ApRiL FoOLs!!

I was such a great mom today! These delicious vanilla cupcakes smothered in home made Chocolate frosting were waiting for the boys when they came home from school today. What an AweSOmE after school snack!!

...until you take a bite!

Clyde, oh Clyde. I watched he and Seth take their bites and begin to eat. Seth was eating around the edges first and therefore missed the cotton balls. Clyde took a great big bite right in! The cotton ball is stringing from his mouth to the cupcake and yet he just looks at it funny and CONTINUES TO CHEW! I'm laughing so hard that my tummy begins to hurt (in fact I'm laughing right now telling it.) I finally go over to the trampoline and say,"STOP! Stop eating that!" He says "What?" and he takes another look at the cupcake - the 2nd cotton ball is staring right at him (in fact, above is a picture of his cupcake.) "What is it anyway?" As if it is some sort of magical filling I have added to his treat. "Cotton balls Clyde! Please stop eating it." (My laughter is turning hysterical now.) "Real Cotton?" - "Yes, Clyde, APRIL FOOLS!!!" - "Gross Mom," as he takes an entire cotton ball out of his mouth that he's been chewing on and hands it to me. I truly believe had I not stopped him he would have just swallowed the whole thing. I did redeem myself by giving him a fresh cupcake-no cotton- after words.

***

Then we dropped off cupcakes at our neighbors house, the Judds. 1/2 fools, 1/2 regular. We got their Dad good according to the Mom, daughter Destiny too. They tried to pull a quick return on me a few hours later when I called for something telling me that their 3 year old was having a really difficult time breathing. They were just about to bring her to the ER when I called. Maybe it's a new food allergy? She's been given a blessing and everything but it was only getting worse. "Oh my," I say "What did she eat?" I just let the Mom talk it out, "grilled cheese etc..." until I finally ask, "Are you trying to April Fools me?" her reply, "Now why would I want to do that?"

I fear that next year we are going to get it!!

CoNFuSiOn...

I'm feeling slightly confused.
I think this is my backyard.

But isn't it late February in Arizona?

These are my boys.

(...and my smelly dog)

But what is he holding?

WiErD!

you know you have boys when...

Christmas songs go something like this,

"Oh Cannon Bomb, Oh Cannon Bomb how lovely are thy branches." - "MOM! I just sang the Christmas Tree song in German!"-Clyde

And kissing under the mistletoe brings up questions like this,

"Mom? I don't get the part about having missiles on your toes."-Monte

...I'm just sayin'...

Tasty Treat!!

You know how I can tell summer is ending?

We had the missionaries over for a summer supper of Tacos and watermelon...well...maybe just TACO's then.

you could live in it too!

According to experts the best forts include; family room and kitchen areas, cushions from two couches, the ottoman, two captains chairs, five kitchen stools, three kitchen chairs, the kitchen table,every blanket and pillow off of every bed, and food for snacks….wouldn’t you agree?

Mommy Make Over

Who says little boys don't like to play with hair and make-up...they love it!! They're just not so good at it...They had the spray bottle, because, acording to Monte Birk, "when it's wet, it's darker, and that looks better (with the black ear rings they'd picked out)", berrets and pony tail holders...you can't see very well but the back of my hair is in 2 small pony tails, and ALL of my make-up case (I've never had eye liner actually circle my eyes before.) Apparently my lips needed to be a little fuller when the lip liner was used and if my eyes were closed you would see the beautiful DARK eye shadow that completley covered them. They were so serious and intent trying to make mommy beautiful that when they were finished they took the head shot themselves.

The physical outcome may not have been stellar but the emotional me loved being pampered by my guys...

Mouse soup anyone?

I am usually not one for lengthy narratives...but I promise, this one is worth it...read on my friend...

Have you ever known the type of people that just have to "one-up" you? No matter what circumstance you are in or what you are talking about they always have the worst, the best, the most disgusting story and it's always bigger and better than yours? Well, NOT THIS TIME BABY! WE WIN! We've had a little problem with mice the last month. No big deal...put out some poison...find the dead little suckers somewhere...and trash 'em...right?
DAY ONE: the boys had a friend over, the family room stunk! Me, "Does someone have to go to the bathroom? Is someone tooting in here?" I finally resorted to smelling each little boys fanny to see if they'd had an accident...friend included! Said friend sat on the couch, "Mrs. Gardiner? the smell is over here." Sure enough dead mouse behind the couch.
DAY TWO: fantastic Saturday...one of those where you actually get everything on your list done and the house is still relatively clean? I was even going to make dinner...imagine that cooking on Saturday! Into the pantry I go to get the rice...dead mouse right next to the open bag of rice. (at least he didn't smell) no chicken and rice that night.
DAY THREE: they're getting in through the pantry...they've chewed through the dryer duct...now replaced with metal
DAY FOUR: clean out the entire pantry
DAY FIVE: oh no...that familiar stench...under the kitchen sink...I was spoiling myself for my ornament exchange party by having a cleaning crew help with my house...I was under the kitchen sink (I couldn't really expose an innocent Mexican woman to my shame could I?) voila! in the very back of the cabinet. I entertained 5 sweet Mexicans, who speak absolutely NO ENGLISH, building up the courage to pick up that sucker...it finally happened after a chorus of, "uno, dos, tres!" amid a flurry of Spanish giggles
DAY SIX: "Why is that smell still under the sink?"
DAY SEVEN: "Monte it is YOUR turn, there must be another one under the sink"
DAY EIGHT: "You must not have looked close enough honey...it reeks!"
DAY NINE: "Then check under the dishwasher honey...you can't just keep the kitchen window open all the time!"
DAY TEN: I notice our dishwasher has a ton of gunk inside around the base...are we not rinsing our dishes well enough?
DAY ELEVEN: "GOSH, I just cleaned all that gunk from the dishwasher!"
DAY TWELVE: OK this is sick, now I'm scraping this crap out of the dishwasher..."by the way honey...it doesn't seem to be cleaning the dishes very well..."
DAY THIRTEEN: We have our widower neighbor over for supper..."Monte, could you unload the dishwasher?"

You see where this is going right?
We have successfully cremated, cooked, thouroughly washed, a mouse...after at least 8 loads of dishes. Our new dishwasher comes tomorrow morning at 9 am at which time all of the dishes in all of my cabinets will go through at least 2 loads in the NEW dishwasher...with a heathy dose of bleach. Until such time as everything can be sanitized we will be using paper and plastic!

Trimming the tree for Christmas!

I really should have taken before and after photo’s of our tree out front so you could appreciate the difference, difficulty and time that went into it’s transformation! Maybe it is enough to know that we had to jump on, sit on, push in, cram all of the branches into the truck to make it fit just enough to get the tarp over it to be taken to the dump.

The happier healthier final product!

What's that I see? A house behind the tree?!

Random Sampling

Ever wonder what a Gardiner girl would look like?

Seth is such a good sport! Playing with puzzles while Mommy plays withe her new camera! Yes, we've finally done it. We've paid and arm and a leg and sacrificed quite a few date nights out but our new arrival is here. the Cannon rebel xsi...welcome little one...

Clyde's clothing fiasco!

SOOOO...Clyde got ready for school one morning and I thought to myself, "boy those shorts have NOT held up well. I can't believe how much they've shrunk." He looked like he was wearing little girl capri's. I wasn't too surprised though because they looked like the ones I got from Big Lots for $2. I made a quick mental note NOT to EVER purchase clothing from Big Lots again and decided that when he took them off I would give them to our cousin Janet. Well, it wasn't worth the fight to get him to change out of them before school, so I let him wear them. It wasn't till the next morning while picking their clothes up off of their bedroom floor from the night before that I noticed, they weren't his shorts after all, they were Jackson's 6-9 month old Pants!

Ward Party with friends

Jillian Ellsworth, Donovan Parke, Piper Whiting, Spencer Ellsworth, Monte Birk, Trystan Vinal, McCabe, Braden Tueller

Tyler Jones, Monte Birk, Nathan Ghisolfo

Braden Tueller, Clyde, Seth

Ward Campout

We had so much fun at the Patterson Ward Campout this year. Our big realization was that it is actually better to get there a day early and spend the night before the campout! We had to get back for soccer games and pictures early Saturday morning so we spent Thursday night up in the pines and came home late Friday night after the bon fire gathering with the ward. There were about 4 other families that camped there a day early with us. Although our tent has been used in the backyard with our boys and with the scouts this last year this trip marks the first time my little family was in it together since we got it for Christmas last year!

Jackson, Seth, Daddy and Clyde

Just Hangin'

Mommy and Monte Birk

We kept our fire going non-stop!

We went for silly walks...

Jack cut his 3rd tooth that night...notice the relentless biting in almost every picture we have of him this last month!

We hung out with best friends we've knows since we were 18 months old

Monte Birk, Donovan Parke and Tristan Vinal

And we built a house with kindling!

On a nice long walk Daddy, Jackson, Seth and Clyde gathered wood for our fire. We ended up with A LOT of dry branches that we brought to our campsite whole. Monte Birk decided that these were needed as a “house” so we stacked them up as four walls, one with a door opening of course, and put the kids table and chairs inside. It became a gathering place for the ward kids to come and play card games with us. We had quite a few stirring games of ‘war’ with the face cards. Mommy can get pretty rambunctious when the competition is on!

(pictured here Bret, Josh and Sara Barker, Carter Marshall, Monte Birk, and our across the street neighbor Spencer Ellsworth)