Tuesday, December 20, 2011

The Happenings in the Brown House

Well we haven't been doing much around here this month, except for the kids starting basketball and just the regular piano lessons and church activities. So here are a few pictures of the kids have been doing.

Carson started pre-school this year and so they had a little Christmas program and some kids were dressed as elves and some were dressed as santa and each child had a part that they said. Carson's part was "I can't wait to see Santa". They sang some Christmas songs and it was all very cute. As you can tell Carson was an elf.


Excuse the red eyes I fixed them but when I posted them onto my blog they came back and I don't know how to fix them now.






He didn't sing the songs at all, which isn't unusual for him, but he did say his part. I was going to post the video of him but I can't figure out how to post video's yet.






This picture is from our work party. It is just the one but that is all you need right. This year we decide to give our staff from the store a Christmas party so we went to the Old Spaghetti Factory and treated the staff to dinner and we had a white elephant exchange. It was alot of fun.


On the 16th we had our ward Christmas party. We had a great turn out and it was alot of fun. We had a little program where each auxiliary would come up and sing a Christmas song and then after that we had some of the primary kids do the nativity. Madison was asked to be Mary which she was so excited about and then another boy from her primary class was Joseph. They did a great job. After the nativity we had some great food.


Mary, Joseph, and the donkey, oh and baby Jesus.


Madison and Zach have started basketball and so this month they started having games. We have been lucky enough that the games are on the same day but to bad they are at different times. Zach's are always in the morning and then Madison's are always in the early afternoon. Anyway it has been great to see how the kids have progressed this year in basketball. This is Madison's second year and Zach's third year playing. Zach can finally shoot the basketball without shooting it through his legs and he can actually make baskets he was so thrilled when he realized he could. Madison is doing better is getting more aggressive in her playing. So now that I have said all that when we take Carson with us he gets kind of bored and Larry and I like to cheer the kids on and watch them so when we go to the basketball games we bring the ds for Carson to play. I usually don't like to use the ds as a babysitter but at the games it makes it so much more enjoyable and he is happy during that time. It is after the game when I tell him he needs to turn it off.


Madison getting ready to play






On the 18th we went to Larry's mom's house and did Christmas with them. The kids had a good time and got some good stuff. Madison got a lava lamp which she wanted, Zach got Connect Four launchers game which he was thrilled about and then Carson got a race track and some cars which he loved as well. We had a great time with Larry's parents.


Carson opened his race track and was so excited.



Larry's mom helping the kids.







Madison's lava lamp


Wednesday, November 2, 2011

ELEVEN

On November 2nd it was Madison's birthday, she turned 11. I can not believe that she is 11. I sometimes can't believe that I have an 11 year old. This year for Madison's birthday we didn't really do much, I decided a couple of years ago that the kids didn't need big birthday partys every year, it just gets to expensive so this year for Madison's birthday we didn't have a birthday party for her, we just had a family birthday with her favorite dinner and cake and ice cream and fortunately this year she wanted an ice cream cake so it was all together. It was a nice little birthday and Madison really enjoyed it which is what I try to make sure that my kids like their birthdays and Madison said she did.

Well what do you get an eleven year old girl, that is a good question and I am even her mother and I didn't know what to get her. She is getting to that point where she doesn't really play with dolls that much but she still ask for them and I am reluctant to get them because I know she will grow out of them very soon, but I did find some things for her. I tried to convince Larry to get her a cell phone because as she is getting older and I think that it would come in handy when she is at a friends house or when she is at home with the boys when Larry and I go for our walks but he said no and that is fine maybe I am trying to rush it with her.


Madison is so great, she is sweet and caring and is such a big help to me, sometimes I have to make sure that I am not asking to much of her. She is growing up way to fast and I am not sure that I like that. She is already asking me how old she has to be to babysit other peoples kids and I told her 12. Soon she is going to be in Young Womens and I don't know if I am ready for her be that old yet. Madison is such a great big sister and we love having her in our family. The boys tell her all the "Madison I love you" and I love to hear that and I am glad that she responds back to by telling them the same thing. I hope that it doen't change.


Happy Birthday Madison


Before school

Birthday cake
She really wanted the Harry potter dsi game and so I got her the lego harry potter and then I realized that there was an actualy Harry Potter game not in lego style. Oh well she liked it anyway.

She wanted squinkies, I don't know what you do with them but she got them.
And this doll, it is a Monster High doll.



Oh and by the way for dinner we had Pyrogi's with sausage and onions and then on Saturday her and I are going to go out and going shopping. Oh and on a side note when Madison got home from school she looked in her room and looked around the house she "mom where is my surprise", I thought to myself "what surprise", I kept on thinking and even Zach got in on it and was asking about her surprise, I responded back to her "I don't know what you are talking about what surprise", she said that every year she had had some kind of surprise for her birthday. Well I think she thinks that because it was easier to buy her presents in the past and so she had some big presents that couldn't be wrapped, like her doll house and her desk, and so when she got home from school it was there in he room waiting for her and she was surprised. So after that I felt kind of bad but explained to her that she can't always get a surprise on her birthday. I think that I have created a monster with the birthday's. Oh well next year I will have to make sure that she has a surprise.

Monday, October 31, 2011

October

So here I am once again posting a bunch of pictures because I didn't post right away, but oh well. I tried the whole month of October to get into the halloween spirit but for some reason I was just dreading it. I never usually feel that way but this year I was, maybe I need to get halloween decorations, maybe that might help. We were just busy in October I felt like. We didn't get a chance to go to the pumpkin patch like we usually do but that is o.k. I really only like to go to the pumpkin patch to get the pictures not the pumpkins, we can get pumpkins at our store. Anyway I had gotten all the kids Halloween costumes early this year and I even thought that I would dress up as well but I couldn't find a costume that I wanted to dress up as. I always know what I want to do after halloween. So we were just busy, Larry had a meeting for work that he had to go to and then him and I went to California because Larry had to speak at a Grocery Outlet School for aspiring operators, so we went there for a couple of days. He only had to speak the one day but we took the opportunity to stay with our friends in Livermore for a couple of days and we saw some other Grocery Outlets there. Then in that same week we had parent teacher confrences. It really wasn't that busy now that I have written it down but I just felt busy. We had a good month of October though and the kids were happy and that is what is important right!


The kids had gotten up for school one day and I felt really happy about it being a Halloween month I had to take these next pictures. I thought when I looked out the window, "who needs fake decorations when you have the real thing". This was about the only decoration we had besides the pumpkins we carved.


Carson's pre-school class went on a field trip to the pumpking patch though and it was a new one for me and it was a very cool farm. It was call "The Farm". They had animals and then the pumpkin patch that they took you to in a wagon with hay and then they had slides, it was a great farm.

Carson when we first got there wasn't really into doing anything as you can tell by the picture below. He eventually got into the whole thing once he got comfortable.

Oh there he is.

The is the hay maze. It was very cool and it led you up into the barn where there was a slide that the kids could go on and they loved it. I didn't get any pictures of the slide because the lighting wasn't that could and I couldn't get a good picture even with my flash. I think I need a better camera. :) Ya right.They had a tractor you could sit on as well.




After we looked at the animals and sat on the tractor they took us out to the pumpkin patch and we got to pick out a pumpkin.


Carson found his.

Carson wanted the green one but I said no.

The next thing is that we have a new addition to our family. We had to get rid of one thing but got something new in place of it.

Larry got himself a new truck. He LOVES it. I have to admit I really like it too. It is a little bit bigger then his other one but he likes it and we were kind of looking to get something a little bit bigger and a little bit roomier for the kids in the back because in his other truck Madison's knees were squished and in the new one she has a ton of room and Carson can't get his feet on the back of the seat. It was something that we have been looking at doing for a while because our accountant said that we needed to buy something for the store so we won't have to pay to the IRS next year so that is really why we got it. We wouldn't have gotten it other wise because his other truck was payed off.


It is a new color for him.



Well I finally did it, I finally decided that I was going to paint the basement bedroom. My dad comes and stays with us alot and he doesn't mind the bedroom the way it was but Larry's cousin was coming and even though she was just staying the night I didn't want her to stay in that room downstair. I feel really bad for having other people stay in it now that I have painted it and it looks better, but I am not a decorator and I really don't like painting. Luckily Larry said that he would help me. I discussed my idea's with my friend Aunna because she has helped me in the past with rooms and she is good a decorating, and so she helped me by saying "ya I think that will look great". So when Larry got home from his business trip he helped me paint the room. I feel really bad because he actually did alot of it because I had to take missy to the vet in the morning and then we got painting I realized that one gallon wasn't going to be enough so I had to go and get another gallon, so thank you so much to my wonderful husband who helped me with this.

This is the room before. I had actually started putting painting stuff in the room so I didn't get an actual picture of the room before but it really is much different.


Before.



After, with the curtains closed. Those curtains were actually the curtains that I had up in the kitchen where our new door is going out onto the deck.

We got new lamps and some more pictures. We just need to put some shelves in the closet now in the room and we need to put a bathroom down there as well. All in due time right. We are actually going to switch chairs eventually and put a different and nicer chair in the room as well.









That same weekend that Larry's cousin came we went to Larry's mom's house to visit. Madison loves it there because she gets to go to the bard with Tom and help with the horses. Of course it was raining that day so we weren't sure if we were going to be able to let Madison ride the horse but we hoped for a clearing or just for the rain to stop just for a little bit.

Carson out in the rain



Hmm is it ever going to stop.Oh it stopped for a littel bit we had the opportunity to get one of the horses and start brushing her and getting ready to put the saddle on her.


Madison getting excited to ride.





Here she is. She loves to go horseback riding.



She even let Zach take a turn. We were surprised that Zach even wanted to get on and he did and he loved it too.





Madison waiting her turn.



Carson just waiting.

Madison got on again.

Larry's mom surprised Madison with cake and some gifts because she wasn't going to be able to make it for Madison's birthday and since all the other family was there she had a little mini party. It was so nice if Larry's mom to do that.



The Saturday before Halloween we carved our pumpkins and we found a costumes for Missy, she was our batman because Carson was Robin and we needed a batman, so we got one of Carson's old pj's and put it on her and there we had a batman costume. She was a good sport about it and very tolerable.

Carson looking into the pumpkin.

Larry got out his power tool this year to make it easier for carving. Why we didn't think of this before I don't know, it was so much easier.

Carson not really like the guts in the pumpkin.

Zach and his pumpkinCarson and his pumpkin.





We went to the ward trunk or treat and this is the only picture I got of kids in there costumes plus my nieces.

Carson, the only picture I could get of him.

Kenzie in her cupcake costume

On Halloween we went over to our Friends house and had a little Hallowee party with another family. It was fun, we had soup and the kids entertained themselves and then they got to decorate cookies and make mud and worms. The kids had a great time and so did we. After we ate and the kids had some fun we went trick or treating. I didn't get any good pictures of that because for one the kids were fast and then another was because Carson wasn't cooperating and so I had to take him back to the house and sit with him




We had a good October and are looking forward to the next couple of months with the holidays.