Orange pickers

OK, so maybe pickers is a stretch. But they helped! 

 OK, again a stretch.  But they looked cute and held an orange.

 And that's the truth and I'm sticking to it.

The smart kid

Well, I'm certainly glad SOMEONE decided to finally play with a toy for it's intended purpose.

Notice there are no teeth involved in these pictures.   There may be hope after all.

YWIE 2012- There's no Place like Our Heavenly Home

This is a very late post!  I was waiting on pictures from this activity from someone else but I have them and am ready to share!


We had an awesome Young Women in Excellence at the end of November.   It was actually on a Stake Level, however our ward had already started planning (um I kinda love my calling and plan WAY in advance!) and purchasing stuff for it when the Stake decided to move it to the Stake level this year.  So the Stake allowed us to use our theme and help with the planning.   (Here is a link to this handout in full resolution)

We pretty much had the whole thing planned, the decorations, the food, the skit idea - but I must admit it was super nice to be able to pass a lot of the ideas off to other wards so we could focus on our strength- the decorations!   So much of what we did would not have been possible if we would have had to prepare the skit, the musical numbers and the food.

The entryway was probably my favorite, a yellow brick road lined with giant flowers!  Seriously, these things were tall!  I think the tallest was around 6 ft.  Made you feel just like you were in munchkin land!

We had a dessert table that looked like Dorothy's house with the witches legs coming out from under it (we didn't get a picture of the legs sadly!).  For food we had Toto's puppy chow, Ding Dong's the Witch is Dead, Yellow Brick Roads (twinkies), and rainbow fruit kabobos.  To drink we had I'm melting punch (green kool aid with dry ice!).

Along the back wall was all the display tables of the girls projects.  They did some amazing things this year!   That area was draped with a rainbow of chiffon fabric.  I don't think the pictures do it justice because it was really cool in person.  Just like you were walking under a rainbow!

A couple of the wards did a skit all about Dorothy trying to find her way home and how she could use the 8 Young Women Values to get there.   The stake leaders actually found a skit online (HERE IS A LINK TO WHAT WE USED)  so we didn't even have to recreate it!  There was even lyrics made to Somewhere Over the Rainbow that fit with the values.  It was really cool. We had an instant choir and band/orchestra do a musical number using that song.  We also had a cool photo booth backdrop.

I'm so lucky to be able to work with some amazing women in our Ward who truly love the Young Women and want them to feel as special as possible!

(PS-  since I know I have lots of friends working with YW, if anyone want's to use this idea for their ward let me know if you have any questions over anything we did.  I can add that info if anyone wants it.   The handout at the top is something I created myself and I can send that to you if you would like as well.  My original idea was to give that as a handout in a frame, but the stake used it as the invite.  They just added another stripe across the bottom in white that had all the information about when and where the activity was).

This is an alternate Invite I made, and here is a link to a blank copy if you want to use it for yourself 

Waking up is hard to do

For some reason, waking up from afternoon naps ain't pretty.  See for yourself.

Yes, this happens nearly every afternoon.  And yes I did stop and take a picture.  To be fair, they woke up much earlier than normal and their bottles weren't ready, so even if I got them out they would still be screaming.   Whatever, don't judge me.

And just know it did get better.. After the bottles we look like this

(Ok maybe not a smile, but since when does this kid smile for pictures anymore anyway?)

On the other hand

Yep, there it is!

When its TOO quiet

I fully understand the slight bit of panic moms have when things are suddenly too quiet.   Our house is mostly baby proof, and the areas that aren't we keep gated, or the doors shut.  So generally its not a big deal when Charlie and Adella wander down the hall to their room.   And yes, generally they go together.   One day I'm gonna have to really pay attention and see if there is a clear leader, I'm thinking not yet, but might be interesting to watch for.   Sorry, tangent.  The real point is that just when I think they can't be getting into trouble, I am wrong.

So the sound of silence brought me to this little situation.

Um, yes they are in their closet.   I don't remember leaving the doors open, but I must have.  Despite that they are BEHIND the door just wedged in there having a great time.  

And while I had also thought we had cleaned out anything they could get into just a few days earlier, I had forgot that there were some user manuals in the pockets of the sweater hangy thing.  So of course, if there is loose paper and books to be found, they will find it!

Luckily they really couldn't get into THAT big of trouble (and besides how do you get mad at THAT face?)  But it's just another reminder to me that when things are quiet, it's not always a good thing!