My baby girl isn't a baby

Like so many of you I too had to send my oldest off to school today. I can't believe what a damper that put on my day. Autumn was thrilled and loved every minute of being a "school girl." Brynlee and I were sad she wasn't at home with us. I hate losing that control of knowing what she is doing every minute of the day. Brynlee really missed having a friend. Autumn's best friend Emma is in her class so they quickly found each other and were ready to start their adventure. I know she is ready to be out doing and learning, I just don't think I am ready. I quess I will just remind myself it is only three hours - at least we aren't into the entire day yet, I definitely could not handle that just yet.

As I side note, Chaz is just starting on solid foods sthe last couple days. Boy does he like his carrots and boy can he make a mess.

Welcome to my world!

I usually pretend I didn't see my name on one of these tags. But I enjoyed seeing Julie's house and a glimpse into their family that I thought I would take her up on the idea. So here it goes.

Here is our rental house:


Lovely Kitchen and Living Room

I took these pictures yesterday, we moved the boxes last night, and I cleaned the kitchen this morning. So in all fairness to me, you should know that my house looks better today.

What my kids were up to

The girls were making fancy boxes for their fancy kingdom. And Chaz was having his nap!!!

Now here is the house I wish we were all moved into and enjoying:

My Fridge

Well at least this is where my fridge should be. We just can't seem to find a Saturday or an evening moment where we can even look for a fridge. Hopefully next week, my girls are going to visit Grandma Simpson and Chaz and I are going to get a lot done.

My clean sink

It looks so lovely right now, without a ding or a scratch. How long will that last?

Living Room & Dining Room

Can you spot Chaz in the above mess? If not here is a close up.

We have Stairs

About a week after we moved to Twin Falls, a city with no basements, Brynlee walked by the kitchen a couple times then stopped and asked in all seriousness "Where's the basement?" It really bothered her to have no basement so for Christmas she said she wanted to ask Santa to bring her a basement. Well it cost too much for us to have a basement but we did add a bonus room above our garage so at least now we have some stairs for Brynlee.

Self Portrait
Okay so I don't enjoy pictures of me, but I think anything with Chaz in it is precious so he joined me for the self portrait

Well that was actually kind of fun. It was at least a good excuse to sit on the couch for an hour instead of packing. I am not so sure this slow moving idea is the way to go. It is slowly driving me crazy, I just want to be done.

Finally she is 5!!

Autumn has been so exctied to be five since her best friend turned five a few months ago. Well, she made it. Now she is so old she even classifies Brynlee and her friends as "the little kids." Well, she had a great day. With a Pirates of the Carribean party, presents, and even a cake. We invited her primary class and some of their siblings that usually come to play too. All the kids got pirate bandanas and pirate gear, they thought it was fabulous. We played a few pirate games and set out on a treasure hunt to a couple of the neighbors. It was a lot of kids, but they all did good and had fun.

Notice how cute of a pirate Brynlee makes. I don't believe she can see anything, but she is posing for that picture.

Autumn was very excited to go swimming at the city pool for the afternoon. Well, Brynlee was exhausted so after her nap we headed out, I noticed one grey cloud in the south sky but didn't have the heart to suggest we wait for another day. So ten minutes after arriving at the pool the cloud was above us and the lightning started. After all that work, I wished I had just made her wait from the start becuase now we'd have to wait anyway. Oh well, hopefully we can go tomorrow. The girls were so crushed, I felt so bad we hadn't gone just after lunch like we had originally thought.


Well she also had cake that night with our family. Yes that is more than five candles, in fact I think it is all 24 in the box. She frosted her own cake and put in her own candles. Her dad told her they would melt before we could sing to her and blow them out and I said oh just put them in. Well, they did melt some were almost completely gone. She thought the wax on the cake looked disgusting and said "Well I should've listened to Dad, not Mom!" That won't happen too often in her life as I am sure I am more knowledgeable than him =)



It was a fun day and now she is officially one of the "older kids."

Just have to add Chaz. He is too cute to forget. He slept through the entire 2 hours of chaos of the party. Thank heavens for a peaceful baby boy!

Finally home

July was crazy for us. We had always planned on attending the family reunion at Priest Lake for ten days, and then Garth got engaged and we decided to make a family vacation of that as well so we also spent ten days in the LA area. We had so much fun at Priest Lake, but my camera died so no blog here.

California was a lot of fun. We were able to see Ben's Grandma in Palm Springs area, go to Disneyland, and make it to Garth's wedding. On the freeway just before we got to Ben's Grandmas there are thousands of windmills. My girls loved the windmills. Palm Springs was incredibly hot, but we beat the heat swimming at the hotel. Even Chaz enjoyed the swimming.

Disneyland was of course magical. Our girls were the perfect age, Brynlee came to life with all the cute shows and characters. She was even brave on all the rides. Autumn tried splash mountain once, but didn't want to do it again. When we first got to the park Bryn was obsessed with going on the train and seeing the princesses. So for the first 4 hours at the park we saw the princesses and Ben took them on the train all the way around the park while I fed Chaz. We really had a lot of fun and enjoyed spending our days together with all of us.

LA area was fun. Stephanie, my sister in law, is from there so she took us to a beautiful beach near her Grandmas and fed us the best mexican food you can imagine. Also she helped us have our first In 'N Out Burger experience. Garth's wedding was beautiful, his bride was gorgeous, and his reception was a lot of fun.

Now we are home and working on moving to our new home. I feel like crying at the task, but excited to have our own home. Here are a few pictures from our California excursion.