HAPPY THANKSGIVING

Brooks has been on an ER rotation so has been leaving in the morning at 10 and gets home around 10:30pm. So on Thanksgiving morning before he had to leave for work I made  asked Brooks to deal with the turkey.

I just have a hard time with meat. If it has bones or resembles it's "former shape/self" then I just don't have much to do with them. 

Brooks of course changes everything into an anatomy lesson and told the boys to stick their hand in the turkey and pull out what they can find

(Camden's face says it all....)

Wow! The sack of treasures with all the organs in it. *GAG*

Here is Brooks pointing out to the boys the heart where the blood goes in and yadda yadda (I tuned out)

The turkey really was QUITE the entertainment for the morning though.

The "wingspan" for some reason was REALLY interesting to them.

So with that, Brooks was off to work to help save people from their electric carving knife wounds and Turkey Bowl blunders...........while I save the world one Thanksgiving feast at a time.

It was actually SUCH a nice slow paced day. I put each kid in charge of a dish. The day before Emerson had made the raspberry/pretzel dish and Iris helped with the potatoes (I make the make-ahead potatoes) and both were in the fridge. 

Bronson wanted to make the blueberry cobbler.

Aleeya did the deviled eggs

Another HUGE perk of having just me and the kids is that I didn't have to worry about the "presentation" either. The kids just wanted the food. To illustrate my point, check out Aleeya's eggs......

While all the morning cooking was going on, these three just did this......

pans, spoons, hotpads and a LOT of make believe.

They picked the mid-day "snack" too which consisted of the deviled eggs, mini-pickles, pomegranate seeds, Ritz/cheese sandwiches and celery with peanut butter. (Personally celery w/ peanut butter is an abomination on Thanksgiving to me, but I couldn't find the traditional Degn family cheese spread to put in the celery sticks. Darn.) 

After snack I put the younger 4 down for naps, the 3 boys went upstairs to watch football and I shoved the turkey in the oven so I could go take me a nice relaxing "Ensign Bath". I'm telling ya, how many people get to soak in the bath before their Thanksgiving feast?!?!? It was heaven.

I know I always talk about how Royce doesn't speak very much but in the past month he has REALLY tried to start talking. When he woke up from his nap I led him in to see the turkey in the oven and he said, "Oooooo, tu-key". It was so cute that I pulled out he video camera to capture it again. He didn't exactly say it like that, but here is just a sample of his cute voice.

(LINK)

The turkey turned out!!!!! Wa-hoo.

I actually just wanted to sit and stare at it. You see, cutting turkeys or whole chickens really isn't in my......um.....job description? It's more in Brooks' department. For the kids' sake I put on my game face on, pulled out the electric knife and went to town. BIG ACCOMPLISHMENT PEOPLE!!!!

It wasn't too hard though because it kept just falling off the bones and the dreaded "detach the leg at the joint" thing turned out to not be that vomit-provoking for me.

Another perk about having a low-key Thanksgiving is that there wasn't a set time to have things done or any stress. I just called the kids in when I was done. They each grabbed a can of A&W Rootbeer (their special request)........and sat down. Yes, we're high class like that. 

AND apparently we don't have a dress code for the feast either. You can come with no shoes, in your pajamas or heck, without a shirt if you're Emerson!

Looking at that full table made me so thankful.......just so so thankful.

One of my favorite things is how EVERY TIME we sit down to eat any meal that Royce will go behind Kellyn's seat and move her close to his seat. He always feeds her and wants her close to him. When she is NOT in her chair, she always walks over to him and opens her mouth. She knows how to work it and WHO is the sucker.

It was truly such a peaceful, relaxing day full of gratitude. As I sat at that table FULL of food and full of children, I couldn't help but be grateful for it all........and a husband who has a job to provide all of it for us.

(Don't feel too sorry for him, the hospital catered the docs a big ol' Thanksgiving meal)

Mango Week

The kiddos have had "Mango Week" marked on our calendar since I was 6 weeks along.

We read an article saying that by 19 weeks the baby would be the size of a mango. When Bronson read that, he said, "On that week can we EACH have our own mango to celebrate?!"

Of COURSE I said yes!!!!!

 Not exactly because I'm a nice mom but I am always craving a good ol' mango, so it sounded like a GREAT excuse idea to me!

 Pretty sure this kid could eat 20 in one sitting!

 EVERYONE loves mangoes.........oh wait, my ridiculously picky-fruit eater Emerson doesn't....so he and Kellyn got a banana. (Kellyn's little sleepy-I-just-woke-up face is so cute)

SURPRISE!!!

It was fun last Thursday to check the kids out of school early and load them up in the Yeti......they had no idea why or where we were going. Infact, it was long enough for Iris to fall asleep like THIS...

When we pulled up to Great Wolf Lodge the kids absolutely freaked out!!!! We're talkin, they've been wanting to go back for over 2 years.

 As SOON as we dropped our bags the kids immediately threw on their swimsuits to head downstairs to the waterpark.

The waterpark is really a lot of fun. We happened to time it JUST right to get the rascals under the water tower. Royce didn't know WHAT hit him, all he knew was that dad was holding him there. Iris tried escaping but didn't make it.

I mostly just hung out with Iris, Royce and Kellyn. They loved this play area. This picture is a miracle in itself because Royce actually got to sit on the jetski toy.......Kellyn was VERY hard to pry off. She sat there for hours.

The three boys came and grabbed me because they wanted to take me on the "Tornado" waterslide (the biggest one). It's one of those that you go down and then a funnel thing and you almost flip over while all 4 of you are sitting together and your life flashes before your eyes.......yes, those ones. 

Yes, this was me on that ride.....

Okay, so not EXACTLY, but that's what Camden said I looked like. I really should've heeded the "pregnant women are advised not to ride this" sign, (you know, the sign they put right above the slide that you see only as you are already moving!!!) but I just loved that the boys wanted me to go with them so badly.....now I know why. Daddy probably doesn't provide the entertainment I do.

I decided that I would do better sticking with the younger ones.

When I came down to find them I found Royce like this with Brooks.

He has a hard time believing that the life jacket will actually make him float and Brooks was DETERMINED to make him a believer.

Here is Royce, scared out of his mind and not moving a muscle.

In the end, Royce got the idea and was kicking himself around just fine. Only Brooks could've pulled that off.

Iris especially couldn't get enough of the wave pool. She would sit and giggle with Royce and jump over the waves yelling, "This is just like the beach!!!!"

Well, she played with Royce until she found a friend that she latched herself to......

 Here is the loner himself.

 I would just watch Iris talking and talking this girl's ears off. (Iris talks with her hands like I do)

 that is, until the waves started again and they would retreat back. It was pretty funny.

 I kept trying to snap pictures of Emerson but he liked getting WAY in the front where the waves just leveled him over and over so it was obviously tricky. I promise, he was there though. 

 Kellyn really is so spoiled.......it was nice to have other arms to keep her contained because she just LOVED the water and kept diving for it.

When I got tired of chasing her I would stick her on one of these chairs and it worked like a charm. Her feet would start to slip between the bands and she would freak out and hold really still and sit there. 

I need one of these chairs for church.

And of COURSE there were a lot of competitions going on.......like this 4-way race slide (clearly, if you weigh more you have an advantage........an advantage that Brooks delighted in)

Then there was this race across the lilypads between Brooks and Bronson....

 And thanks to a lucky slip where Bronson slipped onto the finish line he actually pulled off the win......here's the mandatory handshake.

We ate dinner and then I stayed back in the suite with the younger ones to put them to bed while the older ones went back to swim with Brooks. It's amazing how much peace I feel when Kellyn is contained on a very high bed with an unplugged phone to entertain her.

 Otherwise, there's usually torn up toilet paper/kleenex everywhere and pizza crusts....but of course, STILL with the phone.

 I had to include this sweet picture of Iris sleeping. She looks like an angelic little lady here.

We obviously swam again in the morning before we left in the afternoon.....I made them take ONE more picture before we left. 

Some were in better moods then others.............

It was actually a very fun and relaxing trip (okay, okay, MINUS the tornado ride).....and I wasn't expecting the relaxing part.

Camellos

I'll admit, I cringe every time the kids come home announcing they have another school project to do at home. So sue me.

Emerson's was actually something new I had never done before. He was assigned to do a project on camels (in Spanish). He had to research them(by himself), write a page of facts, RECORD himself reading the paper and then make a 3-D model of the animal in their environment. Did anyone else ever have to RECORD themselves?!?! The point is for the teacher to play it for the class......which is not too much different then reading it in FRONT of the class, but who asked me anyway? 

Nevertheless and notwithstanding Emerson was SO SO (almost ANNOYINGLY SO) excited to work on it. I didn't want to buy anything for a 3-d camel project so we made one out of marshmallows/glue/toothpicks and then he painted it. Then he got dead flowers outside (I'm a PRO at growing the dead ones) and painted them brown to LOOK like thorns. He made marshmallow clouds and a 3-d sun (actually an applesauce cup covered in tissue paper......don't dis it.) 

He was VERY particular about everything and where they should be and I just let him have at it. He kept staring at it after he finished saying over and over how cool it was.

Then for YOUR entertainment, here is Emerson reading his report in Spanish. He only had 60 seconds to record and had to cut out 2 sentences as it was........he didn't want to cut out anymore so he decided to speed read it......granted, he messes up pronunciation of  words when he does that, but it still is beyond cute. Adriana, this is for you. ;)...........hopefully it works. Like I said, first time "recording" on this website with the character Emerson created. 

(Link HERE if above doesn't work)

Genius

Royce has been a thumb-sucker since he was a baby. Personally, I loved it. It was SO convenient, miracle-working and to be honest, pretty darn cute.

But. he's. almost. three.

And then it's not so cute........nor will the dental bill be cute.

Well, and let's be honest, it's a LOT easier tricking a 2 year old into not sucking his thumb then an 8 year old. One day Brooks just grabbed his black Gorilla tape and taped Royce's pointer finger and thumb together so he could no longer suck his thumb.

Then Royce put his RIGHT thumb (the only thumb he sucks) in his mouth and laughed at Brooks while pointing and mocking him for taping up the wrong thumb. 

So Brooks finally got the RIGHT one this time.

And there wasn't so much laughing after that. In fact, you would've thought we just cut off his leg.

I felt kinda bad for him that night so I went in to check on him while he was sleeping......the black tape was off and his thumb inserted. Hmmmmm, maybe this 2 year old is a little stronger/smarter then we thought. And just MAYBE I should start taking over in the problem-solving department. Move over Brooks!

The next morning I grabbed some medical tape and tried Brooks' same technique.

It probably lasted 10 minutes tops before he had it ripped off.

I decided I would put a sock OVER his hand and tape it to his shirt. 

But the thin little sock was still "suck-worthy" I guess because it didn't deter him.

Then in a moment of pure genius I thought of my fuzzy socks..........because who REALLY wants to put their mom's fuzzy pink sock in their mouth?!?!?

It worked like a CHARM!!!!! He didn't want ANYTHING to do with his thumb.

Problem WAS, that he could get his arm out of his shirt because his neck was pretty wide.

But don't you think for a SECOND that it stumped me! Oh no no no......It may 11 years since I've been to school, but no 2 year old is going to outsmart ME!

See? Wide necked shirt problem fixed.

Man, I love that Gorilla tape.

Checking on him at night and his thumb is faaaaaaaaar from his mouth.

And the PLUS side of the whole sock idea is that I have TWO of them, so I can wash one and he can wear the other one. He can also use his hand really well (think sock-puppet), so he never got frustrated for a second.

Here he is, 10 days later and still making a fuzzy pink sock look cool.

I am HAPPY to report, that I have removed his sock from his hand today. The child went to sleep without sucking his thumb..........

thanks to his MOM'S ingenuity.