busy work

Helping with the dishes. It was all I could do to get her out of my hair when I was cooking dinner. But it worked plus she washed her hands and that is always a struggle for her.


Ben was eating a piece of a dinner roll and shared it with
boca



This is when he realized that it was GONE!



Mommy, I need a new bread!



Cheerios for breakfast anyone?

Thanksgiving dinner

I did my first Thanksgiving meal all by myself. Last year Mike did it and the year before his sister was here so we all helped out. But this time I did it start to finish all on my own. So the one thing I learned is that I am missing a few of the essential kitchen tools and I need to stock up on some more serving dishes/platters. Otherwise everything went well and everything was edible! Five Gold Stars for ME!

Ben loved his dinner. He smeared it in his hair and ears, but I spared you a picture of that.

Yummy dinner! Ashley ate her dinner "all gone"!

Snow time. We got a touch of snow today and Ashley was begging to go out and play.

scary

So my little sister works in a bank in Little Rock right off the base and today the poor girl got robbed. It was a really strange situation where the guy seemed to be "high" on something and told her he wanted 75.00. She asked for his account number and he closed his eyes and stood there for a while and then told her he wanted 3.00. Then he reached across the counter to her change rack and took a handful of quarters. He walked out and she told her manager who called the cops and the whole shebang. Then later he came back and waited in line because he wanted to talk to her and no one else...scary. She was able to take long enough with her current client that the cops were there before she had to deal with him. But crazy enough he lit up a cigarette while waiting in line. My oh my. Poor girl!


Then we just got the results from my nephew's dr who diagnosed him with epilepsy. So now they have to decide how to treat it with out causing more problems from the medications. Poor guy. I really hope that they are able to find a happy medium without too much medication or side effects. Yuck!

Oooey Gooey sticky lip gloss

So I was on the phone chatting with my friend Ellen. Of course I was trying to use my chatting time wisely by unloading the dishwasher at the same time. After a few minutes I noticed Ashley sitting at the computer desk so I walked over there to remind her that she is not supposed to be there and this is what I found. Oooey gooey sticky lip gloss squeezed out of the tube all over the keyboard. Yuck. I had to pop all the keys off to clean them because it had melted down in between the keys. It was terrible. Plus the lip gloss has a slimy, waxy consistency that was a pain to get off the keys.

She made me a Mr. Potato Head figure and was so proud of herself so I just had to have a picture. Love the smile too!

Okay, mom are you done yet?

Ashley insisted on eating a watermelon war head sour candy that she got for Halloween. It was too funny. Apparently she didn't like it too much cause she set it on the table...I turned around just in time to see Ben pull himself up to her table and pop it in his mouth....

and no I didn't get a picture of his sour face either because I was too concerned with getting the choking hazard out of his mouth. But here is a smile for you.

my curbside treasure...

So I was coming home yesterday and noticed that someone had put something out on the curb. I slowed as I drove by and my heart started racing. What was it you ask, a treadmill! I went home and very sweetly asked my hubby to go and get it. He not so sweetly told me he wasn't going to go down there and pick up a 200 pound (exaggeration alert) broken treadmill and drag it home, unless I went and knocked on the door to find out if it was functional. So I put my on walking shoes and marched my butt right down there and rang the bell. Sure enough I was told that it worked they were just tired of walking around it in the basement. So my hubby drudgingly drove down there to get it (I don't think he thought I would really go). We got it all set up this morning and yup, it really does work.

I love curb shopping!

My little plumber

Is that not the sweetest thing ever ;) I had to snap a picture of that.



My messy little boy

"wheelie tall, mom"

I knew there had to be another use for the blocks that Stampin Up sends with my orders....and Ashley was just the one to figure it out! Blocks!!!!


She was so proud!

Uggh

So after having Ashley potty-trained for a month we have since gone back to diapers. I am taking advice of others and letting her be the one in control. Plus I was getting sick of trying to keep up the laundry when she would pee in her pants sometimes 10 times a day! So I am now giving her the choice whether she wants diapers or big girl pants and we can try again in a little bit.

It's really frustrating! But I realized that I was the one fighting going back to diapers because that meant I was admitting I had failed. But I am not the one potty training, she is, and she is the one to has control over her actions. It took me a while to realize it but now that I did I feel much better about it. It just seemed as the more we pushed and encouraged the more she quit trying. So that's how it will be for a little while.

Otherwise nothing much going on here. I am in the thick of another round of classes so I am busy doing homework and writing papers, and taking tests. Oh so much fun! Oh well, I am on the final stretch of my degree, YIPPPPEEEEEEEEEEEE!

Oh and Ben cut his second tooth 2 days before Halloween. I thought he was just trying to get ready to eat some candy. He did try one sucker and boy did he love it. He screamed so loudly when I took it away.

Ben crawling

So here is Ben's version of crawling. I will have to try to capture some of him coming at me because it looks quite silly from that direction also. It is really funny when he gets moving fast.

Carving Pumpkins

She has the cheesiest smile lately. I love it. I think all kids go through a stage where they do this.



Ben just wanted to eat the pumpkin guts. Hehe, it's a vegetable right? One serving down


So here is Mike and Ben at 11:30 last night. Yes, Ben was awake at 11:30! He does a wierd late nap thing where he goes to sleep at 7 (like Ashley) but then wakes up around 9 to play for an hour or so and then hits the hay again. I don't mind too much because I am up anyway and then he sleeps in a bit longer in the morning.


Mike did this one and I just love it. The pumpkin is all warty looking so it looks cool even during the day.


This one I made for Ashley. I thought it was pretty cute.

My chuckle for the day

I saw this and it made me laugh. Enjoy!

Potty training HELP!

I am calling on all my more experienced Mommy friends for some potty training advice!

Ok, so here is the issue. Ashley did great the first few weeks of potty training with very few accidents. We did a potty chart that she filled up and earned a trip to the water park. She was staying dry most nights although I was still putting her in a diaper for bedtime. Everything was going too smooth :).

This past week she is peeing her pants constantly. Most times without even saying she has to go or trying to get to the potty chair. I tried to bribe her with a piece of candy corn for everytime she went and it worked for the first few days but now she is doing it again. I also tried to resurect the potty chart and still she's not too interesting in going to the bathroom.

So my question is what should we do. First response is to get mad and try time out or something but I know there has to be a better way! Help, I need some advice!!!!

Pumpkin Patch

Ben is so into balls he never wants to put them down. His new favorite toy is the dinosaur ball toy. Mike's sister M got it for Ashley when she was a year and boy he loves it way more than she ever did!


We took the kiddo's to the pumpkin patch. Ashley is hard to get pictures of now because she moves so quickly. Even if you get her to stop and smile it's only for a half second and then she is going again. Most of the pictures I got of her were either blurred or I got the back of her head.


Here is Ben in his bumble bee costume. It barely fits. But it will work for this year! It looks so cute because he is so rolly-polly.

He found a pumpkin and wouldn't let it go, of course, until his big sister Ashley stole it away in the wagon. How sweet huh!

Update on Ben

So I took Ben to his 9 month check up yesterday and he is 23lbs 15oz. They said he was in the 95th percentile for weight and 90th for height. So he is for sure a big boy! Otherwise he is doing great, besides being cranky from teething.

Here's a funny one of Ashley. She was trying to get her big baby to eat her dinner. She was quite mad that the baby wouldn't pick up the spoon to feed herself. hehe. I was just laughing while watching her explain that she needed to eat her dinner.

*I swear I have that same conversation with my little girl EVERY day*

Yay, Ben is 9 months old!

Yippee, Ben is 9 months old! He is doing well and is still the most smiley baby I have been around. I snapped a couple of his precious smiles this evening for you.

He's got a funny thing going on with his tongue which is probably because he CUT HIS 1ST TOOTH TONIGHT!!!

Here I think he is really just hamming it up so I have a cute picture for his 9 month page in his album (yikes, that I haven't started, bad mommy!)

Now here he is trying to show off how he started crawling, or scooting, or whatever you can call it. He works his arms well but only one leg is in the crawling position and the other is folded under him, but he gets around so that's what counts.

Now tell me this picture doesn't make him look older than 9 months, holy cow. What a big boy we have!

So yes, he started crawling, and cut his first tooth all on the day he turns 9 months!

Break from school

Man, I was really looking forward to my break between classes and when I went and looked today on the calender I realized I only have a week. Classes start on the 22nd, No fun! Usually it has been a little longer but oh well. I guess a week is better than none, right?

So for the next term I am taking:

Psychology Tests and Measurements & Minority Group Relations.

Should be fun! But now I only have one more quarter of required courses and then the rest are all electives. Yay!

Fall fun!

I love fall weather, I just don't like raking the leaves. Ok, well I don't mind raking as much as I hate getting the leaves into the bag. I did 5 bags 2 days ago and I swear if I went out right now I could probably get at least another 5 bags.

At least everyone enjoyed themselves though. I have to keep Ben in something because he likes to eat anything and everything, including leaves, grass and bugs. YUM, right!

Ashley had fun collecting the leaves in her trike and then I got to dump it in the can.

Oh and she also decided to make a bed in the leaves and as you can tell she improvised with a garbage bag for a blanket.

Potty Training Reward...the waterpark!

So we took the kids to the water park to celebrate Ashley and her new big girl skills.

Both kids loved the water. Ashley even went on the biggest slide with Daddy although when he asked her if she wanted to go again her was response was "NO!"
But she loved these slides. She even went down this one all by herself.

Here is Ben after we got them ready to go home and go to bed. It was a fun time but both kids were pretty wiped out.


here's a pic of Ashley on the way home. She is doing so great with her potty business.

Potty trained!!!!

YAY we finally have Ashely potty trained! Whooohoo! We started this past weekend and she is doing great. Today was the first outing in big girl pants and we went to the library for storyhour then to the BX. We had to visit the bathroom 3 times but only once made a deposit. I was just super happy that she didn't have an accident. Yay, we have a big girl on our hands.

Mike's Radio

So here is Mike's latest project a Philco radio from 1938. He bought it off ebay (we picked it up in Fargo) and stripped it down, sanded, refinished, replaced all the tubes and compacitors, order a new part for the dial and so here it is. The only thing left to do was to order the original fabric for the bottom as this has been changed. Oh and the darn thing really works. It picks up stations from all over, the other night we were listening to a Thailand station. It's pretty neat.

The only problem is now he is addicted to the old radios. Two days later we were at a garage sale out in the prairies of GF and came across one from 1935ish so he had to have that one too. Oh well, I got my crop-a-dile so I'll be happy for a little while :)