Happy Halloween ... from Sean!

Sean almost didn't go to his preschool party, and ... maybe it didn't really matter if he wasn't there. Just kidding! He's usually great at school, but I think all the unfamiliar parents got the best of him! Poor boy's just too shy for a crowd.

I tried to upload the stupid 18 second video of Sean at the party to Blogger and YouTube, but couldn't get it to do it at either site... I'll try again later, so you can check out how Sean looked for his party. Come back.

Okay, here it is!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B8GFoJdg0_Q

Close Call

See how cute Sean's costume turned out? Well, it almost happened again!! He woke up this morning super excited to dress up and go to his Preschool Halloween Party! We got him dressed and I asked him if he wanted to wear his vampire teeth, or if he wanted me to draw them on his chin. He said to draw them on and then insisted on seeing them in the mirror. I should NOT have let him because he freaked himself out and then threw a fit! I told him to put the rest of the costume on and then see how he felt. It didn't work. So, then I took off his cape and belt, got my shoes on, and said that I was going to go trick-or-treating at his party while he stayed in bed. He quickly stopped crying and bargained.



He came over to me and grabbed my leg. Then, with his cute, sad face said, "I don't want these teeth, but I really want to wear my cape." Whew! I thought he was going to go another year with no costume.

As if that wasn't enough...

My friend Kathy and I were hanging out one afternoon and she was showing me some of the knitting she had been working on. She had a beautiful sweater for her 2 year old daughter, Alice, and a GREAT idea for a present for her sister. Fingerless gloves! It just so happened that Bittersweet was playing an outdoor gig the next day and I would've benefited greatly from those gloves! So, I ordered the yarn and Kathy was gracious enough to help me thus far.

Look how cute!!! :) Hooray! I did all of that! Now, I just have to find the time to finish them.

I *heart* Dustin!

We started the kids' costumes a few weeks ago so that we'd have ample time to finish, and we made it! They're all done! We've been putting the kids to bed and then staying up late trying to get as much done as possible. Reilly's was the hardest because we had a cape and a dress complete with fur lining on the bottom of the cape, dress and sleaves.

Doing her's first also helped us do Sean's cape. We started at 7:30pm and were done by 10:00pm. I know it seems long, but it was amazingly fast. With me cutting the fabric, pinning and telling Dustin what to do, and him sewing everything, it went by very quickly. :)

So, anyway, doing all of this got me to thinking. Of all the husbands that I know, I have a hard time believing that many of them would kill their backs sewing late into the night to help their wives. We may argue about school, work, money, parenting (sounds like we're on the brink of marrital melt-down, eh?!), but, in the end, he's got my back and would do whatever to help me out. He's a great guy!

B - I - N - G - O

Dustin rented some movies on Saturday, but we didn't get a chance to watch them until last night. He got a movie named Bingo (1991 and it shows) for the kids and some dramatic thriller for him... er, uh... I mean us? Well, in the middle of our movie, Reilly comes running down the stairs in tears! My initial thought was, 'What are you two fighting about this time?!' I was wrong! It was the movie. Apparently, it's about a dog that gets treated very badly by all of its owners. From the time he's a puppy, he gets abused from owner to owner (one is a ring-leader in a carnival). Anyway, she was crying because it was too sad for her! How sweet is she? It was adorable that she cares so much that this very poor movie got her to tears over the main character!

So I watched the end of the movie with her and really had a hard time seeing how she was so emotional about it. I think it may have something to do with Fiona moving. On Saturday, the reason we didn't watch the movies was because we helped Ian and Dianne move more stuff to their house. They moved all the crutial things: beds, kitchen, clothes, washer/dryer, etc. They are officially living there now, but will come back during the week and on Saturday to clean up and move the storage things. It didn't hit Reilly right away, but at about 3:30am on Sunday, she had a break down. She woke up and couldn't stop crying. Dustin went in to console her and talked to her a bit. Turns out that she's really distraught about Fiona not living right next door. She's never known anything but having Fiona there and I think this'll be a hard transition for the poor girl. :( She's going up on Friday to have a sleep over with Fiona, so I hope that'll help her out.

Moving day...

Last week Dustin started helping Ian and Dianne move into their new house. We took up a load of furniture and the piano and got a tour of their new pad. After a couple of week imagining that it looked totally different, it was great to put a place to the idea. It's a new home that seems just the perfect size for them. The kids were the funniest (although Ian's flamboyant hand gestures were laugh-out-loud funny) when they showed their rooms.

Good luck, guys!!

Reilly's Witchy Costume!

It's almost done! I've been working 'round the clock (as you can tell) trying to finish Reilly's costume and last night it all came together. I just have to add a hook/eye to the dress and the fur on the bottom of the cape and the sleeves of the dress... THEN... IT'S DONE! Reilly was so excited to see it and try it on last night.

The time on the post is correct. Reilly was trying really hard to stay up all night last night. I don't know why, but she's been bugging me to stay up for weeks. Since she didn't have school today, and we were working on her costume, I said it was okay. She didn't make it very long, but late enough!

Makeup or Kids?

Dustin and I were watching E! this evening and caught part of a show called "Stars Without Makeup" and were digusted! They were ripping on celebrities that got 'caught' living without primping and painting for hours. They're still human and they look normal. So, every picture they would say what each celebrity needed for a makeover... um, when they're on screen they look fine (sometimes over-done, but fine), so what's the big deal?! Goldie Hawn and Diana Ross are old... GET OVER IT! Now, some of the pics were horrific, like Eva Longoria walking all around town with frizzy, crazy hair... I wouldn't go out looking like that, but that's just me. Anyway, besides a few pics, they just looked normal!



P.S. Have any of you guys ever thought that Annie looks like Julia Roberts? Minus the huge teethy grin, it's pretty close, no?

Halloween Costumes

I'm working on Reilly and Sean's costumes for Halloween and delegating some to Dusin... while I type his paper, he's cutting and sewing Reilly's cape. We went looking for ideas when the patterns went on sale for $1 each. I didn't expect to buy that day, but it was a great deal. While we were choosing Reilly's Sean was feeling left out and said he wanted to be a vampire, so that's why he's anything this year. Every other year we've fought with him to wear anything. His first Halloween, he was a lion - only because he couldn't fight then. The next one, he was supposed to be a lion again - different costume - but I couldn't get it on him. Then last year he was 'green' because he wouldn't wear a costume. He had a green sweat-suit, so that's seriously what he was - green. I'm excited to get him dressed finally!!

We're going to have a blast this year... we're even dressing Maya up like a witch. Fun, fun, fun!!

By. <---- Reilly typed this!

Like This and Like That

This is a bit of Sean talking. He's getting TONS better, but he's got a few letters (and combinations of letters) that he struggles with. After this was taken, we hit "th" hard and he's doing better. He's sooo cute!

School Pictures!

Here they are!!! Soooo cute!

New Floor

Dustin and Sean re-did the floor in the basement. The carpet was painfully stained, so Dustin had a great idea. There's a type of flooring that he's just recently started installing. It's sort of rubbery, sticky and he's going to make fun of me forever if he reads this. :) HAH! Anyway, it looks like wood floors, so I was in. I think it looks great, but Sean's the happiest because I let him keep out his road mat now. When we had the carpet, it looked cluttered if it stayed out, but now it doubles as a rug around the computer desk. :)

Crazy-Lauren Dream!

I always remember the stupid dreams - relate much? (Refer to the HIV/AIDS blog.) My latest one was last week. It was reoccurring, too, so I got a lot of stuff from it. The first night I dreamed that we moved to a sort of compound. It was a huge house on a 30 acre lot. Complete with security gates and forest-mote surrounding the house. It was right next to my friends the Fishers (who live right around the corner from me in real life)... which is nuts because there's no way 30 acre lots would exist in Utah. Anyway, so that dream was all about how we moved and had to transition with the kids. We put up two GI-NORMOUS play sets with those slides used on aircrafts in case of emergencies. We were in a no-fly zone... who knows why or how... There were statues all around the house that we were deciding what to do with, etc. It gets better. The next night (or something) I dreamed that we were watching aircrafts fly overhead. We, as in me and Angela, didn't know why or if it was US planes, so we waited it out for a while. Eventually, we could see that these were terror attacks and quickly moved the families to the bomb shelter. (I know - like they even exist anymore!) Then we had to get to fightin' those 'hell-bent terrorists!' (That Sarah Palin! Hah!) We went to one of the play sets where, under one of the tower-floors, we had a stash of EVERY kind of gun you could think of. Angela and I took on the terrorists! I'm not sure that we won or not, but it sure does top my list of weird, crazy dreams!

So, how 'bout that stock market?

I just thought I'd do a quick blurby-blog about what's going on here. Firstly, Reilly did it again! She was getting sick of me being too busy to make her a sandwich (30 mins before dinner time) that she did it herself. While she was at it, she made Sean a peanut butter and jelly sandwich (no mess), but I have no pics to prove it. She's growing up so much lately... oh, and she's losing one of her top front teeth. We're going to sing 'All I want for Christmas...' Just kidding, that would be lame. Sean is starting to change his words on his own. I'll post a video of it soon, but he used to say 'this,' that,' and 'there' really funny, but he's been working on making them right. Okay, so besides that, (shout out to John A.) HOW 'BOUT THAT STOCK MARKET, eh?!

I'll just do it myself!

Yesterday... well, truthfully it's been for a few weeks... Reilly really wanted to make cookies. I've been pushing her off because I've been really busy, but yesterday, it came to a crutial time! I told Reilly I needed to clean out the sink so that the kitchen was prepared for cookie-making. There weren't that many dishes, but I just didn't have the time. Monday and Tuesday are really bad for lessons. Monday I teach from 12:30 - 5:30pm and Tuesday I teach from 2:30 - 7:30pm. I don't have breaks, either. It's solid lessons. She kept asking me to do the dishes between lessons, but it never worked out. Dustin came home to get ready for class and she bothered him, but he didn't do his homework for that class until then, so he couldn't help her out either. So, after she got sick of waiting for us, she did it herself.

She emptied the clean dishes...



Put the dirty dishes in and ran it!

We made the cookies today! :) What a girl!!

BTW, we posed the first picture because I didn't catch her doing it yesterday and the second picture is the actual way she loaded those dishes. It quite amazing that she didn't overcrowd dishes or cover up the dishwasher components. :)