Sleepy Head

My mom offered to watch the kids while I went to Activity Days at the church.  I readily accepted her offer and the activity was much more peaceful than usual.  They aren't really bad or anything, just distracting!  When I came home, Kensley had fallen asleep in this position on the ottoman.  I guess she really needed a nap!

Temple Lights

I think it was Stephen's brilliant idea to go see the temple lights and maybe catch a concert while my mom was here.  Not his best idea yet.  The temple lights are beautiful and all, but not so much fun with an almost two-year old.  Pyper was awful!  I really should have packed her in a stroller, but I only have a giant one and it is a pain to use as well.  She was running all over the place, the temple was EXTREMELY crowded, and she only wanted to be where she wasn't supposed to be.  She would duck under the rope lights to try and get at the nativity scenes on the lawn.  Then, we had the brilliant idea, to walk through the nativity display in the visitors center that has all the nativities from all over the world.  A neat display, yes, but not with a toddler!  At one point, she escaped Stephen's grasp and ducked under the rope and grabbed one of the fragile nativities and knocked another piece on the floor!  I was horrified and couldn't get out of there fast enough.  Thankfully, nothing was broken.  Stephen wanted to hear the singing and I wanted no part of it.  We finally started thinking about going home, but not before Pyper ran onto the front lawn and grabbed the "Do not step on the grass" sign and ripped it out and threw it to the ground!
This picture about sums it all up for me...

I told Stephen that he is welcome to go back to the temple another night to listen to a concert with Kensley, but me and Pyper will not be participating!

Turkey Trot

Now that Kensley is in Kindergarten, we get to watch her participate in the Turkey Trot!  Basically, the kids all lined up and they sent one class at a time to take off running.  It wasn't a race, so their were no winners.  The Principal dressed up in a turkey costume and the kids wore turkey hats they decorated and took off on a 1/2 mile run.  I volunteered Stephen to run with Kensley. :o)  I figured it would be bonding for the two of them!

Pyper HATES it when we put her on Stephen's shoulders!  I guess she is scared of heights.

Off they go!

My Mom came down for Thanksgiving and then a couple weeks to visit!  She took a little walk with Pyper.

Here they are running to the finish line.  I couldn't get a good shot because of the angle.  Stephen is blocking Kensley a little behind him, but she is there!  Stephen said she ran the whole way.

Kensley telling me all about her run...

Pyper wasn't really sure about the turkey and was checking him out the whole time, but didn't want to get too close.  We finally got her to go up and say hi, but she still wasn't sure she was happy about it.

After the race, the kids were allowed to play on the playground for a little while before heading back to class.  Pyper jumped right in and played with all the other kids.

This is how happy Pyper was to head home!

Kensley was also so happy to see us leave!

Isn't She Precious?

I think it is pretty clear what happened here...

Veteran's Day

This year for Veteran's Day, we once again went to the Mesa Veteran's Day Parade.  The difference this year was that Stephen got to be in the parade!  The cub scouts in our ward are in the parade every year, but this year they added a truck that a man in our ward restored and filled it with the veterans from our ward.  Stephen walked behind the truck. :o)

Stephen's Dad is also a veteran so he came down for the weekend to be in the parade with Stephen and share the experiece with him.  He is waving from the truck!

Pyper made a friend in the crowd who was the same age as her.  Her birthday is in December, too.  They stood there sizing each other up for a little bit and then Pyper said "let's go!" in toddler talk and gestured for the other girl to follow her and they took off in the other direction!  I have no idea where they planned to go, but they were on their way!

Stephen was the first float in the parade right behind the Grand Marshall!  So, when they were done, they walked back to where we were sitting to enjoy the rest of the parade with us.  Pyper really liked his hat!

Gobble Gobble!

For Activity Days, we helped the girls make little turkeys out of oreos, reeses peanut butter cups and candy corn.  I have to bring Kensley and Pyper with me (kind of a pain) and Kensley was whining the whole time because she wanted to make one.  I told her we would make one at home so she would leave me alone!  She was very proud of her turkey!

Later that day, Kensley and Pyper settled into the toybox to read books

First ER Visit

Kensley has had a cough all day yesterday, but didn't have any other symptoms and kept telling me she felt fine.  She even said her throat didn't hurt.  It wasn't really that bad, just sounded awful.  Last night I was hoping to get a good night's sleep because I always go to bed way too late.  So, I took some Benadryl and went to bed.  The next thing I knew, it was about 2:15 in the morning and Stephen was waking me up saying that Kensley couldn't breathe.  Apparently, she had been hysterical in her room and I didn't hear a thing!  It is really unheard of for Stephen to hear her before me!  Her breathing was really labored and she was crying and scared.  I really had no idea what to do to help her, other than take her to the hospital.  That freaked her out and made things worse because she didn't want to go!  She kept saying she felt better, even though it was obvious she didn't.  Eventually, she threw up, but was able to tell me so it made it into a bowl at least.  After she threw up, she said that was all she needed to do and she was all better now.  We took her to the emergency room anyway.  They said that she had croup, which was what I figured it was since she sounded like a barking seal when she coughed.  Her breathing was fine when we got there, but it probably would have happened again once we put her back to bed.  They took her vital signs and everything was good with that.  So, they gave her a Hello Kitty sticker and then some steroid medicine.  It was a liquid that she could drink to reduce the swelling in her throat.  When they checked her throat, it was really red, but they said it wasn't completely closed off because we caught it early.  They also said they had been treating kids with croup all night long, at least 10 other kids, because it is going around the valley.  They gave her a popsicle and said she would be good to go to school on Monday.  We were in and out of the hospital in an hour and back in bed by 4am.  She slept fine, in between me and Stephen, for the rest of the night.  On our way home from the hospital, she was all smiles.  Stephen's cousin was here visiting so we were both able to go to the ER with Kensley, while Stephanie was at the house with Pyper.  Kensley told me before she went to bed tonight that if she wakes up not being able to breathe that I have to take her to the hospital myself and not Daddy.  She said I could take care of it.  Thank you Kensley, I will do that, but hopefully it won't happen again!  This was my first time ever visiting an ER and it wasn't that awful.  I really regretted the Benadryl I took, though!

Happy Halloween

from Pippi Longstocking and Wonder Woman!