Tradition #3

Sleeping under the tree.

Our kids sleep under the Christmas tree on Christmas Eve Eve (so December 23rd). They can't sleep under the tree on Christmas Eve cause they would be in Santa's, but nothings wrong with sleeping there the night before! This is a tradition that was Bryan's when he was a kid. We turn on the tree lights and put out a bunch of blankets and let the kids try to sleep. I think this will be the first year that Kate will be included in this tradition. They really don't sleep all that well, but it's okay cause then they are extra tired on Christmas Eve. I tried finding a picture from a previous year, but I guess I don't have any. I will definitely get on this year.

Christmas traditions #2

Pillowcases!

I make them every year for my kids and whichever nieces and/or nephews our family "gives" to. So this year I'm making 7. My kids get theirs rolled up in their stockings. I only started doing this about 4 years ago, but it's a keeper. I got the directions from this site, the only difference is that I don't use holiday theme fabric. I use whatever fun/cute fabric I can find. For example Tyler has airplanes, Thomas, Cars, and BYU cases (Thomas and Cars are from his younger years!).

Here's my pile of my different fabrics cut, ironed, and ready to be sewn together...

And here are some of the finished product (I can't show all of them cause I'm not finished!)...

















Homemade gifts are always a good thing. And these are super easy to make. I'm sure we'll send Anna off to college someday with a stack of 10 or so pillowcases that are all her own.

Christmas traditions #1

I guess it's time to put up another post seeing as how my last one was on Halloween! It's been crazy here since my last post. Bryan was working in California for about a month and a half. He would go during the week and come home on weekends. Near the end he was only home on Sundays. But that's done for now- Thank Goodness! We had a great Thanksgiving at the Haymond's house and I survived Black Friday (but just barley!). So now it's time to move on to Christmas. I thought I would share some of our Christmas traditions.

This first one is all for me. I actually learned it from my sister who got it from a friend of hers. I love it, it helps me not go overboard when shopping for the kids.

I buy each of our kids 4 gifts:
Something they want
Something they need
Something to wear
and Something to read.

Now of course there are exceptions to this rule. The first major one is that they also get something from Santa (so now we're up to 5 gifts). The "wear" item is always jammies. That's a tradition all in it's self. These 5 gifts are just for them, we also get family gifts like movies, wii games, and board games. Another big exception is this- last year they didn't even get the 5 gifts. Instead we were surprising them with a trip to Disneyland. So I think they got their Santa gift, jammies, and a book but that was about it. But it was well worth it, I think it has been our best Christmas so far.

So if your not done with your Christmas shopping maybe this will help!

Happy Halloween!

Halloween was a few days ago and I'm happy to report that we survived! It always gets really hectic right before Halloween with costumes to finish, pumpkins to carve and parties to go to.

I think I finished Tyler's costume around noon on Halloween this year (yes- I'm a procrastinator!). I really wanted him to be a pirate since I already had everything for a pirate costume, but he refused. So a Ninja he was!




Kate's was easy- a gnome. She's still at that age where you can pick the costume for her, I don't think it will be that way next year.







Ellie and her friend decided last year that they were going to be nerds together. We made a trip to the DI and found her the perfect pants, suspenders and glasses.






Anna (oops- no picture, what kind of bad mother am I??!) is too old to go trick-or-treating but dressed up anyway to hand out candy. She wore the dress I bought myself for an 80's themed party. It was a gloomy rainy day, but lucky for us- it stopped raining right as we were heading out to trick-or-treat. We even got a big rainbow for a little while.

Club Initiation

Tyler was initiated into a club last night... or should I say this morning since it was about 2:30 in the morning to be exact. He is now a proud (well, probable not so proud) card holding member of the stomach flu club. That's right, up until last night he had never thrown up (except for spitting up as a baby). He's 6 and a half- how does a kid get away with not puking for 6 years? Let's just say that it was a long long night and we are both really really tired today. Let's also say that I've been sanitizing the house like crazy this morning. One puker is enough for me.


Poor kid. It's the "sick eyes" that get to me- they break my heart! While we're on the subject of Tyler... here's some pictures of his from 2 weeks ago that I meant to post about.










He's our bloody nose kid. He get's one about once a week. Usually they're not too bad but this one didn't want to stop. That's why he's holding an ice pack on his nose. One of these days I'll get around to taking him to to doctor to see what can be done to help. But until then we'll just keep shoving rolled-up tissues up his nose. I also pulled out the humidifier to use at night to see if it helps.

It's that time of year again

Time to do a little canning. I love taking a few boxes of these...


And turning them into this...

I love making jam most of all. We now have enough peach jam to last a long time!

I've also started working on our long term food storage. Boy is that a chore! We really don't have that much storage space, but we'll make it work somehow. I just couldn't pass up Macey's 50lb bags of flour for $10. I think I'll work on 3 months at a time. Once we have 3 months of all the necessities I'll start building it up to 6 months. Slow and steady right?!?

I like how...

When I asked Kate to clean up these (cause they were all over the floor)...
They ended up here (in the trash can- if you can't tell)...I didn't know I needed to be so specific with a 2 year old.

I wonder what other things she's thrown away that I don't know of?!?! I'm sure that's where some of our spoons have gone. And yes, I did dig them out and wash them off. I guess I should have just cleaned them up myself to begin with.

Out with some of the old...

And in with some new. This post has 2 different stories that will tie into each other in the end.

Story #1:
There is one part of August that I really truly dislike. August is the month that our power and gas bills are adjusted. We are on the "budget" plans, which don't save you any money but do make it easier to plan your bill paying because you pay the same every month. In August they figure out if you over paid or under paid. Well folks, we under paid big time! I guessing it's because this is the first year we've had a finished basement. So we are now paying $7 more to Questar and $12 more to Rocky mountain power every month. That adds up to $228 a year! (I like math by the way)

Story #2:
I was walking around Costco the other day and saw an amazing deal on their compact fluorescent light bulbs in all shapes and sizes. I wasn't planning on buying new light bulbs that trip, but I just couldn't pass it up. I like to think that I'm a little "green" and this is just a super easy way to do it. I mean really, how hard is it to unscrew one bulb and screw another one in. I got enough for the 6 can lights in our basement playroom and for three of our bathrooms (our bathroom has a window so we really don't use the lights that often, the other 3 don't).

So now to blend the 2...
Now that I'm spending over $200 on energy that I don't want to be spending, it's time to make some changes. I hope the new bulbs live up to their claim of lasting longer and so forth. We also turned the temp up on our air conditioner so now it doesn't come on until 80 (I really wish the weather would hurry up and cool down!!). And will probably do the same with the heat for the winter (but down I guess). I've also tried to make a better effort at getting the kids (and myself) to turn lights off as they leave a room. I guess we'll see this time next year if all my hard energy saving work pays off. If anyone has any other thoughts or ideas let me know, I could use all the help I can get with this one!

Once upon a time...

there was a crib. This crib entered our lives when Ellie was born (10 years ago). When Kate started potty training (which is another post for another day!) I started counting down the days until I could finally get rid of the crib. We all know that Kate is the last, and why store a crib that I will no longer need, so it was going to take a nice little trip over to Sweet Pea (a store close by that takes used kid/baby stuff). Maybe I was a little too excited to be done with the crib, or maybe it had hurt feeling at being let go so easily and jinxed me, I really don't know. But the day I called to see if they had room for another crib they nicely let me know that they no longer take cribs. WHAT?!?
Once upon a time there was a crib re-call. Well great! I guess there was a recall on many many many cribs that have drop down sides. So Sweet Pea is no longer taking any crib just to play it safe. The crib I so desperately wanted to be done with is digging in it's heals and refusing to go.
What to do now... Well I guess I could try to sell it, but let's face it- who wants a 10 year old crib. It could go to DI and find a new home that way. Or it could get a make over!
And that's exactly what happened. I turned the old crib into a toddler bed for Kate. I searched and searched for a "before" picture but this is as close as I got...
Tyler in the upper left, Ellie in the lower right, and Kate in the big pictures. There's some rails and bars but no whole crib. And here is the after...Don't pay any attention to the white walls. Sure we've been in our house for 5 years, and you would think that we would have painted by now, but no- white walls it is. Bryan has color picking issues. I know it looks like the foot board is taller than the head board but it really isn't. I think it was just how I took the picture. They really are the same height. So, just in case you're wanting to cut apart your crib and make a bed, I'll tell you how I did it.

First: I sawed off all the legs. See how the foot (and the head) board rest right on the floor. I guess you could leave some of the leg if you want it a little taller. I also filled in most of the screw holes from before and painted it white.





Second: I took a trip to Home Depot and bought some wood. With this wood I made the supports for the mattress. They run between the head and foot boards. I actually used 2 pieces of wood, the one you see in the picture and another one that is screwed onto the bottom half of the back side (so it make a ledge- if that makes any sense).

And Third: I screwed the mattress support from the crib onto the wooded frame.



That's it- you have a little bed! (which, by the way, Sweet Pea will take!)

Hot jammies

Why she insists on wearing fleecy footsie jammies in the middle of the summer is a mystery to me. But she insisted and I've learned to pick my battles so- hot jammies (as she calls them) it is! Oh and just so you know, no she didn't wear the hat to bed.

A new favorite

I have a new favorite website. In fact, I like it so much that I made it my homepage, so every time I open our internet it pops up! It's The Pioneer Woman. I'm sure many of you have already heard of it or checked it out, but I'm slower than most so it's pretty new to me. I think I could spend all day reading her recipes if I didn't get headaches from looking at
the computer for too long. I've made her French Breakfast Puffs and they were to die for. We ate half and froze half, and the half we froze were just as good reheated in the microwave as the fresh ones. And sometime next week we may be eating her Pasta with Tomato Cream Sauce- Yummy! I might just have to buy her cookbook so I can have it always on hand! Check it out in your free time- you might be hooked too!

Double Digits!

Our little Ellie had a birthday 2 weeks ago. She's now into the double digits (and will be for the rest of her life probably)! She's the big 10! She wasn't sure what she wanted for her birthday this year so she got a day out with mom. I took her to do some shopping so that she could pick out her own presents (is that being a bad mom?). We went to lunch at Panda Express cause she loves the orange chicken, we went to toy's-r-us where she picked out a beading set, we went to Costco where she picked out a coat, we went to JCPenney's where she picked out a dress and a shirt, and finally we went to JoAnns where she picked out some fabric for a skirt to go with the Penney's shirt. I guess I don't take my kids on enough 1-on-1 outings cause she thought it was great! No friend party this year, but I did make her a strawberry topped cheesecake by her request.

Another fun bit of info about this birthday is that she was part of a family mathematical equation. On the left is my Nephew Noah who turned 6 on Aug 31st, in the middle is Ellie who turned 10 on Sept 1st and on the right is my Dad (Papa) who turned the big 60 on Sept 6th.
So you see... 6x10=60 -You don't see that every day! (Oh- and thanks Aubrey for letting me steal your photo off of your blog!)

New found respect

That's what I have for toilet paper companies. They can get those rolls of toilet paper so tight and smooth, which is a lot better than what I can do. Yes, I have some experience. You see, Kate decided it would be fun to unroll the TP all over the bathroom floor. What was she thinking! I mean honestly- there must be better activities than that! I decided to try to roll back up what ever wasn't draped into the toilet bowl absorbing all the toilet water. This is what I ended up with. I definitely won't be putting it out for guests. Hopefully I wont be granted more opportunities to improve my toilet paper rolling skills, but who knows- anythings possible with a 2 year old!

PS- Kate must have been having a mischievous day yesterday. After I typed this up she colored all over her leg with markers and decided that she wasn't going to wear a pull-up for her nap and wet the bed (not just her little bed, but Tyler's big bed- comforter and all!) And yes- those are smiley face stamps all over her face. What a stink!

Beginnings and Ends

With the Beginning of a new school year I have officially put an End to my blogging vacation. I've put off blogging all summer long but now I really don't have an excuse. I have 3 out of 4 kids in school all day now! Hooray! (Does that make me a bad mother that I'm excited to have so many kids in school all day?) I love that we are back to a routine, that I have quite afternoons again, and that my kiddos aren't asking to watch TV all day long. I really truly enjoy the beginning of a new school year, and I think the kids do too. In fact, when I picked up Tyler yesterday he told me that it was the best day ever! Pretty impressive Mrs. Perkins- you rank up there with Disneyland and Christmas! Tyler is in 1st grade this year, Ellie is in 5th (with Mrs. Findly) and Anna is a freshmen! Yes you heard me right- I am now the mother of a High School-er. Wish me luck cause I'm gonna need it!

No rest for the weary

So I full realize that sometimes I stink at keeping our blog up-to-date. I think it's just a part of who I am. I'm a little ADD and have a hard time sticking to things. I have many unfinished projects. But I'd like to blame my resent inability to post anything on my crazy-busy life. Here's a brief list of what we've been up to for the last month and a half-

-Anna had 8th grade graduation (that's right- she'll be in high school next year. yikes!)
-Ellie had a school talent show (she played chopsticks on the piano with a friend)
-School ended (mixed feelings with this one)
-Ellie and Tyler had soccer
-Tyler had T-ball
-We finally had Tyler's friend birthday party (what were we thinking inviting 10 boys)
-I taught Relief Society
-We had a birthday party for my Mom at our house (the big 60)
-My sister from TX came to stay for a few days with her little girl
-I took said sister to the SLC temple and out to lunch
-We cut up all the grass on the south side of our house
-I built 6 garden boxes (and yes, I actually finished them)
-I installed, filled, and planted my 6 new garden boxes (with lots of help from friends!)
-I moved sprinkler heads and put down a lot of weed barrier
-We had a patio poured (i know we didn't do any of the work for it, but it still counts)
-I've had a cold for a month (why?)
-Bryan went out of town a few times for work (Atlanta, Seattle, and Seattle again)

And all of that is on top of the normal every day mom things I have to do too. I haven't gotten myself organized for the summer yet. Our schedules are really messed up still. I'm hoping now that my big projects are almost finished I'll be a little more organized. We'll see though- that might just be wishful thinking!

*I can't find my camera right now- but when I do I'll update this with some pictures!

Happy Birthday Tyler!

My little boy (who's not so little anymore!) turns 6 today. He was my mother's day baby. I went into labor on mother's day and had him at 3 in the morning the next day. Last year his birthday fell on Mother's Day so he got to have breakfast in bed with me. He's such a fun kid! Right now he's playing soccer and T-ball and loves them both. He also loves riding his bike and playing with his friends. He can be very sweet- especially to Kate. We love having him in our family! Happy Birthday Buddy!

Spring is... Springing!

I guess it hasn't full sprung yet, but it sure is on it's way. I love spring and I think this is why...

I gave Bryan this peach tree last year for his birthday and it's beautiful right now. I love the little blossoms and knowing that maybe we'll get some yummy fruit off it later in the summer. So come on Spring- cause we sure are ready for you!

Over the past few weeks...

So I have a bunch of pictures from the past few weeks. Just little bits and pieces of our life. So this is what we've been up to...

Anna got a hair cut- she looks so grown-up with her shorter hair. What a cute young lady!
Kate threw a fit at lunch one day when I didn't let her help put her mac & cheese in her bowl. She got mad and dumped her lunch on the floor. What a twit! Needless to say- she was sorry and had to help clean up!

We gave in this year a bought a season pass to the zoo. Kate was really afraid of these metal animal statues. Tyler looks a little sassy in this picture!
That's about it for now. I spaced out on Easter and didn't take any picture. OOPS! More to come later!

Happy Birthday Katie Bug (finally!)

Our Little Miss turned 2 at the beginning of the month. I can't believe it. She is such a cute little person and so much fun to have around (most of the time). She talks a lot and is very independent. I think she sees the other kids doing things by themselves (like pouring cereal) and so she has to do it too. She had her first favorite movie last month. She called it the "hoo-hoo-ha-ha movie" but it's really Curious George. She has some funny quirky things she does, like she has to have her pacifiers washed at nap and bedtimes (yes- she still uses them, I guess they'll get thrown away soon) and she likes to have different types of cereal in her bowl at the same time. She's turned out to be a really good dinner eater. I've always had this theory that if you offer little kids the same food at dinner that everyone else is eating, eventually they will start to eat it too. I don't cook 2 different dinners- everyone gets the same thing. About a month ago she realized that dinner is good, and now eats what ever we put in front of her. It still makes me sad that she's growing up so fast. My last baby really isn't a baby anymore! So happy birthday Miss Kate- we love you so very much!

Happy Happy Birthday Anna Dear!

Today is Anna's 14th birthday. I'm having a hard time believing that she's really that old. She's such a beautiful young women and a lot of fun to have around. She's always very helpful and loving. Some of her friends are coming over tonight for an ice cream & movie party. SO- Happy Birthday Anna, we love you!

Pulling Teeth

Tyler lost his second tooth a few weeks ago, I was just to busy to post about it until now. It had been loose for a little while and finally he was fed up. He came downstairs one evening and said something like "I just can't take it anymore mom, can you just pull it out?". None of my kids have ever asked to have a tooth pulled. I've tried to pull teeth before with out much success. They have either been crying too hard or I couldn't get a good grip on the tooth. Not this time. I grabbed a tissue, got a hold of the tooth, and pop- out it came! No tears and no problems! I know he looks a little worried in the picture but that's just because it bled a little after it was pulled. He's such a brave kid!

Anna's School Project

Anna had to do a project for her science class. She had to create a Rube Goldberg- lots of little steps to accomplish a simple task. We spent part of Saturday helping her with it. The task that she was trying to accomplish was to fill a glass with water from the refrigerator. So watch and see...

Little Piggies

The other night Bryan took Kate upstairs to get her ready for bed- or so I thought. Instead I found this...
That's right, he's painting her nails. Who does she have wrapped around her little finger (or piggie!)?

The Mischievous Miss

Our Miss Kate is becoming more and more mischievous every day. I find her doing some of the craziest things. -She climbs up on everything- none of my other kids did that.
-She is always taking her pants off and finding different things to put on instead.
-She sneaks pacifiers out of her crib and comes down giggling with them in her mouth.
-She goes in the laundry room and tries to hand fed Penny (the cat) her food.
-She pushes kitchen stools into the pantry to try to get out snacks.
She is totally one of those kids that if they're too quiet then you know they're up to no good! I don't know what I'm going to do with her! It's a good thing she's so darn cute!

The sick house- UPDATE! And Another- UPDATE!

That's our house right now. 2 of my kids now have strep throat- Anna and Kate (the oldest and youngest). 2 down 2 to go right? I really hope it doesn't spread any further! But more than that- I really hope I don't get it. I can take care of sick kids, but no one takes care of a sick Mama! Keep your fingers crossed for me...

2/19/10: Well- add one more to the list because Ellie's now sick (and Anna woke up with a fever again!) I guess it's time to DEEP clean my house!

2/21/10: Anna has it again and now Tyler has it too. Well actually he's probably had it for the past few weeks. He was sick about 3 weeks ago with a fever and stomach ache- no sore throat and it went away after a few days. Well, come to find out, a lot of kids never have a sore throat with strep- they have a stomach ache. Who knew?! When I took Anna in yesterday to get tested yet again, I had them test Tyler even though he doesn't have any symptoms and he was positive. Growing up, my sister was a carrier of strep. We would all get sick and test positive but she would be the one without any symptoms. So maybe he's a carrier too. Anyway... Hopefully after this round of amoxicillin we'll all be better. The doctor even gave me prescriptions for Bryan and myself (which is a good thing since I'm feeling rotten now too)!

The Big "D"

Of course that's code for Disneyland- I mean really, what bigger D is there! As most of you know, we surprised our kiddos with a trip to Disneyland for Christmas. It was a hard secret to keep seeing as how we planned the trip in October. I'm still surprised that none of them found out early. I was worried that the parks were going to be crazy around Christmas, so I planned for the worst so that I wouldn't get my hopes up. And it worked! The first day we were their (Dec 28th) we spent only in Disneyland (we had park hopper passes), and by the end of the day it was packed- standing room only! The second day we spent at California Adventure and it wasn't nearly as crowded. And our final day (the day of rain!) we went back and forth between the two doing the things we liked best.



I did learn a few things on our little trip:
1) don't leave the ponchos (you know, the ones you purposely brought with you just in case it rained) in your hotel room, because the ones in the park cost $7.00 each!
2) if you don't want to wait an hour to ride on Dumbo, go to Fantasyland first thing in the morning. You can ride all the little kid rides without waiting in long lines.
3) if you get motion sickness- DON'T ride the teacups!
4) don't expect your baby girl who loves Mickey mouse and carries his doll around everywhere to LOVE Mickey mouse in person! Life-size mouse = kind-of scary!
5) try not to wear a white polo with tan colored pants because you'll get asked more than once where the bathroom is or where someone might be able to get a hot dog!

We stayed one extra day in CA so that we could go to the beach. Now granted it wasn't really beach weather- it was still fun. It happened to be the warmest day of the trip (high of 70). We drove down the coastal highway and ended up stopping at Crystal Cove State Park. The kids had a lot of fun playing in the tide pools and exploring. They found 2 star fish, hermit crabs, and lot of other sea creatures. And yes, we touched them all even though you weren't suppose to! We had a great Christmas and a Fantastic trip! I don't know if we'll be able to top it next year!

Christmas!

Only a month late...but better than never! We had a great Christmas. On Christmas Eve Eve (so the 23rd!) my sister Stacy and her family came over for a fondue party. YUMMY! The kids loved it. That night the kids slept under the Christmas tree like they do every Christmas Eve Eve. It's a Haymond family tradition. Christmas Eve we did a little house cleaning cause Santa can't come to a dirty house! And then we did out traditional Christmas Eve dinner at Pizza Hut- dine in! This is something we've been doing for the past 3 years or so with Bryan's sister Jen and her family. The sad this is that I don't have pictures of any of those traditions! Next year I'll have to remember to get out the camera! We opened one present on Christmas eve- jammies, left some cookies for Santa, read The Night Before Christmas and the story of Christ's birth, and went to bed.Here are the kiddos waiting to head downstairs to see what goods Santa brought them!
Kate got a kitchen, Tyler got Cars Race-o-rama for the Wii, Ellie got an Our Generation doll, and Anna got a docking station for her iPod.

When all the presents were opened and everyone was happy, we brought out some cards for them to open. Inside was a photo card with a picture of all 4 kids and a little poem that said "You kids are the greatest, you're really number 1. So go pack your bags becasue DISNEYLAND here we come." That was their main gift form us this year. A surprise family trip to Disneyland. They were all really excited. This was our first time going. So stay tuned for a post all about our trip.

Almost there-

Yes, I'm still catching up. But I'm almost there.
The Monday and Tuesday before Christmas I went up to Logan with the kids to visit my family. My sister just happened to have her baby girl the day we got there. Lucky me! Welcome Miss Eli Jane-We also made cookies and decorated some gingerbread houses (but those just don't compare to a darling new baby girl!)
Here's before-And here's after-

Fun times with some cute kids!