Santa has email?

Does Santa have email? Peyton now thinks he does... I've already started using Santa as an excuse for Peyton to behave when she's getting a little to out of control which seems to be getting more and more frequent. Terrible 3's are getting the best of her! The other day we were hanging out at home and she was having a rough time so I suggested we send an email to Santa. We sat down and I asked her what she wanted to tell him and what she wanted him to bring her for Christmas. I obviously helped a little with the email to let it have some type of flow to it, otherwise it would have been a jumbled mess, but almost all of this was Peyton...

 

Dear Santa,

I have been a very good girl this year! I've been a great big sister and I take care of brother. I like to color pictures of Donald in my coloring book. I watch cartoons, eat lunch and do everything I can do. I like to eat and drink and do cartoons and everything. I mind my mommy and audge too! And Kinsley too! I mind my daddy too! I help mommy with cleaning the t.v. and my camera. I don't work, but I help with laundry and picking up the echo. Brother's been a good boy too! I want you to bring me a cookie monster that says, "cookie" and a elmo that says, "hahaha" when the song's over. I think you look very christmasy with a long hat on the top!

Love,

Peyton

 

 

Ever since we saw this Elmo toy in Walmart and listened to him sing the same song 50 times she has wanted it. Maybe Santa will end up getting it for her! ;) Anyways, I thought our email was cute and wanted to share... Obviously I sent it to myself and forwarded it to Audge because I thought she might want to know that Peyton is proud of herself for minding both her and Kinsley, who can't even talk yet.

Our Halloween

Unfortunately Daddy had to work this Halloween, but he was at least able to see the kids in their costumes before he left. I took this little witch and her pirate brother to Oroville to celebrate with family!

When picking out her costume we tried to talk her into so many different things like princesses or something cute and frilly, but she was stuck on being a witch so we finally gave in. She even picked out the last witch costume I would have chosen for her, but after we put it on her we realized it was a cute one. We practiced her witch laugh a thousand times at home and she got it down perfect, but once we actually got out and around other people she was too shy to do it... We started out our night of trick or treating at Grammy's work(an assisted living facility). All the elderly people were so excited to see these two at their door and I'm pretty sure grammy loved showing them off to everyone.

Jax made such a cute pirate! I was surprised that he left his hat on all night, even after taking it on and off while getting him in and out of the truck.

His costume was a little big, but it worked. It came with shoe covers that looked like boots, but they were way too big for him. He picked up on the concept of getting candy in his pumpkin pretty quick and was blowing kisses at everyone as a thank you.

After trick or treating Country Crest we went to Derek's Aunt Edna and Uncle Dale's door and stayed a while. Then we went to Jeff's to see aunt Sarah. The kids got tons of candy and little gifts from all of them. Peyton loved showing off her outfit all night! I wish I took more pictures through the evening...

We ended the night at my parent's house in Gridley with Audge, Damon and Kinsley. Kinsley's owl costume was to die for, but I think both her and Peyton were over their hats... We were all pretty beat by the end of the night, but it was worth all the running around we did to see everyone we wanted to see. 

Interview with a 3 year old...

So, I keep saying that every birthday the kids have in the future I want to record an interview with them using the video camera. I think it would be the coolest thing for them to watch when they are older and remember how they thought way back when. I haven't done it yet, but I'm pretty sure I'm going to start on Peyton's next birthday. Anyways, I was on Pinterest today and I saw a pin that said 21 questions to ask your child. I read through them and thought it was pretty funny, but they were all about what the kids thought about mom. I started asking Peyton the questions and she kept saying I don't know, so then I started asking her other things and she was crackin' me up so I decided to share the rest of the interview with you. Here it goes(I'm the one asking the questions obviously and she's the one answering):

Q: How old are you?
A: 3!

Q:What makes you happy?
A: Going down the slide!

Q: What makes you sad?
A: When you put me in the crib. (I swear I've done this 1 time when she was throwing the biggest fit and would not stay in her bed. How does she remember that?)

Q. What do you like to do?
A: I like to watch cartoons and go down the slide and play outside and I'm gonna all eat candy!(the last part doesn't really make sense, but that's what she said)

Q: What do I like to do?
A: Umm.. you like to put away dishes and i'm going to answer these questions so then I can watch the cat movie!(She's really into busytown mysteries on netflix!)

Q: What's your favorite thing to help me with?
A: Laundry!

Q: What do you wanna be when you grow up?
A: Umm.. I'd like to be a doctor when I grow up...(what a smarty)

Q: Who's you favorite person?
A: You mama! And Jax!

Q: Where is your favorite place to go?
A: To the doctor..(lol, what kid likes the Dr. office?)

Q: What's your favorite cartoon?
A: The cat movie! Can I watch the cat movie now?
In a minute, just a few more questions...

Q: What makes mommy happy?
A: we can do everysing we know(umm... k)

Q: Where does daddy work?
A: Trains!

Q: What makes brother happy?
A: What makes brother scared?
Hey I'm the one asking the questions here... This isn't working very well...

Q: Tell me something silly?
A: Umm... I want the cat movie! Can I have my cat movie now?

Maybe it's a good thing I'm not filming her first interview till her fourth birthday! Now that she's watching "the cat movie" I guess I'll finish this blog up with what she's been saying lately. When we're telling her to do something sometimes her response is, "shush..." I'm pretty sure she got this one from me.. oops! When I tell her what we're going to do in a day she gets really excited and says, "maybe we can do all that!" of course we're going to do all that. That's why I said "this is what we're going to do today"! She's really into calling Jax "Jackie" I think she said it on accident the first time and thought it sounded funny so she's been saying it ever since. In the morning she comes into our room, climbs into our bed and yells, "OKAY, let's get up and get some strawberry milk!" but the way she says "lets get up" is like she's trying to make it sound convincing, like it's fun to get out of bed or something. When she wants Jax to go play with her she tells him, "come on Jax, you can come into my room if you want to!" like he already needs permission haha... She's really into singing songs and now has a few country songs memorized, or at least the chorus anyways and it's soo funny to hear her belting them out from the bathroom while she's on the potty. She is so smart too! She now knows Derek's, mine, Jax's and her birthdays and she has our phone number and Janeane's cell phone memorized. It's crazy how long she has remembered them too! Today in the bath she was playing with her letters that stick on the wall and tilted the I sideways and told me, "look, mama! I made a fat H!" she's hilarious! I love it! The last thing I can think of is whenever she's being chased by anyone she yells, "oh no the big bad wolf"! She's a chicken too.. she LOVES Dora still, but lately when it's on t.v. I've caught her a few times sitting behind the couch looking into the kitchen. I finally figured out why the other day. Whenever she hears the sound right before swipper comes out she gets scared and hides until they find him. She never did this before, but all the sudden she started doing it every time she watched the show! Anyways, that's enough for now about my crazy daughter! I'm still waiting to hear what my son is going to say! Look forward to that post in about a year!

Getting excited for Halloween!

Peyton and I decided we were going to make Halloween cookies! I hadn't made rolled out sugar cookies in a really, really long time so I thought it would be a fun thing to do together.

We did have fun and Peyton was a great helper, but they didn't turn out as well as I hoped so I didn't take pictures of the final product. Maybe next time will be better. :) I think I didn't let the dough chill enough before trying to roll it because it was still really sticky so I tried to add more flour and then ended up putting it back in the fridge. After all was said and done they tasted like pure flour. I felt bad for disappointing Peyton, but luckily Audge came over before she could eat her cookie and she got all excited to go stay the night at her house. So I was saved on that one!

The only thing Jax wanted to do with the cookies was to lick the mixing paddle. Typical boy wanted to play instead of bake.

We took the kids to the pumpkin patch. Jax was only 2 months old when we took him last year so there's no way he remembered it, but I think Peyton kinda knew where we were going.

Jax took one look around and didn't know what he wanted to do first.

He wasn't to thrilled that Peyton took over the wheel.

It was fun showing them all the animals.

Their favorite part was a tie between the petting zoo and the train.

She was afraid of the goats. It took her a while to even get up the courage to pet one.

I'm not sure what she was doing here, but I loved her face!

The train couldn't start moving fast enough he was so excited!

They got to ride a train like daddy does!

We found our pumpkins almost right off the bat which was good because it was pretty hot out there.

I think he looks like such a little stud in this picture.

Our pumpkins! We actually only got four, but Peyton kept trying to add more and more to the wagon. Pretty soon we will carve them, but that will probably be the next thing I blog about.

Photo Book

My mother in law prepaid for a photo book so I could capture Peyton's first year. I put it all together online and when I was finally finished and it came I loved it. I had been wanting to do one for Jax's first year so when I got a coupon in the mail from shutterfly for a free photo book I was so excited! It couldn't have come at a better time! I can't wait till this gets to my house! It was fun while I was putting this together to kind of go over the past year and see how fast Jax has actually grown. He's so big now. I love the little boy that he is. He already has his own way of showing Derek and I that he loves us and it is the sweetest thing.

Click here to view this photo book larger

Shutterfly baby photo books are the perfect way to preserve your baby's precious moments.

Goodbye summer!

We've been spending all day cleaning and packing up things we don't use anymore so I decided to clean our little kiddie pool out and store it away till next summer... after letting it dry I brought it inside. The kids and I decided to have a little fun! Its awesome how the little things make them soo happy! I love it!!

Ba Ba Da...

A few months back my sister Sarah burnt me a CD that I put into the player in our truck. Every time it would come around to this song I would skip it because it sounded like Christmas music to me. I couldn't figure out why she would even put a song like this on the CD. I never really listened to it all the way through, but one day we were driving home from somewhere in silence and Peyton told me, "I wanna listen to the ba ba da song..." It took me a few minutes , but i finally figured out this was the song she was talking about. It was soo funny to hear her singing along with the chorus. Just ba ba da ba da ba... Then we started listening to it every time we went somewhere. Now if you know Jax, you know that he is not that big of a talker yet. Everything is ba.. ball is ba, bath is ba, bye is ba... he walks around all day saying ba so this was the perfect song for him. He started singing and dancing along after a while too. Every time we listen to this song we crank up the speakers and dance and sing! A little cheesy? Ya, probably, but I love every second of it. This song makes my kids so happy! We do so many silly things like this that daddy doesn't know about because it would just confirm his suspicions that mommy is a dork... He found out  about this one though on our way to Fort Bragg a while back. Jax was super fussy and I was trying everything to calm him down, but he was completely over it. Finally I turned on this song and his whole mood flipped around. He got all excited and started clapping and singing. Derek was soo confused. We still listen to this song every day and I have to say it is now my favorite song, just because of the kids. It's so fun to rock out to it with them. Jax nods his head to the music and Peyton yells/sings as loud as she can! This song will eventually be a memory that I never want to forget...

p.s. you might want to pause the song that's always on my blog before listening to this clip... to do that just scroll all the way down and you'll find the music player...

Peyton's 3!!!

Janeane, Audrea and Kinsley came over on Peyton's birthday and brought her a few gifts and this cute cake that looks like a giant cupcake! They weren't going to be able to make her party so they decided to throw her a little one to celebrate! It was so nice of them to be so thoughtful and of course Peyton loved it!

Janeane bought her this cute little outfit and the shoes... Dora, of course!

Janeane told her to make a wish and I guess this was her way of wishing it would come true!

Our little family is now all a year older! It's been a crazy few months, but we're finally starting to get back to normal!

Peyton has been obsessed with Dora since day 1! I thought she was finally starting to appreciate all the other cartoons that she's recently started watching, but when I asked her what kind of cake she wanted for her birthday she told me she wanted a Dora cake... I tried soo hard to talk her out of it by showing her other samples of cakes that I thought were cute, but she stuck to her guns!

This probably wont come as a shock to you if you've read my blog in the past because I am annoyingly ALWAYS saying time is flying by soo fast! I wonder if i will ever get used to this feeling!? Peyton will always hold a special place in my heart as my first little angel because she was the one who changed my reason for living! I will always be grateful to her for showing me what life is really all about! Derek started the process of changing me into a responsible adult when we got married and settled down, but I didn't really get it until I was holding my baby girl and realizing that everything I'd do from that moment on would affect her...

Three years have gone by in the blink of an eye! My little girl is getting bigger and smarter everyday! She is like a sponge soaking up everything she sees and hears. We had a small get together with close family members to celebrate her birthday with desert and in front of my mother in law she used the expression, "oh crap!"... oops! My bad! 

As always, she was spoiled by everyone! I think she was even more excited because we just had Jax's party and now it was her turn to get presents!

My in laws bought her an easel and Derek's aunt Edna and uncle Dale bought some of the supplies for it! Peyton was soo excited!!!

She was finally able to blow out her own candle, unlike the years before! Kinsley slept right through all the best parts!

Daddy keeping Jax occupied!

A few days after her party I decided we should have some fun with the finger paints! I love how excited Peyton gets when we do new things and she is such a good listener..

We are anything but artists, there is no denying that! To explain the color blotches above what's supposed to look like a bee, we were trying to learn what colors mixed together made... Jax came walking up to us in his diaper and we attacked his belly drawing a big smiley face on it with blue paint. Unfortunately we didn't get a picture of it. Then Peyton got a little crazy, with my help of course!

What's the fun of keeping it on the paper anyways??? This lasted about a minute, then they were both in the bath! Bath time is bittersweet... I love how they love to play in the bath. They have these colorful letters that stick to the wall so we learn letters, colors and spelling. Peyton can actually spell a few words! Jax just loves to knock the letters down and get yelled at by Peyton for messing up her hard work. The bitter part of it is getting them out. They NEVER want to get out of the bath! There is ALWAYS fits being thrown when bath time is over!

We had Kinsley for a whole weekend when Audge went out of town and we had tons of fun! Jax actually did pretty well for a while, but I think he was ready for her to go when Audge came to get her because he wanted all the attention back. She's so crazy now! She's almost nine months old and already trying to stand up ALL the time! I swear she will be walking in no time! We've been having so much fun with her lately!

Derek's 30!!!

Last Thursday was Derek's 30th birthday! He woke up to Peyton calling him an old man! I loved it because I was the instigator in that one of course! He seems to have taken it quite well. It did hit him pretty hard at first that he was no longer in his 20's, but he's adjusting ok. I remember what it felt like to be 18. It still feels like it was yesterday and I thought that people in there 20's were soo much older and more mature. They aren't...  at least not as much as I thought they were..:) I mean I have more life experience and more responsibilities now, but I still feel like I'm 18! Now I'm married to a 30 year old! Crazy! Anyways, back to Derek's birthday! Derek and I have been blessed by having family that gets along so well with each other. Derek's grandparents and mine were very close friends since way back when. Crazy that Derek and I didn't meet each other until I was about 20 years old. Our families have had a friendly tie together since before we were born. Derek and I were the ones to turn that tie into a family tie! Which to me is soo awesome! Having our kids makes it even cooler because our grandparents who have been friends for years share great grand kids now! I guess what I'm trying to explain in such a short few sentences is that whenever Derek and I have events that we invite both his family and mine to it seems like we're all just one family and I'm soo grateful for that...

Thursday night we went to Casa Lupe in Gridley with both our families and it was soo much fun! This is Derek and I with Jason(Derek's brother) and his girlfriend Amanda. They are soo much fun!

My aunt Brenda, my grandma Ramona and Derek's grandma Auda

My brother Brad, Uncle Brian, Aunt Brenda and cousin Rob

My brother-in-law David(Janeane's husband), Jax, and my sister Sarah

My dad and Jax

I'm sad this picture kinda turned out blurry because of the candle, but I love it so I wanted to include it too! It was a lot of fun visiting with everyone. Peyton is so used to seeing our family now that she gets very excited to hang out with all of them and she makes her rounds soaking up all the attention. Jax still gets pretty nervous at first and takes a little while to open up, but once he does he definitely is an entertainer!

Before going to casa lupe we decided to take the kids by Grandpa's shop. My dad let Peyton drive in a few mowers and she loved it! This picture means soo much to me. Having children definitely brings back many fond flashbacks from the past. I spent so much time with my dad at his shop growing up. My earliest memory of being at my dad's shop was when I was in Kindergarten and I would go to work with my dad until school started at noon. Back then his shop was right down the street from the school so he would watch me walk there every day. Now I have a daughter that is only 2 years younger than I was then.

After Casa Lupe that night some of us went to my parents for dessert. When we were getting ready to leave I was asking the kids if they were ready to go home and go to bed. Peyton started whining a "no".. My mom turned to my dad and asked him, "Doesn't it remind you of when the kids were little?" I thought that was kind of a trip because there I was at my dad's shop reliving my childhood through Peyton and then here was my mom reliving her early parenthood through me. One day hopefully I will be reliving my early Parenthood through my children. It kind of makes the phrase, "Carpe Diem"(seize the day) take on a whole new meaning to me. Or "living in the moment" also. One day I will be reminiscing on today wishing I could go back, if only for a second, to cuddle with my babies again. They are already growing so fast and this definitely makes every kiss(butterfly, Eskimo, or regular) soo much more special. I'm not going to take anything for granted because one day I will wake up and it will all be memories.

I'm so grateful for my husband. I'm hoping for a long life ahead with him. He is such a great dad who cares for our children so much and is always considering how everything we do would effect them. He does so much for our family and asks for so little in return. He is the love of my life and I'm excited to see what the next 30 years has in store for us! :)

Fifth disease...

We thought Jax had developed a really bad sunburn when we were in Fort Bragg, but we couldn't figure out how it was that bad. At first he looked like his face had just gotten a really bad spray on tan. Then the next morning when we woke up the right side of his face was swollen so bad he could barely open his eye. At that point we thought he might have been having an allergic reaction, but then I googled sunburns and read that they could cause swelling. I decided to call his doctor anyway. They told me the nurse would call me back, but I ended up having to call again hours later and finally got her. She told me to call back in the morning to schedule an appointment. I was a little upset because their office is usually not so flakey, but I didn't want to wait another day. I felt like a horrible parent. How could I have let him get such an awful sunburn? So I took him to urgent care and the Dr said, "He has fifth disease." Immediately I was freaked out because disease sounds like a long term problem. Then he told me it was kind of like a flu virus that lasts from 3-5 days which explained his fever. They also call it "slap cheek" as well because it causes a red rashy face and swelling. It was soo sad because he looked like a completely different baby, but when you looked into his eyes he was the same. He didn't really seem uncomfortable at all. He was playing like normal and Peyton never even noticed that his face was different. She was clueless. I love how innocent kids are. She played with him and yelled at him for not sharing, never once did she ask me what was wrong with his face. I still can't figure out how he got it. This might sound awful, but I was almost relieved that it was a virus and not a sunburn because the blame didn't completely fall on my shoulders and I didn't feel like such a horrible mother anymore. It got pretty bad with blisters on the right side, but its finally starting to heal. His fever broke and he is almost back to normal. I feel like I'm becoming one of those parents who's always complaining about their kids being sick. This has definitely not been easy. Peyton was literally never sick. Then we had Jax and it seems like our family is picking up every virus you can think of and even viruses that we've never heard of.

Our Vacation!

Derek had vacation this week so we ended up taking the kids camping in Fort Bragg! It was soo much fun! I hadn't been camping in years and I forgot how it felt to sit around a campfire, sleep in a tent and relax out in the wild... It was overcast almost the whole time so all my pictures turned out a little gray.

Derek did most of the work including the cooking. I have to admit I was very skeptical about taking the kids camping, but he was really good at doing so much and letting me focus on taking care of them and keeping them occupied.

Keeping Peyton out in nature for three days wasn't easy. I don't know how many times she told me she wanted to watch cartoons. It seemed to be the worst at night when it started to get dark she would say she was ready to go home.

Before we got to the campsite all she could talk about was having a campfire and telling "spooky stories"!  The night we actually had our first campfire I asked her if she wanted me to tell her a spooky story and she said, "no, I want a silly story.." She chickened out on the scary ones...

Jax did soo well the whole trip, minus the melt down he had the first hour we spent driving there. He was tired and just wouldn't fall asleep. He screamed and screamed until we finally stopped to have lunch and when Derek took him out of his car seat he found a small toy ball that Jax had been sitting on the whole time which is probably why he was whining in the first place... oops!

Peyton is usually all about being clean. She hates getting dirty, but for some reason I could not keep her out of the dirt. At first I kept telling her to stay out of it, but then I realized that we were camping and it wasn't really fair to take her out there and expect her to stay clean. So I just let her be a kid and go crazy with the dirt... Every time I tell Peyton to be careful these days or not to do something her response isn't "OK" like it used to be. Now it's, "Don't worry!" She's a smart little girl because it's her way of not promising anything.

This tree was in our campsite and it was funny because when I first saw it I was reminded of all the times my siblings and I would climb trees in our backyard when we were little. My brother actually fell out of one of our trees and broke both of his arms once. My first thought was, 'that would be a good climbing tree'... Not that I would just start pulling myself to the top of it and Peyton's still too little, but it was the first thing that popped into my head. The first day we were there some kids from the campsite next to us came over and asked if they could climb it. Peyton just watched them for a while and kept asking me if she could go play with them.

Finally when I was finished with whatever it was that I was doing at the time I took her over and gave her a few pointers on how to climb a tree. She didn't get too high up, but she kept telling me, "wow, mama! I'm almost all the way to the top!" It's weird how things must seem soo big to her. It's like when you go back to a place you used to play at when you were little and it's always soo much smaller than you remember...

Peyton started laying out firewood and told me she was making train tracks so I brought out Jax's toy train that we brought with us and she was soo excited. It's fun playing with her and seeing what her imagination can do.

This was my attempt to be creative with my new camera... I thought this picture turned out pretty cool!

We were all excited about roasting marshmallows! Jax wasn't a huge fan, but he ate the gram crackers! Peyton was scared to eat her smore because it was going to be too sticky, but once she tasted it she didn't care... Derek was focused on roasting the "perfect marshmallow" that was golden brown. He was pretty good at it! Mine lit on fire and it took me a while to put the fire out so I ended up having to start over because it was completely burnt.

I wanted to get soo many cute pictures, but the kids were not having it. I honestly had to bribe Peyton to smile in over half of the pictures in this post. Jax is just in his own little world 24/7 so to get his attention for more than 2 seconds isn't possible.

We took the kids to Folsom Lake a while back and Derek showed Peyton how to throw rocks into the water so when we told her we were going to the beach she was soo excited to throw rocks!

Peyton called the campground bathrooms the "potty house". One time she went to the "potty house" with me to wash Jax off after snack time. We were standing at the sink when a Lady with short straight hair and no make up on came out of one of the stalls and started washing her hands. Peyton hid behind me and started saying, "I'm afraid of the boy, mama!" she said it about three times. I automatically knew what she was talking about, but trying to make things not so awkward I asked her, "you're afraid of brother?" Then she said, "No, I'm afraid of the boy.. I'm afraid of the girl... I'm afraid of the boy." She was soo confused and I am not the type of person to think of something right off the bat to make the situation better. This woman was obviously a woman, but Peyton didn't know what to think and I just kept washing Jax and acted like I didn't have a clue what she was talking about. I mean really what could I have said? "Peyton, that's a girl"?  I think anything I would have ended up saying would have made the situation more uncomfortable so I quickly finished and left. Later I explained to Peyton that girls can have short hair too. I still feel like I should have said something..

I love her so much! She has brought a smile to my face every day for the past 3 years almost! Yep, she will be 3 next month! Crazy!

Jax loved rolling around in the sand with Daddy when he wasn't trying to eat it! He's getting to be quite the little fighter these days and he can definitely hold his own!

 We had fun running from the waves. At one point we kinda hiked down this steep hill to our own private little beach. It was soo worth it!

There's something very amazing about standing on a beach watching the waves come in. It's beautiful!

I think I was more excited about the little animals that we saw then anyone. It was kinda scary how brave they were though. I think they're used to people feeding them so they aren't afraid and will come right up to you. I didn't take a picture of it, but we took the kids to Mendocino and had lunch on the patio of this little cafe. A bird came up and ate a cheezit that had fallen on the ground and Peyton thought it was the coolest thing so we threw another one down close to Jax and a bird picked it up and flew away. I think Jax was a little upset that the bird took his cheezit!

This was my favorite picture from the whole trip! I love it!!! I'm soo proud of our little family! I'm proud of how well Peyton has adjusted the past year and how much she's learned, I'm proud of Jax for all of his milestones, I'm proud of Derek for being such a great Dad and for all that he does to make my life easier and I'm proud of myself for everything I never thought I could accomplish so early in life...