My score as a 1930's Wife

71 As a 1930s wife, I am Superior Take the test!

Honestly, I don't believe it. I absolutely thought I'd have a score of about 30! haha.

Happy Halloween everybody... pictures coming sometime this weekend...

Gas is now $1.95, and the weather today is 70 degrees! THEE BEST HALLOWEEN EVER! No need for winter coats! And I actually convinced Josh to dress up, so look forward to that Cindy!

MiLeStOneS!

Conrad went pee in the potty! Twice so far, today.

And Amelia sat up! I took a picture... so I will post it soon.

Hurray for my kids!

Pumpkins and Gasoline

Tonight we went to the Riverside Trunk or Treat and took a few pictures. You all have to agree that Amelia is the most delicious banana you've ever seen.

And Conrad loved taking the candy from the trunkers (actually he was a bit apprehensive, but slowly he warmed up to people and finally said the magical phrase he'll say many more times in the future, "trick or treat!"

Josh looks dang hot, Conrad is a cheeky monkey it and Amelia is just delicious!

Last night we had our neighbors over to carve pumpkins, eat donuts and drink cider (which was actually not all I hoped it would be). How do you serve Cider? hot or cold?

Here is Anthony:

And here is Victor and Beatrice:

And here is the birthday boy, Nathan!

Right before they came over I realized it was little Nathan's 3rd birthday, and I felt awful for taking them away from their house to celebrate, but I was SO honored that they agreed to come over and carve pumpkins on HIS birthday! Carving pumpkins was a new experience for them, so I'm sure they felt awkward about the whole experience. They are thee kindest people you have ever met. It was so enjoyable to hang out with them, they have the sweetest dispositions. And Beatrice really wants to trade my Amelia with her Nathan. I'm sure Amelia wouldn't mind, Amelia sure loves Beatrice! Sorry to disappoint you Beatrice, but I think I'll keep Amelia!

Josh thought it would be cool to carve McCain and Palin's faces. I agreed to carve Sarah Palin, and he was going to do McCain. However, in the end, Josh ended up carving Palin's face for me. I was kind of busy being hostess... and I don't really have the patience to do something that elaborate! So, these are the pumpkins Josh carved.

Here are all 3 pumpkins. Conrad is in front of the bottom pumpkin (although you can't see him) so the traditional jack-o-lantern is the one that Josh carved to represent Conrad's.

This is the good ole local QT (Quick Trip) gas station. "one ninety nine, are you out of your mind?!?"

Freaking awesome. This is proof that Missouri is where it's at. All y'all Utahn's need to move out here!

Happy Birthday Kim!

I hope you get lots of presents...

I hope someone takes YOUR picture...
I hope you have a restful nap...

And I hope it's a Happy one!!!

Thanks for being a swell brother! Happy big 27!

Lengthy Question to all you native KC folk

I am looking for ideas for free fun things to do this week as it is right before Halloween. Are there any free (or even discounted) pumpkin patch places around here that are fun and family-friendly for even a 2 year old? Or other fun Halloween-related festivitals?
I am awful at figuring out good places to go... they always end up being closed or we can't find it.

I want to start some fun traditions, so please bring on the suggestions!

Happy Birthday Brielle, and another item...

Happy Birthday Brielle! We are so happy your parents made it through the first year! We miss you and can't wait to see you at Christmas!

Conrad got this potty today. We're just opening Conrad up to the idea. We shall see...

Nothing like a quiet rainy day

Today it is raining. So we haven't done much but enjoy the sound of rain outside and played inside.

These were some sites to be seen inside our house today:

My package came in the mail... check out my new necklace(s)! It was an impulse, but I justified it by buying the CTR one. I don't have a CTR ring, so why not a necklace?!? That way more people will see it and ask what it stands for and then I can open up a conversation about it!
Thanks Em. You always have cool things on your blog. I am thrilled about these necklace pendants from Homestudio on etsy.

This picture is from the other day, but it is a common site around these parts lately. Conrad has his fingers in his mouth a lot lately... those darn molars are creeping up again (after making their trial run 5 weeks ago). He is very into telling me "uh-uh!!" (for "no")--- sooo annoying. And he also put on Josh's shoes after Josh was gone for school. He was walking around and he walked out of the room and said, "see ya laterr mom. I goin-a school." It was cute, I laughed and grabbed the camera.

Today's journal

Simple post. I didn't take a camera because it would have been tacky.



Josh is now studying human development. So today for "lab" students were asked to bring in their children (if they had any ages 0-5) so they could practice doing Physical Examinations (PE's) on them. So we woke the kids up early and left for Josh's school at 7:44 am. 4 minutes late.

It was a great experience for Conrad, mostly. And just fine for Amelia~she thrived in all the attention. Until it was naptime, then she simply fell asleep in my arms and slept for one of the hours. Basically, though each hour they had a different lab group come in and do the PE's on our kids.

The first hour for Conrad was awful. If you have ever met Conrad you know how he is with new faces. Captain Hide-indadschest. Or Captain Hide-inmomsarms. Or Captain painfullyshytothepointoftears. Yes, he cried over someone listening to his heart and lungs. And he resisted all futile attempts to have his ears and nose and mouth checked. Just forget it. Josh was amazed at how awful he was. I told him, "this is payback for all the Dr appointments you have never been to!" (side note: Conrad doesn't have to have another routine check-up or SHOT until he goes to Kindergarten!!!! yipeee!)

The second hour went much better. We warned the student. The student made friends with Conrad and his tractor, and Conrad allowed student to do the PE. Conrad even stepped on the weight scale!!!! That is major progress for him! According to Conrad's weight he has gained about 4 pounds since his 2 year check-up (one month ago!) I am not sure how accurate the Dr's office weight measurement was, though, because... well, he was writhing in pain because he did NOT want the nurse to put him on the scale. I was glad to hear that though. And Amelia is already 15 1/2 pounds according to a weight check with Daddy. They are growing growing growing. The third and fourth hour went along much more smoothly, too. So I am just thankful my kids are strong and healthy and well. And they are even happy, too! Isn't that what makes life good? Oh how I love being a mother.

Oh my!

is what you all are saying right now! Conrad really wanted to wear Amelia's clothes, and I was happy to oblige to keep him happy while I made dinner and while Josh was away... This is what we got!

Amelia was tagged, too!

Amelia was tagged by her cousin Sophie. Amelia has only been around for .... 5 months, today! SO, with Amelia practically a newborn still there are not too many exciting things to talk about like joining the WNBA or what kind of things she collects or what kind of style she has. I will be as creative as I can be!

1. Amelia Jane is named after her paternal great-great-Grandma Vada Amelia and her maternal grandma Jane. Below is Vada as a young woman, and the other picture is my mom at Josh's graduation from Weber State University. My mom really just wanted to have a picture of the lady dressed all in purple.

2. Amelia gets really excited just to see a face in front of her. Here is her face right when I went in to get her from her nap.

3. Amelia gets mugged on a lot by her brother.

4. Amelia really likes to sleep in this position.

5. Amelia has lost some hair since she was born. On the left is her head 1 month after she was born, on the right is her more recently.

I tag:

Ari, Max, Sadie the dog, Carson, and Jonas.

Conrad was tagged

Conrad was tagged by his cousin Brielle. Conrad is only 2 years old so you may or may not be surprised with 5 things you did or did not know about Conrad.

1. Conrad is named after his paternal Great Grandpa Richard Conrad. Grandpa and Conrad even share the same birthday!!! Sept. 13th!

2. When Conrad finds something he likes to eat, he REALLY eats it. He has always been kind of a picky eater, so when he finds something he likes, he practically inhales it. Here he is eating his first candy cane.

3. Conrad never took a binky. Instead he has a preference for his blue blanket. Here he is 2 days old with the blue blanket.

4. Conrad started teething at 5 1/2 months. By 8 months he had 8 teeth. Here he is at 6 months old with his top teeth just coming in.

5. Conrad is nicknamed Mr. D. Short for Mr. Delightful. He has always been the happiest mellowest little guy. His grandma Cindy nicknamed him that and it has certainly stuck! Here they are last summer when we went to Adam-ohndi-ahman.

There ya have it. I will do all the tagging on Amelia's tag.

Thank you, Tom

For introducing Josh and me to Pandora.com. Josh listens to it at school while he studies, and I am about to attempt some exercise music with the treadmill close by.

Josh's results with Pandora: he felt really good about his NEURO test on Friday! yay! He feels confident that he did well. In addition to his Diet Mt. Dew study-aid, Pandora aided him for the past few weeks so he could study well.

Ali's results with Pandora: let's hope I lose some weight. Anybody up for a weight-loss competition? I think that's the motivation I need. I hope to lose 15% body weight. Let me know what percentage body weight you hope to lose and we will race each other to see who can do it!

So, thanks Tom. Oh, and when are you going to send me pictures of Lisa's growing belly so I can blog them? She's probably what... 23 or 24 weeks now? It's time to document it!!!

Funny looking people

Yesterday at dinnertime I started getting some snapshots of Amelia. I decided it would be fun to get us being silly, too. Conrad got to learn what it means to make a funny face. He had never figured that out. So, with a lot of instruction on where to place hands and whatnot he came up with the face below.
Amelia even joined in on the fun:
But then she decided that she was just too cute for this silliness and gave us her usual cute self. If you click on the squinty-eyed picture of Amelia you can see her 2 teeth she already sprouted! Wow!

Conrad has picked up a bad habit. Obviously so have I.

Finally, the creators of the weirdness.

We make a great couple, don't we?

Good luck to Josh tomorrow and on Friday for his FINAL TESTS on the horrible NEURO section. I am looking forward to having a husband again. Josh is just treading through the deep stuff of Neuro right now, studying as hard as he possibly can.

Wish me luck with Conrad and the poopy pants syndrome. (today he did it again, and it was the worst it's ever been! AAAAAAH!)

I made jam!

I never ever thought I could do it. Making jam was always something you did with your mom or an older woman with lots of knowledge and wisdom put into making something that took allll day long to do! Fortunately for me, my friend Heidi made some and I said to her, "WHAT?!" She explained how easy it is to make FREEZER jam so I got the courage and did it! It only took me like an hour and a half to make like 15 of those little containers. And it is THEE best!!! Go me!
For those of you saying, "Hey, if ali can do it, then so can I!..." all you do is buy a package of SureJell and it has the instructions on the back of it. Basically, puree some fruit, add some sugar to it, then get the surejell mixed with boiling water, then add it into the puree'd fruit and voila! YUMMY!!!

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