The economy has affected everyone...

This is a conversation that I overheard between Michael (13) and Matthew (4). Michael was explaining to Matthew about Santa...

Michael: "If you are really good Santa will bring you lots of presents!"

Matthew: (Laughs with excitement)

Michael: "If you are really bad then Santa will come and fart in your stocking."

Matthew: "Na uh!"

Well, there we have it folks...Santa too has felt the pinch of the economy's downturn. He can no longer afford coal so he has turned to a free renewable resource!

I hope you have all been very, very good!

8 Random Things

A while back, I got tagged from a random poster. I have been veeeerrrryyyy slow in getting around to following through on this. I have to admit, it's hard to think of anything that I might want to post on here for anyone to see.

1. I am an extremely private person and most people do not really know me.

2. I love, love, love shoes!!! The more the merrier! My motto is: If the shoe fits...buy it in every color!

3. I enjoy ironing and often iron my bedding. Weird, huh?

4. I am not anywhere close to the person I was in high school. My husband said that if he had known me in high school he would have never married me.

5. I am deathly afraid of bodies of water where I can't see the bottom.

6. I was named Business Student of the Year my senior year of high school. I was also named Most Likely to Have Ten Kids but not because a crystal ball saw that I would marry a Mormon. Maybe it had something to do with all the partying? I think that it's totally funny that I now have 9 kids.

7. I am a major homebody and have no desire to travel.

8. Someday I would like to be a foster parent and do emergency placements of infants and toddlers.

Well, that's it! Not very exciting, huh? I actually had to go back and change some of those after the first posting. I'm just so darn private that it was driving me nuts having a couple of the original things that I said hanging out there for anyone to run across. :)

Burping and other bodily issues

This is happy little Matthew, our 4 year old. See this cute little happy face? This is not the face he gave me the other day. Let me explain...

My dear husband will not allow any burping or farting around others. I have never actually heard him do either and we've been married for almost 15 years. Not allowing those actually has merits, I mean, who wants to be stuck in the van smelling something that has come out of someones, ugh...know what I mean?

But sometimes, I just have to let loose a really good burp, just to show the boys who is boss. Of course, this has to be done when the husband is not around.

The other day, I thought I was out of earshot, and I took a big swig of pop and let one loose. It was long, loud, and had lots of interesting textures to it. I turned around to see my 4 year standing there in open mouth astonishment. I was about to say "Hey babe, what do you think of that?" when he said:

"MOMMY! Where are your manners?! Control yourself!!!"

Now I'm just hoping that he doesn't tattle on me!

Out of the mouth of babes

You would think that we only own one place to sit...good thing that they all have small buns.


Our favorite game-What does a "insert animal name" say? We usually play this at mealtime or bathtime. I ask what certain animals say and the little ones answer with an animal sound. Recently we have branched out and this is what the kids have come up with...

Me: What does a Daddy say?
Kids: Go Ducks! (said while pumping your fist in the air)

Me: What does a Mommy say?
Kids: No, No (said while shaking finger)

Me: What does a Joseph say?
Kids: (Make farting noises)

Me: What does a Michael say?
Kids: Mr. D (His soccer nickname, stands for Mr. Defense)

Me: What does a Timothy say?
Kids: I forgot (This is Tim's favorite and our not-so-favorite line)

Me: What does a Joshua say?
Kids: Beavers, boooooooo

Me: What does a Liz say?
Kids: Sorry, sorry, sorry (said while laughing and putting hand in someone's face)

Me: What does a Matthew say?
Kids: Tractor!

Me: What does a Hannah say?
Kids: Princess!

Me: What does a Levi say?
Kids: Batman (insert Batman music) Batman...

Me: What does the baby say?
Kids: (make crying noises while rubbing eyes)

Me: What does a Grandpa say?
Kids: Motorcycles! Vroom...vroom...

Me: What does a Grandma say?
Kids: Love you!!!

I think that pretty much sums us all up in one line each. I guess that doesn't say much about Joseph... Poor Josh, he is Joseph's roommate and he sleeps on the top bunk. :)

The smart kid and the not so much...

I asked Liz to clean under her bed. Her solution...to put on a stocking hat with her book light clipped on so she could see. Quite funny!

The not so smart one?...He (the older, taller twin wouldn't allow me to release his name) wouldn't let me take a picture of his shiner. How did he get the shiner you ask? While playing the Wii he got really into the game and accidently hit himself in the eye with his controller. That is the most lame self-inflicted injury that I have ever heard of!

All caught up!

Now the kiddos get to put it all away!!! My favorite part...

After I snapped the "before" pix, I got down to business. Over four hours on my feet resulted in a much cleaner laundry room! Thank goodness I have three sets of machines! Although, I think I ran them so much today that they were getting ready to wave the white flag of surrender!

Making a grown woman weep...

What happens when your dear husband is out of town all week, you are doing childcare and taking care of your own nine kids? The laundry gets way, way behind... When you are doing over 25 loads a week getting behind is not good. It's actually very, very bad.

I have not been this far behind since I got my new laundry room. Before that I was constantly behind. The laundry piles would get so big that my dear hubby would joke about climbing to the top so he could put a flag up there. Funny, yet not so much...

All those empty hangers are never a good sign...

Earrings!

I love, love, love earrings on my girls!!!

We just had Lily's done (ok, well, I had Lily's done). My dear husband said that Lily was too young....but that was a couple of months ago. She is older now, right?

Halloween

Levi as Batman

Hannah was a beautiful princess

Matthew was Buzzlightyear....to the rescue!

Liz was a stylin' witch with glitter eye make-up and fake eyelashes

Halloween!!!! My favorite holiday! My dearest husband took all the kids except for Lily to the church for the chili cook-off and trunk-or-treat. The kids had a great time, pigging out on chili, playing games and trunk-or-treating for lots and lots of candy. We didn't even take them out door-to-door, they got so much. I stayed home and handed out full-size candy bars to trick-or-treaters. Because our house is totally decorated (people even were taking pictures) we got over 150 trick-or-treaters!

Sleepy Girl

This girl can fall asleep anywhere....anytime, anyplace. Her thumb is her built in binky so she is good to go! Wish I could go to sleep that easy!

Pumpkin patch

If you look close here you can see Levi genuinely trying to take a bite out of his pumpkin.

Going through the corn maze

Saturday we took five of the kids to the local pumpkin patch. For a few of the kiddos, this was their first time there. After finding our way through the hay and corn maze (after hitting a few dead ends) we came upon the pumpkin patch. The kids had so much fun picking out their own pumpkin and can't wait to carve them. The three little ones picked out really, really small pumpkins which we have no hope of carving. They will make for cute decorations though.

Joseph

Levi loves, loves, loves "his Jo-Jo"
Joe with Tim and Michael at a swim meet
Joe with his new desk in his unusually clean room
Joe working on his Archery merit badge at Scout Camp
Joe with Lillian. He is soooo loving with the little ones.

Michael

Michael at Scout Camp
Michael with Tim and Joe watching a swim meet
Hmmm...he doesn't look very thrilled about the fireworks Michael with his new bike Nice Duck tie!

Timothy

Showing off his new desk
This was Tim's second year at Scout Camp
Here is his cultural project. I love the green and yellow colors!
Tim was also on the swim team. Tim was hiding while we were setting off fire crackers. Not sure why...

Joshua

Josh is almost always wearing yellow and green. What a good kid!
Josh swam on the swim team again this summer

He turned ten in April
Josh with his Ipod and new desk
Josh and Joe loved their new pix for their "surfing" room.
Josh with his big school project at the end of 4th grade
Josh receiving his 4th grade diploma