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November 2013

The Kids Said…

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Spencer was clinging to my leg and whining at me as I was trying to make lunch for the kids.  Caroline was nearby getting frustrated with his noise.

When she had had enough, she glared at Spencer and said, “Ugh, Spencer.  You’re too loud!”  Then she sighed and mumbled under her breath, “Miscreant.”

***

Spencer stepped on one of the millions of pony toys we constantly have scattered throughout our living room.  He yelped, cried for a second, then ran over to me and said what Dallas and I say roughly 100 times a day when that happens to us, “That’s why we need to clean up our toys, girls!”

***

Brooke was working on her homework.  Her teachers send home a packet with the entire week’s worth of homework to be returned on Friday.  One day Brooke was feeling especially productive and decided to complete her whole packet on the first day.  She was almost done and was getting pretty tired of writing.  I noticed that she had only written her spelling words twice when she was supposed to write them three times.

Me:  “Brooke, you need to write your words one more time each.  If you’re too tired you can save it for tomorrow since you’ve already been working so hard today.”

Brooke (sighing):  “Well, I might crab if I have to do it tomorrow.  I don’t want to hear my own crabbing so I’m just going to do it now.”

***

I got the girls’ Halloween costumes at the end of September.  They loved wearing them around the house.  The next day we were headed to my mom’s house.

Caroline:  “I’m going to wear my costume to show Grandma!”

Brooke:  “Me too!”

Me:  “Sometimes Grandma likes to be surprised by your costumes on Halloween.  Do you want to save them for a surprise?”

Brooke: “Well, Grandmas are kind of old and I think if she sees our costumes today she’ll forget what they are by the time Halloween comes.”

More Potpourri

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Caroline made a jellyfish in her preschool.  Brooke decided she also needed to make one.  The next morning I saw that the girls had made an entire habitat for their jellyfish:

37Brooke lost her first tooth!  Red-letter day!  She had been DYING to lose a tooth.  When one finally became loose, she immediately got mad and felt betrayed by all her friends who had already lost teeth.  “No one ever told me having a loose tooth would hurt!”26Caroline made a house for her little Dora characters:

35We asked Brooke to take a bath.  She insisted she needed a straw in order to do so.  A few minutes later we found her snorkeling:

34Brooke found some fabric scraps and turned herself into Little Red Riding Hood:33As the weather has turned colder, I’ve resorted to pulling out our Play-Doh to keep the kids happy and occupied.  Works like a charm:28 31 29Spencer thought he looked so pretty with his “princess” on:30One of Br————–>ooke’s homework papers:36I taught Caroline’s preschool class.  Spencer looked so cute joining all the “big kids” for the art projects:25 We went for a walk in the woods.  Brooke was excited to find acorns because she was just sure she could catch a squirrel now which I guess was a high priority for her.  She made up a little trap and monitored it constantly.  She couldn’t figure out why the squirrels weren’t taking the bait: 27It’s about time we got a picture of Baby #4 up on the blog:32Our baby in utero has a much more pleasant profile than Spencer did on this day:38He fell no less than six times in one day and hit the exact same spot on his head each time.  It’s rough being little sometimes.

Potpourri

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Once again I’ve been saving up pictures and not posting them.  We’ll start with our visit to the fire station.

The girls immediately wanted to get their faces painted.  Caroline asked for a butterfly and Brooke wanted a pony riding on a fire truck.  I felt bad for the poor high school volunteer tasked with painting that on her face:13Wishes granted:1417Brooke was careful to put her best cheek forward when posing for pictures:

2018I really don’t know if I’ve ever seen Spencer as happy as he was walking among the fire trucks.  He had a perma-grin the whole time:

2119152223I love when the kids play creatively, even though it usually involves a huge mess.  Here are all the ponies at the Grand Galloping Gala:

4Scrap fabric makes great roads according to Spencer:

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One morning the weather was so pleasant it just beckoned the kids outside to read:

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Brooke was pretty proud of this get-up:

2Here the ponies are sitting at their desks in school:

5Had to get a close-up of the pony at her computer:

24One day I glanced out our back window and thought I saw a person on our deck.  I crept over for a better look.  The person was gone, but to my surprise, his tent was still there.  My thoughts started racing:  What in the world?!  We’ve got a squatter who’s taken up residence in our backyard?!  How long has this been going on?

3Unsure how to handle this unexpected situation, I just watched the tent for a little bit.  It was a really windy day and before long the tent was airborne, flying into our neighbor’s yard. I then remembered that I had seen their tent set up the day before, so it must have just taken flight during the windstorm.  Phew.

We had a family dinner up at my aunt’s house.  They had chickens and my kids thought that was the greatest thing ever.  They loved running around on the grass, feeding and chasing the chickens:

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I love Carson’s face in this picture:

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Obligatory Halloween Post

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Oh my.  Apparently blogging about Disneyland took everything out of me because I just haven’t been able to bring myself to blog since.  Good thing Dallas snuck a couple of posts up.

Where to begin?  How about here:

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‘Tis the season to look like you swallowed a baby pumpkin.

Not looking forward to when I appear to have swallowed a full-grown watermelon.

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But yes!  It’s true!  Baby #4 is on its way!  It’s been about four weeks since the above photo was taken, and we found out we are having….another girl!

Dallas and I were convinced I was gestating a boy and I still can’t keep it straight in my head that baby he is actually a she.  Coming up with yet another girl name is proving beyond impossible.  Our best options so far have been Caroline’s suggestions:  Dora or Rapunzel.  Baby girl is doomed.

I feel really good now.  The first trimester was probably my worst yet (even though I never actually threw up).  I was really nauseous though and had no energy at all.  It’s nice to feel more like myself now.  The baby is due March 7th.

Now to continue onto some Halloween pictures.  My extended family didn’t know I was pregnant, so I decided to let my costume do the announcing.

Here I am – a pregnant Minnie Mouse with my baby Minnie.  Brooke is a peacock.  There was another Minnie in the house and a cute little Alice:

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My aunt and uncle’s family:

3My mom and her sister:

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Another aunt and uncle’s family:

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The patient costume was best when viewed from the back:

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My grandparents:

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We grew pumpkins in our garden.  We got exactly one pumpkin that was large enough for carving.  Dallas carved that one while the kids just drew faces on theirs.  Less work and mess.  Works for me!

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We went to Brooke’s school to watch the costume parade.  We killed time taking pictures:

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The best picture I got of my little peacock in the parade:

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Here are the kids on Halloween.  We still had Disneyland on the brain and decided our family costume theme would be Disney.  Brooke is the peacock from Sophia the First (I guess there are peacocks on that show?), Caroline is Rapunzel, and Spencer is Lightning McQueen (or “Lightmeen a Queen” as he says):

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You’ll recall I was Minnie.  Dallas was going to go as a tourist.  He was going to wear one of our matching Disney shirts and a camera around his neck.   It would have been so cute had he been able to make it to the family costume party.  Oh well.

The kids trick-or-treated and then came home to raid their loot:

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Brooke loved to use the candy bones to make skeletons:

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I probably should have skipped asking Spencer to say “cheese”:

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And there you have it!  The Golden Family 2013 Halloween post is now a wrap!