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I went to Wienerschnitzel (when, exactly, did they drop the Der? No, really, I would like to know.) this afternoon for a quick snack. I know, I know, but we all have a guilty pleasure or two, don’t we? I crave something or other from their menu every few months. Frankly, I am a little surprised they are managing to stay in business. I mean, the “Most wanted wiener” slogan is bad enough, but this?

Could that possibly be intentional double entendre? Are they (or their target audience) that intelligent?

I tried really hard to be a good mom and have the kids be ready for their school photos.  I had washed everything that needed to be washed.  Marissa said she wanted to wear her school uniform dress for the photos.  I ordered Jonathan a new long sleeved shirt for school so that he could have something nice looking to wear in his photo.  The night before the school pictures, I came home from work and Marissa had licked below her bottom lip so much that she was red and purple all over.

It wasn’t pretty.  This picture is actually the next morning.  I almost didn’t even send the money for her photos, but I decided that if they didn’t turn out well, I could always get retakes.  Then, as Jonathan got ready for school, I heard him call out from his room.  “Mom, the hole for my head is too small in this new shirt!”  “No it isn’t,” I yelled back.  “You need to undo the buttons.”  Then he came out wearing his shirt that now looked like this:

Yes, a nice hole was now ripped into the front of it.  Luckily I had ordered him more than one new shirt…but now I had to run into the bathroom, rip the shirt out of its package and iron it as fast as I could since we had to get him to school in the next few minutes.  Luckily I got him there on time.  Then I came home and did Marissa’s hair and tried to apply a little bit of base to her chin to cover the redness.  Adam referred to her photos as “Something she will always remember because of this.”  I mostly thought of it as “Something that will always make me angry.”

Anyway, here is how she looked after a little make-up session….not too bad.

We finally carved our pumpkins from Grandma and Grandpa.  Marissa chose to carve a witch.  Jonathan chose “Heatblast”…from Ben 10 of course.  Mostly it always turns out that the kids just tell us what to do and we make the pumpkins.  Jonathan actually pulled some of the guts out of his pumpkin this year, but Marissa refused to put her hand in the muck.  Jonathan also traced his picture onto the pumpkin.  Adam and I had the honor of cutting them out.

I tried to get pictures of when Jonny came home from Europe so that I could post it for Nana while she was in England.  But, then I had a few mishaps…see my next post.  So, here are a few photos of everyone getting together to see Jonny for the first time in weeks.  Everyone enjoyed the slide show.  I know that it made Adam VERY jealous and even that much more determined to get us to Italy sometime in the next few years.  Jonathan also enjoyed the photos, but the kids of course like the candy the most.

Adam and Jon cooking together.

Chevon and Miles

Jonathan holding Brendan

Adam with Brendan

Grandad being a good host

Chevon and Miles

All of us

I took Savanna and Miles to Pumpkinland today. Every October Vineyard Nursery in Orem opens Pumpkinland for children to explore. They have a corn maze, a selection of farm animals to see, a playground, a kid friendly spook house, and of course, the pumpkin patch. We went last year and really had fun, so we went again. This time Savanna and I actually found our way through the maze instead of cheating and taking the shortcut, hence the victory picture of Savanna at the exit. She had a blast and got filthy and we all got to enjoy some fresh air on a beautiful fall day. FYI, the reason Miles isn’t in any of the pictures is because he was asleep in the front carrier the whole time, making the experience that much easier! Next year will be awesome because they will both be able to run around and play together. Happy Halloween everyone!

Our shower before (and for nearly 4 months)…. Our shower now (although probably without a door for the next 4 months) 🙂

ooohh…ahhh…

Savanna had her first ever dental check-up today! I was very nervous that the experience would be just awful.  James prepared me by saying, you know she’s not going to be okay with some stranger messing with her face.  However she  surprised me! She did great! She did everything she was asked and didn’t cry or protest at all! The office we went to was a pediatric dental office so they were prepared. There had TV screens on the ceiling and she watched Cars as she had her teeth cleaned and while the dentist looked at them. Best part of all, NO CAVITIES!  YEA! The only concern was she has a very slight overbite caused by sucking her thumb. The dentist showed me some torture devices she could wear to stop the sucking, but he said that because she’s still young she will probably just grow out of it and we should help her along all we can.  Amanda do you have any suggestions how to get her to stop? Anyway, it went well and  I’m happy!