Pretty Piggies

*WARNING: This post is about nothing in particular...just something to break up the monotony between child and vacation posts, but on the plus side I think you will get to know more about me than you ever wanted to;)...ENJOY!*

Yes that is a picture of my newly beautified phalanges! How is this blog worthy one may ask (that one probably being my husband)? BECAUSE I am 29 years old and just a week or two ago got my FIRST pedicure!
I can hear the intake of breath as you go into shock
How does one get to be 29 and never have a pedicure one might ask? I asked myself the same question and here is the multi-dimensional answer I have broken down into a timeline like fashion:
"Teen Years"-I suspect I never had a pedicure in high school for 3 reasons 1) I was too poor; I could barely scrounge up $2 for Zingers and a Fruitopia for lunch 2) You can't wear opened toe shoes on the volleyball/basketball court as well as the softball and/or track field 3)I just wasn't "that" girl
"College Years"-Oddly enough I come up with reason #2 again...Poor
"Married Years"-it really never crossed my mind.
"Motherhood"-This was the time that I noticed women with glistening, soft, callous-free toes, but I guess I played the martyr thinking it was a luxury I wasn't worthy of.

But when I received a "pedicure coupon" for preschool graduation from two very astute mothers who had obviously seen my gruesome feet and thought that it would both for everyone involved, I had reason to hope!

But not being a normal pedicurist I did not take my fat pregnant feet in because I think I really wanted to see what miracles could be worked by a short Vietnamese woman. So I waited all summer until the coupon was going to expire before giving it a try.
AND....
I loved it all! The oils, the rubbings, the painting, the 45 minutes of silence!
What I didn't love was rolling up my pant legs to find un-shaven legs...beginner's mistake?!?!?!

But all in all it was a-ma-zing and I am hooked. I told my husband I EXPECT a pedicure coupon every mother's day!
Some woman make a bucket list (things to do before they die). Some items might include seeing Paris, going bungee jumping, etc. My goals are more realistic...finding my true hair style, owning a piece of jewelry valued over $20...but now I can officially cross off "Get a Pedicure!"

Good Fortune

It has been a crazy, busy summer for our family with the new baby and the cabin building so we couldn't resist a vacation over the UEA weekend. We booked some hotels online and headed to sunny St. George just as the temperatures dropped up north.
We loved the swimming,



the "Big Beds,"


Bowling (it was our first time as a family),







and visiting Brigham Young's Summer Home!

Kylie's Panda Express Fortune on our last night in Dixie said it all...

Reunions

In September we had lots of fun attending two reunions in two weeks. Here are the higlights:
Crafts with Cousins



Old Fashioned Photos


Suckers, Suckers, and more Suckers!


Fabulous Food and Delicious Desserts!

Horsey Rides!


Spending Time with Those We Love!

Our Family's Top Model

MCS? do you have it? Know anyone who suffers from it?
What are the characteristics of Middle Child Syndrome? Well according to the Urban Dictionary it is "an emotional scarring condition.Middle children are known for ending up with the things that are too big for the baby in the family and too small for the oldest.It is a known fact the youngest and oldest are treated differently than the middle child for the oldest is the first child aka favorite and the smallest is the baby aka the last child known for getting whatever they desire because they are the 'baby'."

MCS often weighs heavily on my mind. Usually once a day I find myself trying to find ways to "even things out." You know trying to make sure that each child gets the same time, attention, etc. I have this fear that Tessa will someday ask why she never gets to do anything or why there are 1/2 as many of her baby pictures compared to her older sisters.

So I was so excited when Kacee (the awesome person who took the girls tutu pictures) needed some baby models for a photo shoot for apericots clothing. And it was for toddler clothing and cloth diapers. That meant Kylie was too old and Mallory was too young! Yeah one thing that Tessa could do that neither of her sisters could...these opportunities do not come around very often.

And the photos turned out so cute!





So while Kylie may get to drive and date first and Mallory will get to live at home the longest (you know all babies of the family do :))...Tessa will always be our family's top model!

These Are A Few of My Favorite Things

Girls in white dresses

So it was the prefect overcast day to take pictures of my three girls in their white dresses for Tessa's blessing pictures. I should have hired a professional to take them but my girls (all three) are at that stage where they don't take a very good picture. Kylie has a forced smile and adverts her eyes, Tessa will not smile or does a scrunched-nose mouth twisted "cheese," and Mallory cannot hold her head up very well.
Most of them weren't too bad and I think they capture the very essence of my three favorites things (my girls)!

There is NO Fun in Fund Raising

I guess I shouldn’t have been shocked when Kylie came home from Kindergarten with her first fundraiser. Never the less I did groan, out loud…you see I HATE fundraisers. There are two reasons for this (1)It’s genetic. It was passed down to me from my mother who also puts fund raising on the same level as a root canal when it comes to effort and discomfort.
(2) When I was 11 years old I had to collect money for a paper route and seeing how it was so hard to get people to pay for something they already had received I decided I never wanted to SELL anything ever again!

So what is it my daughter is supposed to sell to support “field trips?” Happenings Books. These are $20 books that have coupons for restaurants, travel, attractions, and shopping. And while I don’t hate these books ( I think they can be quite useful for some people) I do hate the idea of my daughter “working on commission” at such a young age!

Fundraisers are not a new concept. When I was in elementary school (a long time ago) we would start the year with a fund raising assembly. That’s right, let’s take the students out of class for about an hour so they can listen to a sales pitch by people who were so good at their job that by the end of the last bell we were all sprinting home to sell five gazillon of whatever to get those awesome prizes (and this was when no one warned you not to sell “door to door”. I remember I was quite taken with this prize:


Well some 20 years later the prizes are still “crap” (pardon my French). In my daughters packet was a purple note with a superman-like character with big bold letters asking” Are you a SUPER starter? You see if my daughter sells 2 Books in the first 3 days of the sale she gets…wait for it…wait for it…a “FREE BIG 2 INCH SUPER BALL!”

Seriously, we should hustle our bustle so we can get a prize that I could buy at the dollar store?
But wait the prizes get much better!
If Kylie sells 1book she gets a giant inflatable balloon.

Sounds cool but it would deflate in two days and until then where would I put a 7’6” long balloon?

So we better sell 2-4 so we can get a Roomarang!


That’s right, like a boomerang but shaped like a X! Can you imagine the dents in our walls this would create and the tears when she realizes it is merely a plastic “X” that you throw! By the way my daughter would be selling $40-$80 worth of product to get a prize that I can buy online for $2.99.

For the really ambitious kids there is the shake wobble pen,

the dinosaur ring that lights up when you squeeze



or the blockhead plush

that promise to talk and sing when it falls ( why would it be falling?) and that confesses in small print that it has “non-user-replaceable-batteries.”

So if we really wanted something cool we would have to sell 25-34 books and get the Wheel-Running Hamster


…because hey that would be the only "rodent" my daughter would ever get to keep as a pet!

Can’t I just donate $20 to my school and bribe my child with a dollar store toy not to sell anything!

I have an idea why doesn’t this company set up a website where people can order online. When people order there is a box to input the name of the school and the student so they both get credit. Make up business cards that the students hand out to family, friends, and neighbors. That way there is no pressure to buy and I don’t have to collect money.

Sounds easy right? WRONG! Because Happening Books don’t sell themselves…little brown haired blue-eyed girls sell Happening Books to family, friends, and neighbors who would hate to be the reason a cute kindergartner didn’t get a “SUPER BIG 2 INCH SUPER BALL!”

It Was One of Those Days...

That phrase is usually used to denote a day we would rather not relive, but this was one of those days I wish could last forever!
Today was Kylie’s first day of Kindergarten and Tessa’s birthday, so we had to make it special. The morning started with cinnamon rolls (no, not homemade…I’m no Betty Crocker but does it really matter as long as it has cream cheese icing on top?!).
Next it was the tub time, because no one wants to go through their first day of school with sticky hands and face.
Then of course we were long overdue for some finger and toenail painting…in our favorite color…bubble gum pink.
To pass the time before AFTERNOON kindergarten we played with friends at Mommy Monday.

Finally it was happy meals from MacDonalds. As luck would have it the toy was little American Girl Felicity paperdolls. Well the toy gods must have been smiling down on us because we had just rented the Felicity movie weeks before. Kylie kept saying, “How did they know that we wanted these?!!”

We finished just in time to snap a few pictures and get Kylie off to school. She was so excited. She already knew 6 of the kids in her class and was glad to see them in front of the school.


As a novice school mom (Kylie being my first to go to school) I had forgotten to tell her how we would find each other after school. So I somehow missed her and couldn’t find her, but then I heard a little girl sobbing to the crossing lady…I felt so bad!

In the evening we celebrated Tessa’s 2nd Birthday. She loved her toys especially her baby!



We ended our day dancing to Taylor Swift singing at the CMA awards!

After days of fighting and grumpiness both girls were so kind and happy that I wish every day could be like this!