Stupid plastic teeth!!

So my kids have this weird fascination with plastic fake teeth. The dumber looking they are, the more likely they are to love it. Sunshine especially. They could be in a pile of mud, and she will brush them off and stick them back in. It's really pretty gross. I try to stay away from them, mainly because they just seem like total germ magnets. However....in tonight's party favor bag there were a pair of super rad "Bubba" teeth. Of course Sunshine was all over them. They were in her mouth faster than the candy.... also in the bag.

The funny thing is, her mouth is so small, that it just looks like she has a mouth full of marbles along with those rubber teeth. Not to mention when you get that much business going on in your mouth, you can't properly swallow excess spit. So she just has this steady stream of drool. Much like a St. Bernard dog. Whats even funnier is that she insists on carrying on a conversation with you while wearing said teeth. Which goes something like this. "HBYRUTYDCDFHjf!!" .........."what?" .....bncfreurhruj!!......"what?" It's really hard to keep a straight face.

She reminds me of Eduardo from Foster's home for imaginary friends. Too many teeth with not enough mouth.

Safari Sam's is made mostly of awesome!!!

So Safari Sam's is this place in my area that is one of the largest indoor playgrounds on the west coast. It has an enormous jungle gym, an arcade , a room for bouncy inflatable things, and a miniature golf course. It is best known for it's birthday party packages.

Well some very close friends of ours had a birthday party for their daughter there tonight. It was nice to get the kids out and blow off some stink, but it was nice to hang out with grown ups and not worry about our kids peeling the paint off the walls too. Our friends used to be the music Pastor for our church while my husband played on the worship team with him. Our kids were about the same age, so we used to hang out a lot. But they took another job in another town and moved (just part of the job, you move where God tells you to ) so we don't see each other as often as I would like. So it's nice when one of our kids has a birthday or something. It gives us a chance to get together.

All in all it was a great night. Considering all the sugar the kids consumed, there was no meltdown or sass. Once we got in the car, well thats another story. But at least they saved it for behind closed doors :)

Here are some pictures of our fun night. Note...I only got 1 of bug, mostly because he barely stopped moving for me to take one :)

Well they did come from afar...

I just want to take this moment to recognize just how cute kids can really be.

This is what I found in front of the manger scene of my Christmas village. Also I would like to add, in case you can't really see whats going on here, this is a plastic lizard, a plastic donkey (from another nativity set) and invisible girl from the fantastic four all basking in the glory of our infant savior. I just think it was nice of them to show up :)

The Oregon food bank

So every year our local fire department collects for the Oregon food bank which gives families in need food when they need it. It's a pretty cool organization. I'm sure every state has their own version of it. It's just cool because it is very hard to abuse this organization . They don't give out money or anything else that could be traded in for drugs. So the people that need it, really get the food that is donated.

Anyhoo....our local fire department puts on a sort of "parade" through the neighborhoods. Between 6-9 at night 5 fire trucks crawl through the residential streets with their lights and sirens a blarin' just to get everyone's attention. (like how could you miss that?) Then the fire chief walks around with a bull horn and tells people to "go back in their houses and dig through their pantries for non perishables to donate." Then everybody comes out with arm loads of food. Then one of the old fire trucks is all dolled up with lights and has Santa on it. Volunteers come and get our bags of goods and in return give us candy canes.

Bug and Sunshine loved it of course, but Peanut was sort of spooked by the REALLY loud sirens. All in all it was a really cool night though.They do it though several different neighborhoods. We may just go and do it again in somebody else's neighborhood before the season is over.

Look out Bobby Fischer!!

So last night Sunshine had a sleepover with Grandma and Grandpa. So Bug had us pretty much to himself. When he gets special "Bug time" he really likes to play games. As any red blooded boy of 6 does. So he decided he was ready to learn how to play checkers. He caught on really fast and within a couple games he was whipping both my husband and I. We weren't even taking it easy on him and letting him win. He was really beating us. Repeatedly. So apparently we have some big checkers champ prodigy living under our roof :)

Monkey see monkey do.

So my husband stayed home today. He's been having a hard time sleeping and his job is really high stress right now, so a little hookey was in order.

Well on his days off you can most likely find him playing xbox or as of recent wii. Although the wii is the "kids" Christmas present (don't tell them), but my husband can't seem to keep his hands off of it. After all....Christmas is still like 3 weeks away and we can play it when they go to bed and they'll never know. One of these days someone is going to sneek down the stairs and we'll be totally busted.Caught with the remote control nun chucks in hand. But until then....I can totally kick his butt in tennis. But that is neither here nor there.
So video games are just a normal part of our life. Although it really cracked me up when I see my husband playing xbox this morning (Nothing new) and I see peanut sitting next to him with a spare controller pointing at the screen. He didn't know what "it" did, but he knew that we point these at the screen and watch the screen. It was pretty cute. He knew what to do.

It's a sad, sad day.

Today we hold our hearts at half mass in honor of our beloved "whitey" the crab.

I went to feed the crabs today and noticed that whitey was completely out of her shell and not moving. I know that sometimes crabs will change shells if they get too big for their current one. So I go out to the garage and get a bigger shell. I set it next to her. Nothing. I tap the glass. Nothing.

I realize that when you buy a pet from the mall, you have a 50/50 chance of making it a month. And frankly I had no love for these dumb crabs. But Sunshine loves them. she checks on them a couple times a day, she sings to them. I really didn't want to tell her. But I did and she was ok with it. Her first response is that "Jesus can play with whitey now."

Sure why not. We'll go with that.

Here's some pictures in case you ever wondered what a crab looks like without their shell. well wonder no more!

The good old days weren't always good.

Can I just get an "Amen" for being born when I was? I mean seriously!

The great tree decoration

So tonight is the night we decorate this tree that is now tinkling needles all over my already dirty carpet. It does smell nice though.

Everything went off without a hitch. We all enjoyed pulling out all of our ornaments that we have gotten over the years. Each one has a story and I can usually remember where each one came from. We really don't have any just "random" ornaments. Each one is special. So we went through them and got them all on the tree. Everyone helped. Even Peanut. Although he was more determined to take them off the tree than put them on. It was a good night.

Then when it was all done we sat back and just enjoyed looking at it.

The best trees are Bug approved....or real trees vs. fake

So today after church we decided that today was the big day. The day we get our tree. Normally I am a big fan of the fake tree as I have been in the "fake tree camp" for years. I know there are some of you that have "Views" on this sort of thing, but frankly, fake trees are just easier. You pull them out of the box that's been in the crawl space all year and ...Voila! Instant holiday cheer!! But last year my husband grew tired of our sad looking tree and decided that it was the last year with it. So we got rid of it when we took down decorations last year. That fact slipped our mind all year until we started thinking about decorations a couple weeks ago. So needless to say....we needed to do something. So he suggested that we get a real tree this year.

Now don't get me wrong. I love the smell of a real tree. You can't beat that. But there are soooo many drawbacks. Like first off....we have cats. Cats that love to climb trees. In fact that was what pushed me into the "fake tree club" in the first place. About 10 years ago when Merlyn (our tuxedo cat) was a kitten, he climbed the tree so much and knocked the whole works over so many times that I ended up hanging the whole tree, stand and all from a series of hooks from the ceiling. it was pretty elaborate. I vowed then and there that I would never do a real tree again. And I hadn't ....until now.

So Bug and I venture out to pick one out and haul the dumb thing home. In the van. Good times.

We pull up to the place and Bug leaps out of the car totally thrilled with his responsibility to find the perfect tree. He meticulously examines each and every tree on the lot. Finally he has made his decision and a deal is made.

After much wrestling with this dumb thing I get it secured on the roof rack of my van and off we go at a staggering 15 miles per hour and with the hazards on the whole 4 block journey back to our house. I'm not taking chances. The whole works is held together by 2 bungee cords secured to the roof rack. I guess it was wrong to assume that the place would.... you know, help me get it on the car and tied down securely. Yeah,.... no. I was wrong. We were pretty much on our own.

But it all worked out and it is now drying off (it rained all day) on a table cloth in my living room. We'll decorate it tomorrow. Bug was so proud of himself for finding such a great tree. I am too. he did a good job. My mom was even here to share in his triumph.