It's official...yet again!

That's right, I have once again qualified for mother of the year. Here are two of my most recent 'proud motherhood moments' that put me in the running.

#1
Addison has become quite the tattle tell lately. She tells on her brother for absolutely EVERYTHING! Now I will be the first to admit that he is quite the stinker, but my goodness she does not let him get away with anything. All I hear all day long is "mom, Urban's drinking", "mom, Urban's breathing", "mom, Urban's singing", "mom, Urban's hitting/biting me", "mom Urban's throwing something away", "mom, Urban's breaking something", etc. You get the gist. Now some of these are legitimate concerns, but so many of them are so ridiculous that it just starts to drive me crazy after awhile. So the other morning after she had told on him for some insignificant reason for the one hundredth time I just lost it. I yelled at her and said I didn't want to hear any more. I didn't care what he was doing, she just needed to deal with it and resolve it on her own. I went into the other room and several minutes later I heard Addison quietly sobbing. She was trying very hard not to let me hear her, which is strange. She normally tries to cry as loudly as possible to evoke as much sympathy as possible. I figured something must not be right. I went into the room, startling Urban as I did, to find Addison sitting there with tears streaming down her face and a bright red arm. Apparently Urban had put the smack down on her arm (very quietly might I add, I never heard a thing) and Addison just sat there and took it because I had yelled at her for being a nark. What the heck! What kind of mother does something like this? I felt so bad. I sat there hugging her and crying and telling her how sorry I was. Yep, mother of the year!

#2
Urban has recently decided that it is great fun to play with the locks on the front door. He's great at locking the door, but has some trouble turning it the other way for some reason. He has locked me out of the house on a couple of different occasions when I've gone to get the mail or take trash to the curb or whatever. Luckily it's never been for very long. He either quickly figures out how to unlock it or someone else is around to let me in. Well, on this particular day he locked me out and I was simply not in the mood for his shenanigans. It was freezing outside and I was in a hurry. When I got to the door to find it locked I yelled at him to open it for me. I heard him messing with the locks but it was still locked. After several minutes of listening to him tinker with it I was less than amused. "Damn it Urban, open the door!" Oh that's right, I said it. I'm quite ashamed of myself but I was so mad. Nothing! So I started repeatedly ringing the doorbell and kicking the door hoping that Addison would hear me and come to the door. She didn't. I knew what room Addison was in so I went to that window and told her to go to the front door and unlock it for me. I heard her get to the door, then I heard a brawl break out. Urban was determined not to let her near the door. I don't know if he thought it was a game at this point, if he was just being territorial or if he knew how much trouble he was going to be in once I got inside. Anyway, I started yelling for Addison to hurry up and unlock the door. She started crying and telling me that she was trying to but Urban wouldn't let her. She told me that he was hitting her and pushing her out of the way so she couldn't. I tried telling Urban to knock it off, but of course he didn't listen. So then I told Addison to do whatever she had to do to get to the door. "But he won't let me" she screamed. "Then push him out of the way" I yelled back, "I don't care what you have to do just get him away from the door". After hearing some screaming, crying, pushing, hitting & yelling the door was finally unlocked. I entered to find Urban sitting in a nearby chair trying as hard as he could to ignore me. He knew he was going to get it. After making sure Addison was okay I laid into the Urbster. Again, what kind of mother does stuff like this? Standing outside yelling at my children, giving one permission to do whatever it takes to the other in order to open the door. My neighbors must think I'm just lovely. Yep, mother of the year!

To my dear, sweet children; some day when you're sitting in a shrinks office trying to sort through your issues, just hand him a copy of this post and all will be explained.

Maternity pictures

My sister took my pregnancy pictures today and she did a fabulous job. She's been waiting forever to take them but I don't really get all that big (so I'm told, I feel huge!) until right at the end of my pregnancy. We decided we needed to do it today just in case little miss came early. It was so much fun. She found the cutest little place and we got down and dirty (literally, we were on the ground) to get some shots. She has a little sneak preview up on her blog http://bloggingwithus.blogspot.com/ and I can't wait to see the rest! I love what I've seen so far which is rare for me because I hate having my picture taken and never like the way they turn out. I guess it helps when you're SUPPOSED to look tubby! =) It also helps to have a great photographer that I'm so comfy with. She made me feel like a super model. Thanks again, you're the best!

Halloween

We had a fun filled week of Halloween festivities this year. We started the week by carving our pumpkins. I apparently have very odd children because they do not enjoy getting dirty. You can tell by the looks on their faces that they were less than thrilled to be cleaning out the pumpkin guts. I must say they come by it honestly, Jared hates having dirty hands, it totally grosses him out. Every time Urban would stick his hand in his pumpkin he would pull it out and say "sticky, need wipe". I tried to explain to him that we would clean him up once he was all done, but he wasn't having it, he wanted to be cleaned each time.

The pumpkins turned out pretty cute. Jared helped Urban carve a face into his and Addison wanted a kitty cat so I helped her carve a silhouette.

On Thursday Addison had a Halloween party at her preschool. She was so excited to wear her costume for her class to see. She originally wanted to be a witch (which I was very excited about, I had cute costume ideas) but then she saw her cousin Ava's costume and just had to have the same one. I could not talk her out of it. Oh well, she made a super cute tiger kitty and she was happy.

Then Thursday night we went trunk-or-treating at the church. It was so much fun to see all the kiddos in the ward dressed up all cute. Urban was a monster which was perfect because I call him my little monster man anyway. I remembered that my nephew Blaise had worn this costume when he was like 3 (he's now 10) and my sister still had it so it worked out perfectly. He looked so cute, I want to have him wear it everyday.

On Friday night we went over to my sister's house to have a spooktacular Halloween party. Of course I didn't get any pictures, but believe you me it was lots of fun. We all dressed up & had yummy Halloween themed finger foods.

Halloween night we met up with some friends of ours to have dinner then took the kids trick-or-treating around their neighborhood. We all had a lot of fun and got lots of yummy candy. Once we got back home we put the kids to bed then Jared & I had our annual Halloween date. We rummage through the kids candy and make some other snacks then watch a scary movie together. Not too scary mind you, we're both kind of scaredy cats! =)

Pumpkin Patch!

We went to the pumpkin patch a couple of weeks ago before the weather got too cold. We tried a different one this year just because it was cheaper than the one we went to last year. Honestly, last year's was quite a bit better but the kids didn't remember and they had a blast. All they cared about was the slide, which they must have spent an hour playing on.

We went through the corn maze and took turns letting Addison & Urban lead. They weren't very interested. Jared & I knew where we were the whole time but he was trying to get the kids lost and hide behind corn stalks to jump out and scare them. All they cared about was getting out of there as soon as possible so they could go back to their precious slide.

The funny thing is that both of them look absolutely terrified while sliding down, but once they got to the bottom they would get a huge smile and start laughing and run back up the stairs to go again. Urban threw quite the fit when it was time to leave!

This top picture of Addison cracks me up only because of the memory associated with it. She decided to go down on her tummy because she saw other kids doing it but she didn't realize she needed to lift her hands up. They were screeching down the slide the entire time making an awful sound and totally slowing her down. I think a snail may have passed her up! You can't really see the people at the top of the slide, but everyone was laughing at her. We kept yelling for her to lift her hands but she didn't quite get the concept. Oh well, she still had fun. =)

Dear John,

I am writing this letter to inform you that I think it's time we call things quits. Trust me, it's not you, it's me! You haven't changed a bit, I just have different needs at the moment. I'm sure you've noticed that my visits to you lately have been far less frequent. In the first several months I used to come to you many times a day, even many times an hour some days, but now it's just a couple of times a week. In the beginning you were the only one who could truly understand me. No one else would welcome me with all of my "baggage" into their bowl at any time of day or night no questions asked. I spent many nights curled up on the floor next to your strong, supportive base knowing that it was pointless returning to bed only to run back to you with hardly a moment's notice. The truth is that I'm finally able to venture back into the real world. At last I can give my children and husband hugs & kisses again. I can handle most smells and tastes without feeling the need to run back into your cool, porcelain embrace. I will always remember our time together, however I can't say that they will be fond memories. Again, not because of anything you did wrong, just because of the circumstances surrounding our time together. I'm sure I'll be back for visits every now and again, but for the most part we are over. Please don't try to stop me as I am very excited about this new stage in my life. I wish you well and promise to come back once a week to keep you sparkling clean (I know how important this is to you) so you can perform at your best. Good luck in your future encounters.


Sincerely,
Hollie

Family Outings

Here's a couple of things our family has been up to lately. I am so behind on blogging but I have got so much else going on right now. I like to try to post these things just so I remember them. I have such a terrible memory and unfortunately I'm not great at journaling (is that even a word?) either.

When the kids and I first got back from Arizona we decided to go to Chuck E Cheese to have fun and spend some time together as a family. It was a rainy day so we had to think of an indoor activity. The kids had a blast. Mason actually slept most of the time but he woke up for a little while towards the end so we could get some pictures with him.

About 2 weeks ago was supposed to be one of our last really nice weekends so we decided to go to the zoo. The weather was beautiful, it was just perfect for a trip to the zoo. But man was it crowded! I guess we weren't the only ones who listened to the weather report. =) The kids loved seeing all of the animals, especially the brand new baby elephant. They also liked the train ride and carousel. Well Addison liked the carousel, any type of motion ride kind of freaks Urban out a bit but he did ok.

The Perfect Morning!

We had a wonderful morning.

We all woke up and cuddled in bed together for about an hour.

Then we made muffins, eggs & fruit for breakfast and ate while watching the rain out our front window.

The weather was beautiful. It was cloudy and rainy and windy, but oh so comfy cozy. I normally don't like weather like this, but I have been welcoming it with open arms this fall. It's been a nice change and feels so homey.

I sat watching the raindrops fall onto the window while sipping my first hot chocolate of the season. I LOVE hot chocolate. You can't feel bad while drinking it. It's warm and comforting and reminiscent of holidays, family togetherness & traditions.

We finished up with breakfast just in time for conference to begin. Conference is kind of like hot chocolate; you can't feel bad while watching it. It's full of so much spiritual goodness & "warm-fuzzies" (I loved that part...too cute)!

I felt very full of the spirit this morning and so blessed to be with my family. I wish every morning could be so peaceful and full of love.

I suppose it can be, I just have to work harder to fill my life with some daily "hot chocolate".