How we roll in Iowa

I'm not going to lie Iowa has changed us (that's a lie :)). We do things different in Iowa. The pure awesomeness of Iowa has seeped into our very souls and makes us do crazy and outlandish things that we would never have done before (once again lying. I just like to blame things on Iowa :) ). Like-

now we have "moose-staches" as Emma calls them. (I thank the moosetache books:))

"ah, Luigi, whata you talkin' about, aye?"

Fox is not a fan of moose-staches.

Hahaha!! You've got to love this picture!! Liam is trying to look sophisticated with his moose-stache, and Emma has hers on her nose. I told her to put it back on, so we could take a picture with all of us, and thats where she put it!! LOL!

But in Iowa we come home to fancy flowers for our birthdays (well, at least mine) (I like that part of Iowa :)).

This next part is for you Ma. I know you'd be proud. :D

And finally,

In Iowa we take up dumpster diving.

but we look cute while doing it :D

But Let me tell you, it was worth it!

Look at what we got-

A beautiful new head and foot board for our bed!!

I also tried to salvage a nice couch. It was perfect! It matched my other couch (the nice one not the burnt orange one, although that too would be AWESOME!) But unfortunately after hours of trying to clean it, we couldn't get the stupid smoke smell out. :( If you ever need one reason not to smoke here it is-

It keeps mormon dumpster divers from stealing your trash.

If that's not enough of a reason, I don't know what is.

"Which brings me to my next point- don't do crack."

Oh wait! I have one more awesome Iowa change. You may want to empty your bladders first though cause it'll make you wet your pants. Here it is- the famously talked up -Liam playing video games :)

Well I guess thats all. Until the next Iowa adventures. Goodbye and good night...day :)

Holy Christmas Batman!- Christmas Day

Christmas morning, what can I say? It was AWESOME! Liam and Emma are at the perfect age where they get all excited about it and it makes me even more giddy. :)

The kids waiting to come downstair to see if Santa came.

(I had to play my Dad's part and say things like, "I don't know. I don't think he came" :))

Tony's and Kira's stash (Yes those are giant green dice in my stash! Awesome! How else do you play the dice game? The one where you throw it at people, remember Tom, Channa, Jess, and Kris? :) I've already played it with my kids. They love being pelted with giant green dice. hahaha!!)

Fox, Emma, and Liam's stash. (There is a video of when they first came down, but it's at the bottom of the post. I never know where the darn videos are going to show up :))

Santa put socks on our tree!!

On to presents

Emma opening her present (We were so blessed and opened so many presents that I couldn't put a picture of every present from everyone on so insert your present here. :) Then you can pretend she's opening yours)

Tony's way excited!!

Fox opening his present. Notice how he is opening the present with one hand while holding a pringle in the other. That's the way he rolls. As long as he has food he's happy :)

Liam takes a turn

Emma and I got matching aprons! Cute!

Tony got a game called Butt Head....it made him very happy :)

hahahaha

I was most spoiled! Tony got me new stainless steel cookware!! Wahoo!!

I love my stainless steel cookware :)

All three kids working on one box.

It was a radio flyer rocket!! Fox loved it and would clap any time you pushed the button and made the music play. :)

thanks to all of our awesome family who send fantastic gifts!! We loved waiting everyday to see if we got another package (We got a ton! It was awesome!! Me and the mailman became best friends :)) We love you all and loved your gifts!! Thanks for thinking of us!! Merry Christmas!!

Holy Christmas Batman!-Christmas Eve

Aahhh, Christmas Eve. The day that seems to last way too long, and the night that Kira can't sleep and drives Tony insane (He really loves it though...Deep, deep in his heart...I think.). Let us share a little of our Christmas eve with you. It was weird this Christmas eve. We were away from our families and had to do our own thing. It was a blast though and I think all of us greatly enjoyed it.

We started out by leaving food out for the reindeer (oats, cheerios, and sparkles so the reindeer can see them [We made them at Happy Joes, and Liam made some at school])

Then we fed ourselves. (I think Tony wanted me to put this on here to make my Mom or Dad jealous ;)) After we ate Tony replied, "I should have just taken the family to Red Lobster, it would have been cheaper." :)

Then it was on to pj's..- I mean the one present we get to open on Christmas Eve that nobody knows what it is. :)

Fox was first.

Thomas the train!?! He was extra excited.

ps - he also got this stocking that I made him ;) Designed it myself. :)

Emma's turn!

Princess pj's!!

Your up Liam! (Notice Emma in the background hugging her pj's. I think we chose wisely)

How to train your Dragon pj's? Awesome!!

Kira got pink pj's with dogs and hearts on them...(what? they were soft... and free, you can't beat soft and free) [Tony got black socks, not pictured (what!? That's what he wanted!! Don't you judge me!)]

We took a family pj picture.

So Merry Christmas to all and all a good night...that is if you can sleep ;)

Holy Christmas Batman!-Happy Joes

Sometimes I wish my kids weren't so gosh, darn cute....Okay, not really, but I would make it so I wouldn't take so many stinking pictures of them and then have to rake through and decide which ones are the absolute best and make it onto the ol' blog. Get ready for a whole slue of post from Christmas with about 20 bizzillion pictures. That's how good our Christmas was ;).

Anywho... a few days before Christmas us (the Bundy's) and a few friends went to a pizza joint called Happy Joes. Happy Joes was doing a whole bunch of free activities for the kids in hopes that you would buy their pizza (Which we did :)).

The kids got to go behind the counter and make their own pizza!

Liam/Emma choose pepperoni, while our friends chose sausage. They did a fine job don't you think?

Then all the kids got to decorate their own cookies. Emma spreading the frosting and D (D is a lot easier then little red-head friend #3 :)) trying it out. :)

Emma using the tongue action to help her put sprinkles on.

B and A take a turn

And then Liam

We ended up with some pretty fancy cookies, if you ask me.

And delicious. B was so excited he got a little carried away.

D demonstrating how delicious they were.

It took forever to get our pizzas (mostly because they forgot them in the oven while they were helping other little holiday spirits and had to remake them. Luckily the kids didn't notice they weren't eating the exact ones they made.) and Fox was getting antsy, so how did I entertain him? With the shaky parasen cheese of course. What kid doesn't love to lick his fingers and stick it in a pile of cheese on his plate?

Emma was extra excited when this jolly old guy showed up (I think he's lost a little weight...:)) She followed him around the whole store until I finally made her stop. Then she came back to me and happily said "That's a fake Santa. He's not the real one." Dang. But at least she was happy about it.

When we finally did get our pizzas everyone was extra excited. They were delicious too!

Nothing like holiday fun with fake Santas, shaky cheese, and burn pizzas ;)

Gingerbread overload!

This weekend we decided to have a gingerbread fiesta (okay we really didn't decide that, but that's what it turned into). On Friday the kids had some friends come over and we made awesome gingerbread men, and played Candyland! Could their be anything cooler? I think not.

The gang

Little red-head friend #2 (for sake of the-parents-might-beat-me-up-if-I-give-out-names-on-the-www, the names of our friends have been changed...to protect the innocent) :) She was hilarious! She tried a gingerbread cookie that Tony had bought at the store and then made a real funky face and said, "oh, yeah, I forgot I don't like gingerbread." Then after we had made the gingerbread men she excitedly took a cookie, took a huge bite out of it, made the same funky face and repeated, "Oh, yeah, I forgot I don't like gingerbread." LOL!

Little red-head friend #3

I helped him make his gingerbread man. He asked for the gingerbread man to have a mustache. When I put one on he looked real disappointed and said, "No, a really big mustache!" How cool is that kid? Is it any wonder we have them as friends? hehehe

Liam showing his half eaten cookie :)

Even Fox got in on the eating action

Emma with a snotty nose. (What? You know your kids have them sometimes too! Even though you might not take pictures and put them on your blog...sheesh!)

Not as little red-head friend #1 showing off his giant snowman gingerbread man.

Tony looking hip. Leaning and finger in his pocket? Grrrrr. He could totally be thrown into westside story right now and fit right in. (well sort of....) :)

On Saturday night we decided to make gingerbread houses. We were extra excited! All was going well...and then you know how they say not to warm up honey in glass bowls on the stove? Well, I didn't know that either. But we have a giant tub of honey that we have used and loved for about two years now. It gets crystalized, but if you warm it up it looses the crystals and goes back to delicious honey. Usually we warm it up slow on a candle warmer, but we were in a hurry to warm it up so we could make gingerbread houses. Tony put the honey (that was in my big glass measuring cup thingy) on the stove to speed up the process. We were all in the kitchen having a great time when it EXPLODED!! Literally exploded! It made the loudest noise and honey and glass shards flew clear across the room...It. Was. The. Coolest. Thing. I. Have. Ever. Witnessed!!!

Clear across the room. I found glass pieces three days later several feet away from the stove.

Unfortuately the gingerbread batter was also out. We are not sure if there were glass shards in it (quite probable), but we decided to use it anyways (what? We are lazy! Gingerbread takes effort to make, we didn't want to have to do it twice! sheesh!), and just not eat any of it. (Careful, that gingerbread is....sharp.)

All in all the night turned out fantastically fun. Emma and I made one house and Liam and Tony worked on the other. (Fox was asleep. By the time we got the honey/glass shard mixture cleaned up it was a little late :)) We used the left over Halloween candy (brilliant) that I had hidden from the kids (fantastic mother I know :))

Emma in front of Charlie buckets house/farm house

Me and Emma. Notice the pet cow, pig, sheep, ect. by the house. Our house also came equipped with a kit kat door, sky light/hole roof, car with smarties for wheels and white trees/poles.

Tony and Liam showing off their house

Yes, that's right, they had super hero's living on/in their house, along with a mailbox, garden, SUV, and person made of melted starbursts (Darn Tony and his need to show up his wife and her Charlie Bucket house!). Wolverine is also on the side of the roof, but you can't see him here.

And if you were wondering who is hiding the house- it's the Hulk. He's there to "scare away the big bad wolf, if he ever dares to come."

Well, happy Gingerbread making days!