A brotherly moment ...

... in Dad's chair. A brief pause from fighting over who can put their arms where and who gets the bigger half of the seat.

Early Halloween Gifts

Cards from The Grandmas and Grandpas arrived (with $5 for each boy!) as well as a gift box from Aunt Vicky and Uncle Earl. The box was full of candy, plus there was a foamy animal pad of paper for each, too! Will picked out the Hippo for himself, which left the dog for Xan. But Xan did not seem to mind the lack of choices because he quickly found the candy and helped himself!

Brandon at 4 1/2 months

He likes sitting up and playing with the light-up piano toy at Grandma Nancy's house. Tomorrow he will celebrate his first Halloween!

Scrapbook Expo ... Rodney-style

Three times each year this is an Scrapbook Expo in SoCal: Orange County in February, San Diego in the summer and Ontario on October. Ontario was this last weekend and I took Rodney with me one of the days. Kits2Remember has applied to be a vendor at the six California Expos in 2008, so I figured if we were going to do these shows, Rodney should see what one of them is like.

He wasn't tortured too badly, really. We took a beginner/intermediate scrapbook class, the "Wild & Crazy" layout class by SEI and he kept up quite well. The only "manly" mistake he made was trying to use his pocket knife to cut out a part of his layout. I was quick to get a picture before I handed him an Xacto knife.

The ladies coddled him all day and gushed over how nice he was to go to an Expo. In his own words, "The ladies spoiled me." I guess there are worse things than being gushed over. :)

Good news on the K2R front: Two booth had our acrylic for sale and it did gangbusters. I even had to bring more back for one of the booths on the show's last day!

Fires all around us ...

It seems as though all of SoCal is on fire, but, fortunately, it hasn't reached too close to us. Yes, the Santiago/Modjeska fire has been only a couple of miles away from our house, as the crow flies, but we have a lot of neighborhoods between us and the fire line. The smoke is horrible and school has been cancelled for tomorrow.

The photo here was taken by my brother, Joe, when he and I went diving to go find the fire Sunday evening, The Santiago fire started about 15 minutes after I drove past where it started, on the 241 toll road. I hadn't seen any smoke when I drove past, so when we saw the black smoke from my parent's house, I knew it was a fresh fire. I had no idea that it would last four days ... and counting. It is now 50 percent contained. I drove on the toll road today and it was just to amazing to see the burnt trees, brush and cacti. Some pockets were still smoldering.

Camp Pendleton was also on fire, and, unfortunately, Rodney was assigned duty today. So he has spent the day fielding phone calls since the there is near the flightline and threatening a number of homes. The I-5 was even closed last night, but was open by the time Rodney dive to work aound 7 a.m.

Laughing Baby Boy

My nephew Brandon is now four months old and quite a happy kid ... as long as he is held and entertained! (Don't forget to note in theis photo how Cousin Xan is pilfering the pacifier ...)

I finally made it to one of Will's soccer games!

Since I am woking on weekends a lot now, I have managed to miss every one of Will's soccer games so far. I've been to practices, but it is just not the same. So, as promised, here are some of the photos I took of him this past weekend.

What I want on my "farm"

Rodney has said that we are going to move to Illinois and have some property there, once he retires from the Marines. Fine by me ... I love open space and animals. Here are three animal I plan to have on Ol' McGuthrie's farm: A herd of miniature horses, a few miniature cows and alpacas. Some boxer dogs, llamas and pygmy goats would be fun, too.

Hangin' out in Pumpkin City

Shots and Popcorn

Xan Had his 18 month shots on Oct. 8, and suffered a bit of irritability and fever. He woke up that night hot and crying, so we brought him out to the living room where we were watching TV and gave him some popcorn and Tylenol. He went back to sleep about a half hour later and seemed to be feeling much better

The dog waterer

One morning, Rodney came home from work and handed Xan his water jug. This is a normal routine - Xan loves to cary the jug around. Well, Rodney and I were talking in our bedroom and didn't really pay attention to Xan, who is always on the move. In a matter of moments, he had managed to get a play dish fom his room, put it in the bathroom and fill it with water fromthe jug. Slade then eagerly lapped it up until the bowl was dry. Xan filled it again, as carefully as an 18-month-old can, dumping some on the floor, and himself. Despite the mess, Rodney and I were highly amused and Slade looked quite grateful.

Four goals!!!

Despite the rain and mud, Will kicked butt at his soccer game yesterday! He had six attempts on goal and scored FOUR TIMES! Whoo-hoo! I am sure the 6-yr-old team coaches and scouts are keeping an eye on him! AYSO is so competetive here! Anyway, he loves soccer, so we'll keep doing it. We'll also give T-ball a try in the spring and see how that goes.

After the game, Daddy took the boys to the Del Cerro school carnvial and had a great time. Grandma Nancy was kind enough to work the Kindergarten booth since Mommy was an hour and a half away working in Victorville (scrap stuff) and Daddy was busy with the boys.

I hope to have some soccer pics up soon!

Getting ready for Halloween!

Halloween is starting to show up around the house! While most of the decorations are not yet out, I did purchase a $12 spider that falls down the wall when you clap. Then his eyes blink and he crawls back up. This was a big hit with both boys, although Xan is the one who insists we clap for it. He has also learned that if he hits the nearby stool with a plastic sword, he can make the spider move. Xan also got a fun surprise in the mail ... a jack-o-lantern binki! This was from Grandma Peggy and Grandpa Paul. Will got a cool light-up pumpkin pen! And even Slade is getting in on the act, trying out his ghost costume. (He really just likes to be covered up with a sheet now that the nights are cooler and sometime he just has to poke his head out to see what's going on.) Can't wait to see what the rest of the spooks have in store!

Curtis' Birthday Party

Scooter's Jungle was a hit! A boy in Will's class celebrated his birthday last weekend, with a big party in an inflatable gym. Will loved it so much that he wants to have his birthday there in April. We'll see because it is certainly NOT the cheapest choice in town! But it was a lot of fun and adults got to play. Rodney won the adult jump and slide contest (rug-burning his elbows in the process - they are still healing) and won a bunch of plastic Army men for Will. Will had a great time with the other kids, his favorite thing was the smaller slide with the rope swing. Dady showed off on the balancer, doing push ups. Xan tried the balancer without much luck, so we gave him the blue "balancer" (step stool) and he did quite well.