Friday, November 27, 2009

Happy Thanksgiving

Darin's parents recently moved to Pocatello (about 45 minutes from us) so we went to their house for Thanksgiving. I was so busy cooking and the kids were so busy playing that I didn't get many pictures, but here are the ones that I did get.
Emily is caught in the act of stealing vegetables from the vegetable tray.


The kids made these fruit turkeys for a healthy snack to help pass the time while they were waiting for lunch to be ready.


A Ralphs family traditon. The kids all stick black olives on their fingers and eat them.
Abigail and Ariana loved doing this.


Elizabeth is catching on. It took 1/2 an hour for her to get the olives on her fingers. We were pretty lucky to have her find something that occupied her for that long. Next time I need her to sit still for a while I just might have to break out the black olives.
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Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Double Disaster

Today I gave the girls baths after Abigail got home from Kindergarten. I then got the girls dressed and sent them on their merry way to play with each other. I was rotating the laundry when I heard Elizabeth crying. I then went to the back bedroom to locate Elizabeth and that's when the smell hit me. Why was I smelling peanut butter? I found Emily who had cornered Elizabeth and she was painting Elizabeth with peanut butter. I said "No, No Emily" and she turned around and said, "Mess?" I said, "Yes, big mess!" So much for clean babies! For those of you that don't know, Abigail is highly allergic to peanuts, so I had to quarantine her to the upstairs while I cleaned up the mess and bathed the twins for a second time in two hours. After I cleaned the mess, I went to investigate how Emily got the peanut butter. She had pushed a chair up to the counter, climbed on the counter top and got the peanut butter off of the second to highest shelf in the cupboard. I am not sure what was running through her head when she did this I guess she was thinking, "Hummm, what should I do today. I know! I think I will style my sister's hair with peanut butter! What a great idea!" If I could only get into the heads of my toddler twins, my life would be much easier.


Elizabeth's new hairstyle

The Culprit caught peanut-handed Emily Celia Ralphs
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Thanks Pa Pa

Abigail was so excited to win her Looney Tunes shirt. Pa Pa Carl sponsored her school by ordering some magazines and Abigail in turn won a T-Shirt. She felt pretty special when she got it at school and when she got home she immediately changed into it.
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Friday, November 13, 2009

The Next Survivor Series

I am sure some of you have heard this because it is one of those "forward emails" going around, but I thought it was pretty funny, so I decided to post it on my blog. It is definately worth the read.

Six married men will be dropped on an island with one car and 3 kids each for six weeks.
Each kid will play two sports and either take music or dance classes. There is no fast food. Each man must take care of his 3 kids; keep his assigned house clean, correct all homework, and complete science projects, cook, do laundry, and pay a list of 'pretend' bills with not enough money.
In addition, each man will have to budget in money for groceries each week. Each man must remember the birthdays of all their friends and relatives, and send cards out on time--no Emailing. Each man must also take each child to a doctor's appointment, a dentist appointment and a haircut appointment. He must make one unscheduled and inconvenient visit per child to the A & E. He must also make biscuits or cakes for a social function. Each man will be responsible for decorating his own assigned house, planting flowers outside and keeping it presentable at all times. The men will only have access to television when the kids are asleep and all chores are done.
The men must shave their legs, wear makeup daily, adorn himself with jewellery,wear uncomfortable yet stylish shoes, keep fingernails polished and eyebrows groomed. During one of the six weeks, the men will have to endure severe abdominal cramps, back aches, and have extreme, unexplained mood swings but never once complain or slow down from other duties. They must attend weekly school meetings, church, and find time at least once to spend the afternoon at the park or a similar setting. They will need to read a book to the kids each night and in the morning, feed them, dress them,brush their teeth and comb their hair by 8:00 am.
A test will be given at the end of the six weeks, and each father will be required to know all of the following information: each child's birthday, height, weight, shoe size, clothes size and doctor's name. Also the child's weight at birth, length, time of birth, and length of labour, each child's favourite colour, middle name, favourite snack, favourite song, favourite drink, favourite toy, biggest fear and what they want to be when they grow up.
All the above must be completed whilst working in either full time (preferably) or part time employment to assist in the financial input for the family. The kids vote them off the island based on performance. The last man wins only if...he still has enough energy to be intimate with his spouse at a moment's notice. If the last man does win, he can play the game over and over and over again for the next 18-25 years eventually earning the right To be called ‘MOM’!
Misty's Note: I think this would be really funny to watch. I think they should add in the requirements that the dad has to stay calm, cool, and collected at all times. I guess according to this list, I'm still trying to earn the right to be called "mom." Pretty Funny though.

Wednesday, November 4, 2009

Extreme Makeover Car Edidion

So, 2009 has brought along alot of adversity for us. I am not going to bore all of our blog readers with the telling everyone about all of the trials that we have gone through this year, but I can definitely say that 2009 has been the most challenging year for our family since Darin and I have been married. One of those challenges has been with our family mode of transportation. We started out the year with our Ford Excursion, which was a great car except for the gas mileage. When Darin lost his job, we decided to sell the car for what we owed on the loan. We were very lucky that we found a person to take it. We then bought a Saturn (for one day). We got the car home and it had some major problems, so luckily the dealership took it back because they had misrepresented some things when it came to the sale of the car. That could have turned into a court battle, so we are lucky it didn't. We then purchased the 1986 Station Wagon that is pictured from Darin's Uncle for $200.00. We had no car and needed one desperately, so this is what we resorted to. After we got our Tax Return, we did a little car shopping and decided to purchase a 1999 Suburban with our Tax return money because we felt like we couldn't handle a car payment in our current financial situation. We felt really good about our purchase, the Suburban ran well, was clean, etc. Well, we drove it for four months and it started giving us LOTS of problems. After taking it to three different mechanics and having Shane (Heather's husband) look at it and spending way too much money on a car that old, we still don't know what is wrong with the Suburban except for sometimes it starts and sometimes it doesn't, sometimes it drives and sometimes it doesn't. We were at our wits end with our Car Troubles, so we did some more research and decided that we needed to purchase a used but new to us Toyota Sienna Minivan. Yesterday, we drove down to Utah (they had better prices) and bit the bullet and purchased a minivan with our savings. I think it will be a good car for us and it better last a really long time. At least I don't have people staring at me as I drive down the road now (not that I cared too much when we were driving the station wagon). So here it is in all it's glory. I never thought that I would ever drive a mini van, but I think it fits our family perfect. I would also like to recommend Consumer Reports when it comes to buying almost anything. They gave the ratings for any and all cars made in the past 10 years and the Sienna was #1 for minivans.


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Monday, November 2, 2009

Halloween 2009

We started out the day with a special Halloween lunch.
We got dressed for trick-or-treating. Elizabeth - Pumpkin, Emily - Kitty Cat
Before we went trick-or-treating we had to dance to Michael Jackson's thriller. Abigail made a pretty scary witch.
Our first stop. I am so glad it is safe to trick-or-treat in the town we live in. Abigail got to her kindergarten teacher's house and said, "trick-or-treat. I have to go potty!" I felt totally comfortable letting her go inside to use the restroom. We didn't trick-or-treat long because it was cold and windy, but I think it was a sufficient amount of time for three little ones.
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