Valentines and the Seatle Aerospace Museum

 Every February I like to go to the outlets to get the kids their fall clothes for the next year. This year we went and made a weekend of it. I am not sure how much money I save but it was fun and  I am done for the season. I really hate to shop so it works. While I shopped the kids went to the nearby train museum.

Here is Keaton and Annie near the logging train.

 After I was done we headed over to the Seattle Aerospace Museum. The kids REALLY wanted to do this wind tunnel. Look at Annie's CRAZY hair in there. They thought it was pretty cool.

 There are also lots of planes to ride in. Annie had to be the driver too :) We love this museum and plan on going back many many times on our passes!

 I have really tried this year to celebrate more. To make the little things a big deal. I made pillow cases for each holiday and we have tried to make it fun in other ways. For Valentines I made a fondue dinner by candle light. I wanted it to be healthy so I found a fondue that was a lot of chicken stock. I then roasted a ton of veggies and bought some other fun veggies for them to dip. I bought some bread sticks for Lee and the kids. We got out the "fancy" plates and cups and made a fun dinner out of it. The kids loved it! They loved even more the chocolate and peanut butter dips to dip their fruit in for desert.

 Last but not least Tessa is still growing and a total delight in our family. She is usually happy and we all fight for her attention. She started eating foods and will eat most anything. We can't imagine life without our little Gracie Girl.

Christmas 2011

 Christmas was a great time with family and friends! Here is a quick re-cap! At Grandma Palmers the kids LOVE Grandmas long balloons. The boys made all kinds of cool things. They had a great time blowing them up and then building stuff :)

 Annie pretty much just liked to "OWN" them. She was too busy trying to hold as many as she could to really enjoy them. She even fell asleep guarding her collection!

 Aunt Stacey pretty much rocks! She had all the kids come over and decorate cookies. She helped each one cut out their shapes then had tons of decorations for them.

 Aspen was a great babysitter. Tessa loved her!

 Tessa opening her gifts. She didn't really get it.

 This was a bad picture but this is my nieces and I dancing at the Church History Museums children center. We had a great time!

 My cute family at the Temple Square Lights.

 My Mom's family got together for a breakfast together. It worked so well we think we are going to need to do it that way again!

After my Grandma died most of her Granddaughters got little daughters in the next year or so. I still think she had something to do with it :) Here are SOME of those little ladies!

Thanksgiving 2011

We started out the month with Keaton's Birthday. Can you BELIEVE he turned 6. He was pretty excited! We were really happy to have Grandma and Grandpa Palmer up for the celebration!

Living away from family has been really hard around holidays. We have found it best to "get the heck outta here". For Thanksgiving the last 2 years we have gone to Portland. It was really fun. This year we went to the Portland Zoo. It is really a fabulous zoo. The only bummer was I had surgery 2 weeks before so I wasn't getting around too well.

I really don't know how this got in the middle....blogger changed. Annie also started ballet classes in November. She LOVES the ballerina training she is getting! She is a natural!

Lee and the kids sizing up the bears. You can see Tessa was not too impressed :)

Tessa and Annie "matching". They love to stay in a hotel....especially when they can SWIM!

Lee and I took turns going to the Portland Temple. I had a pretty great experience there. It is a lovely Temple. Annie always wants to have her picture taken at a "Princen Temple".

Savannah

This is from the here and now. I know I risk putting this out of order but this serves as our family journal and I don't want to forget this experience.
Savannah has always been a very careful special child. She picks up on things and understands things way beyond her years. On St. Patty's day I painted foot prints on the toilet and tried to pass it off as leprechaun footprints. Keaton fell for it completely. Savannah looked at me, saw a TINY dot of paint on my leg said nothing but pointed at it and shook her head at me. I tell this story just to remember how she looks at details and sees things other kids miss.
This month Savannah has been suffering with her ears again. We were told to do the "drops" and they didn't do anything. After that we tried antibiotics and they also did nothing. The Pediatrician said that there was a HUGE build up of blood on the ear and that she did not have the skill or tools to take it off but that was probably causing the pain. She suggested that I take Annie to the ENT. We made an appointment and waited in pain for the day to come. She woke up every night in pain up to the appt. day. The night before she was up 3 hours. It gave me plenty of time to panic about the appt. The pediatrician said that any other drops would be painful so they would probably have to do some sort of "procedure" to remove the dried blood and Savannah would probably freak. I was worried how I would comfort Savannah and get her through it and take care of Tessa. I thought about who I could call to come take Tessa. I prayed that it would all be fine. I thought of a bunch of ladies and my thoughts kept coming back to Jewel a gal I visit teach. I kept dismissing it thinking she has a new baby too and a lot on her plate so she couldn't help me. The thought came again, "Jewel will be there and it will be fine". We drove up to her appt. the next morning. I was nervous. You can imagine my surprise when Jewel was walking into the building at the same time as me. She had an appt for her son at the same time. We visited in the waiting room and I told her about the thoughts from the night before. You have to know Jewel to know that she is really laid back easy going gal. She put me at ease.
We went into the appointment and the Doctor said we don't have a ton of choices. The blood is causing the pain and we have to get it off. He said we could put hydrogen peroxide in her ears 2x a day for 4 days but the pain is unbelievable and after the first time she would freak when I got near. He said though the only other option would be for him to remove it with his tools. He said it was also very painful and he didn't have many patients that could tolerate it awake. She would have to hold still and that would be near impossible. I asked for a minute to talk to her. I was very calm and peaceful because I knew Jewel was there if I needed her. I put Tess in her stroller and pulled Annie on my lap. I told her I would lay on the procedure table and that she could lay on me. I told her the Doctor had gone to school for a long time to know how to help peoples ears. I told her that she would have to hold perfectly still so the Doctor could help her pain. She looked at me and agreed. I lay down and held her close. The Doctor had 2 nurses come in to hold her down. I told him that would not be necessary but would freak her out. I said she would be fine. I sang to her in her ear and patted her hair. It was unreal she flinched her leg on time. I reminded her to hold still. She didn't move after that, she didn't cry out, she didn't do anything. He removed the first big chunk of blood. He checked his work and he told me he didn't get it all. He was worried she would freak. He had to go back in 3 more times and took an amazing amount of blood out. Each time she held still. The Doctor and the nurse were AMAZED. They had never seen someone so young with such self control (they had never been around my Annie). They had never seen such bravery from someone.
Heavenly Father answers prayers. He knew Annie needed me calm. He was right Jewel was there if I needed her (and what I needed was to keep me calm for Ann). He knows my sweet little girls heart and her bravery. I am thankful that I get to be Annies Mom and I am excited to see who she grows into!

Halloween 2011

Well, this blog is serving as my families journal so as much as I would like to just start where we are at I would hate to loose those memories we made over the Fall. Fall in our neck of the woods is FABULOUS. We loved all the Fall Festivals and pumpkin patches. They were all free to cheap and really made our fall!!

This festival had a huge hay pyramid with a slide down it. Lee climbed with the kids to the top. They had such a great time sliding down and getting hay all over EVERYTHING!
Little Tessi just liked to be outside. She was pretty happy watching the kids :)
The other thing we loved along with picking apples, pears, blueberries, walnuts, pumpkins, etc. was pressing our own cider. This farm here gave us the pre-picked apples for free, let us use their old press and then we could take the cider in our own bottles. Why is it that anything free tastes so much better to me? We have squirreled away the cider in our deep freeze and pull it out for truly special occasions :)
I have really focused this year on getting healthy. After a diabetes scare and a pretty bad pregnancy I decided enough was enough. I love this picture because it reminds me how great I am feeling. I RAN with Keaton through that maze. I couldn't have ran 10 feet the year before!
Savannah wanted to be Cinderella for Halloween. I cut up the tablecloths from Lee and I's wedding and made her a dress and cape. For Halloween I let her wear my wedding tiara (what else am I going to do with it?!?!?). She was so thrilled. Tessa was an Elephant (which all 3 were for their first Halloween).
This is an even better picture of Annie's costume and cape. Please note her sparkly shoes!
Keaton was a pirate. He looked pretty cute. I made a lot of his costume too. I even dressed up as a witch this year. I think it is the first time I bothered in 10 years or so. It was kinda fun. I think I will do it again next year! We moved the day after Halloween so I am glad we filled up October before we had to get to WORK!

Pear Pickin'

Since my last post was Tessa-less I thought I better lead with her :) A couple week's ago we went to Smith Orchard to pick some pears. We paid $15 for 50 pounds so we ended up with 100 pounds (our friend shared some of hers too).

Lee loved it (maybe he just loved bossing Keaton around....just kidding).

Savannah kept picking them off the ground (which is a no no).

Keaton liked climbing the tall ladders. Conference weekend Lee and I did pear halves in apple juice, pear sauce, dried pears, pear butter, and pear syrup....yum, yum!

Central Washington Fair

This picture is of my little boy Keaton (we will contrast this later). He LOVES tractor's still and can't pass up a chance to give a sit on them.
This was totally the highlight of the fair for us (please note I went on opening day alone with 3 kids....I ROCK :). Keaton and Savannah both played for a long time in this big pile of feed corn. They were FILTHY when I pulled them out but happy!
THIS Keaton is the new KINDERGARTEN Keaton. Where Mom has him do things that are not quite cool enough for him....sigh. I was really hoping it would be awhile before I saw this face. At least he still did it. By next year I am sure he will say NO WAY! It was a "School of Rock" display. They had all kinds of instruments the kids could try out and this wave made of records. Maybe I thought it was more cool then they did?
This was Savannah in the petting zoo. She really loves the animals. She pet them all. She was mostly smitten with the little Lamb's. I thought it was really quite a fun place. I really wish I had gotten pictures of the Horse Costume Contest. You would not believe what costumes they came up with!