FINALLY! We got an updated family pic

My darling and oh so talented friend consented to tromp through the wet slushy snow one fine Sunday and take some family pictures for us. (I'm so sorry again about that pesky tree and the fight it had with your van's bumper!)

Since she took such great pictures, I had to post a few of my favorites:

And I promise I did curl their hair! It was all beautiful and lovely and curly, all until we stepped out of the car, into the slushy wet weather, and all those lovely curls went kapoot. But that's alright. I got over it (not quite, since I'm writing about it here).

And thank you again Kirstine!! You are brilliant, amazing, and talented!

My Thankful List

I was looking at my sweet friend Hillary's blog (cutest blog lady ever), and she had a thankful list that she is adding to each day. I decided to copy her, since I loved hers so much. However, she is a much more faithful blogger than me, so I decided to lump all my thanks into one big one.

I searched through my pictures, and most of these are just precious moments to me, when I thought to myself, "Oh, life is good. I can't ask for anything else!" I need to remind myself of these times when I am NOT feeling so complete and whole, and think upon what's truly important. So this list is most especially for me.

I am thankful for:

1. My sweet babies. Nothing is better than feeling those little arms around my neck and having a little voice say, "I love you momma".

2. Cetera choosing to be a happy helper. THOSE are moments to savor. She's a pro at the silverware.

3. A squeeze from my Squeeza.

4. Show time from the ladies!

5. When someone is so tired sitting on dad's shoulders while he's mowing the lawn, they just fold over and go to sleep.

6. The chance to be able to sneak in 12 hours with a most extra special cousin out of the blue! Love ya K!

7. The moments when my kids are content, quiet, and happy in their own little world--together.

8. Beautiful days outside, flowers, and time spent with my parents.

9. Sneak peeks into the past, like this, when Spence and I were younger and pregnant (respectively-well I was younger too....).

10. Being able to have SISTERS finally!

11. My most excellent family, on both mine and Spencer's side.

12. My baby brother who gets me out of the house and keeps me young and sassy! Love you Dano!

13. My other baby brother who drives for 12 hours by himself to come and see us. And who has fabulous hair. Love you Dave (DAVE!!).

14. Having the greatest husband in the world who always says "I love you", who puts up with my drama, who is always my biggest fan, and is my absolute best friend. MUAH!

Of course, this is not a comprehensive list of all I'm thankful for. I unfortunately don't have pictures of everything that makes my life happy and complete. I am thankful for my Savior and for His example. I am most thankful to know that I can be with my crazy little happy family for forever. I am grateful for good friends, who remain my friend even if we don't see each other for years! If you are one of those--give yourself a big squeeze from me!
Happy November!

I got dressed up too.......

So I had to add myself in here...cuz I was feeling a little left out. Here's us on the REAL Halloween. We went to dinner with Karlyn and Bryce, and we thought it would be fun to go all dressed up--y'know, cuz OTHER people in our little town would SURELY be in the spirit of Halloween, and be dressed up too. Uh--no. We didn't see a single person dressed up. Oh well. We still had a good time! We were happy to be able to be together and have fun! We came home after, ditched the wig and hat and face painting, got in our jamies and ate candy until the sugar comas set in.  It was awesome!! I love my little family!!

The Haps on Halloween for the Sorensens

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!

So last night was Trunk or treat (you know, where your chillins can get 3x the regular amount of candy that Halloween offers-because the garbage can just isn't full enough!?), and my sweet darling hubby took the little gals to it without me. I had a nice quiet hour of silence. It was special.

But I did get them looking FABO before hand. Even Spence was excited to dress up. I mean look at those pants (and yes, I sewed in the additions. Peace out!)

Here we have Little Ninja 1 and Little Ninja 2 with Big Poppa JuJu Beans.

I had to show C's hair better. She had crazy hair day at school. Go here to see it better.

AND the final touch that made his costume just one notch above perfection: courtesy of Mosqueeza.

Spence is a great daddy who is willing to let his small fries make him pretty. I love you dearest.

Sillies in Idaho last weekend

The girls and I ran up to Idaho for the weekend since C had no school Thurs. and Fri. The husband was of course WORKING (and watching movies and going out to eat sans nous), but that's OK. As you can see, we had a lot of fun on our own. We saw Grandma and Grandpa and Aunt Celeste, Uncle Chris, and Baylee and Dax.

The gals had some crazy loony dress up time. And notice, they are outside--it was lovely. No snow. No bitter freezing wind. Remember those days?

I like C's hat.

After the silly dress ups, we had to refuel with some yummy sugar cookies.  Here's Miss B with hers.

And Miss C. Her cookie's hair was thick and luxurious.

Mr. D's was classic, nice clean lines of licorice.

Weeze said her pile of licorice was a 'chair'.

And here we have the queen of sugar cookie land! They were SO good. How do you do it Celeste!? It's a gift she has I tell you.

Thanks for letting us stay!! Love you guys!

I feel dorky but.....

Ok, so I'm posting this EVEN though I feel like a dork for doing so. Some of you dear ones asked for pictures, and unfortunately I had a few, so here you go. Here's the latest and greatest in my life of fashion and high style. I chopped off the mess and hallelujah I feel free!! WHY did I ever let it get so long!? I have done this so many times, will I never learn my lesson!! Shorter hair is EASIER, FASTER, and gets done (more occasionally). :)

The big mess before:

And the much improved after. See? I'm smiling!

Uh, I didn't pose for this one--Spence caught me. At least my eyes weren't closed.

j'ai perdu ma deuxième dent!

Ok, so here's the before shot:

This is when I was frightened she would swallow her tooth, which would cause huge hysteria--not because there would be any alarm on Veruca's part of digesting a tooth, but solely because she wouldn't have a gem to leave under her pillow for the tooth fairy.  It was so stinking loose that she could lay it flat in her mouth. Fortunately, school pictures were the next day, and Spence and I were betting on whether she'd have her tooth in for pics or not. I lost. It was still there. But I made her swear to suck that tooth in upright for her pictures.

She didn't like it when I called her Snaggletooth.

So the morning after pictures, she turned to me, as we were getting her beautiful for the day, and said, "Mom, will you just pull it out?" I smiled queasily and said, "Really? Uh, ok." I got a little piece of TP (it was moist!) and yanked that little sucker out (ok, not yanked, since all I had to do was pretty much take a hold of it and it came right out). Why couldn't we have done this on picture day?

Our Zucchini Summer

"Plant a garden!" the prophets say.......so we try to be diligent in our efforts to do what we should.  We hoed and raked and planted many seeds, and weeded and watered. Luckily for us, that packet of seeds marked 'Squash' really turned out to be Zucchini! So, along with the other packet of seeds marked as zucchini, we ended up with 6 Z plants this summer.

This is the product of one foray out into the garden. We have super extra hugundous, super large, large, medium, NORMAL, and itty bitty. This is what we'd get in one week's time. Somehow we would always end up with these megaton Z's. They liked to hide.

After filling my freezer full of oh, about 80 cups, of shredded zucchini, and after pawning it off on my neighbors until they said 'please no more!', we had to get creative. (And yes, we should have taken some to the local food bank....I know. The guilt still consumes me.) Here's a few samplings of our zucchini fun:

Weeze helping me make zucchini brownies. These actually are super yummy-when you coat them with a nice tall layer of frosting.

This is when she said, "Will you help me get this junk off the spoon?"

Aislyn would also help herself to a raw zucchini or two, y'know, when apples weren't readily available to snack on.

Even Spencie joined in the fun. Sure beats those peanut butter jars, eh, hon?

Next year we are only planting ONE zucchini plant. That is, if my freezer supply has run out by then.

Sept. 14--The first visit from the Tooth Fairy

Veruca lost her first tooth on Sept. 14th.  She lost it at school, and when she came home, she burst through the door, holding her prize in a ziploc baggie, and was bubbling over with delight. "MOOOOOM!!! I LOST IT AT SCHOOL TODAY!". I was on the phone, with Auntie T., and we were giggling at her exuberance. Violet was playing at a friends, and Veruca was DYING of anticipation. "MOOOOOOM, we have to go tell her NOW!" We went and got the Weeze and called Dad and took pictures, and all that business. She's so proud of her gapped smile. My baby lost her first tooth!

The Saddest Girl in the whole world

Aislyn is a very easy going and sweet child. She entertains herself easily and we have a lot of fun together while big Sis is at school.  But....there are those moments when the fun stops and I have to be a mommy, and I have to tell her no. It usually involves her wanting some sort of snack, and it's usually right after we've eaten a meal.

This happened today. She came to me holding an apple, and said in her oh-so-sweet-and-soft voice, "Momma, can I have an apple?". (We had just eaten lunch, of course). I said, "Weeze, we just had lunch! AND, the last time you had an apple, you only ate half of it. So no, not right now".

 Then she hits me with this:

And then this:

And finally this: (see the apple?)

She did not appreciate my taking pictures of her sad sad sad times. I love her 'sad face'. She sticks that lip out, and I'm jelly. So, I caved and let her eat it. And she ate the whole darn thing. MUAH!
And see? Her hair is not done. I didn't lie on my hair blog. I really don't do their hair fancy like that most of the time. :)