Is this what dinner looks like at your house?

Seth has a strawberry crystal light mustache he has been sporting for a week now. Crystal light, you say...well, he is a month from being 6 and about 40 pounds, so he is watching his weight. His dad is pushing protein shakes to try to put some meat on his bones, but all he wants to drink is crystal light. Hence, the mustache. I ask him to get a straw to drink his crystal light (maybe that will help at least with the re-staining).






Paul is enjoying his barbequed salmon and decides he wants to share. He offers anyone $20.00 to eat a whole fillet. Hailee of course was the first to take him up on it. For the record he offered $3 for a bite and no one took the bait. Now he has upped the ante and Hailee is in. She starts to shovel it in and at first seems to enjoy it. Then it hits. "Oh, this is awful" she says as she shovels in bite after bite.



Tyler decides he can't pass up the opportunity to make $20 in a matter of minutes. Tyler is very picky. Well, he used to be very picky and I can only update his status to mostly very picky at this point. Tyler surprised us all by LIKING his salmon. He really did like it!



Now Kenna is finished with her dinner. She is missing a shirt because it got so dirty during dinner she insisted I take it off. Her tummy is so full by the time she is done that it is bloated out to here and she is proud of it. What you can't see from the picture is what happens next. She proceeds to spit crystal light (Seth shared) down her naked tummy. Did you know crystal light stains upper lips and tummies too? She has red streaks down her tummy and flaunts that too.

Dinner is expensive tonight. It wasn't the salmon, but the $20.00 a fillet Paul had to dole out to the kids who ate the fish. Recession, what recession?!

Terrible Twos

I think we have a serious case of the terrible twos. If that is not the case, we are in trouble. She may be possessed or who knows what. There has been no end to the terror she inflicts on our otherwise peaceful household (ok so that is a lie...there isn't much peace, but Kenna is doing more than her share of wreaking havoc). In the last couple of days alone we have had so many incidents I just don't know where to start. I guess this is me venting.

I went to a shoe party at my friends house and she cried the whole time-as in no one could talk and they nearly asked me to leave except I offered to leave before they could do so. She would not let me put her down and when asked afterwards told me that she was scared. Uhhuh! It happened at the doctors too but she may have really been scared there. Who knows!

At Seth's soccer game she pushed every small child there! I am serious. This includes hitting our neighbors little boy on the head and he had open wounds from a dog bite the night before. On a side note, did you know they don't stitch up animal bites so that whatever foul stuff the animal left in the wound can work its way out. After pushing and hitting and promising good behavior countless times, she ended up on my lap for the remainder of the game. I told her she would have to try again the next game.

Yesterday Hailee offered Makenna a snack, pretzels in a bowl. Kind you say, but to Makenna this was the worst offense for some reason. She took a handful of pretzels and chucked them one way, another handful and chucked them the other way, and then took the bowl and threw it as hard as she could at ...me, I think. The bowl shattered. I believe Paul still has a piece of it stuck in his foot trying to work its way out. I guess Hailee won't offer Kenna any more snacks especially not pretzels.

Also yesterday (it was a bad day) the girls decided to make brownies for the boys. Things were going along fine until I turned my back and Makenna dumped the whole can of salt in the brownies. You just can't salvage that, you know. Now, I know this one may not seem intentional. She just wanted to help you say, but after all the other misdeeds I am sure somehow this was her way of sabotaging the brownies. Ha ha now they will suffer!!!

I just can't wait to see what will happen next. I hope we survive.

Happy Halloween

Seth and Makenna



Tyler has decided (on his own) that he is too old to trick-or-treat. He stayed home and handed out candy. Well, that lasted about a half-an-hour until Paul and Makenna came home too. Makenna liked trick-or-treating so much but tired out pretty fast.



Hailee is a ninja. She did not want to be anything "girlie" this year.



Seth is commander cody from Star Wars. We saw a few of those out trick-or-treating. He loved his costume, loved trick-or-treating, loved the candy. He was just the right age for all of it this year.


I told Makenna to show me her grumpy face (she is Grumpy Bear). Just in case anyone thinks we are mean parents to make Makenna be a grumpy bear rather than a cute pink Cheer Bear or a happy purple Share Bear, Paul and I did not pick her costume. She did! She loves care bears and when I asked which one she wanted to be she said Grumpy Bear. She insisted. She did change her mind several times between the initial decision and Halloween night but luckily was back to Grumpy Bear for Halloween night. Honestly, with her recent terrible two behavior I would say the costume fit.

With the set-up of our neighborhood right now our cul-de-sac is a little lonely and does not get a ton of trick-or-treaters. Paul tries to draw them in with full-size candy bars. Lest anyone get a cavity eating their full-size candy bar, Paul includes a tooth brush and tooth paste. The night before Halloween, we taped the candy bars and dentist stuff together. Makenna was a huge help. She would bring us a candy, toothbrush, and toothpaste chanting "trick-or-treat" all the while for at least a half-an-hour.

St. George Marathon

I ran. It rained (the whole time). I got my goal time. I am done running (until the next one).

the BAHAMAS

Paul and I just got back from a fabulous trip to the Bahamas (well it was really two weeks ago that we got back but I can pretend). We went with a group of good friends from St. George and got a much needed break. We had an amazing support team back on the home front that made our trip possible. The kids enjoyed both their aunt Beth and their grandma Wilkins for several days. Thanks again!!!

This is one of the few trips that we have had no travel problems. I honestly just don't remember a single time we have gone to and from anywhere that had anything to do with an airplane and not had at least a little glitch. Airlines and Harmers (at least these Harmers) just don't mix well. I have lots of negative things to say about airlines and the way they handle problems, but I will save that for another post. Well this time was...dare I say...perfect. We left late at night on a Wednesday and reached the beautiful Bahamas by morning.

We stayed at the Sandals resort. It is an all-inclusive resort with meals included. I don't know if we would do that for every trip, but it was a lot of fun. The food was quite good, the water sports were great (since there are no waves to speak of), the sand volleyball was top-notch (more on that), and the service was first-class.

We did a lot of scuba diving since this was included in our all-inclusive. We did a dive with a couple of ship wrecks including some wreck from a James Bond movie; the dive was called James Bond. We also did a free dive with sharks. Our last shark dive we did last summer included a cage for the humans. I was a little leary going into this dive, but it was well worth it. By the end I only wished I could dive longer and watch them more. They are fascinating! They were interested in us and followed us, but none of them wanted a nibble. I guess that was a good thing. I am sure those particular sharks are well-fed.







I also talked Paul and at least one other couple into going to Blue Lagoon Island with me and playing with the dolphins. We got to swim with them, hug them, pet them, and we got to experience the "incredible nose push". They referred to the nose push often and it was pretty incredible. You just lay on your stomach in the water and two dolphins push your feet with their nose at about 25 mph. You get up out of the water and it is pretty thrilling. I think they do something like that at Sea World. Now I just need to take Hailee to do it. She would be in heaven.





On this trip I played more sand volleyball, or any other kind of volleyball, than I ever have in my life. At least half of our group had played volleyball in college or beyond. I am pretty competitive and I hate to be bad at something, but I was definitely the worst one out there. I tried my best and by the end I wasn't too much of a hindrance. I had a lot of fun and I think I might get invited to play again (even if it is just Paul they are after). We ended up in some very heated four on four matches. Well, they got a little less than friendly in any case. At the end we got to play all together and take on some of the people who worked at the resort. It was a ton of fun and as it turns out our stacked team even won!

It was a great trip! I had such a good time hanging out with my favorite person, my husband. I think every couple deserves some time away at least once a year.

Seth Tiger Harmer

Lately I have been reminded what unique individuals each of my kids are. In honor of this I am posting "things about Seth" or Tiger as he would prefer to be referred to right now. Seth's is going through an ALL BLACK phase right now. He likes all his clothes to be black. This way everything matches, right? He also is enjoying the mohawk hairstyle. He styles and gels his own hair and HATES me to fix the back or anything else with his creation. Seth loves ALL sports. He is particularly good at tennis, but says fall soccer is his favorite. It is just refreshing to see him in yellow and green (go Yellow Sharks) instead of his signature black attire. Seth loves to sing. Honestly the primary songs are his favorite. I am sure that is not just wishful thinking. He likes to rock out on his ipod and sing along to primary songs and stuff from the RM, etc. He has a future in that direction I am sure. Seth, we love you! You are a great kid.

Catching Butterflies

 

 

 

 

We have a lot of "butterflies" ...I think they are moths..right now especially at the elementary school playground. Paul and I took the kids and some friends to catch the butterflies. Kenna spent a lot of time hydrating; It was hard work. Paul spent a lot of time texting (his newest obsession).

Parenting Woes

My daughter has been sleeping on the floor for a time now. This was by her own choice, I promise. She absolutely refused...REFUSED...to sleep in a crib any longer. I know I should have immediately done something to remedy this situation, but somehow I let this problem drag out for quite a while. She is my baby and she wants to move into a big girl bed. I just don't know how I feel about that. Well, I ended up ordering a bed to match Hailee's and she has transitioned into being a big girl in with her big sister. Now the problem is that she won't sleep in said big girl bed even though she has care bear sheets and care bear stuffed animals covered 90% of the bed. She does fall asleep there but for the last two nights Paul and I have been up countless times with the little princess because she wakes up crying. Last night I gave up and took her to her old room and even that would not get her to stop crying. When I had had enough I went to sleep by her on the futon but was too angry to bring a pillow or blanket. Kinda irrational, but I was sleep deprived and grumpy. Lying there cursing my laziness (not willing to get back up to get a pillow or blanket) and lack of sleep and all the crying, I said "Makenna, why are you still crying?" Kenna-"I am sad." Mom-"Well, you are making me sad and dad sad because you won't stop crying." Kenna-"I don't make you sad. I make you happy. I go pee pee on the potty." Ok, now I am not mad. I only feel bad. I am a bad mom. She is a charmer. Yes, she occasionally does pee on the potty and I tell her I am proud of her or some such thing, but who knew the pressure she felt. I guess she has decided that is how she makes me happy. Really she makes me happy just because she is Kenna.
Carebear Bed

She Sleeps...for now

Playing Well With Others

My brother just emailed this picture to me and it is definitely blog-worthy. This picture was taken at our Wilkins family reunion and just speaks to me. It says "I love my cousins," and "families are forever," and "plays well with others." Honestly, I think Makenna enjoyed this interaction (you can see the glee despite her scream) because Addie wouldn't let Kenna get very close... ever. Addie has a very big personal bubble and didn't appreciate Kenna's repeated efforts to snag a hug. Kenna was also "borrowing" Addie's bracelets and that was the last straw! This picture truly captures Addie's pent-up fury. I wonder if there will be more disagreements over clothing and accessories in the future. I'm just glad this classic cousin moment was caught on film!

 

First Day of School

Things started off with a bang! We were nervous, excited and ready (I think). Then the unthinkable happened...Hailee and Tyler got sick. They spent their second day of school in bed (and third in Hailee's case). AHHHHH!! Seth was very proud of himself today because he biked home from kindgergarten (just over a mile). His face was so red it was almost purple, but he did it.

The kids all let me take their picture on the first day and Kenna wanted in on the action. She was in her pajamas and decided to go with an unconventional shot. She refused to look at the camera or smile. She is just into doing things her way right now and usually I think she is pretty cute anyway.

Ragnar Relay

We were invited to run the Ragnar relay with some friends from our Saint George neighborhood. Ragnar is a scenic relay race run on the back roads from Logan to Park City. Teams consist of 12 runners and each runner runs three legs of the race. The race for us started on a Friday afternoon and ended on Saturday evening (yes, that means we ran all night). We raced on a team called the McGruff Milers, as in the McGruff crime dog. One gal on our team was kind enough to sew us each a pair of ears for our running enjoyment. I do think the ears helped with aerodynamics or at least they made us feel faster. It really was a great time dispite all that running, and freezing, and burning up. Go McGruff Milers! Oh, and the more professional yet grainy looking pictures are the pictures the race photographer took of me. I think I have a stalker cause of the 27 pictures taken of our team 23 were of yours truly. What was he thinking? But I did think they were pretty cool pictures and I usually hate pictures of me running.