Flamenco Barbie

Hayley and Travis recently took a blissful trip to Spain and returned with this adorable little number for Brielle. She thinks it's about the most beautiful thing she's ever had. You can tell she just feels like dancing when she wears it. She loves it so much that she insisted on wearing it to church on Sunday. Seriously, all out tantrum until we put it on, then she gave us this happy little pose. We're in trouble!She got so much attention at church that I'll probably never get her to wear anything else ever again!

On a gloomy, rainy day in October, my friend Sherida and I decided that the best way to get over the autumn blues was to spend the afternoon making a cute craft. Sherida had an idea in mind, I had some leftover wood, we both had a free day the next day (by free, of course I mean tons of stuff we didn't really want to clean, places we could pretend we didn't have to go....) We figured it would be simple, and we'd feel good about shirking responsibilities, because we would have something lovely to show for it by the end of the day...

... It actually took us about three weeks of pretending to have free days before we finally put this little number together! I get my optimism (time frame denial) from my mom -- not sure where Sherida gets hers! Please tell us you think it was worth all that undone laundry!
Anyway, we finally have it done, only to stumble upon...

WINTER! In all it's hideous snow filled, so not autumn anymore slushiness! I'm thinking we should've just started our Christmas craft last month, instead. (which we blissfully began planning for the first craft day, you know, just in case we had some leftover time!)

It's a good thing my kids are having so much fun out there, or I'd be really, really ticked!

I'm loving how hard Trayson is concentrating on building this snowman. It takes a lot of hard work to get it just perfect!

As much as I despise being cold and wet, and driving on slick roads I was deeply grateful for the hours --yes, I said hours, that my kids spent outside this weekend playing together and NOT fighting.

Last weekend I was bound and determined to visit my family while Jody and the guys went on their fishing trip. I thought about it for weeks. The kids packed for days. And then I got sick. I woke up Saturday morning, popped some pills and decided that, hey, I wasn't feeling all that bad.

Okay, so I probably shouldn't have driven that far when I was feeling like garbage (in retrospect, I KNOW I shouldn't have driven!) I probably shouldn't have dragged my germs with me, and I really should've just waited until I felt better so that I could totally enjoy hanging with the family. I'm really not good at making the intelligent choice.
We actually made it there safely and I promptly discovered that I wasn't feeling all that much better. Of course, I decided to ignore that and go to lunch and shopping with the girls. Brilliant!

Aren't I doing a great job pretending like I'm feeling fine?! (but seriously, how beautiful is my daughter!) I dragged my poor mom and sister along for the ride, they were pretty great sports, dragging me to stores and just forcing me to buy stuff so that I would give up the farce and go home to bed!

The real reason I was so determined to go is to watch the kids play with their cousins. They spent the whole weekend proving to me that it was worth it. They all have such sweet relationships with each other, and just smiled and giggled the whole time.

Thanks, guys, for taking such care of me!

Brielle has really been outdoing herself with witty one-liners lately and I just had to share a couple.
I had a bunch of stuff all over the counter the other day while I was doing her hair and ended up knocking a few things onto the floor in my hurry. Without missing a beat she said ,"I saw that one coming!" Is she really only 3?!

This is a conversation that Jody related to me the other night when I came home from scouts.
Jody: "Brielle, you know you're not supposed to be jumping on the couch."

Brielle: "I know, Dad, but mom's not home!"

Then, in the middle of the afternoon last week, I recieved one of those phone calls we mothers dread, "Your son fell off the monkey bars at school. He won't get up and he doesn't want us to touch his arm." Crap! Crap! Crap! (long story short, no break, just a nasty, nasty cut!) Brielle was very tender and worried about him in the ER, promising to watch "that dragon movie" with him instead of Barbie and everything. So sweet, until she got a look at the gash in his arm. "Mom, Kutter's elbow looks just like a crabby patty!"
He wouldn't let me take any pictures that day, so this is after a couple days of some serious neosporin. Poor kid!