Halloween 2012

 Before Halloween we had crazy hair day--here are the girls with their crazy hair.  The girls enjoy dieing their hair.  It was this color or a faded version until March!  And we bleached, died, bleach, and re-died their hair to get it back to it's natural blonde.  Kaylyn's didn't last very long. :)

 Kolten made such a cute pooh bear.  He is just rolly polly enough that he looks great!!  But he did not like his costume.  So you will see we let him be Monster Mike on actual Halloween.

 Here is Garth.  Mom made his costume after his favorite power ranger.  We then attended her ward party.  It was a lot of fun.  Trunk or treat.  Chilli feed.  And walk across the stage show off.  They even had a best costume contest.

 Here is my tigger and my butterflies or pixie for the party.  I have to laugh--here is Kylee crossing the stage.  And this is classic Kylee!!  She is our little movie star.

 We spent one afternoon with  my dad.  And here is the jack-o-lantern that the girls made!!  I love all the eyes.  I didn't take my camera up there.  But we made cookies.  We painted and carved pumpkins.  We enjoyed being together.

 I went as Thing 2 for actual Halloween.  But Thing 1, my sweetheart, decided to stay home and get some extra sleep.

 But he helped me get our Mike into the car.  Kolten seemed to like this costume a lot better.

 Kylee--our diva--could not wear the same costume twice in the same season.  What were we thinking?  So she went as little red riding hood.  We went with Aunt Dot and her foster kids to safe street.  We enjoyed the bouncy houses and the trick or treating.  We then ran over to my ward's trunk or treat.  It was fun to see everyone.  When we got home--there was a lot of trick or treaters.  So we went Trick or treating for 4 whole blocks.  The girls had a blast.  Kolten was such a trooper too.

Pumpkin patch

In October, it was so fun to watch this sweet boy smile.  He really does have a very sweet temperment.  And for the most part, he is a very happy boy.  I am one lucky momma.

He is also wearing his superman shirt because I was a Mann before I became a Nef.

 In October, Aunt Dot invited us to join her ward's homeschooling group to go to the pumpkin patch.  It was a lot of fun.  Here is the pumpkin that Kaylyn picked out.  She also got to ride in a cute little train pulled by a four wheeler.  And then we got to go to the petting zoo.

We also got a fresh made pumpkin doughnut.  Yummy.  There was a fun slide and a tree house.  We then picked out several pumpkins for making into jack-o-lanters and then later into canned pumpkin.  It was fun because I got to go with Dot's foster daughter--and my new best friend.  The babies came too.  Because it was cold they stayed bundled close to mom or grandma.  We even were able to all car pool out together in my new big car!! 

Every day life summer of 2012

On our way to the Nef family reunion, we drove through this fire.  I am grateful it wasn't worse and we didn't get stopped.  I pray no one was hurt.  It looked like all that was lost was crops--we felt bad for that poor farmer though.

 We are in the era of losing teeth.  This is Kylee's first lost tooth!!  She was excited to finally be like her sister.  Karla has lost several.

 We have a picture of Grandpa Nef on his tractor.  This is the cook version.  This is Grandpa Cook picking corn. 

 I couldn't go out and help with corn.  It was around the time that Kolten was born.  But Todd and the girls went out and canned some corn.  We actually freeze it.  And we found out that we love the pint sized bags better than bigger bags.  We don't waste as much that way.  But Grandpa thought we were silly.

The girls are finally big enough to be big helps.  And they are good helpers.  Here is Kylee with Grandma Cook.  We are canning out in there porch.  We enjoy putting up food with Grandma and Grandpa.  We feel so blessed that they are willing to share their food they can glean living out there in farm land.

Silverwood trip

 Last year, Karla and Kylee's school offered a reading challange: the reward were tickets to silverwood.  The girls worked really hard without being prompted.  And they not only met the challange but more than doubled the minutes required.  They worked so hard.
With Todd just out of school and the baby being born, we weren't sure we could do it.  And yet, they had worked so hard.  So we talked about what other expenses we would have with the trip. 

 And the girls went to work to help us get to Silverwood.  When they found penny's or coins they put it in our silverwood jar.  They probably got us a tank of gas in coins.  We would often talk about it too.  They would ask to go out to eat or get a new toy.  We would ask them "do you want to get xyz or do you want to put the money in our Silverwood jar?" They would often choose Silverwood.  They were so proud of the fact that they helped us go on our vacation.

 Grandma Julie and Uncle Garth came with us.  Originally I was going to just send Todd and the girls.  But we all went up for the day.  It was a lot of fun.  Grandma even gave Todd and I a chance to ride two of the bigger rides together.  I had never gone on the ride that takes you so high up and then drops you.  But Todd gave me courage and we rode that together.  He was tickled pink to take me on it for the first time ever.  I was wondering for the first half of the drop if I had made a huge mistake, but we both survived to tell the story.

 Kylee really wanted to go to the water park.  And we were headed that direction, but we got distracted by Karla's ride--which took way to long.  The water park closed before we made it there.  Kylee was really sad.  So this year for her birthday--we are planning on going back and going to the water park first!!  We might not do much more than the waterpark this time around, but that will be fun too....except this year I might need to stay home.  We will see.

 Mom even had a phone interview while we were up there.  I think we all had a great time.

It's been a while

Life has been crazy.  We have moved to Richland.  We were in the process of trying to buy a house, and in the last minute, it fell through over stupid stuff.  Thankfully it wasn't our stupid stuff, but the house's stupid stuff.  We were sad.  And everyone once in a while I think we almost had . . . .  But we found a nice A house in Richland.  We are loving having a yard again.  I very much enjoy having a washer and dryer here at the house--even if we are on our 3rd set since moving in.  That's what I get for buying craigslist, but it's been good to us for the last few houses we've been in.  We are not cut out to live in apartments anymore!!  And it seems like we moved into the ward we need to be in for now.  We have felt home here a lot quicker than most places we've moved.  And for that, we are very grateful.  Even if occassionally we miss good friends in other wards.
One week after moving, we had Kolten.  I have posted some about him.  I am hoping to catch up soon.  I know I have needed to be better about journal.  Guess what--here is where I journal.  Blogger for a while wouldn't let me add anymore pictures--and that through off my grove.  But they are letting me now--so here we go again.  Right now, he is 10 months old.  He is big compared to my girls.  21 1/2 lbs.  I don't know what I am going to do as his little sibling grows bigger and bigger in my tummy.  Carrying him up and down the stairs winds me already!!
Have I mentioned, we got a surprise just after Valentines Day and we are expecting another little-- I hope--boy.  And so far, things are going better than feared with this pregnancy.
I am not working as a home care provider.  I am enjoying having my schedule freed up more.  And I am trying to keep a cleaner house and be a better mother than I feel I've been the last few years.  I still do papers--but only the Horn Rapids area now.  It's a good route.  I hate getting up every morning so early, but I appreciate the income, and it's a good route.  We still occassionally get calls from our other route. 
Todd is working for PCS as a driver.  He enjoys it.  He runs stuff, mostly car parts but sometimes other stuff too, to Lewiston, ID and several towns surrounding it like Clarkston, Cottonwood, and such.  Although it is good work, it is a 14 hour day 5 days a week.  He gets up at the same time I do.  And it is wearing on us.  The upside, we like the overtime pay.  He makes more in overtime than he does in straight time--and for now between the two we are making our bills.
God has been good to us. Kaylyn is becoming quite the big girl.  She is mostly potty trained.  And she loves to follow her sisters around, although she enjoys while they are at school too.  It sounds like she is up playing with her brother now.
Kolten is about to start walking soon.  He just got his first two teeth and have several others trying to come up.  He is sweet and happy.  It's nice for me that he is such a good baby.
Karla and Kylee have done chess club this year.  Todd enjoys playing with them.  It's a game Todd and I enjoyed as kids.  Although Todd and I have never played each other....hmmm.  It is amazing to watch as these girls grow and develop.  It's hard to believe how grown up they are.  Karla was just baptized, but I'll talk about that in my next post. 
For now, it's time to get back up and go back to work.  But next time I have to sit down and relax I hope to update some more.