The Pixie and The Amazon

This is Norah and her new friend C. She's the daughter of one of our close college friends. Maybe the title of this post is a bit of a giveaway, but guess which of these two is older... Norah turned 3 in August. C had her birthday in June. Difference is, C just turned 2. Moral of the story: my shrimpy kid will probably never be a point guard.

Fashion Fabulous Friday - Acessories With Purpose!

A couple of months ago, I read a post on my friend's blog about amber teething necklaces. Contrary to what I originally thought, they're not for babies to chew on. Trust me, Penny has tried.

The info from the Baltic Amber Website was pretty compelling. Here's the info from the site on the special acid contained in amber and why it helps with pain relief:

"Succinic Acid is found naturally in our bodies and in plants. It plays a vital role in our metabolic processes and in cellular respiration. It acts as a powerful antioxidant, ridding the body of toxins and free radicals. It stimulates neural system recovery, boosts our immune system, compensates for low energy levels in our brain and body, thus increasing alertness and awareness, concentration and reflexes. It also decreases stress, has a calming effect and has been proven equal or better than many commercial drugs in many health and wellness areas."

Basically, when you wear amber against your skin, your body heat releases and absorbs the acid from the amber. That's all pretty interesting stuff, but the reason I finally decided to buy one was the testimonial of my friend. Anina has twins. Both have had a lot of miserable teething symtoms. She got one teething necklace and tried it one one of her daughters. The daughter who wore the necklace cut two molars without her parents knowing. That was good enough for me!

Since we've had the necklace, Penny drools less and seems happier when she wears it. I wrap it around her ankle when she's sleeping so I don't have to take it off of at night or during nap time. I'm really impressed with how it's working. In fact, it got lost for about a week and she got pretty grumpy. About an hour after I found it and put it back on her, she stopped drooling again!

Norah was what I like to call "a difficult teether". I figured that something that got such good results for my friend's daughter was al least worth a try. So far I haven't been disappointed. Penny looks pertty cute in her little necklace too, doncha think?

Trip to the Farm

Last Sunday we took a tour of James Ranch, where we have been getting our produce this year. Norah was looking forward to the adventure and, to tell the truth, so was I. Not many people these days have the opportunity to learn about where their food comes from by actually seeing where it's grown and produced!

For more information on James Ranch visit this site. If you live here in Durango, I would highly recommend that you look into joining the CSA program and get your produce from them like we have.

We told Norah that she had to take a really good nap if she was going to go see all of the plants and animals. She took us seriously, because when I went up to get her, I found this:


She slept for about 3 hours.


Once I managed to wake her she was ready to go! The first thing she found at the farm was a table that was just her size.


She was pretty excited about it!


I was pretty excited about the view.


My parents were pretty excited too (believe it or not).

We took the electric cart tour. As members of the CSA, that tour was discounted for us. It was really smart of them to do that for us because now all I want to do is go on the Twilight Dinner Tour! How amazing does that sound, right? You can see the James Ranch tour options and pricing here. I will definitely be adding the ranch tour to my repertoire of fun activities to take our out-of-town visitors!

Our tour guide (who Norah calls Farmer Jen, and insists on waving and yelling to every time we pass the ranch) is one of the James' kids and grew up on the property. She did a great job of incorporating interesting facts about ranching with family stories and a lot of local history. The tour was incredibly informative and managed to keep Norah's attention most of the time. This is no small feat, trust me.

I didn't get any pictures of animals because they were all a little far away for my camera (and I didn't get off the cart much since I had 15 pounds of baby strapped to me).


I did get a few good pictures of my favorite little animal on the swing!


In the background you can see Mark, my dad, my in-laws and the one other guy who took the tour with us. That poor, brave soul!

Even though I didn't get pictures of them, Norah got to see the 5 acres of gardens where we get most of our produce. She got to see the dairy cows, the angus cows, the pigs, the chickens and their laying house, the sheep and the donkey who protects the chickens and sheep from predators. (Her name is Xena. She's a warrior princess donkey.) We even got to have a little snack of cheese, cherry tomatoes and locally made bread at a duck pond on the property. The baby ducks were adorable.

All in all, the girls were amazingly good for a two hour tour. I think it helped that we got to ride on the cart and there were planty of things to look at on the way. Penny got a little indignant at the end, but I kept giving her Cheerios for the last 20 minutes or so. Her mouth was busy enough chewing that she didn't have much time to complain.

And that, my friends, is where (a lot of) our food comes from!

FAIR-ly Fun

A couple of weeks ago, the County Fair was in town. So just like last year, we had to go check it out!

Norah and her friends all got balloons. They were a huge hit!

In the rabbit house we saw what my brother called "The Bruce Vilanch of rabbits".

You'll only know why that's funny if you've ever seen Bruce Vilanch, so here:

I know. Uncanny, right?

The second half of the rabbit house is actually the bird house. A sweet little girl let Norah and her friends pet her hen.

The turkeys are kept in a separate pen. I'm not sure why, but it's probably because they're jerks. I have a special dislike for turkeys that goes back to when my parents raised two of them in our backyard. I was just old enough to be eye-level to them and they tortured me. Long story.

After the turkeys we saw (but didn't get very good photos with) the goats.

Then a really nice girl let the kids pet her pig (whose best side I clearly photographed).

I'm A Wild Flower

Hey I'm a wildflower, growin' in the sunshine


Soakin' up the way of life I was raised in


Runnin' barefoot bloomin' in a summer shower


Ponytail dancin', I can't help it. I'm a wildflower.

I'm so greatful that my little Wildflowers are growin' up in a place like this!

PS - If you haven't heard the song I'm quoting... go here.

Hacked By Penny - Hand Me Downs

Hello again blog people!



It's me! Your friendly, pint-sized fashion consultant. I hope you all have taken my advice from June and gone pants-free as much as possible this summer. In July, we talked hairstyles and cuisine. Today, I'm going to talk to you about Momma's favorite kind of clothes, hand-me-downs!

Seems like lately everyone who meets me tells Momma, "She's so teeny!" "She's just such a little thing." "Well isn't she so petite?" Honestly, it doesn't matter to me what people are saying as long as they're talking to me. You could be reciting a recipe for liver soup and I'd still be about this amped just to hear your voice:



But anyway, back to hand-me-downs. Momma likes them for two reasons. First, they're free (this time around, at least). Second, they're a good way for her to tell how much I'm growing. She just puts me in an outfit, then looks up pictures of Big Sister in the same outfit and figures out by the date how old Big Sister was when she wore it.

Take this ensemble, for instance. Adorable right?



Aw go on, you're too kind.

Since everyone has been commenting lately on my small stature, Momma decided to look up when Big Sister wore this particular outfit. She found photographic evidence pretty quickly:



As it turns out, the picture of Big Sister in the outfit I'm wearing at 7 1/2 months old was taken at dinner on her first birthday! In fact, when Big Sister was big enough to wear this, she had already achieved some pretty amazing accomplishments:


(I'm starting to work on this one, but Momma says it'll be a while if she has anything to say about it)

The funny thing is, according to the doctor I am really small. Just not quite as small as Big Sister was at my age.

So watch out, Big Sister! Not only can I mimick your facial expressions (see photo below for proof), but I'm catching up in size too!



Maybe one of these days I'll even learn that walking trick you've gotten so good at.

Spud Lake

This past Saturday was the first day in weeks when we didn't have anything to do. We were hanging around in our pajamas all morning, completely content to do absolutely nothing. So when we got a call at 9:30am from a bunch of friends who were planning on going on a hike to Spud Lake - just 15 minutes from our house - Mark was inclined to say, "No thanks".

But being the sweet, wonderful husband that he is, he indulged my desire to see friends (and wear the girls out so they'd take a good nap). We raced around the house trying to make it to the trailhead by 10. So much for our relaxing morning! Mark managed to make himself some coffee and pack the girls some snacks and suncreen and we were off. We were only a few minutes later than everyone else!

When I told Norah that we were going on a hike with all of her friends she said, "That sounds like a great idea!! Mom... just one thing. What's a hike?" When I told her it was a walk in the woods she was slightly less excited, but the promised presence of her friends made up for the whole walking part. There were 13 kids total, so there was no shortage of distraction for her!

I don't have any pictures of us on the way up. If you want to see a few good ones (including a couple of rare and elusive photo of yours truly) go to Jill's blog. What I do have are pictures of the craziness that ensued after we got there.

You see, once we got there, we realized that we were at a lake. Duh. And what do small, water-crazy girls want to do when they see a giant body of freezing cold mountain water? They want to get in it!


One of our friends was brave enough to get in and invited any small person who wanted to join her. We had brought a spare pair of undies for Norah so naturally, we stripped her down and said, "Go for it!"


Naturally. Because this - that look of chilly alpine lake swimming joy - is why we moved to the mountains in the first place.


So that our children could convince our friends to take them swimming in frigid, muddy mountain lakes.


So that they could learn to hunt for the perfect skipping rock.


So that they'd be the kind of kids who would rather play in lakes half naked than play video games fully clothed.


So that they'd see their daddy and their friend's daddies enjoying the great outdoors.


So that they'd know the joy of poking things with sticks.


This is exactly why we moved to the mountains.

I love that we could barely get her out of the water when it was time to hike back out.

I love that she had so much fun with her friends totally for free.

I love that the whole experience happened just a quick, 15 minute drive from our house!


And I LOVE that when it was time to walk back, she did a little of this...


...and a lot of this.

Bar D Hikers

The Bar D has a little nature trail that goes around the property. We had never hiked it before , so we decided to try it to help Norah and C get the wiggles out before dinner.


At first they were reluctant to go on a "walk in the woods".


But they held hands (and their Woody and Jessie dolls) for support.


They really did hold hands basically the entire time. So cute!

We didn't make it the whole way around, but thalfway and back was good enough to get out a few wiggles.

A Long Overdue Birthday Post

I did a teeny tiny blurb about Mark's 30th birthday surprise party and I think I might have promised more pictures. I may or may not have neglected to download my camera for over a month. In any case, ere are some long overdue birthday photos for my now 30 year and one month old husband.

The cake.

His face when he walked in the door.

A "You Did a Good Job Hug" for me.

The banner made in less than an hour before church. (I know, right!?!)

The boys in their natural habitat.

Grilling my homemade sliders!

The "Octo-dogs and Shells" we made for the kids.

The little kids.

The big kids.

The middle kids.

And how did we keep all those kids quiet for the "SURPRISE!" part of the surprise party? We had them all hide in Norah's closet downstairs. They thought it was the most fun ever.

Anyway, even though it's super late, I'll give another happy birthday shout out to my awesome husband, the best daddy I could have ever imagined for my little girls. Happy birthday Mark!