A gift

The other day, I had my friend come over to hang out while I used my new router in the garage. TJ says that I'm not allowed to use it if I'm home alone, and so I had her come over in case something went awry and I were to severe a limb or something. Everything went fine, so she only had to babysit long enough for Madison to go potty... not too bad.



Anyway, this is what I was working on. I needed to put together a baby shower gift. Well, the truth is that I had done the rest of the gift all week long (here and there, I'm not that ambitious) and centered the whole thing around being stacked on something, but when it came to the last day, I surely couldn't leave it all stacked on an old paper doll book... so I really HAD to finish the base of the gift. I did. I was worried about it, but I actually think it looks rather nice.

I sprung for some transfer tape to place my vinyl... total life saver there! It made the project so much nicer looking, and a tad less crooked too.... interesting.

Anyway, I really hope she loved the gift, many people seemed to ooh and Aah over it, which always makes a person feel better about it. But I hope she truly loves it and will be able to use everything. Apparently it's like an obsession or passion of mine to put together gifts and make them look cool... I'm a total freak. Whatever.

Free stuff!

Well, for a price though! If you are interested to see how the weight-loss campaign is going, don't be too shy to check it out on my Skinny Hippo site! Progress is being made, slowly but surely. However, if you are interested in winning, say, some free movies or tunes, then check it out and see what you have to do to participate in the current weight-loss challenge!

I know you are all interested in a freebie, so go on, don't be too shy, give it a try... you just might lose a pound or two, and feel better becasue of it!

Red Boogers

What a sweet baby. Tristan is now 10 months old!
~She is crawling on all fours everywhere, not real fast though.
~She's been going up the stairs -time to get the baby gate out!
~She can pull up on anything.
~She even cruises a little bit.
~She LOVES to eat food. real food. She's been eating steamed veggies (at Benihana's with G&G), macaroni and cheese, and gold fish!
~Her new favorite toy is the stacking blocks. Her eyes lite up when I stack them all way high!

So the other day I heard her wail out a good scream, and I went to check on her. I found her standing along side the excersaucer, wailing. I grab her and notice that her nose is bleeding. and after she calmed down, I could clearly see she had scraped it, so it wasn't an impact bloody nose. The under side of the plastic saucer is pretty sharp, so I think she scraped it as she stood up.

Anyway, the next day: she has a bog ol' scab underneath her nose, and also on her left nostril. It looks like something is on her, and I always think I should pick it off, then remember what it is, and feel bad for her all over again!


**These pics were taken today at lunch, so to check out a few more from out awesome lunch, just go look in my photo album. The big girls were cheesin' it up with their Cheetos!

Mother/Daughter camp out

Well, it's official... yep, I'm officially crazy. Who in their right mind would take these two crazy girls on a camp out? I did. It started off horrific. After several extremem child break downs, we finally got all ready for bed, and into our tent. This was the last breakdown of the nite, before everyone finally went to sleep. Madison had had enough appparently.

And I snuck this pic in shortly after they were both asleep. After this I just decided to go to sleep myself, I was tired. Probably worn out from all the crying I had heard all evening.

Ah, the next morning, we were up and off to breakfast. Everyone seemed to have slept alright, except me... it was actually surprisingly chilly, (for where we are at, and how hot and humid it is) but I was still sweating. ANd then it was totally gross that I was cold and sweating? ick.

The cut breakfast short to go play on the tree branches. I don't blame them too much... Breakfast was Awesome...

But our day turned around when our friends rented a boat and so we got to take the kids out on it. I never heard another whine all day long. We carted the raft up to the top of the river, when the dam is at, and thought we would raft back down to where everyone was playing. It was a little trickier than that. The drive up was great, I drove while some good sports held the raft atop the vehicle. The coming down was a little ackward. There was a small spot of some class 1/2 rapids. The raft was barely wide enough to make it through. My girls were scared and freaking out. I lost my shoe and was chasing it down the river... we all made it through though, (and with two shoes!)

More rafting

At the end of our rafting excursion, we hung out and scored a sweet snack. the girls were digging into the mass quantities of Hershey bars left over from the nite before, and some root beers.

Brooklyne, looks so adorable with her chocolate covered face!

And here's the hoo-rah picture... the only one with me in it. (I'm not complaining.) It's a good thing that we ended on such a good note, because now I might actually do it again in the future. But had we not had a friend riding with us, we would have left the nite before.

Anyway, do moms with 3+ girls even take their kids on these kind of things? I'm just not sure I'm ready to take all 3 next year.... whew.

Family portrait

We finally have our FIRST family of 5 portrait. I know everyone's been waiting a long time to see this, but it's jsut SO hard to get to a place and get one done. And if we don't go somehere, then we don't have an extra set of hands to help. Madison helped us out with this one. What do you all think?

Alright, see, I knew you would jsut love our new family portrait! I think I'll get it enlarged and hung on the wall!
Alright, in case you don't think that will do for this year's Christmas cards (I don't see why not?) Maybe this one will. This was part of our little family photo shoot on Sunday when my folks were here. The only bummer is that we didn't get one of all 7 of us, oh well, I think we got jsut about every other combination!

Our family of five.

Labor Day with Grandma and Grandpa

When my parents come down, my dad always tries to go and do something cool with us. We don't really make it a point to get out and see the sight-seeing stuff, so it's a good opportunity for us. We've gone to the drive-through zoo, and the river walk, and a few other things. This time with it being so hot, my dad suggested that we do something "cool".... not as in interesting, as in not hot!

So, we decided to go to the local natural caverns, those should be cool enough, right?



Here's the whole gang (minus Gpa) just as we entered into the caves. Um, much to our surprise this "cool" fell under the first of being interesting, but still hot! I've been to Carlsbad before, it's like a nice 60-ish degrees underneath. Sure, these were only about 70 degrees, but with 99% humidity! We were all a bunch of sweat buckets! I swear the place jsut got stinkier the deeper we went!

We went down to a depth of 180 feet below the surface.

Madison totally hated it, she was scared to death of the place. I don't even know why, here she is accentuating her frowny face, since she didn't like it THAT much. She finally quite the whining when I told her we could play on the dinosaur when we were done.

Another seaty break! I think Tristan loved being carted around my back... I on the other hand did not LOVE it!

Caverns cont'd

Brooklyne... she at least wasn't scared of the caves, but she didn't think it was the coolest thing ever.... oh well.

Yeah, those are two sweet little girls were are ever so happy to have submerged into fresh air again!

ANd here's the awesome dinosaur... not much to really play on, whatever. Oh yeah, jsut for your viewing enjoyment, I chose the one that had me goofily waving in it, cool, huh?

Sunday with G & G

After getting ready for church we had time to spare, so we took some pictures. It's so hard to remember to take pictures when my mom comes, but I didn't want to miss it this time! So, above is TJ and I. I think we look pretty good, except I swear the kid doesn't know how to smile!

Mom and I once more. Notice that fancy watch I'm sporting? Yeah, Grandma and Grandpa and I did a little shopping while the girls were at a birthday party and I picked that beauty up, for not a bad price either. I'm in love with it. I've wanted a watch like that for a long time. It's like a bangle bracelt or whatever, where it cracks in half to go on and off. Love it!

Grandma and Grandpa and all their Zufelt grandchildren.

And a sneaky one of just me and Tristan. She sure is a pretty sweet baby. Spoiled as all get out, but still sweet!

See...

See, I told you he doesn't smile!!

Saturday with G & G

Ah, it was a beautiful (and humid) Saturday, we spent the bulk of it, mowing, trimming and tidying the back yard for a party. When the work was done, and it was time to play, Gma hooked the girls up with a little bit of water and their spong bombs to play with.

Swimming in that little bucket just wasn't going to cut it, so Gpa widdled a wooden cork for our boat and we filled it up with water to have some real summer fun!

Uh, this is Madison... she's funny.

And here's the real star of the day.... no, not TJ... the meat!! It's a true passion of his, so now we have real documentation that he does it! Dinner was awesome by the way!

The list never got finished

Yep, it's true.... I never completed my list, or atleast not before my mom got here. But all is well in the end. I mean, who needs clean clothes anyway? I swear the whole thing is over-rated anyhow. I had so much fun with my mom being here, I'll fill details in later, tonite I'm tired. Probably tired from my double airport run during rush hour today. Oddly enough, the first time freeway traffic wasn't bad, but airport traffic was horrendous. On the second run it was exactly opposite; airport was a ghost-town, and the freeway was a parking lot. Oh well, I got home with time to spare the grab my lesson and head to Young Women's mutual!

I love getting to have my mom come down, I have an extra hand to help with everything, I also have a friend to not just listen to my rants, but craft with me WHILE I rant. The day that TJ picks up a needle and thread to listen to my woes....!

I'll add the rest of the pictures on later, and only this one for now. I had to have a picture of mom and I together, to atleast remember that she came to visit.