turning 30

last saturday the twinster and i turned 30. i have to admit i was a little freaked out by that number, but mostly happy to be spending our first birthday together in four years. 

we went out to dinner with our husbands, hung out with family, drove the alpine loop around timpanogos to enjoy the absolutely amazing autumnal glory, and had a family dinner.

nene put together a slide show of pictures of us from baby to recent and set it to beautiful music--it had me bawling. it was the best birthday present ever. here are some images from our weekend together:

nene took these pictures of my kids and i turned them into polaroid-style images using rollip.com

let the wild rumpus begin!

i don't know if any of you are as ecstatically crazy to see where the wild things are as i am, but just in case you are, here's some stuff for you:

you can watch the awesome official trailer here (complete with one of my favorite songs by the arcade fire.)

you can listen to the entire (fabulous) soundtrack here. 

paste magazine did a great article about the movie version, the book version, and maurice sendak that you can read here.

there's a blog devoted to all things "wild" called "we love you so" here.

* p.s. the movie opens october 16th, in case you were wondering.

blind pilot

i haven't done a music post in a long while, but i just re-discovered this band blind pilot and i'm really taken with them. falling in love, actually. their sound is folksy and mellow and perfect for fall. (maybe i'll include them on my fall playlist --coming soon!)

you can download a few of their songs for free from their daytrotter session at daytrotter.com

image from daytrotter.com

bananas

whenever my kids are feeling grumpy and i want everyone to perk up a little, i put on this clip of the aggrolites on yo gabba gabba. works every time.
The Aggrolites - Banana (Yo Gabba Gabba!)

do you have a song that always makes you/your kids happy dance fools, no matter what?

milk teeth

sweet m.'s tooth was really, disgustingly, loose last week.

then it came out. this is her fourth baby tooth gone, but her first on the top row. i think missing one from the top makes a lot bigger difference.

i'll follow the sun

i love taking photos into the setting sun. it gives the kids a kind of halo effect around their hair and i think it looks so pretty.

flip flop, part 2

so you'll remember that last week the flip house (sometimes we call it the bungalow in fond remembrance of our first tiny basement apartment together) looked like this:

one week later and a lot of hard work on the hubs' part, it looks like this: (that's him up on the roof, don't worry, he's a pro.)

it may be the gorgeous people standing in front, but i think the place is starting to look TONS better! (also, it may be hard to tell in this picture but they are each holding a toy tool from little c.'s tool box. he brought it to help daddy work.)

just doing his part!

i know where the summer goes

today might have been the last swimsuit-wearing, playing in the water day of the season. 

sometimes don't you wish you had a camera on your kids twenty-four hours a day so none of the precious moments would be missed? that's how i felt today. so i apologize for the abundance of pictures.

p.s. i'm having trouble getting my images to look right in blogger, sorry.

i'll see you at home

this is one determined young man. and yes, that corn dog is roughly the size of his head. this was taken at the state fair on monday.

i was thinking about what to write about our experience at the fair, and what pictures to put along with the post. (the only pictures i got were of the kids eating their corn dogs.) i thought about all the fun little day trips we've taken with the kids this summer, sometimes impromptu and sometimes an outline of a plan in place.  each trip has had its own unexpected turn, its own small adventure, with some good music and snacks thrown in.

but other than that all of them have had something else in common. no matter how much fun we had i was always excited to get home.

when we reached the point in each trip where someone said, "let's go home," or "it's time to head home," i felt a little thrill of happiness.

i have a home.

and it's with these people.

how lucky can one girl be?

dorothy was so right. i'm going to print out that line and cross-stitch it or something. and then frame it. there really is no place like home.

flip flop flim flam

the hubs and his family have purchased a house to flip. boy, is it in need of some t.l.c. but we can  see the potential:

the porch that was closed in will be turned back into a real porch. the fake ugly stone will be gone. hooray.

a whole new kitchen please. thank you.

look at this beauty of a front door! imagine it all sanded down and re-finished! (or if i can persuade everyone, maybe we could paint it some delightful hue.)

please don't gag when you see the only part of the bathroom i could safely show you:

whaddya think? imagine with me restored hard wood floors, repainted moldings and original doors, maybe some nice historically accurate subway tiles in the bathroom? it's going to be nice, right? right?