December 10, 2011

Askited

Once Gus decides how a word is said there is no going back.  So here are a few things Gus is askited about!  We went to Bass Pro Shop and took a picture with Santa.  I told him to smile big and we ended up with this gem:


The other thing Gus is askited about is getting out of this sweater when it was 75 degrees in November.  Poor kid was perspiring profusely!


December 8, 2011

That's right!

I wore Birkenstocks with socks yesterday and I loved every minute of it. It was amazing! I'm bringing it back, don't try and stop me.  Join me, you know you miss it.

November 28, 2011

Tasty Lemonade



You know the saying, "when life gives you lemons, make lemonade." When Leah passed away on October 29th that's all I could think about because she is the most beautiful example of this to me.  Right after she finished several rounds of chemotherapy she lost all of her hair.  We had a family Halloween party and we expected her to be feeling a little down about it, but we were pleasantly surprised. She made lemonade out of lemons, or better put the perfect Uncle Fester costume out of a bald head!  It's hard for me to express how much I'll miss her, but man that was some tasty lemonade!



November 27, 2011

The beautiful Caboodle



On a recent visit to Target, Gus was thrilled when he found the perfect item.  A purple glittered Caboodle, a most glorious treasure.  He whined and complained, stating he would like to spend all of his hard earned money on this box.  I told him, all of his change he has earned over the months would be mine, and he was cool with it.  We drove home and I told him, that I would have saved my money and bought something else later.  He decided after much pondering that the box should go back, but he did have me take pictures and every time he would walk by it he would tell whoever was in ear shot, "man, this great box is really beautiful huh?"  Such a funny kid.

November 14, 2011

A Halloween with cousins


We were able to do our trick-or-treating with cousins this Halloween because everyone was in town.  It was so much fun going to Aunt Debbie's neighborhood, they are close houses which makes for optimal candy gathering.  The kids came back with so much loot, it was out of control.  Gus decided to be an ocopus again, at the last minute.  It really is a cute costume, but he is so wiggly and excited to get trick-or-treating.  James, was of course a lumber jack with his amazing beard.  He has since shaved, and I am so sad about it.

October 25, 2011

Witches Brew

My friend hosted a Halloween party and gave us all a witches hat to use as the foundation to our costumes (which would be judged and awarded prizes).  I have some of the most crafty friends in the world, so I knew I had to do something that was more random that crafty.  I starched, pinned, blow dried, stitched and painted my hat until it resembled the Sorting Hat from Harry Potter.  It looked pretty cool, and I was proud of how it turned out.  I'll post more pictures later of all the cute witches at the party.

C25K

For those of you that might not know this acronym is, let me clue you in... it stands for couch potato (ME) to 5K.  I got this app for my phone that times my runs, and is supposed to take me from a non-runner state to running a 5K without stopping... in 9 weeks!  I read over the schedule, and it definitely starts you out slowly.  I'm on week 3 and I can now run for 3 minutes without stopping, which really is quite the feat for my feet.  I invested in these amazing shoes that feel like baby pillows (until I start running.)  I'm hopeful that I will continue my progression.  If you see me, ask me about my running...if I give you a vacant stare or some lame excuse, punch my throat and tell me to keep running.

September 22, 2011

Want us to rent your house?



So we are hoping to have our house sold and taken care of in the next few months... so we will be looking for a place to rent.  I'm putting this out for everyone who knows anyone renting a property out.  We will be amazing renters; we are crazy clean, James can fix most things himself and we will be very kind to their home.  What we need is a 2/3 bedroom, 2/3 bath, SAFE, not too far from MCC, far away from train tracks.  That's it, nothing crazy... oh yeah, and a reasonable price.  Don't you want us to rent your house?

September 13, 2011

Year #2

We decided to do an overnighter again with the girls.  It was a fun, sleepless weekend; which included swimming pool politics, cannonball contests, a 4lb. ice cream sundae, and a bit of toilet papering, and best of all Lenor came as a surprise to all of us.  It wouldn't have been the same without Lenor, so happy she tricked us all. Good times.

August 22, 2011

So, awesome

I just love it when at 1 a.m. I get woken by a sweet, precious sound.... some crazy drunk lady pounding on my door and windows of my house.  It really is so adorable, when I get woken from sleep to this craziness.  I get to call my best friends, the police and they get to come and arrest the crazy lady.  It is such a special time for us, we love it.


For reals, we want to move.  Last night solidified that feeling for me. I do NOT want this to be Gus' neighborhood while he grows up.  I do not want any more "funny" stories about the wild things that happen in my neighborhood.  I want to complain about peoples overgrown lawns, not about how their drug deals are keeping me up at night.  I need some ideas, any real estate gems out there?  How can we get out of our completely upside down house, I'm serious, share your wisdom with me.... please.

August 9, 2011

Back talk

James was having a talk with Gus because he was being a stinker.  James held him on his lap.  "Gus what you're doing is back talk, and it's not appropriate." Gus replies " No dad this isn't back talk, it's front talk."  Opening his eyes large so that James could clearly see his front.  It was so hilarious, I could not control my laughter. 

August 4, 2011

What would you do??

So lets maybe start a little debate, I'm just curious about peoples point of view on this:


Lets say you are injured at a friends house, random accident... what are your thoughts about going after the home owners insurance??  What do you think?

August 1, 2011

Chi Chi

Our foster care experience was far different then I had imagined it would be.  To be honest, I don't think I really knew what to expect.  When we agreed on fostering, I was very plain about ensuring that we only took children that were ready to be adopted.  I expressed that in every way possible to the people who trained us, but they want you to foster... they push it.  They want you to adopt to, but they all say you foster to adopt.  So we agreed to foster and hoped and prayed we would be able to adopt.  The calls started coming, so many kids needing a safe home to go to.  We would pray, and nothing felt right.  Then we got the call for Chi, it felt good.  Four hours later he was in our home.  It was bizarre, we weren't prepared for a 10 month old baby.  I ran to the store, set up the crib, tried to think of everything, and my dear friends helped fill in the gaps with bags full of necessities.  It took Chi about two minutes to get comfortable, he just wanted to be held and loved.  He was an amazingly sweet boy, he adapted to our schedule like a champ.  The more information I got about Chi the more I started to care.  His history, his life... it had been hard.  I wanted to invest all my love and attention into him, but I was also very guarded.  I did not want to care so much and then have to send him back to that life.  My emotions were torn, I opted for babysitter mode.  It was all I could do to protect my emotions from getting to attached and having my heart ache for him.  The onslaught of extra "help" in my life was daunting as well.  I have never felt more on display and judged in my whole life.  People were calling and dropping in to check, assess, drive Chi to appointments, and check on my emotional state.  The ball dropped on a day when I was having a crap mom moment.  Gus had been in time out about 5 times by 10:00am, he didn't enjoy Chi, he didn't like sharing mom with him  (standard kid procedure.)  I started to resent the whole situation, my son wasn't happy, Chi was having to deal with that unhappiness and I was so worn out trying to make sure everyone had their needs met.  I was visited by a case worker... awesome timing.  I broke down, I told her I was really struggling.  James and I had long talks and days of back and forth.  Why had we felt so inspired to do this, and had we gotten it wrong?  I prayed to understand what I needed to do, suck it up and tough it out, learn some lesson and make life changes...what?  Even though Chi wasn't "ours" it was one of the hardest things I had to do to call and tell them we needed to move him to another home.  I was heartbroken and felt like such a failure, like I had failed that sweet boy who needed so much love.  We learned so much from the experience, so many things we need to improve and change.  I think it was such a blessing to our family, and hopefully we made some small impression on Chi.  I still miss him, and oddly Gus still talks about baby Chi.  It's interesting the way our Heavenly Father teaches us things, he made some of my greatest weaknesses known to me so that I can work on making them strengths.  So, although it didn't work out we are grateful for the experience and pray that we grow from all that we learned.

July 20, 2011

The world as Gus sees it







I gave Gus rights to my old camera, he will walk around and take pictures of this and that.  It is awesome to see all the funny things he sees.  Apparently James and I are on the couch a lot :)

June 16, 2011

A trip of firsts

Our trip to Oregon was awesome.  It was so great to be able to spend time with the Websters in that beautiful Oregon weather.  I sure miss my Lenor, but it makes me happy she went to such a great place to visit.  I took so many pictures, but I just wanted to post a few to show the highlights of our visit.
Gus' first plane flight, he loved every minute of it. 
Lake of the woods, the boys spent hours throwing rocks into the lake and we successfully prevented any of them from falling in headfirst.

Our Harry and David tour was so delicious, the smell of the popcorn and candy was impossible to resist.  Good thing the tour ended at the store and with some samples.


Our trip to Crater lake ended with no view of the lake, but a fun time in snow.  Gus has never seen snow fall from the sky, and he was fascinated.  It gives us a good reason to head back to Oregon, we definitely want to see that lake, we heard it's beautiful.

We went on a jet boat tour of the Rogue river.  It was really cool, we saw bald eagles, osprey and blue herring.  The boat captain did some spin outs, and I was amazed Lenor didn't lose any of her kids over the edge. 
We stopped at this random farm/ bakery on the way home and had the most delicious cookies.  It was the cutest little place.



I went to the Redwoods as a kid, but I don't really remember it that well.  It proved to be as spectacular as everyone says.  It's just crazy to imagine trees that big and pictures don't really do it justice.  Again, one of those things you just have to see.



We drove up the Oregon coast and I felt like I was in the movie Goonies (which was in fact filmed in northern Oregon.)  It was misty and the random rock outcroppings were so cool.  We headed to the beach and spent enough time for Gus to get bowled over by the waves.  The sand was so fine and soft, almost like dust. We had such a great time.  In all fairness if I was to show the real highlights I would have more pictures of Lenor's meals.  She is the best cook, and all her dinners were so delicious.  We love the Websters and we will certainly be going back soon.