Raspberries

We decided this year a buy a raspberry bush in hopes that next year we would get some berries from it. After leaving it in it's small pot for weeks on the deck Johann finally just put it in the ground near our garden box hoping to keep it alive.

We got 5 other shoots from a friend and planted them in our raspberry patch, but sadly none of them took and we ended up with 5 dry pokey raspberry sticks planted in the ground.

When we got back from our trip this summer we noticed that there were tiny little berries on the plant. A few weeks later and they were getting bigger, then one was ripe. We joked that the 1st berry cost $10, since that's what we paid for the plant. As each new berry ripen we cut the cost of the berries down. The plant has now produced around a pint of sweet raspberries.

We took Rebecca over to show her the berries and let her eat one. Since then whenever she is in the backyard she goes right over to the raspberry bush and tries to grab a berry off. Her cuteness has earned her the most raspberries!!

We now have 5 shoots off of this one bush. We are hoping that next year all 5 shoots grow and produce sweet red raspberries for us to enjoy.

City High Homecoming Parade

It wouldn't be fall without watching the City High Homecoming parade down 1st Avenue. This year Johann walked with the 3 older kids with the Lemme group and Rebecca and I watched it from a calm spot on the parade route.
Rebecca wasn't too sure about the firetruck and the noise of the parade and perferred to sit on my lap or sit holding her bucket. She had no idea what the kids kept giving her was, until I opened a sucker for her and she realized it was sweet treats!
The highlights of the parade are:
The Firetruck and it's loud siren-

The Giant Roberts Dairy cow-


Discovering candy!

The Lemme float-

Brothers and a sister who bring you more candy!!

Old cars-


We like this parade so much because it's smaller and less crowded, and we still get to see lots of neat things and get candy. It's a win-win for all.

The Paper Doll House

This past weekend I got to get away with 3 friends (Susan, Jenny and Janelle) to a scrapbooking/bed and breakfast retreat, and it was so needed and wonderful.

(Janelle, Susan, Jenny, myself and MaryKim-the owner)

The 4 of us (along with other ladies) had been scrapbooking together for years. The last few years we'd go to Susan's so that she could take care of her family (her husband has ALS) and still enjoy scrapbooking. It was a great setup for all of us.
Last spring after nearly 5 years of fighting, Susan's husband Andy passed away from ALS. At the funeral the 4 of us were talking and the conversation bloomed into what we could do to help Susan. I suggested we scrap the weekend away at her house. We all decided we needed to do a weekend scrapbooking get together at her house or somewhere else. Jenny did some research and found a few places to choose from. The Paper Doll House was the one we choose-and we choose right!

The house was built in to 1800's and it has the charm of that time period-with modern convience added. The detail of the house was amazing. There were doors everywhere upstairs leading to bedrooms, bathroom, the maids quarters, the attic and the dumbwaiter. It was fun to explore the house.





The owner MaryKim was the nicest, funniest, most friendly person I've ever met. You were her friend the minute she met you! We heard many stories that made us laugh so hard we would cry. She had fun things we were to so-karaoke, wear old time hats to Sunday brunch, and she always turned the music to match the type of food we were eating. And talking about the food-it was amazing and so much of it! Not only was the food wonderful, but we ate it on her Grandma's china and they served you and cleaned up after you. Oh it was heavenly!
There was another group at the retreat with us. They were a group of 6 ladies that had been coming there for 6 years. They knew MaryKim and played many practical jokes over the years. The made the weekend more memorable and fun. We found out that the year before while MaryKim stepped out, they numbered and wrote notes on 351 yellow sticky notes and left them hiding around the house. She had found about half of them and had them kept in a jar for safe keeping.
On Saturday night the music turned to a birthday song and out came a cake for me. The searched high and low until they could find the birthday hat for me to wear. I was so surprised that she knew my birthday was coming and that she celebrated it with me.
This is a must do again weekend. To be able to get away and scrapbook and spend time with friends was priceless.

One of the reasons Kindergarten is so GREAT

***SNACK DAY***

Today was Ammon's day to bring snack in to class. I asked him a few weeks back what he wanted to bring. He told me "not Scooby snacks, someone brought those today". There is no rule that you can't repeat snacks, but to Ammon not repeating the snack was a big deal.
Last week I finally got him to start saying yes or no to things. We knew it would be a mix with Cinnamon Apple Cheerios because he LOVES those.
This week I got him to add to the mix-Cinnamon goldfish (another favorite snack) and pretzels. I asked if he wanted to add Craisins, to which he replied "I don't want anything soft in it."


So finally it was Thursday after school and he brought home the bucket to bring snack back in. We washed our hands got all the ingredients out, mixed them and it needed something else. He decided that it did need something 'soft' like craisins after all.
He has 24 kids in his class, which was more snack bags then the bucket could hold, so they were over flowing.

I love how the simple things to adults are HUGE to kids, like bringing snack to kindergarten.

Open House

Tonight at Open House the kids got to show off some of the fun things they have been working on in school the 1st few weeks of school.

Ammon made an All About Me collage. He got to teach us all about what he does at school. He took us on a tour of his room showing us all the things in his room.


Corrine drew a self portrait. She also had a math/graph all about me game where you had to guess which was hers by the answers. Such as how many letters are in my name, she would have 7 squares colored in, what month is my birthday -February so she's color in 2 squares.

Simeon had some artwork in the hallway and he made himself wearing a shirt sitting at his desk. He had also written a 2 page letter telling us about what he had been doing at school.


The kids all had a great time having us find their projects.

Train Floor pictures

I follow a couple of different blogs where the ladies take such great pictures. Some have tutorials on picture taking, like fun and different backgrounds, angles of picture taking and how to use your camera. I LOVE when these photography posts come up as they help me to think outside of the box with my pictures.
This week I came across a blog that talked about taking pictures from your table and from the floor to get a different perspective, so I thought I'd give it a try.
The boy I babysit LOVES trains, so we've had the trains out downstairs. Ammon found them and wanted to make a track. Trains and their tracks make such a great backdrop for pictures taken from the floor.




I like the different perspective I got with taking the pictures with the camera on the ground. You know it's Ammon playing with the trains, and you can see the action really well by his hands.

The many faces of Rebecca

This afternoon Rebecca walked into the kitchen just like this:


It was absolutely adorable and she did it completely on her own. She loves to be cute and LOVES getting her picture taken.

Later we were downstairs and she got ahold of Corrine's pencil and DID NOT want to give it back, not even for a trade.

She ended up looking like this:


She was not happy with mom, but minutes later, she was off playing with Ammon happy as could be. Ammon asked to take a picture and she was more then willing to smile for the camera.


We are getting more tantrums when she doesn't get what she wants, but the majority of the time we get big toothy grins that just make my day so much brighter.

I took this picture looking down at her outside a few days ago. It makes her look like she is showing off attitude which she isn't, but it's still so cute!

A new discovery-BELLIES

A few weeks ago Rebecca discovered belly buttons and that everyone has one. She also figured out that if she lifts her shirt she is not only being super cute, but she'll get a tickle.





Her stomach may look big, but it's NOT. She can't keep pants up because the waistband on them is always bigger then her little stomach, and she has no rear end to help keep them up!


Rebecca LOVES the camera and will smile as soon as it comes out-even if she's tired or mad right then. It's so much fun to have such a photogetic kid!

Scientists and Rat hunting

This afternoon Corrine and Ammon asked me for the stapler and then dissapeared into the basement. A little while later they reappeared with bags they had made out of ribbon, paper and staples to hold their Scientist maps. Corrine had even cut a paper towel roll to make holders to keep the paper nicely rolled up in.



Ammon's bag says "AAAAAAAAAAAA AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AMMON", and Corrine's says "Love Siyins" (Science).







They then went outside to hunt for the treasure at the end of thier maps. After a short time they changed what they were doing. Instead they started making a "fire" out of the millions of little sticks in the yard, then taking big ones to catch rats and rabbits (dry leaves) to eat for dinner. (The rat idea came from all the dead voles we've had in the neighborhood that have excaped from our neighbors swaying backyard grass. When the kids see one, they always come in and say "There's a dead RAT." We correct them that it's just a vole, but the next time they again call it a rat.)


Every treasure hunting scientist needs to wear-penguin slippers. Makes them much more distinguised!! He didn't wear these outside to hunt for rats, just to hunt treasure.

Hives

Tonight we were watching tv and a saw a pink spot on Ammon's cheek. I asked him about it, but he was into the show and didn't answer. I didn't think it was a big deal so I left it alone. When we came upstairs I looked closer at it, and realized that it had a couple of raised bumps in it. Hives!
I had him take off his shirt and we saw red hives on his chest, his back was covered with hives and so were his legs.



I gave him some benadryl and reassured him that it would be ok.

After tucking him in, he started saying his prayer on his own and he said "Please help me to be alright" with a crackly voice. I felt so bad knowing that he was worried. I reassured him again and told him he could come in to my room during the night.

I checked on him half hour after taking the medicine and his face, chest and back are looking better, but his legs look worse.

About 20 minutes before I noticed the area on his cheek he ate some Edy's Butterfinger ice cream. He'd never had it before, but the ingredients are things he'd had before.

I've already documenting his migraines so I added this to that list.

Group Hug

This evening we were trying to get out the door, when I hear laughing and "Mom, Rebecca kissed Simeon on the lips!" I walked out to see the boys playing with Rebecca and getting some good kisses. Ammon called a group hug and they all surrounded Rebecca for a hug.
I love these kids. It's moments like these that makes the stressful ones disappear.

Raingutter Regatta

Tonight was the once rained out, twice postponed raingutter Regatta for Cub Scouts. The original date was when we were out of town, so we didn't think Simeon would get to do it.
When we got back from our trip we found out it was scheduled for a day we could come to. But that also meant that the other boys probably already had thier boats ready and Simeon didn't.

Simeon had some trouble with his boat. First he lost the rutter. Then he lost his motivation to do anything to his boat. So in the end his boat was plain wood with a "Y" for BYU and "C" for Cubs that he took something and etched into the wood. He did get a plastic rutter from a friend.

The 1st race his boat went more sideways then straight and then it just fell over. Blowing a ship that's laying on it's side is very hard, so he lost that race. Later races he claimed victory, and in the end he came in 5th place. He was a good sport about it and enjoyed the night.