Ridge

In the last few days Ridge has said a few things I don't want to forget.

One-  Holly was reading Ridge a Christmas book.  In the book there was a picture of a Mrs. Clause cooking.  He informed Holly that it was the mom.  She asked why and he said, "because she is in the kitchen cooking!"

Two-  I asked Ridge to put on his seatbelt while I was loading groceries.  He told me, "Mom, I need more training before I can put my seatbelt on by myself."

Fathers and Sons

Ridge, Rusty, and Mike made their first trek to the fathers and sons campout.  Apparently Ridge wouldn't take his sunglasses off, even at night around the campfire.  He got the nickname Hollywood.  Ridge came home and talked nonstop about how much fun he had and all the things he had done.  It is so fun to see them together.

Kindergarten Graduation

Katelyn was one of the kindergarteners in her class who received an award at the school assembly in May.  Her award was for excellence in spatial awareness.  Not 100% sure what that means, but it sounds pretty fancy.  Her kindergarten graduation was really cute.  The class sang us some songs they had been learning.  They got to come up one by one with their graduation caps on, tassles included.  Mrs. Lawrence popped a magic first grade balloon over each of their heads.  Inside was a special dust that instantly turned them in to a first grader when it touched their heads.  Happy graduation to our special little Katelyn.

Queen Nzinga

Kyleigh's class, along with a few others, did a living history museum.  Each student chose someone they had studied in history to represent in the museum.  Kyleigh chose Queen Nzinga from Ngola.  She is well known for a stand she took by refusing to sit at the feet of another King when he didn't offer her a chair.  Instead she motioned for a servant to sit underneath her to serve as her chair so she would be sitting at the same height as the other King.  Lucky for Kyleigh she has the best Dad in the history of the universe.  He sacrificed his knees and back to provide the best prop in the history of living history museums.  Kyleigh also did her own research and wrote a report.  She had to have her report memorized and as people walked around she had to repeat the entire report for each person.  She did a great job as Queen Nzinga (and Rusty wasn't half bad as a throne).

Sandwich Art

Sometimes (mostly a lot of the time) I can't resist random, unnecessary purchases for the kitchen.  One of those was edible markers for writing on food.  This is a sandwich masterpiece by Kyleigh.

Who doesn't love April Fools Day?  This year we made chicken and celery with a ranch dip (rice krispy treats shaped like chicken with a frosting like sauce over the top, and laffy taffy shaped like celery dipped in yogurt).  For "dessert" we had pie (meat based with mashed potato top).  My favorite part about these dinners is definitely not the food.  It's the kids' excitement and Rusty's awesome Dad reaction.  I love the pictures in sequence. 

Baby Chicks

Our family got a little bigger this spring with the arrival of 8 chicks.  I was less than excited when we got them.  We were crazy busy.  We were starting our day at 5 am and ending around 10 every night.  I think we were eating spaghetti or tacos every night, but I can't even remember because I was so tired all the time.  The last thing I wanted was one more thing on my list.  However, we knew we wanted chicks and opted to buy them when we could rather than waiting another year.  The kids loved them.  I have to admit they were awfully cute.  During this particular picture the girls were enamored even after the chickens pooped three times each on the paper towels in 10 minutes.  Too bad they started growing and jumping out of there stinky box and making a giant mess of the laundry room.  That had to be stopped so all other production stopped while we built a chicken coop.  Since then we have lost 4/8 of the chicks.  A dog got one and the heat got another.  Then the kids started telling us one of the chickens was really mean.  They kept complaining of getting pecked.  Then Kyleigh started telling us she thought we had a rooster.  We kind of blew it off because we had bought the separated chickens and they were all supposed to be hens.  One day I went out to feed the chickens and sure enough, Kyleigh had been right the whole time.  Since roosters are illegal in Boise the rooster met his demise via Rusty and quick ringing.  Then one day we discovered the chickens had started eating their own eggs.  Since their entire purpose is egg production this just wouldn't do.  I read everything I could find and tried every suggestion out there.  We put golf balls and mustard filled eggs in their nesting boxes.  I started giving them a dish of milk every day.  I observed them closely and discovered the one who seemed to be the ringleader and kicked her out of the hen house.  That was it for number four.  They stopped eating their own eggs.  We were getting 2-3 eggs per day until the weather turned colder.  The jury is still out-are they really worth it?

Watching Peeps Pop

Doesn't take much to entertain our family. A peep, a plate, and a microwave.

Easter with the Graves Fam

Just like last year we had a big Easter get together in Boise.  This time we were halfway to a home.  Meaning living in a rental and half way done with our house.  Last year we weren't even in a rental yet and staying with the Christensen Family.  The kids played with the baby chicks, trains, and on the trampoline.  Uncle Dan entertained everyone with his mad unicycle skills.  We had a picnic lunch on the porch.  The Dad's went down to the lot and hid Easter eggs for a big hunt.  We made the trek down there with the kids and let them loose finding eggs in the backyard.  Easter wouldn't have been complete without Grandma Graves' rice krispy birds nests, so we made a batch of those.  I love getting together with my super fun family.  Maybe next time we can entice Uncle Nate to come with a rice krispy nest.

Easter Eggs

St. Patricks Day, 2013

The Leprechauns found the green the kids put out for them and left the kids a delicious rainbow treat.

Crazy Girls, Crazy Hair

Valentine's Day 2013

Ridgerman and the Big 3

Ridge Michael Cook is THREE! (6 months ago, but who is counting?).  He had a great birthday.  In the morning while the girls were at school he spent at least an hour painting small wooden things I had been collecting for just such an occasion.  When we were walking home from picking up Katelyn from school at lunch time he got some fun surprise balloons from his friends Sadie and Hudson Fish.  His request for party theme was a resounding FOOTBALL.  He had had the theme chosen for months and interestingly enough he had the following year chosen also (tractors).  He wanted a football birthday party with pizza for dinner.  I had an idea of how I was going to make a football cake, but in the days leading up to his birthday he kept asking if I had all the stuff to make "THE football cake."  Finally I thought I better clarify what "THE football cake" was.  I was surprised to get his quick and direct answer.  He said, "you know, the football cake in the cake book."  He proceded to pull the cake book out of the cupboard, open it up, and find a page with a football cake.  He pointed out the marshmallows, licorice, and brown frosting.  I was really glad I had asked.  He also wanted pizza so I attempted to shape the dough into a football, which Ridge appreciated.  The best part of the whole night was Ridge's birthday song.  He bounced and danced through all four of the Cook family birthday songs.  We got a great video of it.  His big gift was a pirate ship playhouse for his room.  He loved it as did the rest of the kids.  It is a really cool pirate ship.  Happy birthday to our little man.