All together!

To say this weekend has been magical would be a gross understatement! I has been total perfection. We have got in some really fun family time with extended family and we have also had some wonderful time just to ourselves.
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We had a little photo op before church started while we were all in our fancy dancies! (Do you like my sweater....it makes me feel all fancy and international because it came from LONDON! Thanks Kaitlyn!).
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We have been making candies, eating a ton of food, going out for dinner to a Korean restaurant, watching The Fighter, playing Settlers of Catan, watching movies, have parties, eating brunch, taking a bazillion pictures, laughing so hard it hurts, learning Korean nursery songs and cuddling.
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The girls have been wonderful! Acting like he has always been here, no weirdness or anything. I expected there to be more of a transition but so far we have just snapped right back into full family mode. It has only been a few days and my heart is so full!

EEEEEEEK!

So I am so hyped up that I can hardly contain myself. I don't know how in the world I am going to get any sleep tonight!

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Marcus comes home TOMORROW! He left in July and I only saw him a day in a half in September. The girls haven't seen him (besides skyping) since July.

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I CAN'T WAIT! Plus I am also major scattered brained right now and can't really focus on anything long enough to get anything accomplished (IE uploading any pictures to do a decent posting).

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Oh well, you can't really blame a girl for going out of her mind in excitement....right?

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Do you like how I published in extra large text so you could REALLY feel the excitement through your computer screen?

Getting our Christmas On!

Olivia was confused when I told her we were making a star for the Christmas tree. My friend Rachel did her Christmas tree über cheaply and I incorporated her ideas when doing ours. Except I didn't do it as fabulously as she did.

My little Konks loved all the Christmas decorating action!

They had just eaten lunch and Bianca is especially messy in all things including and not limited to meal times. Her clothes got trashed...hence naked baby running around.

Here is our little 35 dollar prelit Walmart tree we bought a few years back. Works like a charm.

Except when you can't find the legs to the base. In which case you just pull rice from your food storage and load them in a stock pot to stable it. Which then you also fasten securely to the wall with string and tacks. All of which will not stop you bebe from tearing the whole dang thing down!

3 dollar tree decorations! Just two boxes of candy canes. I cannot take credit for this idea either, Kaitlyn already did this style to her tree. And as all the evidence proves thusly... I follow my friends blindly and with wild abandon. (Can you see my nifty string in the background??)

Candy on a tree?? Awesome idea Mommy!

Thank goodness Grandma Teri was there to be our picture taker! You know you are a SAHM when wearing anything other than yoga/exercise pants makes you feel terribly uncomfortable and constricted. Thank goodness leggins are in fashion or I would walk around looking like a homeless person!

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Surprisingly no one has eaten the candy canes yet! And I am not the least bothered that they break when they fall off because they are so cheap!

concerned...

I was folding and putting away clothes and I realized something. I have, somehow, taken over the entire closet. We boxed up a lot of Marcus' clothes before he left and all that is really in the closet is his suits.
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I have the whole rack, on both sides, full of my clothes. I haven't been shopping, besides a very limited few new purchases, all my stuff has somehow oozed all over the whole place. Then I realized I was very content with my closet conquering. Which isn't a problem right now.....but it will be when I eventually will have to share closet space again.
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Also I am a very light sleeper by nature and I think I have gotten used to sleeping solo. Olivia had a nightmare and slept with me the other night and I woke up with every roll over that she made. Ruh, roh. Me thinks I might be in trouble!
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On a happy note, I found the camera! Yeah! Pictorial posts soon!

Best thing about my Monday night.

Or any night really. Skyping with this guy! We talk about our day, he shows me the homework he is working on. If he gets home and the kids are still awake then they will talk to him too. Olivia gets the most talkative when I "remember" there is something urgent I need to take care of in another room and she gets the computer all to herself.
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Then she really becomes a chatty Cathy, telling Daddy all kinds of magical stories about her day. It also helps if I only have the window of him open, if I also have the window of us open she gets too fascinated looking at the video of herself to focus on anything else.
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Bianca loves to skype the most. She will sit with me forever and slobber all over the place, squealing and occasionally pointing at him. She loves it and if I don't pick her up so she can see him, she will sit at my feet and bawl her brains out. Skyping with him is the only time she cares about the computer. Most times, when the kids are awake, it is Bianca and I hunkered down in front of the computer with Olivia running in sporadically to tell me some monster is attacking her fisher price school bus. Quite often she is doing all of this in her undies.
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I am so excited to see him again, I can hardly stand it!! 2 weeks and 3 days and then we will get him all to ourselves!

Laying Low...

Olivia wandered off with my camera a few days ago and I have not been able to find it yet! If you see it, please tell it to come home so we can take some pictures!
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Olivia has been real sick this week, so consequently we have not been doing much of anything. I am starting to get it and Bianca seems untouched by it yet. So she has tons of energy and keeps wanting her sister to play with her while Olivia is in a coma like state on the couch.
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I am hoping that tomorrow we make some ground on this sickness stuff. Being sleep deprived I need to constantly remind myself not to lose my patience. My new mantra is "she is really sick, she is only 2.....she is really sick, she is only 2". That helps me keep everything in perspective.
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We have been skyping a lot with Daddy and we were happy to hear about the two Thanksgiving dinners that he got invited to. He has been able to catch up on some much needed sleep with the long weekend. He was watching a Korean movie on Netflix when we called to chat with him on Thanksgiving day. I really love that guy.

Dear Marcus...

Today I feel sassy! Just got my hair done and it feels a thousand times better. I even wore a sassy outfit to the hairdresser (my usual outfit being yoga pants). My new skinny jeans, boots and a shirt I found in Helen's give away pile.
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Then I went to Dutch Bakery and got some pea soup. It was divine! It was a little bit of a wait for the food so they gave me some free chocolate puff things which was a pretty magical ending to my hair crisis of 2010.
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Me and my sassy hair can't wait to see you 3 weeks and 1 day!!!

Hair Update

Good news: Marcus saw pictures of the pixie cut on Konks and LOVES it. Whew!
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Good news: Kaitlyn read my blog post about the pixie and called me right after reading the part where my hair appointment isn't until January. She said, basically, that I am a hot mess right now and that I won't make it until January. Something to the effect of me going crazy and one by one chopping every one's hair off (not an exaggeration). Squabbling ensued resulting in her calling the hair place, as me, and telling them that I was having a hair emergency and that I need to get in ASAP. Doesn't matter who does it or when or what they do to me, something has got to be done and fast.
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Luckily I have been going to the same place for QUITE some time and am familiar with most the gals there. She got me in TOMORROW at noon. Gotta love a girlfriend who goes for the gusto on getting you help, kinda embarrassing that I need the help this badly.
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Good news: I will have fabulous looking hair for when my Marcus comes home for break!
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The gal I am seeing tomorrow is not my usual gal, but I still have my appointment for January so if anything gets too crazy my main gal can fix it up then. But honestly I believe we are at the point that even if she butchered it, it would probably make it look better!

Say hello to the Pixie.

Something just had to be done. Olivia even knew it. That danged curse of baby girl hair that takes forever to grow out and looks ridiculous.

Cousin Vienna of course had to get in on the action.

Bianca had some major mullet action going on. I remember how long it took for Olivia's crazy hair to grow out and it just made me anxious. Olivia's hair is STILL growing out those baby layers.

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Plus I was feeling kinda depressed about my hair (problem solved...hair appointment for January with my name on the list to call in case of cancellations). I knew me and Olivia were going to be hooped for a while and just figured at least one of us girls needed to have some sassy hair.

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So, on a total whim while my Mom and Auntie Michelle was here, I went for it. That's right, sister.... I CHOPPED IT ALL OFF.

First cut... excitement plus "Oh crap, what did I just do."

But I knew at that point there was no turning back. A big ole chunk of Mr. Mullet was gone. With a sucker as a distractionary tool I just kept hacking away.

And I have to say that I am IN LOVE with how it turned out!

I had some hair wax left over from when my hair was short and just spiked it up all sassy like.

Half the time people can't tell if babies are boys or girls, even if you have them dressed in blue or pink. Her hair just looks so healthy and spunky, just like her fun little self.

No more mullets for this baby. It is so awesome because she knows how fabulous she looks. She will take both her hands and run them through her hair and just smile at me. I am already getting excited about all the different ways I can spike it and/or put in cute little clips for the front part.

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Watch out world. We got a pixie baby on the loose!

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PS- Hopefully Marcus doesn't kill me ;)

Hair-tastrophe

It's pretty hard to get a picture of my whole head when I am trying to do it myself. Let me tell you something, my hair has reached a whole new level of ridiculousness.
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I have a baby.
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6 months post baby all the finer hair that frames my face (as well as a good 1/3 of my thickness overall) falls out in humongous, embarrassing chunks.
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I have bald patches on either side of my temples for a good, long, while.
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Fast forward a couple of months. Finer hairs start growing back in.
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Fast forward a couple of months after that. Finer hairs are about three inches long. Not quite long enough to do a full curl, but plenty long enough to stick out at ridiculous angles and make an afro halo around my head.
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All this young, new hair is in it's adolescence of development if you will. It is dying to get noticed and show the world what it is all about. It does NOT take kindly to direction, rebellious in spirit.
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The older, more mature hair looks down on the hyperness of the new hair. To demonstrate how fully developed and refined it is, the longer hairs lay flat and dull. Trying to tell the new hairs how to behave in public. All calm and tame. Then the new hairs get all their feathers ruffled, ashamed of how the older hairs want to hide their light under a bushel. So they really pull out ALL the stops and become one with the afro.
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My head is a battle field for hair decorum and I am afraid the only person loosing the fight here is me. I believe it is time for me to book an appointment with my hairstylist before I go crazy. Trying to reason with the two sects of hair is no longer working...if it ever worked at all.

Blistery Sunday.

Today was a harder Sunday for our clan. Kids shenanigans ensued, felt like a wild banshee wrangler the whole time. I might have even exclaimed a little louder of an "Amen" at the end of Relief Society, not because I was glad to be done with it, just glad I survived my kid craziness with my sanity intact. (I swear the wind is turning my kids into crazy hooligans!).
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I was just starting to dread the inevitable "load the brood into the car in the freezing cold" end to church when something pretty cool happened. A Mom of older boys that was sitting across the way flagged down one of her sons to help me out to my car. I had a momentary thought of turning her down, my pride screaming that I could handle all this and Oh, so much more! But then I turned to her and said that would be wonderful.
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See I had been thinking about a post a friend made HERE and it had been on my mind all day. What good would it have done me to try and haul my cranky kids out there all by myself when I was already feeling frustrated... when someone was trying to ease my load? He buckled Bianca in like a pro and Olivia practiced her manners by thanking him for helping us.
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It also made my kinda admire the Mom for seeing a need and filling it as well as showing her boy how to fill those needs. I got my spiritual fill for the Sunday not when I was sitting in the chapel, but when I was in the Church parking lot.

Wowza was an understatement....

Goodness Gracious me! This movie blew my socks off. For one this book to movie installment was my favorite so far. Keeping all the main points, no parts felt like they were dragging, good pace. PLUS we saw it in Imax which just put it over the top! I would happily pay full price to see this bad guy once, if not a few more times more before it leaves the theaters.
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The only part that was weird was the insinuated nudity blip, which just felt off. Like even though it was a crazy intense scene, when it came on I was like "what the...." and felt slightly uncomfortable. It is not coming from a stance of only watching PG movies either, I do dabble in riskier ratings of movies... but it just kinda came out of nowhere and I felt like it was not really integral to the direction of the scene. It could have more than easily been done without that bit in there, which just made it seem like it was more in there for shock factor than anything else. But a blip it was (20-30 seconds) and even with the weirdness from that part I still totally loved it.
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Has anyone else seen it?? What are your thoughts on that one scene?

Wowza

Thanks to Auntie Helen's fabulous babysitting skills, I will be enjoying a day out on the town. Seeing the most awesome movie ever. The finale of the Harry Potter series PART ONE.
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I would not be exaggerating if I said I've been having a hard time sleeping this week over the anticipation. If how I act when seeing a preview is any indicator (Jayme knows what I am talking about) I will be hooting, hollering, squealing and clapping like I am 13 years old. AND I WILL NOT BE EMBARRASSED ONE LITTLE BIT.
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There will be a luxurious lunch time out, a brief shopping interlude followed by waiting with other Harry Potter crazies in line for hours. Plus I will be rocking my new skinny jeans that I got for way cheap (Old Navy sale... holla!) and feeling like a million bucks.
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I will be baby/toddler free all day. Have I mentioned how magical this will be for me? Because it is. Going to be magical.
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So whilst you are going about your Friday activities you can think about me and my crazy awesome, fabulous time that I will be having!
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Oh, Harry Potter! {sigh}.

Mom, I'm Belle!

Here is Olivia, in all her scowling glory, in her new Belle dress. (The scowling is a new phase we are on). Despite what her eyebrows might be trying to tell you, she is seriously in love with this dress.

My Mom saves everything. She even saved the bridesmaid dresses she made for us when she married my step-dad. I "encouraged" her to whip up this fanciful thing for me. She re purposed the bridesmaid dress (it is the perfect color of blue) to make Olivia this dress for playing around the house.

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She even made a separate crinoline slip to help puff it out, but that can also be used with other dress up clothes.

She even took a decorative tea towel and turned it into a little apron (because when Belle wears this dress she wears a white apron). Olivia wears it ALL DAY LONG. She requests to put it on right when she wakes up and takes it off when she eats so she doesn't get "grodies" on it.

She really thinks she is hot stuff when she pairs it with her Cinderella slippers. I am still on the look out for a white undershirt that matches the outfit, then it will be complete! Oh, and I also need to get another little basket.

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In the opening scenes, Belle is walking into the village to return a book all while carrying a little basket. We did have a little basket but Olivia literally wore that sucker out pretending to be Belle all day that when she finally got the dress the basket was broken. She reminds me repeatedly of her need to have a basket so she can carrying her books around in it.

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Thanks so much Mom, the dress is PERFECT!

Konks

I love my little crazy climber girl. Every day that she gets bigger, I see more and more of her Daddy in her. Sometimes looking into her eyes is like looking into his. That is such a comfort to me.
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She is very flirty, with everyone, everywhere. At church she will run up to random people and ask them to hold her and then she will give them a little hug. She makes flirty faces to the family of all boys that sit behind us during church. She is really perfecting the "coy, aren't I so cute" smile. All's I know is when she hits her teen years I am going to be IN TROUBLE!.
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She is go, go, go. TV is beneath her, she would rather sabotage Olivia's TV watching by sneaking up and turning the TV off. She will climb up ANYTHING. Her favorite dare devil activity is to climb up on the glider rocker. She will climb up on the glider footstool, which glides, and try to launch herself onto the glider. Both are moving simultaneously and separately from each other, she loves the challenge of balancing herself on the stool to get up on the glider. As soon as she gets up she will sit down and glide a few times and then get off just to climb back up again.
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The first night we skyped with Marcus she wandered up and asked me to pick her up. Then she just sat on my lap for 12 minutes (yes I timed it). She just stared at the computer, staring at him and listening to him talk. She would point at him, but mostly just sit perfectly still. She has never sat with me that long since she was 6 months old. It was such a sweet moment because it was clear that she knew who he was and was mesmerized by him.
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She has seen the computer play videos before but will not pay attention to them UNLESS we are skyping Marcus. She will stand on the chair in front of him and point to his nose and he will mock like he is trying to eat her finger. She LOVES it!

Sicko's

So to top off our Halloween activities we had a lovely bout of "barf and poop your brains out" hit our house. Olivia first and then me. We were MISERABLE. There is nothing worse than having your girl sick but you can't really take care of her because you are camped out in front of the toilet. (Was that a little much? It felt kinda TMI...sorry).
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Luckily magical, wonderful Helen saved the day! She brought me much needed BRAT diet supplies to help our "delicate" conditions and took my crazy baby off my hands for the day so Olivia and I could just do ... nothing.
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Helen has saved my bacon on a number of occasions. I love her to pieces. My girls love her to pieces. We may be at Helen's house as much as she is at her house. Can you say "know your boundaries, Vashti?". She says she doesn't mind. I believe her. Hence we are always there!


Also a hazard of all the barfing was that this bad boy needed to be cleaned out. I have a confession to make. I have never once taken apart a car seat to clean it, nor put it back together again. That was always the Daddy's job. This was all new territory for me. As crazy as it sounds I was slightly scared about doing this and sad about doing this. Scared that when I took it apart I would wreck it some how and never be able to get it back together again, ruining my chances of escaping the house with the girls.
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Sad because it made me miss my Marcus.
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Day to day things I am really good at. We all know the routine. We now skype every night which the girls LOVE being able to talk to him that much. I don't even get too sad when we are talking. But something like this happens, something as stupid as taking apart a car seat, and I about have a mental breakdown.
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It is random, run of mill, daily grind stuff that makes my heart well up with sadness. Just when I least expect it. So the car seat and I had an emotional moment together. But I did it, put it all back together in working order and felt like I had conquered Mt. Everest!
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We all got better, a few pounds lighter and ready for adventure!

MIA

This is probably the longest I have gone without writing a post in a long while. But I am back in the saddle!
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Bianca has been teething and has been not as enjoyable to be around. My solution is cram as many and as much activities into our day as possible to distract her from the army of molars that are invading her soft little gums. Let me tell you, it has been working! So we have been having play dates up the wazoo and have not been at home as much for me to blog my brains out.
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I have enough time at the end of the day to read every one's blogs but by the time I am done with that I just want to watch something on Hulu or netflix or I end up skyping with Marcus FOREVER! (Sigh! I love him so!).
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But just so y'all know I plan to blog my brains out for the next few days. You have been warned.

Christmas is going to ROCK!!

So I had been on pins and needles for the last week waiting to see if Marcus' leave for the holidays was going to be approved.
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Yesterday he found out.
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He is going to be home for 18 GLORIOUS days at Christmas time! I have been on a high since last night. It will be such a wonderful, magical time for us. Days upon days with the only thing on the agenda being "Family Time". From sun up to sun down, for 18 freakin' days, our family will be together again.
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So now my mind is swimming with all the things we can do together. Daddy-daughter dates, nap times, holiday baking, Mommy-Daddy dates, home cooked meals, movie watching, Settlers of Catan.
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It is going to ROCK! {As she gets up from the chair and does a happy dance around the computer}

Observations

I was changing.......

.....this one's diaper this morning.

This girl waltz's into the room and squats down right next to me to inspect what I was doing.

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Then she grabs my arm, looks me in the face and says...

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"Holy Cow, Mom! Bianca just pooped her brains out!".

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Then she gets up and walks out of the room. I have been laughing about it all day long!

Halloween

I know Halloween was forever ago, but I am posting these late anyway! On Saturday we went down to Lake Steven's to see Nana (Blaine's Nana). We went to the trunk or treat at Church and had a ton of fun.

Thank goodness DJ Lance Rock was there to watch Bianca while I trunk or treated with Olivia.

Olivia was going to be a duck, but then decided she wanted to be fairy-ish like Blaine. Luckily Kaitlyn had back up costumes and there was this leopard print kitty fairy thing. It was actually a onesie type get up for 18 month size, but we just didn't snap it closed underneath and no one was the wiser!

Bianca was a cute little skunk (like Olivia was last year).

Kaitlyn tried getting pictures of the big girls in the gym before the trunk or treat started. They were being so goofy!

Olivia unfortunately was feeling a tad under the weather and didn't eat any of her candy that day. We both spent Halloween day feeling sick and yucky. Aunt Helen took Bianca for the afternoon so Olivia and I could just rest and watch movies. It is not fun to be feeling sick, it is double not fun to be feeling sick and also have little ones to take care of.

School Time

My boy is getting all grown up and going to school! Classes have started and my main man will be learning.....{drum roll please}.... KOREAN! He has been doing independent study before classes went into full swing. History, pop culture, celebrities, geography.
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At church they gave him a Korean Book of Mormon. He took a cell phone picture of the writing and sent it to me, to which I responded "You have to learn how to read like THAT?".

He is very excited to get going with things, being in limbo in between training and schooling isn't very fun and the time goes by really slowly. He is living off base with a really nice family who the husband is also at the DLI and they had an extra room to spare. So now his schedule will look something like this.
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sleep.
wake up.
study.
eat breakfast.
study.
ride the bus.
study.
study.
study.
study.
eat lunch.
study.
study.
study.
ride the bus home.
study.
study.
study.
eat dinner.
study.
study.
study.
sleep.
repeat.
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The classes are intense and fast paced. Falling behind is not an option, fall behind at all and you flunk out. TALK ABOUT PRESSURE! They try to fit educational-fun in here and there. Marcus sent me the link for this YouTube clip. I guess some students in a past session made this video as a class project.
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Happy Studying Your Brains Out Marcus!!

Pumpkin Patch Virgin

In case you don't know where I live... we are exactly 2.5 miles away from Stoney Ridge Farms. AND I HAVE NEVER BEEN THERE! I have lived 2.5 miles away from this place for 13 years. I fully realize that I am the lamest person on the planet.
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Every year we would have the best of intentions but then either someone would get sick and/or Marcus would have to work over-time... and it never happened. This year we made it and Kaitlyn took roughly a kerbillion pictures for me so that way I could post a kerbillion pictures which would then allow Marcus to feel like he was there with us through the kerbillion of pictures.
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I have to say "Mission Accomplished!". So here are now a kerbillion pictures.

We had a gaggle of children, it was so fun! Anna brought her kids along for the ride too! Olivia thought the hay ride was THE COOLEST. Whenever she gets really excited she does this embarrassed-purse-her-lips-together smile. For the hay ride she was embarrassed smiling her brains out.

Best Friends.

Konks' mullet has now reached a slightly less awkward phase. It is now in "I can finally fit two tiny pigtails in my hair" phase. Her Buddha belly kinda rocks too.

And here we have a candid "look how mature and motherly we are solving the problems of the world whilst taking our kids on a magical farm adventure and allowing them to frolic about."

Henry deciding the group strategy for mastering the corn maze.

My mom knits and made the girls these AWESOME sweaters. The color looks so great with their skin tone and I love it when my girls are matchy matchy.

Me: "Ride that pony"

Blaine: "But that isn't a pony it's a mailbox!"

Me: "That it is!"

Konks loves it when she gets to be like the big girls.

Olivia has had practice with these bad boys thanks to magical Auntie Helen!

It's a pumpkin tree!

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Kaitlyn was there, she was just busy being my personal photographer to be in any of the shots. It was so fun and we went on the cheap Thursday which made it even better! I was of course kicking myself for having not gone there sooner, as I figured I would.

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The only thing that would have made it more perfect was if Daddy could have been there with us!