Has it really been 4 weeks?

I know it's been a while since our last post. I am going to attribute it to 3/4 being busy and 1/4 being lazy. My apologies for keeping you waiting, but I am ready to regale you with some of the things we have been doing lately. We are all doing well. Rueben is in the final weeks of this semester and couldn't be more thrilled about it. The kids are doing excellent in school and continue to enjoy it immensely. I have been busy painting the house, clearing out some of the clutter (that will be posted on Ebay come the new year), and at the moment packing for out trip to Utah. The kids and I are excited to be around our family and friends that we miss and love so much. Isa keeps talking about going to Grandma's and Nana's house, wanting to say thank you to Grandpa Wayne for the Christmas card, and meeting her cousin Sean. Sam is counting the days to see all of his grandparents and hang out with his cousins. Can't wait to see you all. Give me a call and let's get together!

Here are some of the funny things Isa is/has been doing lately.

1. She walks around singing the Imperial Death March, "dum dum dum dum dee dum dum dee dum". We always knew the dark side of the force resided in her.
   
2. She will growl "mom" if she has to say it more than two times.
   
3. She still laughs when she farts and proceeds to let everyone know.
4. She will mimic her brother doing tae kwon do and can actually punch better than Sam.
   

About a week ago, we had our first snow. It promptly melted in about 2 hours. The kids were so excited with Sam wanting to build a snowman. The schools were on a 2 hour delay. Fortunately our school opened and the kids didn't miss a day. Translation: Mommy got to spend some much needed quiet time at home.

The house in front is still for sale. Any takers?

Our friends the Greenes came over a few weekends ago and spent the night. We had such a great time hanging out. We went to Old Salem and had some ice cream.

I don't know why Jackson is not smiling, but I suspect that Sam had something to do with it.

Isa holding little Mckay. He is such a cute quiet baby. I would forget that he was even around at times.

After playing in his room quietly, Sam came down in this get-up. He was dressing for success. Here are some stories about Sam.

1. The other day, Sam's pant zipper was down. Rueben told him to "close your barnyard door or your horse will get out" which elicited this response, "I don't have a horse in my pants. All I have in there is my penis. It's like a cannon, you know, cause it shoots out lots of pee."
2. He thinks that his laptop is smarter than his teacher.
   
3. The other night he was trying to tell us something and we were being silly and pretending not to understand. In a very frustrated yell he said, "STOP PARENTS!!"
4. He is starting to read simple sight words.
   

This is what I have been doing the past month. We decided to add some color to our white walls and make our home feel more like home. I am proud to say that I did 95% of the work: prepping, painting, and cleaning. I loved every minute of it. I am still not done. Just need to paint the master bed and bath. But that will just have to wait. If anyone needs any painting done, I will be more than happy to oblige. In the living room, I used a sandstone textured paint and it turned out pretty awesome looking. We are hoping that this will eventually increase our home value. Maybe.

Isa's room was the most time consuming but it turned out pretty neat. I thought about using a laser for the lines which would have shaved hours off, but decided against it when I saw that they cost a fortune. Unfortunately a few days after I started painting, Isa started saying that purple was her favorite color. Oh well. I guess she will have to wait for a purple room.

This is by far my favorite room. It's Rueben's study room/my reading room. I used a canyon orange for the base and sponged a burnt orange over it. For being my first sponging project I kicked ass.

And this is Sam's room right after I was done painting. Sorry I haven't taken an official after picture. I will have to do that later.