A Few Snapshots from My Blog Break

Here was my fabulous day (Yeah for toddler motherhood!)- oh and this was actually yesterday but I am just getting around to having time/energy to write tonight.

-So I was on call the night before- never a good omen.
-Kids woke up at 5:15 am.
-I semi-woke up and slumped around for the morning sneaking cat naps every 10 minutes.
-Tried to remember when Laura was coming over to look at family portraits.
-Laura then showed up as I finished that thought. I can not even begin to explain the state of my home- utter disaster- or my self- I had gone to sleep with wet hair so I had the full on Polly Lion Mane, tee shirt with a hole in it, no bra, no sleep circles under my eyes- very very bad.
-Just as I pull on a sweatshirt (my very pathetic attempt to be socially acceptable) father-in-law pulls up- unannounced to rake leaves. (Which kept Coen busy for an hour so that was great and we have three giant sycamores in the yard- so tons of leaves and Leonard raked the whole front yard even though he is allergic to them because he is a living breathing SAINT.)
-Laura sees the panic in my eyes and instead of looking at photos she cleans my kitchen because she is a living breathing SAINT (it may be genetic).
-Get final list of photos together- that was good.
-Lay down on bed- exhausted phone keeps ringing. During one call Coen falls off the bar stool and some how lands with his arm under the stool- the first of 3 major injuries for the day.
-While crying he then tells me that when I have a baby girl her name can only be Charlie. No others are up for consideration.
-We all nap. Because let's be honest that was all about survival.
-Wake up when Alma gets home from work, rush around to make dinner foe missionaries. Spaghetti squash never gets finished in time and I forgot about the salad in the fridge but other wise it was a good meal.
-right before Missionaries show up Alma point out that I might want to get dressed, and maybe do something with my hair. He offers to get in his PJs if it will make my outfit look a little better.
-The only clean clothes are the ones that live in the bottom of the drawer and haven't fitted since Beckett was born. I do not look good. Maybe the opposite of good.
-Coen wakes up just as the missionaries show up and wails and wails and wails, then he goes into my room and wails in there. Towards the end of dinner he comes in and sits on my lap and wails. Just as he is done crying injury #3 occurs (maybe caused by his mother) and the wailing restarts. This entire time Beckett is out eating the 2 missionaries, smiling and waving at them anytime they look over at him and rubbing food in his hair because it makes them laugh, over and over again.
-Alma asks missionaries to share spiritual thought as he is ready for tortuous night to end- and just as the one elder starts to read both boys really start to wail- the loudest of the night and it was already a loud night. His companion and I just start laughing- what are you going to do? The elder keeps pausing waiting for a quiet moment to continue- but between the screaming and now food throwing, the hysterical laughing it is just spiraling out of control. At this point Alma tells him to power through which makes the two immature adults laugh even harder.
-There are two young men who are now willing to wait a couple more decades before starting their families.
-Put Beckett in to tub. Coen decides he is ready to eat after everything is cleaned up.
-I go to check on Beckett to find that he has pooped in the tub. This is a usual occurrence in our home. The unusual thing was he didn't start wailing. Normally Beckett is freaked out by poop in the tub and screams like a girl in a horror films while he tries to climb over the edge. But today he just gathered all the poop in his toy fishing net and threw it across the room. I personally was impressed by the motor skills required to do this- not to mention the problem solving. Alma was less impressed.
-Finally boys to bed. Finally. And they curled up together in the crib, sharing the big Star Wars pillow (a hot commodity in our house) just a sweet as yo could imagine, the little liars.

So all in all an awful day with some great highlights- amazing service from Alma's family- I lost it completely by the end and just laughed at the absurdity- a nice talk with Becky and Coen was dry all day! And today the roller caster of motherhood just started all over again. Beckett answered the phone when Susie called and apparently chatted a little before he brought me the phone. Coen told us he loved us about a thousand times (I am not exaggerating). He also told Uncle Dave the barber that his dad's father was named Grandpa. We went to the library and I finally tracked down all the books floating around our home and turned them in! I haven't been caught up in months-thank goodness for renewing. I found a lot of great book about Thanksgiving- and some children's Thanksgiving poetry. They are just great and tomorrow I will list them on here so you can see if your library has them. Coen is big into listing what he is grateful for- mostly his family and cookies. Beckett is getting lots of words- read, ma, da, my da. my ma, me go, hi there, bye, book, bowl, yeah, no, out- and lots more.

And this happened tonight:

At least half of the game was trying to clean it up!

Last night I got home from the hospital pretty late to find this:

I love my little football obsessed kid.

I love the Fall

The Requisite Halloween Pictures

Here are my boys- not sure who handed down Coen's costume, but he found it in his closet and was sold. Beckett's was a K-Mart special bought on the 30th.




Isn't he just the most darling little carnivore? At music class another little boy was a lamb and they kept sitting by each other. It was so cute!

Friday we went to Grass Valley's toddler trick-or-treat. Probably my one and only trip as I hated the crowds. I felt a little inadequate as Andrea made this great costume for Summit and Breanne had sewed matching cotumes for her girls and her self. But you can't beat $8 at K-mart. And honestly I put way too much on my plate so I am trying to cut myself a little slack.

While we were walking around Beckett fell asleep mid sucker.

Saturday night we had hamburgers and went trick-or-treating with Alma's family. The big kids were so good with Coen. They walked with him the whole time and held his time. I love that they like to spend time with our little guy. Here is Annie as a mermaid.

Jessica and Beckett

The whole crowd. Coen pulled in quite a lot of loot. I found out later that at every house he would look up with his little sweet face and say "Two please." and everyone gave him extra. So for being the littlest guy he got the most loot. He has asked us to go trick-or-treating every day since, and cried when I packed up the spookey guys (skeleton Halloween decorations).

More crafting

So I went a little crazy making these cloth pumpkins. I loved them so much I just kept making them. I am a little sad that you can't see the brown corduroy that I just loved. Now where to put all these little guys. And don't you think I need a few more medium sized ones?

Some Crafting

I made this apron for Kate for her birthday:




And then we all had to try it on.

Me:

Coen:

Beckett:

What a Difference a Year Makes

My Football Fan

Coen is obsessed with football (no surprise in our house). He lines all his toys up "on the line". If Beckett moves them he screams "no- no he is moving my offensive line!" We play tackle all day and this morning he started practicing his kicking. I woke up to find this:



Later that morning he told me he needed his uniform, and his pads (oven mitts) and his face gaurd. The following is how this all came together. He played like this for an hour (only it was hard to throw the ball) and kept telling Beckett not to touch his face gaurd or he would get a penalty. I laughed a lot this day.

Fall Pictures

These didn't even need any editing (and I am too lazy to do it tonight!).

Out Trip to Papa Ray's

Well at some point last month we headed on over to Papa Ray's house. Coen was in hevan. He loves his Papa Ray. He talks about him all the time and whenever he is sad or pouty I ask him what is wrong and he usually says " I just miss my Papa Ray so much" or he says "I miss Lukey". So he was pretty excited when he realized Luke was there too, and Marshall- not to mention lots of activities with the cousins who live in the area. A good time was had by all. I didn't get any pictures of my favorite moment- lounging on the couches in the bar, the fire roaring, the lights down very low, listening to the juke box. Coen was mesmerized by it and just laid on the ground watching the bubbles ans listening to the music. We adults felt pretty relaxed too.

Here are some other things we did- We went to the beach- but Becky had her camera out so I didn't take many pictures.





We celebrated Isabelle's birthday



We went to the Montery Bay Aquariam with Papa Ray and Grandma Dee- The boys loved this, especially Beckett. I was afraid he would be too little, but we had to pry him away from every display. The seahorses and jellyfish were the boys favorite.

Some Things We Did While I Was on a Blogging Break

Still coming up: A trip to Aptos and Moterey, Liz (or Wiz as Coen says) and Sean's wedding, crafting, crafting, crafting, and my attempts at first day of school pictures.

Things we did that have no photographic evidence: I got lice- ick and have done about a thousand loads of laundry, Grandpa Holmes' memorial, lots of stress, and lots and lots of debate about Halloween costumes. I keep meaning to write about Grandpa Holmes- but for various reasons I just can't. Maybe I will be able to with a little more distance. Music classes have started which Beckett and I love and Coen is finally getting into. Fall color has hit and it is just breath taking driving to our home through all the old Victorian neighborhoods. We made an offer on a 4 plex, but they accepted and offer just hours before ours was submited. Strangely I was more upset about that not working out than I was the first house we offered on that fell through. We took a wonderful walk to gather leaves with Grandma Conley who is getting sweeter and sweeter with age- it is a little creepy- like some one else is in her body. When we got back to her house Dale and Dee were there for a visit. I always love to see Aunt Dee- she is so sweet (in an uncreepy way). I think you can see why I took a little break- Becky even stopped getting phone calls for a while (a serious sign of stress) which resulted in a panicked call from Dad to see if I was okay- which was pretty funny. But I am back and will be a better girl, I promise.