as close as we get.

They aren't perfect. But we can all agree that they are a drastic improvement over this.

A couple miracles.

First of all. When my oh-so-wonderful camera disappeared, the SD card happened to not be in it.  Miracle (or oversight) number one.

Miracle number two: the last pictures I took were of my children. And. Well, you are all well aware of my family's photogenic handicaps. It is impossible to get a good picture. That is, it was. Until this one amazing moment when the universe must have realized that I would shortly be losing my camera and the powers that be decided to cut me a break. Because. These are the best pictures of my family. Ever.

I didn't pose the shoot. That is why they are wearing the most ridiculous clothes while spread out on the most noisy background ever. But those facial expressions. The smiles. The grins heavy with love and friendship for each other. (Just humor me here. They're the last pictures I'm gonna get.)

Getting all of them smiling at the same time was almost worth the missing camera. Almost.

Why going to the grocery store with three children is a joke.

Can you find all four of us in this reflection? Ten points if you can.

Feel free to lecture Grace on safety. I do.

Costumes and other things.

Halloween is an annoying holiday.

1. Finding costumes is a hassle.  
2. There ends up being a lot of extra candy in the house. Which I end up eating. And finishing. Two days after Halloween. This is a serious deterrent to my efforts to pack away the maternity clothes.
3. It is not that fun. Really. Think about it people. We gear up all month for a holiday where the climax is walking for hours just to gather a bag full of Smartees and Tootsie Rolls. My kids can even see through that. They prefer to stay home and answer the door, eating candy out of our bowl.

But. I have decided that Halloween is important. I mean, it's a pretty amazing display of trust to knock on a stranger's door and expect untainted candy. And that makes Halloween a valuable American holiday.

Also, our town officially declared Saturday, October 30th Halloween day. Too many people in the city felt uncomfortable trick-or-treating on Sunday. Say what you will about ugly run-down Carlsbad New Mexico, but that is pretty stinking cool.

Conspiracy Theory

We are all aware that photogenicness is not among our family's talents. There is, unfortunately, a great deal of documentation on the subject.

It's getting to the point where I suspect a conspiracy. Some sort of telepathic communication is going on to screw up every perfect moment I attempt to capture.

Like this one. They were being so cute together at a local small town parade. So I grabbed the camera. Fast. In a [futile] effort to catch it.

Grace: Oh, she pulled out the camera. It was inevitable, I guess. What should we do this time?

Claire: I don't know, but look. She thinks she might actually get some good stuff out of us this time. Silly mommy.

Grace: Oh, hey! I could pretend to have no arms.

Claire: Brilliant! We haven't done that one before.

Grace: Don't forget to do the eye roll/half open eyelids thing.

Claire: Oh yeah. Our old standby. Nailed it.

Grace: Oh, that's a good one. What are you doing?

Claire: Signing.

Grace: Signing what?

Claire: Oh, I don't know. Cat. Coat. Cold. Doesn't really matter as long as I'm not smiling, right?

Grace: I don't know. Mom is sort of sabotaging herself this time. I mean, look at the photo composition. Not her finest work on the background there.

Claire: Good point. Think we should give her one behaved smile for pity's sake?

Grace: Do we have to? I'm having fun here!

Grace: Oh, okay. Here it is.

Claire: Poor mom. She tries so hard.

Grace: Nah, she loves it.

Nothing Good

...ever comes from playing outside on a Sunday. We have lots of multi-generational examples proving that only injuries occur following Sunday play. So we can add an incident from last Sunday to that list:

Grace insisted on a band-aid, and we spent the rest of the evening making cookies. All better.

Another Year Has Gone By...

... and I still have last year's unmailed Christmas postcards sitting on my desk. The top on the pile is addressed to the Cunninghams and includes a postscript urging Sarah to start a blog. She still hasn't. Probably because she never got my postcard.

She wasn't the only one. Most of them are addressed. But I am really challenged by putting on stamps. And walking out to the mailbox. And so for those of you who are sitting here in my unsent pile, for your belated benefit, I present last year's postcard.

I'm dumbfounded by the difference that a year makes. Serious changes, people.

Although I suppose the important things have stayed the same. Like my tendency toward lateness, for example. Or not-at-allness. Which is my cue to announce that Christmas postcards are not-at-all this year. This probably does not matter to most of you since cards from us were not-at-all last year too.

My apologies. I am not Superwoman like the rest of you. Okay, let's be honest. You can't qualify for Superwomanhood if you can't even remember to buy stamps. Or make a list of addresses. Or take a family photo during the full course of one year. 

And put it that way, I sound pretty lame. Bummer.

All Hallow's Eve

Grace has always had some trouble saying her full name. So far, she hasn't been able to pull it off quite right. It comes out something like "Grace Uhn-a-ville." I guess it's really not a big deal. But whenever she says it, people look at me like, "I didn't quite catch that...." So, we've been working on it. 

Friday night, a few neighbors stopped by trick-or-treating. We started talking. And after fifteen minutes of chatting, I finally asked their four-year-old what her name was. I couldn't decipher anything. Well, except for what I assumed was an attempt at her last name. It sounded a lot more like an obscenity. So much so that I was afraid to ask her to repeat it. Her parents translated: "Trinity Funk."

I don't care anymore. "Uhn-a-ville" is no big deal.

Our Halloween this year was a thrown together, last minute affair. It's not my favorite holiday. In fact, I would say I get more excited about Lamb Day in Fountain Green Utah. 

Like, way more excited. 

So, without any costume planning, I slid Grace into one of Karlee's old ballet tutus, and added wings from another of her costumes. She became Tinkerbell. We only went to the ward's trunk-or-treat on Wednesday (we didn't do any candy-hunting on actual Halloween), and so I wasn't going to dress Claire up at all. My Mom, though, (ultimate hater of the goulish holiday) surprisingly found this unjust, and felt the necessity to give Claire pigtails and freckles as Pippy-Longstocking.

I think she ends up looking more like a cowgirl.

Judge for yourself.

From Attempting Motherhood

For Maren.

One of my good friends suggested that I blog six of my quirks. 

I'm not that brave. I'm pretty sure that one is enough.

I am a tired person in general. I think we've gone over my sleeping disorders. But since I started working it's gotten worse.

This is me. Every night a little after 10.

I do not remember this picture being taken. If I had, I'm sure I would have also been coherent enough to pull up my pants.

Happy Father's Day

I made scrambled egg wraps for breakfast in honor of my daughters' Daddy. He had unfortunately picked that day as the start of a new diet (a diet which somehow restricted the intake of eggs, but not of the candy bar handouts at church).

So, we had leftovers. Which I thought I would try out on Claire.

I might as well have given her a pony.

Uh-oh... Nope, still good.
"Claire, the floor is yucky. We don't eat things from the floor."

Wanna bet?

Every Night's a Sleep Over

The living room is the only part of our house that is air conditioned. And with temperatures hitting the hundreds, and most of the furniture out of the house anyway, we are camping out in the living room.


Rolling into people in the middle of the night is at least more comfortable than frying in bed, I assure you.

After All

So Brad and I did not actually remember our fourth anniversary by ourselves.

But it seems that our anniversary would not go uncelebrated. It only gets one day a year, after all. It must have felt cheated. It demanded our memory.

And so it happened that while packing up, getting ready to move, we found a camera. An old one. The film kind. I know. Ancient.

In the camera, we found partially used film. Intrigued, my Brad went to Walmart and bought an antiquated, short, fat camera battery (for a whopping $9), and turned in the film.

One hour later we returned, excited [do you remember the anticipation of going to pick up pictures at the store not quite sure of what you'd find? Try. Try to remember], to retreive our envelope of pictures.

We opened it to discover our long lost honeymoon photos.

Can you believe it?

Sunday

My parents have this great pond behind their house. The girls were being rowdy, so I took them on a little walk with my Mom and we grabbed the camera. We had a blast.