Happy Birthday Graham!!!

I have no idea how Graham is now four.  Caroline was four when we moved here!  Its gone by way too fast.  Graham was so excited about his birthday this year.  He wanted to open all of his presents right away when they came in the mail but I made him hold off.  We celebrated a day early because Shawn had to present research at a conference on his actual birthday, but he was awesome and got a flight home early to see Graham on his b-day.  What a good dad!  We kept it VERY low key this year, just cake, and some presents, and singing of course.  He couldn't have been happier, he's so easy to please!  On his real birthday we had tons of fun at a pumpkin patch, and later at out ward trunk or treat. Not a bad day if you ask me.

He was so excited about all his presents and gave them all a big hug.  Thank you grandma and grandpa Reed and Funk!

Birthday cake covered in M&M's.  Not my favorite cake ever but fun for a four year old.

We finally had candles, thanks to Lindsey for leaving them after Violet's birthday!

Getting ready for the maze with slides.

I'm pretty sure my kids could have played on this tire swing ALL DAY LONG. I can't blame them.  I really wanted a turn.  

They were good and took turns Graham was lucky enough to fit down inside so he got double turns.  Lucky boy!

Devin's turn.

Getting ready to go through the corn maze.  They lasted about 10 minutes then wanted OUT!

They also had a nature walk and in the middle of it we found a lot of bamboo.  Kind of weird for Tennessee but oh well. 

Wolverine dancing at the trunk or treat.

My other "junior" wolverine as he calls himself. 

Graham had a great day and had so much fun he fell asleep on the way home.  Then promptly woke up when we did get home and wanted his candy.  Smart boy. Happy birthday my sweet Graham we love you so much!  Thanks for keeping us on our toes!

Christmas Exchange

Hey Family, I went ahead and drew names for the Christmas exchange this year.  With out further ado...
Bethany and Brandon give to Ryan and Brianna
Ryan and Brianna give to Lindsey and Brandon
Brittany gives to Bethany and Brandon
Ashley and Landon gives to Carrie and Shawn
Carrie and Shawn give to Brittany
Lindsey and Brandon give to Ashley and Landon
There it is everyone!  Have fun.  And Poodle, what do you want?

Why does the government hate me?

I've decided the government hates me.  For whatever reason they seem dead set on making sure we take out as much debt as possible.  My frustration goes way back to medical school.  When Shawn first started school for some reason the government decided to raise the interest rates higher than ever before, so remember those days when medical school loans only had a 2% interest rate, yea I would love to only have double that amount, we have much much more.  Speed forward to residency when we were looking forward to Shawn being able to moonlight at the VA so we could pay for fellowship interviews, beds for our children, you know the luxuries in life.  But no for the first year in a VERY long time the VA shut its doors to residents and are no longer hiring.  Then last night when Shawn was filling out our medical insurance information for next year and we find out that its going to cost almost double what we pay now.  I can only assume this is because of Obamacare that's going into effect in January.  Isn't it funny that the affordable healthcare act is making health care more expensive for those that already have it, making it not affordable.  Did I mention that Shawn doesn't make much more than when he started almost 4 years ago, so really starting in January we'll be taking home the same amount as when he first started.  Our expenses are not the same as 4 years ago.  Our kids eat more, they won't stop growing so we're forced to buy them new clothes, beds, shoes and all that good stuff and I forgot that our property taxes went up which means so did our mortgage payment.  Don't get me wrong somehow we get by and I'm inclined to think its because of tithing.  We pay tithing and we have what we need but holy crap the government is sure doing its best to make life a whole lot harder for us.

Shady and her babies

I love my little sister.  She drove all the way from Houston with two kids by herself to see me.  I can't say I'd ever be willing to return the favor.  But she's awesome and we had a blast hanging out watching the kids entertain themselves.  To be honest we really didn't do a whole lot, we did go to a park everyday so the kids could run themselves tired but other than that we baked, ate, and hung out a lot!  It was fabulous.  I remember laughing a whole lot.  Shady is hilarious in case anyone had doubts.  I haven't laughed that hard in a long time.  And since I haven't spent a ton of time with her kids before I here are a few things I learned in the last week.

1. Violet really loves dirt.  I knew being Lindsey's child she wouldn't mind getting dirty but wow she takes it to a whole new level.  

2. Violet also LOVES sparkles, skirts, and shiny things.  I don't think she wore pants or shorts then entire time she was here.  She is very much a girlie girl.

3. Charlie is a mama's boy, but will gladly come see me if she's not around.  He really loved me and every time I called his name and looked at him he'd laugh.  I loved it. 

4. Charlie sleeps like Shady.  Or really he just loves sleep like her.  I found them many times taking naps together, it was adorable.  

I really hope we didn't bore them too much and I tried my best to fatten those cute little kids up but I don't think I made any progress.  I loved having her here and can't wait to see her again.  The only way I could get Caroline from not crying was reminding her that Mabel would be here in about 6 weeks.  Its going to be amazing.  I can't wait!  

Here are some cute pictures, not as cute as the one's Lindsey took but still ok.

Graham and Violet playing soccer while waiting for Devin's game to be over.

Charlie and Lindsey taking it easy.

One of many dance parties.

The cutest picture of the cousins!  

My favorite picture of Shady and Charlie.  

We love Cumberland Park!  

Climbing through the nets.

Being a stud.

 This was very fun we walked over the Cumberland River to downtown.  The kids loved it!

Miss Violet on her birthday with her new necklace.  Can you tell she loves it?

Playing pin the crown on the princess.  Violet and Caroline came up with this game all by themselves.  It was really cute.  And I'm pretty sure Violet is the only one that didn't cheat.

Violet and her requested Oreo cake.  I thought it was pretty tasty and she was so excited about it she decided to use her hands and face instead of a fork.  I love this girl!  Thanks so much for coming!  I can't wait to see you guys in the spring! 

Grow Up

Do you know what I just discovered I don't like very much?  Parental magazines.  I know they are trying to be helpful but sometimes I think to myself, "Really you call this advice?"  For some reason Devin got one of these magazines sent home this week.  I flipped through it and after reading a few paragraphs of one of the articles I laughed a little and had to stop reading it was so ridiculous.  I kid you not one of the articles was called Tricky Situations: What happens when your sister-in-law steals your  costume idea for your child?   Are you serious do people really care about this stuff? Is that really a tricky situation people think is a big deal?  If you have a child I really hope you are mature enough to know that several other people are going to have the same costume and no body cares!  It really bothered me.  And then something even sadder happened, I realized people really do throw fits about this stuff and a part of me died inside.  It made me feel slightly better as a parent because this is the furthest thing from my mind.  But then that night I saw Devin crawl into his bed which I'll have you know is a toddler bed.  Yes my almost 6 year old is still sleeping in something the size of a crib, and I realized maybe I'm not quite as great as I originally thought.

Thanks!

Thanks to everyone who commented on the cookie trays!  It was very helpful and I have a better idea of what I'm going to do now.  I"m really enjoying all this baking.   This week has been even more exciting because I've gotten some really fun things in the mail.  The first package was from my mom.  She got me some really nice gel colors (which I've already used) so I can pretty much have any color of frosting I want now, and some pretty edible sliver balls.  I'll have to save those for something fancy.  I"m excited.  The other package came from Shawn's mom. It is awesome I just have to show a picture of it.

It says cake delivery assistant.  He LOVES it.  So much in fact he wore it for almost two days straight until I had to wash it for an actual delivery.

And here's the back.  Awesome right?  It makes me smile every time I see it.  The people I have delivered to seem to think its adorable too.  I really wanted to take a picture of one place we went to.  Its a building downtown, and the office is on the 28th floor, I didn't snap a picture because I wanted to appear professional but I guess that goes out the window when you bring a three year old with you.  Next time!  Graham calls it the tower and loves to look out the windows its a great view of Nashville.

And here's Devin photo bombing Graham's picture, he wasn't too happy about it.

And Graham photo bombing Caroline's picture. I'm so glad I found the camera, blogging with pictures is WAY more fun.  Thanks everybody for your support!