"Shh, be Still"

Church can be quite hard with two three year olds. My mom started making me an awesome quiet book around the same time my ward started to make one during our project nights.

Of course my mom finished hers and sent it to us WAY before I ever thought of finishing mine, but I can now say... it is finally finished!

I love it!
Take a peek...


Here are some of my favorite pages:
Tithing page: they can count the pennies, and put them in their piggie bank and then one in the tithing envelope.
Fishers of Men Page: They can go fishing!

The Liahona Page:
The spin the wheel on the Liahona and then they have to move Nephi where the Liahona says to go.

Jonah and the Whale:
This page doesn't do much, but the twins can stick Jonah in the whale's mouth all day!

It was fun to make, but super time consuming.
I don't think I would ever make one again, but I definitely glad I have this one!

Gummi Bears

My kids have been exposed to A LOT of Gummi Bears lately...
and not just the ones you eat either.

*In their favorite movie right now {Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs},
this little character destroys gummi bears...

*And someone gave us a bottle of those Costco kid vitamins that look like gummi bears
(who knows if they are actually good for you!)

The other night when Tyson was putting the kids to bed, he asked Berkleigh what song she wanted to sing, and she said, "The Gummi Bear song". I leaned a little closer to the door to listen to what kind of crazy song Tyson would make up for her...

I died laughing when this is what came out of his mouth.
And he didn't miss one word. How cool is my husband?


Now my son and daughter, born in 2007, can be heard singing this song, invented in 1986. :)

Fall is here, hear the yell Back to school, ring the bell

I love that as I write this, I have the windows open and can hear the local high school band practicing. The drums are reminding me of football and fall.

Merrick and Berkleigh started their preschool class today.
They were so excited! We had planned with some friends to have our kids in the same class, so we were all up in the wee hours of the morning to get our kids together. It worked out quite nicely!

Here are some first day pictures...


Merrick and Berkleigh with one of our church/school friends, Saxon!
I am looking forward to some alone time with me and the Stater Brothers...
Grocery shopping alone! I can't even tell you how exciting that is!

My master plan...

So I have had a plan...

a master plan... and it finally came to fruition last Wednesday!

Here is how the plan went down:

FEBRUARY: my parents gave the twins money toward their annual passes for their birthday!

MARCH: my neighbor and I Gave a Day of Service... so I could get $76 off my annual pass.

JUNE: my pass expired, which needed to happen so we could get by on the Disney loophole. (Annual passholders were not allowed to get a free day, but ours were expired.. hehe)

APRIL-SEPTEMBER: We have saved and saved... because we had to buy 4 annual passes this year!
Yep, not so much fun when your kids turn 3... the age of paying!

SEPTEMBER 8, 2010: We saw the fruits of our labors! My friend Kristi and I packed up the kids and headed to Disneyland.

The twins were so excited to get their own passes!

We had so much fun because... the twins are now 40 inches!
So we headed to some big rides. It is like a whole new park now!

SEPTEMBER 9, 2010: We had so much fun on Wednesday, that we begged our other Kristy friend to come with us to get her pass.
We stayed another 7 hours!


SEPTEMBER 10, 2010
Tyson was still gone to his conference in San Diego, so we went again Friday night.
Three days in a row. Am I crazy! I think I just might be.

Bring on our weekly Disney Days!

Savvy?

Tyson has been at a conference in San Diego since Thursday, so what did I do?
Played Hard! Seriously, but that is another post.

His conference ended today, and I was getting anxious to have him home, so we set off for Dana Point to the Tall Ships Festival.

We stopped off and picked up some friends before we left and then picked up my sister in law Mackenzie. (I am trying to pack in lots of quality time with her before she leaves on her mission to Switzerland!)

We watched a pirate get captured by the "red coats (?)" and taken to the brig. Then in an exciting, yet very poorly acted scene, they prepared the noose, brought the pirate to the deck, and were about to hang him, when his fellow pirate mates, swung over the side of the ship and attacked the English. It was intense... hehe (Well for some at least!)

The fight about to start, Merrick preparing for the blasts.

The pirates took the ship and put up the Jolly Roger.

We hung out with shady people like this bloke!
He wanted the twins snacks. They gave him the evil eye, and he knew who was boss!

We met lots of strange pirates and got some tats.

We walked around the pirate village, met a rat, and learned how to let down the sails.

We played pirate games and watched a blacksmith make knives.

We had a smash buckling time.
I would go again just to get Merrick and Berkleigh to smile like this again!
(Notice, Merrick climbed to the top of the barrels and Berkleigh sat with her legs crossed on a lower barrel.)
So typical!

When you can't leave your house...

make crazy forts and play ALL the kids games you own!

Our porch was painted today. Which means, we had to be in or out of our house for 4 hours.
It didn't help that I forgot they were coming until they were already painting. Oops.
So we stayed in today.
It was fun.

Make a fort.

Pick a toy we want to play with in the fort!

Mom sneaking a peek inside. They loved it because we put the nightlight in the fort. They thought they were living in their very own little house.


A successful day being prisoners in our own home! :)

First time for everything...

Berkleigh got her hair cut! I mean, a real cut. Her bangs were cut one unfortunate day a year and a half ago, but her HAIR has never been cut. I was brushing it out after bath, and I thought, you know, I could cut it. I don't have to pay $16 to get it cut somewhere.

So I asked. Usually she says no, but we both seemed to be in the mood.

So I chopped 4 inches off.

I love it. She loves it.

I wonder sometimes why I didn't cut it sooner. Her hair looks SO much more healthy.
She still looks like a rag-a-muffin though cause I DO NOT know how to manage curls.

To celebrate new hair, we played "snowballs" (watch Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs for reference)
with a new Costco size box of toilet paper I hadn't put away yet... I mean, it had been sitting on our living room floor for 4 day.