gear to show the kids and their explanations for everything else was kind of pathetic. But, despite it all the kids had a great time and enjoyed their field trip (they didn't know what they had missed out on).
Here are the preschoolers watching the fireman show them the fire truck.

They did let the kids climb in the fire truck, but I'm pretty sure we had to ask them, it wasn't their suggestion. Here is Dax with his buddy Davis in the truck.

Ok, this picture cracks me up. I was just trying to get a picture of Dax but by the time it took it just got the fireman's face. Normally I would delete a perfect strangers face off my camera, but I thought his face was hilarious. He wasn't doing it to be silly this was the real face he has he was trying to lift my son out of the truck. I know Dax is a big boy, but isn't this guy a fireman? Aren't they suppose to lift heavy things?

Mckynlee and Lyric in the truck.

Daxton's Preschool class along with some siblings posing in front of the fire engine. (right to left) Brendan, Becca, Jackson, Tera, Davis, Dax, Eli, Carter, Macy, Abby, and Violet.

Daxton squirting the fire hose.

Mckynlee wanted to try too.

Tera's mom couldn't come to the fire station because she was teaching an aerobics class. So I took her with us. This is her and Dax with all the fun stuff they got from the fire station (a fireman badge, and a safety coloring book). So despite the cluelessness of the fire fighters at this station the kids had a good time.

Our Trip To Arizona

My sister Whitnie moved to Arizona a little over a year ago. But, recently got a new job in Utah and is now moving back to Utah. So, we decided to make a trip out to AZ last weekend to see her before she moved back to UT. It was a very short trip, but we all had a great time. We got there Friday night and left Sunday afternoon. But, we had a great time hanging out with her and Michael (her boyfriend). On Saturday her and Michael took us to this thing called Tour De Fat. All sorts of people come and bring crazy bikes and they dress up all crazy. In the morning they had a parade with everyone and their crazy bikes. It was so fun to see them.
Look in the middle of the picture. This bike had two guy on it. One guys was driving the bike and the other was on the back barbecuing. I thought it was pretty funny.

Like I said, there weren't only crazy bikes, there were a lot of crazy costumes too.

My boys really enjoyed the parade and all the funny bikes.

Mckynlee had a great time running around.

Brock really liked this wavy mirror, and checked himself out for quite awhile in it.

They had this mini arena set up with all sorts of funky bikes that were really hard to ride and people could go in and try them out. This bike in the picture with all the wheels was Daxton's favorite.

This bike was pretty funny too. It had tennis shoes for wheels, it was funny to see people ride it, not a very smooth ride.

A classic family picture, no one cooperates.

Me and my sis Whitnie.

The "Tour De Fat" stage. I guess they had all kinds of stuff going on all day. We just went for the morning portion, which was kind of good. It was kind of a beer drinking fest (it was put on by a brewery), so I think as the day would progress it could get interesting.

My kids loved dancing to the music that was playing. Mckynlee was rocking out. I tried to get video, but every time I would switch my camera to video mode she would stop dancing. It was pretty cute.

All the kiddos gettin' their groove on!

After Tour De Fat we went to Gilbert and tried out Joe's Farm Grill. I've been wanting to go here forever. It was featured on the Food Network on Diners, Dine-ins and Drives and it looked so good. So, we finally made it out there. We actually use to eat at its sister restaurant Joe's BBQ when we lived in AZ, and we loved it. Well Joe's Farm Grill lived up to it's hype and we really enjoyed it. Here is a pic of Michael and Whitnie.

Mckynlee eating her lunch. One of the coolest parts about this restaurant was the bathrooms. I wanted to go back in with my camera to take pictures, but there was a line. It had a tv in it playing some weird clay/cartoon movie and then it had dolls in glass cases inside the walls. Ok, it doesn't sound as cool when I describe it. So, if you ever make the trip to Joe's Farm Grill go check out their bathrooms. After we trekked it out to Queen Creek to drive by our house to see if it was in good condition. We had no complaints and the neighborhood was looking good too. I was worried to see for sale signs everywhere but I didn't. It was fun to revisit memory lane. The rest of the time we just ate out and hung out at my sister's place. It was so fun to visit AZ again and to spend time with my sister and Michael. I was sad it was so short, but it was fun!

Stuffed Monsters

Ever since I made Mckynlee her Jo Doll last Christmas Daxton has been begging me to make him a stuffed animal. I just think he really liked the idea of his mom making him something. We the other day the girl that designs the Jo Doll pattern was having a big sale to celebrate her 5,000th sell on Etsy. All her patterns were 50% off, so I jumped on it and bought 4 more of her patterns, her monster pattern, her bumblebee pattern, her fox pattern and her lamb pattern. You can check her stuff out here. Dax really liked the monster, so that's what I set off to make first. And of course once I started making it Brock wanted one too. So, I made them both a stuffed monster.

Here is the finished product. Aren't they so cute?! My boys couldn't wait for me to finish. They kept asking me if I was done. Or they would say would you go finish my monster, its not too often they are asking me to go sew.

Dax with his little stuffed monster.

Look how excited Brock is for his.

Both of them together showing off their monsters. It has actually proved to be a good thing. The other night Dax was really scared and kept coming in our room. I went to go put him back to bed, he wanted me to stay and lay with him. This is absolutely miserable, because the kid can't hold still in his sleep and you just can't sleep laying next to him. So, I grabbed the Monster and explained to him how I made it because I love him and any night that he gets scared he can grab that monster and hug it and cuddle with it and it will be just like he was hugging or cuddling with mommy because I made it just for him. He got his cute little smirk on his face and said ok and didn't make a peep after that. And I sometimes I'll go check on him while he's asleep and he's holding tight and it just puts a smile on my face that he loves it so much.

Oh How She Makes Us Laugh!

The other day I was on the computer or something, I just thought Mckynlee was just playing with her toys and I come out to find her walking around wearing my bra. I thought it was so funny.

And then today she brought me Daxton's sunglasses and was trying to put them on, and of course was having trouble. So, I helped her out and once they were on she thought she was so cool. I love how she can always make us laugh.

'Purse'-suit Of Excellence (beware of purse picture overload)

As a Young Women Presidency we had gotten together to talk about what we were going to do for our upcoming Young Women In Excellence. Our President found an idea on line called "The 'Purse'-suit of Excellence". The talk that would be given would have a purse as an object lesson and the things in it had to do with things the girls would wand to pursue in life to be better stronger young women. We all liked the idea. I had been put in charge of putting together handouts to give the girls at the end. Not to long ago I came across a blog and it had the cutest purse on it and a link to the pattern, which was FREE!. So I was thinking, how fun would it be, if it were possible, if we could make the girls purses for our handout. My good friend Katie and fellow sewer is also in the Presidency with me and we figured if we got all our fabric scraps together we could make these purses for very cheap. So we decided to take on the project. One day we got together. We had other leaders come over and help us cute out the patterns while me and Katie sewed away. Me and Katie each sewed 10 purses, 20 all together to give to our girls. We were so excited to give them these purses. I mean wouldn't you be excited. Katie also made all the little flowers that were sewed onto the purses.
So here is one of my favorite purses, and I apologize that the picture is sideways, I don't know why the computer did that. This was made with left over fabric from a bigger purse that I made for my mom for her birthday. These purses were so easy to make and only take a fat quarter of fabric for the outside and straps and a little less than that for the inside lining. Then we bought magnet button snaps off ebay for the closures. You can get the purse pattern free here at MadeByRae's website. But, if your interested in making them and selling them you can also buy the pattern from her for $10 plus I think she includes a bonus pattern for a larger version of the bag.

Here are all the purses finished. We stuffed them with tissue paper so they would look cuter on display.

Here are some more up close, sorry I posted a lot of these. I just thought they were so cute!

Kate found the perfect quote to go with our theme, that had to do with the girls worth and we she glued them on card stock and I went and had them laminated and we put them in the purses as part of the handout.

That night was so fun. We had these tables up for the girls to display the stuff they had been working on for their personal progress. Sara Young gave the "purse" talk and it was so good and she really brought the spirit in. Then we got to hear from our girls who did projects that you couldn't display but it was something they did and I was so amazed. We have awesome young women who are going to make amazing future moms, and be amazing women in this church.

We decorated the room with our purses. We didn't tell the girls they were for them until the end of the program.

Here are some that we had displayed at the podium.

Another favorite of mine. I made Mckynlee a doll out of this material.

I loved this one too, it was from Katie's scraps.

Then for our dessert we bought Costco cheesecake and our President, Jenny made all these little purses out of fondant to go on top (she used to be a professional cake decorator). Aren't they so cute? I just fell in love with them!

A close up! I loved the detail she put on them.

Two of my fellow leaders: Emily and Katie (the one who made the purses with me)

The girls were so excited to get the purses. We had them draw a number out of a bowl and then they had to go find the purse that had that number on the back. Even though we thought all the purses were cute we didn't want any fights going on about who got what. Every purse was different too for that reason, we didn't use the same fabric twice. The girls seemed very pleased. These are a few of our beehives sporting their new purses!

All the leaders that were there that night (minus Fran she left before we took the picture). Jaime, Anna, Ashton, Melissa, Jenny, Katie, Emily, Me and Sarah. It was such a neat night and enjoyed so much making and giving the girls those purses.

General Relief Society Broadcast

So every year me and my friend, Kyra, go to the General Relief Society Broadcast at our Stake Center together. This year Kyra got together a bigger carpool to head to this years one. We had so much fun. Before the broadcast we all met up at Taco Del Mar for some dinner. Then we headed to our Stake Center for the Broadcast. It was so wonderful to get some spiritual uplifting. Something I feel I don't get very often anymore being a mom of young kids. Plus, I had a great time hanging out with my girlfriends. After the broadcast the stake had desert served and then each ward had a table set up of the they had been doing for Enrichment that year. There were so many cute ideas. Anyways, some of the girls were not to excited about the desert that was served so we decided to head to Yogurt Biz after for a treat.
6 of us road in Kyra's Buick La Sabre (sp?) that she just received as a gift from her grandma. Front seat: Kara, Vanessa and Kyra. Back Seat: Coral, me and Susie. That thing is so great, it is so spacious inside. And of course we thought it was hilarious to have the person in the front seat in the middle. Vanessa was the lucky gal and thought she was going to die sitting there up higher than everyone so close to the front and Kyra might have confirmed her fears. We had a couple of near death experiences where all of us were screaming, with extreme laughter to follow, such as going really fast on a really tight turn and almost hitting a car. Again, it's so much fun when you get a bunch of girls together.

Vanessa, practically on top of Kyra as she was driving, hanging on for dear life! (ha, ha, Kyra I really don't think your a bad driver, its just fun to laugh about). And no, Kyra is not driving while I took this picture.

Kara, Me, and Susie. Coral was also in the car with us, but I didn't get her in our inside pics.

The whole crew at Yogurt Biz, Melissa, Jessica, Amy and Denise were in the other car. In the picture left to right: Denise, Coral, Amy, Kara, Jessica, Me, Susie, Melissa, Vanessa and Kyra. We had a wonderful night of spiritual uplifting and also a lot of laughs. Thanks girls, I had a wonderful time hanging out with you last night! And thanks Kyra for putting the night together. (You may have noticed from a lot of my posts that Kyra puts everything together, well she actually does. She is our planner and we are so grateful to her for making our social life so much fun)

What Has Miss Koo Been Up To?

I thought I needed to do a little update on my little Kynlee Koo. I use to do her monthly updates before she turned a year and I haven't since. She is now 14 months and such a busy body and so full of it. I mean the picture says for itself. She is constantly moving and doing. I don't think the girl can hold still. She'll want us to pick her up and then once we do she wants down. She goes and picks up a doll and loves it for two seconds and then throws in down on the ground to find something else to do. She'll climb on the couch and sit next to you like she wants to hang out and then she stands up and plays on the cushions to come and plop down next to you two seconds later. I think she likes to get into trouble. It's possible we might have our hands full with her when she gets older. We have found that we don't get much out of church anymore and we are counting down the days to nursery. One of us has to sit in the hall for every meeting. In Sacrament Meeting she tries to escape our row to go to the stage and Sunday School she is constantly running to the front of the class to the teacher, in Elder's Quorum she is begging food from all the other babies dads. So, the halls have become our new best friends. She now has almost 6 teeth ( the sixth one is just starting to break through) and she knows how to use them. She can say Momma, Mommy, Daddy, Doggie and Dolly (all the d ones sound the same). She makes a barking sound every time she sees a dog. Well, pretty much any animal she sees she says "doggie" and then she barks. She can say "no, no, no, no, no" while waving her pointer finger back and forth, this because her parents are constantly telling her this. It's funny I'll catch her doing something she's not suppose to be doing and then she says "no, no, no, no, no". She also says hot and cheese and she'll say please, but it just sounds like cheese. And she doesn't say cheese for actual cheese, its whenever she sees a camera. She also says more or "mo" and bye bye. There might be more but that's all I can think of now. She loves to give you kisses by smacking her lips together and then putting them to yours. Though, dollies and stuffed animals always get the most kisses. She's not the best eater for meals but loves to beg food off of other people. She is very social and will go up to anybody and just get in their face and stare at them or plop down in front of them, or jabber to them. She'll just take off and not care where we are and find some random person, usually an adult, to make friends with. We definitely have to keep our eye on her at all times, so as not to loose her. She is very curious and so sweet. She always makes us laugh because she loves to be silly. She loves her daddy and gets excited every time she sees him. But, always wants mommy for comfort. She has the cutest grin. And she loves playing with her brothers, who are so cute with her. I just love her to death and could squeeze her all day.