Our fall hour

Oh, fall. Somewhere, last night, I was supposed to gain an hour. All I know is that I woke up with a splitting headache, the sun was up, and all the clocks needed to be changed.

Fall really makes you THINK. You start to hunker down and get ready for the rush of winter - Thanksgiving, Christmas (and everything that goes with it), cold weather, and staying inside. Needless to say, whenever we get a day that's warm enough, we go outside. Picnics at parks with jackets on are just as fun. Brett has fertilized the lawn. He pulled out an eyesore of a bush in front of our house and trimmed up everything else. Sophia and I planted 178 bulbs that will look gorgeous come spring. Now, I have to move on to getting things like ice scrapers for the cars, snow boots, winter coats, and ice melt for the sidewalks. Ugh. On the plus side, we did get our big propane tank filled, so we can enjoy our fireplace this year. We didn't have it for winter last year, so I am looking forward to drinking my morning coffee in the sunroom with a fire despite the fact that the floor may be covered with toys.

No, I do not have any pictures of the girls in their Halloween costumes. I may just dress them up in their costumes on some random day to take a picture and record it. We did have an excellent trick-or-treating experience with all the cousins in my sister's neighborhood. I absolutely loved watching my kids. There are screams of delight, lots of short-legged running from house to house, and finally the, "Mommy, hold my bucket. It's HEAVY!" These kids made a haul. I'm thankful that they are still young enough to not realize that I am eating candy out of their buckets. Seriously people, they won't eat all of those little KitKat bars. I made some really fun food. Didn't get a picture of my crescent roll snake that was filled with sandwich yumminess, but I did get some shots of my "finger cookies" (sugar cookies with almond fingernails and red food coloring blood) and bone bread sticks.

Finger cookies

Painted my fingernails for Halloween.
There's a little spider on the top of the web.

Bone bread sticks.

The girls and I have been living through some pretty crazy days lately. I've figured out that Sophia and I are VERY MUCH ALIKE, which means we butt heads a whole lot. Yes, I can adapt, but deep down, I am a control freak. So that means Sophia and I butt heads because we both like things just so...just so, meaning our way. It's a very humbling experience to be called out by a three-year-old. Claire has entered a banshee-like yelping stage. Her high-pitched talking and screaming elevate in volume and pitch as the day goes on. She's also figured out that is she cries (those big, fat, sad tears), then I will probably blame Sophia for something, and she will get her way. This kind of banshee yelping and sobbing always happens when I am feeding Alana, which means, I'm sitting down, can't get up, and can't see what's going on. Alana is getting really good at ignoring my yelling and just doing her thing. Oh Alana. God knew I needed a happy baby for my third. She sleeps through the night. She doesn't like to be held all of the time. She smiles constantly. Alana is the kind of baby that people have and then immediately want another baby. No, I don't want another baby. Don't ask me.

Brett has been working so hard lately. With the change over of the month, he usually gets a really odd schedule. He'll either only get a day off in between his work "weeks," or he'll get a big chunk of time off. This month was one of those one-day-off gigs. So in the last two weeks, he's barely had 2 days off. But after working so hard, he's going to get two weeks off of work. GREAT! It will be nice to see him instead of having him home, doing all his laundry, cooking and packing his food, and watching him leave again.

In these last two weeks, when it's just been me and the kiddos, I'm so thankful that I have good kids. Really. It's awesome. I can go grocery shopping with all of them. We run errands together. I can take them all to the doctor's office when only one has an appointment. I can go to church by myself without having to leave or sit in the back. And darn it, if I want to go out for frozen yogurt (or fro yo, as we call it) after dinner, I can go. Now, I'm not saying that I've never swatted a rear end in public or left a store/library/park because someone isn't listening. It's just nice to know I can still live life and not be tied to the house for fear of going out in public with my kids.

We're debating whether to take a real vacation with the kids while Brett has his time off. The responsible adult in me says no because we have many things on our list to pay for - a possible new tire for the car, dentist appointments for all of us, Thanksgiving dinner, Christmas shopping, and the onslaught of birthdays this time of year. The part of me that is crawling the walls at home wants to put everything on a credit card and just LEAVE! We'll see how it works out. I have another couple of days to debate it.

I've hit a lull in my work, which is fine right now. I've been the only one with the girls lately, so it's good that I'm not sitting in front of my computer the entire time. I do have a small website in the works, and a friend referred me for a commissioned quilting job, so I have work on the horizon. I've been working on some things for the girls' rooms and am almost finished with several projects. I'm so ready to do something creative again. My grandma wrote me a letter once and told me to do something creative every day and you'll be happy. She is so right!

Here's a smile from me to you. Alana's cheeks are getting bigger with each day. She's almost 5 months old, but she's 18 lbs and 26.5 inches long - round but tall. She's in 12 month clothing. She has knee dimples. Her eyes disappear when she smiles. Oh, how I love my fat babies. And Sophia has learned how to do a forward roll. Several times a day, she walks by me, and I just see her feet flipping through the air as she finishes rolling. It makes me smile and makes me realize that life really isn't that hard as long as we laugh a little every day.