Guess who lost her first tooth.....

A few hints:

-She starts every morning with either "look who's lookin hot today" or "mom, I've been practicing some new moves, wanna see em?"

-She is super duper excited about life in general, which makes losing a tooth that much more exciting

-She has big blue eyes.....

Are you ready?

This is exciting!

My fundraising page

http://pages.teamintraining.org/dm/tinkerb12/2

If you have a minute, please check out my fundraising page. Thanks!

This has to make you smile!

School Days!!

I stood in my bathroom getting ready this morning reminiscing over the past couple of years of having Maddie home during the day. I knew we would both miss our movie-watching-cuddle time while Kenzie takes her afternoon nap. This would be such an emotional day for us both. Then my Madison came into the bathroom and casually, but assertively tells me "I don't need you to take me to my class, I'm fine." Really?!? Don't you mean, "I'll miss you mom, give me a hug?" Nope, she has grown into a confident little school girl overnight, and was sure she could handle school without us.

Of course, we went with both girls to school to get them settled, and took a gazillion pictures while wearing sunglasses and crying, a yearly tradition. Does this ever get better? Geez...Rylee is in 3rd grade, time to stop crying mama!

I love this picture, it captures their goals for the school year so well. Rylee wants to get better at multiplication and division, and Maddie would like to have play dates every week.

Where ya been?

Rocky Point, Cabo, California, and here... It's been a crazy busy summer, i'll update speed-date style:

Rocky Point - Nothing says family togetherness like the 5 of us in a trailer for 6 days, but we do love us some Rocky Point! Great ocean, great friends/family, mangoes, and arctic-cat rides....

Cabo - To recover from said Rocky Point togetherness-time, and to celebrate 12 years of marital bliss, we spent 5 days there while Nana and Papa watched the kids. Nana and Papa were half-way backed out of our driveway, heading home when we pulled into our neighborhood after our trip, not really, but they did look extra tired. We had a great time, played beach volleyball, slept in (till 8, parenthood has actually robbed us of the ability to truly sleep in), visited Cabo Wabo, and did a Sunset Dinner Cruise (here's a fact I learned about myself, I get seriously sea sick. A fact I learned about the boat, the bathroom doors don't lock. Bummer for Todd who spent the cruise outside the bathroom telling ladies to go away, his wife was puking). We also left our camera in the taxi on our way to the cruise-of-doom. Todd calmly told me the camera was gone, and all I could think about was all the pictures of preschool graduation on it, and did what every mother would do...took off running down the pier, through the street, to the hightway where I flagged down a taxi full of Americans, and had them all check the seats in the taxi-van, then realized it was the wrong taxi. I turned around to see my calm husband, and many locals running after me, seeing an opportunity for some payment. The locals ended up calling the taxi company and flagging down the righ taxi, and the camera was saved....phew!!

CA....because we love a good adventure...I flew to CA with the 3 kiddos and our niece. We had a great time, and I saw a whole new side of the TSA employees, who continuously said "You have your hands full" and were very accomodating. Everyone did great traveling, even Madison, who yelled "I'm leaving this plane" at the top of her lungs, while getting out of her seatbelt after the pilot gave his take-off speech. I assured the fellow passengers that she was an air marshall, and we were good to go. We met Nana and Papa in CA, and had a great trip, filled with legoland and eating bad-for-us food that daddy would never have approved of :)

Here are some pics from our trips

The girls at the aquarium, Rylee boogy-boarding, lovers arch from Dinner Cruise, Todd and the Rolling Stones, me at the Cabo Wabo bar,

Home Improvement Help

So I am the Queen of unfinished projects. Seriously, my home improvement style is somewhere between Autism and ADHD. I get totally overstimulated shopping for home decor, and if I do make purchases, I don't have the focus to put the items somewhere when I get home. Really, I hired an interior decorator to help, you know what my first project was for her? I showed her my corner. That's right, the corner in our front room where I threw everything I bought to decorate with; clocks, frames, flowers, all right there, behind the door in our front room. She helped, but I never called her back to do any more projects.

Then there was the painting of the interior of the house. We picked colors. We agreed. Then I came home while all the men were painting, saw the color they were painting the niches in the entertainment center, and cried. Then like a crazy person (yah right "like" one...uh huh), I asked each of the men if they actually would paint that ugly color in their own homes, referring to it as baby poo. Of course they didn't speak English and just looked at me saying "I don't know." So, I made them stop painting and wait for me to go buy paint. While at the store, Kennedie put all the paint swatches in her underwear "to keep them berry safe" and we had to throw them all away. It was a good day.

If you've been to our house, you've seen these frames. This one has two happy little girls, and says "Kids, they make life sillier" I have great pictures of my own happy little monkeys, but who do you think the girls in the frame are? That's right, I don't know either, they came with the frame in December:

How about this one. A family tree picture that's been hanging over our fireplace for three years, recognize these people? Other than the three pics on the top, I don't recognize any of them either.

SO....here's where I need some help. I know I do not like our kitchen cabinets, and am getting some bids on redo'ing them next week. Todd says I better know what I want before the poor suckers come to our house. I like black distressed cabinets, and white cabinets, also expresso colored.....here's a picture of our kitchen, what would you recommend? Fingers crossed for no tears, and a completed project this time!

Rocky Point Triathlon

It's over! This year my parents and our family friends Bob and Becky, as well as our friend Dan, and my brother and niece all headed down for the race. The Rocky Point tri has actually been rated as having one of the best after parties in the country, but we were in bed by 8:30 that night, rock on!

The wind was awful, my bike actually got sand-blasted and is missing paint, and my face and arms got a fabulous exfoliating.

My pictures aren't co-operating, so I'll post them perfectly backwards, starting with an overview of the beer tents and after party:

A picture from the bike course, that dirt in the street is actually blowing across

After the swim, shirt and shoes and socks thrown on, getting my once-shiny bike off the rack, ready for the 16.5 miles of exfoliating fun!


Coming out of 1000 meters of swimming-in-the-ocean fun, running up the hill to get to my bike. Note the men behind me, they actually started in the heat before me....some slow men this year (trust me, I'm not fast, so that's actually kind of sad)!

And the end of the backwards triathlon (with no running pictures)

Did you know?

I might be the last one in the world to have figured this out....but, herego's....did you know that you can push the "Stats" tab once you sign in to your blog to get info on who has viewed your blog, where they are (hello Germany and Russia!), what they searched for to find your blog, etc? Fascinating!

I might even be inspired to blog about more than birthdays....

Next up will be the Rocky Point Triathlon....preview....60 mph winds!

Madison Ann

My big 5 year old! We have been blessed with 5 years of affection, entertainment, and love with you. You are my cuddly girl, you've always slept best when you are with one of us or your sisters. In fact, many nights I wake up to find you on my feet! I cannot believe it is almost time for you to start kindergarden, but I know you will love it, because you have fun no matter what you do! I look forward to watching you grow into a young lady, and am very proud that your lifelong goal is "to be a mommy." I love you, sweet thing!

And this concludes our birthday posts!!!

What did you learn at school today?

Kenzie: "That Jesus dieded, but then he got back up, so he isn't dieded anymore, does that make you happy?" Madison: "Mary came down from heaven and gave me a cross, you know, the Mary that knows Jesus really good." (She has a little embroidered cross, I'm thinking a lady from the church named Mary might have given it to the kids at school.) Happy Friday!!!

Kenzie Lola,

Happy Birthday Kennedie! Our little fire alarm, a bit smaller than our other girls were, and quite a bit louder too. I can't believe you are 3! The beginning of this year, we had a little scare with you. When we were camping, Nana noticed some bumps on the back of your head that felt like rocks, a quick call to Aunt Laurel put us more at ease. I took you to the Dr. the next day thinking she would just explain that the bumps were due to you fighting off an infection. Instead, our easy going Dr. looked at me and said "these really make me nervous, they are hard and aren't moving, and don't feel like regular lymph nodes, I need you to go for blood work immediately." She then asked me about our family medical history, including any cancer etc... We spent the entire day finding a lab that could get you in. When we did find one, you were such a little trooper. Daddy held you and you sat there watching the blood come out. A few days later the Drs office called to say your white blood cell count was low, they said it could just be you were fighting off an infection, but they couldn't be sure. We needed to wait another week and take you for more blood work. We did that, and then a week later got the call that you are as we thought, a very healthy little monkey!

You have brought fun and spunk to our house, as only a little girl born on April Fools Day can do! Happy Birthday Princess.

And here are a few pics of you with your favorite things:

You and your lunchbox, ready for preschool!

You and Madison, you love your sisters!

And last; you, a swing, and a pretty dress!

My Rylee

Rylee Kendall,

Eight years ago (well, as of last Sat...I lost the camera cord until today:)), your daddy was whispering to me "we're about to meet our daughter" as we were in the hospital waiting (26 hours) for you to make your arrival. You captured our hearts from the beginning. Happy Birthday Big Girl, we love your list-making, organizing, conquering self!

Shared Party with Jamison at USA Gymnastics

Can You find all of your friends??????

Beautiful, inside and out.

Happy Birthday TJ!

Todd is 35! It's impossible to find something to buy this man. It seems like if a man wants something, he just buys it. If he can't afford it, he saves for it. If a woman wants something, we go to the store and have an internal battle over if we should buy it or not, then we end up buying more clothes for our kids or 30 things from the Target Dollar bin and head home without our original prey.

So this year I decided just to do, instead of buy. I asked T to go to my parents house in the morning to help my dad move a tree. He was of course thrilled to death. I packed up our stuff while he was gone and then headed up to my parents. I walked in and told him we were going to run errands. Then we went to Rent-a-vette. I had reserved a corvette for the weekend, but when we got there T asked if they had any Porche's. The man took us in his garage of Bentley's, Vette's, Escalades, Porche's and historic cars and said to pick what we wanted. So T picked a little Porche convertible. We took of riding in style, enjoying the AZ air and headed up to Scottsdale for lunch and shopping. After that, we headed to Talking Stick Hotel and Casino to hang out by the pool and enjoy a full nights sleep with no little people having bad dreams or having to go potty....ah, heaven!

Happy Birthday TJ, it was great having you all to myself for a couple of days!!

Pray for Kate

If you haven't read this website, you must. A little girl named Kate who was diagnosed with brain cancer, which went into remission. It has now returned and her family is asking for prayer as they face hard decisions ahead. Reading their online journal is heart-wrenching, but their faith is amazing.

http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/mcraekate

We'll miss you buddy!

Poncho,

You were such a great dog! Now, great is relative for a dog who ate a sofa, a bag of paintballs, my wedding ring, and about 100 pairs of shoes. You were such a lover, and would get thrilled to death when we walked out of the bathroom (after 1 minute of being in there) like we had been gone all day. You slept on my feet for 10 1/2 years, and if your brother tried to take that coveted spot on the bed, you just layed on top of him. You would only listen to dad, and if I told you to go in your room, you rolled over with your belly up and refused to move. I just left you, because I never really wanted you away from me anyway. You let our babies play doctor on you, sit on you, and pull your tongue out over your head. You watched as we brought 3 babies home, and sat next to their swing in the living room each time. One of your favorite things to do was to take the trash out with me, you would "heel" all the way to the trash can and back in the front yard, quite an accomplishment for such an excited boy. You were so in love with everyone in our family.

We cried with the kids last night, and are so sad for your brother who is looking all over the house for you. You are greatly missed already my friend.

Girl Scout Cookies!!!!!

Do you love Girlscout Cookies?
Do you love Rylee?
Do you love us and want to spare us from going door to door?





If you've answered yes to any of these questions......



it's time to buy Cookies!!!!

4$ per box, money due when cookies arrive (mid-Feb)

Thin mints, Samoas, Tagalongs, DoSiDos, Trefoils, Lemon Chalet Cremes

Thanks! xoxo....us.