The Pumpkin Farm

I got the privilege of going along with Jane and her class to the pumpkin farm. We definitely couldn't miss going this year because we missed Janie's pumpkin Farm trip last year when we were in Utah for Ro Ro's funeral. It was such a nice fall day and I thought it would be fine with the three little ones. I take them with me lots of places so no big deal, I would just put Annie and Russ in the stroller along with my heavy diaper bag and be good to go. I knew that the stroller was in the van because we always have it there so I didn't even check. We we got there and no stroller. We had taken it out and I totally forgot that we had. Thankfully we had the baby Bjorn in the van so I could at least put Annie in that. So it was a miserable couple of hours carrying that awful diaper bag and Annie on top off it. My shoulder was killing me. But we had fun and Janie was very happy to get to go with her class.

Here we got to go on the hayride and Russ was really excited because there was a tractor pulling it, and he is just a tiny bit obsessed with tractors right now :) I was also very surprised that I got this good of a picture Russ pretty much refused to look at me all day when I was taking a picture.

There was a corn maze that we got to walk through that again would have been more fun if my shoulder wasn't killing me, but Russ and Jane seemed to like it. It was cute that they walked together. They don't always get along that great because Jane teases him really bad. Kevin and I keep telling her that she better watch it because one of these days soon he is going to be bigger than her. He actually is only a few pounds less than she is already.

She really does love him though. :)

I thought that this picture was fun because little Jane was up there posing. Russ would climb a little but he wouldn't go to the top. He has started to be pretty scared of some things lately which is really weird for a boy. I think he is just coddled too much by his sisters.

I did get a picture of my and my little kiddies. I have realized that I really don't have enough pictures of me and my kids. Not that I don't want them I am just usually the one behind the camera.

I love the pictures of them sitting in the pumpkin fields.

Russ did see a tractor that he could sit in and steer the wheel. He enjoyed that thoroughly.

Here are the three little pumpkins that I got to add to the weight of things to carry around. It was great. Sense the sarcasm.

Russ was so funny because he was loving the chickens. I cant remember a time that he has seen them before, but he must have because he immediately said "Chickens!" when he saw them. It was really funny.This was a picture of him watching the chickens.

Janie was really excited to pick out her own little pumpkin. She really took her time picking it out too. She would pick one out and then put it back and pick another. It had to be just right. She is such a cute little goose!

 

All about Russ-2 years

I cant say enough about how I love this boy of mine!! He brings something so different to our family it is indescribable! He is all boy and we love that so much. He is so completely spoiled and so well loved by all of us. I absolutely adore each and every child that I have and my life would not be the same without each of them. It is so fun to have this little man in our home! I know how much Kevy loves him and how he feels like he has his own little special friend to do boy stuff with. All of the girls love having a brother so much and after growing up with 6 brothers I know how good it is for girls to have a brother to make them a little less crazy. Hopefully having 4 sisters will make Russ very understanding of the opposite sex.

Russ was born the happiest little man, he always had a big grin on his face. He was like the boy equivalent of Lizzy. Right around 16 months he got really grumpy and whiney and it was really hard to deal with him, but he is back!! Since moving to our new house he has been the happiest little kid. So full of life and energy. He has gotten really obsessed with Lightening McQueen and all the cars. He love love loves tractors and bulldozers and trucks of all sorts and he loves to drive by and see them working. He has gotten really good at talking and we are all enjoying listening to him say stuff. He loves to say Oh Buddy, and Oh boy, and he says to the girls all the time "stop it!" which is not my favorite because he has started saying it to me when I tell him to do something. He loves to have treats and another favorite phrase is "I want more chocolate." He definitely has a serious sweet tooth. He is a lot like his Grandpa when it comes to sweets so I think we picked a good name for him.

Russ loves all his sisters so much! I love when he calls their names. Russ loves his little sister Anne so so much.. He is always trying to give her hugs and kisses. He pretty much mauls her to death and I have never seen him be jealous of her at all, so that is nice. I really think the two of them being so close in age are going to be best buddies. He also still completely adores his Dad. He loves me and is so sweet with me but he is a total Daddy's boy. He would want Kevin every time over me. Thats okay because it really makes Kevin happy that his only boy loves him so much!

I just love this little face! He is so darn handsome!! Russ gives the absolute best bear hugs. I love when he runs up and squeezes me so tight and the way he says "mom!" when he does it.

At his 2 year appointment he weighed 26 lbs. (30th) and was 35 1/2 inches tall (80th) He is much bigger than the girls at the same age, so there seems to be a chance that he may have gotten a little bit bigger of genes than the girls. We can always hope! Although Kevy is a shorty and he couldn't be any more perfect so if Russ is short that will be great too!

He also is showing signs of liking sports as well. He loves hitting balls around with his little golf clubs and he know when Dad is watching ball on tv.

I had to get a picture of him watching the diggers. We go down to the end of the street and watch them and every time when I say it is time to go home, he cries and says " No! watch diggers!" We just really adore this crazy boy of ours! I am so glad I was blessed with him and that I get to be his mom!

 

FamilyFest

There was a fun little festival downtown in Roseville on Russys birthday. I always like going to these because it gives us something to do with the kids that is free and different than our usual routine. It was fun because there was even a little obstacle course for the kids to do and Janie looked so cute doing it that the person there for the city website recorded her doing it. The kids got to do some little bouncy slides and stuff and some booths and then we got lunch from some food trucks which was kindof something fun and different for us to do. Plus we got a bunch of free stuff, so that is good too. All and all a fun day.

Daddy and his babies

Some cute little pirates.

 

The girls got to make swords out of newspaper. It was cute because they all wanted to give them to Russ for his birthday.

They had these cute little construction hats for the kids to wear and Russ loved wearing his. He also loved Nellies sucker that he snuck into. :)

There was this little blow up train that had an obstacle course in it and Russ went crazy in it he loved it so much!!

 

Russy is Two!!

We celebrated Russy's birthday the week after his birthday with my extended family because Bryce and Mel and their boys were in town, so Grandma and Grandpa and Judy and Jim came over for the celebration as well. I can't believe that this kid is two!! He is so into cars lately that that is what he got for his birthday, lots and lots of cars! It is so fun to see him be so big and really start an obsession like every kid seems to at this age.

He got a really cool dumper thing with boulders that dump down into the truck from my parents. He has so much fun playing with it.

I have been a bit of a slacker in the cake department the last couple of years. I haven't made the kids a shaped pan cake in a while. I was going to make Russ the Lightening McQueen one but I decided he wouldn't even remember it, so I think I am going to wait until next year when maybe he will actually remember it. I did want him to have a fun cake though, so I dreamed this one up. I just used his McQueen and Sally cars and decorated it with grass. This is the first time I have done grass and although it makes it look really cool, it really was actually quite easy to do. He ended up loving the cake so it was great. The weird thing is that when we lit the candles he freaked out and acted all scared. After that we lit a fire in our backyard in a little pit we bought and he flipped out. I think maybe this boy needs to toughen up a bit. He has been around girls too much!

 

Apple Hill

Oh how I love fall! Its my favorite! Probably the only thing that has been a little difficult about living here is that fall comes so late. Growing up in Utah I am so used to September being fall, and here we really don't get it until the end of October. Don't get me wrong I am not complaining because I seriously love pretty much everything about living here, this is just my only minor complaint. One thing about fall here that I love is going to Apple Hill. It is a fun little place on the way to Tahoe just past Placerville in the hills. I know I have posted about it before, but seriously I love that place. It is just so fun! We went up a couple of times this fall. The first time we went was a rainy day, which was actually really fun, becasue we usually go when it is so warm and sunny and this way we actually got to enjoy the hot cider, which we usuallydon't get to, and it was soo good! It was also fun to have so few people there. It is usually so crowded, so that was nice to have it be much quieter.

One of the biggest reasons for going up there are the apple donuts. They are seriously to die for! I swear I could eat 6 without even realizing it! My parents came up and went with us, and it is so fun for the kids to get to see them and spend time with them.

Russ enjoyed the donuts but then got sad because he tried the cider while it was really hot and spilled it and got really scared and started screaming. It was sad, but he was wearing his puffy vest so he didn't end up getting burned when he spilled it down the front of him, so that was a blessing.

While we were sitting in eating our yummy donuts it started pouring so hard and then hailing. This picture doesn't even do justice to how hard it was coming down. We were just glad that it happened while we were safe and sound in the warm building.

The window was open so Jane went and put her umbrella in front of it. Too funny. She is always trying to use that thing. She loves it so much and we justhaven't had that much rain since she got it, so any opportunity to use it she is all over it. She of course remembered her umbrella but forgot a jacket, lovely.

I got to carry this little lady around with me. She actually looks really chubby in this picture even though she is not chubby at all. It was fun to get to use the really pretty hat that Grammie made for her when she was born that she never got to wear because it was just too warm. It was a little small but it still worked.

The kids thought these crazy gourds were the funniest things they had ever seen.

The second time we went up it was a nice warm day, which was a good contrast because then the kids could play outside and enjoy the beauty that is there. There was this little tractor ride and Russ just loved it so much. He is soo obsessed with anything car or truck right now.

These little girls wanted me to take a picture of them in the little jail. They thought it was so funny.

There was a Lightening McQueen car to play in and Russ loved it.

There is a pond up there with fish in it and the kids want to go fishing every time. It is never going to happen. I am not about to come home with a nasty trout. Gross! You cant throw them back there so you have to take them if you catch them and I am not interested!!

 

Grammie, Kiki and Layla

Grammie and Kiki and Layla bought tickets out to see us when they were on sale back in June I think. Boy did September sound really far away at the time, but before we knew it, it was time for them to come see us. We were so darn excited! It is so fun for us to have our family members come and see us. They only were staying for a few days so we really wanted to enjoy every minute! We didn't go do too much stuff, mostly we just hung out especially since the big girls had school and Kevy had to work. But we sure had a lot of fun with them. Probably one of the things that was the most fun was getting to see cute Layla. She sure is a busy britches, I forget sometimes how busy they are at that age, and silly Layla is extra busy. She reminds me so much of Lizzy at the same age. I thought my house was very kid friendly, and it is but it isnt Layla friendly. She just knows how to find things to get into. So funny. We sure loved having that little girl around though! It was also really nice to have visitors in our new house because there is so much room here.

I just love this picture of Gammie with Layla and Annie. It is so darn cute!

We took them to our favorite library park to let the kids play. It was funny to see Layla just running around from one thing to another.

On Saturday since Kevy and the girls were home, we took them down to Funderland. It is right next to Fairytale Town, but we have never actually been there and the girls have always wanted to go.

Janie saw this little fishy ride and she really wanted to do that by herself even though everyone else was going on the airplane ride. Jane is her own person and she doesn't care what everyone else does, she wants to do what she wants to do.

The big girls had fun on the airplanes

Russy enjoyed riding with his Daddy in the plane. He likes to do everything with Kevy. The funny thing with this ride was it said 175 lb. limit. Well we thought that was kind of silly and couldn't be right, but sure enough Kevy and Russy's plane would not go up. They had to low ride the whole time.

Annie was pretty good and chilled in her seat most of the time. But she does like to be held a lot.

Janie rode with Grammie on the train. Cute girls!

Kiki took the big girls on the rollercoaster. They sure had fun with their Aunt Kiki!

I got to take Russy and Janie on the carousel, and I was worried because all of the seats were taken so I had to put Russ on a pony, and he has not enjoyed the carousel in the past. Just a couple months before he got all freaked out at Chuck E. Cheese riding on the mini one. But there was no reason to worry he LOVED it. And showed no signs of being nervous. In fact everytime I would put my hand on him he would push it away like "no mom, I am a big boy!" He just did his cute chuckle the whole time. I love that!

Kiki took the big girls on the tea cups and it was a good thing because I hate those rides!

Russy was most excited about riding on this car, and Kevy said he was very serious the whole time with the steering wheel like he was really driving it.

 

I had to get a picture of Layla strapped in her stroller because it was the only time she really sat still.

The girls just loved having Grammie come and visit. It is hard not living by family sometimes because we justdon't get to see them enough!! Nellie wasn't in this picture because she was pouting becuase she wanted to go on another ride and we didn't have time.

After Funderland we took them to the airport so they could go home. It was way too short of a trip, but we sure had such an amazing time with them. We hope we get to see them again soon!! We had fun at the airport watching the planes take off. Russy thought it was pretty darn cool.

 

Labor Day

Our Labor Day wasn't too exciting this year. I took Lizzy to the movie in the morning because she has been such a good girl and we wanted to reward her for always helping us so much. We went and saw Percy Jackson because she has been reading the books and we had a really good time. It was fun to have a little date with my big girl and it really gets me excited about all my kids getting bigger and getting to spend time with them like that, where I get to be their buddy too, not just the person that takes care of them. When we got home I really wanted to take the kids to Old Sacramento because there was the Gold Rush days going on, but Kevy wasn't in the mood to take all the kids somewhere like that. If it were up to him we wouldn't take this rowdy crew anywhere, so I guess it is good that I push him a bit at times. So we didn't go anywhere and ended up staying home. The fun thing was that it ended up pouring rain that day and our cool neighbors who have two little boys let all the kids ride their power toys. The girls thought it was pretty dang cool.

Janie did pretty good at learning how to operate these things. She liked being like the big kids.

Lizzy looks like an eskimo here. :)

 

Russ was out of his mind thrilled when he woke up from his nap and saw that he got to ride in one of these cool trucks. It started pouring so hard after he came outside but he could have cared less. He was sopping wet but was soo happy and he didn't want to get out even after being in there for quite a while. It ended up being a pretty memorable Labor Day after all. It was fun too because we had soup for dinner and I made apple crisp and we watched a movie. Such a perfect end to the summer and start to the Fall, my favorite time of year!