Single mother with 3 kids!

Tonight...I asked Olivia to do something (while she was in the middle of playing). Her response to me was, "Excuse me, but I'm a single mother with 3 kids!!" Once again...apparently this was a line from a movie (Ice Age 3...maybe?).

Extreme Home Makeover

I sat down the other night to watch Sunday's recorded episode of Extreme Home Makeover. At the beginning of the show, they tell the story of the featured family and show the disfunction of the current house they are living in. While the Makeover team works on their house, they send the family away somewhere on vacation. This particular family was being sent to Disneyland on vacation. As soon as Olivia heard that, she piped up and said, "WHAT?! We don't get to go to Disneyland because we don't have a broken house? (pause) Well...we do have some damage downstairs."

I'm sure Olivia will be soliciting people to nominate us for the show.....now that she knows Disneyland may be involved....haha!

"Great Pleasure"

We have accumulated a few pumpkins around our house this season and Olivia is full of pumpkin ideas! Today, she was convinced that we needed to make pumpkin smoothies...so we did. After supper, she was begging me to carve the pumpkin (or "curve" the pumpkin as she says) and I kept saying that it's a bit to early to do that yet, if we want it to last until Halloween. She kept insisting that we do it and kept asking, but I kept saying we needed to wait. Finally, she looks at me and says, "Mom, PLEASE can we carve the pumpkin tonight? It would bring me great pleasure!!!"

Seriously...I don't know where this kid comes up with these lines, but they always crack me up!

Our 'newest' Announcement!

We recently discovered that we are expecting our third child! Although we wanted to tell Olivia & Braden right away, we knew that we'd need to wait until we were okay with it being 'public' information before we told them. So...the right moment finally came to share the awesome news with them. We sat them down on the couch and I had pre-recorded the 'announcement' in one of those recordable greeting cards. As they opened it and heard the message, their eyes both lit up and Olivia kept looking at the card, then at us, then back at the card....then us again! Finally with great excitement, she shouted, "We're having a baby!!" She kept opening that card and listening to it over and over again for the next few hours and days! The next day she was talking about it again and she said to me, "Mom, all our dreams have come true! We have been waiting for this forever!"

This past weekend, while we were at church, Olivia just walked in front of me and announced to everyone she met, that her mommy is pregnant! Who needs a sign...or even a belly for that matter...Olivia is on the loose! Good thing we waited to tell her....haha!

A "boy" Makeover?

I picked Olivia up from school today and took the kids to Dollar Giant (as promised), to spend their remaining coins from the "spoilings" of Gramma & Papa. Olivia bought some princess stuff (tiara, clipon earrings, fake nails & play makeup) and Braden bought a Pez dispenser (after much deliberation). So...on the way home, Olivia was begging for Braden to share his candy and after a few minutes I heard them finally make a deal. Olivia offered to do a makeover on Braden, if he shared some candy with her. I don't think Braden really cared about the "makeover", but because he is very willing to share, he agreed. I heard this going on while I was driving and said, "A boy makeover?? That doesn't sound right!" Olivia responded with, "Well...Russell (a male friend of ours) wears earrings...so what's the difference?"

Good point! It's getting harder and harder these days to define "gender" likes and dislikes...or do they even exist anymore?

The Terry Fox Run

Olivia is in Kindergarten now and picking her up from school everyday is always a joy! I love hearing about her day and all her "adventures". Last week, there was a particular day that stood out for me. It was a hot September day and usually she runs to me with a big smile on her face, but on this particular day, she was dragging her feet with her shoulders all slumped forward. She didn't even stop when she got to me for the usual after school embrace, she just walked past me and headed to the car while muttering, "We had to run 8 laps today!" Then it hit me. The school newsletter had mentioned something about the whole school participating in the Terry Fox Run. I didn't think the Kindergarten class was participating in that, but apparently they did....and I sent her to school in flip flops that day (which I never usually do).

I continued to ask her about the run and with each question...the number of laps she recounted, kept increasing. I finally asked her what the running was for (just to see if she actually knew). Her response was, "Some guy died and we had to save money for him!"

The Demo-Derby

Yesterday afternoon, we all piled in the car to head to the Demolition Derby in Hope. We didn't know exactly where we were going or how big of a deal this was, we just figured the kids might enjoy it (well...mostly Braden) and it was a beautiful Sunday afternoon for a drive. Anyway...turns out, this was a pretty big deal and a 3-hour long event. Braden absolutely loved all the crashing and Olivia liked the concession stands...ha! I think she actually enjoyed it too, probably not quite as much, but it wasn't until the way home that she decided to complain. Over and over again, we heard, "That wasn't very fun...I wish there was more stuff for girls to do!" So, we tried to explain to her that we are a family and we do things together. Sometimes we do things that Braden is really into and sometimes we do things that she really enjoys, but we can enjoy things together, even if it's not exactly what we like.

So...when Shawn was tucking Braden into bed last night, he asked him if he liked the Demo Derby and if he'd like to go again sometime. And my thoughtful 4 year old son said, "Well....Olivia didn't really like it, so maybe we can do something that she likes next time!" It's so interesting to see the different personalities coming out in our kids.