Moving On...

Apparently we ran out of space on this blog....so we moved.  Please join us at our new blog.

Happy Halloween

The Zoo Keeper and Her Animals

Birthday Party

This year we decided to let Paige have her party a little early.  It seems like every year and no matter how hard we try otherwise, Paige's birthday always seems to get wrapped up with Christmas.  Kids bringing presents wrapped in Christmas paper, kids missing the party because they have a Christmas party to attend, and not to mention that its cold every year on Paige's birthday resulting in an indoor party.  So after thinking about it and asking around (finding out that surprisingly, there are many kids who have winter birthdays that get celebrated in the summer months) we decided to let her have her party the end of September.   It was still warm outside and way before any of the winter holidays began.  She was so excited.

 

It's a big birthday for her this year.  The only time that she will go from being a single digit to a double digit number.  This won't happen again until she turns 100 going from a double digit number to a triple digit.  So 10 is big at our house.

 

Paige loves paper dolls and thanks to pinterest and a little online shopping we were able to put together a fun little party.

 

We made old fashioned party hats, drank root bear and cream soda from bottles with beautiful colored paper straws. 

We cut out tons of little paper doll clothes for the cupcakes.

Made a fun ombre cake (made out of rice crispies for the gluten free kids) along with a cute little cake top banner from the scrapbook paper we used for the party hats.

The girls played pin the dress on the paper doll, Simon says, pixie stick relay.  We also had a lunch buffet.  We made little chicken sandwiches, pasta salad, fruit salad, carrot sticks, and lots more.

The best thing was the photo booth.  The girls loved using the different props to take pictures.  It was a nice party.  The weather was perfect and it was a nice afternoon.

Homecoming

Homecoming at Tuacahn High School was last week.  They had so many fun activities for the kids.  MaKady decided she wanted to play in the powder puff football game this year.  If you know us then you know that neither Jared nor I are very athletic.  We both had asthma as teenagers so we didn't play sports, and  I literally have two left feet, I can't play sports or dance.  It is ridiculous to watch, or very entertaining :)  Luckily MaKady is pretty athletic.  It was so awesome to go watch her play.   Her team did great!! 

 

 

 

Adjusting

A couple of months ago Lucas stopped eating.  Seriously just stopped.  We worked hard at pushing food, getting him a little cup of grapes or some crackers.  We tried everything we could to make sure that he was eating at least 1 thing during the day.  We could get him to drink chocolate milk and occasionally he would eat his chicken nuggets for breakfast, but then nothing the rest of the day.  We did this for about a week before I finally decided that I needed to try something else.  I wracked my brain for a reason.  He didn't have any symptoms of being sick and he never complained so w were kind of at a loss.

 

Then something dawned on me.  I had recently read an article about gluten intolerance in kids.  I went back and read some more and decided that it might be worth a try, plus my mom is gluten intolerant....so we tried it.  We cut all gluten out of his diet, that meant no more chicken nuggets, no crackers, no spaghetti-o's or ramen, no more of the easy stuff to cook.  Almost immediately his diet improved.  He began eating better and gaining weight and just started to become more like himself.

 

A few times I thought maybe  it was just a fluke and it might have been a temporary thing, but every time we slip and give him something that he really wants like a cupcake, he stops eating for 2 days and he gets sick to his stomach.

 

I'm not going to lie, its been a challenge.  We are the family that eats bread with every meal.  We use to eat pasta 3 times a week, soft tacos, etc.  All that has changed.  We decided as a family that for the most part it is easier to adjust the entire menu instead of try to make 2 meals, one for us and one for Lucas.  We eat a lot more potatoes and rice and chicken and fruit and veggies.  We've all lost weight and we are doing great.  I still like a nice sandwich once in a while and we have found a great gluten free pizza crust for Lucas so the rest of us can eat a normal pizza.  We have some new recipes that we are trying and over all we are doing great.  This isn't the lifestyle that I would have chosen, but I have so say we are all adjusting well.  And Lucas is doing great!!

 

 

15

Happy Birthday to my beautiful MaKady.  Can't believe she is 15.  Time has surely flown by.  She is a joy to be around.  She is lovely and kind to everyone.  She has an old soul.  She loves anything vintage.  We sometimes joke about the fact that we both think we were born in the wrong era.  For her pictures this year she wanted something like you would see in the 1950's.  So we found this dress and shoes online, borrowed the pearls from Tabi and went to Judd's Store one early morning.  I am truly proud to be her mom.  Happy, Happy birthday MaKady dear.

 

Back to School

I don't know about your kids, but mine were sure ready to go back to school.  We had a long summer.  Fun but long.  So when school started early this year (August 14 for MaKady and August 15 for Paige) we were totally ready.

 

 MaKady is a sophomore this year at Tuacahn High School.  She seriously loved it so much last year and couldn't wait to go back.  I've said it before and I have to say it again, it was well worth our move down here so that she could attend that school.  It has been amazing for her.  I'm hoping this year that she will have as much fun as last year.

 

Paige is in 4th grade this year.  She actually has the same teacher this year that she had for half of last year.  Last year she started out the school year with one teacher whom she loved but by Valentines Day he had some "personal problems" that weren't resolved so he left the school.  However in his place they hired a permanent - substitute teacher.  At the end of the year they hired her on for the next school year and she opted to move up to 4th grade with most of the kids in her class.  Paige was so excited.  She loves her teacher and so far both girls love school.

Roos n More

There is a little interactive zoo down in Moapa Nevada that everyone has been telling us about.  So one morning we got up and decided to drive there.  It is in a remote town between Mesquite and Las Vegas that you really don't even know is there.  We pulled in to the parking lot, paid our money and went in.

There are a lot of different animals there.  Most of them are in cages but the workers take them out and you are free to look at them, pet them, and even hold them.

MaKady loved this little ant-eater.  It kept sticking its head and arm out and wanted her to pet him.

Lucas was pretty scared of the animals, but with Jared holding him, he was willing to get close and pet them for a second.

I had to laugh at this goat sitting up in the trough.  He was just hanging out in there. 

This little monkey was so cute and friendly.  Lucas was too scared to pet him because he was a little hyper, but the girls thought it was pretty cute and funny.

Check out these Guinea pigs.  They were huge, like the size of a full grown rabbit.  I have never seen them that big before.

The Binturong - also known as the bear cat was the nicest animal.  Very tame.  It was like an old dog.  Just wanted to hang out.  It spent most of its time sprawled out across MaKady's lap, just chillin.

Isn' this baby monkey adorable?  It was even wearing a little diaper.

This baby Kangaroo is only 7 months old.  I guess they are born and just chill in their moms pouch for several months.  They said they just pulled it from her pouch that morning. 

It was a fun and educational day.  The kids loved it.

Fair Week - Part 3

On the last day of the fair - Saturday, we took the kids to the Demolition Derby.  It was loud and hot and so much fun.  MaKady said "I love this".  Paige was super happy that we kept giving her money and it was her job to go get us snow cones and water.  Lucas loved the cars and trucks, but he really loved the tractor!!  He was really mad every time the cars would crash into each other though because as he said "now those guys have to go to the shop to get fixed."  I couldn't help laugh.  During the truck part he apparently had picked one that was his favorite, well that particular truck got smashed to bits, the front tire came off and everything.  He was literally sobbing for "my truck, that's my truck, now he's broken, oh no."  Poor thing.  But he sat very still for the entire 3 hours and he loved it.

He wanted to take a picture of himself.!

The fair was also the only time this summer we were able to see any fireworks.  We had fire restrictions during the 4th of July so all the fireworks were cancelled.  Then it rained on the 24th of July so they were cancelled then also.  It was a fun way to end our summer vacation.