Carson's 11th Birthday

This year Carson was pretty specific about the cake he wanted.  I made a cake from scratch.  Once it was cooled I went to take it out of the prepared pan and it all fell apart!  So I put it back in the pan and just decorated it in the pan.  Thankfully Carson's theme was very forgiving and it still looked pretty cool!

 Carson's "Hot Wheels cake in the desert"

This year Tony and I got Carson his own IPod.  As you can tell by the picture Carson was beside himself with excitement.  It was a little difficult for me to get something like this for him, but Carson has always taken good care of his things and has never given us a reason not to trust him.  He's been given some ground rules of when, where, and how he can use the IPod.  He's been on it a little more than I'd like, but it is still new and an exciting thing to have.

I say it with every birthday and milestone my kids make, but I can hardly believe how grown up they are becoming!  Carson is such a great kid and I am very blessed to be his mom.  He's a very affectionate kid and so helpful with his siblings, especially Lincoln.  So here is to the last year of being a kid and then onto the tween stage...eeek!

Halloween 2015

This year for Halloween we went to a trunk or treat at our church.  Came home for dinner.  Tony took the older kids trick or treating around the Neighborhood and I stayed home with Lincoln to hand out candy.  We actually got a decent amount of kids come to our door this year and we gave away all our candy.  The kids all came home with a ton of candy and each got a full sized candy bar!

 The night before Halloween we carved pumpkins.  An Avenger pumpkin, a witch's hat (hid behind Alaina's knees), a transformer pumpkin, and a cute little Jack-o-lantern.  Tony and I didn't get our own pumpkins this year.  We figured that we spend so much time helping the kids with their pumpkins we didn't need to.  Which turned out to be the case.  I carved both Charlie and Lincoln's pumpkins.

This year I talked Alaina into being Dorthy from the Wizard of Oz because she already had sparkly red shoes and I had blue gingham fabric to make a costume for her.  Charlie got to pick a costume from the costume box and decided on Optimus Prime after much debate.  Carson wanted to be Captain America and Tony made his shield out of Foam Board and paint.  It cost probably $4 to make.  Much better than the $20 Party City wanted for their plastic shields.  Lincoln modeled the Lion costume all three of the boys have worn their first Halloween.  I have come to the conclusion that Halloween doesn't have to be elaborate to have a good time, and look our kids are happy and cute as ever!    

Family Fun at the Corn Maze

To my delight we were able to find a real corn maze near us this year.  Last year we found a maze made out of old pallets (kind of weird) and in Rexburg people didn't grow corn so all the mazes were made from straw bails.  On our way out to the maze Tony and I realized the last time our kids had been to a real corn maze was when Carson was in preschool and we still lived in Nampa!  Oh our poor deprived children!  This place was a pretty neat setup complete with a country store, train rides, corn pit, straw mountain, petting zoo, and a hay ride out to the pumpkin patch.  We all had lots of fun despite it being a little cold and windy.

 Charlie making a "corn angel".

 Carson and Alaina laying around.

 All four of the kids enjoyed a train ride.  

 Carson, Alaina, and Charlie 

 Getting ready for a ride out to the pumpkin patch.

 Showing off their pumpkins.  (Alaina is in the make silly/funny expressions for pictures phase)

Lincoln trying to decide what he thinks about the corn.

Moving

Man, it feels like the last 2 months have been a roller coaster ride!  We've had so much going on I feel like I can hardly keep up.  So here is the reader's digest version of what's been going on.  Tony and I closed on our house right before we went out of town for a family reunion in Idaho.  It was nice to see our family, but I spent the whole weekend thinking about all the work that needed to be done on the house to get it ready for us to move in and all the packing we needed to do on the townhouse.  We got home Monday afternoon and went straight to pick up the keys and to get the water turned on.  We spent that Monday and Tuesday cleaning the house and carpets.  Wednesday and Thursday was spend packing.  Friday we moved all the small stuff.  Saturday all the big stuff was moved into the house with some help from the brothers in our ward.  Monday I spent cleaning the townhouse and Tony (with some help from his co-workers) got the Camaro towed over to the house.  It was an exhausting week!  The next week we spent ripping out our "clean" carpet downstairs because the smell just wouldn't go away.  Sealed the floor and had new carpet installed.  School also started for the kids.  The following week soccer started for Alaina, which she loves and has improved immensely!  She has a really awesome coach this season.  Then her 8th birthday and baptism celebrations.  We had my parents, Tony's dad, and brother's family come visit for that.  Preschool started for Charlie, which he loves!  We are mostly unpacked and doing little projects on the house when we can find the time.  We have lots of plans and really love our house and all the space it provides for our family.  Right now we're hanging all our pictures and noticing that they all need updating badly.  We're hoping to rectify that shortly.  

 Exhausted Alaina asleep on the floor of the new house.

 Exhausted Charlie asleep on the couch.

 We bought a new refrigerator!  I know it's silly to get excited over a new appliance.

 All of our furniture was in the kitchen/dining room while we ripped out the carpet and sealed it.

The previous owners let their animals do their business on the carpet.  It smelled so bad that I could hardly stand to be in the front room.  It's much better now.

 Carson and Alaina's first day of school.  Carson 5th and Alaina 2nd.

Charlie's first day of preschool.

Alaina's baptism.  She was so excited!  (disclosure: I was absolutely mortified when I saw these pictures of me.  I swear my top didn't look that tight in the mirror when I put it on!  I'm so embarrassed.)

Carson also earned his arrow of light award in Cub Scouts last week!

Charlie turns 4

Last week we celebrated Charlie's 4th birthday.  It was another low key birthday.  Friends were unable to come so it was just us.  A dinner of hot dogs (Charlie's favorite) and chocolate cake with strawberries on top.  Charlie got a new scooter and Lighting McQueen helmet.  A few weeks ago he got a pop gun from Grandma Foster and some read along books from Grandma Elton.  Charlie is full of mischief and energy.  He's an independent dependent, meaning he wants things done his way but he wants you to do it for him and right now!  He loves rough housing, playing with cars, trains, and Legos.  He's excited that now he's 4 he can go to preschool (which we're still working on).  We love our little monkey and can hardly believe how quickly our kids are growing up!

Charlie with his birthday presents.  Sorry about the quality of the pictures, but we having trouble with our good camera right now.

Big 4 year old

Charlie's cake and trying out his new scooter.

Let's Try This Again

So after walking away from a house we put an offer on back in May, Tony and I were feeling pretty discouraged about the whole house buying thing.  We were beginning to think that maybe we weren't supposed to buy a house right now.  We had looked at everything on the market and nothing new was really coming available.  For about two weeks straight I was checking all the listings everyday, sometimes multiple times a day.  Then this house that we had looked at previously and liked but someone else put an offer on it before we could showed up on the listings again.  I immediately called our realtor to be sure that it really was available again.  Then called Tony to see if he was in agreement with me that we needed to put an offer on it NOW before anyone else could.  He agreed with me and we put an offer on it that evening.  The next day we walked through the house again, just to be sure.  The house is a bank owned foreclosure and has been sitting empty for over a year.  It needs some work, but nothing we can't handle, and the price is right.  The house is in our ward and school boundaries which is a plus.  Our offer was excepted, the inspection is done and looks good, and now we're waiting for the appraisal.  Then we'll be ready to close and move it!  Our closing date is set for the 5th of September right now, but we're hoping to close the end of August.  Tony and I both feel so much better and at peace about this house.  This house just seems to fit our family so much better than the other house would have.  I'm pretty excited and have been virtually doing work on the house for weeks now.  Gotta love Pinterest!  So August and September are going to be pretty crazy with 2 family reunions, scout camp for Tony, school starting for Carson and Alaina, Alaina's Birthday and baptism, and moving but we'll manage and it'll be wonderful!

 

Camping and Silverwood

This last weekend we met my parents at Farragut State Park in Northern Idaho.  The weather was wonderful.  Not too hot or cold and no rain!  There was a fire ban in effect which meant no campfires, bummer.  We all got there on Thursday afternoon and stayed until Sunday morning.  We spent all of Friday at Silverwood theme park (sorry no pictures. Too busy having fun).  The highlights of the day at Silverwood were Alaina trying out the big rollercoaster and not wanting to have anything to do with any of the others for the rest of the day.  All of us getting soaked on the rafting ride.  Riding on a train pulled with a real steam engine, and Tony, Carson, Dad, and I riding Aftershock which is more intense than the Wicked ride at Lagoon.  On Saturday we went to breakfast at Jimmy's Down the Street, went to the beach on Lake Pend Oreille and swam in a natural lagoon, and visited a museum about the navel base that was once where the state park is now.  We didn't take a ton of pictures of the weekend, but made many wonderful memories.    

 

 Lincoln was a real trooper the whole weekend and actually slept the entire night both nights we were camping!

 Grandpa taking a cat nap.

 Grandma teaching the kids Crazy 8's.

Lincoln taking a nap on the trailer while we waited for my parents to arrive.

Grand Coulee Dam

About a month ago we took the kids up to see the Grand Coulee Dam.  We just went up for the day.  Brought a picnic dinner and stayed for the laser light show.  We went through the visitor's center and watched a video on the construction of the dam.  When it started to get dark we watched all the spill ways open on the dam and marveled at the amount of water coming over the dam.  Then we watched the laser light show, which ended up being repeat of everything we had seen in the visitor's center and we learned that compared to shows done in the past it wasn't that impressive, but the kids thought it was cool.

 Charlie, Alaina, and Carson.  The dam looks white because of the water spilling over the dam.

 Carson, Lincoln, and I.  (each of the kids had to get a picture with me and Lincoln)

 Alaina, Lincoln, and I.

 Charlie, Lincoln, and I.

The beginning of the laser light show.

Trying to buy a house

So we've been here in Moses Lake for a year now.  Part of me can hardly believe that it's already been a year and then again part of me can certainly believe it and thinks, "It's only been a year?".  The kids just completed another year of school.  I will soon have a 5th grader, a 2nd grader, and a preschooler!  Lincoln is 3 months old and such a joy!  Work is going well for Tony, now that he has a new supervisor.  I'm feeling great not being pregnant anymore.  I've lost all my pregnancy weight plus some and don't mind being so tired all the time because I feel so "light".

The plan was always to buy a house after we'd been here for a year.  We wanted to learn the town and decide where we wanted to be.  We also wanted to have a good grip on what our financial situation would be.  About 6 weeks ago we started our search.  We got pre-approved, and set our house budget.  I don't know how the bank thinks we could afford what they're willing to lend to us.  We don't want to be "house poor".  We found an excellent realtor and started our search.  After a couple weeks we felt like we had finally found the one.  It was really close to us.  The kids would go to the same school.  We'd be in another ward, but close enough to the friends we've made.  It was pretty much everything we wanted in a house.  It was on the higher end of our budget, but thought we could make it work.  So we put in an offer.  They countered and we accepted.  Then we had the inspection.  We found some things that we weren't thrilled about, but as long as the seller was willing to fix everything we'd be ok.  Well, the seller wasn't willing to fix what we asked and wouldn't make allowances for us to fix them.  So, we walked away.

We started searching again.  We found a house that was even closer to where we are now and it's in our ward.  It was an older home (it reminded me of the home I grew up in) and needed some updating and work, but it was a much more comfortable price for us.  Then we found out it had a wood foundation, and that the bank won't finance it because wood foundations aren't typical for Moses Lake.  The fact that the foundation was sound had nothing to do with it.  (So Stupid!)

Now we are in a situation where we've looked at all 4 bedroom, 2 car garage houses in our preferred locations and in our budget in Moses Lake.  We're trying to be patient and watching the real estate websites for anything new to come on the market.  Which there isn't.  I wanted to move during the kids summer break so in case they switch schools it's not during the school year.  But that's starting to look less likely to happen.

I keep asking myself, "Are we being too picky?"  Not really, and I don't want to buy a house I'm not happy with.  "Could we raise our house budget?"  Sure, but forget about that new family car, any new furniture for said house, any trips or fun activities with the kids, and anything extra at all!

Now what, you ask?  We keep looking praying that the right home for us is here somewhere.  We are fortunate that we aren't on any real time line because our lease is now on a month to month basis.  So we can be patient (as hard as it is) until the right one comes along, and when it does we'll be glad we waited.

Spring Break

Last week was Spring Break for our kids.  Tony still had to work and it was his turn to drive so the kids and I just sorta hung out at the house.  The kids were doing a pretty good job keeping themselves entertained until Thursday.  On Friday the kids hung out with our neighbors while I went to a doctor's appointment and to the store.  Once Tony got home from work he asked me what I thought about a weekend getaway.  I heartily agreed.  Within an hour we had a hotel booked in Post Falls, Idaho and were packed and ready to go on our impromptu mini-vacation!

Saturday morning we went to Breakfast at a diner featured on "Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives" called Jimmy's Down the Street.  It was just a little place but it was really yummy "real" food!    

 Alaina, me, Lincoln in his car seat, Charlie, and Carson.

 Tony showing off their "world-famous" pecan caramel roll.  It was huge and so yummy!  We shared 1 between the 5 of us.

After we rolled out of the cafe and a stop at Cabellas, we took the kids to a Science Discovery Center in Spokane.  It wasn't nearly as cool as the Discovery Center in Boise, but it was still neat to see the different displays.

 Alaina making a web.

 Charlie playing with magnets.

 The boys making circuits.

After the Science Center we checked out the 3 story mall across the street.  Each of the kids picked up a toy at the Toy store and we got some pretzels for lunch.

 Charlie thoroughly enjoying his cinnamon sugar pretzel.

Then we took the kids to a trampoline park.  The kids were so excited!

 The kids were a bit worn out after an hour of running and jumping.

After expelling lots of energy we went out for pizza for dinner.

Lincoln and I doing what we did most of the day.  I was amazed at the number of comment we got on our little baby and the number of kids we had.  We were fortunate enough that they were all good comments, and the kids were well behaved most of the day so I could accept them easily.

We finished off our fun filled day with swimming at the hotel pool.  Needless to say that it didn't take long for the kids to fall asleep and they slept in until 8:00!  Sunday morning we headed home.  We all really enjoyed our full and fun day away from home!