A portrait

This is Allia's portrait of a family that lives down the street from us with six very sweet children, the two youngest of whom are girls Allia and Mariana's age. (the Machas for those who know them) I think it is great that she sees them as lots of smiling faces!

Craft time

I have been trying to include "crafts" in our weekly activities lately...I am not naturally a crafty person except perhaps in scrapbooking and making All Saints' costumes. However, I was inspired by Julia with this one, and we had tons of fun.





Unfortunately the only pics I have of them together are after I gave them paintbrushes, and they stripped their painted clothing off. So those photos are therefore unbloggable. It seems my girls prefer painting with brushes to finger paint...what sophisticated artists!

More fun pics

I think Mrs. Potato Head is missing something...hmmm


A sneak peek for All Saints' Day...trying on costumes for final adjustments


A penny for those thoughts

Life

is never boring with children...who needs a night out at the theater when you can have way more fun at home?!?


The Ascent


The Goal!

Fall fun

Guess which two are ours! :-) They are so proud of their scarecrows.

Under Allia's pillow

this morning I found something as I was changing the sheets (for the first time in several weeks! :-0 ) She had her little crucifix and guardian angel statue that usually reside on her dresser tucked neatly under her pillow. I had not even noticed they were missing amidst our crazy busy life lately. It seems she had decided several nights ago that they did her more good there than up on the dresser. She asked me if I slept with my guardian angel and Jesus under my pillow too. I told her no, that I was content to pray to them but I was glad she wanted them close! So sweet.

Wacky Wednesday

I am having a day to rival Blair's Manic Monday today!

I will spare you the minute by minute account, but here are a few highlights:
(All while trying to clean and cook for Austin's boss and wife who have no children yet and are coming to dinner tonight.)
-After mowing the back yard, hose off the children who ran and rode trikes through the abundance of wet grass clippings
-Clean tee tee accident and bathe child in the recently cleaned bathroom
-Clean stomped on goldfish off the clean kitchen floor
-Wipe up random blood spots off re-cleaned kitchen floor after child cut toe and failed to cry or let me know
-Kill red wasp (yikes!!!) who made it into the house mysteriously
-Clean mess up from children sampling chocolate dessert for tonight

I am sure there is more, but I still have to finish getting ready for the dinner, so I'll have to think on it and add more later!!!

-Husband just came home and caught me blogging instead of getting ready...oops! ;-)

Fun moments from our trip

The girls with their Lolo (Austin's grandfather)


Our newly baptized Godson...what a blessing. He is SO precious I was just dying to hold him, but we had to keep our distance because we all had colds. :-( My desire for he and his mommy not to end up in the hospital had to come before the overwhelming urge to hold and kiss him!!!


The girls shared a strawberry sundae (against my better judgement!) on the way home as a reward for good behavior at the baptism.


The girls had SO much fun playing with their cousins! Fun girl time!

Aside from the cold bug and thunderstorms all the way home, it really was a great trip...and possibly our last out of town venture before baby #3!

From our trip

Allia: (to Austin's grandmother, "Lala"): People who are good go to Heaven.

Lala: Yes, Allia.

Allia: I think you will go to Heaven because you are very, very good, Lala.

Lala: Oh, well I hope you don't see it when it happens.

On the road again

We will be leaving tomorrow morning for a baptism this weekend at which Austin and I gain another little Godson. We are so excited! May it be a blessed weekend for all! See you next week. :-)

One last time

We made our last journey of the year to the pool this afternoon with some neighborhood friends. It was the first time I have been with both girls by myself. We all had lots of fun. I would have taken pictures, but I wanted to focus my attention on keeping everyone safe! So until next summer we will be keeping dry, and next year we will have another little "swimmer" with us! How exciting!

Going to Heaven

Apparently our backyard has a secret...you can skip all that following the commandments stuff and just go straight to Heaven by swinging very high on this particular swing. Pretty great, however there is one catch. Eventually you do have to come back, eat dinner, take a bath and go to bed. But you can return the next day anytime you make it out into the backyard. It's really a pretty good deal!

Learning colors

I think Mariana has finally mastered two of her colors. She has consistently correctly identified blue and red the last few days. The rest are still a little shaky, but yay for her. I was thinking she should get the hang of it soon!

A late note...

from the wonderful feast of our Guardian Angels yesterday:

Allia: Mommy, we forgot to make our special angel craft today.

Mommy: (laying on the couch, ill with a stomach bug but trying to infuse the day with some of the joy of celebrating our angels.) Maybe we can do that when Daddy gets home, sweetheart.

Allia: Can we make real angels?

Mommy: (moan, grumble) No. Only God can make real angels just like only He can make people. He is the one who made baby sister in Mommy's tummy, remember?

Allia: (looking perplexed) Yes, I don't understand why he did that.

Mommy: What do you mean?

Allia: Well, I don't understand why he put her in there where there is no hole for her to get out.

Mommy: Oh, um, well, she will find her way out when it is time, sweetheart. Don't you worry about that.

Allia: (still looking a little perplexed) OK.

Mommy: (to self) Whew!