Happy Halloween

This is not exactly my favorite holiday. I think I’ve said that before….. actually, I say that every year. But I do love making costumes.
This year the boys are OBSESSED with the Lone Ranger. (Not the one with Johnny Depp, the classic). And when I say ‘obsessed’, I mean they watch it every day! The William Tell Overture is permanently stuck in my head. I actually hum it to myself when I’m driving… that’s how bad it is. So, it wasn’t any surprise to me when they wanted to be The Lone Ranger and Tonto for Halloween.

And I think they pulled it off pretty good

Jefferson, in character. Apparently Tonto doesn’t smile? I kept trying to get Jefferson to smile for me, but he just said, “This is how Tonto looks”. Okay?

And the hero himself…

After a thousand pictures of them holding guns and aiming at each other (which is probably the only reason they wanted these costumes), I asked them to just smile for Pete’s sake!  That’s how I got this totally fake smile from Grant. I’ll take it.

Reagan wanted to be Cinderella. She doesn’t like the movie, and if you ask her who her favorite princess is, she’ll say “Ariel,” but for some reason she wanted to be Cinderella. This girl baffles me. 

Reagan INSISTED that Kennedy be Cinderella also, but I didn’t want them to have the same costume. I was able to make both of us happy by making Kennedy Cinderella Pre-Princess.
Then I put her to work!


Here’s everyone… some happier than others….

We celebrated the weekend before Halloween at church. The Primary President from another ward and myself put together the Trunk-or-Treat. It was a LOT of work, but totally worth it.


Kennedy spotted one of her besties and tackled her (like she usually does), then followed her around. It was pretty cute. Kennedy is my most social baby and loves playing with friends.
 

Last night we went Trick-or-Treating through the neighborhood. My kids got LOADS of candy. They decided not to do the Switch-Witch this year, and instead want to just eat all their candy. I tried convincing them that trading in their candy for a toy was a better idea… but they weren’t buying it. Now we have PILES of candy in our house. I told them they need to have it all eaten by the end of the weekend… otherwise it’s getting thrown away.
I am so cruel, and I don’t care.

You should have seen Kennedy trick-or-treating. It was probably the cutest thing I have every seen…. at least since the first year Reagan went out, and before that Grant. Really, watching little babies run up driveways and hold out their little baskets for candy melts my heart. It’s just adorable.
But then again, everything Kennedy does is adorable.

Okay, so maybe I do like Halloween… a little.
I just like watching my kids light up and have fun.
Here’s our family on Halloween. Shawn is the only Ba-humbug, but he’s a handsome one.
   

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

Projects

Although I don’t get as much done as I used to (no time, no energy, no money), I still try to keep myself busy with projects. I want to share a few….

It’s been a while since I made this shelf. It’s HUGE and looks a little out of place in my small house. But whatever! Shawn was out of town when I finished it and I had to ask my neighbor to help me hang it up, it was that heavy.

Here is a before and after of this record table I found at a garage sale. I gutted the whole thing and now it holds… well, nothing. But someday I will have something stored in there. For now it’s just an entry table hiding an air vent.

Here is a before and after of this desk I found 2 years ago (that is how slow I have become) in Oregon. It was $7. I was with Shawn when I saw it. He didn’t think it was necessary to buy it because we already have a desk. He doesn’t think anything I buy necessary. It is…. oh it definitely is.
Don’t let it’s size deceive you… it is a heavy sucker! The wood wasn’t too bad, but I just preferred white.
 

Then, there is the project of the century. At least that is what I am dubbing it. I don’t know what gave me the idea that this project would be simple. Perhaps it was those craft bloggers who make reupholstering look like a piece of cake. They’re lying… it’s not! And it doesn’t take a weekend like they portray. If you’re like me it takes 6 months (maybe less if you don’t quit halfway through like I did)!!!

Here is the before. It was $20 (in Oregon of course, you can’t find deals like that here!)
 

I spent roughly 20 hours just removing staples. This was by far the worst part of the project. I hated my life!
Once the staples were removed, I disassembled it piece by piece…. taking 8 million pictures of the process so I would know how to put it back together.
This is the chair totally taken apart. I painted the wood, then quit. It sat in my garage for MONTHS! I didn’t have the energy to put it back together. I mean… look at this thing. I considered throwing it in a dumpster.

My motivation to get it done was when poor Shawn asked if he would ever be able to park in the garage again. He sure puts up with a lot. So, I gave myself a 6 week deadline and promised him he could have his spot in the garage back. I met my deadline with time to spare.
Here is my chair, all done… FINALLY!
 

And I only cried twice. Once when I saw better fabric at the store and wanted to buy it after I had already cut my fabric at home. And the 2nd time when the only way to complete the reconstruction was to buy a new tool. Shawn says I have to do more reupholster projects now that he spent the money on that tool.
He said it…. not me!
Although I’m not thrilled to dive into another chair just now.

I’ve got something bigger, and better up my sleeve….

Girl’s Weekend

I’m going to tell you a Fairytale. Fairytale’s aren’t actually true…. but this one is.

Once upon a time I was driving when my phone rang. I answered it (probably not a great idea, but I put it on speaker phone so I was ‘hands free’). It was one of my best friends from Washington. She asked how I would feel about her coming out (as in clear across the USA) to visit me. What kind of question is that? “Can I come visit you in North Carolina?” Heck yes!
I actually had to pull the car over, I was so excited I couldn’t even focus on driving. We’re lucky to be alive! I was so flattered that she would want to visit me. And if I remember correctly I screamed a few times.

But that is just the beginning of my story….
When we found out the days Megan was coming, Shawn requested time off of work. Who does that? Amazing husbands, that’s who!

Megan and I decided to visit the Outer Banks. I had just been there, which was a little like dejavu, but we did a few new things I’d never done on my previous trip. |
The Outer Banks is 4 hours away and we needed a reliable car.
The day before her arrival, our Civic broke down. Big time! The repairs were going to cost over 1K and take 3 days to fix. After crying for a while, Shawn reminded me that this problem was easy to solve. He rented a car. I’m way too emotional couldn’t see outside of the box.

So, after Megan traveled an ENTIRE DAY to get here, I made her get up at 5am to start our road trip to the OBX.
Here we are geared up and ready to go. (Actually, this is us when we got back. We didn’t take a picture at 5am. Just pretend)

We stopped at Bojangles for breakfast and got some biscuits. They were really delicious… or I was really hungry.

You have to excuse my pictures. First of all, I brought our dinky camera that takes pretty awful pictures. And I didn’t take many pictures.
Megan does have more, but she hasn’t sent them to me yet (hint hint). When she does, I’ll update this post.

We arrived at the Outer Banks and stopped really quickly at Fort Raleigh to learn a little about the Lost Colony

Then we drove through the National Seashore on our way to Cape Hatteras. We stopped the car and walked along the shore for a while. It was beautiful. These pictures don’t do it justice. Miles and miles and miles of undeveloped shoreline, COVERED with seashells. I collected a whole bag full of whole shells (of which I still have no plans for, they’re just sitting on my counter… but they’re pretty).
  

We were pretty fascinated with the rippled sand.

Cape Hatteras hadn’t changed since my last visit. It was more fun climbing to the top with a girlfriend, rather than a whinny child, though. I’ve decided, everything is more fun with a girlfriend! Or is it that everything is more fun when you’re not responsible over 4 other little bodies?
Here we are at the top….

We ate some GREAT food! Megan made me get out of my comfort zone and order something besides Cesear Salad (it was a real challenge).

This is me holding a soft-shell crab sandwich at Dirty Dicks. There is a WHOLE crab in there…. claws and all! And instead of breaking the shell and digging out the meat, you actually eat the entire body. I was a little scared, but after 1 bite I was hooked. It was delicious!

We went to the hotel, put on our bathing suits and grabbed our boogie boards. I took 1 look at the water and froze… there was no way I was getting in there. The waves were too turbulent. Megan was crazy and made me get in. I ruined all the fun by almost crying (I was convinced I was going to die). So, we just sat on our boogie boards and got washed by the waves. We decided to try again the next day.

We were thirsty and needed a drink. And there’s no better place to quench your immediate thirst than at a Brew Thru! This is the best idea ever!!

We ate dinner at the Blue Moon and I had the best Cesear Salad I have EVER had (I know, I promised not to order that, but it was too tempting)

The next morning, the waves were even MORE turbulent.

I know, you’re probably all looking at that picture and thinking, “so what, that looks like nothing”, but believe me… I’ve never been more scared of waves than I have been of those! It was like a White Squall, really!
Here I am, standing at the edge of a pier, scared for my life!

The night before I had promised Megan I would get into the water… so I kept my word. We stood as the waves totally knocked us over, and over, and over. I swear I had bruises on my thighs from the impact. But I have never laughed so hard. It was life threatening, and fun!

After that we took ourselves to higher ground… much higher.
We visited the Wright Brother’s Memorial and gathered all the First Flight knowledge we could!
Then I raced Megan to the top of the memorial. I WON. But If this were her blog post, I’m sure she would claim the win. It’s debatable. Yet I do have 1 elderly couple on my side!
At the top….

One of the great things about the Outer Banks is all of the thrift stores.
We stopped by one and found most of their items outside. I just saw a bunch of junk. That was until my eyes caught a glimpse of this old bike. It was just what I’ve always wanted… an old rusty bike (to refurbish, of course). There were no prices. They just had a jar on the table and were asking for donations only.
I stood in front of the bike for 10 minutes, just staring. Until Megan, who knows me really well, and is crazy herself, insisted that I buy it and we could stuff it into the car. I stuck $2 (yes, $2) into the donation jar and we worked some contortion magic to fit that sucker into the back.
Best buy ever!!

Next stop…. Jockey Ridge State Park, AKA the Sahara Dessert
It is the tallest natural sand dune system in the Eastern United States, and boy is it breathtaking!
Note to self – take my children here
It was endless fun. We walked up to the tallest dune, then ran down it, of course. It was quite a hike around the dunes, but it was also very relaxing. Looking around, I seriously felt like I was in the middle of the dessert, hundreds of miles from civilization.
 

Here’s 1 last picture of food. These were the best fish tacos I’ve ever had. They were from Tortuga’s Lie. I would recommend it if you ever head out there! 
 

As you can tell, this really was a fairytale. I got to enjoy an adventurous, kid-free weekend with my best friend! Thank you Megan, for making this happen. It is something I will never forget.
But this is not The End. This story will continue… one of these days… in Washington!

I wonder if they have a brew thru?

The First Day of School

My kids have been in school of 9 weeks. I figured it was about time that I mentioned their first day of school. Better late than never, right?

This year I have a 4th grader, 2nd grader, and Kindergartener…. leaving me at home alone with a baby. It is the best thing that’s ever happened to me!

Here is Jefferson with his teacher, Ms. Huggins. She is a really great teacher! If you ask Jefferson to name his previous teachers, he won’t be able to name a single one…. he’s forgotten them. How is that even possible? Maybe non of them have made a big impact on him yet. We were talking about Ms. Huggins at the table one night and Jefferson said, “I think I’m going to remember her name next year”…. that’s sayin’ something.


He has really dived into school this year and loves going. He is involved in Chorus again, and has joined Battle of the Books also. In Battle of the Books the children read 18 Statewide chosen books, become experts on them, then compete later in the year. He is an amazing reader and will be a major player on the team, I’m sure. He has read the 2nd most books and has the 2nd highest AR points in the 4th grade. Way to go Jefferson! He is also running for class President again, I’ll let you know how that goes.
 

Here is Grant with his 2nd grade teacher, Mrs. Ross

She is very attentive to Grant and his needs. He’s pretty smart… as in he can complete Jefferson’s homework. He’s doing multiplication and division, and is an advanced reader. But he also very quiet. I felt that Grant was overlooked in Kindergarten and 1st Grade. But Mrs. Ross wants to challenge Grant. She actually sees his abilities and wants to strengthen them. He’s lucky to be in her class!

He was totally embarrassed that I was lingering in his class on the first day. It was just so hard to say goodbye to my sensitive little guy. He asked me to leave, then I snuck this one last picture of him sitting at his desk.

This is Reagan on her first day of Kindergarten. Her teachers are Mrs. Paradis and Mrs. Hughes.


And here she is saying her last goodbye to baby Kennedy

It was very difficult saying goodbye to her. She has been my sidekick for over 5 years. The morning started well, but after the final goodbyes she started to cry. She clung to me, kicked and flailed her arms as she was pulled away, and screamed as I walked down the hallway. It was fairly traumatic. I did NOT get a picture with her teacher. This continued for weeks…. 9 actually.

Here we are today… she no longer screams and flails her arms, but she does cry on some mornings, and she always clings to me. The teachers have to actually pull her out of the car every morning. It’s getting old.

She comes home thrilled to tell me everything she’s done during the day. She loves being at school, once she gets there.
But you’d never guess it from her school picture

Here are the boys coming home off the bus on the first day. Reagan had been playing with my phone and put in on this weird setting, but you get the idea.

So far the first 9 weeks have been successful (besides Kindergarten adjustments)…everyone is happy with their classes and more importantly “I” am happy with their teachers!

The Outer Banks

This is a SUPER long post, about a SUPER fun vacation!

We just had to take one last outing before the school year began (aka, we are tied down). We decided to visit the Outer Banks which is a 200 mile long strip of islands along the coast of North Carolina. It is chuck full of beauty, adventure, and history. I wanted to go for the history… Shawn for the beach.

We stayed 3 days in a tent (more on that later) because it is significantly cheaper.  3 days was nowhere near enough time to explore the islands, we really needed a week. But, we didn’t have a week, so we had to pick and choose the best things. We had to see the Wright Brother’s Museum, Fort Raleigh, and Cape Hatteras to cross them off our NC bucket list.

So, after driving for 4 hours….


we set up our tent, then headed straight for the Wright Brother’s Memorial...

I am fascinated with Wilber and Orville Wright. And, I thought I knew a lot about them already. I mean, they built a plane and were the first ones to fly it, right? Simple as that. But what about how many times did they fly that December 17? What was the telegraph message they sent to their father? or why did they choose to fly here in NC when they were from OH? How many setbacks did they have? Why didn’t they fly on Sunday?
I know you’re all dying to know the answers to these questions. You’ll have to visit yourselves to find out. Or just ask my kids, they’re Junior Rangers with badges to prove it!

Here’s the boys, soaking up some good info from the Ranger. They’re sitting at the exact spot that the plane took off.

This is a replica of the cabin the brothers slept in. You’ll notice their beds high above. They slept up there because the tide would frequently submerge the cabin in water, and they didn’t want to get wet.


These stones mark the 4 landings of the plane that day. At 120ft, 175ft, 200ft, and 852ft. (I just answered one of my own questions).
We walked to the first  markers, but skipped the 4th… it was too far away for those with little legs.
 

But somehow strength was mustered to climb up a ginormous sand dune to reach the monument at the top….

Each day wasn’t complete without a trip to the beach….

The kids boogie boarded the whole time!


Grant and I dug a humungous hole. And here he is, meticulously building a sand castle.

The baby put sand in and took sand out of this bucket all afternoon.

And in and out of her mouth…

A man on the beach was nice enough to offer and take a picture of my family… and cut off my daughter’s head.
I guess beggars can’t be choosers.

The next day we woke up to celebrate Shawn and my 11 year anniversary!
And what better way to celebrate your anniversary then on a vacation, in a tent, with 4 kids? (Trust me… it only got worse from there!)
Here we are!
Don’t those smiles just shout excitement? Really, I’m tired from sleeping on a rock all night (we couldn’t blow up the air mattress) and my fist is clenched because I’m scared my son is going to drop my camera. As long as we still look 19 and 20, I’m happy.

We toured Festival Park and Fort Raleigh on this day.
I am totally obsessed with the mystery of the Lost Colony. The settlers on Roanoke Island were the first English settlers in America in 1587. They built a town with 116 men, women, and children. One woman even gave birth to the first American born child, Virginia Dare. Long story short….. they were left by their governor who went back to England to get more supplies. When he returned to America, the colony had disappeared. Dun Dun Dun! The only clue was the words “Croatoan” and “Cro” carved into wood. To this day, no one knows what happened to the colonists.
I intend to become an archeologist and discover the answer. I’m not joking! I really think about them all the time. Maybe I’m weird.

Anyways, we got a chance to go aboard the Elizabeth II, a replica of one of the early settler’s ships.
My kids are so excited to be here, can’t you tell? They love when I force them to enjoy history.
I’m kidding, I think the sun is to blame….

… because once it was time to leave, we had to pry them out of the ship.
The kids, turning this in order to lift the anchor.

Reagan, making a chair leg with a tool an early settler would use.


And of course we had to play dress-up. Grant really got into character.
Don’t we look fabulous? The dress I’m wearing weighs 300 lbs at least! I don’t know how those women did it.

We walked around the woods and trails that the Lost Colony actually walked on. It was like walking on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, only better! 
Then we found ourselves at the outdoor theater at Ft. Raleigh. I snapped a picture of the set (and my kids climbing on in) to remember that I was here. See, I wanted so badly to see the show, The Lost Colony. It’s been playing outdoors here (and only here) since 1937. But, it started at 8pm and I knew the girls wouldn’t last.
Then, just as we were walking away, Shawn gave me the best Anniversary gift ever… he bought me a ticket to see the show and he offered to watch the kids.
What?!
I was a tad bit excited!

But, this picture is all I will have to remember the play with. Because that afternoon it started to rain… hard! We literally sat in the parking lot until 8pm with our fingers crossed that they wouldn’t cancel it, but they did.
It was still a nice anniversary gift, honey!

Oh ya, did I mention it was POURING? and did I mention that we were staying in a tent?
So, after a disappointing day (which also including sitting in traffic for 100 hours to get Thai food at the most expensive restaurant on the islands), we returned to find our tent surrounded by a LAKE of water 7 inches deep! The kids thought it was great fun. Stepping into the tent was like walking into a bouncy house. You would lie down and literally wade around like you were on a waterbed. We WERE on a water bed!
I was actually excited about it until I noticed water in the tent. Pillows and sleeping bags were sopping wet.
Shawn and I locked the kids in the car and began unpacking everything from the tent. We brought everything out (into the rain), then we moved our tent out of the lake and brought everything back inside. We were wet, tired, and irritable… which made for a wonderful conversation on our Anniversary, you can probably imagine!
But, we survived. Like I’ve said before, if Shawn and I could survive our 1st week being married, we can survive anything!

To be honest, I wanted to go home the next day. But there was 1 more stop on our list, Cape Hatteras.
We took the most beautiful drive through the Cape Hatteras National Seashore. I kept begging Shawn to open an Optometry office somewhere on the island so we could move there. Everywhere you look is gorgeous.  
We made it to the Lighthouse first thing in the morning.
Isn’t it pretty? It is the tallest lighthouse in America, and the worlds tallest brick lighthouse. 
And we just had to climb it!
 
Here are the kids, about to climb 257 steps to the top (equivalent to 12 stories). The baby couldn’t go up, so Shawn volunteered to sit out with her.

We made it to the top without a single complaint. They want you to limit your time spent on the top to 5 minutes. We couldn’t do it. It was a breathtaking view!


Peeking down at the original light keeper's house.

They actually moved this entire lighthouse, and keeper’s house 2,900 ft away from the shoreline in 1999 to save it.
How do you move something like this?

Here’s the boys accepting their Junior Ranger badges for Cape Hatteras.
Someday they’ll have all of them, at least it would be cool to try. Although I can’t really tell whether I want them more than my kids do. 
 

We spent the last afternoon on the island soaking in the sun on the beach.
Here we are in our new suits. Or should I say, old suits?
 

I only asked for 1 picture of the kids with the lighthouse in the background, one!
This is the best I got.
I think everyone was ready to go home at this point…. and put on some Aloe Vera, holy smokes.

Are we already planning a trip back to the Outer Banks, yes!
Want to join us?

I promise, we will not stay in a tent. At least, if we do, it will be on high ground!