famous last words

Sunday we were invited to Tony D's 4th birthday party.

That morning I got Ryan ready and asked him if he would like to watch a movie or sit in the office with Daddy while I got ready for the party.

He chose to sit in the office with Daddy.

Before I jumped in the shower, I told Ryan not to get dirty and reminded Daddy to watch him.

10 minutes later Chris came into the bathroom to show me this....

I guess I should have ended my sentence with,

"...or create an Indian mask on your face."

Today I am THANKFUL for washable markers.

A Birthday...A Giveaway!

Could it be? Today I turned 33!

Happy Birthday to me!

This year I decided to celebrate this special day with my very first GIVEAWAY on our family blog. If all goes well, I might just make it an annual event...or not. I guess we will just have to see. I am VERY excited for this GIVEAWAY though and hope everyone enters to win!

Before I get into the details of my very first GIVEAWAY, I thought I would pepper this post with pictures. I know how much you love seeing our smiling faces...especially our dear, sweet Nanie. These are for you! :)

Chris and Bobbi on our 5th Wedding Anniversary (8.21.09). We celebrated 5 years of wedded bliss in the beautiful Finger Lakes (NY) and this photo was taken on our sunset sail on Seneca Lake. (more pics and post coming soon...)

Here's our little ham, Ryan. He makes us laugh every day, can be sneaky at times and is extremely lovable! Ryan turns 4 years old in a few weeks!

And last, but certainly not least! Our beautiful Kara. She is sweet but feisty. Kara loves to dance and be her brother's shadow all day long. One look at her adorable smile and she will melt your heart!

I feel so lucky to have such a wonderful and loving family!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Ok! Time for the juicy details of my very first GIVEAWAY!

Over the past year, I've met (via the Internet) some very inspiring and special mommy bloggers! One that I would like to introduce you to is Jennifer Thomas! Jennifer inspires me everyday with her creativity and her ability to juggle being a working mom with everything else life throws at her. We have become really good friends and I hope we are able to meet in "real life" someday soon! Jennifer is not only an amazing mommy to her adorable son, Preston (who by the way, is only ONE day older than Kara!) but she is also an amazingly talented composer and pianist!

Jennifer has recently finished her 2nd album titled The Lullaby Album. This album was inspired by her son, Preston, who as an infant had difficulty falling asleep. Jennifer along with her mother, Carolyn Southworth, collaborated to create this beautifully calming 2-disc lullaby album. During the year long process, Jennifer would often ask her fellow mommy bloggers for advice on the songs she was working on. I felt so honored that she allowed me to critique her work. We were a part of this album from the very beginning, so it holds a special place in my heart.

This clip shows Jennifer's creative side (she created the montage), her beautiful family (the photos are of her, her husband Will and Preston when he was just a few weeks old) and of course gives you a taste of what is on the album!

Do you want to WIN a copy of this beautiful 2-disc album?!

Of course you do!

Ok, here are the rules to enter....

First-

Click Here to check out Jennifer's website. Scroll down her home page to find 2 sets of music clips. Listen to them!

Don't forget to let Jennifer know you stopped by her website by leaving her some comment love in her guest book!

Second-

Determine which lullaby song is your favorite...then leave a comment on this blog post stating your name and which song is your favorite!

ie. Bobbi-Jo High: Baby of Mine (Preston's Song)

** For my non-blogging friends...the comment section is at the bottom of this post on the right hand side. You may sign into Blogger or choose to be anonymous (please make sure you leave your name in your comment if you choose anonymous!)

Only one entry per person. You have until 11pm (EST) on Friday, November 13th to enter this contest. A winner will be announced the following day. Good Luck!

mischievous children

Mommy is making breakfast...

Kara gets stuck in the play food container.

And yes, that's a fake french fry in her mouth.

Mommy makes a quick trip upstairs to switch the clothes from the washer to the dryer...

Someone from the RK Alliance creates a new chalkboard on our kitchen wall.

Mommy is making lunch....

Ryan decides Kara's hair needs a few more "accessories".

Never a dull moment here!

Pajama Day

Halloween ~ 2009

On Halloween-Eve, we started the holiday festivities with a trip to Weaver's Orchard to finally get pumpkins! Sadly, the weather was horrible the past few weekends causing us to squeeze in some pumpkin picking right before Weaver's closed on Friday evening. This year we did not enjoy a fun hayride to the pumpkin patch or the cool activities that the Orchard has for the children on Saturdays. Instead we raced to beat the sun setting for the evening with choosing what we thought were the perfect pumpkins*.
Here's our weekend in pictures...

What on earth are they staring at?

Oh...just a scary goat on the rooftop!

(yes, that is a real goat on top of the barn roof!)

Kara loved helping Daddy choose the perfect pumpkin*. She inspected them all.

Ryan insisted on picking them up. This one appears to be a little on the heavy side...

....and walking around with them. Any guesses on the phrase of the night?

Kara measuring up against the "medium" hay stacks....they win. :)

Look what we found! GO PENN STATE!

I asked Chris if he could just build one of these in our house?

FYI--We still do NOT know where our bee infestation is coming from. Poor Kara has been stung THREE times in the past two weeks. Thank God she is not allergic like her mama!

After paying for our perfectly picked pumpkins*, some yummy apple cider and a box of homemade sticky buns (Chris added them to the cart at the last minute), we headed home for movie night with Ryan. We watched Monsters vs. Aliens. We give it two thumbs up!

*not so perfect...see below.

This Halloween I wanted to carve a pumpkin. Believe it or not, we have not carved a pumpkin since Ryan was born. I think we just thought Ryan was too young to understand or even help...so why bother, right? Well, this year I decided we must carve a pumpkin.

I found the perfect template online...

Isn't it adorable?! (now we really can't wait for our Disney trip in Nov. 2010!)

Ryan was ready to help while sporting this super silly t-shirt that Grandma High sent to him!

Let the carving begin!

Chris had a cheering section...

"Go Daddy!"

"Carve that Pumpkin!"

We were having a great time cheering for Daddy, but then he lifted the freshly carved lid and we found this...

hmmmm. I know it's been a few years since our last experience with pumpkin "guts" but we are pretty positive that they shouldn't be in liquid form!!!!

Chris took the pumpkin over to the kitchen sink and tried to clean the pumpkin out as best he could...but he accidentally created a small hole on the bottom.

Thus causing this to happen...

The cheering stopped and the gagging started. Yuck!

But we weren't going to let a semi-rotted pumpkin stop us!


Do you see Mickey?


Getting closer...


carving the finishing touches...


And may I present...


The High Family 2009 Halloween Pumpkin!


Once the pumpkin was completed, it was time to take pictures of the kids in their costumes.

Kara the Ladybug

Does this costume look familiar?? Yep, it's the same one she wore last year!!! Click here to see our 2008 Halloween pictures.

Ryan the Bee

LOVE BUGS

Once there was a break in the rain (yep, it rained AGAIN...what a rainy October!), I strapped Kara into the stroller and took the kids around the block. They got A LOT of candy for only doing a block.

This year Candi brought over Kianah and Ava (two out of her four girls) to keep us company and Trick-or-Treat. Ava and Kara were born only three weeks apart but as you can see, differ greatly in height and weight. Watch out Ava, Kara is starting to catch up though. :)

The Ladybug with her Flower!

Happy Halloween!

The Toy Fairy

The MOST ANNOYING thing about being a stay-at-home mom is this....

(please note-these photos were taken on a mild day)

I clean and they mess.

I organize and they "reorganize".

I tell them to clean up and they look at me like I'm an alien from another planet.

Sadly, Ryan gets the brunt of clean up duty because Kara is still too young to understand that her toys need to be put away after she throws them around the room plays with them. This is something we are working on with her. Ryan is also at an age where he likes to "ignore" and "complain" A LOT when asked to do something. It is very trying on his mother's patience...aka MY patience.

One day I decided enough was enough. I had heard about "The Toy Fairy" from a few friends and decided that she was worth a try. I sat Ryan down and explained to him that the Toy Fairy had called and she informed me that she planned to make a visit to our house to collect all toys left out during nap time that day. At first he just stared at me...again, like I was some alien from another planet. I wasn't sure if he was going to take me seriously or laugh in my face.

I mean, this child is one smart cookie.

Then he asked why she called our house? I told him that she knew that he was giving his mommy a hard time when it came to cleaning up his toys and at times, completely ignoring her requests to clean up. He then said, "OK, I will clean up." and went into the playroom. A few minutes later he ran into the kitchen and said, "hey mom, don't worry about the Toy Fairy. I locked all the doors so she can't get in!" (I told you he was a smart cookie, right?)

I then had to explain to him that it doesn't matter if the doors were locked or not. The Toy Fairy is able to get in because she has special fairy powers.

Ok, so at this point I am ready to throw in the towel because the "little white lie" is becoming way too much work to keep up!

After a little more whining and a desperate attempt at telling me that it didn't matter because Santa was coming soon anyway (seriously where does this child come up with this stuff?), the toy room was left unclean while I scooted both kiddies up for their afternoon nap.

If there is one thing I've learned in the short years as a mom, it's the fact that I have to follow through with everything and always be consistent. So when I told Ryan that the Toy Fairy was going to take ALL toys that were left on the floor...then so be it, the Toy Fairy did just that!

I didn't get a before shot of the crazy mess...here is what was left after the Toy Fairy stopped by. She decided to leave the puzzles and games behind so Ryan had something to clean up when he woke up from his nap. Wasn't that nice of her?

After nap, Ryan came running into the toy room to find that his toys were missing. Curious how he reacted? Well you are in luck, I was able to catch in photographs his many emotions....

Angry Ryan

Sad Ryan


Confused Ryan

Guess what he did next? CLEANED UP the remaining mess!

Holy Canoli, it worked. (yay!)

Soooo I continued my "little white lie" and told Ryan that the Toy Fairy told me that she would return then next day (after nap). She explained that if Ryan listened to his mommy and cleaned up, she would be more than happy to return his toys!

To my amazement, the following day Ryan cleaned up all his toys with only being told once! When he woke up from his nap, he found this waiting for him....


The note says,

"Dear Ryan,
As promised, here are your toys back.
Please continue to clean up your toys every day or I will return. Good Job today! :)
Love,
The Toy Fairy"

Ryan was SO EXCITED to find this bag of goodies! It seriously felt like Christmas in our house as he held up his toys and exclaimed how much he missed each toy.


Happy Ryan



So what did we learn?
The Toy Fairy does exist and she will return...just ask Ryan. ;)