Say Cheese!

I want to introduce everyone to the newest member of our family...Gracias the Chicken. I copied the pattern from Grandma's own chicken that is a family legend. I know that everyone in my family is jealous. I can just feel it. Gracias was a lot of work, but he is well worth it. Now my rolls have a place to roost and stay warm. The kids are super excited for Thanksgiving tomorrow so that we can try him out. Today, in celebration of the first day of Thanksgiving vacation, we took a day trip to the Ashe County Cheese Factory in North Carolina. Ahh, we thought it would be a piece of cake. Unfortunately, we underestimated the roads between here and there. Let's compare it to riding a two hour roller-coaster with no relief and only a small (and I mean 'small'!) shoulder betwixt us and death by ravine.
This photo (above) is how Spencer and I felt the whole way...aka...BARFFFFF!!!!!

Apparently they grow Christmas trees in the hills of North Carolina. Who knew? The kids were ecstatic to find this gem tidbit of information.

Here we are enjoying the cheese making process. This little room makes 40,000 lbs. of cheese a week. We saw them stirring the milky, bacterial concoction, mold some wheels, sqeeze them and remove them to the fridge. I especially enjoyed the cow-inspired benches.

Happy troopers! And the only time everyone sat still...sort of.

Inside the cheese store. No one could keep their hands off. And miracle of miracles, everyone liked cheese curds, which I adore because they take me back to my childhood. Who wouldn't like squeaky cheese? It was a fun day and one that the children will probably be talking about for a long time. Which is good, because I don't think I can handle driving there again anytime soon. Barf!

Why?

We are in the throes of potty-training Hunter. And in the depths of dispair. And ready to pull my hair out, one strand at a time.

For example, this morning Hunter stayed dry during our walk and when we got home I put him on the potty. No problem. He kept saying "Pee-pee, pee-pee" and looking down, but nothing happened. Finally, after 10 minutes he gave up in disgust and as I walked away, I said (and I quote) "I'm going to put you back on the toilet in 5 minutes because you need to go." No more than 10 seconds after I pulled his pants back on, there was a puddle on the floor. AAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!

But it gets even better, about an hour later I smelled a little something funky. I asked Hunter if he was poopy and of course he said "NO!" I didn't believe him one bit so I went over to him and grabbed his pants and pulled them out to look. Guess who got fingers full of poop? Oh yes, that was me. The poop had traveled up his behind and was at the top near the waistband, so yes, I got fingers full of poop. I thought I was going to die.

So, our next option is bribing Corbin to train Hunter over Thanksgiving. $5 is a small price to pay to have someone else do it.

The Language of Levi

Levi is now at the age where he understands what I am saying to him. Unfortunately, his understanding seems to be a little twisted, or perhaps something is lost in translation. Here are some examples:

My statement------Levi's interpretation

"Levi!"------"Run away as fast as you can"

"Get that out of your mouth"----"Smile, shove faster, run away!"

"Stop Levi!"----"Do it faster, hurry, hurry, hurry! Quick, before she catches you!"

"I love you"------- "Run away before she kisses you!"

Or perhaps I'm missing something here...apparently all of his interpretations include running away from me. Hmmmm...

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween!

I'm just going to let the pictures do the talking, and some of them shout. Just keep in mind that I only posted the best ones.

Corbin and Hunter: Squishing out the brains of the fat pumpkin!
Miles and Ella-marie: Oozing out the brains of the skinny pumpkin!

Our finished pumpkins and happy kids. Levi really loves saying "cheeseburger!"

Corbin "Captain Brown-eye" Finch

Miles "Captain Bluetooth" Finch

Ella-marie "Beautiful Princess" Finch

Sailor Hunter (though grumpy he may be)

Tail end of Levi the dragon (I had one picture of him running to eat the camera, one picture of him eating his blanket, one picture trying to escape arms, and then this one...which do you think would have been the best?)

There's nothing quite like Halloween to liven things up a bit!

They're Alive!!

Try JibJab Sendables® eCards today!

P.S. Thanks Brecken for the great idea!

Hunter, oh Hunter!

I've decided that two year olds are the funnest kids in the whole world. Hunter just makes me laugh, over and over and over again.

Well, I guess you can say, I could either laugh or cry, and lately I've been laughing.

Last week I was sitting at the table balancing the checkbook when my dear Hunter came and climbed up in the chair next to me. I didn't think anything of it until an unpleasant aroma came wafting my way. Our conversation went like this...

A: "Hunter, are you poopy? You smell a little stinky!"

H: "No poop, no poop!" and at which point he turns around, smells the chair and states, quite vehemetly "Chair poop!!"

A: "No way, the chair isn't poopy. Are you poopy?"

H: Sniffs again..."Chair poop! Chair poop!"

A: Leans over and smells the chair... "The chair isn't poopy, it doesn't smell at all, I think it's you!"

H: Sniffs again for good measure... "Me no poop, chair poop!"

At this point I was laughing so hard I almost fell out of my chair. Sure I could have gotten upset because I had to change ANOTHER poopy diaper, but instead I just enjoyed his view of things and let him sit in his diaper until I finished balancing the checkbook. Good times.

And yesterday our friend Kristy had a baby girl and we decided to visit them in the hospital. Hunter has been sucking on a binky since we broke him of thumb-sucking, and so I had the brilliant idea to have him give his binkies to the new baby. Big boys don't need binkies! So I asked him if he wanted to give his binkies to the new baby and he said "YES!" and ran and got them. He put them in an envelope and decorated it with stickers and he had no problem at all giving them to baby Autumn. I don't think that he realized what a drastic thing he was doing until naptime. Needless to say, naptime was really rough. It took 2 hours of crying for him to finally fall asleep. Bedtime was better, but it still took him a while. Today should be great! I'm crossing my fingers.

Home sick, again!

Once again it's Sunday and I'm home sick with three sick kids. This is the second Sunday in a row and it's getting pretty lame. I always forget how much harder it is to stay home on Sunday than it is to go to church and wrestle the kids during sacrament meeting. Well, I guess I should clarify, both of them are hard. No question there. Now that everyone in our family has either gotten it already or is working through the flu right now, we should be free and clear in a couple of days. Keep your fingers crossed that it doesn't start back around at the beginning again.