Monday, November 15, 2010

Foose Ball

We have a USC Trojan football player in the making. Braeden made an interception in his football game on Saturday! He was super cute about it! (I personally was looking over at my sister Kara when it happened, but I hear it was amazing!) The coach's wife got a picture of it, and I will need to snatch a copy of it. He was so close to getting the touchdown when the other team grabbed his flag. But he was as happy as a fat girl eating sugar when he caught the interception!! 


GO BRAEDEN & CADEN!!


And Braeden takes this game very serious, he never lets his eyes off that ball!


LOVE THIS KID!!!

Saturday, November 13, 2010

Ca-Cub

I love this little guy!! He is such a stud. He calls himself Ca-Cub. So we all call him that now. He is soooo much fun when his brother and sister are at school. I love his personality.... and boy does he have one! 

He never stops moving. He is always on the go. He LOVES kisses. It's what gets his mind off the sadness of going to bed. All we have to say to him is, "Go give Braeden and Elli a kiss." And he is off running to find them to give them kisses. Then he runs to bed himself. He is now sleeping in a toddler bed and loves it!! 
I love it when someone sneezes because Caleb will say, "Bless you!" EVERYTIME! He'll say it when I forget to or if I hear someone sneeze, but something else is on my mind and I don't think to say it. All of a sudden I'll hear Caleb say, "Bless you."  Today when he sneezed, he said, "Bless you, dank you!" Because he always hears us say thank you after that. I couldn't stop laughing!!

2 weeks ago we started potty training him and I don't have to buy diapers for a while now!!!! Woot Woot! He ran around naked for the first 2 days and it just came to him. Now he tries to squeeze anything out just so he can get a treat. It's so funny!!

I just had to give a shout out to my favorite Ca-Cub!!  I love his cuteness and am enjoying every little thing about him! Even the annoying parts. It's a good thing he is so DAMN cute!! And yes, I said that... I'm a mom, I'm allowed!

Friday, November 12, 2010

HedBanz

My kids want this game for Christmas. It looks like a fun game.


But I guess I don't need to buy it for them..... Elli made her own game.


 She made this and came to me and put one on my head and said, "Let's play Hedbanz" Her first question to me was, "Am I a ballerina?" Hmmmmm, that's exactly what she was. But she made me ask a million questions for me to figure out what I was. I love it because she even drew pictures. Funny Girl!!

Thursday, November 11, 2010

Her first tooth... GONE

I'm not sure who allowed this, but Elli lost her first tooth. It's really kind of cute.... as of now. But now she is going to have these huge, big teeth grow in and her cute little smile won't be the same. I'm not too fond of how fast these kids are growing.

But Elli couldn't wait for the tooth fairy to come and wrote her a note that she lost her tooth and asked her what she was gonna get for it. Well, the Tooth Fairy almost forgot, but remembered in the knick of time to leave $2 under Elli's pillow. Elli asked her dad if he put the money under her pillow.  Ha Ha!!  But how could Dad take the Tooth Fairy's job away from her. I love how they believe the silliest things!

Wednesday, November 10, 2010

Halloween Party

Grandma & Grandpa Harper throw a super fun Halloween party for the grandkids every year and the kids had a TON of fun!!

Here they are. The boys who aren't dressed up came as girls and didn't want to wear lipstick or a dress anymore, so they changed... pretty fast.



The Baker clan..... with Dorothy, Captain, and the little Baker boy!


It's never a Harper party without a piƱata.




All the kids getting settled in for the sleep over


And finally..... peace!!








Why are sleeping kids so cute??


The morning after.....



These 2 little girls LOVE drawing together.


I found these little guys outside playing together.  



Then we had to rush off to Caden & Braeden's football game. Elli held Cash for a little bit. And Crew.... well, we never know what Crew is doing!

Thanks G & G for a fantastic party!! The kids LOVED IT!! And we can't wait for next year's party!! ☺

Thursday, November 4, 2010

Halloween

Is Halloween REALLY over?? It didn't even seem like Halloween to me. It seems that once Halloween comes, Thanksgiving and Christmas fly by. I love this time of year!!

Braeden & Elli's school had a Halloween parade. Elli did her little like this the whole time. How do I know that?? Well, I started watching the parade where it started and she was waving then..... then I decided to go to the end and watch them again and I noticed her still waving. You could tell that Elli felt pretty this day. She LOVED her Dorothy costume!!


Then we have Captain Smith (the captain from the ship Titanic) Braeden picked this costume. He has gotten into Titanic and learning how it sank and everything.... funny kid. But I was worried he would have to choose something else because I couldn't even find this costume on eBay. But we lucked out because there it was at Target!! You should have seen how excited he was to find it!!


Elli's class.


This is Elli's friend Trystan. Elli has grown attached to him and even Trystan told his mom that he is going to marry Elli someday. I love how Elli has a way of making everyone feel loved. She's amazing that way!



Here's the clan.... 
We have Dorothy, Captain Smith & our Little Baker 


Mark and I went to a party Friday night and had to come up with a homemade costume. We decided to go with Where's Waldo and Wenda!  That is duct tape for the red stripes. 

I love Halloween!!

Wednesday, November 3, 2010

Where's Waldo Pumpkin

My kids begged and begged for us to decorate a pumpkin for their school contest. I gave in and this is what we came up with. It had to be a character from a book. Since Mark and I were dressing up as Waldo and Wenda for Halloween, I already had the hat. And yes, the shirt is made up of a white shirt and red duct tape. 


Braeden was POSITIVE we would get 1st place. But they had some pretty cool pumpkins in there. The Despicable Me pumpkin won. It was really cute!!

Wednesday, October 27, 2010

Mark's brother and his wife Camille went to Hawaii for October Break. They have 4 kids, but they just took their 2 older ones. So Mark and I watched their 2 little ones at their house for a week and a half. It was pretty fun watching them. Our kids don't get to play with them very often and were in heaven having some cousins to play with nonstop.

Had to get the bath tub picture. And yes, I was too lazy to do 2 separate baths with the babies and the girls. They were too busy playing that they didn't care.


Braeden had football practice so we played at the park while he practiced. I LOVE this park and so do my kids. But it sure makes it hard when it's time to leave. 



Eli


Elli was excited to show off her Mad Monkey Bar skills


I know, I know.... kids aren't supposed to climb up the slide, but what the heck. I never make them stop unless I sense another parent is mad. It's more fun to climb up than it is to go down... right?


Eli wasn't a big fan of getting his picture taken. I chased him around the playground until I got one...


Got it!!


Caleb thought it was a game and ran away from me. 



These girls were having too much fun with each other!



He IS a cheese ball. He loves his picture taken..... hmmmmm, where does he get that??


Then Sunday rolled around. Mark wanted to go to church but I didn't have any clothes for Braeden. So I just got the girls ready and Mark took them to church. Emma has an older sister and their clothes are always coordinated. They are always dressed so cute!! So Elli wore Haley's dress and Emma wore her dress and they went to church!! Love these pictures!



When I was cleaning their house the last day we were there, the babies had fun playing games with each other. They were funny with each other. Eli would get mad at Caleb for playing with his toys and Caleb would just yell right back at him. But for the most part, they had fun together!



 I think this was their favorite game. 




I realized I didn't get too many pictures of Braeden. Basically because this is what he did most of the time. He has been learning the hymn "Nearer My God To Thee" Mark has been teaching how to play more than the top hand. He's doing pretty darn good!!


The only other pictures we got of Braeden were when he went to the hospital. So here's how it started. I had a cough and signs of a sore throat every morning for about 3 days, but it never turned into anything. I felt fine and never felt sick. Well, Braeden started feeling that way Saturday night. So he took his airborne and woke up the next morning feeling the same way I did. I never thought anything of it because I never felt sick and it was going away slowly. So I assumed Braeden's would too. We put the kids to bed Sunday night and at 1:00 in the morning, Braeden came to our room having difficulty taking breaths. I have never experienced anything like this. My kids don't have asthma and have never had any issues like this. At first I kind of thought he just needed to relax and just breath. I took him to the bathroom so I could see him better and after a minute or so, I got Mark out of bed and told him he really can't breath. After Mark tried to figure out what was going on, Mark whispered to me to call the ambulance. So I panicked and and called them. I could barely talk to them because I was so scared. But by this time, Braeden was doing everything he could to take even the littlest breath. He even asked us, "Am I dying?" That broke my heart. But we took him downstairs and Braeden asked his dad if he could go outside to get some air and if he would give him a blessing. After the blessing, Braeden was breathing a tad bit better. I love Braeden's understanding of prayer. We try to emphasize the importance of it and Braeden has seen first hand how powerful it can be. (Even in little situations) A little while later, the ambulance came and gave him oxygen and even after that, they decided it was a good idea to take him to the hospital. I stayed at the house and Mark followed the ambulance to the hospital. (Braeden thought that was pretty cool to ride in an ambulance) The nurses gave Braeden a steroid and determined it was croup that he had. Mark texted me that and I started looking at what croup was. That explained Braeden to a T. But there isn't anything to really do except give him a steroid to relax his throat and open his airways. They kept Braeden there until 4 AM and sent him home because he was doing much better. SOOOOO glad he is doing better. He slept with us the rest of the night. 


Through the whole thing, Braeden had the best attitude. He was calm and knew he was being taken care of. I love this little guy. I am so lucky that he is my boy! 

 This was him "trying" to get some sleep.