Happy Anniversary to us!

Aaron and I celebrated our anniversary this weekend by going to dinner at Flemmings and staying the night at the Mariot in SLC. Have I ever told you that Aaron is the best anniversary planner/gift giver? It was a nice evening away from everything (we did have our little buddy with us, and he was a champ). Now we have made it through our 7th year, and neither of us have had an itch!

I love Cabbage Patch Kids!

I have always been a fan of the Cabbage Patch Kid. I was dying when I saw these fabulous dolls!

Just a note of interest....These dolls are up for grabs on ebay and here are the bid totals so far:
Sarah Palin doll: $3,100
John McCain doll:$1,250
Barak Obama doll:$955
Joe Biden doll: $615

IS THIS AN IDICATION OF WHAT WILL RESULT NEXT TUESDAY???? I hope so!
Keep updated on the "Cabbage Patch Poll" here. http://cgi3.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewUserPage&userid=auctioncause
This is the poll I will be tracking.

One Boooooooooooooooooooooy, Boy for Sale!

Last week we took the family to our favorite store, Bukoos. My kids think that it is as good as Lagoon. There is tons of random furniture to hide behind, tall shelves to run around, and lots of strange junk. Aaron and I were looking at a few of the many treasures to be found at Bukoos while our kids played at our feet. They found one bank of shelving and decided to run around and around it. We watched for them to come around to our side about every 15 seconds. Well, 15 seconds went by, then 30. N never came around. I heard M yelling "Mom, come help!". I walked around to the other side, and this is what I found..........

N had sqeezed in between the two banks of shelves and climbed all the way to the top. He was sitting there just as proud as can be. He was well above my head (the shelves were probably 7 feet tall), and so I began to yell for Aaron. He came around the corner, but before we retrieved our 2 year old, we had to get a picture. Aaron kept saying "Dude, as soon as I take this picture you are in time out!".

The Stucco is done

Yay. The scaffolding's down so I could get a nicer picture. Here it is. We are moving along. We have most of the tile and finish work done. The painters and soffit/fascia people are supposed to come next week. We're getting too close! If any of you have a friend/family member/acquaintance/ward member/former teammate/hair stylist/ anyone looking for a lovely townhouse, let us know.

Thanks!

Funny things 5 year olds say!

I love the things five year olds say. They are so observant and it amazes me at the words that they retain and repeat (even if they don't know what they mean). Today was the first day I picked Mar up from school since we had the baby (I wasn't cleared to drive because of the c-section until now). She saw me and ran to me yelling "Yea Mom, now everything is back to normal!". I assured her that we were slowly getting there. Then she said "Well, we are back to normal except for the baby, and he has to keep going in for circumcisions". HUH?

More Organization??

With three kids, I have been trying my darndest to think of ways to be more organized. It just seems like everything is out of place. So, everybody.......give me your thoughts, tips and organizing tricks PLEASE! One thing that Aaron and I started doing (that I am LOVING) is
e-meals.com What is it, you say? A 5-7 day meal plan with easy and inexpensive meals to plan. You print out 2 pages per week. One has the meal plan and instructions/recipes. The other has a shopping list with everything organized in to different sections of the grocery stores, so it is fast and super easy!!

He's Here!!!

Our little guy is here! We are thrilled. He was born on Saturday morning via c-section and is doing great. He does have his nights and days mixed up which makes for a very tired Mama. Hope we can work that out soon. More pics to come!

A chip off the old block.....

Tonight while reading books to my kids (yes, I was waiting for Pres. Bush to give his address about the bailout plan...so I DID have the TV on mute in the background) a clip pops up on the screen that catches M's attention. She looks at me wide-eyed and says "Mom, I want Sarah Palin's autograph. I really like her". (My daughter is as hip as this toothless grandma! I am so proud!)
Hmmmm.......I think most of you can guess the theme of most of our dinner conversations over the last couple of months.

While blogging about politically themed anecdotes, I have to mention what Aunt Beth overheard M singing in the bathtub a couple weeks ago while babysitting. While getting little brother toweled off in the next room, Beth let M have a few extra minutes to play in bathtub. (M is a nonstop noise maker and I am sure felt the need to fill the silence). So the girl busts out in one of her favorite jingles (picture Stevie Wonder singing up and down an octave scale) "Barak Obama....Barak Obama......Barak Obama.....". We started singing this jingle around our house when we first heard Stevie singing it. We thought it was hillarious. But now that both kids have been caught singing it in public places..........it's not so funny!

Twoooooo Kidders

We thought this was ultra qute. So cute we couldn't even spell cute correctly. We were just overwhelmed with cuteness. So this Saturday is the big day. We will let everyone know how it goes. I'm actually going to film the surgery again. I'll post it after it's done.

Blogging is a lot of work

Congratulations to all those who regularly update and maintain their blogs. It is a lot of work. So, update on the house, we have rough electrical, sheet rock (both of the taped and sanded variety), rock is ongoing and the stucco will be soon. Here is a photo of the latest. I'm hoping the slide shows showing the progress are working. Just click on them to see the pictures if they are not working. Let us know if you have any specific questions on the house, we are both experts. Like, say if you want to know the per square foot cost of a certain colorbody porcelain daltile, vibe techno brown light polished, I could tell you that it was $5.32 a square foot and that it comes in 12x12, 18x18, 12x24, and 24x24 (sorry, no bullnose). Or the per square foot cost for toast bamboo engineered click and lock flooring. Or, anything else. Have a great day!

Runaway Camera

So, a few weeks ago, our lovely little camera (which Marsh broke the first day we had it) suddenly vanished. We could not figure for the life of us where it went. We looked under the carseats in the car all through the house, but no results. Several days later my mom called asking if we had lost our camera. She had gotten a call from one of the receptionists at my dad's practice saying that she thought she might have our camera. Some lady had called the office saying that she'd found a camera on the side of the road in front of Walgreens in Kaysville. She opened it up and watched some of the little videos that were on the memory card. She saw a guy wearing a Wasatch Peak hat (Aaron) and someone on the video was named Nula. So, she thought she'd call the office to see if anyone would claim it. Well, there are a million receptionists in the office, many of which have no clue who we are, so what are the chances that the one who is familiar with our family happend to be standing there during the call and said, "I think Kim has a grandson named Nula". We got a hold of the lady that picked it up off the side of the road and gratefully picked it up from her home in Layton.
You think that would be the end of the camera story............but it isn't! Not too many days later, Aaron and I stopped out at the house to take some pictures. We had tile and carpet samples to load in the car, and two crazy kids who were ready for bed. We threw everything in and headed home. The freeway exit was closed by our house so we had to go clear to Layton Hills Mall exit and come back south. I'm driving along, minding my own business, when I look over to see some stranger waving her arms and yelling at me to pull over. I roll down my window and hear her scream "You've got a camera sitting on your bumper".
Seriously. Could we be any more brain dead!

Where we are so far...

Well, here is the house as it stands now. The framing is mostly complete. The plumbers and electricians are busy doing their thing. Ann said that the "plumber" moniker still holds true, as she's seen more than she ever wanted to. Things are starting to take shape. It's fun to see the skeleton complete. This week they are finishing the HVAC. Next week they will start finishing the roof and start on the exterior. Yay.

Meet McBeamerson

This is McBeamerson, a new member of our family. Isn't he cute? This is the scene Annie and I found last week when we went (wow +5 alliteration!) out to the house. The framers had installed this 20ft by 18in steel beam across the back of our family room. Yes, it was as per specs, but we just didn't realize it would hang so low. I could reach up and touch it from the ground. It hung down a full 18in from the ceiling. Our builder tried to talk us into leaving it initially, stating that "oh, you won't even notice it when it's in." Hi, have you met us before? We are apparently very picky. Because we did not want McBeamerson in the family. So, after some words were exchanged with the framer...I give you...'lil Beemie! They pushed the beam up into the ceiling and said our HVAC wouldn't work, but we didn't care! We are form over function people. So, when you come over, bring your portable fans and/or heaters, cause it's going to be hot and/or cold in our house.

Here's the after picture of 'lil beemie.

Floor Plans

Here are the floor plans. (In case you wanna case the joint).

Downstairs:


Upstairs:

Pick your Favorite Win a Prize!

fine print: the prize is really just the satisfaction of knowing that you possibly, maybe, influenced our decision...and our undying gratitude and appreciation...and our next born child, Cheedo Archibald, or one of our existing children, because they have had really questionable behavior today.

Here are a few pictures showing alternate views of the house.

Kid's Stuff

So, this blog is mostly about our house, but I wanted to share a few kid related morsels. This is the video showing the song that Marsha sang at Papa's wedding dinner. Don't pay attention to me, she's the real star of this one.

I was practicing a ton and we hadn't initially planned on having her sing with me, but she just out-of-the-blue started to sing with me on the chorus and it was so cute, so we decided to see if she wanted to and she said "yep." I was nervous that she wouldn't go through with it, but she did, and it was so cute. We didn't tape the actuall performance, but recreated one for posterity. She had to have the microphone to sing, otherwise she wouldn't perform.

Here's a few pics of us at the cabin. We went fishing, but there were no fish. Then Nula threw Marsha's new shoes into the river. She was very upset and has reminded us frequently of this fact. But we had fun!

We also white-trashed it up with a hommade fireworks show out in the street. The kids were mostly excited but mostly scared of the fireworks. It was more fun to watch them than the actual fireworks.

Foundation Firming 101: How a?

That sort of sounds like a really good workout video. Anyone want to start one with me?

So, here are the results of last week's pour. Looks good! Save all of your oohs and aahhs for my audition tape for So You Think You Can Dance, or SYTYCD as Ann likes to call it. I'll post that later. I pretty much owe all of my inspiration to Dance Company and the dance that I practiced for but never actually did. Man am I glad.

Here are the pics. Sorry, no nudity.

Here is a video.

Try to watch it without throwing up or down. It sort of reminds me of that Bourne Supremacy movie. I could totally get a job with that director. You can hear the birds singing in the background in the video. One of them landed on my shoulder. They're just so excited for us. And it really is a wonderful, magical place out in West Farthingham. The sun is always shinning and there is always a rainbow. Mostly, the animals come running when we drive up to the lot and regale us with Disney songs. Then, after the squirrels feed us dinner, the neighbors get together to hold hands and write missionaries. Most likely, we will strike oil, find gold, or diamonds on our property, I just haven't gotten out my prospecting pan yet. It's still in the basement with our metal detector. Anyway, if you'd like to buy a lot, call 521-lots. Disclaimer: I can't really guarantee that the animals will sing to you, I think they just really like us specifically, but you'll probably have all that other stuff, diamonds, gold and oil and rainbows, if you like that sort of thing.

So, after all this happened, I fell down into our hole and bloodied my shin. The bird on my shoulder laughed, so I fed it to a passing skunk. Who's laughing now?

Don't Lose your Footings

Here are pictures of the footings that were poured yesterday.

They are so interesting to look at we know.

Yay new house!

Nula says, "Go forth and build me a house, exactly 20 cubits by 30 cubits." No, that's what Ann said to me. Nula's exact words were "I-waahhnn ummm housh-u-moush."

We are excited to announce the birth of our new house. We don't have a blog for our kids, but we have one for our house, which incidentally, is still a gleam in its' (is a house a boy or a girl?) parents eyes. Meaning, it's still a hole in the ground. Notwithstanding the previous, we would like to keep everyone updated on the status of the construction of the house. Mostly because we're so excited. And because we're overtly confident that everyone cares as much as we do. Yay! Over-assumptive narcissism. We love you all!

Quick Facts:

Location: Farmington Ranches (West of I-15, ok really West of I-15, ok, like almost out to the lake West of I-15)

Style: Northwestern Craftsman, with a few requisite Utah house touches.

Type: 2-story, slab-on-grade, a little bit bigger than our condo. No basement (frown).

Projected Completion: December 2008 sometime.

Here's us at the Ground-breaking ceremony. I forgot my golden shovel. I was also a little surprised that no one else showed up. Didn't you all get the invitations?

Here's a few videos!



More to come later.

We hope to be done before Christmas!