Candy Corn Counting

Today, Max worked on math, officially, for the first time. He knows his numbers, but this was a really good, challenging exercise for him! I loved to watch his little brain work!

I can't remember where I saw this, but I put exactly the number of candy corn that he would need in a bowl with the instruction that if he ate any before he was done, the project wouldn't be correct...uh-oh. He didn't eat one!

I have a feeling we'll be doing this more often with different mediums!

Halloween Fun

Today we had a fun-filled day of Halloween activities. I love it when there's lots to do!

We dropped Max off at Preschool, and Ivy and I headed to our friend Carrie's house for our ward story time. It's been so fun that so many moms and their babes come to story time every friday. We've had a great turn out and I'm so pleased with how well it's going!

Ivy and I left story time a stitch early so I could drop Ives off with Daddy, so that I could go to Max's preschool Halloween Party. He got to wear his Halloween costume to school today and was so excited about it!

This is him and his friend Lindsey trick-or-treating around the community center.

We had snacks and did a bean bag toss game. But his favorite part was wearing his costume. I loved to see him interact with his friends from school. It was fun to see how well-liked he was amongst his peers. Cute kids.

After our quiet time/nap time, we rode bikes for a while and then broke out the pumpkins. Jeff's been gone nearly every night for the last 3 weeks or so! and won't be around for the next few nights, so that left me to carve 3 pumpkins with 2 kids all by myself. I pictured it being a disaster, but it was fun! In California, or at least in HB, I've learned that if you carve your Jack-O's more than 2 or 3 days before Halloween, you won't have pumpkins on the big night. They mold and cave in faster that I have ever seen. holy! So, 2 days before Halloween should be about right, I think...and we'll still have to bring them in at night. weird. Anyways, Max loved scooping out his pumpkin and did most of it by the time I got to helping him. (I scooped out the one for dinner on Sunday, and then scooped Ivy's and then helped Max).

They both loved the slop.

I enjoy that Ivy had a seed living in her hair.

Max told me the shape, and location of where he wanted his face. Told me how many teeth on top and on bottom...here's his "scary face". Ivy just got an I for Ivy, but I should have just done the same with her...it was fun to let him pick what and where.

Can't wait for more Halloween fun at Trunk-or-Treat tomorrow!

Playgroup Central

We've been busy the last two weeks scheming up activities for the letters I, J, K and Halloween. While Max is at preschool, Ivy's been going to a little playgroup at her cute little friend's house. It's so nice to have a couple of hours twice a week to get stuff done! The last two weeks, we've gotten to have the little girlies over to our house. Here are a few of my favorite pics of Ivy from our fun days.

Eating Popcorn from an ice cream cone for 'I' day. {the popcorn was supposed to resemble ice cream}

playing ring around the rosies with Maddy and Bryn...{after our letter activities are done for the day, they get to play!}

they all fall down...

Jumping on the hopscotch rug for 'J' day

Dressing up like a Kitten and learning all about them on 'K' day

trick or treating with the 3 other witches in our neighborhood

and decorating felt Jack-o-lanterns

now I get a MONTH break!

woo hoo!

Fall Favorite!

I look forward to a tradition with my friend Kim to make her special Apple Pie A la mode Caramel Apples each October. Oh My Yum!

We made them yesterday, and lucky for me, Jeff doesn't like carameled apples...{weirdo}

...more for me!

18 month Player Profile

Ivy had her 18 month Dr's appt. this past week. It was awesome. Can I tell you how much i LOVE our Pediatrician? It took a pediatrician with a really poor bedside manner and a horrible front office for us to realize how amazing our pediatrician was in Arizona. So we switched to a recommendation from a friend and he is soooo great. so so great.

Ivy is growing like...a weed. yes! she used to be in the 9th percentile for weight...teensy. But now, she's somewhere between 10-25% AWESOME!

Here are her official 18 month stats:

Length: 32.8" (75th%)

Weight: 22 lb 6 oz (10-25th%)

As we left the Dr's office, both of us got a big hug from our Doc and he tells me: "you're doing a great job, mom"

sigh... whether I am or not, thanks for telling me that! I'm trying! He probably tells everyone that...but I REALLY appreciated it.

thanks to Kim for our cute pic of Ives

Mousser Cousins

Sometimes I'm sad that on the Mousser's side of the family, all of the cousins are older than my kids. Jeff's brothers are all 12 years or more older than him. Max is lucky enough to have Easton and Jacob his age, but poor little Ivy's got no one to play with, and it'll keep going from there.

BUT

it's times like these, like when we went to visit AZ for Ali's baptism the other weekend, that I KNOW they are so lucky to have older cousins, and I wouldn't trade it. The older cousins {seem to} LOVE to play with them. My kids get all their attention, everyone wants to hold Ivy, everyone laughs at their crazy tricks, I don't even have to think twice with regards to where they are when we're with the family...do I even have kids when we're there? One of the girls is always with Ivy and the Mousser boys have enough energy to keep Max running for hours.

we Loooove our cousins!

that's what I was thinking about today.

so,

Dear Kaite, Aimee, Tyler, Julie, Brett, Kayla, Lexi, Bubba, Emma, Ali, Ashleigh, Jacob & Easton,

we are sooooo thankful for you!

Ivy's Words

Until about 2 days ago, Ivy's been saying Max's name without the 'x' sound at the end...that's how most babies have said his name...it's totally cute. But now, she's mastered her version of 'x' and I loooove it. No one will probably like this but Grandmas, but while I was recording "max" I thought I'd record how she says enough words to fill up 30 seconds {cause that's all my phone will do}. Here's Ibes

Helping make Apple Pie

I pilfered through my sister in law's FHE stash when I was in Washington a few weeks ago and stole a few of hers to copy. One of the packets I stole was on music...and how it can make us happy, and comfort us when we're sad or scared. It was a really cute lesson, we learned about a bunch of different situations when music helped comfort a group of people from the scriptures. BUT the best part was the activity.

Our kids loved it.

We had a bunch of apples that were cut out of cardstock and on each of them was the name of a primary song. There was a corresponding CD in the packet, and the kids got to help mom make apple pie. They'd put on a mini apron, a chef's hat (both of which I got from another sister in law and now I'm so excited I took them when she offered (thanks, Becky), they grabbed their wooden spoon and picked an apple out of the bag. We played the song while the helper stood in front of the fam and directed the music for us while we sang. Then put the apple in the pie tin, and it was the next little's turn. Oh my, so cute! Max looooved it, and enjoyed dancing around while conducting.

Ivy stood rooted to her spot and shook that spoon like she meant it. Huh-larious!

Such a cute lesson, Katie, thanks for letting us copy it! We can't wait to do it again!

Field Trip!

We went on the first Sandy Toes and Popsicles Field Trip yesterday to the Cal Poly Pomona Pumpkin Field. It was the most ginormous pumpkin patch I think I've ever seen...with 90,000 pumpkins for us to choose from!

Max was in heaven running around with Jill and her friend Hope's older boys that were there...running all over this huge pumpkin patch. It was well worth the drive.

Ivy was mesmerized and didn't quite know what to do with herself.

After we perused the patch, we sat down and had a picnic with our small group. Jill had prepared a bunch of really cute little snacks for us, and it was nice for us to sit in the shade while the kids played on a big, old tractor.

Ivy's little cheese-er grin...

Ivy and her friend Maddy got a little bit of time on the tractor alone...girl's turn. The kids played so hard, and Max totally zonked the whole way home...

Thanks, Michelle for such fun pictures! You're awesome!

Thanks, Jill for setting the field trip up for us, we can't wait for the next one!!!

So Excited!

The time has FINALLY come!

My parents have been living in the "guest house" on the top of their {beautiful, by the way} barn for {has it been} years?

They had to sell the house that I grew up in first before they could start work on this one, and then work to design the perfect dream house for them on a 10-acre lot in the middle of the forests of Western Washington.

They've finally broken ground, and begun to build!

I can't wait to see!

ps...dad...you ruined the fire pit! you better build a new one before we come again!

Surprise!!

This weekend we got to go see this pretty girl be baptized! The best part was that we surprised her, and it was so fun! Max, Ivy and I took a really, really quick trip to Arizona to be there to watch Ali. She was beautiful, and the baptism was perfect!

We got to hang out with our friends Brooke and Kirk and their kids, with my cousins Cody and Michele and their kids, and right before we left, we got to spend time with Grandma and Grandpa..here's Ivy with her hammie smile saying cheeeeese!

So fun to surprise you all, thanks, Becky for letting us crash at your house, and for keeping it such a good secret!

Ivy's 18 months!

Our little Ivy-Twine turned 18 months old on October First! She is a little spitfire yummy girl and we LOVE her. Here are a few things that I want to remember about Ives at 18 months.

She'd rather drink milk than ever eat food, but if we can get her to forget that milk exists until after a meal, she'll eat like a champ!

She does not enjoy sitting in shopping carts, in fact, one of the things on her chore chart that she can get a sticker for is to stay in the grocery cart the entire time we are at the store. Seriously. She throws some awesome fits.

She loves to be chased by Max.

She loves to have dance parties and gallops around while music is on. She's so funny!

She still sucks her thumb, and constantly has her hair in her face, try as I might to keep it out. She calls me "Mammy". She calls Max "ma." She calls Jeff "Da-ee."

She loves cucumbers, especially the seed parts, and is known to dig a hole through the center, eating only the seeds.

She loves Ham, Eggs, Milk and Fruits and Veggies

She loves to read books

She loves to sing songs with us before bed

She's awesome at folding her arms for prayers and closing her eyes

She loves to play with wood puzzles

She loves to go to her playgroup with her friends, just like Max does.

-Words she says the most: NO! (sad), Yep, milk, hi, please, thank you, mammy, Daddy, Max, ready, yellow, sorry

ooooh, we are so lucky to have this little pretty in our family! Max adores her, and so do we! She is such a joy and we looove her!

where have I been?

I have been such a slacker lately...sheesh!

So I haven't taken my camera very many places, and we've done fun things...we finished up Dland with a mommy-son date to World of Color, which Max LOVED and got to stay up super late for, we've played at the park, and played in the back yard TONS. Here are a few things that we've been doing that I did actually catch on camera:

We went on a free tractor hay ride at Tanaka farms one Saturday with our friends Kim and Hudson.

i love autumn time and i especially have a crush on these real white pumpkins!

Anything free, we're all over! It was fun to walk from Kim's house to the farm to check out the little petting zoo animals and all the pumpkins. It was the perfect 'get in the mood for autumn' activity.

Max and Ivy love to paint in the backyard. LOVE.

we've been swimming in the back yard, it's been so hot up until the last couple of days!

(i think we need a deeper pool if we're going to be jumping off the side)

Ivy and Max can play in the shark pool for hours. So grateful for our backyard!

It's been 8 whole weeks since Max broke his arm...Dr. Hrasky said that Max couldn't jump, climb, run, i don't know, anything boy-ish for 8 weeks. Well, slowly I've been relaxing about him jumping around all over the place {are you kidding? what are we supposed to do? watch movies all day long?} but the rule was, he wasn't going to get back on his bike until that 8 weeks was up. So, we swam all day, and then evening time came, we got out of the pool and were about to eat dinner...and then ride bikes....and then it started pouring out of no where...no bike. oh, so sad! So, 8 weeks and 1 day, here's Maxer hoppin' back on the horse. I thought he'd have a little hesitancy. nope. flashbacks, nope. he kept singing: 'umabee, uma-uma-umabee' because his bike looks like Bumbebee from Transformers, and there just so happens to be a song that, according to Max is about Bumblebee, by the Black Eyed Peas. You know the one? And don't worry, he was filling it up with gas, too.

and he's been asking to ride it every day, ever where we go. The boardwalk, the park. We'll see how brave I get.

Conference weekend: I was determined to watch some of it! I haven't watched conference, really, for a long time. So, after practicing with our tent, we set up our tent and the lap top to be just like King Benjamin on top of the tower and all the people setting up their tents around him to listen to their prophet. Here's us. They had a little activity booklet to color while they were in there.

It sounds like an awesome idea, right? I thought I was pretty tricky. But lets be honest....I still really didn't get to watch conference, try as I might. We weren't reverent around here. At all. And the activity book only lasted about 2 minutes into the first talk. I should have figured, their teeny! but I was admittedly bugged. They did have fun in the tent, though and i listened to more talks than I have in a long time.

and just so you know...as a side note, can I tell you that I 'don't prefer' not going to church on Sunday. Especially when Jeff isn't home. All Day. It makes for the longest day in the history of the world. seriously.

But, today's Monday, and life is good!