All because I washed my windows

We finally had warm weather in Idaho for a few days and I finally got my front windows clean. As proof of how sparkling they are, we have had several birds fly straight into them already. Inspired by my cleaning, I decided to take a few pics of the kitchen, like I am always telling myself I am going to. Then, inspired by that, we ran down to Home Depot and finally bought new blinds for the kitchen windows. Happy day! So in honor, I thought I would do a couple of pictures of how our kitchen looked when we first moved in.

It wasn't horrible, but it was definitely wanting some updating! The different colors of paint were put there by me, trying to figure out what color to put in the kitchen. I didn't use any of them. I think I will do side-by-side pics, to make it look better! I think you can tell the difference between the befores and the afters.

 Not "done", but a lot better. It was really hard to change the kitchen with the kids running around, and having to clean up everything every night so we could use the kitchen again the next day.

One of the things we will do someday, is to replace the black dishwasher with a white one. But as long as this one holds out, I guess we will live with it. I would try to make it look better, but it is really old and I think won't last much longer anyway. I think it will look a whole lot better when we get a white one.

One of the very best things we've done was to replace all the old brown doors with new white ones. But the best of all was the french door going to the deck. It lets in so much light and makes it easy to know when the kids or the cat want in!

And here is a picture of the old blinds, as we tried to get them back down. They were so broken and we couldn't raise and lower them. It is soo nice to have new ones!

I should have turned off the light over the sink, but I didn't realize that until it was too late. And I am too lazy to try and take more pictures right now. I think you get the idea of what they look like. A lot better, that's what. And they look a lot better on the outside of the house, too!

To end this post, here are some funny things the kids have said:

Alaina is very aware now of "Mommy milk" and always says that she has "Lainey milk" and pretends to nurse toy rabbits and dolls and things. The other night Danny was getting her dressed for bed and she said, "I have Lainey milk, and you have Daddy milk!" Danny told her that no, Daddies don't have Daddy milk. She looked confused and asked, "Do you have cow milk?"

"No," said Danny.

Now thoroughly confused she asked, "Do you have apple juice?"

We have a set of little laminated dolls that represent good and bad behaviors. For example, there is Rudy Red and Greedy Green, or Bully Brown. This morning Tristan woke us up, very upset. Apparently Alaina wouldn't share a toy with him. He came into our room yelling, "Lainey's not being Polite Paula!!"

If Hannibal Lecter had children..

Whew! I am soo tired today! I just want to go curl up in my bed, that I haven't made yet. And that makes it seem all the more appealing for a nap. Mmmm... nap..... But instead I will try and catch you up on a few of the things that we have been doing here. So here goes!

Per my blog title, don't these look like Hannibal Lecter's children? They did this themselves and said that they were Hopper, the grasshopper off of Bug's Life. I think they look scary!

Alex scooted Emme up in her chair to watch him on the computer. Then he got up on the chair to dance like the animated Santa that he watches on YouTube. Danny hates it when he dances to it because he looks so silly. If Blogger will ever let me put videos on here, I will put one of him dancing to the Santa. I think it's hilarious. You can see that Emme is quite fasinated by it.

Tristan came running in yelling, "Lainey's naked in the sandbox!!" She likes to be naked a lot, and it took some convincing to get clothes on after this.

This is how we found Alaina sleeping one night. Doesn't this look comfortable?!

Emme is getting sooo big! She likes to lift her head and shoulders up when she is laying down and loves to watch her brothers and sisters. She smiles soo big whenever she sees Tristan. Probably because he talks to her all the time. She takes baths in the sink, because she is scared of the tub and screammms when we put her in there. But she just barely fits in the sink now. She is such a happy, contented baby and is so patient when I can't get to her right away. She does little giggle laughs and is a little flour sack.

She also loves to be flown around like an airplane. And she loves to lay on her back and have you sing to her. She coos back and tries her hardest to sing, too. She has really liked singing since she was a few days old. I'm sure as she gets older and becomes more discriminating she won't like my voice so much. But for now she sure does!!

I think this shows how cute and roundy her cheeks are. :)

She is always playing with her hands!

She thinks they are so cool!

This is a lot of pictures, but it was hard to decide! Sorry so many are blurry!

Alaina naked again, but at least this time she is wearing a shirt and cowboy boots, the only important items of clothing, anyway.

It was soo windy yesterday and Alex was flying his kite in the front yard and just about had it up in the power lines. So after dinner we took them all to the church field and flew his kite around.  It was so easy to get it to fly, the kids basically just stood there and up it went!

You can kind of see in this picture that Alex lost his front tooth, the one that stuck out funny. He fell off the chair, doing his Santa dance, and hit the tooth. I still had to pull pretty hard, but it finally came out. Good thing, too, because the new one is already coming in!

Do you see the kite way up there? That was all the string it had, but I wonder how high it would have gone if it had more string.

Walking home. Danny made the kids hot chocolate while I tried to mow the neighbor's lawn. Well, there aren't any neighbors there right now. Did I tell you it goes up for auction in July? Scary, 'cause whoever moves in will be our next door neighbor. Anyway, I couldn't get the mower to work right, then Justin pulled up from work, fixed it, and then mowed it for me. Wasn't that well planned on my part?

On a final note, did I tell you about the kids' cd that they listen to in the car? It has cute little songs, like Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star and so on. But there is one song on there and these are the words to it- "Ladybug, ladybug, fly away home. Your house is on fire and your children will burn." And that's all the lyrics, sung about 4 or 5 times! Doesn't that seem strangely morbid for a children's cd? Especially when I hear Tristan walking around singing it. "Your house is on fire and your children will burn."

To My Mammer-Loo

Dear Mommy,
  We've always called you Mommy, haven't we? Well, you didn't answer if we called you anything else! I'm glad. :)
  You've always been such a good Mommy to us. All my memories of my childhood are filled with happy things. Laughing and pretending, imagining and dancing and singing. Do you remember how you would have us lay on our backs and close our eyes and tell us stories full of wonderful things? Did you know one of my favorite things to do with my kids now is to tell them stories? But I am running out of ideas.
  You've always made life seem like some wonderful, grand adventure. When we would get lost going somewhere, it was always part of the adventure! Even when we didn't always have the things we wanted, you always showed us how wonderful life is and that life and loving are intrinsically good things that will always be there, even if things are down for a while.
  You taught us the gospel through your life and actions, not through preaching or lecturing. We saw your faith and did not doubt our Mother knew it. You talked to us about our Heavenly Father in daily life, as naturally as we would talk about the weather, because it was a part of our lives.
  You gave us our best friends, in each other. Somehow, we all grew closer through trials and challenges, and came out of it with the best friends we could ask for, which include you!
  You always saw the best in us- and I really mean that! I always wanted you to be at any of my performances or competitions, because you always sincerely believed that I was the best out of all of them. And you always told me specifically what I did that was great. You saw who I could be when I didn't believe in myself. And you encouraged me to pursue things, that I know I never would have on my own. And because of that I have found some of my greatest loves in life. And even now, I feel a confidence inside myself that I know comes from knowing that you would think I was great, and that I could accomplish anything.
  You ran and exercised and taught us about health, not looks. You ate fruit and vegetables and big bowls of mashed potatoes with lots of pepper, and I think that is why I always think that sounds so good. You read all the time and there was nothing you didn't know. Only Ben was willing to challenge you in a game of Trivial Pursuit, but we all gained a deep love of reading from you.
  When I was little I thought you knew everything and had no flaws, and I loved you for it. As I grew, I maybe was overly critical and thought I knew everything, and you loved me despite it. Now I know that you are a person, just like me, with strengths and weaknesses, but that you try every day to become the person the you want to be, and I love you more than I ever did before. You are one of my greatest heroes, and I am sooo glad that you get to be Grandma to my kids. I see in their eyes the same love for you that I have. Thank you for loving me and raising me and for sticking around to make life wonderful. I love you.