All Carnie

The second annual Penny Carnival was even better than last year's (if one could even imagine such a possibility, and I still have to back date the post of the inaugural year!). I couldn't believe that all 10 kiddos sat for the picture above. And doesn't Grandma Nae look too happy to be the resident witch?

3 Strong Girls: Marin as Nike, Greek Goddess of Victory; Autumn as Pocahontas, Indian Princess; and Santi as a Sailor Sweetie, an American Icon.

Lyla (Snow White) and Abram Pumpkin Boy. 

I love how of all the crazy, scary, superhuman things Aboy could choose to be, he chose to be a sweet little pumpkin, well, jack-o-lantern, actually. It was also super handy that I had this particular costume in storage because both Marin and Santi had worn it before him (Halyn has no choice, she will at one point wear this costume). Abram's favorite part of the costume is how the front part was a ginormous pouch for candy. So he was sort of a candy stowing marsupial of sorts. Nice gig.

I'm not really sure what we dressed up Halyn as, but we thought she was pretty cute. Kimball in his little pirate pants kept me laughing all night. He was too cute for words. He looks as if he's singing a sea shanty in this picture. Where is his accordion?

The Bluest Eye. Santi helped keep little Andi a happy Tinkerbell. 

Marin refusing to stay my little girl. Refusing!

The costume parade followed no distinctive path, but the kids sure had a blast.

It's so nice to have a big cousin around to lift you up when you get tired. Even if you're over half her size.

One of the biggest hits of the night was Aunt Amy's haunted house. So we all agree (and I do so with a little chagrin and incredible envy) that Amy is the coolest Aunt of all. Of course, her booth just reemphasized that with the kiddos. The Little Tikes playhouse turned haunted mansion of many mysterious windows was all the rage if you were under the impressionable age of 11. Actually, I totally loved it and I'm only a few years past 20. 

The kids got the biggest kick out of reaching into each window and being told they were feeling eyeballs and brains and a beating heart, etc... Who wouldn't be convinced with Amy's weird and unidentifiable accent saying, "touch my eyeballs, my many, many eyeballs." 

The best was when Santi was feeling a chicken bone after Amy begged her to touch her "broken bones," and it caught onto Santi's hand somehow and it fell out onto the floor and all the little ones screamed. So funny. Now that's a haunted house.

Aunt Amy's delight. She was so funny hunkered down in that little playhouse. Have I mentioned she's about 6 feet tall? I know your next thought, and YES, I am the shortest of them all. I'm at the bottom of what we lovingly call the "family spectrum" while Joe towers at the top at like, 6'6? I don't know, I can't even think that high.

Their faces say it all.

The chicken bone drama.

Sweet Halyn and the Italian Stallion. So funny. Chris will that joke EVER die? I just couldn't come up with a good enough rhyme for Colombiano. So you'll either stay Italian or be like, the fumblin' columbian. I agree.

Muggas as a carebear. What matches better with those blue eyes than those pretty ruby lips? I'm serious when I call her "lipstick."

You can't tell from this photo, but this little Lyla adores me. I'm putting it in print so it will become true. So let it be written, so let it be done.

Emmers and Joe's bean bag toss booth. Look at those cute paintings! The paint was just about dry when the kids started tossing. Phew! Good job Morins!

Aunt Alli will always be famous for the donut game. I don't think anyone can and will ever fill these shoes. 

Kimball about to best this teeny tiny crumb. I love that kid!

Autumn and Sadie intent on winning it.

Abram was only, as always, interested in the donut. Although this year he did feign to play the game for the first few seconds and put his little hands behind his back.

Cam and Kath did a cute bowling booth that I apparently got no pictures of. I'm not sure why. Cam, as usual, was hilarious. All of the kids were able to bowl strikes since he shook the table to help knock over the pins every time. They loved it.

Auntie Boo and Uncle Michael played bingo. Only the big girls really played, the others just ate their candy bingo markers. My kind of game.

Bri and I had the fishing booth and let me tell you, it was my favorite. Those kids are so funny as they humor me on the other side of a brick wall. They so know what it's all about, but they cast their lines over anyway as if doing me the favor. Thanks kiddos. I loved hooking Frosty coupons and other little halloween treats onto their poles (or rods -- such a heated debate if you're ever at the house in Wyoming... it's NOT a pole, it's a ROD. Well, Ok. Sheesh!).

We had a special treat for Emmers and Squirts (Amy) and even though they are adults, we thought it would be funny to make them fish for them. Then Uncle Joe made a big fuss about what special treat he was going to catch. So he cast his line over and Brian OR I (and I'm not going to admit who) decided to clip onto it a dirty diaper (because we were standing next to the trash cans and thought we were so funny). Thankfully Joe is the best sport of us all. And his stellar sportsmanship earned him (count them) TWO frosty coupons. So see, it all worked out.

Grandma Nae and Conan O'Brien. Oh no? I guess he's just your average Joe, but to us, he's bigger than Conan. He doesn't look put out at all about the whole dirty diaper thing either.

Uncle Cam willing to look like this so he can have the outdoor heater all to himself.

The snuggles this girl gets is why she's enjoyed being the baby of the whole family for the last year. But baby elevensies is on her way!

See? All about the donuts. Never too many donuts. Thank you Aunt Alli for the many varieties of one of Aboy's favorite treats.

The birthday girls, Marin and Halyn, were honored with cupcakes and some presents since the family didn't get to celebrate with them a few weeks earlier. Cute outfits and toys have been added to their bounty. Thanks fam.

It seems we're getting into the groove of this carnival thing. What will next year's hold, I wonder. But I do know it takes half the year to recover. Thank you Grandma Nae for hosting another bewitching carnival. We all enjoyed ourselves so much.

It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad Lib

For Marin's birthday this year we had a Mad Lib party. And it was her actual birthday. Hooray! It turned out to be so much fun with hardly any prep at all. So already it was a winner with me.

Each girl received a Mad Lib booklet invitation. And yes, I'm very aware of copyright laws and that this would be considered infringement, but hey, the reproduction of which only amounting to 10 invites just might classify it as too petty to seek damages. That's my thinking.

Inside the booklet was a mad lib for each of the girls to fill out and later read. It was fun to see them read a wacky story about Marin and themselves. So funny.

Another fun activity of the evening was the improv puppet skits (I knew those Melissa and Doug puppets would come in handy again). The girls drew from a hat which characters they'd be and also scenarios they had to act out that the other girls would have to guess. Um... hilarious. Who knew 11 and 12-year-old girls could be so imaginative and genuinely funny.

The crowd was easily pleased with the spotlight a la camping flashlights.

Maybe it was the feeling of Halloween in the air, but almost every skit ended with one puppet trying to eat the other. Huh? Yeah, I don't know. Strange since all of the groups were separated while preparing their skits.

And even after the game was over, they all decided to have another go and put on more shows. What a lively bunch. What a loud, loud, lively bunch.

Dinner was make-your-own flatbread pizzas. We had quite the assembly line of pizza makers.

Check out Aboy in this photo, who is very happy to be the darling little brother with lots of older girls around to give him attention. Where did he learn to flash a peace sign? From the look of this photo, it seems peace is going around.

Santi was my hostess with the mostest. She and her BFF, Abby, helped set up and ensure the girls had all they needed for good fun. Santi helped prepare the favor bags which included a Mad Lib (from Mrs. Figs'), a colorful pen, a cute bracelet with each girl's initial, and candy. She really did a good job giving her sister's likes and feelings the utmost attention. I love her big heart.

As stated earlier, Abram thinking he's the grand marshall at all the girls' events of any kind. Something he's slowly learning quite isn't the case as he once suspected. Finally. But I have loved that he feels so relevant a part in their lives, even if he thinks he can hang with a bunch of tween girls. Bri and I predict that he'll have crushes on his older sister's friends, and his little sister's friends will have crushes on him. All is fair in love... and war.

Only 11 of the millions of things we love about you Marin:

1. We love how you search for answers to everything under the sun (and then some) and how curious you are, even if you're caught day dreaming while doing chores.

2. We love how excited you become at the prospect of a new idea, like teleporting. Or an old one, like the Urim and Thummim (thanks to Dad and the Gospel Word). "Doesn't that just blow your mind?"

3. We love how you will sit and watch a preschool show with your youngest siblings and, do I dare say, get caught up in it? You are so patient with your younger siblings and young children in general.

4. We love how you believe in justice for all and truly believe that each person is a child of God.

5. We love how for Christmas you ask for things like books written in braille, or an original Dead Sea Scroll (like Dad and I can travel to the middle east and hunt through caves for sealed clay pots) along with things like silly bands.

6. We love how you try your hand in the kitchen and concoct all sorts of presumably edible combinations like applesauce with bacon bits. I mean people pay lots of money for that apple bacon flavor, right? Even if we don't love the aftermath in the kitchen.

7. We love how much you love making memories and how you truly treasure family time with us and with your extended family. You are the best oldest daughter, the best biggest sister, the best biggest cousin, and the best biggest granddaughter and great granddaughter. You carry it all well.

8. We love your sense of humor and that you genuinely make us laugh. You are such good company and you have such a funny perspective on so many things. You're always up for something new or fun.

9. We love how you are learning that words are powerful and that using them for good is always better than using them for ill. We love how you are always writing a new novella, short story, or poem. And we love how your current favorite genre is historical fiction. At your age, I had no idea what historical fiction was, or even what "genre" meant.

10. We love how you have always taken time to think through the gospel until you have an unshakable testimony. You have incredible questions on doctrinal points that have required your parents to study harder. How quick you are to apply gospel principles to real life situations.

11. We love that loving you means learning something new about the world just about everyday. You have an incredibly big heart and we certainly love hearing you say that you love us back. We are so grateful we get to be your parents.

Bonus: We love how you try to stay positive, that you strive to be polite, and that you are (usually) so complimentary of your parents. And we love how you'll be keeping your room clean from this day forward.

Love,

The King and Queen of Far, Far, Away

AKA: Mom and Dad.

Fully Present for Presents

Happy little girl. Halyn opened her birthday presents a day after her birthday cake fiasco. She enjoyed the gift opening much more than succumbing to the inevitable crash after sugary frosting.

She loved the little outfits Nana had made for her. Nana bought little tops for a dollar and then embellished them with little skirts. So cute. She laughed at the monkey on this top that says, "go bananas." No problem. She is a monkey, and goes bananas.

Naturally, she had to try her outfits on right away. Thank goodness she wasn't too big for them already. She also received cute outfits from Grandpa Finn and Grandma Lainie that were just perfect. She has been wearing size 18 months for a little while now, so I was worried when their gifts were clothes. Luckily it all fit.

Halyn showing off the little trucks she got from Lito. Lito felt it important and very necessary that she have her own trucks since Abram is a little stingy in the sharing department. Actually, he's a very good sharer, he just doesn't appreciate the manner in which she plays with his trucks. He's of the opinion that baby drool inhibits the performance of his precision cars and trucks. I understand. There's a few things of mine I prefer without baby drool, like my makeup brushes for instance.

And the pièce de résistance...

Halyn's music box.

When each of our girls turn a year, Daddy buys them a pretty little music box with a beautiful tune inside. It's something he looks forward to and quite frankly, something I had forgotten needed to be done (so Brian put a notch on his belt to indicate to all the world that he had remembered something I had not, that's how infrequently it occurs). How much sweeter of a surprise it was when he brought it out for the baby and none of us knew ahead of time.

Marin and I trying to get a closer look at Halyn's prize. I was amazed at how much she truly loved her little music box. Of course, she yearned to put it in her mouth, but aside from that, she wanted to repeatedly open and close the top to hear the music (video below, though not the best quality).

The rest of us trying to get in on the action. Abram thought it should be his, maybe to compensate for the soggy tires and flooded floorboards of his toy cars. Regardless, the box was all Halyn's.

One of those moments that lasts but a few seconds, everything seems just right. We're all together and we always will be.

Little Baby Doll, you are growing too fast. In the early morning of your first birthday, your dad and I reminisced of how just one year earlier we were leaving for the hospital, all a flutter and excited to meet you for the first time. What would you look like? Though very unlikely for our babies, we wondered if you would have hair. (Nope.) Whose eyes would you have? And my primary concern... how big would you be? (Though you made a grand entrance at 9 pounds, Santi still had you beat at 9.5, so don't feel too bad for Mom).

We look at you, or even just think of you, and marvel at how much joy you've brought to each one of your siblings and how your birth has helped them evolve into more responsible, more loving, and overall better people. If so for your siblings, then think how much more you've done for your parents by being born. Thank you for being so trusting, so silly, and so beautiful. Now Daddy and I realize what it means to have a Halyn, or at least we've gotten a tiny glimpse. We love the idea of spending our entire lives discovering all the little Halyn things you'll do.

Let her eat cake...

 

I'm not sure I understand...
You WANT me to delve my pudgy little fingers into this mouthwatering delectable delicacy? And you're using that high pitched nice voice, the one you bring out when you want me to perform my newest trick. For real? This sounds just too good to be true.

Well, if you insist...

Oh yes, this is quite good. I even got a little morsel into my mouth. It is better than I expected, actually.

What's that? There's something in my hair? Oh my!

My goodness, I feel so silly, like I'm not quite myself, yet more myself than I've ever been...

Wait, is this spinning sensation normal?

I'm suddenly feeling a little frustrated...

Who are you people and why are you getting this on video? Of all the cruel jokes! Cake is not fun or funny. Quite frankly, I'm sick.



Happy Birthday Halyn! Sorry the cake wasn't what we/you expected. Thanks to Nana for getting you your first ever doll cake (many more to come).

We sure love you more than you could ever imagine. Our little caboose, our little Halyn buggy, our zooga doos a zoogie moo, our little baby doll, our squishy mish... the sweetheart of the family.