This week was "Spirit Week" at Tanner's school. Every day had a different theme they were supposed to dress up for. He had lots of fun, and we of course had to snap a picture each morning before he headed off for the bus.
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| Blue and Yellow Day * Pajama Day * Western Day * Black and Gold Day |
Just wanted to post our Thanksgiving decor for the year. We can hardly believe Thanksgiving is in less than a week and then we'll be officially into the Christmas season. Yikes! How did that happen??? We're getting VERY excited for the holiday break, for family to arrive, and for lots of yummy food to eat. And although it's not exactly picture worthy yet (no beautiful flowers planted or anything) our retaining wall is officially DONE. So once we clean out the garage we'll be back in business and I can finally park somewhere other than the lawn or the neighbors house. YAY!!! And now Jared can feel safe coming for Thanksgiving without the fear that he'll be put to work. I keep my promises. ;)
This handsome boy got his first school pictures the other day. Hard to believe he's big enough for this, but I guess it's just a first of many. I can say this because he agrees, it's not the most natural of smiles, but I still love it. My big Kindergartener . . .
Well I know my boys don't mind me posting these, and Dean should know by now that if pictures are taken there's a 99% chance they'll end up on our blog, so he should be fully prepared for this post, but that doesn't mean he'll be happy about it. Ha! Tonight to pass the time the boys begged to do my hair. It didn't stop there, they moved on to doing Dean's hair too. They were pretty proud of the outcome, and quite frankly I was too. Not too shabby for 3 and 5 year old BOYS! Sundays are the best. We disconnect from TV and electronics and reconnect with each other. I wish we were better at making that happen ALL the time, but tonight was a sweet reminder of how important that is. We had some good old fashioned fun and it was just what we needed. We laughed more than we have in a long time.
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| You should all be jealous of my seriously ADORABLE hair dressers! |
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| Annnnd this is what Braddock did the whole time. Tried to scale the bookshelf. And yes, that is a dirty diaper on the floor, just keeping it real. ;) This kid keeps me on my toes. |
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| Don't worry this was all pretend play. No actual, HOT curling irons were used in this process. |
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| Don't you think this is a good look for Dean?? |
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| He's such a good dad! And comfortable with his manhood. ;) |
Admittedly it takes a LOT of time and effort to keep up on our little old blog. It takes even more work to put it all together for our blog books each year. (That reminds me I'm WAY WAY WAY behind. Ha!) But it's all worth it when you find your kids looking through them and loving every minute of it. I'm grateful to have a little record of our family that they can enjoy now, and take with them when they grow up and head out on their own. I walked in on this the other day. . .
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| Tanner hard at work. |
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| A real view of how this went: Landon twirled his rake and did very little raking, Tanner raked his little heart out and was just a wee bit bothered by Landon's lack of work ethic, and Braddock just ran all over eating dirt, leaves, and sticks. |
This week we made our traditional "Thankful Turkeys." Tanner did his all on his own and I just adore it. Especially that once he saw it hanging on the wall and noticed that his feather's weren't perfect like the others, he blamed me for messing them up. Ha! Yep bud, it was totally me. Or maybe that you're a FIVE year old and your stuff isn't supposed to be perfect! And I love it for it's totally perfect imperfections. If that makes sense. Anyway, on to our turkeys for 2013...
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| Can you tell this was the same day Tanner lost his first tooth?? Really? What gave it away? |
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| Notice Braddock's wearing a different outfit than he was above?? That's because he had a total meltdown and went to bed before we were done, so this picture was taken the next day. ;) |
It's official, our first child has lost his first tooth. That seems like a pretty big deal. I'm sure future teeth won't be as big of a deal, but this time around it is. Tanner was thrilled and I'm glad it happened at home where we could all watch. The Tooth Fairy stopped by last night and dropped off a little note and a dollar. I even managed to snap a picture of her as proof. So it begins, years of Tooth Fairy visits to come.
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| First picture with his toothless grin. |
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| Tanner insisted he hang his tooth on the door and he poked a whole in the bag so the Tooth Fairy could get in. ;) |
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| I snuck in to take a picture of my sleeping boy and guess who happened to be dropping by at the same time??! |
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| I guess it makes sense that a tiny fairy would leave a tiny note. |
It seems like we have even more Halloween activities every year than we do Christmas, and by time Halloween actually arrives we're almost burned out. Or maybe it was just because it started raining and blowing right before it was time to head out trick-or-treating, but luckily the boys are still young enough that we got away with hitting five houses and they were satisfied. It probably helped that two of those houses were grandparents and great-grandparents who spoiled them rotten. Braddock caught on quick that Halloween is all about candy and boy did he like that. He was just frustrated that he couldn't open it himself and that Mom didn't seem to see eye to eye on how much he should be consuming. Ha! All in all we had a wonderful day and after all the work getting everyone's costumes ready it was nice to get one more use out of them. And now that Halloween's over I think Dean's Batman costume is going in a case on our bedroom wall. He was probably more excited about being Batman than the boys were about their costumes, but you didn't hear that from me. ;)
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| The boys LOVED their matching super hero balloons. |
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| I found Dean's batman costume at Salvation Army, but it didn't have a cape or utility belt. So I did what any good Batman wife would do and I whipped one up. Can you tell what we used to make his belt?? |
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| And to top it all off I made each of the boys their own trick-or-treat bags. They got to design their own jack-o-latern on paper and then I made it into a stamp and helped them stamp it onto the fabric. They turned out really cute! |
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| And of course the best part of Halloween is getting home and checking out your spoils. |
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| One of my favorite parts about this picture is that that's not even his bag. Ha! Poor Landon should have known better than to leave his bag on the floor. |
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| "Eh, eh, EH!!!" a.k.a. "Mom, open this candy bar NOW!" Good thing I speak fluent Braddock. |
think they're in charge around here, but really we all know the boys call the shots. Dean's the cyber school coordinator at the high school and has made himself indispensable as the go-to tech guy as well. Andrea loves being a stay-at-home mom, hanging with Keaton all day. She does her best to keep up with the boys and is Activity Days Leader at Church. She volunteers with the PTA and blogs in her "spare time."
is nearly 18 and is halfway through his freshman year at BYU. He's pursuing a degree in Chemistry but changes his mind often. He has pet snails in his dorm and is working on a podcast in his spare time. He also loves to cook and is enjoying his independence.
is 15 and in 10th grade. He plays the trumpet and piano and participates in the school musical every year. He can't wait to turn 16 and learn to drive and is enjoying being the oldest now that Tanner's away at school.
is 13 and in the 8th grade. He plays saxophone in the school band and continues to take piano lessons. He rocks the school musicals, plays on the boys soccer team, serves with NJHS, and a million other clubs. His mischievous smile keeps us all on our toes, and he is best known for his scavenging skills, bringing home all sorts of "treasures" he finds at school.
is a big 10 year old and rocking the 4th grade. He's the lone Nelson at the elementary, but handles that like a champ. He plays piano and is always talking our ears off. He's smart as a whip and loves playing soccer.
is almost 3 and absolutely full of energy. He loves music and sings all day long. He is smart as a whip and has an impeccable memory. He's adored by his big brothers and gets into EVERYTHING.