Snow??

Yep. First snow of the year. Got more than an inch too. We're just above 5,000 feet. When I got to work (4400+ feet) there was no snow at all in town. Very pretty at home, but the green will be fading from our yard. Our apple tree was such a bright brilliant shade of yellow this year. The prettiest I can remember seeing it, maybe because it is just getting so tall and it didn't have apples this year (seems to fruit every other) to suck its energy.

The kids and I drove to Camino, (California) yesterday to pick up apples from Apple Hill. We usually get 7-9 bushels, but not as many fit in the trunk of the Inifiti as does the old Camry (and we have the Mega Warrior Basket on th roof rack on the Camry). I also felt safer driving out of Reno in the Infiniti with the kiddos in it, it has less miles. So we came home with 4 bushels. It was as productive as I had hoped. We did have a lot of fun, but the apple selection this year was picked over and fairly poor. We had hoped to bring a box of Pink Lady apples back for Grammy Cher because they are her favorite, but we honestly could not find enough to make a pretty box. The Pink Lady apples were bruised, cut, shriveled and had a lot of growths (frost bites I think they said). And the kids and I made many, many stops to try to find them. We even hoped to cheat and left the orchards and went to the Safeway in town! But guess what? No Pink Lady apples. I did ask and they suggested that the crop wasn't good enough to sell to stores, but okay enough to sell to folks willing to come and get them.

Oh well, it was fun though. We always have to stop at Kids, Inc. to get a walkin' pie! We have to, whether or not anyone else in the car wants one - I DO! I love those personal pies that are big enough for two, and even better ala mode, but I can't seem to make 'em like theirs. I am going to figure it out. I guess I do know how, I have watched them in their kitchen, but my chopped apples inside never turn out as tender as theirs. I'll see if I can find a picture from a previous year for you. I can't find one from the Apple Hill website, which is linked here for you to check out. Darn, I found a picture in my stash from last year, but blogger isn't letting me post any pictures tonight. I'll add it to my list of pics to add... Anyway, the walkin' pie is made with very finely chopped apples without their peel and then smooshed tightly into a large ball, wrapped in a flaky pie crust and baked. It stays round and when you order it, they use a ladle to smoosh the top open and add some of their apple pie syrup and/or ice cream. It's sooooo good. I don't have to eat anything else all day :0)

DH had lot of studying to do for a test in his class tomorrow afternoon. He hung out at home to get work done. This also left us with more room in the car as I was able to stash Sister's stroller in the front seat and leave more room for apple boxes in the trunk :0) But we missed him!

Okay, have to gather kiddos and see what we need to get finished for the evening. I also have bushels of apples waiting for me to process to make apple sauce, apple gook (kiddo word for apple juice), dried apples, and whatnot. How about apple pie, apple fritters, apple turnovers, apple cake, apple muffins, apple pancakes, apple waffles, apple tea... Do I sound like Bubba Gump?

October in a blink

Seems like I'm posting about once a month now. Hmmm.... maybe I'll try to squeeze one more in this week, just to do something different. Haha!

I'm going to post some pictures from last month, try to catch up a bit, though I have pictures from August to post sometime.

On September 16th, E learned to roll over on her belly. She rolled over and pulled her head up right away. She was so proud of herself, and must've rolled over hundreds of times and loved for us to put her on her back so she could quite flip over. Here she is, so proud, our little smiley girl! Was so funny to watch as she kicked her little legs so hard, she does that when she's very happy and excited.
A little more about E. I also tried her out on cereal last month. She wasn't too excited at first, and then decided it was pretty good after all. She hasn't been eating much cereal though lately, she hasn't gotten past the tongue pushing everything out yet. So a little early to worry about having to have solids. I love this funny face!


J joined boy scouts! And here he is. He sold over $1,000 worth of popcorn, and had a great time doing so. He was quite the little door-to-door salesman and we walked and rode our bikes all over the neighborhood selling popcorn and emailing relatives. He learned a lot about how to sell and how to talk to people. Here's a quick pic of him ready to head out the door to sell popcorn.
Here he is at a local Wal-Mart selling with other boys too:


L also enjoys going to the scout meeting. They call younger siblings "Little Buddy" and he is able to join in on their activities most of the time. Here he is making a bird feeder with a pinecone, peanut butter and bird seed.


Have a good week, and hopefully you'll hear from me again before the week is over!!

Last day of September!!

Wow, my life is passing before my eyes! How did it get to be the end of September?? We've done so much, and yet, seems like yesterday that Sister was born. I figured that I couldn't let September go by without posting anything, so I'm trying to get kids in bed and spend a few brief moments here...

What happened this month?

1. J turned 8 on 9/4
2. Our family had the flu the week and weekend of J's b-day
3. We saw the Great Reno Hot Air Balloon Races on 9/11
4. My little/big brother had a bday on 9/14 (won't give his age, it'll make ME look old!!)
5. My brother and sister-in-law shared their 4 yr wedding anniversary on 9/24
6. J joined boy scouts and is a Bear Scout
7. L became a Little Buddy in Boy Scouts
8. Little Sister learned to roll over from back to belly and sitting up on arms this last week. If I 9. have counted correctly, she is 18 wks
10. Little Sister also went from the sling to sitting in a baby seat in the Chariot bike trailer
11. School started for J and L (homeschool)
12. DH taking a psych class at UNR
13. We are down to 5 chicks after the skunk make a return visit
14. J is selling popcorn popcorn for scouts and he has to sell $475!! Or we have to come up with the rest!! WANT TO BUY SOME? PLEASE??
15. 9/25 All 34 kiddos and I volunteered for the river clean up in Reno. With Sister in the Backpack carrier, we cleaned up trash, pulled weeds and had fun!
16. Sister is teething and chewing on EVERYTHING, including her feet
17. I've messed up my low back again and can't sleep for the pain. Have a chiro appt with the miracle lady, Dr Dublin on Monday, late afternoon/evening.
18. Adding 18 just because I know I'm forgetting something. It's been busy, eh?

How about you? Staying busy, too?

iron-on crayons

I have soooooo much bloggin' to catch up on. But here's a bit from our day today. After work the boys and their friend, A, made their own iron-ons to put on t-shirts. They had a blast!! A was so proud of herself that I thought she might pop. She ran across the street 3 times to show her dad her t-shirt. Aren't they a cute bunch? A has Hello Kitty, J has a flying dragon, L has Spongebob and his pet snail Gary.

My mom gave me several boxes of these crayons a few years ago and we still pull them out and use them (thank you, Mom!). This is the first time A has tried them and she said she would go home and dream all night about her next design. The kids drew/traced their pictures and colored them with the special crayons and then we simply ironed them onto their shirts. Very easy. Very proud little creators.

Hello!

Hey there!

We disappeared for a while, huh? DH decided that we were able to swing a quick trip back to visit my family in Oklahoma and Missouri. It was totally spur of the moment. DH decided it on Thursday the 5th and we packed up that night and left. Always easier to start out a trip at dark when the kids sleep and we can put many miles behind us before they start asking "when will we be there?" We had a wonderful time visiting and introducing Little Sister. I wish we could have stayed much longer, but I started back to work yesterday. We drove back there, a bit under 2,000 miles each way. The kids were good in the car, and little E is quite the traveling baby. She was great and loved sitting in the middle with her two brothers on each side. She smiled and cooed and laughed and slept. J continued reading on his "Unfortunate Events" series and L chatted and played with dinosaurs and cars. We made many stops along the way there and back to stretch our legs, eat (no eating in the car!! doing our best to keep it clean), and let the boys run. My favorite state to drive through is Utah. I absolutely love rocks and Utah has a lot of them!! I love to see the buttes and wind and water swept dry canyons. Just beautiful! The pictures above are of the boys at a stop along an exit from the highway in UT. They needed that run! I'll have more to post about our trip, but wanted to say hello before going to bed tonight.

I have many more pictures to share too.

I returned to work yesterday. It went well, and it was really great to see all my friends and co-workers. I had trouble remembering passwords, I have a bunch in my job doing payroll and reports. The trouble was that many changed just before my leave and I couldn't remember what I changed them to. And several cannot be the same as another, so again, I have a lot to remember. I was able to get them reset or remembered and the day went by pretty well. I did miss my family, but I emailed pictures to my work email to put on my computer so I could see my kiddos throughout the day. DH was home with the kiddos for the first time by himself. He took them all to church too! He said it all went great. Sister was a bit fussy and I think she missed me :0)

Long time no chat! Sorry about that, has been really busy around here. Just before we left for camping, I made an enclosure for our chicks and mama hen. We didn't leave until the next day after we had planned. Too afraid that the skunk would return for another chicken dinner, so we stayed home an extra day to build the enclosure. It's not pretty, but it's sturdy with a double leayer that little skunk hands cannot reach through. DH made an extra sturdy plywood top and an extra heavy door. So far, we still have all 8 remaining chickies and a happy mama hen!

Here are a few of my favorite pictures from our trip. I'll post more, but this is a start. We drove up to Seattle to see DH's sister. Hi, Kelsie! She recently moved back up there has a great place. We also visited REI up there, I HAD to! It's a two-story HUGE REI store. We all loved it. They have a great restaurant where we ate Thai, there's a climbing rock in a separate building area, and you can see that the boys loved that! J was just awesome, in the literal meaning of the word, not just slang. When I asked how far he thought he might try to climb, he told me he would go to the top. And that he did and rang the bell. Shocked the belayer below, the guy that helped him into his climbing harness and holds the ropes. The rock is 65 feet high... that's like 6 and a half stories tall!! It was so tall that I could not get the whole thing in a picture! He scurried up so fast that it was hard to get a picture of him. My sweet little L climbed too, but only a little ways up, and I was proud of him too for giving it a try.



Below is a picture along the Oregon coast. Was so pretty! Little E was a good baby as usual on the trip and slept well in the the tent. We saw a lot of beautiful ocean and mountains. DH fixed our dinner and breakfast on the cobb grill, gotta love that thing!



Talk more later. Sending you hugs. Have a good night from the 5 of us

Church, book group, and tadpoles

Hi there!

We went to church on Sunday. During the summer, they do not offer Children's Church (Sunday School), so we don't always go. Too many families traveling during the summer and not enough kids to make a class at each level. The boys were good though, they listened to the sermon and colored in their books that the church provides for the kids that attend in the summer and sit with their parents. Little E wore a dress that my mom sent, and she was a living doll. Yes, I am a proud mama. All 3 kiddos were so good and didn't cause trouble or make noise. Wow, wish it were like that all the time!!

The boys' tadpoles are growing legs. Picked up $5 critter container thingy at Wal-Mart and added a plastic plant and rocks. Looks better than the big glass flower vase they were in!

J had book club again today. They discussed books 5-8. Had a blast. L played with the toys that were there. He and I also played dominoes and Connect Four while Sister slept and J and other kids discussed their books. Haven't played Connect Four in a billion years! L didn't quite understand that he was to keep me from getting 4 in a row, but he had a great time getting 4 across and up-n-down.

We are down to 8 chicks... Decided that a skunk was climbing the chain link dog kennel and stole 3. *insert big frustrated sad sigh here* The spotted skunk is known for climbing chain link, stealing eggs and chicks. The smell was strong last night. Locked up chicks and mama hen in a way that we hope they can't be stolen.

We are going camping, leaving soon. I'll post pictures over the weekend.