Sperry's Speeches

Happy St. Patricks Day! Check out the rainbow cupcakes! Fun!

2011-03-17T21:07:00.000-05:00

And now he's a fireman! Apparently jack likes hats :)

2011-03-04T09:48:00.001-06:00

Today Jack is king!

2011-03-04T09:10:00.000-06:00

2011-02-25T09:01:00.001-06:00

myoglobin

Projects that Hillary Built

2010-05-11T19:12:00.005-05:00

I've definitely been busy in my absence. In the last 3 weeks I went crazy got sick and went crazy again. Anyhow go check out my Designing Happy Blog for the sewing I've been up to and here I'll show you my house and family stuff. This is the landscaping I put in by our porch. If you don't remember, this area was full of rocks and Allyson and I hauled all of the rock out so we could plant our flowers. This happened while Alex was out of town and Alayna had just fallen and jammed a stick atleast a 1/2" up and into her leg. It's still healing. The plants are still growing. This landscape project also resulted in some forehead damage to Phoebe while she was helping me shovel and walked behind me and my big shovel... whack, cry, oops, bandaids! This is the Mailbox I built. I'm pretty proud of it. No plans and no help. Leveled it, poured the pad, mixed the mortar, laid the brick, and hurt my wrist, all by myself. :) My wrist still hurts too. By the way that's the neighbors house but it's our mailbox. This is the curtain I'm still working on. It should be done by now but it's not. It's beautiful and I'm excited for it! That's red velvet and a shiny metal colored fabric that's amazing. Please ignore the mess in the room, I was getting the picture while I could. The fireplace pics are coming :D On other news, the kids are getting big. Ally will be 11 this year and she is a little grown up, so helpful I am loving having big girls! She reads like crazy, is very dramatic, & loves to write stories, music, & poetry. She loves being a big sister and she's good at it! She and Livvy were in the school talent show this year doing a dance number that was supposed to be singing. This year for the talent show we learned to just go with it this year :) Liv is showing me everyday what an amazing girl she is. She loves school friends and her siblings. She is creative and sweet she picks me flowers during the walk home from the school bus often. Just because she thinks I'll like them. She is also an incredible help and quick to be obedient. Alayna is thriving in school, making friends, and soaring to the top of her class :) She loves to be there and be learning. She reads well and plays well she is a friend and helper to anyone who will let her! She dances everywhere and loves to play anything involving a girl. :) Meaning dressup, princess, barbie, pretend play families really anything with a girl... or a puppy. Phoebe is my little helper. She is the big girl at home while the other girls are at school and she is Jacks helper and friend. She is so sweet and caring always worried about someone else. Sometimes it's as that someone relates to her, but she has a sweet heart :) She is learning so much everyday it's almost scary. It's the learning you can hardly control. She is always watching and copying and figuring out what works in her life and the skills she will need. Amazing, and scary. Thank goodness she's such a good girl. One of my favorite things about Phoebe is hearing her break out in song she has an amazing memory and she will often start singing to herself in the middle of a game or the bathroom etc. and it could be anything from primary songs, to Hannah Montana, to the Bee Gees (she loves stayin alive!) She is a great girl! Jack is 17 months now and in nursery, a few weeks early but we have amazing nursery leaders! He waves, says uh-oh, drives toy cars everywhere, sings & dances, claps his hands, and can open doors... and run down the street... fast. Jack is always eating and always busy. And I worry that he's to skinny. But he's happy, and cuddly. He likes to lay on mommy and daddy's shoulders. And I love his hair I've already cut it 4-5 times.

Easter 2010

2010-04-05T12:36:00.005-05:00

Here's hoping all of you had as wonderful an Easter as I did!

Alayna

2010-01-14T09:55:00.003-06:00

Happy 6th Birthday to my sweet Alayna!

Sarah took this pic of Alayna while we were visiting recently and I love it. It shows here sweet face and the smile I see there so often. she has such a tender heart. Alayna loves to dance and play and loves going to school with the "big" girls. She is growing up so much it amazes me everyday. How much she knows and is willing to learn.

We love you so much Miss Belle!

Happy Birthday!

Welcome, season of light!

2009-12-14T22:14:00.002-06:00

Happy Santa Lucia Day, umm, yesterday :)

We had many Lucia's at our house this year since everyone was awake before we were ready! That never happens to us! I've slacked and Ally didn't even have a dress! She wore my temple dress that (shocker) I didn't even have to pin up! Granted it touched the floor but we tied her in a red ribbon and that was it! Livvy followed in her baptism dress and red sash, I've decided that once they are baptized they can be Santa Lucia's helpers if they want to. The baptism dress becomes their first Lucia dress. I like that :) One good moment for this year anyway :)

Ah, how can I complain? The rolls were good, the kids were happy, and Alex took care of Jack before breakfast! And there's still yummy hot chocolate waiting in the fridge for me!

Life is good!

And Happy Birthday Joshie! I bet you love that we can never go a year without thinking of you! We love you!

Holiday Mantels

2009-12-10T14:59:00.004-06:00

I love Holiday decorations don't you! And a mantel makes such a statement :) I'm thinking of doing something a little different this year.... What do you think? Still maybe I should add a little greenery. Hmmm... Oh well! Merry Christmas!

Can you guess what day it is?

2009-12-04T15:31:00.003-06:00

Here's a Hint.... My baby boy is turning one!!! Here's my big boy on his big day! Happy Birthday Little Jack! We all love you! Can't wait to see you demolish some cake tonight!

2009-11-29T20:51:00.005-06:00

Holy freaking cow. Jack's taking his first steps tonight!! ...and I have no camera. I'm reduced to cell phone pics and video. Yuck. I'll see if I can get anything even slightly decent tomorrow.

Hi there! I'm Little Red!

2009-11-18T20:27:00.000-06:00

Ally did a full page monologue awhile back and I finally figured out how to get a video you could see and hear because the ones I brought home were awful. We got home from the talent show and this is what I wrote: I'm incredibly proud right now! Ally just preformed at her school talent show, and did AWESOME! I have only silent video from there and black video at home... geez! Here it is anyway :) (I've edited it up and lightened the black video so that you can see what's going on but the color is horrible.)

Tons of compliments and she just looked so at home up there!I think she blogged about it when it happened!

Building tents

2009-11-02T08:59:00.005-06:00

OK this happened way back in the summer but it was awesome! I remember building tents when I was a little girl and whatever day this was the girls filled the entire basement family room almost wall to wall tents! They were so proud! So was I :)Everyone got in on the game :) I hope they are always building such happy memories!

Back 2 School

2009-08-20T18:58:00.003-05:00

These are my back to school pics that never quite made it. As you will see at the bottom I started this post on time. Yesterday was quite the big day! (Yesterday? Sheesh what happened?) I thought you'd want to see some pics anyway. Even if I'm a slacker :)

2009-07-14T11:37:00.004-05:00

Hey guys I made a little video of Jack while trying to catch him practicing his crawling.

Kind of fun and you can see how big he's getting!

And, to head off any comments on the subject,

I don't know when I'll be seeing you all next but we think about you all the time!

Love you all!

Lake pics

2009-07-02T12:42:00.000-05:00

As you probably gathered from the last post it was lake weekend last week. And everyone but my camera had a great time! I have a few good shots, but mostly it was so hot that anytime I tried to pullout my camera to take pictures my lens would fog over

Phoeb's havin' a good time!

The girls tried laying out a few times of course they decided you couldn't do that without a stack of magazines. Here's Liv enjoying her Midwest Living or some other magazine not geared for teenager's or girls laying out :) I guess I should be genuinely happy but I can't help but laugh a little!

Here's Ally being taught by Anna how to hold her sparklers :) We've never been as careful with the fireworks as we probably should!

We of course had tons of fun in the water! This is Alex, Jack, Layna, & Livvy enjoying some float time :) They all came back crispy!

Surprise, surprise, this is where Layna spent most of her time!

Here's my boys wishing you a happy summer!

Happy 25th Anniversary at the lake!!

2009-07-02T07:00:00.002-05:00

This is the cake I made for the 25th anniversary of lake house ownership for the Malter/Sperry/Blackburn Clan

We celebrated with chocolate cake and marble cake both filled with rich chocolate ganache and topped with a layer of the same yummy stuff!

It was wreathed in fondant leaves

I thought it looked pretty cool! The chocolate stripes remind me of a hat box :)

Oh do you know the muffin man?

2009-07-01T10:10:00.002-05:00

This face is not unusual at our house... I decided to pull out the muffin tins today... Now I'm seeing faces like this....

He particularly likes it when there's food in the muffin tins :) ....

I might actually be able to make dinner now!

Thank goodness! We've finally met the muffin man!

Jon and Anna's Wedding Madness!

2009-06-12T19:39:00.004-05:00

Well it was slight madness for me but that's all it takes right now! So 2 weeks ago it started with truffle making... ha, ha, ha! Yes I had planned on making 1,000 truffles.

What can I say I think big :) I only made it to 700 with the help of the lovely Suzanne who is currently staying with us. They were milk chocolate dipped in either white or dark chocolate. and most were specially decorated with little pink flowers or a squiggly S type of Monogram.

Then after leaving for Missouri last Friday morning I spent Saturday at a Civil War reenactment with my Mother and Sisters. Fun! Pretty much I love anything that involves dressing up! Then Monday morning we imposed on my good friend Laura and I started the cake. Wow! It was gorgeous! 6 tiers, the 1st one chocolate with chocolate chips and filled with chocolate buttercream, the 2nd was white filled with a cherry filling, then Marble with a coconut and pecan buttercream filling, then we had 2 layers of strawberry filled with strawberry buttercream :) , and it was topped with another chocolate layer filled with strawberry buttercream!!! Aah! It was so good! Here's pictures!

All the stuff sticking out of the sides was from a flower display behind it :)

This is a good close up so you can see a few of the details :D

I have to thank Both of my good friend Lauras! Laura McDavitt was absolutely incredible hosting us while I destroyed her kitchen and my children overran her house and she watched my baby and helped settle many of the decisions that were made during the cake and pictures process! And thank you Laura Aitchison who so willingly put us up in her house while we stayed for the wedding in Nauvoo, she guided me around to help with picture ideas, and helped me prep and choose pictures! Thank you Thank you to the fabulous Laura's in my life!

And this is a picture of the wonderful new little family that we did this for!

Congrats Jon & Anna! We love you!

Sperry updates

2009-05-13T10:58:00.008-05:00

So, Jack just learned how to hold and shake a rattle.

OK, in our best sappy sniffly voices, let's all say "I'm so Proud!"

Hehe! Things are still goin' here :)

Ally is gonna be in her school talent show doing a little red riding hood monologue. It's a full page long.. of 12 point single line typing. She's got it down!

Livvy is amazing! She does everything she's told and her only desire is to go to a birthday party... someday.. it seems every one she is invited to is on Sunday (We don't do parties on Sunday. I know I'm a mean, horrible mom. But it's our day and the Lord's.) or we are gone that weekend. It's really true! I keep telling her it's no big deal that there will be lot's of parties in her life but even I'm starting to be shocked by the odd coincidence of every time!

Layna has discovered she will be starting school in the fall and thinks she's about the hottest thing around!

Phoebe's a screamer who has taken up boys bathroom habits of spending hours on the pot. I think I need to get her a stack of board books in there while she sits. So, annoying when I have things to do.

In general, things are good. Alex has a window washing business now and I have a pattern design company. I'll post when websites go up!

While Daddy's away...

2009-04-28T19:01:00.002-05:00

Well Alex was gone to Moab for about a week starting the 15th and I thought I'd put up a couple pictures of the fun we had while Daddy was off playing!

Happy Conference

2009-04-07T10:52:00.002-05:00

I hope you all had a fantastic conference weekend! Our family was lucky enough to spend it with Alex's family Saturday, Saturday Night we had girl time and talked wedding and dress for My soon to be Sister in Law! And here is a picture of Sunday

we spent that with my wonderful parents. Phoebe obviously enjoyed her time with Grandpa :)

But I think honestly the highlight of the weekend was sewing Friday till 2:30 am with my momma and sisters! Only Natalie and I lasted till the full 2:30 of the morning... hehe... We felt a little sorry for the people who live on the same block as the quilt shop because when your up that late, and still enjoying it :), no matter how sober you are you start to sound drunk! We're prepping for another girls weekend I think. We're all starting to feel it!

Anyhow, Conference was wonderful, and I can't wait to get it on CD so we can go over it again and again. Lots in there for us. Hold the course. Be positive. Have faith.

Sorry

2009-04-07T09:59:00.002-05:00

So.... I'm sorry guys apparently my last post was misleading and I feel the need to come clean... That is not my quilt. Sad but true. Apparently you were all as taken with the fabric as I was because I never said I made it. I simply chose it because it looked like it was swallowing some lucky little girl in fabric :) It was really just supposed to be one of those generic web found pictures used to illustrate a point. Feel free to continue admiring it though, I know I will!

Guess what I've been up to!

2009-04-02T08:19:00.002-05:00

Hey everyone!

So I know it's been awhile :) sorry! I think the fabric and quilting world is eating me alive! lol!

I've been contributing almost regularly on the Missouri Star Quilt Co. (MSQC) blog

I've also started a quilting blog of my own!

It's pretty exciting for me because I decided to do this to promote quilt patterns that I am in the process of designing and printing. There aren't any completed ones up yet, but several sneak peek pics and just other info about little projects I'm working on :) Go check it out if you have a chance. It's called Hillary Ann... Designing Happy
I chose the name thinking it fits in so many forms... Designing happy kinda like Slap happy, designing and I'm happy :), and designing happiness. My goal was more for that last thought (though I kind of like the slap happy connection :) ). After all my mother was a big believer in you choose how you feel so why not be happy by design!

S. W. Photography

2009-03-07T14:48:00.006-06:00

So, how lucky am I to have a fabulous photographer friend who while visiting after month's away from eachother actually wants to spend time taking gorgeous pictures of my sweet baby! Super lucky that's what.

Thanks Sher!

I tried to pick just a couple of these to put up... I grabbed almost all of them and then took some off so I didn't overwhelm the page. If you want see the rest click here to get to her blog page. The pictures really are fabulous!

Ally the fashion designer

2009-02-27T08:21:00.005-06:00

Well atleast I know she's a trend setter and not the follower :) Ally has decided that these ballet skirts are to cute to only wear to dance class.
She brings them to school and let's her friends wear them too as long as they return them. Apparently she likes them to well to let them out of her site :)
Aww, my little fashion designer is growing up :)

By the way the awful picture quality from this and the last post is because they are phone pics... My nice new camera I got for christmas is already on the fritz so it's been sent off because walmart now has a 31 day return policy for cameras and electronics. Understandable but frustrating :) So this is what ya get for a while, sorry :)

My favorite Soiree

2009-02-23T10:34:00.006-06:00

Okay, so I'm dying! The MO Star Quilt Co. has their new daily deal up and it's one of my favorite fabrics... Lila Tueller's Soiree, *sigh*

It's so fun! I want to make quilts for atleast a couple of my girls out of it and here's my chance! The deal is seriously a steal! The cake layer, 10" squares (around $35), The honey bun, 1 1/2" strips (around $23), Jelly roll, 2 1/2" strips (around $35), and an adorable charm pack, 5" squares (around $8) all for 69.95 ..... Oh how I wish I wasn't unemployed. :( If you've ever quilted you know $70 bucks is cheap for even 1 quilt top and should make that and then some. ( Though you probably will still want some border fabric, not required but probably :) ) If there is anyone else who wants to make adorable quilts, curtains, or other such fun projects I would be very excited to come help you. Seriously! Just ask and I'll be there just to enjoy the fun of working with such happy fabric. Call me! I'll be waiting. :)

On what I've actually been doing with my time these days, take a look :)

I am being blessed to enjoy a tiny bit of Soiree's goodness for a brief moment in time making a quilt for display in the MSQC shop.

It's been a ton of fun laying it out and cutting the appliques (iron on is a wonderful thing :) ) but I think my girl's favorite part has been all the fun fringe hanging from my table while I work on the details :)

Hehe! I love it too :)

Otherwise, life is good and I'm avoiding the thought of how little money I can spend by filling my time cooking everything from scratch.
Whoopie :) Seriously.
I keep reminding myself that it saves us money for me to make tortillas, although my bread making has gone downhill since I've been trying to use wheat & Aldi bread doesn't seem so expensive after a few flat yeasty tasting loaves :) So, instead I'm having my fun using other peoples fabric and dreaming about cute color schemes and fun new bedroom decor!

Missouri Star Quilt Co.

2009-02-18T14:18:00.000-06:00

Woohoo!!! Look at this ladies! OK seriously even if you don't quilt you've got to just go look at these gorgeous fabrics!

This is my family's quilt shop online store front :) it's fantastic isn't it! I'm so proud of them! They're doing a daily deal that is quilting at fabulous prices!!! I wish I wasn't unemployed right now. :( They also have a blog that talks about quilting and trendy fabrics and fabulous colors and projects as well as the crazy goings on of the shop!

I'm excited and I think you should be to so go take a look. It'll make you want to pay attention at the next Relief Society sewing mini class so you'll know what to do with your newly growing fabulous fabric stash!

Four sister's...

2009-02-10T11:48:00.003-06:00

So we all knew it was only a matter of time....

Really, this started off a lot happier...

Oh, and before you start in on the girls just know it was Daddy's idea!!!

Belles Tinker Belle Party

2009-02-07T16:03:00.004-06:00

A few belated pics of Layna Belle's b-day.

Sorry, you can't see them very well but this is Layna blowing out the candles :)

Making the wings!!

Layna's super cool Tinker belle purse cake :) I know, I know, "Wow, where did you get that?" Right? I know you want one too. Maybe for your birthday... if your lucky!

Our lovely winged friends playing games

All of our wonderful friends who came!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ALAYNA BELLE!

The ice storm

2009-02-04T12:54:00.004-06:00

Okay, I know all you Arkansasians (I guess, what do we call ourselves? besides crazy I mean?) know how crazy the ice storm was but here's for my other family & friends a few of my favorite pics from our first time being iced in.

Sorry

2009-02-04T12:51:00.002-06:00

As with so many others sorry I haven't posted in awhile. There's been some serious craziness happening here. Oh well, I've got several potential post pics that I'll be working on. I'll call them my ppp's . Speaking of, I do believe Phoebe's officially potty trained. Hurray for me thanks and now for the rest of my ppp's.

She is her mothers daughter.

2009-01-21T14:28:00.005-06:00

This is Allyson.

This is Allyson with my melted cutting board.

Here's a closer view of the melted cutting board.

So those of you who knew me as a child can start laughing now. Other wise pull up a chair and let me tell you a story of a little girl who was not a pyro but had a certain knack for burning things.
Wait, first, let me tell you about the pictures.
While giving Allyson a cooking lesson yesterday (this means let my big girl make dinner in the name of teaching her while I have to feed the screaming baby) I went over to the stove where I had instructed her on how to make white sauce and smelled something a little odd. The chicken was boiling and the white sauce was bubbling away happily just about done and still the smell.
Aha!
Why was the cutting board laying flat on the stove, & pushed as far as possible to the back of said stove, not removed before cooking? I don't know. It must be genetic. I groan and move pots aside and lift up the cutting board to survey the damage, praying it was far enough back but knowing this can't be true, to reveal a puddle of melted plastic on my lovely flat top stove and dripping as if it were sugar candy from the cutting board.

Poor Allyson, After several comments like I'm never gonna learn to cook, I'm never gonna get this right! (Quite the perfectionist, one mistake and it's all over :) ) I decided to let the cat out of the bag.

I've also made similar mistakes.

Yes, I told her about my experience of lighting on fire a 25# bag of flower simply by setting it on the stove (I didn't know it was hot!) and then going out to play. I don't know why I did this it just happened and as for the other experiences of my previously, unintentionally, fire prone self. I have burned everything from my fingers on the oven rack to a hole in my mattress the size of a grapefruit with my bed lamp.

So apparently this is genetic. I'm sorry Al, but it looks like you are certainly your mothers daughter.

Hi Alex, how was your day? I smell like barf.

2009-01-20T12:26:00.004-06:00

so Nat says I have to blog my awesome day yesterday... No pics but you'll walk away grateful for your own sanitary life. Be warned- this involves bodily fluids and Wal-Mart.

It's started with several very messy potty training incidents I won't go into detail on to get me in good spirits. Phoebe is having a rough time figuring all that out. So after cleaning her up for the second time and putting on a pull up. We headed to Wal-Mart for a few things I needed so we would be able to eat till Fri. First we dropped off birthday invitations to Laynas friends (by the way, I'm sorry I didn't know! And I'll call if things aren't better soon.). Upon entering the store I immediately have an argument with Alayna that comes down to do what I say and quit crying or we'll go to the car. She unwillingly cooperated and stopped crying with only halting whines coming for a little while after her concession. At this point I almost wish she'd won. So, we shop. Mind you it's Martin Luther King Day and all the kids are out of school and shopping with me. That's adventure enough you might say, but, no. I'm almost done shopping, my few things turned into a half full cart, and Layna says she has to throw up. Right like I'm gonna believe that. She's been giving me grief this whole time and acting, talking, and eating perfectly normal. Of course that phrase usually doesn't come out of nowhere but still, yeah, right. So I ask if she can wait, she grumbles something and I keep shopping. I'm on my last aisle of things I kind of need and Layna says again a little more urgently that she thinks she's going to throw up. (yes, I know, ample warning) So I say "fine. let's just go". I really did consider leaving my cart several times but she just kept acting so normal. So instead I decide to checkout. I'm holding Jack and I've got about half my stuff on the conveyor belt and Layna frantically says she needs to throw up NOW! So I grab her hand and start towards the bathroom, but my brain starts to struggle. I can't do this with Jack in my arms, I can't leave my stuff, yes I can, not my purse, not my kids, set Jack down, etc. about this point Layna throws her hands to her mouth and explodes. Seriously, this is 3-4 foot projectile vomiting going on in checkout lane 7. I'm getting dirty looks from everyone and laynas hands have created a sprinkler effect (feel free to laugh at me) and the vomit now has 3-4 foot range all around and yes I'm standing with Jack right in front of her (feel free to laugh again). (This part took much longer than the split second brain struggle I mentioned earlier) So now Layna is standing there and the chekout lady next to us is saying she'll watch my kids as I'm holding Layna's hands and setting down Jack and I start to leave but I can't leave my baby and my kids so we stop and get them too. We take Layna to the bathroom and wipe her up... mostly. Go back and stand in line for a second time since checker #7 still has half our things. I'm almost ready to put our things up when I realize I've forgotten one of the things needed to eat this week.

*Long pause*

Dang it! I have to go get it. So I take my barf smelling and slightly covered child and cart back into the aisle grab what I need and get back in line for the 3rd time. Again, as I'm almost ready to put my things up Layna says she has to throw up. Oh geez, now I'm feeling flushed. Well I'm not having that experience again in the newly cleaned checkout lane and I grab Layna and we rush to the bathroom where I leave Allyson on guard while I go and get my things from the previous checker and get in line for the 4th time so I can finally pay get my children and get out of that dang store.

But don't worry it's not over yet. Layna threw up again in the car on the way home when I couldn't get pulled over fast enough. She managed to keep it off the floor but it went all into her clothes so in the freezing weather my child is standing shirtless getting baby wiped off so she can get back in the car.

That was my day it was completed with getting home and simultaneously changing everyone, bathing kids, and making dinner. My phone call to Alex had him first laughing at my Wal-mart experience and then very anxious and on his way home at the news that the car had also been violated.

Layna's experience did not end there. Once home, she had several more moments, this time with a bowl nearby. And one in bed overnight which she adamantly denies despite her barf crusted eyelashes, arm, and hair. Because she doesn't want to be sick.

So no worries everyone yesterday was my day! I was that woman with the sick kids at Wal-Mart! And the mean mom punishing her kids making them stand out in the freezing cold naked! Woo hoo! You are all free! I win the bad day award for Monday :) Thank you, thank you all for having good days. And here's to Tuesday, that I might also be a loser of this prestigious award. I'm off to wash some sheets. :)

Happy Birthday Alayna!

2009-01-14T07:18:00.008-06:00

Me? It's my birthday?
So this is my Sweet girl,

Not quite ten, but very excited to be five!

Always a smile and a chance to play with someone.

Layna is getting so grown up!

Poor Girl :)

I woke her up this morning while I was taking pictures of my sleeping girl :) She didn't mind though! I wished her happy birthday and she hopped out of bed singing
"It's my birthday! I'm five, I'm five, I'm five!"

I call this picture images of a sleeping five year old,
and yes I'm still working on her bedtime thumbsucking. Thus, my resistance to let Jack suck his thumb. It apparently gives my kids so much comfort they don't ever want to give it up.

After breakfast I asked Layna what was different about being 5. Her response "Hmmm..... My toes." Me "Your toes?" Layna, "Yes, my toes aren't bigger." ....ummmm, ok. I don't know what she was expecting but I for one am glad that her toes didn't grow for her birthday :)

Anyway here's one more shot of my big 5 year old! Showing us her numbers...
and...
her sisters toy. Hmm....

A little Phoebe Lovin'

2009-01-13T08:30:00.000-06:00

Yeah, they get along alright :)

Sunbathing in January?

2009-01-13T08:15:00.002-06:00

What better time to pull out the swimsuits and dance in the driveway than January?

Well apparently my girls agree because last week it hit the high 60's and my girls decided that was the perfect activity for the day :) So on went the swimsuits out came the lounge chairs and towels and on went Some great dancing/sunbathing music aka Alvin and the Chipmunks... the new Alvin and the Chipmunks. I don't now if you can hear it but here's Ally & Layna taking advantage of the moment and Livvy getting ready to when the moment is right :)

Jack's Blessing

2009-01-12T08:46:00.003-06:00

We were thrilled to bless Jack a week ago on the 4th of January. We had some great support from family and friends. Several people got to meet Jack for the first time and he looked fantastic! So it was a big weekend for him :) Here's Daddy and son :) Alex gave a wonderful blessing, he even got choked up for a moment from the emotion of blessing his son, it was a sweet experience for me. Our almost family picture... Sorry Phoebe, Gramma has you in her pictures Grampa Ron enjoying his first meeting with Jack :) And we were lucky enough to have our friends Kent and Sharon Nance here with us :) It was a wonderful day made complete because of everyone who was there.

Let's back up a moment OK

2009-01-12T08:10:00.004-06:00

First off Thanksgiving....

.....hmm I never posted on that but enjoyed everyone elses posts, and like everyone else I also have no pictures. :( Sorry about that, but thanks everyone for coming!!! :) We had great fun and I hope to do it again next year if no one is opposed :)

Christmas

And so this is Christmas :) What's Christmas without a tree? The Sperry's and Grandma Jo made it down and got to meet Jack for the first time :) I think he made a good first impression Alex, poor guy, got me a camera for Christmas and now he has to deal with this :)

New Year's Eve!

This is our future Rock Band! Thanks to our friends the Enger's We enjoyed great Guitar Hero tutoring and a glimpse of the next great girl band! They've got some great rhythm :) Ally played everything at some point, layna rocked out on the drums and guitar (guitar was rather brief... I think she prefers drums), and Livvy settled in as the bass player, while our 2 year old friend max ruled the microphone! I was allowed to sub a few times, and Alex and the other dad's made some great competition for best band of the night, it was great fun! I might add that this is Phoebe and Hannah as fabulous groupies :) These groupies did best while doing puzzles for the band. So we played and talked and ate and Alex fell asleep till New year's came... It was a good night!

I think that catches us up since I was able to post Jacks birth. Things have been good here, I'm hoping to start some painting projects soon and Dad now has me thinking some Civil War Reenactment stuff, but wow that will be a lot of work! It's so much more than making a cool dress. I guess now we just wait and see where we go from here!

Happy Everything Everyone!

Jacks Quilt

2009-01-12T07:49:00.003-06:00

A little RicRac lovin!

Yes we love the quilt Mom & Sarah made for us. And yes I do mean us. Here are some pics of Jack and his lovin' the quilt but honestly... I still can't decide if I'm going to let him use it so people see it everywhere we go or if it's going on the wall in his room because it's to perfect to use!

Thanks again Momma & Sarah! I have to admit I'm lovin' that quilt shop for all it's benefits!

Nativity & Noel

2008-12-16T08:24:00.003-06:00

So our stake puts on a community concert and Nativity display every year called
Nativity & Noel.

It features choirs and groups from the area, such as performance groups, and even some spectacular High school groups, and even work choirs (the walmart choir was fantastic :) ) as well as "The Ozark Mormon Chorale" including members from all over the area. I didn't get to stay and listen to all of them this year just a short sampling of some.
But hey maybe next year I'll be in it. :)
For this year I participated in the Nativity display.

It's called an International Nativity Display and includes Nativities from all over and a live Nativity performed every few minutes.
This year Alex and I and baby Jack got to be Mary, Joseph, and Baby Jesus.
I've done it once before when we had Allyson and I looked like the young teenage Mary. They were willing to over look that this year since we had a brand new baby boy who was absolutely perfect in the manger.
He just lay there and looked around all wrapped in swaddling clothes... He did need a pacifier on the last few times. Jack was 9 days old when we did this so I ended up trying my best to sit normally in between performances but it seems every time I sat down the music would be on to cue us for another round. It probably didn't help that we always ended up stopping to talk to people who wanted to see the baby and ask questions on our way out. :)

Oh well, oh, I'd started to say that having done this once before I have to say I am truly grateful to have had this experience. As wonderful as it is to watch a Nativity scene taking place before your eyes. It's fantastic to be apart of one. To sit there listening to the narration (it doesn't really matter to me what exactly it is, they all tell the same story) and knowing you are representing the earthly family of the Christ child let's me feel so much closer to the experience and there is nothing I can think of that helps me more to remember the true meaning of Christmas.

Merry Christmas to everyone. We love you all.

It's a boy!!!

2008-12-09T08:31:00.006-06:00

It's a boy!

OK, so I'm here and ready to go! If you want to see what I did for thanksgiving you'll have to check out my sisters blogs but really I think we're all past that now :) Please every one know that I am thankful for many things. :) I am now in the Christmas spirit and after birth pain! So here's the official announcement...

Jackson Alexander Sperry

was Born

December Fourth Two Thousand Eight

At Three Thirty Three in the Afternoon

Weighing Seven pounds Nine ounces

At a Length of

Twenty and one Half inches

Quintin Alexander Sperry

And

Hillary Ann Sperry

hehe. Yeah, we are pretty excited! We have been so blessed by the love of friends and family too! From the shower and the meals and offers of childcare and personal care and visits, you have all been so wonderful. Alex just asked if I thought I would still know how to cook after this is over... my response... Well you know I can still make cheesecake so we're good. *Ahhhh, to live on cheesecake.* Sorry slight distraction, Anyway, Jackson has been well welcomed into this world. Now if we can just keep him awake to see it then maybe Alex and I can stay awake too. Can't wait for a good sleep pattern to kick in. At the right time of day. :)

Mothers who know by Julie B. Beck

2008-11-07T08:42:00.007-06:00

My friend Jolynn sent this out on facebook and it made me think alot :) and cry. Ok, so I know I'm all pregnant and emotional but yes this made me cry this morning... Perspective is a horrible thing to have some times... It makes my vision blurry... or maybe it clears it, but the tears make it very confusing to decide which one it is.

I know in this talk there is a lot of we must do this, and do this, and this. And part way through the tears gave way to being overwhelmed... The tears returned shortly after... We need to remember that there have also been many talks that speak about not being overwhelmed and not comparing ourselves to the talents & abilities of others, and the things we think... we know others are doing, but it's also important to remember what we are shooting for. The compilation of clips is from a talk by Julie Beck titled Mothers who know, I've linked it here. And while there are inspirational talks out there for women in every walk of life this one is specifically for mothers, as the title indicates, however there are many instances where Mother could easily be exchanged simply for Women. These are things that we as women should be doing and striving for not only in our families but in our lives. To help those around us and ourselves. Think of how you could improve yourself if we nurture our own minds with the gospel and time. If we pattern our homes after the Lord's will it only be beneficial if you have children? No, it blesses everyone who enters it. It would certainly be wonderful in the lives of our children though to have such peace and order around them... I think it will even help if *ahem* we (this one is definitely for me ladies) even just strive to have that.

Thinking a little towards fly lady principles a little is better than nothing, and we can bless our families and our lives simply by making the effort. (Even housework done incorrectly still blesses our families... that's such a freeing principle.) Anyway I could go on... I suppose the end rant was partly brought on because I read a few comments that were left to the video. Oh well I suppose in the end we just need to remember a couple of things, One - what good is anything if we don't have a goal to reach for, and Two - that whoever we are there is always room for improvement.
And thus the tears and blurry vision.

Yes we did have Pumpkins!

2008-11-06T11:56:00.013-06:00

So about a week before Halloween we bought pumpkins...

A few days later we dove into the gooey nastiness. The girls loved it! Ally is starting to show some pumpkin carving understanding and Livvy is doing great as well. Honestly it was nice to circle the table helping people and actually be helping some of them, because they were actually making good progress on there own! So good job to them!

Layna and Phoebe both had a blast! Layna got right into her pumpkin designing it and cleaning out guts! Woo Hoo Layna! Phoebe didn't get into the pumpkin but was very excited whenever dad pulled anything out... she eventually tried going after seeds :) She was fun to watch!

Phoebe eventually decided the coolest part was sculpturing the guts after they were out and on the table! Thankfully there was no eating it just playing with it like it was an awesome gooey sand pile!

Livvy liked it too... a little bit :) hehe

Our lit up pumpkins! Yes success!

And last here is some Pumpkin Joy from Phoebe.... For Everyone!!!

2008-11-06T11:41:00.006-06:00

My sister in law Misty mentioned this on her blog so my family has all seen it but I thought I'd post it for all my Bella Vista friends because it is so perfect, and appropriate to how we should be feeling and acting The links above will take you to a blog titled Shark Bait by a woman called Tiburon/Tib & Misty's blog... I'm so glad Tib & Misty found this, Now here's the text of her quoted post: I think Bob Lonsberry summed it up well:

Barack Obama was not my choice, but he is my president. That is true of all Americans. For the last eight years, there has been an ongoing campaign of destruction meant to handicap and hobble the last president. I refuse to be part of an effort to do the same to the next president. Those who didn't vote for Barack Obama must set a higher standard of civility and citizenship than those who didn't vote for George W. Bush. In defeat, there must still be nobility. The last eight years have taught us what happens when you set out to destroy a presidency for political gain. You help your candidate, but you hurt your country. That pattern must not be followed with this new president. America must treat Barack Obama better than he treated George W. Bush.

While the candidate that I voted for did not win - I will make this pledge. I pledge to be kinder to Obama than his party was to Bush. Cause that is how I roll.

Me again. The scariest thing about this election to me has not been the candidates or the house, though all are intimidating subjects, the scariest thing to me is how the American people have reacted. There has been more violence and acting out and growing to hate than I can remember seeing in our country. And it is wrong. Respect for me will be a hard thing to muster for someone who has not earned it from me but I can reject the hate that has begun to surround this subject, and I can be kind... and hopeful. Cause that is how I roll.

2008-11-05T13:55:00.002-06:00

Just started going through pics of Halloween and our quick but wonderful trip to be with Sarah and her family when they were blessed to have Jason sealed to them this last weekend. I found and edited this one of Phoebe. I'm trying to find one of her to put on the wall because at this point we have one of everyone (even though they are seriously out of date) except her up. I don't know that this is it but I thought it was cute and thought I'd share! Happy Fall!

Fun blogs for fun people!

2008-10-28T11:10:00.005-05:00

OK so I saw this and loved it it's a little political humor

By the way I've been meaning to point out to my sisters that they should check out Meg's blog too. It's way fun and you would love it. It's a hilarious blog by an LDS stay at home mom who always seems to find the humor in things. You guys should definitely search out her blogs about time out for women and the later jean dress karma post.

Warning: Sarcasm to be found there!

hehe sarcasm makes life fun.

Updates without pictures

2008-10-28T10:31:00.003-05:00

So I was going to take a picture of my pregnant self but I am somehow between yesterday and today missing the memory card from our camera.

But I'll update anyway.

We are approx. 6 weeks from D day and I have finally gotten myself some maternity fall/winter pants.

In fact Saturday was quite a good day as I got home from the Primary Program practice at church and had received a box in the mail.... new underwear!! hehe no not pants yet... but seriously, Hurray for new garments. Actually, my favorites came shortly after I found that box, when the mail came and I had 2 more boxes consisting of 2 pairs of maternity Jeans, 1 pair of seriously long... and cuffed gray pants... sigh... so nice, 1 pair fantastic khakis, and 3 new shirts/sweaters. Hurray again!! I felt like I'd been on a shopping spree so I spent the next little while trying everything on.

So Fun!

Other updates

Ally and Livvy are doing great in school.
My next Doctor visit is Nov. 6th
It finally froze and my tomato plant is melting in the front yard.... :) I finally get to take it down and look a little less white trash.
Of course now my counter is covered in the tomato bounty... About 41 tomatoes and half are already red... hmm, not enough to can but too many to eat... We'll see, Alex has been managing so far but he even mentioned it yesterday :)
I hear strange drip/creak type noises coming from the bathroom but nothing is wet I don't want to go look.
And we have yet to figure out how to efficiently and cost effectively work our screwed up heating system, any electrician's who want to come visit feel free!

I think that's all for now, thanks for reading and let's everyone have a round of, "Thank you very much.... For the underwear! I always wanted.... underwear. Tell Uncle Harry to have a Merry Christmas Love and Kisses...." Yeah, you know the rest and if you don't you probably don't want to. Who wants underwear songs stuck in there head anyway.

Love and Kisses, Stevie

HEHE!

2008-10-14T08:30:00.002-05:00

And we like all munched and Oh! I know how to eat like a Chipmunk mom! HAHA I just found this in my posts as a draft from October! During my pregnant and trying but not succeeding to post days :) I think this was a quote from Layna. She was just going a mile a minute that morning telling me about who knows what but she concluded a long paragraph with this and it made me laugh! So I started a post and ofcourse didn't get a chance to finish it! Love those pregnancy days... blegh!

2008-10-13T17:13:00.002-05:00

OK Ladies, on the 15th of October Handbag Planet is giving away 24 purses in 24 hours all you have to do is sign up to win, and you increase your entries by blogging about it! So go...CLICK HERE, and maybe one of us will get lucky! Thanks Misty, Laura, & Natalie for the heads up! Yeah, a lot of you know but let's spread it around a little more :)

So you've got one day left to pick out your purse and tell us all!

A homework moment!

2008-10-08T12:06:00.005-05:00

I loved this! It made me giggle :)

So, this is Livvy's, when I first picked it up I read, "This is a beautiful day." My first thoughts were that this was a random poem from Ally... she likes to right poetry... and I wondered what she was thinking about today. Moving on I read, "this is a beautiful day. Will you all be quiet! Come here." A moment of shock, wow, this poem changed quickly! Oh wait it's not a poem... third line, "Dog!" weird. Oh, wait this was Livvy's homework... Oh yeah, I helped her with this.... imagine much laughing at yourself at this point.

She was making sentences from sight words, This, Will, and Come. On the last one I told her Come here wasn't a full sentence so she added the dog part... oh yeah that fixes everything:) Anyway, it made me laugh when I started reading it like a poem instead of Homework and I'm loving anything that makes me laugh right now!

This one at least Mom will get... and yes I know you probably can't read it but it's the effect of all the added lines you need to see anyway :) You can just trust me that it's imaginative writers prompt stories about a substitute teacher and catching an iguana... heehee...

... So, I was home-schooled pretty much from 2nd grade to high school graduation despite a year or two of high school relapsing and trying out the public school system again. Anyhow one of my favorite activities was writing stories from a prompt... The problem I had is that we'd get 5 minutes and by that time I only had the first chapter or so of my story lined out and always had some kind of to be continued thing. So seeing Ally's extended paragraphs made me smile again... I could almost see her scribbling frantically and going "Oh, I just need a few more lines! Hurry, hurry! Dang, how do I end this quick...."

I love seeing my girls learn and grow. They're so smart, it's awesome :) I hope they always love to learn.

2008-09-22T08:38:00.002-05:00

Happy Happy Birthday Misty!We love you and love having you in the family!!! Have a great day!

Ally's Birthday

2008-09-22T07:51:00.004-05:00

Well I'm a few days late but I wanted to wish Ally a happy birthday.

Allyson Josephine Sperry turned 9 on the 18th of September 2008

I would like to invite you to enjoy the festivities with us...... unfortunately it's over.

However,

for your listening enjoyment turn on a Hannah Montana CD and read on and you'll get the full experience anyway :)

Close your eyes..... close em! Sorry you can't read that way can you... OK... next sense.... Smell the cake! Yes we love that one! Ally was having Chocolate Chocolate Chocolate cake, chocolate cake, chocolate frosting, and chocolate curls (...from Sam's club might I add. Great fun for her... rather unusual for me :) ) So, Ally was having very chocolate cake for her Littlest Petshop sleepover birthday party. She had 2 good friends over and they played and ran circles through the house while hitting eachother with balloons to the tune of the current Hannah Montana CD.

After the balloons and music and other various pretend animal playing, we had pizza for dinner, presents, cake, and movies... the girls stayed up late enough to play and turn on another movie

after I had gone to bed.

I made donuts for the following morning, which we all enjoyed and shortly after girls were picked up.... it was fabulous! And I have 1 fabulous cake picture courtesy of Alex.

Oh wait, 2 pictures.... Look I was there!

Truly I am grateful for Allyson, She is a huge help and a blessing to my family. She tries so hard to make others happy and she is just sweet!

Allyson's favorite color right now is blue, green, or purple... I think purple is the main winner or any combo of the three :)

She loves school! And her teacher Ms. Laine :)

I believe her favorite subject is math... "It's just so easy!" she says

Allyson loves Animals... pretty much any sort of animal :) stuffed, live, jungle, or farm!

She is such a joy, I hope she continues in her friendly hard working ways throughout her life. They will serve her better than she knows.

We love you Ally!

Zombies, and Screamers, and Stepford wives... oh my!

2008-09-11T08:23:00.008-05:00

Ok so I've been following Stephanies self discovery blogs and started writing my own, on myself, and basically I started crying into my bowl of cereal and I'm thinking I'm too pregnant to be ready for self discovery. So, I think I'm going to settle for the zombie version of myself that I've become and forget for a while who I am and who I want to be.

So forgetting all that who am I stuff, what category do you fall under?

Zombies, screamers or Stepford wives? Or are you happy? I imagine there are plenty of you who are... most of the time I am, maybe only pregnant people feel like this... in fact I think I rotate through the stages regularly... Poor Alex. Great! I feel more self discovery coming on... dang, I forgot to put a crier category up there.

Painting Practice

2008-09-09T16:39:00.003-05:00

So ladies I need some opinions.... am I crazy for wanting to paint this all over my walls?

This is basically what I want to do... (though it was a first time practice that I knew I would be painting over) I'll have white/cream walls and paint aqua and brown vines all over just for fun. I have 2 windows on one wall, a door in the opposite wall, and a large walk through on the third wall, the fourth wall is plain. And I'd basically run the "vines" vertically through all the objects as if they weren't there to begin with... ???? It is a textured wall and even with more practice I highly doubt that the edges will be much more defined... so, ths is pretty close to it. thoughts?

Scattergories... why not

2008-09-02T09:31:00.008-05:00

Use the 1st letter of your name to answer each of the following. They have to be real places, names, things.. nothing made up! Try to use different answers if the person in front of you had the same 1st initial. You CAN'T use your name for the boy/girl name question.

WHAT IS YOUR NAME? Hillary

4 LETTER WORD: High (as in High school, High notes, high bar, let's not get high, you know... high things.)

BOY NAME: Harry (this is what my name always had to be if I were a boy... I hate it.) (just so you know:) )

GIRL NAME: Harriet.... seriously H names... come on!

OCCUPATION: Hair stylist

A COLOR : Hot Pink.. is that cheating

SOMETHING YOU WEAR: Hat... Hot pants

BEVERAGE: Hot chocolate

FOOD: Hamburgers... w/ avacados :)

SOMETHING FOUND IN A BATHROOM: Hand cream

A PLACE IN ILLINOIS: Haunted town of Alton Illinois... thought that was better than some random H town... yeah so why Illinois?

REASON FOR BEING LATE: Hair emergency

SOME THING YOU SHOUT: Holy Cow!

Misty's comment - This was harder than I thought it would be...give it a try. This may be hard for some of you, for me all I really had to do was put Hot in front of a word to make it work :) I tried to be a little more creative on them... It was probably more fun doing this to than it will be for you to read it.... but enjoy it anyway and think of the giggles as we thought of the things that didn't make the list :) Happy Day everyone!

Phoebe's update

2008-09-02T08:25:00.002-05:00

So I decided that Phoebe seems ready and hinting about potty training time... Anyway this is about par for the course at this point. Same as the other girls. This is a picture of Phoebe from this morning diaperless and happy... I'll post the pictures of me crying later... it can be a rough process :)

Phoebe has also upgraded to a big girl bed. Yes, it's still her crib we just removed the outside bars. you make do what can I say. :) We tried it first during naptime almost a week ago now. She was up about 4 times before she actually went to sleep. That night she went down with no problem... but she apparently rolled out of bed about 4 times during the night as she would wake up crying in the dark and we'd find her standing in the doorway not understanding why she was awake. :) Long night :) Anyway the next couple nights she was only up once and now she's doing great! Atleast that's one Phoebe success on the books. We'll see what happens with the rest :) The girls are thrilled about Phoebe's big girl bed success because that means Phoebe will need a new bed before Jack comes and that also means someone is gettin' bunkbeds! Woohoo! Seriously, they're thrilled... I just laugh at their simple happiness:)

Well you guys have said you wanted to know what was going on with me... hehehe... Now you know :) Potty training and new beds exciting stuff huh :)

Back to School Time

2008-08-18T13:05:00.002-05:00

It's that time again, and as ready as I was for summer to be over I was surprised that after the lunches were made, and the new clothes were on, and they had made it safely on the bus, I sat at the computer feeling sad that they were gone... of course that lasted till my other two woke up and started whining at me :) and then I was suddenly grateful to only be dealing with the two of them... well, not exactly grateful :) but you know what I mean :D
Anyway, here's my only picture of them before school today (I had to change camera batteries 3 times before I got it, they almost left me!) All pressed and clean :)
maybe I'll get some after shots too ;)

Nauvoo 2008

2008-08-18T12:31:00.004-05:00

We made it out to Nauvoo this Summer... it was fantastic! The night of the pageant the girls got to play before hand and do all sorts of fun stuff!
They all watched a pioneer puppet show. It was fun they did it like a mellow drama, all the kids had sock puppets and they had to say certain things as certain puppets came up... such as barking at the dog or saying "I'm proud of you son!" when the dad came on or "Whew, that's hard work when the workers were on the set."
Definitely fun for the kids to be involved! Livvy Just hung out with Grandma :) She wasn't to worried about the puppet show They also had a great time learning some pioneer dances! The pageant actors & actresses actually went around and taught the dance to those who wanted to learn... This was the waltz... I think Alex enjoyed being the one to try and teach the girls I know Layna enjoyed it! They played in a tug of war... And then they did sack races... of course shortly after that Layna fell and cut her knee and we headed to first aid and just hung out after that :) Colored pictures and played hand games and such ;)
Then it was time for the pageant. Because we came on our "Special Stake Day" we got to sit like 3 rows from the front. It was great! I hadn't seen the new pageant yet so that was fun, but nobody seemed to know what to say when I commented on how well they'd done and how I also loved theater... is that wrong... I just wanted to talk a little theater. :) The next day we went to the visitors center... I don't know if this was appropriate... but we had fun :) Anyway we all had a great time and plan to go again next year... hopefully as time passes the girls will get a good feel of what Nauvoo is and what it is about and eventually we'll get to do more than just look at the temple with them!
Won't that be amazing!

Phoebe's Growing up too fast!

2008-08-18T12:24:00.003-05:00

So I came upstairs the other day, after I realized it was much too quiet, And this is what I found :) She is apparently thinking the big girl bed thing is pretty cool... she apparently didn't want to be discovered though :D

Birthday Lovin' for Sarah :)

2008-07-29T08:45:00.002-05:00

All the best from us too Sarah :) hehehe

We love you Sarah! We being your sisters your friends your kids your husband your in-laws your brothers your parents and even those random people you meet on the street today!

Happy Birthday!!!

Breaking the girl streak!

2008-07-26T22:14:00.005-05:00

So It's true... We are finally having a BOY!

as to the picture above I'm sure Alex already pictures him with a bike, so, there it is :)

We finally made it to the doctors last Monday and this is one of the pictures of our sweet baby boy :)

Alex is being very cute about it :) you can tell he's excited... he's often rubbing my belly and asking how his boy is doing, to which I usually don't have a response as I can't really feel him yet :)

Oh well, he'll get to meet him soon enough.

A Twilight Moment :)

2008-07-15T09:46:00.004-05:00

So anyone out there who is also enjoying the Twilight craziness and awaiting August second with bated breath but for some reason is unaware of the online Twilight love, if you will look briefly to the left of the screen and down a bit you will see that since July 12th I believe Stephenie Meyer has been submitting a quote of the day taken from the soon coming Breaking Dawn.

So just in case you were wondering what that was it is a little twilight excitement updated daily :)

It's Official

2008-07-15T08:10:00.000-05:00

All right, it's official, baby number 5 is on it's way. I finally went to the doctor's while mom was here and I have a due date of somewhere between the the 5th and the 10th of December, so right on Sarah with your estimations. The heart beat was at 150 bpm (Mom said that sounds like a girl :) ) and I have a sonogram scheduled for next Monday. So we'll be finding out specifics on due date and gender if possible very soon :)

It's Always fun when Grandma (& Grandpa) Comes, When Grandma (& Grandpa) comes Hurray!

2008-07-14T10:17:00.003-05:00

So I didn't take that many pictures but we had a great time with Mom and Dad last week!
This is a shot from the second night she was there and the girls some how convinced her that they should have a girls night sleepover and Grandma (wonderful woman that she is) let them all in bed with her... it's a king size but still, wow! This one shows a little more of the room as the first day she was here she got me cleaning out "her room" so we had a place to fit a bed in there properly.
Don't look to close, mom looks a little sick...
and that was the beginning of the last sleepover with Grandma that weekend. Thankfully Grandpa came to save her :) So while mom was here we talked and moved a ton of boxes and talked and organized sewing and talked and hung pictures and talked and managed one garage sale (maybe more next time!) Seriously, mom got me doing things that I had told myself just couldn't be done at this point and I am thrilled to have my house and my brain moving in the right direction again! A small testimonial to why every one needs a mother :) Thanks for visiting mom! and thanks for sparing her everyone else during what we thought was a free week... oops!

By the way... happy 4th :)

2008-07-14T10:02:00.002-05:00

From our very own Miss Sparkler!

lake pics

2008-07-14T09:48:00.007-05:00

So early on this month we had a fabulous time at the lake of the Ozarks we spent a week there and the girls (minus me) all got very tan :) As you can tell :) And yes I know I should never willingly post a picture that includes me in a swimsuit... sorry and oh well... Ally looked cute ...and this way you know I didn't let Phoebe in there with out an adult, so, I guess I'm just proving parental competence even at the sake of my ego :) There was also much fishing to be done. Alex got poles for the girls before we went and they were very well used. This is Layna and one of her many fishing partners Kennedy (from the Malter side of the family) They even had a dress up day and decided that even princesses should fish. And then of course what is a weekend at the lake without chocolate.

What is a week at the lake without a boat ride? This is us going out to see the firecrackers. It was fantastic! And I am terribly sorry but you have all missed out on Ally's first time driving the boat Obviously it was enjoyed by all :) And this is where Phoebe spent most of her time during the boat ride :) She loved it! and danced her way all around till she fell asleep on my lap during the ride home.

Oh, and here's how we celebrated the Indy 500 weekend

2008-05-29T10:31:00.004-05:00

So I don't know that the girls actually knew that it was Indy weekend but here's what me and my flower children did :)
Allyson learned to make daisy chains (she thought that was pretty cool)
Livvy wore flowers and rode her bike... her fastest mode of transportation.
Layna was just happy to be playing with her sisters :)
Ally putting flowers in Phoebe's hair... Phoebe loves to pick the daisies :)
Phoebe trying to get in on the bike riding, she thinks she's so old.
Phoebe also enjoyed a little crouquet :)
...and last but not least we had a little hula entertainment for the rest of the evening :)

Memorial Day

2008-05-29T10:20:00.002-05:00

OK so I took my camera to the ward picnic and never pulled it out *blush* sorry :)
So here's what happened anyway... We were all looking forward to a beautiful day and as we started getting ready for the ward breakfast it started sprinkling, we waited for a phone call that never came so Alex went to the park to see if anyone was there (thank goodness it was close :) ) Of course a little rain meant nothing to them and they were all there :) The girls enjoyed themselves the slid down slides with umbrellas over there heads and wet pants Livvy fell off the playground once and we couldn't keep Phoebe in the pavilion are for anything but pancakes :) She thought walking out in that rain was amazing. hehe

Later the rain stopped and Alex hit the trail with some new biking buddys got home just in time to pack us up for the next barbeque and for the rain to start up again. Because it was raining and the pavilion at the park we had planned on was taken we headed to the church got under the pavilion there and the wind picked up and the rain POURED so we figured third times a charm :) ran out in the gushing water back to the cars and headed to our friends house.
By that time the rain slowed and stopped again and we BBQ'd and played and had a great (even if a little damp) time.

I hope you all had a great memorial day as well :)

This ones for mom

2008-05-29T10:17:00.002-05:00

So I heard this and thought of you mom :) and girl's camp and campfires and trying to sing harmony in the van going somewhere :) and all sorts of other fun stuff
OK if it doesn't work just click on the blank space and it should take you straight to youtube.

All right Sarah... Just Beat it :)

2008-05-20T08:51:00.006-05:00

Hope fully someone will enjoy this... I enjoyed it :) It might be best with Blue's Clues playing in the background, hehe, jk :) OK maybe that fixed it.

Happy Mothers Day!

2008-05-12T08:10:00.002-05:00

So I know her name isn't Phobe but it was cute anyway :)
So I think I just had my best Mother's Day. Alex was awesome and now I'm terrified for Fathers Day :)
So here goes, a few days ago I got a truly gift worthy massage, I can't remember much but that I think I really needed it :)
Moving on, Sat Alex took me out and I went to the salon and got my face waxed I think, hehe, no but you all know how grateful we all are that I did get my eyebrows done... you know 20 min alone with some one else doing things that you need done is pretty amazing :) So I felt good and I came out and got presents for the girls... yes, yes, I know but they loved it and that makes me happy too. :) Then we went and rented 27 dresses which I loved and Alex endured :)
Then Sunday I did nothing I think. Unless I wanted to do it. I think I drizzled chocolate and washed some strawberries eating a few in between. We had friends over and had a fabulous dinner with cheesecake (that I didn't make) and strawberries for dessert. The girls gave me cute little cards and things. It was great.
Wow, so then I laid down at around 5 o'clock to rest cause I was so full and Alex cleaned up and took care of the girls. I didn't get up from that rest until 6 o'clock this morning (which is when I'm always awake now, so that was unavoidable) And I only got up for like 20 min. in the middle somewhere thinking I would need to be up for a bit, but I was still tired so I went back to sleep. Okay so seriously I got 13 hours of sleep approx. When was the last time any of us slept that long?! And you all better say before children or I'm gonna be mad! I might allow one child into the not be mad category... alright so maybe I'll just be jealous.

But anyway that was my fabulous Mother's Day. I hope you all had wonderful days as well.

To my mother,
I love you.
That's the basis of it all. You have loved me for longer than I can remember and more than I can tell and I am so grateful for the example you have given me to look to so I can be the best mother I can for my children. So, once more Momma I love you! I hope you had a wonderful Mother's Day.

My Chocolate Chip Phoebe

2008-04-17T09:56:00.004-05:00

So Phoebe can say please, thank you, no, and... cookie, and this is why :) So in the middle of her cookie the other day Phoebe started grinning like a crazy person teeth and all and so of course out comes the camera!
Oh, and yes that is all chocolate on her face. This is Ally trying to recreate the huge smile. She succeeded a little... but cookies always make Phoebe smile... I wonder where she gets that from?

Thank goodness for girls weekend.

2008-04-17T09:52:00.002-05:00

So I've been spending afternoons looking at wedding dress websites and checking out awesome cakes and thinking about making a huge painting. I think I'm starting to get desperate. My brain needs to do something creative, I'm needing to sew or decorate or something that uses some of this pent up energy. So, this morning I'm grateful that soon I will be far away from my (adorable, if not very sick) children... yeah, yeah, we all know we love them. Girl's weekend and brain relief and relaxation is not coming soon enough.

Phoebes new words :)

2008-04-11T14:44:00.007-05:00

Phoebe has finally learned to say Please and Thank You! I'm thrilled!

Or can she?...
(you'll have to turn my music off at the bottom... sorry!)

listen close ;)

UPDATESo incase you couldn't tell Phoebe's answer to every question was no and as I just listened to now with Phoebe on my lap she again answered no to every question she heard from the computer, then promptly got down "answered" the telephone and talked for a while then handed it to me and said "Tank ou" It's very cute but I guess you'll have to take my word for it :) Oh well :)

Big Sisters and bubbles :)

2008-04-11T14:21:00.003-05:00

So The other day Ally and Livvy decided to blow bubbles for Phoebe :) and seeing Phoebe bouncing and jumping around Layna put on her tutu and decided to join in the fun. Here's how it went :)

Easter Time in Arkansas

2008-04-11T14:05:00.003-05:00

So this was Easter at our house and yes these are all the pictures I took... So sue me!
Thankfully Ally decorated for us. What do you think? We left all the decorations in Texas even the easter baskets so again Ally rescued us and the girls all had custom made Easter baskets by Ally those are them on the table. Also available online for a small fee :)

Wanna be beach bums

2008-04-11T13:48:00.005-05:00

You can tell these girls have been living in Texas after all the rain we've had here in Arkansas there was a little sunshine a while back and out came the swimsuits and beach umbrellas Poor Phoebe, she has no idea what sand is :) I suppose the rocks are kind of like really big sand :)

ABC's of Me...

2008-04-04T08:34:00.004-05:00

I was tagged by my friend Sherry... and I've been following it around and so I thought why the heck not...

Attached or Single: Attached

Best Friend: Here goes probably Mom, sisters, Sherry, & Laura... Strange that's even the speed dial order :)

Cake or Pie: Cake or pie... if it's cheesecake or a chocolate peanut butter pie... Cheesecake I think :)

Day of Choice: Saturday... It's either a lazy day or a play day and both those can be fabulous!

Essential Item: My fuzzy slippers

Favorite Color: in clothes pink, in my house blue(s) or otherwise happy colors :)

Gummy Bears or Worms: Worms... they last longer and tend to be softer :)

Hometown: I claim Hamilton MO though technically it's probably Salinas CA

Indulgences: I'm trying to avoid them today, but there's a great tub of choc. chip cookie dough in the fridge. Mmmm.....

January or July: I would say July as it's summer time and in my head I look great in a swim suit!

Kids: 4 girls... Adorable sweet fabulous girls

Life is incomplete without: Alex

Marriage Date: December 29,1998

Number of Siblings: 4 brothers, 3 sisters

Oranges or Apples: Oranges

Phobias: Death and throwing up.

Quote: “Love is the feeling you feel, when you feel, you are feeling a feeling, you feel you have never felt before." -- Mom?

Reasons to Smile: I'm living with my husband :) Toddler kisses :) Grown up kisses :) little dancing girls :) ...cheesecake :) :)

Season: I would say Winter or Spring... Snow or flowers... I'm gonna have to go with the flowers and the right now :)

Tag others: Selissa, Natalie, Alicia, & Stephanie... yes all of you :)

Unknown fact about me: I don't know I don't keep many secrets... maybe that I'm a Star Trek junkie, but even that is not completely secret most people just choose not to talk about it with me :)

Vegetarian or Meat eater: Steak baby :) My mouth waters at the thought of it :)

Worst Habit: I agree with Sher - Procrastination- especially in regards to deadlines and house cleaning :)

X-rays: Yeah Dental ones, I don't think I've ever broken anything and you'd think that even I could remember that.

Your Favorite Food: American, definitely a steak and potatoes kind of girl :)

Zodiac: Pisces

Still unpacking :)

2008-03-21T09:40:00.004-05:00

Things that make me happy today... TREES! We got up this morning and found the sewer line gushing in the yard... talk about depression. but as we are on the phone figuring this out Alex stops and says we have 2 deer outside... (the water had stopped gushing, Alex shut it off, the deer were down in the ravine making their way past our house, not playing around in the nasty water- just so were clear on all this :) ) So like a true midwesterner :) I jump out of bed to see myself and then run up the stairs (it's good for the legs :) ) to tell the girls so Ally can see them out her window (how cool is that to wake up and see deer out your bedroom window) Then we decide to go out on the deck to see them if we're very quiet :) and Livvy goes first and is also first back in going (in a very loud whisper) Mom you were wrong there are 4 deer not 2! So I grab my camera (Alex is scoffing at this) and try to go take a picture. but the deer blend in to well and I can't see them through the camera lens... hmm... oh well. I lean over the edge of the deck and feel the coolness of the morning air, gaze through the trees and enjoy the last moments of watching this family of deer walking past our house.

So why is this post about trees instead of deer? I was just feeling grateful this morning as I did yesterday and the day before that I can walk out my back door and stare into trees. I can touch them and enjoy the beauty of this gorgeous area and because of them have such peace and serenity. I think the deer agree :)

By the way Still unpacking title is because I did take several pictures and even caught some deer on camera finally after zooming in but I don't seem to have a usb cable. And so the search for the missing things goes on. :)

Birthdays past

2008-02-29T09:07:00.003-06:00

Well I realized I had these pics of Laynas birthday and had never posted anything so here's to Laynas happy 4th birthday!

She had quited the princess affair! Getting all dolled up :)

She had a great time with a couple friends over and then we all went to the movies! It was very exciting :)

2008-02-16T18:50:00.003-06:00

Hurray!!!! We got the house! Did you all hear me?!?!?
They accepted our offer! We are going to be together as a family again!
HURRAY!
So here are a few more pictures of the house :)
Enjoy! I know we will!

So I started this days ago and couldn't get pics to load I'm sorry people but I'm so tired I think I'm going to fall asleep on my hands. And I haven't even put away dinner yet... and I didn't even make it tonight!
Since I wrote last- I've gone crazy a few times Livvy got sick throwing up multiple times... I was by myself.
I got a loan for our new home.
I bashed my head... all by myself... and cut my forehead... (do you feel my pain Daddy?)
planted my front yard with flowers and bushes... myself. :) and then had them snowed on :(
Still trying to finish off my partylite stuff... taking longer than I thought.. my fault, my own, myself, my fault... sorry people
Spent the rest of the time dreaming about moving or sleeping... it's always a toss up :)
Anyway, I love ya and have a good night

Updates in the dark

2008-02-10T07:10:00.000-06:00

Sorry there haven't been any new updates. Alex/Quintin is home this weekend and we are still working on the house purchase plan probably won't know Monday or Tuesday evening. So I'll let you all know later :)

I hadn't planned on this

2008-01-29T08:36:00.000-06:00

Really I hadn't, I've come across so many wonderful and beautiful posts and tributes to President Hinckley our beloved Prophet that I really felt that mine was not necessary. :) As I read Sherry's post about our Prophet and her heart felt honest feelings. It really helped me express mine as I began responding to her. So I nixed the comment sorry Sher :) but here are my feelings too.

I know how you feel :)
Every post has expressed great love and admiration for our prophet and I echo that in every strain. I remember President Hinckley from conferences long before he became the prophet... not necessarily the words:) but I always loved listening to him :) We have to remember that one of the reasons he helped us so much is because he was our PROPHET, and he gave us the words that the Lord gave to him, and the Lord placed him here for us in this day to feed us and help us in our need. But we must also remember that the Lord will not abandon his people, He was not taken from us but taken back to the Lord and the Lord will provide for our heartache, and give us a prophet to lead us through the coming days of trial.
And thankfully we will always have President Gordon B. Hinckley's inspired words and guidance to each of us as reminders of his love and inspiration, compassion and strength. Thank you President Hinckley for so often feeding the very part of my soul that was in pain or struggling.

Yes people I was joking!

2008-01-28T18:48:00.000-06:00

So yeah the $400,000 home is gorgeous but no I can not afford it!!! So I thought I'd post a picture of the house we're actually looking at :) We love it! It's not as big as the other one :) but it's bigger than our current one :) It's about 2800 sq ft and it's really a gorgeous home that has virtually everything we've been looking for! Amazing I know :)
It's just a picture of the front, I didn't bring my camera when we went through it, but it's got 4 bedrooms and a big bonus room upstairs that will probably become a combined little girls room :) laundry room, eat-in kitchen, Dining room, 3.5 bathrooms, Living room with a fireplace, a Family/media/play room, 2 decks
Ofcourse, It's not completely perfect, but it's pretty great.

2008-01-24T00:11:00.000-06:00

OK so I knowit's a bad picture but I want this kitchen and it's only 400,000 If Manda's got one for 5 surely I can do 4 right... I'm looking for vain reassurance here people... where are ya? Oh and here's the front... it's a foreclosure, ya never know :)

So ... yeah.

2008-01-23T22:05:00.000-06:00

Still here still trying to sell the house and still not quite successful :) But we are going to Arkansas anyway and going to look at houses so this should be interesting :)
I tried to take a little video of Layna singing A Child's Prayer the other day she sat down to clean up one of her many messes and just randomly started singing it with the cutest words and everything... of course made up :) but about half way through she figured out what I was doing and it became this huge performance with dancing and twirling around the living room, and then when she was done you couldn't hear a word of the song... which is what got me excited to begin with anyway :( Oh well.
She's still adorable.
So instead here's my 2 most recent videos one is Phoebe just being cute, She is quite the mothering type :)
and yes she did have a clip in her hair at one time! Just not at that moment :)
And the last is Layna singing for her daddy :)

2008-01-11T08:50:00.000-06:00

OK people here's the whirlwind update.

ALEX GOT THE NEW JOB!
(yea cheer clap and move on)
:)
We found out right before Christmas... seriously like as we were driving out of Amarilo he was on the cell phone making the final negotiations. (Not fun keeping the girls quiet while in the car for that kind of a call :) ) So Christmas came was glorious and wonderful you saw my joy on either mom or Sarah's page :) and Christmas went, I got sick... I still have mucus and a small cough that just won't go away. Nasty I know. The girls are back in school :)
I got a new job!(yea cheer clap and move on) hehehehe
For the few of you who don't know Alex now Quintin and working in Bentonville Arkansas ( I'd have to check to even know the abbreviation for Arkansas... oh well) He started Jan 7th. He's working for Maurice Sporting Goods. I am know and Independent Consultant for PartyLite candles :) And I had my first succesful show last night!!! Yea! Quintin (hehe, it makes me laugh to call him that :) ) is enjoying his job and I am too :) I'm loving the candles and candle stuff!
Layna's birthday is monday we are going to the movies to see Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium Today as well as Monday so that all the girls will get a chance to see it... it's in the dollar theater right now :)
Ally has several sleepovers this weekend and Livvy and Phoebe are just fine and beautiful girls so that's it I just looked at my camera and realized I only have a few pictures from Christmas day and about nothing else so I might post some later if I get the chance...

... Oh and my favorite thing today is a clean show ready house as that is what I am striving for every moment of everyday right now so that I can sell this house and go hunt with Alex in Arkansas, so yes A Clean House that looks and smells gorgeous! So when someone walks in they see simple beautiful decor that will allow anyone to see themselves living here... so they will want to live... in the midst of the pledged furniture, vacuumed carpet, and cloroxed counters :) (and now reading in your best nasally sales girl voice...) And of course the smell of our gorgeous Sun Kissed Cotton Reed Diffuser from PartyLite which if you would like to order one so your home can smell as wonderful as mine you can contact me at 555-partylite or visit my website at www.partylite.biz/hillarysperry :) hehe the web site's real the rest is a joke :) I love you all and hope you've had a wonderful new year so far and a great one to come and I'll be posting again soon I'm sure! :)

The aftermath of Hurricane Lucia!

2007-12-13T08:12:00.000-06:00

So I love Santa Lucia Day really! I do!

It's just not so much fun after the candles are put out and the lights are turned on.

I think people are right everything looks better by candlelight.

Now close your eyes and click your heels and say it with me, "I love Santa Lucia Day, Ilove Santa Lucia Day, I love Santa Lucia Day!" :)

"Happy Lu-santa-y Day!"

2007-12-13T07:45:00.000-06:00

It's a great day this morning!

My girls got up early ate breakfast and got to school on time only changing clothes once!

Hurray for Santa Lucia Day! :)

Ally was beautiful and helpful and then we woke Livvy up on accident while looking for Ally's white dress... oops... So Livvy put on a white dress and participated in Santa Lucia's Parade :) Livvy was thrilled! (Ally not so much :) ) The parade gathered everyone and we all ate breakfast by candle light with beautiful christmas dishes and happy little girls :)

As everyone was leaving and wishing eachother a happy Santa Lucia day Layna runs to the dor sticks her hand up high and yells "Happy Lu-santa-y Day, Daddy!" "Happy Lu-santa-y Day, Ally!" (Livvy was already in the car) So I giggled a little and echoed the sentiment with what else but "Happy Lu-santa-y Day Ally!" :)

And to everyone else who wants one, Happy Lu-santa-y Day to you to!

Things that make me HAPPY!

2007-12-07T08:49:00.000-06:00

So today I'm finding that I love fresh baked goods! I love the smell of them, I love the golden hue that cookies and bread and even the edges of a cheesecake take on when they are baked correctly :) It makes me smile to lean over fresh baked bread and feel the heat rising up from a pan of fresh baked bread, the smile widens as within the heat rising I'm am taken in further by the sent, breathe deeply and I honestly feel like I could fall into that gorgeous soft loaf of golden bread! Not to mention I know it'll make me even happier in a few minutes when I get to eat them.
Sadly enough this is brought home to me this morning as I have come very close to over cooking a gorgeous christmasy cheesecake... :( It was all swirled white, green, and red. Now it's very golden, green, and white. I'm frustrated but at least golden is christmasy right? :) I just hope it's not to dry... thus my love and happiness over beautifully prepared and delicious baked goods :) And so today I love fresh baked bread, cookies, cakes, pastries, and really anything like that!

Things that make me HAPPY!

2007-12-04T11:40:00.000-06:00

So I started this post with the intention of a list of all my favorite happy things and then seeing how long that list could become I decided like 10 things that make me happy.
So I started preparing my list...... and realized that to narrow it down would be very difficult but to do a full one would take more time than I have so I've decided to do a 1 or 2 a day thing and since I was already getting this ready here's a couple of things that make me HAPPY! but don't expect this much in the future!
My first HAPPY post is

Baby Fingers The way they touch and look and hold tiny things finding for the first times and watching them discover what wonderful things these hands are capable of. Seeing such tiny replicas of my own hands, having them come up and pat you on the arm or the cheek or wherever they happen to be able to reach is such a sweet feeling.
I love baby hands... even tiny dirt covered hands :)

A Gourgeous Gown I love a well made gown... not just a pretty dress, but a Gorgeous, long, uniquely designed, well made, gown! I love the way fabric hangs on a gown I don't care if it's straight or aline if it hugs the body or billows in layers of tulle or drapes in a shapely bias cut gown. Any tme you see a gorgeous dress like this I start to imagine myself wearing it ...which usually leads to brief moments of depression and frustration but, The first initial thoughts of these gorgeous gowns are just enchanting (speaking of I'd love to see that movie... have you seen her dresses? :) ) they make me think of Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty which in turn makes me feel that anything is possible.
I love a gorgeous non cookie cutter well made gown :) (By way of designers I'm a big fan of Jane Wang, The Klienfeld Collection (some are a little eccentric but unique and gorgeous), and the picture is from the Pronovias Collection which is quite beautiful... I like to look at dress sites the way Al and Sarah look at photography sites :) by the way there is some good creative photography with some of these designers!)

2007-12-04T08:27:00.001-06:00

So I've just convinced Layna to change out of her ballet clothes so we can go to the store to buy Dora cereal, but she is not happy about it so she pulls off her tutu and turns her back to me stomps her foot and shouts "ZIP!" I raise my eyebrows and calmly say "Ask me nicely please." She gives me a grumpy face, stomps her foot again, and a very little bit quieter yells "Zip!" I shake my head and say "Nicer" I of course am waiting for please, she stomps her foot again and says "Zip!" Mom shakes her head. Layna, foot stomps and a little quieter says"Zip" still looking very grumpy. again I shake my head and say "How about, Will you please unzip me Mom?" Layna's face sudden'y changes to a confused, and very sad look, "But I said that Mom"
Hmmm.... maybe I'm missing something. :)

A ballerina's Mother's life :)

2007-12-04T08:01:00.000-06:00

So this is what I'm doing all the time right now Layna has been wearing this ballet outfit as often as possible for the last week :) Even when we go places and I make her change into "normal" clothes she will turn to me with the most worried expression a 3 year old can have and ask "But I can change back to these ballet clothes when we get home right?" Because not just any ballet clothes will do and life isn't life if she's not dancing :)

Decorating the christmas Tree!

2007-11-28T11:00:00.000-06:00

This actually happened the monday before Thanksgiving :) I love decorating! We went through a whirlwind day trying to get things cleaned up enough that I was comfortable getting out all this christmas stuff and then the girls had a blast! We mainly did the Tree, The Nativity, and of course what is the tree without the Christmas train! :)

I guess it's time to blog again :)

2007-11-28T08:27:00.000-06:00

Well here I am.

Yeah. Hmm...
Boy I'm exciting! Aren't I! :)
I guess it's time to go and find out what's on my camera, I'll be right back.
Well first it looks like we have leaves! This was a while ago but it was a lot of fun... in fact the pile may still be out on the lawn. Oops huh, it never made it to the trash :) Ally's so pretty! I have a bunch of these! This is one of my favorites but I guess I'll have to scrapbook it all and show you later:)

Halloween!

2007-11-02T11:38:00.001-05:00

Here's some pics of costumes and pumpkin carving! Definitely a favorite fall passtime :) Here's how my Texas trick or treaters were dressed hehehe (truthfully it did get a little chilly :) but Livvy wouldn't have it any other way!) And Phoebe was eating candy and dancing to... was it Monster Mash? Anyway it was adorable as always :) Here's Livvy... And her pumpkin :} Here's Layna... And her Pumpkin :S And here's Ally... And her Pumpkin :) Anyway I hope everyone had a wonderful time! We miss you all! Happy Halloween!

The Big Birthday Blog!

2007-11-02T08:57:00.000-05:00

So this is long awaited by all I'm sure! So I need to show pictures from our 3 fall birthdays!
First we have Ally who had an awesome Diva Party
(This only shows the divas age 8 and younger:) No telling when I'll post my own awesome diva shot,hehehe) Then we have Ally the Queen Diva of the night ;) Livvy's party was awesome... I'm lucky anyone came really. I went around searching out parents the week of because it had taken so long for me to get on it & to figure out who Livvy even wanted to invite. But it was fun and Livvy had a happy day! I think I have a picture from long ago with me & my friends in our own paper plate birthday hats and all holding cabbage patch dolls. It reminded me of this one with all their homade party hats they got to decorate and create their own hat it was fun :) Then I wanted to show the cupcakes I took and frosted each cupcake on their plates like a mini cake using whatever colors I previously had it wasn't till after spraying on the blue that I realized I'd made 4th of July birthday cakes :) The middle platter was just made as rainbow as possible. :) Seriously I think Phoebe was a little jipped it doesn't really even look like a birthday. :[ But She loved the food and Livvy loved the cake! :) Livvy sure knows how to get into the spirit of things :) And Sarah, she did stick her face in the cupcake of her own accord (and idea I had nothing to do with this except for the picture:) ) So that was our birthday... time... couple of months... whatever you want to call it :) Happy birthday to my girls :) I guess it's time for some new tickers:)

Baby Talk!

2007-10-14T18:46:00.000-05:00

So we've had a lot of sickness going around the last two days and I meen some serious sick. Eww! So who else but Mom is taking care of everyone? That's what I thought. So anyway, I'm a little tired and I happen to know that my girls are at one end of the house and as I'm walking to go put away some laundry I hear the radio playing loudly (not blasting... it's been worse :) but loud) and I'm getting upset, I round the corner and look in the room to go shut it off and I see Phoebe standing there swaying to the music and bending down to pickup one of there toys every so often. It was too cute! :) So I let the radio stay on and watched her for a little longer as she kept dancing and lookin around before I went on to finish putting the laundry away and continue with my normal stuff. It's sad but life goes on. :) Love the memories :)

Here you go

2007-10-08T12:09:00.000-05:00

So this weekend I have been flattened against the cabinets in the kitchen stuffing metal cables down a 1 1/2" tube in the wall and pulling it out covered in black sludge and a lye solution that was supposed to be cleaning the pipes and instead kept splattering ourselves..... Continued :) We had some horribly clogged pipes starting from Fri. morning we have been unable to use our kitchen sink and although the lye solution worked the best of any of the pipe cleaners every time it touched us we had to hurry and run it under hot water or we would end up with a painful if not deep burn where it had touched. At one point as Alex pulled the cable out of the wall and I tried to hold it steady it turned and splattered across all my arms and neck... that was probably one of the more painful moments. :] But after several tries with an electric snake and In the middle of Conference(coincidence? I think NOT:) ) and after much prayer It started to finally drain.... slowly! By the end of the day it was fixed and we were able to get some of the 2 days worth of dishes washed before the morning. I still have to go and wash off all the things that had sat under the kitchen sink because they also are rather covered in lye polka dots :) Fun, fun, fun!

Conference was great wasn't it. There wasn't anything in particular said to fix this but somehow it really helped me get over my woe is me feelings I've been dealing with (again) lately :) There was a lot said that helped me in other things though. I think it brought back all my smiley faces too (as you might have noticed there are quite a few in this post :) )