Sleepy boy

This was just too cute to not take a picture and post.

Pumpkin Patch Field Trip

Today was Cooper's field trip to the pumpkin patch. Jeff went with him today while I stayed home and got a few more things done on my "to do" list (I think I'm in the nesting phase, maybe that will mean I will go into labor a week or two early....a girl can hope can't she?)

My little preschooler ready to get going on all the activities!

Jeff and Cooper ready to go on their tractor ride through the apple orchard.

Everyone got to pick an apple from a tree. Cooper with his cousin, Zachary. Cooper has his and Jeff's apple.

Eating his apple while they learned how to make apple butter and got to have a sample.

At the end of the field trip, eating a pumpkin cookie that Miss Jolinda brought for the class. Yummy. I remember these from last year's field trip with Mason, they are so good! I need the recipe. Hint. Hint.

Cooper with his preschool class.

Just before leaving, Cooper got to pick a pumpkin to take home.

Carving Pumpkins 2010

Monday night for FHE Mason and Cooper (cough...Jeff and I...couch) carved their pumpkins. Can I just say that I could care less if I never carve another pumpkin in my life?! I really don't see the point. We grew our own pumpkins this year. We ended up with six, one of which never turned orange. Weird.

Mason with his pumpkin, excited to "carve".

Cooper with his pumpkin....scared? or excited? to get carving.

Here are the other four pumpkins we grew. Jeff and I were going to carve the other pumpkins at a different time, but I don't think either of us will "get around to it".

Cooper was brave enough to stick his hand in and get the guts.

Cooper's finished pumpkin. He wanted Wow Wow Wubsy. Yeah....I carved his for him. I'm not very good at being patient and making precise cuts, so some parts that were suppose to be attached, came off. Oh well. I don't think Cooper cared.

Mason's finished pumpkin, Swipper the Fox from Dora the Explorer. As you can see, Jeff was way more patient than I was.

Ready or not...

OR. NOT. is what I am thinking when it comes to raising a GIRL! Jeff and I had my nieces this last weekend. When people tell me that girls are different to raise because they are more dramatic than boys, I have always thought the dramatic part wouldn't kick in until the teen years.....so I'd have plenty of time to get ready for the drama. Yeah. Right. Try maybe a few years. There were more tears shed in our house this last weekend than I think there have been all year. Tears....over....nothing. Tears out of a girl when something didn't go the way she wanted it to go. Like, one day I said, if you eat a good amount of your dinner, you can have a cookie. Well dinner wasn't eaten. Then when the cookies were brought out, so did the tears. I am used to pouting, or stomping off, or "that's not fair", when something doesn't go my boys' way. I like to boy "drama" much better. Don't get me wrong, I love my nieces. But oh the drama and the tears! I am so not ready to deal with that!

Then there is the hair. With Mason and Cooper, if their hair is getting unruly, time to shave it off. With a girl, you actually have to brush it. What? I don't like that. Then the washing of hair. With the boys, I just put some shampoo in their hair, scratch their head a bit and the shampoo becomes well incorporated. With a girl it's a lot more work. Then there's the rinsing. With a boy, dunk a few cup fulls of water over their head and wallah shampoo is gone. A girl? You actually have to do a through job. I thought I did with my niece, but while brushing her hair some soap suds came out. ooops. AND the whole time I was brushing out her hair, all I could think was I hope I'm not hurting her. She never complained, so I guess not.

Anywho, I....am....so....not....ready....for.....a.....girl....!

Score!

Last week Albertsons was having a big sale! For every $25 you spent on participating items (there were like 45 different items) you got $10 back on your next shopping order. Usually the $25 is calculated on the sale price, but this time it was on the regular price. So this made it an even BIGGER sale.

So what did I get?
130 cans of Healthy Choice soup
25 boxes of Swiss Miss cocoa mix
33 Hunts pudding packs
25 cans of ravioli
24 cake mixes
18 brownie mixes
17 can of frostings
13 cans of refried beans
12 boxes of popcorn
9 packages of sausage
8 bottles of oil
7 5lb bags of flour
7 mustards
6 boxes of crunch n much
5 jars of jelly
5 12 double rolls of toilet paper
3 8 roll paper towels
1 peanut butter

So what did I pay for all this?
$47.68

What did I save?
$867.83

I did all this in about 35 transactions with NO coupons! I could have saved a little more if I had done a few of my transactions with different combinations of items. The soup was a money maker, so most of my transactions had soup in them, but I really didn't want anymore soup, so I did a few transactions without soup and paid a little more for each item.

Baby check up

Here are the stats from today's visit:

I am measuring small still: 31 cm, should be 33 cm.

Shiloh's heart rate was 148.

I gained 3 more pounds. A total of 13 pounds.

I have an ultrasound in two weeks to check on Shiloh's growth.

I am 33 weeks 2 days pregnant.

Burn Baby! Burn!

Yesterday the city fire department held a live demonstration on the effects of a house fire. They compared the difference in damage between a house with a sprinkler system and one without. They also wanted to show the difference between hose water damage and sprinkler damage to put out a fire. We typically flow between 150-200 gallons a minute out the tip of the nozzle of the hose, the sprinkler system is significantly less.

They constructed two mock living rooms with similar furnishings in them.

First they set a trash can on fire in the room without a sprinkler system.

This image is the room without sprinkler system, 1 minute into burn. This is called a flashover. As the fire grows the smoke and heat layer become more dense, they eventually will move down in the room to the level of the combustibles. The surface of the combustibles will heat up and release gas which super-heats. The point at which the gases, the combustibles and the particles in the smoke combust is called a flashover. Flashover generally starts at about 1000 degrees. This fire went from 800 degrees before the flashover to about 1600 degrees at its height before being knocked down by the water from a fire hose. Anyone caught in a flash over including us firefighters has a very poor chance of survival.

They then ignited the room with the sprinkler system. The temperature in the room reached just beyond 100 degrees before the sprinkler kicked in and knocked the fire down.

The two rooms side by side.

The boys checking out the burned up room.

Brennen Frank, Mason and Cooper all get a close up look of the destruction.

The burned up furniture.

We were lucky enough to know the engineer from engine 1, Russ Butters, he let the boys sit in the engine and take pictures. Here is Coop.

Mason, driving engine 1.

Even being in the fire department I was still amazed at the effectiveness of a fire sprinkler system. The amount of damage was greatly reduced. Crystyne and I are seriously contemplating installing a system when we can save up the money for it. It would be well worth the money, about $1.50/per square foot. So someone with a 2400 square foot home can a sprinkler system installed for $3,600. The city also was handing out literature on the difference between ionization smoke detectors and photo-electric smoke detectors. We finished the day, with treats provided by the red cross.

Preschool field trip

Last week Cooper got to go on a field trip to the Fire Station. It probably wasn't nearly as exciting for him as it was for some of the other kids. He was probably thing, yeah I get to go to the fire station any time I want, cuz my Dad's a Firefighter.

The Firefighters taught them Stop, Drop, and Roll.

Cooper sitting in Engine 91

Cooper's preschool class. He actually only attends with 4 of these kids because he only goes to the Music and Motion class on Wednesday. Most of the kids go Tuesday and Thursday. Cooper is 3rd from the left. Look what I caught him doing. Shock!

Happenings

While Mason is in Kindergarten in the morning, Cooper gets some good one on one time. It's been really nice to be able to spend time with just one child and I am soaking it up while it lasts for this short time.

One day Cooper got some Ritz crackers out and stacked them up. He was so proud of himself and how many he was able to stack.

Then another day, I was cleaning a spot off a cupboard. He then wanted to clean all the cupboards. He cleaned most all of the bottom cupboards. He's such a great helper.

So looking at these pictures makes me sad. My little baby is not a baby anymore. I don't know when or how it happened, but all of a sudden he has become a big guy.

Adventures of George

Mason's Kindergarten class has a class room pet, Curious George the Monkey. It's a good thing he is just a stuffed animal, for my boys' sake. Each weekend one of the kids get to take George home with them. There is a booklet that comes with George for the kids to put pictures in and a place to write down all the weekend adventures. Here are a few things Mason did with George.

Mason took George to the wedding reception of one of my former Young Women, Shiloh and her husband, Scott.

Eating cake and ice cream at the reception, sadly George didn't get to eat any.

George and Mason helped Dad mow the lawn.

Making sure George was safe while riding in the car.

George came to Mason's cousin, Madeline's first birthday party. George was really mad that he didn't get any cake the night before, so he wasn't going to let another opportunity to eat cake go by.

That George is always getting into trouble.

On Sunday George got to borrow one of Mason's ties and go to church with us.

Happy Birthday Jeffery

I have the best husband in the world. Today is his birthday. He spent his birthday alone. How sad. He worked Tuesday night, Wednesday night, and tonight. When he has more than one shift consecutively, he stays there to save gas. I really wish I could have spent the day with him.

Back to why I have the best husband in the world. Well, I just do! Do I really need a reason?

I know lately he hasn't felt like the best husband because he can't find full time work. You know how men are, well most of them anyway. They pride themselves in being able to provide for their family, it is part of their identity, a part of what makes them a man. I know there have been times these last few months when he has felt horrible, like he did something wrong and that it is his fault he was laid off. I have never blamed him or been mad at him for being laid off. I have loved having him home more and even though I know he needs to find full time work not only for our finances, but also for himself, I wish he could just work part time always. He has been such a huge help to me with the boys, the house work, and making dinner all the time. I truly have been spoiled by him. I used to not enjoy having him home during the days (like when he would take vacation) because it would mess up my routine. Now, I have gotten so used to having him home and have come to love it that I feel lost and so lonely when he is gone, even if it is for just one day.

Anyways, I have the best husband. He may not make millions and buy me diamonds every week, but he is the best because he loves me and shows me he loves me everyday by the little things he does for me.

Baby check up

Today was the latest baby check up. I understand why they need to be every two weeks, but I still think they are kind of pointless.

I am measuring small again. I should be measuring 31 cm, but am measuring 27 cm. I am SO NOT worried about it, my back pain has returned, but I think it is worse than ever before, so I am positive she is just positioned really far back. I know it could mean that Shiloh is not growing properly, but since I had the same back pain with Cooper and he came out two weeks early weighing 7lbs 10ozs, I am not worried.

Shiloh's heartbeat was 140bpm.

I gained 2 more pounds, so that's a 10 pound total weight gain.

Shiloh likes to do gymnastics and push her arms and legs out as far as she can. Sometimes all the pushing she does really hurts me. My stomach feels bruised from the inside. I love to feel her move, I will miss that after the pregnancy. The one thing I can say I will not miss is the back pain.

I am 31 weeks 2 days pregnant.

Life update

Remember how Jeff's former employer filled out paperwork for unemployment stating that Jeff quit and then later provided unemployment with a forged resignation letter "from Jeff"?

About three weeks ago we got a letter from unemployment with a ruling and a brief summary of each persons rebuttal. In Jeff's former employers final rebuttal, they stated that they did indeed choose Jeff's last day of employment with the company, and in choosing Jeff's last day, they admitted that they "laid Jeff off" or "let Jeff go", without directly saying it. Either way, it proved that Jeff did not quit. So unemployment has paid Jeff back for what they owed him.

Telling the truth does pay off in the end.

Decorating

We finally have some decorations up in Shiloh's room! We still need to figure out what we want to do on two of the walls, but I think we've got a great start. So this idea we stole from our wonderful sister-in-law, Michelle, who is super creative. Isn't stealing someone else's ideas the highest form of flattery? The "S" was $8.99 at Jo-Ann's, but it had a small crack on the back, so I got 75% off! I used paint that we already had so this project was cheap!

Then we found this 3 pack of white 20"X 20" canvas', also at Jo-Ann's for 40% off. I talked Jeff into coming up with a design for them. He used paint that we had left over from painting Shiloh's room, so this project too was cheap! Jeff doesn't really like his paintings. I guess it's too girly for him. I LOVE IT though and I'm sure Shiloh will as well.

Preschool

Yesterday was Cooper's first day of preschool. He will go one day a week to a Music and Motion class at the same preschool Mason was at last year. Cooper was pretty excited to go to preschool but was not happy that he only gets to go one day a week. I mean gosh! Mason gets to go to school five days a week and he only gets to go one day! Standing proud in front of his homework chart. Look how old Cooper looks in this picture. How did that happen?

Ready for Mom and Dad to leave so he can get down to business.