my diy get-up.

it is another challenge for our ffa club.

(no, I would not put you through this special kind of torture if it weren’t for this blasted club..)

hurry.

run.

hide the men-folk.

I am lookin’ hawt.

(many thanks to my 7 year-old amateur photog.)

(she did some pretty amazing work.)

(and dudes, I totally trusted her with my camera!!)

see.  secksy, right?

let’s break this down, all fashion-show style, yo.

A- the pants.

they have been kickin’ it round these parts for the better part of 4 years, almost 5.  they lived through one pregnancy, one post-partum recovery, many lake powell trips, and multiple room paint jobs.

I am sure that if I were in need of matching a paint color, there would be a sample that someone could scan, somewhere on these bad boys, to get a new gallon or two.

(but that might be highly inappropriate.  maybe?)

2- the shirt.  it is a lucky shirt.  look at it, it even has a horse shoe.  it asks if you are feeling lucky, and what’s more?  it’s green.  like, the luckiest of colors.

and wouldn’t you also know, it must be pretty darn lucky cause it has fared much better than the pants.  I mean, it hasn’t been around as long, but I only has one tiny smudge of grayish paint above the right boob area.

see, pretty lucky!

III-  the feet must always be bare.  no matter the season, they must be bare.  well, except for when I am behind the mower.  and that would be where my zig-zag tan lines come into play…

(do you spot them?  they are awesome.)

d- the hair. 

it’s always up.  if I am painting a ceiling, you can count on me wearing a hoodie, maybe even glasses.  I look much like the unabomber.  minus the thick and luscious stache.

and if the above picture didn’t exactly “do it” for you, here’s an outtake:

little soccer player.

and please, when you read “soccer”, don’t read “sock-her”.  read it like adam sandler would say it: “sock-a playa”.  that’s just how we say it around here.

we (totally meaning “I”) also yell (but not in anger), to pump her crazy legs, and when she starts to get to polite on the field, I yell her name (but again, not in anger, it has been 7 months, almost 8 now!!) and make a fist and growl at her.  I want her to play for heaven’s sake!!  not apologize for stealing the ball and then practically giving it back!

she has had a love/hate relationship with soccer (again, please watch your pronunciation!).  any given day she would be in love, absolute love I tell you, with soccer.  the next, she would hate it.

today, and she has been holding steady for a week now (amazing!!), that she loves it.

I signed her up for another year, and in all the excitement/convincing peyton became sold on the idea as well.  come fall, we will have two little “socca-playas”.

this weekend, ash had her last game.  the kid was responsible for shooting a few goals, and making one.  she had a few awesome blocks, but none as awesome as the header she took a few weeks ago.  that was fun!

I didn’t get pictures of her last game, and with her wearing her most awesome participation medal (that I have been commissioned to make a shelf for, as well as all soon to follow medals and trophies…), but looking through last week’s pictures, I found some evidence that she is mine..  you know, despite that fact that she pretty much looks just like her dad and all.

 

my dad used to tease me when I would play basketball.  I mean, he teased me a lot, not just when I played basketball, but when I would play basketball, and maybe miss a shot, he would tell me that I wasn’t “holding my tongue right”.

apparently ash has inherited this from me.

isn’t she cute?

an affinity for hair.

peyton really likes playing with her dolls, especially their hair.

this is what I found the other day:

all she wants for her birthday (today anyway) is a comb and a spray bottle.

I have to say that jasmine is quite the sport.

this whole post might be because my kids watch “despicable me” too much.

this is peyton:

she is almost 4, loves her purse (doesn’t like hannah montana though), eats just about everything (but oranges have been a favorite lately), and is my favorite sidekick.

part of her duties as sidekick include making me laugh.

(like just now, she informed me that her panties are hanging out of her skirt.)

this child, as well as my other two, love the movie “despicable me”.  I can’t blame them.  I find it pretty darn funny myself.  I am not sure if I love it enough to want to watch it everyday though.

there is just one certain part of this movie that has seemed to have stuck in the brain of my little nearly four year old.

imagine, the minion.

“whaaat?”

go, see for yourself. 

now pair it with this sweet face:

and here’s a story to put the two together for your enjoyment:

sunday has changed in our home.  we have moved from the 1-4pm church to the 9am-12pm block.  it’s still taking a little getting used to, but for the most part, we are loving it.  sundays have also changed in the fact that peyton is no longer in nursery.  she is a sunbeam!  (she is also the only one of my girls who would not allow me to take a picture of her after her first sunday as a sunbeam with her new ctr ring.  stinker.)  her first sunday in class, no big deal.  she rather enjoyed it.  I was rather relieved.

the second sunday, I was gearing her all up for another fun sunday as a sunbeam (!!!).  we got there, and despite another kid, crying incessantly, she went to class without hesitation.

now, merrill and I teach the oldest two classes in primary.  during peyton’s class time, we are in music and sharing time, during our class time, she is in music and sharing time.  so just as we make the transition to go to class, right when we are going to have the opening prayer, there is a knock at the door.  it was the primary secretary and peyton’s teacher.

and there was peyton.  big tears on her cheeks.  her teacher explained that she thought peyton wasn’t feeling well, she stood the whole class time and didn’t want to sit down.  she didn’t cry for a while, but at the end of class, she started to cry and said she wanted me.

so I took her into class with us, but when she started to get too comfortable in there (read: she was being a distraction) I had merrill take her out to see if she wanted to go into singing time.

(come to find out she didn’t like that either.)

well, after sacrament meeting, when we were going home, I decided to ask peyton what happened in class to make her so sad.

“well..  I was just trying to play with all of my friends, but they didn’t want to play, so I was like ‘whaaat?’ and then I was sad.  and I didn’t want to sit down, and so I started to cry.  and my teacher was like ‘whaaat?’ and she asked me why I was sad and I just couldn’t talk.  so I said I wanted my mom.  and well, then she took me to you.”

that girl…

other funny things she has said lately:

sunday night when she wouldn’t go to bed she told merrill:

“when I am grown up, I am going to stay up all night, and I am going to be tan.”

she also told him that she was going to change her name, but he couldn’t remember what name she said.

she also likes to bust in on conversations by saying, “what?  are you guys eating chicken nuggets over there?”

I love that I get to spend all day with her, and merrill, that does not give you permission to say anything about when she starts school, in the very, far, distant future, and leaves me all by  my lonesome.  her position of sidekick might just have to be filled if you say anything that makes me cry.

and well, I kinda sorta got my picture of my new little sunbeam in a round-about kind of way after all.

an update on the painfully obvious.

so I believe we have already established the fact that merrill does not like the obviously stated.

(remember?  he doesn’t like it.)

but I certainly cannot help myself.

I believe I smell a terrific april fool’s joke.

about them eggs…

they were very anticipated.

we didn’t make it to midnight.

(didn’t want to!)

and they were harder to crack that I thought.  a little pain, offense, then revenge was experienced.

(don’t be jealous of peyton’s bedtime get-up.  I know you want one just like it.)

here’s the infliction of the pain:

evidence of the pain and trust me, she’s a little offended here.

and here would be the wind-up for the revenge whack:

hope your new year is as awesome as ours is already.

those funny little things that happen that make life, life.

I have three little girls.

they add a fair dose of drama to our house.

a lot of humor.

too much excitement at times.

here’s just a sampling of the shenanigans that have gone on the past week:

lynn has another loose tooth.  she won’t let me touch it, but complains about how it bugs her and has given her a sore on her tongue from playing with it.

she is also terribly nervous about the moment (which will inevitably come), when her third grade teachers will start to throw all of the “hard” stuff her way.

she passed her level one, basic ice skating class!!

she has also started channeling her inner comedian.

then there is ashley.

she is growing up. 

the child who was once afraid of talking in front of people, saying prayers in primary, etc.,  has started to voluntarily, and by herself, fill in for kids who aren’t there.  amazing!!

she is also the child, who will lose things.

she is at school all day now.  (sniff..)  which means she doesn’t have lunch with me anymore. (sniff..) which means that I pack lunch for her to eat at school.  (sniff sniff..) 

now I could put her lunch in a boring old brown bag, but that might just depress her.  if I put it in her fun hello kitty lunch bag, it will make her happy, but she will lose it.  honest!

so as school started last week, so did the eating lunch at school minus her mommy, and the hello kitty lunch bag went too.

it came home two days in a row, and the third day, it was forgotten.

now do I know my kid or what?

it was happily reunited with us friday.

she is also obsessed with dinosaurs.  mammoths are her favorite, and she will happily recite random facts about them to you if you listen.

(allosaurus is a close second.)

and the youngest of our bunch has an obsession with taylor swift.  I need to record her singing along to a few songs and post it.  it’s pretty darn cute.

she is also currently idolizing mulan.

she even butchered her hair (but not obviously), in an attempt to be like her.

I swear, every time I fix her hair, I find a new spot that has been trimmed or scalped.

p.s. merrill turned 32 on saturday.  he desired a low-key day, no cake, but he does make a handsome 32 year old!

risk factors of having long hair.

it’s funny..  the moment i actually get a second to myself, to sit down and to type anything of substance, the first place my mind immediately goes to is my hair and the caution that seems to flow constantly with it.

sometime i will no doubt update the world (or me and the two people who might still cruise over to this corner of the www to see what we are up to) on the goings on of our summer thus far.  i will regale the tale of the cold/allergy fit 4 of the 5 of us had (still not sure which it was really, it was just snotty, head poundlingly bad), our latest adventures, some funny stories, some cute pics.  ya know.  life stuff.

but right now is all about my hair.

the last time i had hair this long was when i had lynn.  if you do the math right, it was 8 and 1/2 years ago (okay..  a wee bit more.).  it was highlighted, split-ended, and long!!  i loved it.  loved it until she figured out how to grab a fist-full of it while she nursed, then it wasn’t so fun anymore.  yes, the hair-pulling and the summer heat, heat from the season itself, lugging around my hunk-o-chunk of a baby, and my hair, all pushed me to that breaking point to cut it off.

so here we are again,  long hair.

it gets stuck in my armpit, or between my arm and body.  i will attempt to move my head only to have it jerked back into it’s original position due to the fact that my hair is pinned by my own body!

then there is a similar quandary at bedtime, or at least the time i should be sleeping..  it gets pinned there too.  most unpleasant.

peyton has taken to tugging on it recently.  not to hurt in any way, she just twirls her own out of habit.  i can see why my hair might be enticing to her twirling-prone fingers.

but when she desires a shoulder ride has to be the worst for my hair and scalp!  that is the most uncomfortable of hair being pinned situations.

then there are the times when i am the cause of my own pain and torture.  do you remove hair from your clothing?  i hope you do.  i do.  there are times when i think i am innocently removing a fallen out strand only to find that it is just a solitary hair, still very much attached to my scalp.  it’s just so darn long!! 

then there is the grossest.

wiping small people when they are in need of such assistance in the bathroom.  that is where much caution needs to be taken.  one impulsive move can mean that the end of my locks end up in potty water.

see gross.

but you should know, I am not even playing with considering to think about contemplating the pondering of getting my hair chopped.  I am loving it’s longness immensely.

(hope you enjoyed my shallow post.  it is a poor attempt at humor, i know.  but give me a break!  it’s been a while.)

what to do while your files are transferring to your new external hard drive..

why you rack your poor, tired, probably bloodshot brain, to think of updates to blog about.

let’s see…

ashley’s hand is a magnificent shade of purplish/green.  still can’t make a fist, well, because it is still swollen awesomely as well.  no blood-filled bubble, but an awesome contusion.  her splint “accidentally” came totally unwrapped yesterday.

(yeah, you buying that too?)

get this..  peyton asks merrill first thing this morning, right after her little eyes pop open (in our bed..  bed hog), “daddy?  will you turn on simpsons?”

his answer: “i can’t right now, but they will be on later tonight.”

her response: “yesssssss!”

the kid also drew a mural on ashley’s wall, probably the same time ashley’s splint and bandage get up was “accidentally” falling off of her hand, with the markers from the dollar bin at joann’s.  they don’t come off the wall unless you really work for it, and when i say “really” i mean reeeeeeeaaallllly work for it.  the wall is now dull.  it needs paint.

(so does my obscene basement.)

so i think i will buy plenty of paint.

;)

(i do have plans for that…)

lynn lost another tooth.  she freaked-out, saw her own blood (all two drops of it on a tissue), turned a whiteish/green and i promptly made her lay down.

there is another one that is on the brink of falling out.

she won’t let me near it.

i plan on “flossing” her teeth tomorrow.

(insert evil laugh here.)

while sitting in sacrament meeting sunday, ashley looked over at an older gentleman in our ward, one who has a good, full white beard, and asked me, “mom, is his name lonesome dove?”

well, if you haven’t watched that particular mini-series, you don’t get that.

you might not get it if you don’t live in our ward and know who i am talking about.  it made me laugh, pretty hard, and well, that is all that matters.

so here i sit..  and type..  while forty-something gigabytes transfer to my new, gigantic, external hard drive. 

why am i doing it now?

well, because i just edited the cutest pictures i think i have ever taken (well, i love them now, like, a lot..) and i have this nagging feeling that as soon as i go to bed, start to dream about happy things, something will inevitably happen to my computer and all will be lost.

i took these pictures yesterday.

i edited them all today.

hard work.

done.

fate.

not my buddy.

am i making sense?

free cell is a good way to spend this time.

Whereabouts and such.

I could easily throw myself into typing a rather lengthy list of reasons why nothing seems to be going on here (perhaps that would answer some of the almost panicked e-mails that have been arriving in my inbox these last few days?) but that would be sufficiently boring, I am sure.

I can tell you that the headaches I seem to have are not friendly to a computer screen.  Not really friendly to much to be quite honest.

Then there are projects that I have been working on, that are very friendly to my headaches.  Projects that require not much thinking at all, repetitive actions, and lots of holding still, or being semi-still. 

There are also possible reasons/causes for these awesome headaches..  just a few theories: 

- allergies

- sinus issues (due to the above)

- sleep deficiencies

- children (reason for sleep deficiencies)

- old age (?)

- too much sugar

So following one of the possible theories, I, in a rash decision (according to Merrill), vacated my craft room to turn it into a bedroom for Ashley.  If you, or he, were here to experience what  a non-peaceful event bedtime was, you would have done the same thing.

Ashley and Peyton are not good roommates.

Well, that actually depends on who you ask.  They would say that they make fantastic roommates, I would have to disagree.  You see, Ashley has encouraged, cheered-on her younger sibling to ascend the ladder to the top bunk to “hang out” and “talk”.  I took that ladder away.  I took it far, far away, and then what does the older, influential sister do?  Why teach her younger sister how to scale the bed frame, using the windowsill, whereby to gain access to that upper bunk.  The look of triumph on that littlest girl’s face was magical.  The look on mine was pure annoyance, a sheer second of shared excitement, but mostly annoyance.

(Fantastic roommates!  If no one needed to sleep.)

Bedtime commences around here at 8:30.  They would usually fall asleep somewhere after the final beating, or to people who go by actual “time”, roughly 10:30 pm.  Sometimes later, after more beatings, and various threats.

Bedtime for me, took on an entirely different name.

Thus, the move.

Justified?

Totally.

Ashley does love her new room, I have somewhat enjoyed putting it together.  I only wish that the weather would cooperate so I could finish painting a shelf to help rid the floor of it’s newly inherited mess.

Bedtime, is back to being bedtime in my book.

(Success!)

Meanwhile, I am homeless.

My stuff, the whole lot of it, sits in one of the unfinished rooms in the basement, waiting for me to feel inspired as to what to do with it.

Merrill seems to think that I should take the large room in the basement.

(Well, that is only after the thought that I was too “rash” and should not have given up my room in the first place, but remember, *he was not present for the hellish routine of bedtime on the most hellish of nights*.  “Rash”, I think not, I have been pondering the move for quite some time now.)

Now back to that room in the basement.  It is a very nice, large space, with sucky morgue-ish lighting.  It also has a wall color on one one (thank heavens) that resembles a place where bright orange outdoor basketballs have been massacred.

Can I be creative in a poorly-lit basketball murder scene?

(Quite a coincidence how the two of those details go hand in hand..)

No, I can not!

I need a color that inspires, lighting that makes me feel alive!

So maybe, once I feel better, I will want to paint, and move on in…

Meanwhile, I am homeless.

Oh, and I have a headache now.

Signs of aging.

The other day, I started to take stock of my life, what just doesn’t work the same as it used to. 
It got pretty funny after the first couple of minutes.
There was a moment that started it all, and I will get to it, I always do; but bear with me as I list the other signs of my aging.
Our neighbor’s daughter has a boyfriend (a punk kid really), who likes to boom.
(For those of you who are deeper in the aging process than I am, that is when you have some major sub-woofers in your car, and you listen to your bass-driven music loudly.)
I am so annoyed by it!  During the day, he’ll show up, I’ll check to see if he’s smoking pot again, so I can call the Sheriff, again..  at least he lets me know he’s there, right?
Even more annoying is when he shows up late at night with the daughter, and they sit out in the driveway.
And boom.
I went on for awhile about it one night to Merrill, telling him I was going to call the Sheriff.  Then I looked at the clock to see that it wasn’t even 10 pm yet.
Old, old lady I am…
Then there’s the kicker..
It wasn’t too long ago, that was me and Merrill.
(Well, all of that except the illegal drug part.)
Even during the daytime, when I hear somebody booming down the street in front of my house, I have to rush to the nearest window to “tsk” at them for a minute.
Whipper-snappers.
Somehow I know when it is Merrill (cause he can boom now), and not one of those whipper-snappers.  Usually it’s because I hear with the booming, the accompanying sound of the garage door opening.
I have began using the sayings that my parents would.  Things they would say when we would stand with the front door open, conversing with a friend.
“Shut the door!  You are heating/cooling the whole neighborhood!  When you pay for the electric/gas bill, then you can do that.”
Or one of my favorites, especially this wintry time of the year is when they stand with the fridge or freezer open, trying to decide what to nosh on.
“Shut that!  Decide what you want to eat out of there before you stand there with the door open, cooling off the house and making the furnace work harder than it needs to…”
While we are on the subject of what our parents did..
I am the light nazi.  I go turning off lights that are completely unnecessary.  When I turn around and see it on again just two minutes later, there are usually some stern words expressed.
Then there’s the food not eaten, left on the plate routine.
I could go on.
The one that really got me though the other day, was when I was cleaning.
What does this look like to you, my dear friends?

Please tell me that you think is is smooshed, melted chocolate with a hair on it like I do….
(Just say it to make me feel good, kay?)
Well, that is what I thought it was..
I scrubbed at the thing with the steam mop far too long.  It wasn’t even shrinking!!  So I gave in, got down on my hands and knees (like a sucker) to more closely inspect.

It is not chocolate.
It isn’t a hair either.
Just a burn mark, maybe a small knot in the wood.
I clearly need to wear my reading glasses now while I clean.
Oh, and tomato soup gives me heartburn.

Shall we laugh?

Despite the “funk” I've been in, the kids are still hamming it up good around here.

 

The other day, after Ashley did something she thought was quite obvious, Peyton asked her a follow-up question,  Ashley thought the answer was quite apparent and replied, “Are you blind?”.

Peyton answered, “NO!  I’m Peyton!”

 

Tonight Peyton came up to me and said, “Mom, I’m just a superhero you know…”

Completely out of the blue and darling as can be it was…

 

Lynn has been a real bookworm lately.

To prove just how into books she is, she reads them while she walks home.

How would I know this odd fact?

While we were eagerly awaiting her arrival at the end of the day, watching for her out of the '”eagle’s nest” (loft window), there she appeared at the end of the fence, nose in a book.

She has been reading a verse of the Old Testament every day, and proudly marks it off on her reading list.  She also colors the heck out of every verse she reads.  After showing her my first set of scriptures, she still does it.  I thought that massacre with a hot pink highlighter would really speak to her, you know?  But it really didn’t.  Surprisingly.

She also find Ramona quite humorous.  Especially when she throws up at school.  I love to hear her giggle when she reads.

 

Merrill and I have been hard at work, trying to establish some great exercising habits, and little Peyton is right there with us.  Her jumping jacks are adorable, and she can do static lunge curls like a rock star.  The best is when she grunts doing crunches.  But I love it the most when she cheers us on, telling us that we are doing such a good job.

 

As we read the scriptures together for FHE, we always do a re-cap of what we have studied the previous week.  Peyton always goes off on some story about Nephi really being a princess, and traveling in a carriage.  She gets really into her plots.  It is quite cute.

 

Ashley is slowly coming out of her shell in school.  It is a relief to see her actually speak out loud and interact with the other kids, and her teacher especially.  Today in her class, they were discussing the “sp” blend.  The teacher asked them to share words that they could think of that start with that blend.  Ashley turned around to me and whispered. “Like spare?”  I nodded and told her to raise her hand and say it.  She turned back around and then turned to me again, that look in her eyes.  I nodded at her, she turned around and raised her hand!!!  Her teacher saw her, eyes grew wide, and she exclaimed, “Ashley!?”  and guess what?

She said it.

Out. Loud.

Miracle of holy miracles!

She also got a beaming report from her teacher at parent teacher conferences today.  I was thanked repeatedly for having such a great little girl.  She may not talk out loud, but she is pretty dang good.

Ashley’s story.

At the beginning of the year, Ashley got this little book in primary, it’s intended use a scripture journal.

She did her own thing with it.

Almost every Sunday, she would get it out in Sacrament meeting, and start coloring away.

A couple of weeks ago, she revealed the book to me.

“This is the story of me and Brandon’s happy home…”

(Brandon is one of our favorite neighbor boys.  He and Ashley have already pretty much arranged their future marriage.)

“This is a picture frame with our wedding picture in it.”

“This is me cooking lunch for Brandon..  and here is Brandon at our table eating the lunch I cooked for him.”

“Here are pictures of us in our wedding clothes..”

“Here we are watching TV.  Brandon has the remote and he’s trying to find something for us to watch for a while.  I am crocheting.  We agreed to watch this for a while.”

“Here we are going to bed.  That is our fireplace and our TV.  We are sleeping under the blanket I crocheted.”

“We are watching the moon, and there is a shooting star!”

“Now we are flying kites…”

“And here’s pictures of us so you can see how we are different…”

“The end!!!”

I love it Ash!!

Meet Salvador Sanchez:

Don’t ask me where the name came from, or what possessed Merrill to give the girls such wacky (but silly) nicknames, but this particular one belongs to Peyton.

(The chocolate milk mustache does lend to the name, wouldn’t you agree?)

He has given Lynn the new nickname of “Juntao”.

(Again, don’t know quite why…)

And Ashley has earned “Haru”.

(And she loves it.)

Just kind of silly that guy is.

A Christmas miracle took place Sunday with our little “Salvador Sanchez”.

She went to nursery on her own.

Someone else opened the door, and she went in, on her own.

(!!!!!!)

I peeked around the corner after her, and there she was, hugging her nursery teacher.

(!!!!!!!!!!!)

(Note: there were NO tears.)

There was a wave and a signed “I love you” goodbye, and I was off, and she stayed there being  happy.

(!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

See, early, but a Christmas miracle nonetheless.

She’s my favorite!

Is that bad to say?

(Okay, then I will follow that up with telling you that each of my girls are my favorite, at different times of the day..  okay now?)

But really..  she is too much fun.

I caught these shots of her during breakfast, before #1 and #2 were up.  My zoom lens helped to earn me some candidness.

She calls her fruit loops, “fu-hula hoops” and tells me she loves “choc-a-milk”.

But she also tells me throughout the course of the day that she loves many things.

Examples:

- “Yay!!  Bubba-gum!!  I love it mom!!”

- “Phantom!!  I love it!”

- “Ice cream!!  Yay!!!!  I love it!”

- “Outside!  I love it!!!”

When asked who wants to do a particular something, i.e. have a treat, say a prayer, brush teeth, go to bed, Pey is the first to respond with: “ME!  ME!  I do!  I do!”

She repeats far too much of what we say.

She has picked up on “Say what?”

And the other day when Ashley was screaming (for fun I must add), I kept yelling (not for fun, but to try to regain my sanity) “SHUT IT ASH!!”

Peyton picked up on that fun little phrase really fast.

We had to laugh.

Another time, when Ashley was crying about something (anything with her, she is our most hormonal/emotional little girl…) I said to Merrill, “Someone needs to go ask that fool what she’s crying about now.”

A couple of minutes later, I hear Peyton saying, “Ashley, what you crying about fool?”

Everything is a race to her.  Everything.  She also seems to crash, a lot, but rarely, if ever, cries about it.

She likes to walk up to any one of us, smell our leg, thigh, or butt region and exclaim, “Eeewww!!!  Gross!”

(I should also note that when she smells ANYTHING, flowers, perfume, poop, food, she says, “Eeewww!!!  Gross!”)

She frequently likes to list off all the people she loves.

She is always included in that list.

At a PTA meeting, she listed the names of everyone in our little family, then added, “And Ju-lee, and Kiss-tee..”.  She even added a determined little nod with a lip pucker after listing their names.

When she says the prayer, she also tells Heavenly Father what activities she has been participating in that day.

“And play with blocks..  and play with dolls.  Eat ice cream.  Play outside.  Go Goon..”

She always tries to say the prayer, even after someone else has been called on.  She thinks that if she starts to say it before they do, then it will be her turn.

She says her prayers with one eye open and a grin on her face.

Lynn now has a lock on her door and when Peyton goes to visit her, she knocks to try to gain entry.  When asked who it is, she tries to pass herself off as “mom” or “dad”, but quickly tells the truth.

She has kicked the binky habit.

She is sticking to her finger-sucking habit.

She has picked-up a habit of Lynn’s that we are battling daily to get rid of.  She starts most every sentence with “Guess what?”  and now Peyton has started to employ this method of conversation starters.

When she is tired, she comes to me, holds up her arms, and blinks those tired, long-lashed eyes, and asks me to “snuggle you mommy?”

The other night, I finished a baby beanie.  She thought it was for her and was very disappointed when I told her it was for my baby gift stash.  I had to make one for her.  When I finished it, we had to take pictures (of course).

Just more evidence as to why she is my favorite.

(And don’t ask me to pick just one, I can’t.)

A little wink action.

 

So now, can you see why she is my favorite?

(I am working on getting ponytail pics for you mom..  just for you.)

Do I say that?

The girls are keeping up with the silliness.

What would life be without that?

I don’t want to know..  really, I don’t.

Lynn is keeping up with her goal of reading 100 books, and while reading to me the other night, she kept inserting the word “shenanigans” about every other word.

Do I say that or something?

It was pretty silly.

Peyton is on her “Labyrinth” kick, still..  kind of.  Merrill thinks she looks like Ludo, when her hair is un-done.  She likes to quip “NOT FAIR!!” no matter what the situation is.

She also has hair that is long enough for my to put in one ponytail, on the top of her head.  It is so stinkin’ cute!

She has also memorized a Quest commercial.  It comes on a lot in the morning hours when the news is on.  Her favorite part: “Mr. Pickles..  are you wearing a wire?  Tell me…  TELL ME!!”

We also made up our own version of “You are my sunshine”.  It revolves around a pickle.  Just something else the girls are asking for a lot more lately..  that and popsicles.

Ashley is Ashley, she usually assumes “the position” when her name is called loudly (or yelled in most cases).  The position you might ask..  She stands stick straight, and covers her bum with both hands.

(Can you tell who has been getting threatened a lot lately?)

They are all getting tanned and turning blonde thanks to the heavenly time spent outside.

Summertime isn’t too shabby.

She is my girl.

I went to clear the table after breakfast this morning, and found that Peyton had left this:

She is my girl!

Ate all the Lucky Charm marshmallows, leaving behind the oaties.

I try to eat all the oaties first, saving all the marshmallows for last.

(Try it.  It is kind of a challenge, kind of fun.)

She is my girl indeed…

Peyton speak.

Peyton has really become quite the gal. 

She loves to boss..  no there wasn’t enough emphasis on that…

She LOVES to boss.

Me, her older sisters, anyone she hears me talk to.  She bosses.

She also repeats about everything we say.  It is quite funny most times.

One day, Ashley was crying (again) and I said “Someone needs to go say, ‘Ashley what are you crying about fool’. 

Peyton promptly gave herself that job.

It was not well received by Ashley.

While Merrill and I work out together, Peyton is there as our little cheerleader, telling us, “Good job!!”  and clapping for us.  She even tries to join in.  My toes have come quite close to amputation when she decides to try out some bicep curls with the little weights.

She also loves to bust out the, “I-a-wuuuuuv-you” whenever it works most to her benefit, or when it will take us by surprise.  Over dinner, there is usually a chorus of “I love yous” and other variations, all started by Peyton, going around the table and telling each individual that she “A-wuuuuvs” them.

She has also recently picked-up on the word “adorable”.  Could possibly be because her sisters use it so much when they refer to her.  In any case, she now says it to just about everything.  I was mashing potatoes for Sunday dinner, and she asks, “What that mom?”

“Mashed potatoes, Pey.”

“Oh!!  A-doh-ble mom!!!”

I get it a lot through out the course of the day.

I also recalled some of the crazy things she came up with the other night when she couldn’t sleep and insisted that I stay awake as well.

- She wanted to go to church the next day (even though we had gone that day).

- She wanted to watch “The Cat in the Hat”.

- She wanted me to know that she wanted to have her chocolate milk first thing in the morning (like every other morning).

- She also wanted gumballs.

All in the middle of the night..  just to make sure that I wouldn’t forget them all in the morning.

She also attempted to paint her own toenails yesterday..  oh, and fingernails too.

She has a special love for the word “stupid” but when she says it, it sounds more like “dupid”. 

(We are trying to nix that.)

We have a routine in our house when it comes to prayers, to avoid fighting over who gets to say it, we have adopted the even/odd method that my mom and dad have perfected.  If your birthday lands on an even day, then you say prayers on an even day.  If your birthday is on an odd day, then you say prayers on an odd day.  Dinners and lunches are kind of not subject to this rule, as mom or dad picks who says the blessing on those meals.  Peyton likes to ask, no matter where we are, or who is about to say the prayer, “Odd day mom?”  She is an odd day baby, you see.

So maybe you can imagine right before the blessing on the meal, or the nighttime family prayer, the opening prayer in sacrament meeting, or the blessing on the sacrament itself, even at other family events when someone is invited to say the prayer, “Odd day mom?”

She also likes to end every prayer with a very loud “AMEN!” from her little mouth.

Top 10.

10 things this girl does that makes me laugh:

10- She sticks her tongue through her gap.

9- She wrote her name, on her seatbelt, in green crayon.

8- She sticks her gum on her nightstand when she goes to bed at night, and puts it there again before she leaves for school.

7- She told me yesterday, mid-conversation about her day at school, that her teacher called her “a freakin’ genius”.

6- She usually comes busting through the front door after school, shedding layers as fast as she can while doing the “potty dance”. 

5- When she reads her homework to us, she gives us all the alternates for words, such as: live or live, wind or wind, read or read.

4- She packs her “high heels” to change into when she gets to school.

3- The first thing she asks when she is home from school (after the much needed bathroom trip, of course..) is if she can watch more “Anne of Green Gables”.

2- She wrote her name in red crayon on the front porch, right in front of the door mat, so her friends would know that she lives here.

1- The number one thing that she did that had me absolutely rolling yesterday was something she said in a conversation with Ashley:

“Hey Ash. You wanna do me a flavor?”

That had me laughing because she used flavor, just a little slang she picked up from her parents.)

“Do you wanna be my slave today?”

I was rolling at this point, and they both turned to look at me, confused.  Ashley quickly responded with way too much enthusiasm:

“OKAY!!!”

Oh how we love her!

Makes me laugh every time..

Every time I walk into Merrill’s bathroom down at the hotel, I have to laugh!

Now you don’t have to wonder what happens to all of the “little rolls” of toilet paper left behind at hotels.

(Yeah,I know that you ALWAYS think about that..)