The in-laws

Saturday we got a call that Chuck's mother, sister, and brother-in-law were a few hours from us. Sister and BIL live in Michigan... Mother lives in Colorado. Sister comes to Colorado during the winter and stays with mom. This year they decided to do some traveling (they own an older RV) before settling in for the winter. They got mom from Colorado, went to Michigan, down to Florida (including Disney World and the Keys), over to Texas and all around. They stopped here over night on their way home to Colorado. It was nice to see them. I know that Chuck was really happy since he hasn't seen them since his other sister passed away in April '08. But they only stayed over night - they slept in their RV, but visited with us at the house - and left by 2 p.m. on Sunday. The excuse was that they were out of their medications and had to get home to fill them.

We decided to adopt...

Meet Gage, our new addition. He's 4 months old.

Hayleigh turns 11!

Hayleigh's birthday was the 17th.

But her sleepover was on Saturday.


Tinkerbell cake, friends, and presents... sounds like a party!

What was I thinking???!!!

I allowed the girls to each have a sleepover for their birthdays this year. Hayleigh's is next week - her birthday is the 17th. Kodi's birthday was the 9th - so her party was last night. What the ---- was I thinking???!!! Seriously, I think I must have been drunk, on drugs, asleep, or totally out of my mind when I agreed to this. Not just a sleepover - 12 and 13 year olds! Teenagers?! Of course there was a lot of screaming and giggling, but there was a lot of rudeness and crudeness. Mainly from 3 of the 10 - yes 10 - girls that were there. I do not ever remember acting like that at someone else's house. They didn't even clean up after themselves - that's just rude. On the plus side... Kodi had fun. Happy birthday Kodi... we will NEVER do this again! but I love you dearly.

Spongebob cake


Dakota got a nearly 6 foot Peter from the Family Guy. Actually Family Guy is banned in my house. I personally don't care for it... but the reason it is banned is because I feel it is inappropriate for my children. Unfortunately, Dakota doesn't agree and it's one of her favorites. Fortunately, she abides by the rule (most of the time) and doesn't watch it at MY house. (BTW... Simpsons are banned too. I know, horrible mom.)

Dakota and Deklan "pose" with Peter

Dakota got a Spongebob gift card. She was more excited over Spongebob than the monetary amount.

She also got a Spongebob pinata - no candy, just the pinata.

And my favorite gift for her was a 4-pack of Monster drinks! She's not allowed to drink those unless her daddy is home - she has ADHD and those put her over the top for me. She got a new cell phone from us. Both the girls did. A few weeks ago both of their phones broke within a few days of each other - Hayleigh fell off her bike and cracked her screen (it was in her back pocket) and Kodi's kept turning itself off until it just wouldn't come back on. So they each got a Gravity at a very reasonable price... and the payments are split out on my bill so I didn't have to pay anything but the taxes up front. However, it was with the understanding that they would not get a gift on their birthdays because the phones were the only presents. They both agreed and are loving their phones. Anyway...

Deklan got to enjoy some of the party too.



These pictures are just because I can! Kodi was being a spaz and I have the pictures to prove it! HaHaHa!

Chances

Deklan to me...

"Mom, if I had the chance to trade you to another family, well that's a chance I just wouldn't take."

13 years ago today....

Dakota Lyne was born! Today is Kodi's birthday and she's officially a teenager. I don't know whether to laugh or cry.


These are her first official pictures as a teenager, taken this morning before school.

Christmas Play

Hayleigh was in the choir for the Christmas play on Sunday.

Bits and Pieces

First, we had a wonderful Thanksgiving with my mom in Oklahoma. The kids had a great time too and they were actually pretty good. Very little arguing and fighting. Deklan was an absolute angel although he lived in pull-ups the whole week - couldn't get him to use the bathroom to save his life. But it was ok - he was still really well behaved. We had our Christmas with her and my brother and sister-in-law. The girls both got gift cards to get new bikes - which we picked out the day after we got home. They got lots of things and were extremely happy.




Deklan told me last night that I have too many jobs and neglect him and his sisters. Excuse me??? Remember that I'm a stay at home mom - I do not work outside the home. My "jobs" are PTO president at one school, PTO member at another, Girl Scout leader, and volunteer when needed. My life practically revolves around him and his sisters. I go to the meetings once a month just so I can talk to adults. He said that I needed to quit one of the PTO's because I didn't have enough time for him. He said I didn't watch family movies with him anymore; that I don't cook enough for him; that I sleep too much on the weekends and leave "other people" (a.k.a. daddy and/or sisters) in charge of him who won't let him do what he wants to do - which I do occassionally catch a nap, but usually he is completely occupied with other things and he's never unattended. It was kind of funny, but he was completely serious. So, we were in the car running errands at this point, and I was planning on taking him and Hayleigh (Dakota was at a school dance) to McD's playplace while we were out. I told him, "Wow, I guess we shouldn't stop at McD's then... I should take you home and cook for you... I don't want to neglect you... so, yeah, we'll just go on home and I'll cook something." He said, "No, No, you wouldn't be neglecting us... it would be ok if you took us to McD's... that's not neglecting us, really." Too funny!

What else? Oh yeah - cut my hair... what do you think?


Had a busy day today. Hayleigh had play practice for the church play first thing this morning. From there it was directly to a Girl Scout event. Our Girl Scout troops, along with Boy Scouts, got to participate in the "Royal Flush" at the new Intrust Arena in town. Basically, we were all assigned to a bathroom. On count down everyone flushed a toilet or turned on a faucet. The idea was to see if there was any over flowing or if everything went well. As far as I know... everything went well. Then I had enough time to drop the girls off at home, change clothes, and get to a GS luncheon for the leaders. It was fun - we had a Christmas sock exchange this year. That was different, but still fun. Then it was back home to get the fam and head out to the store. Dakota's bike had to be returned... rode it down the block and the chain messed up. Took it back but couldn't find a replacement at the first store... 3 stores later we found what we were looking for. Actually had dinner out tonight - that was a nice change. Tomorrow will be just as busy. It starts out with Hayleigh needing to be at the church at 8:20 a.m. for acolyte, play at 9:40, lunch, etc., play again at 6:00 p.m.

Both of my girls have birthdays in the next two weeks. Yep, my oldest becomes a teenager! So hard to believe that 13 years ago I was extremely pregnant with my oldest. 13 - waaaaaah! My middle baby will be 11! That's almost as bad.

That's the catch up for now. If I'm not back on soon... Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Happy Kwanzaa, Happy Holidays, Season's Greetings, or however you celebrate during the holidays.

Please do not buy this book

About 7 months ago a friend's niece died while in the care of Jeanette Lawrence. The child was only 2. She was left unattended for a period of more than a few minutes and the results were fatal. I believe the DA is still trying to make his case in court so I do not know the details except that the child died and it could have been prevented. The little girl was only one of several that was in her care that day. After the incident, it was determined that the woman should not have had as many children in her care as was that day. Now it turns out that Jeanette Lawrence has published a book... Your Child's Daycare: Everything You Need to Know From Start to Finish. It is even being sold by amazon.com. Please do NOT buy this book... encourage others to NOT buy this book. Amazon.com will not remove the book from their list because it would be considered censorship.

Halloween 2009

The kids did some neighborhood trick or treating and then we went to the church for "Trunk or Treat"... then more neighborhood trick or treating. Kodi had her first Halloween overnighter at a friend's house. Of course I did take her and a friend trick or treating with the little ones before the party... she can't grow up too fast! Anyway, here's costumes for this year. We didn't have the money to buy new costumes so we worked with what we already had in the house.

Deklan is a Ninja. I actually bought the Ninja costume for a dime after last Halloween. It should have been big enough (it's a 7), but he had a big growth spurt over the summer so it was a little short and snug... he didn't care, he wanted to be a Red Ninja. When he got cold I gave him my sweatshirt to wear, which he swam in... he said he was the "Ghost of the Red Ninja" and thought it was great. Funny.


Hayleigh was a cheerleader... with a little tweak of the makeup, hair, and gloves. Surpisingly, this was actually Kodi's cheer outfit from when she took cheer in kindergarten.



Kodi was Abby Sciuto from NCIS, complete with spider web tattoo. (Actually, I drew it on with a makeup pencil.) My favorite show is NCIS with the CSI branch closely following (except Miami... I can live without that one, but still watch it). Abby is our favorite character on the show. She looked great and everyone recognized her right away.

We also had a special guest for Halloween... He lives on my porch.


Since I'm terrified of spiders, he doesn't get messed with.

Great Weekend

We had a wonderful weekend. We took our Girl Scout troop to Great Wolf Lodge in Kansas City. It was Bythia (the leader), her husband Roger, my husband Chuck, myself, and then there were eight girls from our troop plus both our younger girls and Deklan. The total was 15. We all rode in one large van, but it really wasn't too bad.

The lodge has a large indoor water park. There is a "magi quest" for the kids. Basically you get a wand and a map and wander around the four floors of the lodge looking for different interactive items. When you point the wand at the item it talks to you... "you've found 50 gold pieces" from a trunk, "don't point that thing at me" from a fairy in a bird cage, etc. They even had trick or treating for the kids.

It was fun for the girls. Of course there was also an arcade, a couple of stores, and a candy shop (great fudge!). On the way home we stopped at Palmer's candy store. The girls really enjoyed themselves and it was a mini vacation for my family since my husband got to go.


Chuck poses for the camera.Kodi's turn. Next is Hayleigh. Don't forget little D!
Deklan poses in front of the big clock.
Here's the inside of the water park. It was really big - 3 water slides, a lazy river, a swimming pool; a kid's area with a shallow pool, two baby water slides; a large play area that had lots of water sprayers and two more small water slides.

There is a bucket at the top of this that dumps 1,000 gallons of water every 5 minutes.
I think Roger was about ready to go at this point.
This is my hubby - sweet swim trunks huh? LOL
Deklan... the life jackets were free and easily accessible to anyone who wanted to use them.
Kodi is about to do something - look at that evil face.




Of course Kodi couldn't keep from texting for very long. Here we're done with swimming for the moment, but she can't even change clothes before checking her text messages.


There was a tree house in the middle of the lodge restaurant. Don't touch the bears.



They were having a creative pumpkin contest. Here are my three favorites.



The elk were on the wall above the doors. The wolves were above the fireplace.
The clock and little house-looking thing was the back side of the elevators.
The bear sits outside of the candy shop / Starbuck's in the lodge.
Of course there has to be the McDonald's stop for lunch before leaving KC to come home. Palmer's candy shop was our last stop. We got to hype them up on sugar all the way home (approx 3 hours) and then give them to their parents! :)