Lessons to learn from

So the other day I thought I had a great idea to let the girls paint their pumpkins instead of carving them. It was a great idea to start with, but then I had to go to the bathroom and left them alone for a minute when I came back this is what I found.

This was the end result.

This was the clean up.

Halloween

Well, now that I'm not so stressed about getting the bills paid and Blake getting a job I have a little bit of free time to catch up a little bit. Until I have to start packing and cleaning to move next week. For Halloween this year, I decided to make the girls costumes (well I bought their black pants and shirts, but made their tails and ears). I was going to put whiskers on them but thought smears wouldn't look so good on them. They decided that they wanted to be cats. They constantly are pretending that they're cats so they wanted to dress like them. The Tuesday before Halloween, we went to a ward party. We had hot dogs, hot chocolate, and then they had a bunch of carnival games for the kids. The girls loved it. The did a cake walk, a fishing pond, got their faces painted, and had a bean-bag toss. It was a lot of fun and inside a ward members farming garage, so it was warm. For Halloween we took the girls to my parents house to go trick or treating. I think that it was the warmest Halloween night I can remember since I've lived in Idaho. We were out in our short sleeve shirts. It was really nice. Kenzie was more interested in getting compliments than candy. She'd knock on the door say "Trick or treat, don't I look cute in my kitty costume?" She did this at almost every house. Ashley didn't understand that she had to knock on the door and wait for someone to answer, she kept knocking and then trying to walk in on her own. It was fun though. We brought home the candy picked a few favorites and tossed the rest.

WE'RE MOVING!!!!!!!!

What Blake may be dressed as in a few weeks HEHEHEHE!




Well, we finally did it! Blake got a job, and we're moving to Salt Lake City on December 2nd. Blake has been hired by Boeing as the Industrial Hygienist and Safety Specialist. He starts work on December 5th. It has been a long time in waiting, but it has finally happened. It's turned out to be worth the wait because the job is better than we expected. We are so EXCITED!!! We're going to SLC tomorrow to look for a place to live. Hopefully we come back with a new address.

Name Game

I found this on a friends blog and was curious. It didn't surprise me that there wasn't anyone else with my name, but what did surprise me is that there are 2 Ashley Izatts in the US.

HowManyOfMe.com

There are 1 or fewer people with my name in the U.S.A. How many have your name?

24Th of July

The 24Th of July weekend we decided to stay home for once. Instead of going away for the weekend, we took the girls to the zoo in Idaho Falls and the to the carousel in Rexburg. At the zoo my chicken-little Kenzie who's afraid of everything actually touched a snake, only after Ashley did, but she still did it. They also loved petting the goats in the petting area. Kenzie had fun brushing them and Ashley kept chasing them calling then "horsee!" Both of their favorite part was the monkey house. Since this trip Ashley has been obsessed with Curious George. We also took them to ride the horses on the carousel. Lo-and-behold, we finally found something Ashley's afraid of. She hated it, kept calling it scary and wouldn't remove her head from my side when it was in motion. I had a hard time getting her to pose for these pictures when it wasn't moving. Of all the things to be afraid of, it's the mechanical horses. Silly girl!

He Made It!

Well Blake made it to graduation! YEA HURRAY!!! He got his BS in Health Science, his emphasis being Corporate Health and Safety. He clustered in Biology and Physical Sciences (Physics, Chemistry, and Geology). Thank you family and friends who have been so supportive the last too many years, and helped him get through this. He's now talking about going on to get his Masters someday, and eventually before he dies his Doctorate.

Now we're going through the process of finding a job. He's put out about 100 resumes, had 3 job interviews, and 0 job offers. The problem he's running into is everyone wants someone with 5 years experience, no one wants to give the experience. So, we're still looking and praying.



Again, sorry for all the pictures!

Kenzie's Birthday

Yea, okay so I know that her birthday was back in July, but I'm finally getting around to posting the pictures. Sorry! I'm also sorry that there's so many pictures. I should have weeded through them before posting.

Kenzie's birthday was kind of crazy this year. She has bad allergies and once in a while this will cause her tear ducts to clog and become infected. Her birthday happened to be one of these times. So ignore her puffy, gooey eye in all the pictures. Her birthday was actually Monday the 14, but we celebrated it on Saturday the 12Th. She was suppose to have a friend birthday party that afternoon, and then a family party that night. Her friend birthday party didn't turn out so great. She had invited 12 kids and then our good friend Aaron and Melissa's little boy Isaac whose closer to Ashley's age. None of her friends came. The only kid there was Isaac. His parents brought him and Aaron and Melissa visited with me while the kids swam (Blake had to work for most of the party). We did manage to get a couple of Kenzie's neighbor friends to come over for cupcakes though, she was excited about that.

For her family party, my parents and my little brother Thomas came. We had pizza, Little Mermaid cake, and ice cream. She got a My Little Pony rollerskating cake toy from my brother, My First Leap Frog from us, a digital camera from my parents, and then a nursery rhyme story book from her great grandma along with a pink hand made photo frame for her Jesus picture in her room (she had requested this because the old frame was brown and purple and she didn't like those colors). We ended up calling it an early night and taking her into the doctor for eye drops and found out she had yet another bladder/kidney infection. Poor girl! She thought it was a great day though, so no harm done. Monday we took her to Wingers for dinner and she got an ice cream cookie. She loved it.

Conversation with a 23 month old

Ashley was playing in her room and then came running out to sit on my lap. She smelled pretty ripe so I asked her thinking that this was the reason for her sitting on my lap (she hates having a dirty diaper and will ask you to change it as soon as she's filled it). I asked her if she needed to be changed, she smiled huge said, "No, just gas!" and then ran away laughing. She was right of course, but the fact that she knew that means she's past the time to start potty training. She's such a tease, she's going to be a hand full when she grows up!

OUCH!!!

Well, a couple of weeks ago I had (as Kenzie puts it) a little trip down the stairs. Anyone who knows where we live has seen the cement stairs in front of our apartment, well one day we were in a hurry to get some things done so we could go to Salt Lake for the weekend, I was carrying Ashley down the stairs, Kenzie was already at the car yelling at me to hurry up, and I some how lost my balance and fell all the way down the stairs. I was just lucky that Ashley some how didn't go down with me. I think that she must have had a guardian angel with her because she somehow managed to stay at the top. I ended up in a puddle on the sidewalk. (The sprinklers had just gone off and the sidewalk was wetter than the grass of course.) I just closed my eyes and laid there too scared to open my eyes and see Ashley laying next to me, but when I heard her start crying and screaming from the top of the stairs, I finally realized that I hurt in a few places. The worst looking was the line of bruises going down my left leg, and the bruises covering my back and bum. Then I had a little bump on my head, a bunch of scrapes and bruises on my arms, and I hurt my ankle on my right foot pretty good. It's been three weeks and my ankle still is killing me. It was finally decided that I should stay off of it and see if the swelling and pain would go away. So, now I'm on crutches, which kind of sucks, but my girls have been great helps to me, especially Kenzie.




These were taken about 8 days after I fell, things were starting to look better by this point.

4th of July Reunion

Over the 4Th of July weekend, we went to the annual Erikson reunion in Star Valley. It was a lot of fun! Ashley had a hard time taking naps while we were there, and one of the days she was very cranky so Blake threw her and Kenzie on his brother Wade's 4-wheeler and drove them around. Ashley fell almost instantly to sleep. She had to be pretty tired, because she's one who will only sleep in her own bed and occasionally in her car seat and she;s usually a light sleeper but Blake said that her head was flopping all over as they hit all the bumps on the dirt roads and she had the wind in her face the whole time. It was so cute, but as soon as Blake came back and stopped she was awake screaming again. This was also the first time that Kenzie went on a 4-wheeler voluntarily. In the past she's been afraid to even get close to one when it was off. She loved it this year and couldn't get enough of the 4-wheelers and Rangers. This year has also been a tough year for some of the Eriksons financially, so we had a silent auction to help raise money for those that needed it most. Each family was to bring something that could be auctioned. I took a bunch of bracelets and hair bows. To my surprise they all sold. YIPEE! It was great! On the last day there, we borrowed, Blakes cousin's Ranger (a kind of 4-wheeler that looks more like a car with side by side seats and seat belts) and went Geocaching with the girls and Blake's sister Jan and her kids Justin and Emily. We made it all the way up the mountain, found the treasure, and then on the way back, Blake tried to show off and got the Ranger stuck in the still remaining snow that was there. It took some dirt, rocks, sticks and a lot of pushing power to get us out. I just had to roll my eyes and keep Ashley calm (she didn't like being stuck). We also slept in a tent this year. We finally out grew Blakes mom's trailer and had to use a tent much to Blakes dismay. The girls thought that it was the best part of the reunion. Over all it was just a great time to visit with family and relax in between chasing the girls all over.

Farewell to Good Friends

Recently, we had our next-door-neighbors, Megan and Devin, move away to Washington state. He had graduated last December, and got a job with Microsoft, so off they went. It was a sad day, but exciting for them to be able to move on and start Devin's career. Megan and I kept each other sane and laughing, especially when we had kids trying to sell magazines door-to-door. They have a little girl Emily who's just over a year and my girls love her. We watched Emily once so her parents could have a date night, and Kenzie and Ashley wouldn't leave her alone. They had to show her every toy they own, they tried to feed her, hold her, and just love her to death. She was a good sport though and put up with quite a bit from them before running to be picked up and saved. It was fun though, she's a cute girl, we miss her and her parents a lot!

Relay For Life

For those of you that don't know what Relay For Life is, it's an overnight fund raiser for cancer. Different teams sign up and for the entire event from 7pm Friday night to 12 noon Saturday, and there has to be at least one person from each team walking around the track the whole time (including all night). Our team was mostly family. There were a few of my nephews friends that joined. It our first year doing it, and it was a blast. One of the fund raising activities was a kiss-the-pig contest. 4 prominent people from the community are picked and then jars are set around town for people to put money in. The idea was for you to pay for one of these people to kiss the pig. Which ever person had the most money in their jar at the end had to kiss the pig, or match the amount in the jar to make someone else kiss the pig. They kept saying it was just a little baby pig, but you can see for yourself that she wasn't that little. Her name was Christmas. My girls loved her. Someone found out how much money was in the jars at the end and wrote a check to make it a 3 way tie. They were able to raise almost $1000 in just 1/2 hour for this contest.



They also had a hot air balloon. Kenzie started screaming for her aunt Jill as soon as she saw the fire go into the balloon to heat the air and raise it. Ashley was brave though and loved it. Ashley, Blake, and I were able to go up in the balloon. It was so cool! We took the girls back to Blake's mom's house to sleep there, and then Blake and I went back to take our turn walking from 1-2 am. At 3 am they had a Fear Factor game. That was interesting. Blake and I went back to his mom's house at 3:30 and finally fell asleep to be woken at 6 by the girls. It was a great night, we can't wait for next years activities!

I know that it's been a long while since I've updated this, it's been a crazy few months. We've had Relay For Life, a family reunion, Kenzie's 4th Birthday, Blake's Graduation, and our 24th of July celebrations. I'm going to finally have some time next week so I'll spend a few days catching everyone up. Sorry about the delay.

I'm a Big Girl Now

Ashley's growing up too fast! She's not my little baby anymore. She's going to nursery now without a glance back at me, she wants to go potty so bad in the big potty, and I think that she's outgrown her crib. She climbed out of her crib when she was 9 months old, but fell on her head and hasn't really done it since. Now she's mastered not only getting out of the crib, but getting back in it also. There's been quite a few times she's been playing on the floor in her room and started screaming for someone to come get her out of her crib. The other night, after we put the girls to bed we could hear Ashley talking to herself and then a toy start making noise. I went in ready to yell at Kenzie for getting out of bed and playing, just in time to see Ashley's bum go over the rail of her crib where she had thrown the toy making the noise. I was so shocked, I didn't know whether to laugh or not. I'm not ready to put her in a big bed!

Cinco de Mayo

Well I know that this is a little late, but back on May 3rd, we had a Cinco de Mayo celebration with my family. My parents, brother, and both of my grandmas. We had steak and chicken fajitas, 3 kinds of salsa, and we had a pinata for the girls. It was really fun to see the girls try to break the pinata. Kenzie was afraid to hit it because it moved when she did and she didn't want it to hit her. Ashley had no clue what was going on, but was happy to hit something and not get yelled at. They both loved the candy flying out of it when Blake and my brother finally broke it open. There were little champagne party poppers in there (where you pull the string and it makes a loud pop and shoots out streamers) that made Kenzie cry because they were too loud (I think she needed a nap by this point in the day, because the noise makers that she was blowing everywhere were louder). There was also little princess dolls in there that the girls love. It was a great day, but I think it was a little too long for my mom who was still recovering from surgery. It also gave us an excuse to celebrate and keep my grandma Robison's mind off the 1 year anniversary of my grandpa dying.

So Far Behind

I feel like I'm so far behind in everything. Here we are middle of June and I'm still wondering where May went. Blake is getting ready to graduate July 18, and is also doing his internship this semester, which makes him very busy. He also has become certified to teach CPR and first-aid. So he's been gone a few nights doing that. Then a few weeks ago we went to Green River Wyoming for a job interview. For some reason all this has made me feel busier than I really am. Blake's the one doing all the work, but I'm exhausted just watching him. We're also going to be putting a fence up for my grandma this weekend, doing the Relay For Life (a cancer awareness, fundraising walk-a-thon) the 26Th of June, Blake's family reunion 4Th of July weekend, Kenzie's 4Th birthday party the weekend after that, and Blake's graduation the 18Th of July. That should keep us busy, but I can't imagine taking out any one of these things. In between all this Blake's still trying to go to school and job hunt. Good luck to us!

My New Hobby

For a while now I've been making bracelets for my girls, their friends, and friends babies. Recently I started making bows also. It's been a blast, but now I have a tote full of bows and bracelets. One of my friends Cami, has an online store and I was asking her about it, and ended up starting my own. It's taken a bit to get it up and running, but I finally did it. These are some of the pictures I've taken of things I've made. My store doesn't have everything listed yet but this is an idea of what will be coming. My store address is www.girlcreations.etsy.com. If your interested in anything, e-mail me and I'll let you know what the family and friends discount is.

We're Moving to Mexico!

Well, as you can see it has once again snowed during the night. We woke up this morning,the first day of May to find all this snow sticking to everything. Kenzie wanted to know when Santa was coming. She also wanted to put her snow pants on and go make a snow angel. Ashley just kept saying "brrr, brrrr!" As for me, I made an executive decision, we're moving to a Mexican beach where spring has already started and there's NO SNOW! Hope your day's warmer than mine.

The Gucks

Well, our girls have discovered a new favorite thing to do. They love to go to the Skate Park here in Rexburg and feed the "gucks" as Ashley calls them. The last time we went we took the camera and we also ran into a very friendly-tame squirrel. We had it eating right out of our hands. It also would come right up to the girls and sit at their feet until they would squeal and start clapping their hands with excitement. This obviously scared her. It was definitely a momma squirrel.



We had also taken Kenzie's bike to try to help her learn to ride it. She has a really hard time pedaling and steering at the same time. It's either one or the other. When she pedals, she's watching her feet, when she looks up so she can watch where she's going and steer, she quite pedaling. We're working on it. We have been for 2 years now. She must just be very blond or extremely uncoordinated. Time will tell. Hehehe.

5 Years!

Well April 26Th we almost celebrated our 5 year anniversary. We had planned to go out but our babysitter had surgery and we had a sick baby we didn't want to leave her with anyone else who had kids. So we just ordered Applebees to go, brought it home and ate with the girls. When they went to bed we watched Harry Potter. Here's to another 5 years.

1st Yellowstone Trip

We went to Yellowstone on opening day this year. There was still quite a bit of snow, but it was fun to be there with out the summer crowds. We went to Old Faithful and Mammoth. That's all that's open until May. The girls loved it! Kenzie was excited about Old Faithful, Ashley loved that we let her run around a bit and didn't have to be in the stroller the whole time. We stayed at my uncle's cabin in Island Park the night before and then drove from there Friday morning. Kenzie's favorite part was we saw a brand new baby buffalo with it's mom. It couldn't have been more than 3 days old. So cute! These pictures are from our trip last year, but still fun. We forgot our camera this time, so weren't able to get new pictures of the snow covered attractions. We did get a season pass though so we'll be going back hopefully with the camera next time.

Star Valley

We got up Sunday morning and decided, hey, Ashley's been sick this week, coughing all last night, and we just have stake conference today, let's go to Star Valley for the day. So we did. The girls had a blast! Kenzie calls her Aunt Jill her other mommy and loves to go visit her and her aunt Jan along with her uncle Bryan and cousins. Recently her favorite person to go see is her grandma Izatt, because she's been letting her help wash the dishes (without the aid of a dishwasher) and water the plants. Apparently these things are great fun to a 3 year old. She also loves helping her "other mommy" feed the dog (a Dalmatian named Patch). It was a really warm day and there was still a fair amount of snow next to the house, so of course the girls couldn't play outside without throwing the snow. Grandma Izatt stayed in the house and watched from the window so Kenzie tried to throw snow balls at the window, most of them going backwards. Ashley just loved that she had a yard to play in and kept eating the snow. Ashley also got brave enough this time to go into the pen with Patch. He's as big as her, but she did good and wasn't afraid. The bad part was Patch got a drink from his water bowl and then Ashley got down on her stomach and drank from the dog's water bowl also. Blake started gaging, but everyone else was laughing. On the way home we stopped in on my parents for a minute, and then got home late, at least for the girls. It was a fun trip, even if it was just for the day.

I'm a big girl now!

Today was Ashley’s first day in nursery. This face sums up her reaction to her first day. Luckily our neighbor is her teacher so at least there was a familiar face for her. She made it about half way through before breaking down and having to be brought to Blake and me.

Spring Break

Blake had a week break from school before he heads into his last semester, so we tried to spend some time as a family before he disappears back into the library for the next 14 weeks. We decided to take the girls to the sand dunes for the one day it was actually nice and not snowing. It was a bit breezy but about 55 degrees. The girls loved it. Kenzie sat down and right away tried to make a sand castle, but was upset when it didn’t work. She then proceeded to go around finding any and all garbage she could that she thought would make a great collection, including an old-rusty bed spring wire that she used to turn herself into a helicopter and in the process cut her head pretty good. I think her favorite part was throwing the sand and watching the wind blow it away (or into Ashley’s face, which ever was more convenient). Ashley loved to just run. She wouldn’t let go of her sippy though. She carried it all over the dunes, would sit down put it in the sand and gross me out when the top became covered in sand and she didn’t care and drank it anyway.

Winter Olympics

Kenzie's gymnastics class had a winter olympics last Saturday. Kenzie was able to show us all teh things that she's learned over the last 8 months. She was also thrilled that her grandpa (my dad) was able to come and watch along with her dad whose usually at school when she has her "dance". Her favorite part was the giant foam pit that they practice their jumps into off of the trampoline. Her most improved skill is the balance beam. When she started she was afraid to do it and wouldn't let her teacher let go of her, now she even goes on the high beam by herself. It's been amazing the improvement in her balance and in her hand-eye cordination since she started gymnastics last year. At the end she was given a metal for showing what she could do.

Egg-cellent Work!

Kenzie and Ashley had our neighbors (Leah 5, Anavey 3, Corilyn 2, Ryker 6 months, and mom Stacie)over yesterday to have a egg coloring party. It was quite the party! Kenzie spilled the yellow dye all over the floor and still has yellow bum cheeks. Ashley kept trying to drink the colors saying "juice!" She would put an egg in a color, use the spoon to try to drink the color, and take the egg out with her hand and taste the colored egg's shell. Corilyn was too interested in the toys to color any eggs. We had tattoos that were intended to stick to the eggs after they were colored but they wouldn't stick, so they became tattooed on the girls faces and hands.

Lindquist's Visit

In January we had the opportunity to have my cousin Shelley and her husband Mikah and son Kasen come visit us when they came to go through the Rexburg temple open house. It was great to see them and to let the kids play together. Kasen and Ashley are only 10 days apart. Kasen and Kenzie played really well together, but Ashley and Kasen had a rougher time getting along. I'm hoping that as the kids get older they'll be good friends like Shelley and I were growing up and still are.

Meet Our Girls

Well, Here they are. McKenzie Lynne is 3 1/2 now and if you ask her what her name is she'll say Kenzie McLynne. We're working on it, but She thinks that she's funny so it's been a hard habit to break. She's in gymnastics (she calls it her dance class) and loves it. It's also been really good for her balance and hand-eye cordination. She's starting to write her name and recognizes the letter of her name in other words. She loves to look through her books and find all the "K". Then she'll tell you how many of her "K's" Horton took.

Ashley Jae is 17 months now and her goal in life is to climb anything attached to the floor (ie cubbards, counters, chairs, entertainment center, crib from the outside, table). She also loves books. She can't be read to long enough each day. She also pulls the funniest faces. So in light of those two things I give you a picture of both. We've also discovered that Ashley is a lactose addict. She's like people that drink coffee. She wakes up in the morning screaming and cranky until she's had at least one sippy of milk, then she smiles and goes about her day.