And then I challenge myself...

So, last November I participated in NaBloPoMo (National Blog Posting Month) and nearly made it to the end of November, before I had a baby and just couldn't find the energy to continue.

This year, I'm in it.  A blog post a day.  We'll see if you are still with me on November 30th.  Perhaps I'll get all of these crazy thoughts of mine out.  Perhaps I'll continue to blog about the random and family related stuff that I have been doing for the last 6 years (SIX YEARS!!!).

Lookin' forward to it!

The iphone

We finally downloaded pictures from Ronnie's phone, so please indulge me as I share old, but cute pictures of my kiddos.

Daddy/Daughter

 Cutie

 "Reading" to Kendree

We went down to Denver in early June to watch the Angels play the Rockies.  It was a lot of fun and Easton was in heaven!

 The girls

 The boys

 We stayed with our good friends and Kendree loved having lots of girly, "new" toys to play with.

 Easton had his first shave.

 Looks like someone else needs a shave of that chocolate beard.

 Girlys watching General Conference.  First Kendree is in focus...

 and then Devynee.

I'm not sure how these got moved to the bottom, but Ronnie and Easton went to a second Angels game the day after the entire family went.  They got better seats and an Angels coach even gave Easton a ball!

Goal!

Easton played his first season of soccer this fall.  He LOVED it.  We have a competitive little boy.  He ran around with the best of them and got more aggressive as the season went on.  When one of the "stars" of his team would have the ball, he was content to run behind them and let them score.

He scored two goals in the first game, which I didn't even bring the camera for and then four more goals over the course of the remaining 6 or 7 games. 

Here's a video of the goal he made during the last game of the season.  Try to ignore Ronnie's finger. :)



Ronnie's parents happened to be in town for the last game of the fall season and thanks to Ray we have some great action shots.  I'll just share a handful of the 200 I have. You can thank me later.

Big Girl!

We are down to one kid in diapers!  What a wonderful feeling!

This silly girl started potty training last Friday.  With General Conference, we had 2-ish days at home in a row and I decided to go for it.

She has done fantastic.  We are in our "undies" (she insists on calling them the same thing Easton does) all day and just change into diapers for nap and bedtime.  We're still working on staying dry during those times, but overall are doing great.

A few weeks ago, we had a dance party that we were able to catch on camera.  We sure do love this girl!

The first day of the second preschool

As I mentioned previously, Easton is attending two preschools this year.  One that my friend and I are teaching and one that is run by the school district.  It is two days a week for 2.5 hours and he loves it.  Ms. Donna is his teacher and his friend Bianca is in his class.

I had to document the first day of preschool so please excuse the similarity to this post.

 She doesn't get to go, but had to have a picture anyway. :)

 

Devynee - 10 months

At 10 months our sweet girl is doing the following.

• A new perfected form of the "army crawl" (which is more like push-up, lunge, push-up, lunge) but still not actually crawling.
• Learning that there are more rooms in the house than just the living room.
• Wears size 3 diapers and 9 month clothes
• Is a pro at feeding herself crackers, puffs, pancakes and pretty much anything else mama will set on her tray.
• Is quite the vacuum cleaner. For the sake of my reputation as a homemaker (HA!) I'm going to refrain from listing all of the objects I've fished out of her mouth.
• Continues to sleep like a champ and take two 2+ hour naps daily.
• Gets into laughing matches with her sister.  Kendree thinks this is the best thing ever. Devynee doesn't think it is too bad either.
• Is very vocal when she is done playing on the floor.  I sometimes sneak past her to the bedrooms or to the kitchen (when her head is turned) since she will play longer if she doesn't see me around.
• Almost has the sippy cup mastered.  This is crucial as I need to get liquids down her! :)
• Nurses three times a day. Morning, noon-ish and night.  She has successfully skipped both the noon and night time on different days and doesn't seem to be phased by it at all. 
• Doesn't tolerate the binky at all anymore.  She will hold it in her hand, but doesn't even pretend to chew on it or anything.
• Seems to be somewhat attached to her blankies (at least there are two options) when she wants to go to sleep.

I am sorely lacking in pictures this month. Perhaps this proves just how busy I was? :)

Rocking on her hands and knees!

This video is right after the above picture. I love that she is anticipating the flash of the camera and keeps squinting her eyes all weird.  Love that baby girl.

Instagram: September

My three lovies on a lazy holiday morning.

 

Give my dad and Ronnie 8 hours and they can build back steps with the best of them!

 

I've never seen anything so beautiful...

Easton's not done with preschool 'til 11:15 and all my errands are done. I'll have to work on my planning.  I now have to kill an hour with two littles while trying to minimize unloading the loading everyone in the car.

Thank you to the Boy Scouts who have helped me remember to ponder and pray for all those affected by the events 11 years ago.

What do you get when you saturate your newly laid sod and then it rains for an entire day? Oh that's right, water in the basement!  I feel like this just happened...

And just like that keeping the stair gate closed becomes way more important...

And just like that, its been a month

So, how are you?!?!

I'm not real sure where September went, but I do know that we've been busy!

My weeks have suddenly gotten very busy. I still travel to Laramie for work two days a week, then Easton has preschool through a school district run program two other days and I teach preschool with my friend the remaining week day.  The latest we have to be all ready for the day is 8:45 a.m. which means I've stepped up the organization a notch. I know you are thinking, "But KaLee, is that possible? It is you we are talking about."

I've put myself on an actual cleaning schedule and am doing an index card system that a good friend from our Provo days introduced me to years ago that I've never actually implemented.  So far (one week in) it's been pretty great. I'll report on it in a few weeks if anyone is interested.

Also, the kids have chores that we follow through on daily (well, pretty much daily).  This includes cleaning up toys TWICE a day and that has been life changing in and of itself.  Easton also has to do all of his chores before he gets to do anything electronic and that motivation has really helped him.

September also included a work meeting/event for me (Now I have a 6 month break from those. Love that) a trip to Jackson, Wyoming for Ronnie (for work as well), soccer games for Easton and more work on the house (another flood in the basement if you can believe it!).

I'm tackling potty training Kendree this weekend.  Considering she can tell me in paragraph form the condition of her current diaper, I think we are ready.  Now, if I can just get that strong will of hers to work with me, we'll be set.

I have a 10 month update on Devynee in the works (10 month! Are you kidding me?) and hopefully more posts as well so family far away doesn't start sending me hate mail. :)

The backyard: continued

You may remember my marathon of a post not too long ago.  If not, you can refresh your memory.

We've made progress in the backyard!

My brother and his buddy came over last week and worked hard, they raked the dirt, shoveled up rocks, raked some more and then made three trips to get us approximately seven TONS of sand.  The kids were in heaven (and still are). I neglected to get pictures of them actually doing the work, but suffice it to say, they moved up our sod date by at least a week.

 This was the top soil that they put on over the raked yard.

We knew we weren't going to have sod over Labor Day weekend, so instead my awesome dad (who we owe for the rest of our lives) came over and helped Ronnie tackle the back steps.  We used to have the steps you see below that our kids fell off of multiple times.

 Now, after lots of work...

We have these.  Just eight hours later. I am seriously in love.  The kids come out level with the house and even if they fall out the door, they can't go down the stairs (hypothetically).

 Then, last night we had lots of good friends show up and this happened....

 And then this...

 And now, we have THIS!

As I said on Instagram, I have never seen anything so beautiful.  I seriously can't wait for it all to "settle" as Easton calls it so the kids can play all of the time as kids should.

This will forever be thought of as the "Year of the Backyard" but it is so worth it.

Preschool!

My good friend Chelsea and I decided to do a small preschool with our kids and a few other friends as well.  We hold it one day a week at Chelsea's house and teach 8 kids total (4 of which are our own).  We have 4 kids that will be going to Kindergarten next year, 3 that will go the year after that, and then there is Kendree. 

She gets to pretend that she is just as old as the other kids (her favorite).

We had to take first day of preschool pictures, so here they are!

This boy thinks he is hott stuff.  He totally knows how to do preschool, this is his second year, you know!

 And this girl is looking older and older (couldn't be because she is actually getting older!).

So far, we have had one day of preschool and it was a success.  It is crazy, loud, fun and the kids love every minute! Chelsea and I are working out the kinks in time management, etc. but we've just about got it down.  As long as the two babies still take morning naps, we'll be set. :)

Instagram: August

Mama took too long putting the older kids to bed, so Devynee took it upon herself to speed up the process.

Baby shower invites. Love when new babies join our crazy family. #notpregnant #mybrothersfirst

And yet she didn't agree that she needed to put her headband (or band-head as she calls it) back on...

Summer evening races. Thank you Olympics for trying to teach my kids a proper starting position.

Mama/daughters night. Ice cream with sprinkles, our fave.

Thanks for the water table Grandma! We love it!

Plank!

 Totally just scored a goal. I wish I would have gotten it on camera!

 Like mother, like daughter...

 Sand box full of sand=hours of fun!