These are a few of my favorite things...

So I should start off by saying I full-on stole this from Courtney, but I thought it was a really cute idea. Plus maybe it will help me get back into the blogging mood!

Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens, bright copper kettles and warm woolen mittens, brown paper packages tied up with strings, these are a few of my favorite things.

My favorite things (in no particular order).
1. Catey's laugh when I tickle her collar bones
2. Wyatt's fascination with his belly button.
3. Wood burning stoves/fireplaces
4. Rubbing noses with my kiddos
5. Mtn. Dew
6. Pin Trading
7. Disneyland
8. The Belagio Fountains
9. Build a Bear
10. Digital Cameras
11. MP3s
12. Mr Potato Head
13. The Little Green Men from Toy Story
14. Christmas socks
15. Hoodies
16. Down Feather Pillows
17. Charm Bracelets
18. Roller Coasters
19. Rottweilers
20. Sunflower Seeds
21. Rum
22. A New Box of Crayola Crayons
23. Flip Flops
24. The Olympic Peninsula
25. Candles/Warmers that smell like baked goods
26. Sketchers
27. Fireworks
28. Those giant dill pickles
29. Bathtubs that I can actually fit in
30. Cotton Candy
31. Red Velvet Cake - or even better, Red Velvet Cheesecake!
32. Draft Horses
33. Mad Libs
34. Pink Breast Cancer Awareness Ribbons
35. Antenna Balls
36. T-Shirts with snarky sayings on them
37. Old Farm Houses
38. REAL Christmas Trees
40. Children's Books
41. True Crime
42. Page-a-day calendars
43. The big wing-back chair in Catey's room
44. Traveling
45. Costumes
46. Beaches
47. Kitchens you can "hang out" in
48. Otters
49. Disney Music
50. Photoshop (or at least once I figure out how to use it)
51. New England Clam Chowder in a bread bowl
52. Jets (as in the flying kind not the football playing kind)
53. French Fries
54. Hydrangeas
55. Pirates
56. White Chocolate Macadamia cookies
57. Sapphires
58. Chickens
59. Fresh picked green beans
60. A nice shiny Camaro! ;)
61. Haunted places
62. Getting those junk catalogs in the mail
63. Wrapping paper
64. NASCAR
65. Word games
66. Fabric (even though I have no clue what to do with it half the time)
67. Board games
68. Parades
69. Carousels & Merry Go Rounds
70. Maps
71. Anything Archaeology related
72. Bears
73. Fruit
74. Pencils
75. Rocks
76. Christmas Lights
77. Pajamas
78. My mom's ham & beans
79. Corn Bread (to go with above ham & beans)
80. Wristwatches
81. Little girls' dress up clothes
82. The Sunday Paper with lots of ads in it (though I hate shopping)
83. Thunder & Lightning
84. Snowglobes
85. Scrapbooks
86. Flavored lip balm/chapstick
87. Fried Zucchini
88. Rearranging the furniture
89. Float tube fishing
90. Hats
91. Old fashioned shoe styles
92. Chuzzle
93. Facebook
94. All things Tiki
95. Yellowstone
96. Musicals
97. Muppets
98. Football
99. Cake Batter Ice Cream from Cold Stone
100. Bubbles

Halloween Adventure

Sorry I haven't been around much - ok - at all. I just haven't really felt like I've had anything worth sharing. I do now though!

Here's some pictures of Alice & The White Rabbit on their first trick or treating adventure!

Finished for Friday - Pauline Bunyan

As previously mentioned, we went and cut firewood Labor Day weekend. Once home, it of course had to be cut up in to pieces small enough to accommodate our wood burning stove.
Who's idea was this anyways? Oh. Mine.
It started off really fun. My husband taught me how to use a chain saw (insert Tim Taylor "ooh ooh argh" here), so we cut up the majority of the longer pieces so they could be split. That's where this goes downhill fast...
So Paul Bunyan, a.k.a. Daddy starts splitting a few pieces of wood. He gets through about a dozen of them when he stops & says "I can't do this anymore". I turn around & he's hunched over like Quasimodo. EXCELLENT. He had pinched a nerve in his back. NICE. Now what.
Enter Pauline Bunyan.
Now I've swung a splitting maul about ooooh once in my life & nearly took off my own noggin in the process, so not a big fan of the maul. Well I got into one of my superwoman moods & started chopping.
I should mention that I couldn't hit the broad side of a barn with a baseball bat, so it's probably a good thing no one was witnessing the travesty that was unfolding in our driveway. I made lots of kindling...by accident. I think I did pretty good for a beginner. My back however would be inclined to disagree, as well as my left hand for some reason.
I got about 2 wheelbarrows filled in the span of just over 2 hours. Something that would probably take the husband about 20 minutes to do. *sigh* Hey, at least I tried & actually did enjoy myself for the most part. I just wish it didn't hurt so much afterwards! LOL!
Next on my list? Buy a blue ox.

The weapon tool of choice.

(Nice gloves too, huh? My husband bought them for me especially for the occasion!)

Looky what I can do!

What's still left to do: (This will get bigger too, we're going up again this weekend!)

Tune in for Finished for Friday next week when we rent a LOG SPLITTER!

Caught Up - Last Weekend - Firewood!!

We went up and started what will be a weekend tradition for the next few weeks. We cut firewood for this winter. This is the first time we've done it so it was quite the adventure. One I am paying for dearly now. Ugh! My back!

Catching Up # 4 - The Fire

Coming home from work on the night of August 26th, the closer I got to home, the more I noticed the orange glow in the sky.

Uh oh.

Yep, fire. One of the hills surrounding Emmett was on fire. It apparently started around 7 pm, & I got home around midnight, so it had already burned a good portion of the hill, but it still was going pretty good too thanks to the wind.

During:

After:

Catching Up # 3 - The Fair

We almost didn't get to go to the fair this year, but at the last minute I was able to get the last Friday of it off from work, so we went to see the animals. Oh yeah, & Blake Shelton! WOOHOO!

We gotta get us one of these!

Dude tries to snuggle with a goat.
Bath time!
Waiting for the concert to start.
The concert was GREAT! We had horrible seats (camera has good zoom), but it was still a great show with lots of suprises!

Catching Up # 2 - Bug's 3rd Birthday

Bug's birthday was August 13th, so we had her party the following Saturday in Emmett's City Park (as usual). It was a perfect day! It was a little breezy when we got there, but shortly after the wind died down and it was just perfect! I still can't believe my little teeny weeny is 3! *sigh*

OK mommy, we'll hug...if we have to.

Dude had a WALL-E cake for his birthday - so naturally we had to have EVE for Bug's party! (She did ask for an EVE cake, we didn't make her have EVE! LOL!)
Good cake!


Oh look, Cinderella came to Bug's party! That was so nice of her to show up!

WooHoo! Cabbage Patch Kid!

Playing Catch-Up #1 - Silverwood

The weekend before Bug turned 3 we decided to take advantage of the "under 3 free" admission & go to Silverwood Theme Park in Northern Idaho.
I just gotta say - I cannot WAIT to go back! It was great! We were there from open to close & had an AWESOME time - all of us! The kids loved every single ride we went on to the point of squealing on the majority of them! I laughed until I cried several times, and sometimes just cried at just watching my babies being big kids & riding rides, hugging costumed critters, & just having the best time ever in their so far short little lives! I can't wait to have more adventures like this with them!

They LOVED Garfield & we had a hard time convincing them to let him go! He loved them right back though & liked the extra huggins! :)

This is the train that runs through Silverwood. According to the narrator, it was the first "ride" at Silverwood & Gary Norton (the creator of Silverwood) outbid Disney for the engine! Cool huh?!

View from the Ferris wheel!

I finally got brave enough (yes me, not the kids) to let the kids try a ride by themselves. Silverwood has a great "kid land" full of rides that only the peanuts can go on, no big kids or parents! THEY LOVED IT! Once Bug finally figured out the lever made the plane go up & down, that was all she wrote! They rode ride after ride! We finally had to convince them to let mommy & daddy ride some too!

Waiting for the helicopters to start moving. HURRY UP ALREADY!

Things I Never Thought I'd Say...

"Please stop picking your nose with your toes."

Cruise Night

Saturday was also Cruise Night in Emmett. It's the one day a year that everyone gets out their cool cars and cruises up & down the "main drag" of Emmett. Also known as Washington Ave. Everyone breaks out the camping chairs, portable coolers, & finds a nice shady spot to "park it" & watch the cars go by!

Snake River Stampede

I love rodeo! I didn't get too many pictures just because it's extremely difficult to take a picture of a bucking bull or bronc with just the little point & shoot I have. It was tons of fun and the kids had a blast. (Well Dude did, until he fell asleep.)
These are the Snake River Stampeders. It's actually a group of ladies that ride horses in rodeo arenas...in the dark. They are AMAZING ladies & I get choked up every time I see them. I thought my camera did a cool little thing with making them kinda blurry-like, so I thought I'd share
Saddle Bronc horse waitin' for their turn.
The bull riding is my favorite event! They'll be coming out of the chute in the middle so watch close!
Cowboy up!
Big bull...no rider! LOL! That happens a lot.
For all my lady friends!! :D Whatever I can do to help out, I'm there for you!