Gingerbread

Last Saturday we got to go visit Grammy Tammy for our annual gingerbread house making party!

My Grandma Sandy usually makes all the gingerbread house pieces from scratch for everyone, but this year my mom and Aunt Sandy made them all since Grandma has started her cancer treatments now.

 

EmmaLee's family came and the rest of the family participated over Zoom.

 We didn't get to fancy with all the cute Christmas candy. Instead we all brought our left over Halloween candy and the kids loved it just the same! Tai asked for a T-A-I to be iced onto her house to decorate, but her house didn't withstand the evening. It ended up falling down right after our last pictures.

 

I especially love Kasen's dum dum sucker chimney! That and when he asked Grammy to let him lick

the frosting off her finger. Haha At least nobody will be surprised when my kids end up with the rona.

Keslee is catching up to Kohen's size pretty fast!

Later we all had a Thanksgiving dinner together and played Quirkle. Thank you Grammy for a fun party!

ABC's: Aquarium, Bowling and Chill

Yesterday it was only $2 to go to the Aquarium in Draper so I jumped on that deal as soon as I saw it!

We had a good time walking around to see all the animals. Kasen loved the sharks, Tai loved the penguins and I love the sting rays and jelly fish. Kyle just wishes there was an open tank of piranhas with a sign that said "Don't touch" so that he could watch people touch them anyway...

I was kinda bummed that we couldn't touch the sting rays this time though.

Saturday night we took the kids Bowling! Tai would go all the way to the back wall and then run all the way back to push her ball. And she creamed us all! She was getting strikes and spares all over the place.

Kohen was just happy to chill and watch us all bowl.

Earlier that day I took Kasen on a shopping and lunch date. I want to do more one on one dates with the kids and give them their own special attention. Kasen wanted pizza for lunch so we tried Mod Pizza for the first time. He loved telling them everything he wanted on his pizza; pepperoni, pineapple, tomatoes and "orange juice". Then we went shopping for a Christmas gift for Kyle and one for Tai.

Our book club book last month was set in Australia and since I hosted our discussion I decided to learn how to make pavlova for our treat! My mom made it quite a few times after we moved back from Australia, but I've never tried it by myself. I think it turned out how it is supposed to and I had fun trying something new, even if it's not my most favorite dessert.

 Kasen likes making little forts with Kohen over his play mat and Tai likes trying to make him hold his toys, like his little teddy bear. She puts it in his crib at night and in his car sear when we go places too. He's getting good and holding on to them and playing with them a little bit! Mostly she just sits and sings all sorts of songs to him. Like these:

"Alligators eat people and babies, but giraffes just eat graaaass, actually giraffes eat leeeeaves."

"I'm bigger than you, look how tall my fingers are and you're so cute and I love you 100 and 100 is a number and you're a cute baaaaby."

She's doing SO GREAT at saying her SH sound when she speaks too! She's almost completely corrected it, but we have a couple other sounds to work on still.

Tai told me she wanted to tape these pieces of paper onto her clothes. I asked her if she was a fashion designer and now she has claimed that as her new profession. Along with doing my hair for me! My new profession is restoring barbie hair! I learned how to do that this week and have fixed all of the hair on Tai's dolls and horses. Super proud of myself.

I sure love this crew of mine!

Two Wheels

We took the kids to ride bikes a total of 3 times this year. I was hoping to go a few more times because Kasen is SO close to riding two wheels by himself! But now that it's snowed this week, I think the time has passed. So here's to next year and the hysterical things Kasen said to Kyle while learning to ride without training wheels this year:

"Riding a bike isn't really my thing right now."

"This is my worst day ever!"

 

"I wish the wheels were square."

Kyle: "But then you couldn't go."

"I would like that!"

 

"I wish bikes weren't real"

"This is ruining my life"

 Tai is next!

Three Months, Three Kids

It's been three months with three kids and we're doing great!

We thought Kohen might have ended up being our first binky baby, but he's really not. He has started sucking on his hands more though. He's ticklish so we've been able to get quite a few good laughs out of him this last month too! He's had awful patches of scaly, dry skin all up and down his arms and now on his legs, that we're trying to clear up, but besides that he is perfect.

Except that Kyle is bummed that the days of him falling asleep on his chest seem to be passed. I love that as soon as Kyle gets home from work he always stops to talk to Kohen on his way back to go change though and tells him how much he missed him all day!

While I was getting some 3 Month pictures of Kohen, Kasen and Tai came in and requested some pictures with Kohen too! I love catching Kasen talking to and playing with Kohen, it's the sweetest thing.

Tai told me that when she has a baby she wants a girl baby. She came in the bathroom during one of Kohen's baths this week and asked to help wash him with his baby soap. They take very good care of him!

 Besides making forts downstairs, Kasen and Tai have also been playing a new game they made up called Books Give Us Power. I'm not sure exactly how they play it, but they are always telling me that that is what they are playing. Sounds good to me though!

Miss Tai Lynn LOVES spinning. And singing while she spins. She makes up all sorts of songs that crack me up. Her latest one was about tornadoes. "I'm stuck in a tornado! Tornadoes have dirty wind! Tornadoes have dirty wind with leaves! They suck up people with their strong, dirty wind."

She also LOVES getting the mail for us. Every day she goes outside to check the mailbox. She doesn't even ask to go anymore, it's more of an announcement.

Her most spoken phrase is, "You know, I love everyone." She tells everyone that she loves everyone and is always saying, "You know" either at the beginning or ends of her sentences.

Kasen's new thing is that when he says, "No" it's always "No no no", 3 times now.

Usually Kasen and Tai don't come wake me up in the mornings, but Kyle was up getting ready for work this morning and had brought Kohen into our bed so I could nurse him so Kasen and Tai came in for a cuddle and we started doing shadow puppets on the wall with my phone light. Kasen put his fingers together to make a porcupine and it was the best! It was just one of those magical mom moments when you become acutely aware of how blessed you are to be a mom. I sure love them.

Election Self Care Plan

Social media keeps asking me if I have a self care plan for after the election and keeps giving me tips for election anxiety... I didn't know that was a thing. Why is this a thing? But I thought about it anyways and my plan is this: Get on with my life because life goes on. The only thing I can control is my vote. I voted and that is all I can do. So whether my candidate wins or loses we will still have a president and I will still make the best of it. I will still be friends with all the people who didn't vote for Trump and I will move on because it is what it is. I will still do what I need to do to take care of myself and be kind to others. That is my job. So why worry about things we can't control? Maybe it's just my ultimate lack of competitiveness, but I don't care who wins the Superbowl or America's Got Talent or whatever board game I'm playing with my family and I'm not going to go out and throw a tantrum if the person I hope wins the election doesn't win. Why? Because if Biden really gets more votes, honestly, fairly and without cheating, then it's because more people in this country agree with his polices and positions and so he should win regardless of how much I disagree with him. That's just the way it works. All I really hope for is an honest election. I can't believe how many people want a win bad enough that they don't care about cheating to get it. I will teach my kids to be kind, civilized, contributing members of society regardless of who the President is. And I will teach my kids the importance and value of honesty, integrity and respecting authority regardless of who the President is.

I'm not very political though anyway. I don't watch the news and couldn't tell you what sort of deals or policies Trump has instituted during his presidency. I think politicians just tell people what they want to hear for the most part so why waste my time trying to assess who is the biggest liar and what exactly it is that they are lying about? Anyone who believes EVERYTHING they hear from any one side or any one media source is a fool. Because they are all dishonest in their own way. I did take a presidential quiz though and was 90% Republican so that was helpful in confirming what I thought I already knew about myself.

I voted for Trump because he supports our law enforcement, not defunding our police. Because I believe in our national security being the priority, LEGAL immigration and am pro life. I believe in gun rights and in law and order. I believe in not destroying our country or the things our citizens have worked hard for, respecting our nation's flag and I believe in the kind of freedom that doesn't limit me being able to go to church or talking about God in public. I believe in condemning ALL injustice. I do not believe in socialism. Socialism is not true freedom, it's laziness. I believe in self reliance and taking responsibility for earning what you need. That happens by creating jobs for people so they can work. I don't want free healthcare and free college education, I want quality. Quality of life should be each person's responsibility. Nobody should be entitled to receive money that someone else worked hard to earn. I want lower taxes and smaller government. 

I want people to be able to talk about and celebrate differences without hating or being offended by everyone that doesn't agree with you. It goes both ways. If you want someone to tolerate what you believe then you too must tolerate their beliefs as well. Silencing those that may disagree with you is the most hypocritical thing coming from those who preach love, peace and tolerance. I would never hate someone because of who they voted for.

Just be American.