G is for "Good" Grass

I'll have to admit, Jeter's preschool is pretty fun.  They do lots of fun things.  I love to hear about the things they do when he goes to the other people's houses.  It always sounds fun.  He loves it.  They learn a little bit too while they are having fun, so that's good too.  When I had the preschoolers at my house, I knew we couldn't just play, I had to make sure I taught them stuff.  So I did.  Important stuff, like what real, "good grass" is like.  I miss good ol' Idaho grass.  (The grass here in Texas kind of feels like the weedy grass that we try and get rid of if it's in your lawn in Idaho.)   I had my mother in law send me some grass seed from Idaho and each kid was able to plant their own little "good grass" guy.  Then as their hair grows, they get to give them haircuts.  These grass guys were part of our lives up until now, so I thought I better post some pics.  Cuz they're about to get chucked.  (We had an ant infestation in our house, and they discovered the grass guys.  So now there's ants all over in their dirt.) 

Jeter's grass guy before his hair cut

Jerzi's grass girl before her haircut

Giving the haircuts

What great little stylists they are.

A sad farewell to the lovely grass of Idaho.  You will always be missed.

Halloween 2012

Wow, it was hard trying to figure out costumes for my kids this year!  I love doing a family theme, but I also wanted my kids to have a little say in what they wanted to dress up as.  Plus, I kind of like to make the costumes (I say kind of cuz it usually ends up torching me out, but when they're all done, I love it), so it was rough trying to get the kids to agree on the same thing, and having it be something that I can make.  We went through tons of ideas.  And we all finally agreed on something.

Introducing......

Du nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuuuuh

BATMAN!!!! 

Robin

Catwoman

And last but not least, The Joker!

 

I got the idea for Jerzi's costume off of good ol' pinterest.  It was so stinkin cute, and she was actually excited about it.  I thought about just buying it cuz it would save me a lot of time and stress, and way easier. Then I saw that etsy was selling it for $65.  Geesh!  So much for buying it.  So I went about gathering up all the material, and in the end, I'm not sure how much I spent, but I know it was a lot cheaper than $65.  Her costume ended up being the easiest to make out of all of them (well except for mine).

I thought the Batman costume was gonna be a cinch to make.  But then I had to try and save money by shopping at a thrift store to find the gray shirt and pants.  I couldn't find anything but this shirt that was 5 sizes to big.  I got it thinking I could just take it in, cuz it needed to be tight.  Well, that was dumb.  I took it in, but struggled with the sleeves and neck.  In the end, I got it to look ok, but so not worth my time.  I should have just paid an extra few dollars and got one at a normal store.  Our computer ran out of ink, so I had to freehand draw the batman symbol that went on his shirt and on the back of his cape.  Turns out it's hard to make a perfect oval.  And the black undies, whew, they were also a major pain!  But man, they were a cute little Batman and Robin.

The catwoman costume was super easy.  I used my black underarmor running clothes and my boots.  The only thing I had to make was my mask and ears.  YAY, a costume that took like 15 minutes tops!!!

So my plan with the joker costume was to buy an old suit at a thrift store, spray paint it and be done.  Well, I wanted it to be a little longer coat, so I bought a huge one stupidly thinking again, "I can take it in."  The only problem with these thoughts is that I don't know how to do stuff like that.  I'm actually not a sewer at all.  I can't even follow a pattern.  I just make stuff up as I go.  But I always think, "Oh I could figure it out."  So I brought it home and started tearing it apart.  Holy cow!  The inside of a suit is a mess.  It was so hard to take that stupid thing in.  I wanted to scream and give up about 12 times while I was fixing it.  It was puckering and gathering in places it shouldn't.  The sleeves were twisting and the collar was too big.  It was rough trying to figure it all out.  And when I got it done, it definitely wasn't the awesomest job in the world, but at least he could wear it.  Then Had spray painted them and voila, the Joker! Oh and he was supposed to have green hair, but he wouldn't take the time to do it.  :(   

Gettin ready to go out trick or treating

I love that you can wear whatever costume you want here for Halloween cuz it's actually warm.  You don't have to cover up the cute costumes with snowsuits and coats.

Robin and Catwoman fighting the bad guy!  Batman didn't want to have any part of it.  He was too grouchy to fight.

Yikes!  The joker was scary!

And....

he got me.

Jeter had a little Halloween party with his preschool.  It was so fun.  They played Halloween games, and a witch came to the house.

Jeter loved it.  The other kids didn't quite know what to think of her.

She read them Halloween books in her witchy voice.  She was so good!

Then they had a Halloween lunch and treats.  So cute!

 

 

I love Halloween!  I love seeing all the kids costumes.  I love seeing how creative people are.  And I love feeling like I accomplished something after I get done making a costume.  And how awesome is it that you can go ask neighbors for candy, and they give it to you?!  I especially love when the kids come home with chocolate candy bars.  Now, let the feasting begin!

Finally 3!!!

 Happy Birthday to our cute little Jerzi girl!!! 

Although everyone already thought she was 3 or 4 since she was 1 years old, she is just now turning 3.  I don't know if it's all her long, wild, hair, her sweet little face, or the fact that she's really tall for her age (96 percentile!).  But she looks older.  And because of that I think I have been harder on her and expect her to act better, and understand things more.  I am constantly having to remind myself that she is/was only 2.  She has kept us on our toes to say the least!  But we love this little girl so much.  

We asked her what she wanted to do for her birthday and she wanted to go to the movies.  (Going to the movies is a big deal in our family.)  So we all went the night before her birthday to watch Hotel Transylvania.  It was a really cute show!  Jeter loved it.  Me and Had loved it.  Jerzi, well, she liked it but she got a little tired and couldn't pay attention to the whole thing.  We came home and all crashed for the night.  Right when she woke up the next morning, her and Jete rushed downstairs to open her birthday packages from her grandparents.  She was so excited! 

Hadley had to work that morning and Jeter had a baseball game.  She's a trooper to go to all of his games and just sit there while I help with the kids in the dugout and Hadley helps on the field. 

After we got home she got to open her presents from us.  Anything pink or Cinderella, and this girl is happy.

Then that night we had friends come over and carved pumpkins and had cake and ice cream. 

Jerzi decided she wanted a football jersey cake this year, to look like one of her own football jersey's that she wears.  Whew!  Way easier than her football helmet cake last year.

She came and looked at it while I was making it and said dissapointed, "That doesn't look like a football jersey Mom."  I told her it would when I was done, hopefully.  She didn't seem to believe me.  But when I showed her the finished cake, she was so happy to see how it turned out!  That makes me happy.  It's usually worth the extra effort to see how happy they are when its personalized.  This time, totally worth it!  :)

We were going to go camping for her birthday, but since Hadley had to work and Jeter had a game, we weren't able to go anywhere for the weekend.  So we went camping the next night in our backyard.  We even cooked up some tinfoil dinners.  Yum!  After celebrating her birthday all weekend long, I hope she knows how much we love her!