All Hallow's Eve

So we're pretty excited about Halloween tonight, too. We are going to the Meadows 1st Ward's Trunk or Treat--Amy's not feeling well today, so it might be just Mema, me, and the six kids. Can't be too hard, right? (Ha, ha.) We'll see. Anyway, I'll be sure that Mema takes pictures of me and my "bugs", and the David Tobler kids, and we'll post them on the web. Everyone should! Take pictures and post them, I mean, not have Mema do it. She'll be a little busy.

Hope you are all have a marvelous Nevada day. Love you!

Happy Halloween!

We are really, really excited for tonight! Lillian is thrilled that people are going to give her candy just for being her cute self! Last night was our wards trunk or treat and and she really got into it! Today I am already tired of telling her and Erica "NO, you can't have more candy!" I will go ahead and ask the question of the week. What would be your perfect combo of candy! I would ask for a single piece, but lets face it, it depends on what mood you are in! I love a good percentage of chocolet, peanut butter cups, milky ways, snickers, three musketeers and just plain hersey bars, but mixed in, some skittles, starburst and a few lolypops, just for varity!
Love ya all!

football 2

All of the other teams feel pretty much the same as we about Jacob. He is major cute. The first time I put him in his uniform I about broke my jaw with the grin. He is almost a wide as he is tall in his shoulder pads. We have the smallest possible pads and his shirt hardly fits over it. Every week it takes about five minuets to fit his size small football shirt over his pads. He is a good sport about it, however. Jacob will be back to play again next year. He cracks everyone up. He will go over to the other teams players before a game and tell them, "I'm going to take you out!" They laugh, because, of course, they plow over him. He actually has gotten ok about taking down his assigned player. He just holds on and falls down and they come down on top of him. He is out too, of course, but that's ok. We only have one more game, next Saturday and then the season is over. The Mighty Mites don't go to Vegas for the playoffs, just to hard!

RE: Awesome Jacob

OH MY LAND! If that isn't the awesomest piece of football work I have ever seen, I don't know what is! Seriously, that was the cutest, most fabulous, and (dare I say it?) most adorable football play I've EVER seen. I pretty muchly exploded with cuteness and love. That little boy, running down the field, all the other little boys keeping the other team away, and then the throw-down when he reached the goal line--WOW.

Way to go, indeed, Jacob. You ROCK!

(And seriously? What is up with all my capital letters right now?)

I'm BA-ACK (or, The Van Saga)

Sorry I've been out of the loop for the last several days. First Ezra was sick. Then, in the ways of family, Gideon got sick. Then, naturally, I got sick (Thursday night wasn't to be believed). This particular flu-bug is NASTY contagious, let me tell you. I know of two families that we definitely infected (Telima and my friend). So, Ezra's birthday "party" got canceled--he, however, didn't care. He loved all the phone calls he got that day and the day after, thank you all! We spent FAR too much time looking at vans on Friday night, and liked the one from the private seller, but didn't like the one from the dealership. (Let me tell you, never look at a "EX"-type (extras) Honda and then go look at a boring, regular old Dodge. The Dodge will NOT compare favorably. Poor thing.)

So on Saturday we woke up determined to buy the private seller Honda Odyssey. Except it was, um, Saturday, and all banks and credit unions were closed. We had this great idea, though--our credit card sent us checks with a 2.99% APR for 14 months (and 9.99% thereafter). (The credit union was only going to give us 6.5%.) Would the private seller be willing to take our credit card check?

Um, no. His bank told him they'd have to hold on to the funds for four to six weeks before the check cleared. Wow. Don't blame him for not wanting to sell to us on Saturday. And since Bradley was leaving on Sunday night to go to Canada for a week (indeed, he just walked out the door), we kinda wanted to get this done now, so I can take the van to Las Vegas while my husband is in another country.

So I found another dealership, this one dealing in Honda lease-returns. Most of their inventory was out of our reach, but they had a 2002 Honda Odyssey with 97,000 miles for $9900. When we got there and asked about it, though...another couple was taking it for a test-drive. ARGH. Well, we decided to wait. And wait, and wait, and talk to the couple--really nice people--while they tried to decide--it was a little steeper then they were thinking, they only have one kid so far, they're not 100% sold, but it's SUCH a nice car--and then--after 90 minutes--they decided no thanks. And then we jumped on it and yelled "DIBS" and glared possessively at everyone else who walked by.

Not really. But we did buy it. With a credit card check, no less. Hmmmm. Never thought I'd buy a car with a credit card. Truth be told, didn't think you could do that. But we want to pay it off in a year and half, anyway, so it's all good.

So...the van:It's beautiful on the outside and all, but let me tell you, beauty is found within. It has SO MUCH SPACE. Behind the backseat, the floor is lower by about 15 inches. You can fit a folded double stroller in there, and it doesn't take up anymore space. And the legroom in the front! And the POWER sliding doors (on both sides)! And the included DVD player! And the removable captains' seats (middle row). And the cruise control. And the CD player. And the...okay, you get the point. I'm mildly infatuated.

Ezra loves it. Mercy loves it. Gideon is confused by it. Bradley hasn't really gotten to drive it yet. And this Momma adores it.

Anyone want to buy a slightly lonely 2001 red Ford Focus?

Football

As many of you know, two weeks ago Jacob scored a touchdown. This is a link to a video we uplinked of him doing it!
Enjoy! We certainly did!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8B8puJU9Gmg

Happy Anniversary, Samuel and Caren!

Caren, I can't tell you how happy I am that Samuel found such a wonderful person to be his wife and the mother of his children. You two are so fun and cute and just plain great! I hope you guys have a wonderful anniversary today! I love you!

Happy, happy birthday!

Happy birthday to Ezra Owen Ross! All of four years old today and he sure knows it! I hope you have a wonderful birthday, Ezra!

re: movies

I think that I have the award for the most seen of the movies on that list. I have seen 50 of them and didn't see one that I had never heard of. Most, but not all of the ones I haven't seen are R-rated. Okay now about the ones that I own. I own 14 of the ones listed. Most of them are VHS but some are DVD. I can't remember all the titles but some of them are:
Ben Her
Rear Window
Indiana Jones
Lord of the Rings

I can't remember all of them and even very many of them but you get my drift.

Now my list of 100 favorites:
Oscar
Seven Brides for Seven brothers
Princess Bride
Never Ending Story
The Incredibles
Monsters
Miracle on 34th Street (old one)
It's a wonderful Life
Sleeping Beauty
Singing in the Rain
Brigadoon
Frequency
Almost any and all of Alfred Hitchcock especially Vertigo, North by Nortwest and Pysco


More later

How about...

Pride and Prejudice (BBC)*
Clue
Singing in the Rain
Galaxy Quest
Princess Bride*
Lord of the Rings*
Indiana Jones (all three are good, but the last one is my favorite)
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe*
Sound of Music
Apollo 13
Undercover Blues*
Strictly Ballroom*
Groundhog Day
Hook
Thoroughly Modern Millie*
Little Princess (not Shirley Temple)
Secondhand Lions
Ever After*
Star Wars
That Thing You Do (I just have to rewind and watch that kiss again!!)
The Man From Snowy River (The music won my heart first)*
George of the Jungle (Because it is just a FUN movie)
Neverending Story
Maverick

Start of our Movie List

Batman Begins*
American Outlaws
Knight's Tale
Serendipity
Pride and Prejudice (BBC version)
Remember the Titans
12 Angry Men
Clue**
Oscar
Shall We Dance?
Singing in the Rain*
Galaxy Quest
Miracle on 34th Street (original)
The Princess Bride
Finding Nemo
Lord of the Rings
Indiana Jones trilogy
Chain Reaction*
Paycheck

Snow

Oh, and I forgot to mention earlier...LaDale, I'm so happy for you! I think it's great that you love snow so much. Personally, I could live without it. We got really, really wet snow yesterday, and I was glad that we didn't have anywhere that we needed to be. Instead, the house got cleaned! =) Oh, it's going to be a long winter....But at least someone will enjoy it! Love you!

Movies and a sick little girl...

Well, as some of you know, Katy has been one sick little girl this weekend. Apparently, she and Ezra picked something up (where or what, Keryn and I have no idea) and both of them started throwing up Friday night. Katy stopped around 11:30 that night, and thank goodness she did, because her daddy and I were about to take her to the ER for dehydration. But, she's been much better since then, hasn't thrown up at all. Now, she's just being a crankier-than-normal, no one will do except Mommy and not even her sometimes, little girl.

In other news, Uh-oh, Katy's little white teddy bear of a best friend, got his first bath this weekend after being thrown up on. After considering all the advice we've gotten about how to go about washing a teddy bear without him losing all his hair in the process, we decided upon throwing him a pillow case and washing him on a delicate cycle. It seemed to work fairly well. He came out a little less white than he originally was, but definitely cleaner...no more peanut butter, chocolate, cheese, or throw up to be found on him anywhere! And he smelled nicer too! =)

Of the movies list, I have seen 26 of them also (we'll have to compare which 26, Keryn!) but alas, I only own one. I thought I owned 2, but it turns out that we have Miracle of 34th Street, not It's a Wonderful Life. So, the only one we own is Fellowship of the Ring. There are a few on there that I wouldn't mind owning, like Singing in the Rain, the Indiana Jones movies, even Toy Story, but most of them...I think I'll pass.

I'll work on my movie list at church today...oh dear, I shouldn't have admitted that out loud, huh? Well, anyway, it's hard to pay attention with a one-year-old running around. But I'll post some of my favorites later. Love you all!!!

Finally

SNOW!!!

Finally, weeks behind Utah, Colorado Springs has her first real snow. I woke up this morning knowing we could not have snow because it was too warm in my bedroom. But, low and behold, there is snow on the ground and it is still snowing.

YEAH!!!

movies

do I have to do it all at once?

Pride and Prejudice
The Rookie
Cars
Cinderella lll
Indiana Jones (all of them)
Lord of the Rings
The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe
Harry Potter (all of them)
Twister
Nine Months (but only because it was the movie Jeff and I saw on our first date!)
Jurasic Park (only the first one!)
Sound of Music
Singing in the Rain
Seven Brides for Seven Brothers
Apollo 13
Space Camp
Star Wars
The Last Starfighter (Benjamin's contribution)
Sleepless in Seatle
The Little Mermaid
50 First Dates

I'll add more later

Keryn's Favorites

Lord of the Rings trilogy**
Clue
The Incredibles
Star Wars IV, V, VI*
Singing In the Rain
Sound of Music
Muppets' Christmas Carol
March of the Penguins
Galaxy Quest
The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe*
Beauty and the Beast
Scarlet Pimpernel
Seven Brides for Seven Brothers

Top Movies

(First, read this post of mine, and then Jen's response)

The Rules: Okay--here we go. Put as many movies as you can think of in your own list. Children's movies count, too, but this isn't a list of your children's favorite movies (otherwise we'll have Thumblina and I have to draw the line on that one). Non-fiction is okay, too, but don't get too esoteric--I'm not going to put National Geographic's "Volcanoes" on my list, even though I love it.

You can keep adding to your list until November 1--Caren's birthday--and then I'll compile them into a list of top 100--or top 50 or whatever. Put stars next to your top ten favorites.

Remember to finish your "list" by November 1!!!!!!!!!!!

Re: Movies

I've only seen twenty of them and I only own 3 -Star Wars (VHS), Singing in the Rain (VHS)and Fellowship of the Rings (DVD).

Sign, even I will admit, my movie collection is woefully small.

Movies

Who made up that list?!?!?!?!?

Most of them I've heard of, some of them I recognize as "classics," if only because of cultural references. I've seen 34 of them, and I own 10, granted some of them on VHS, some on DVD and some recorded from TV: Jaws, DVD, Toy Story, DVD, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, DVD (Yes, Jeff HAD to have it!) Indiana Jones sieries, DVD, Lord of the Rings, DVD, (I'm with you Keryn, if Indiana Jones got all of his movies listed, so should have the L of R and Star Wars!), Sound of Music, taped from tv, It's a Wonderful Life, DVD, Babe, from tv, Titantic, VHS, Star Wars, DVD, and Forest Gump, from tv.



I think we need to come up with our own "Top 100 movies to own!"



My first input, Phantom of the Opera, I'm sure Jeff will have LOTS to say on this subject!

How many for you?

I don't have the brains to post anything deep/exciting, so I'll post something random:

How many of these "The Essential 100 DVDs to own" have you seen? How many do you own?

I have seen 26 of them and I own...four: Star Wars (as a VHS tape), It's A Wonderful Life (ditto), Singing in the Rain (ditto), and Fellowship of the Ring (DVD). I think it's a cop-out that they don't have the other two, though--honestly, Two Towers and Return of the King are better than FotR, in my not-so-humble opinion.


To be honest, I don't think I want to own most of them. Or even see most of them...oh, well.

High Plains of NM

So, Grandma Pace and I had a great time at LaDale's and at Uncle Frank's over the last week. We enjoyed every minute of it except yesterday. We looked at the map and decided that since we were already so far south it might be easier to go south on I-25 to Albuquerque and then west on I-40 to Kingman and then over the dam home. Good plan. We did just fine except there was a lot of wind across the high plains and very nearly blew us off the road. We were fine but only because we were careful and weren't quite as big as some of the other vehicles on the road. We didn't see anything off the road but almost, especially RV's and U-Hauls. It was very tense. The other problem was there is nothing between Albuquerque and Flagstaff, at least to find any decent hotels or motels, so on we drove for 10 hours. We stopped in Flagstaff and collapsed. Today, we only had about a 4-4 1/2 hour drive home. I wish we had been able to more evenly work out the hours. It was good because we were in country that I haven't been through as often and so the drive was more interesting. All in all it was a good trip.

Silent mush

I have been waiting, quite patiently, for some beautiful peaches to ripen. Tonight, at last, they were just firm enough and smelled perfect.

Bowl, spoon, knife, milk and just a touch of sugar are prepared. I select the two best peaches and place the rest in the fridge to await a later meal.

I pick up the first, slice around it with my knife and open it up.

WHAT?? It's completely brown inside.

Frowning, I drop it into the trash. I carefully weigh the other in my hand before cutting into it.

ARGH!! A few pieces are cut out before it too falls into the trash.

I open the fridge and pull out my other two. Sadly, I end up repeating the process saving only about ten bites.

Into the bowl they are dropped. Down pours the milk with a sprinkling of sugar to top it off. I settle comfortably down with my hard earned, although frustrating, dessert and dig in with the spoon.

Two bites later, the remainder of the bowl joins the rest of the mushy fruit in the trash.

SAD, SAD, SAD!! What a waste of money, time and all that patience.

TOOTH!

Bottom left--boom, boom, boom, there it is! Yay for my Gid-kid!

TWO!

TWO...birthdays today, happy happy to Jenafer and Lillian!

TWO...years old, Lillian-girlie! May your mother enjoy her last two-year-old well.

thirty-TWO...years old, Jen-jay!

We love you both!

Bumbo III

Yes, the wait is finally over. Bumbo III is out!
View all three Bumbo's here
http://www.ready-set-bumbo.com/

Enjoy!

Birth Order

It says that Gideon is the smartest of all of them. That is my opinion.

Re: Samuel

It's okay, I didn't mean to scold. I just wanted to make sure I wasn't talking to myself (a not-unknown event in my home, although fortunately I have children so I can pretend I'm talking to them. Useful little bugs). I'm sure sorry that your family has been sick, what a pain.

For Halloween, I was going to make Mercy be a fried egg, Ezra a piece of toast, and Gideon a glass of orange juice. But I got to thinking about it, and the ages of my children, and decided that it probably won't work. I just can't see Mercy and Ezra wandering around a Halloween party wearing a foam board shaped like an egg or bread. They'll wear it for two minutes and then want it off, for comfort's sake. So back to the drawing board (or the sewing machine). I actually have an idea, but I have to see if I can do it cheaply first.

Gideon is the funniest little boyo ever right now. He rolls and rolls and rolls everywhere. He is getting really really close to crawling--he can move backwards a bit the days, which is the precursor to crawling forward. He's getting stronger and stronger in his arms and back, which only helps. He also has a really strong gag reflex, which makes eating anything more than Stage 1 & 2 baby food an adventure usually involving vomit. Gideon's occupational therapist (whom I adore) gave us two kinds of oral massage brushes to help him get a little more desensitized. Hopefully that will work, because he really really wants to eat other things--to the point of grabbing them out my hands. He has lots and lots of sounds and will repeat "Uh-oh" if you say it first. He is also learning that the "Ma-ma-ma-ma" sound gets faster results from a doting Mama than any other sound.

So what does it say about birth order when you realize that Ezra's first word was "Amen", Mercy's first word was "No", and maybe Gideon's first word will be "Uh-oh"?

Want some more?

1. Freedom from incrustations of grime is contiguous to rectitude.
2. It is fruitless to attempt to indoctrinate a superannuated canine with innovative maneuvers
3. Eschew the implement of correction and vitinate the scion
4. The temperature of the aqueous content of an unremittingly ogled saucepan does not reach 212 degrees F.
5. All articles that coruscate with resplendence are not truly auriferous
6. Where there are visible vapors in ignited carbonaceous materials, there is conflagration
7. Sorting on the part of mendicants must be interdicted.

I'm still alive

I still look at the blog. Most of the time I glance at it first thing in the morning. This puts me in a slight time crunch. I say this because I look at it before I start my day working in the lab. So I don't often feel like taking the time to write something. Sorry. Please forgive me for being selfish and not posting something for you all to read.

As for us: We are getting ready for Halloween. We will post pictures after the event, if I remember to post pictures. Adam will be Spiderman and Kip will be Elmo. Adam loves his Spiderman outfit. Caren and I got invited to a Halloween party where costumes are mandatory. Thus, we have decided to actually spend a little money to buy some sort of costumes. This would be a first in our marriage for this holiday. Granted, I don;t think we will go all out, but this will be fun dressing up again.

After Halloween last year we picked up one of those candy bowls with a hand sticking out of it. When we turn it on the boys have fun forcing the hand down. They don't get the jump of a moving hand like I do when I forget it's on.

That's us for now. Yesterday Caren, Adam, and Kip all had fevers. What fun. Love you all. SKT

Hello?

Hello? Hello? (Taps microphone with finger) Is this thing on?

Hopefully you are all well. I imagine you are all busy right now, so I will do my best to entertain you.

We were going through Bradley's boxes of memorabilia from high school, grade school, etc. Among other things, his mother kept his immunization records (so now I know where Gideon gets his heft from; Bradley was 22 lbs at 10 months) and a sweet little clipping of hair from his first haircut. What can we learn from this? Two--no, three--things:

• a. Bradley's hair was about the same color as Ezra's is now
• 2) Bradley was a very bald baby, because his first haircut was at 19 months
• iii. Bradley will now stop mocking me for saving my children's hair

At any rate, we also found a paper he had kept from high school that had common sayings rendered in very complicated language. You have to decipher the words to figure out the saying. For example:

"The stylus is more potent than the claymore"

equals

"The pen is mightier than the sword"

Simple, right?

Try these:

1. Scintillate, scintillate, asteroid minific
2. Members of an avian species of identical plumage congregate
3. Surveillance should precede saltation
4. Pulchritude possesses solely cutaneous profundity
5. It is fruitless to become lachrymose over precipitately departed lactated fluid

Put your answers in the comments. (That is, if anyone is still reading!)

Conference Saturday (wet and cold)

Wow. I feel like there is an amazing, gourmet, delicious buffet before me, and I'm starving. And I grab my plate and load it up and sit down to eat. No sooner then I place the smallest tidbit in my mouth--Ezra hollers for my attention. Gideon (the child who needs to be careful of head injuries) tips over again, leading with his face. Mercy has another stinky diaper. And the computer stutters and tries to keep up with the streaming audio.

I'm so grateful that the buffet will keep. How amazing it is to live in a time with video-on-demand (ksl.com), audio-on-demand (lds.org, ksl.com), live TV broadcast (if you can get on, byu.tv), and podcasts (in a couple of days), as well as the written transcripts of the talks. Wow is right.

Good News

David and Amy are in escrow for a house!!! It is a very nice town house with some very good things about it. First, it is 3 bedrooms, 2 1/2 baths and is two story. It also has a two car garage. It is on the end of the row so it only has one wall that is common and has a large play area behind the house. The complex has a swimming pool and two or three play areas. As you can imagine they are very excited. Now we only have to wait until Raoul has put everything together and lets us know when they can move in. The biggest down side is that they will not be getting internet service for a little while. They will not be getting on this site for some time.
I can't wait until they can move for sooooooo many reasons.

My own bed

I just want you all to know that I love my bed. I guess the reason that I am saying this is that I have spent so much time away from my bed. I went to Utah twice in August and I went to Arizona in September and now in October I am going to Colorado and Kansas. And sometime in December I will be heading for Utah again. Now don't get me wrong. I love to travel and I LOVE seeing my kids and grandkids and I appreciate knowing that my family needs me and loves me but.... I LOVE MY BED.

Well, DUHHHHHH!!!!!

I think that our family has more common sense than all of these people put together!

http://health.msn.com/general/articlepage.aspx?cp-documentid=100171268&page=1

Read and Laugh!!!

the mom song

Enjoy!
http://cosmos.bcst.yahoo.com/ver/223/popup/index.php?cl=4274384

Worse things to hear coming out of your dentist's mouth

"Ooops."

"Marge, get me the BIG pliers."

"Whoo-hoo! Marge, get my wife on the phone and tell her we're going to Tahiti after all!"

FOUR!

Happy birthday, Adam! We love you much!

Dentist

I was typing in dentist as my topic and dentist woes appeared. Oh, how appropriate. Today's visit was as painful as my weekend- and trust me, that is saying something. They almost had to scrap me off the ceiling at one point.

So, there are worse things to hear coming out of your doctor's mouth than I heard today, but I wasn't too excited about what I did hear.

"What is with this tooth?"
"Christina picked a good tooth to send out." (Christina is my regular dentist.)
"Okay, I guess we go to plan B."
"We need another x-ray of the root. This tooth is over an inch long."
And finally, "You've given us a tough tooth today."

Oh, dear. The happy part is he's half way done. The sad part is he's only half way done.

I have to go back.

At least my jaw isn't cracked. I don't have to have it wired shut or have surgery or anything. And, lucky me, I get to go back to work tomorrow.