Soccer and Basement season ending!

Only 1 soccer game left! Taylor and Kaylee got to be on the same team this year. The first video is Taylor (purple) kicking it in. I'm sad that I didn't continue to video her very typical Taylor spin and dance. The second video is Kaylee (in white with blue sweats) against one of her friends. I would say what number they are but (almost) everyone is either 4 (kaylee) or 1 (Taylor) Anyway, you can see Taylor walking along in the end of the 2nd video. They both have tons of fun, but Taylor is definitely one of the smallest and younger ones out there so doesn't get in the pack as much.



I had mentioned before my birthday that I was actually dreading that week. Matt was actually gone that whole week which is why he took me to Park City the weekend before. I hate it when he is gone! The girls hate it! Here they are Monday afternoon after he got back home.

Before Matt left we stayed up until 2 in the morning one morning getting the painting done for the new carpet that I got (yes, I consider it one of MY presents) the day before my birthday. Here we were trying to recreate the famous pitchfork picture, but the stern-faced one we took looked way to sad for how excited we were. And speaking of excited--you should've seen how excited Taylor and Emily were when they thought they were getting red carpet!

So here it is. (Click on the pictures if you want to see a bigger picture) Our bathroom still isn't done yet. We are having a hard time deciding what to do with the two vanities and countertops. Too many decisions! Here are some befores and afters of the office (minus closet doorknobs) and then the family room. It was so much work. A huge part of me says that next time we will save up and make someone else do all the work. However, it is nice for us, and especially for the girls, to know how much work it was and to take extra good care of it all.

In the bedroom/office below I'm actually standing by the window taking the 2nd picture. The girls bedrooms are on the other side of that wall.


In the last pictures I'm standing in (kinda) the same place both times. You can kinda see the toy room to the left and our food storage room straight ahead. So there it is. I'm officially done talking about the basement. (well, maybe someday I'll show a picture of a finished bathroom) Now we have tons of room for visitors! (yes, Camille, that does include ALL of you! Put some miles on that van!)

Gardner Stadium

WELCOME TO GARDNER STADIUM!

If you were to click on the photos below you will see that we have nice plush BROWN seating for "Wyoming fans" and even for the "other fans".





Instead of going to the game where surely we would have been stuck in a corner amongst the sea of blue we decided to stay home and watch the game. We had the best seats!


In Gardner Stadium we do understand that there are many "other fans" around us here in Utah County so we decided that we would leave a corner for any of these that may have needed a place to watch the game. ;)


But hey! Enough about that--How 'bout them Cowgirls?!

Fall Saturdays in Utah County

We had a few errands to run this morning. The girls had soccer practice and we needed to buy a birthday present for a friend. I just wanted to let you all know that in the sea of blue and the bleeding of red, the girls in game day gold made it out alive! Go Cowboys!

All Cowboy fans click HERE and/or HERE.

No Excuses!

Ok--this is it. No more excuses. I NEED YOUR INPUT! (Skip down to the last paragraph if you are already bored with this blog) Ok--If you have been in my house at all over the summer you have seen the dust and the unvacuumed and unmopped floors (I'm pretty sure unvacuumed and unmopped aren't real words). Well, the carpet guys are here, which means the basement is done; which means no more saying, "Sorry about the mess--we're working on the basement", and no more, "Well, if the basement was done I'd have more room to stay organized." (I'm sure I can come up with other excuses though, like, "If only I had really nice cabinets here to keep things organized.")

After working on the basement I've decided I really want to take better care of our walls, our baseboards, our DOORS! (click here if you have forgotten) Oh those doors! our light fixtures, our windows and window treatments our new carpet etc. etc. Now, I know that I am a mom and my kids need to feel like they can live in this house, but after working as hard as we did on this project I have even more motivation to take better care of it and the rest of our home. Here is where all of you come in.

LAST PARAGRAPH ;) In a perfect world how do you clean your house? How do you keep track of those once a week, once a month, conference weekend chores? Part of me wants the perfectly organized calendar that tells me exactly what to clean on which days. Maybe that isn't practical. I'm just very curious if there are any websites, spreadsheets or other tools that you use to keep you motivated and organized. Now really--I want comments or emails about this, even if you think I'm crazy for wanting to be so "Type A" organized. Thanks!! ;)

Last Week

My friend Heather already has the great theme of Tender Mercies for her blog. I love it and I am jealous that she thought of it first, because I can't think of anything else to call this picture. Matt and I have been spending every spare minute trying to get this basement done. We were down there all day Saturday. At one point I walked through my upstairs and saw this picture outside. Oh how I miss my girls!

They have been so great through all of this mess and chaos. They have taken such good care of each other and Kierra. Matt and I were both so tempted today (Sunday) to get back downstairs and get it done--it is so close, but there is definitely a reason for the Sabbath Day. We needed to be a family! We came home from church, had lunch and then played games!! It was such a wonderful day!

Last Sunday was also a wonderful day with family. We went to Riverton for the day to visit Aunts, Uncles, cousins and Grandpa, who was in town from Wyoming for the weekend. We always love our visits up there. I miss my family all of the time!




Here is Kaylee in their backyard. I'm sure there are great stories behind the trike. I have many great memories of that house!

Then Tuesday was school picture day! I never did get pictures of Kaylee on this day. :( But here are the other 3 along with some video of Kierra. Of course she was walking a lot better before I got the camera out! She isn't even 10 months old yet. She is just ready to keep up with her sisters I guess.





Ok--I wasn't going to add this last picture, but I'd better. This is us on a ski lift Friday night in Park City. I'm dreading this upcoming week for a couple of reasons--one of those being that I'm turning 29 + 1. I'd call it a midlife crisis, but I'm hoping to live past 60. Being a year after 29 just seems soooo.....well.....not in my 20s. Anyway, Matt arranged for the kids to stay the night in Heber and then he took me on a quick getaway to Park City. We did dinner and a musical (hmmm....if you can call it that--it was so bizarre) and walked around, holding hands instead of diaper bags and just had a great time!



So, I'll have to explain more of why I'm dreading this week later, but at least I will be getting carpet in the basement on Wednesday, so that should help ease my pain! ;) Sorry to put so much into one blog. I get online every once in a while to read about everyone else, but just haven't stopped long enough to update my own. I still have soccer pictures to get up and then soon those wonderful and complete basement pictures!

I'm a Dancer

While I was so busy freaking out about Kaylee and Taylor growing up and going off to school I missed my 3 year old all of a sudden turning into a little lady. Click on the picture below of Emily to see one adorable, grown up, little girl.
I just now copied over some pictures I had on our video camera from our last week of summer. I have great video on there too, but for some reason our nice video camera doesn't copy the videos over as well as our brokendown still camera does. Someday I'll figure out the best way to organize and store all of these great pictures and videos. For now I will just have to play catch up.

Kaylee, Taylor and Emily were in a neighborhood dance class over the summer. You've seen part of their dance (click here and scroll clear to the bottom to see the Estes Park talent show). I do have a video of them with their class. I hope I can get it on sometime. I do wish that I had gotten the 3 of them to do it by themselves while they were all dressed up. Here are some pictures. Right after their short little recital they had their first soccer game. Kaylee is #4 and Taylor is #1. I'll get better soccer pictures this week and also some pictures of Kierra. Kierra is almost 1 (well almost 10 months), and almost walking. Right now I feel like I need two hands to hold her up and keep her out of things so I don't have many pictures of her. I will take a bunch today and this week so that I can show off my little baby!



Oh and the basement update: We're selling the house....just kidding. I'm just ready to be done. I finally got the doors painted and Matt did an awesome job on the tile! Then yesterday he and Ryan did the trim. So now we'll go around caulking and filling in the nail holes and then the real painting begins. No more of the boring primer stuff. I'm ready to see real paint!

Daddy! Look what Emily can do!

We ride our bikes to and from the school twice everyday. Emily has been riding her bike with training wheels. The noise of the training wheels on the road bugs her and so she was balancing anyway to keep them up. Today I said Emily we are doing this and she got it right away. She still has a hard time starting, but she did it here in this video. So Daddy--here you go! This is for you!


I don't know how this girl functions with her hair in her face all of the time. She loves to "have it down and curled" everyday.




And here she is already racing Taylor up and down the street.

"Celebrating work by not doing any"

I WISH!! That was a quote I saw to describe why Labor Day was first started in New York back in 1882. Well, instead Matt and I have spent our whole weekend "vacation" trying to get this basement done. So, while my parents and Dale are in Denver at a Rockies game, and while the rest of the world celebrates on a lake or at Disneyland, we are painting doors and laying tile. Just when I think we are cruising along real good, I realize that finishing the basement isn't just floors and paint. You mean the doors don't just come painted and with the perfect doorknobs to match the rest of the house? Okay, I'm really not that dumb, it is just that I keep forgetting about all of the little details that go into this. Wow, 6 doors and a closet (2 smaller doors). That is too many doors for this little area that we are doing. I'd better get back to it though. I have only the 2nd coat of the 2nd side of each door left to do.



These next pictures show exactly what it is we are doing. 3 bedrooms were already finished down here when we moved in. Then we are finishing another little bedroom/office. I kinda took over Matt's office upstairs with all my craft stuff, so I'll probably LET him have this room. It is all our friend Nate's fault for giving Matt the idea of a man cave. ;) Then there will be the bathroom and family room.

So here is what it looked like last week before we started painting and tiling. I am standing in a doorway that will close off the basement from the upstairs. Behind me are the girls' two rooms and then here is Matt's cave.


To the left of the cave is the bathroom that has a door separating the tub and toilet from the two vanities. (because we love extra doors!)



And then here is the family room. To the left of the cd player is the toy room (already finished) and in the far corner is the door to the food storage room and the door to the backyard. Can you tell I'm sick of the doors?! It reminds me of this song (click here) I wish I had a Centennial Singer video of it. Well, Matt's lunch break wasn't as long as mine. He is down there working hard, so off I go.