FRODO

Last night we were feeling a little spontaneous.  
Nate came home from a late meeting at work and the girls were ready for bed when I randomly said
 "let's go buy a hampster." 
Nate's response was "ok"
So, in their jammies, we threw on some shoes and jackets and headed to the pet store. 


We came home with this little guy:


Meet Frodo.

Hailey got to take him to school today for a show & tell pet day, and he was a hit. 

All the kids were crowded around the cage watching him play in his new home.

The girls love holding him and letting him run around on a blanket. So far, he's a very chill hamster.

So, we have a Cat, a fish and now a hamster. We are well on our way to becoming our own pet store.

When I was growing up, I had SO many pets. Here's my list:

5 dogs

3 cats

birds

2 chinchillas

2 hamsters

MANY rabbits

  (my parents raised show bunnies)

MANY baby chicks 

(who grew into BIG chickens)

MANY fish. 

(We had a pond my dad made in our backyard)

some rats

some lizards

a Turtle

I think that's pretty much my list.

What pets did you have growing up?

A Little Catch-Up...


I have a lot of random pictures lately that I wanted to post for all to see. They are just too cute not to. So, bare with me as I run through the past few weeks of randomness.

St. Patricks Day

I'm not the best at preparing for St. Patricks Day. It's never been on my list of favorite holidays, but since it was a school day and Hailey was going to be doing holiday stuff at school for it, I figured we better get her dressed in green. Nobody likes to be pinched.

Petition

We came home from church one day to find this petition taped to our fence. We of course added our names. By the end of that week, it was almost full! :-) It was fun to watch the little girls in the neighborhood come by every afternoon to secretly check on the progress of their petition.

Visitors

We had some fun visitors for a weekend. My brother, Damon, along with his wife Summer and three kids, came to stay with us for a weekend. Summer and I went to a conference retreat at the Zermott Hotel in Midway while the boys took over mom duty.

A week and a half later, they came back for another visit. They just couldn't get enough of us. We're awesome, it's true. :-) I got these cute pictures of Savannah. I didn't get many other pictures because let's be honest, 5 kids under the age of 4... we were too busy to take pictures.

Lil' Models

Like our new recliner/rocker chairs??

I do too.. Nate found two of them at an auction for a SMOKIN' deal.

April Fools?

I wish.

But it's real.

Every bit of annoying whiteness on the ground.

The good news:

it's melting.

fast.

Cheeks Anyone?

I was going through some old pictures the other day and getting all teary-eyed at the sight of my little babies, who aren't babies anymore.

I came across this picture of Hailey and her amazingly giant cheeks. I just want to eat them.

Hair Anyone??

Then I came across this ultra cute picture of Addy 

and her awesome Hair.

I love that my girls have such DIFFERENT features, 

yet in some ways look a lot alike.

Like I've said before, I've got my 

chocolate and vanilla.

The best of both worlds.

I've really been missing my girls as 'babies' lately. I've been going through a lot of pictures and I miss them. Even though i'm completely happy with the sweet girls they are becoming, it makes me sad that they will never ever be that small again. Ever.

California Trip Day 3: The Beach!!!


We all decided to take a break from the rides and head down to the beach for a few minutes. It was a perfect day for a perfect sunset. For those of you who know me best know that my love of photography stems from sitting on my roof outside my bedroom window in Montana and taking pictures of the sunset.. ALMOST. EVERY. NIGHT.   


So, as you can imagine, I was super STOKED to be at the beach during sunset to snap some shots. Before the sun set, I got these beauties of my niece Regan and nephew Aiden.

Aren't they beautiful children? I can't handle it.

As usual, I have to try and get a normal picture of Nolan. It's not an easy task. In the first one, I LOVE the full shot of the dreads. I absolutely love his dreads. He can totally get away with it.

Then, the sun started to do it's magic like I had hoped and I started snapping away. Here are some of my favorites.

My Dream Picture...

Here are a few fun random shots.

Nate trying to coax Addy into going closer to the water.

I love how Addy's hair got cute little curls while on the beach.

This picture just makes me laugh. 

My three favorite people.

And for the grand finale, one of the coolest sunset 

pictures I've ever taken.

These are also some pretty cool shots. I love that the coloring is different in every shot depending on how far our I was with my lens.

This was a great way to end our trip to Sunny California.

Till next time... we miss you so.

California Trip Day 3: Santa Monica Pier


What a fun trip this was! The day we went to the Santa Monica Pier was absolutely gorgeous! When we got there, we decided to just get day passes for all the rides. Since mom and I were just going to be watching kiddos most of the time we just bought tickets to a couple of our favorite rides. 

Addy loved the bumper cars, but couldn't figure out that it goes forward as well. 

She kept it in reverse the whole time.

Hailey, on the other hand loved the rides a little too much. 

Have you seen the roller coaster at the pier?

Well, all together, Hailey rode that thing 7 times!

Yep, you heard me.

Addy felt like such a big girl that she could ride

 the rides all by herself.

Hailey attempted the ladder, and she actually did really well.

We ate dinner at a place on the pier called

Bubba Gumps Shrimp House

(or something like that.)

Aiden and Nolan

Kristen and Regan

Addy couldn't get enough of Grandpa's Bread Pudding

Hailey and Addy just couldn't stop giggling on this ride. I think Regan was a little irritated by the girl sitting next to her.. she kept telling Regan what to do.

Such a fun day! We couldn't have asked for better weather, or better company. 

Beach pictures to come next!!

California Trip Day 3: Baseball

One of the best things about being in California was the fact that we were able to be 

outside so much. 

Saturday morning we spent out in the backyard.  

Aiden and Regan had swim lessons that morning and while they were gone, we wanted to make a stop at Trader Joes, but not before we had a little game of baseball.

This one cracks me up..

Regan

Grandma and Addy Swinging

Nolan taking his turn as Pitcher

Watching the game from the fort

This was also when Nate got a strike and Hailey yelled

"hey dad, you need a longer bat!"

You can tell we go to softball games a lot with that remark!

Action Shots

I love that we're all playing in flip flops.

Dad trying to get aiden out before he gets to 3rd base, which was the slide.

He Failed.

Dad taking his turn as Pitcher

I wish I could remember what was so funny here.

Mom

Aiden was IN LOVE with the game. 

Since this weekend, we've learned that he's signed up for a league to play.

He's gonna be a pro in no time!

Kristen

Nate and his great form.

LOVE this picture!

Also LOVE LOVE LOVE this picture.

um.. not really sure what's going on here, but I love Addy's little sassy stance.

Addy was so exhausted from Disneyland the day before that at this point she was asking for a nap.

Addy went  down really easy for a nap and while Dad stayed behind with her, Nate, Mom, Hailey and I went to Trader Joes to grab some yummy snacks to bring home.

Once everyone was back home from their adventures, we ran and got some mexican food and ate our lunch out on the back patio under the AWESOME SUN!

After lunch.. well... that's the next post!