Happy Halloween

Happy Halloween. I started this wreath at the beginning of the month and got busy and finally just finished it today! It began as just a brown twig wreath and I spray painted the wreath and the bugs and the snakes and glued everything on.

I lost the binky...

I lost Darci's binky two nights ago. When I'm not paying attention, she'll drag one of her brothers of sisters to her bed to get her binky for her. Well, she did this and then dropped it somewhere and I couldn't find it anywhere! This was right around bed time, too late to go to the store and get another one because we only had this one.

So I put her to bed, told her that her binky was lost and she seemed to fall right asleep. She woke up about every 2 hours crying and finally about midnight she fell asleep for the rest of the night.

I was dreading naps the next day, but she fell asleep right away and slept for 2 hrs. Last night she asked about her binky ("where is bebe?", "bebe byebye?") and whined for about 45 minutes before falling asleep and was quiet the rest of the night.

Naps today were great - fell asleep right away and slept for nearly 3 hrs.

And tonight at bedtime, Kevin found her binky hidden near the office couch. Luckily she was outside at the time. I tucked it away somewhere for an emergency in case I need to give in again and put her to sleep without it. She only whined for about 30 minutes before falling asleep.

Maybe maybe we can finally be done with it.....

It's been surprising to me how attached she's been to her binky because she is very independent. She definitely has an attitude and knows what she wants to do. She also likes to hide from us ... she'll go inside dark closets and shut the doors and she'll shut the bathroom door and climb inside the tub in the dark hiding and it doesn't scare her at all. She is all over the place all the time, she is definitely going to be a handful as she gets bigger!

The rest of September and a bit of October

I am trying to get caught up on our blog! This is the 3rd post in 2 days, so make sure you scroll down. I think this catches us up to this past week, so here it goes....

Darci is getting a kick out of sitting on her very own potty.

I love it when its quiet and I go to investigate and find them all playing nice together or reading books together.

We went to the Graham county fair and Darci was overwhelmed by all the lights and sounds.

Derek was proud to point out his contribution to the school projects section of the fair. Kevin also had some drawings there but we couldn't find any of them. He got a first place ribbon for one of them.

I've been trying to do some more projects around the house. Finally got them some money jars. We're decorating them with vinyl pictures I cut so they can be changed around frequently. They have been really motivated to do chores since we started paying them (1 penny for each chore).

I put this family motto on our wall using vinyl.

This was a picture frame that I've had for years. I finally decided to put it to some use. It went from this....

to this...

and finally to this! This isn't even half of her bows and flowers. I have another frame that I'm going to do the same thing to. Now at least I can see what the girls have and can start using them more frequently.

Last week we babysat 2 extra girls for the whole week, day and night while our friends went on vacation. It wasn't as crazy as expected. We all had a lot of fun with them. Both Paige and Darci had a best friend for the week.

While they were here, I didn't do any laundry for that week and finally got around to it 2 days after they left... this was the result! What a mess!

Tad's brother Rusty (whiteyephoto) was great and lugged all his camera gear down here to take pictures of all the cousins. Here is Darci at 21 months.

Derek at almost 7 - in just a few weeks

Page at 4 1/2 - I did not end up getting one of Kevin.

All of the cousins on the Martin side of the family.

Darci got a hold of a soda can and has decided she LOVES "juice" and now goes a little crazy if she sees it somewhere and can't get it.

Always looking out for Craiglist deals... got the boys a box of hotwheels cars for $5.

Picked up a box of 40 barbies, 20 baby barbies and a bag of clothes and cars, etc. The girls love them. I think Darci looks like the one on the right.

Kevin scraped up his face one day at school...

Remember, we took Darci's binky away. In its place, I got her a stuffed giraffe. She loves it, but she was still crying for her binky, so she also got a stuffed bear and a stuffed elephant and finally SHE GOT HER BINKY BACK! She mostly has it just for naps and bed, but she has started asking Derek and Paige to go get it for her, pulling them by the hand to her room. And of course, they give it to her before asking me. The plan is to cut the rubber part off and tell her it broke, probably when it gets close to Christmas.

They fall asleep in the most random places...

We have a big whirlpool bathtub at our rental house and so once a week they get a big bubble jacuzzi bath.

Girls Only Camping Trip

I took the kids camping last month with some girlfriends and their kids. No husbands allowed (OK, we did allow some of them to come up the last day). It was a lot of fun and surprisingly enough pretty easy. I think we had 17 kids running around, but they all played really good together and had a blast.

Aren't these girls cute? They are about the same age as Darci. I left Darci at home with Nana and Grandpa (thank you!) but she would have had fun with these two cuties. Actually she would have been running around climbing trees, chasing bears and getting lost. That's why I left her home. She does not know how to sit still and relax like these two little girls.

Grandpa and Grammy Visit

OK, so I am still getting caught up. Last month Grandpa and Grammy from Washington came to visit. We went up Mount Graham and played on the rocks and at the lake and went to the orchard to pick some apples.

Kevin dressed himself that day - notice the shoes!

This was the biggest dandelion I've ever seen!

They all took off their shoes and waded in to get the bobbers people left behind..

Wish we could've spent more time picking apples (only 60 cents per pound!) but as soon as we got there we were attacked non stop by mosquitos!