Happy Halloween

Last night we celebrated halloween at our ward trunk or treat party. We have an awesome activities committee who put on a great party. We had soup and chili for dinner than played a few games. Kirsten specifically loved the ring toss game and was pretty good. We then headed outside for the trunk or treat. We need to plan better next year because even my two huge bags of candy only lasted 20 minutes. Kirsten had fun trunk or treating. She didn't bother saying "trick or treat" and would just hold her bag out. Maybe next year.

Kirk flew out to New York today. The girls and I took a walk in the nice weather and tried to carve a princess pumpkin. Kirsten thought it was pretty she kept saying "pretty pumpkin mom" Now Audrey is in bed and Kirsten is watching the trick or treaters out the window.
Happy Halloween!

Kay Kay (what Kirsten calls herself)

Yesterday afternoon Kirsten and I were just hanging out while Audrey was taking a nap. We were watching Beauty & the Beast and Kirsten had a bowl of a few candy corns. Which she ended up kicking and spilling onto the couch. "oh no!" she kept saying while she cleaned them up. Then she got down and pointing at her foot said "no no no, be nice, no no no" I was cracking up then she took her foot over and put it in the corner. It was so hilarious. I love that girl!
Actually I think discipline is her new favorite game because Cinderella just hurt Belle so she had to go sit in the corner. (love it!) She also made Cinderella give Belle kisses and say sorry. What does this say about my parenting style?

Also she has started to call her dad "kirk" The way she says it is so cute, calling out "kirk". Kirk hates it but Kirsten loves calling him Kirk and she has such a hard time pronouncing daddy ("nanny") that I think she is just proud of herself for getting it right.

She still adores her daddy. The other day we met him at the park for lunch. He helped put the kids back in the car, gave all his girl a kiss, and then went to get on his motorcycle. Apparently Kirsten wanted another kiss because she started freaking out yelling "kisses kisses kisses" over and over until we drove over to wear Kirk was getting on his bike and he gave her another kiss.

Kirsten is also the queen of kissing our "owies". Every scar or scrape she finds on our bodies she kisses better. And anytime we stub our toe say ouch she asks us if we are ok. She is so sweet. Every time she gets hurt we just have to ask her if she is ok and if she is actually hurt we have to kiss that particular body part and she is all better.

So happy when Adam comes

This morning when Adam's dad dropped him off I grabbed my camera to capture Audrey adoring Adam as soon as he arrives. Before I recorded this video Audrey was saying "Ada" so I tried to capture it but got the head nod instead, also very cute. These two are so funny and cute together. I just love watching them hug each other, giggle at each other, and chase each other around the house.

Butterfly Ear

Kirsten was born with microtia with right tympanic ring aplasia. Meaning her right ear looks like a butterfly. Our cute nephew Ben named it her butterfly ear shortly after she was born and the name just sort of stuck. All of our nieces of nephews have come to love Kirsten's butterfly ear, it is not uncommon for us to be asked why Kirsten was the lucky girl to get a butterfly ear or asking when they would be getting a butterfly ear like Kirsten. My niece Abby just asked her mom why her little newborn sister doesn't have a butterfly ear, disappointed that she has just regular ears. Kirsten recently realized the difference between her two ears, a huge grin on her face realizing she had something special. She certainly is special and we are so grateful to have her in our family, cute butterfly ear and all.
Because butterfly ears do not hear as well as regular boring ears we have spent the past couple months going to several doctors in order to see what needs to be done for Kirsten's right ear. To say Kirsten does not have good luck when it comes to the medical profession is a huge understatement. But we are finally finished and have good results. After meeting with the ENT Kirsten was sent in for a ct scan. The ct scan showed that she has a fully developed inner ear but no ear canal. Luckily technology is so advanced that she will be able to have an ear canal constructed and then an outer ear formed (whether by surgery or prosthetic we are still undecided). We were then sent to get her hearing tested to see how severe her hearing loss is in each ear. Luckily her left ear has virtually no hearing loss but is just not hearing at full capacity because of the handicap of the right ear. Her right ear has as much hearing as the left but is not able to process the sound because of the lack of the ear canal. Which is why she is able to respond as well as she does on the right side. So she will be having surgery in 3 to 5 years to correct the problem. We are really excited the results are so encouraging. In the mean time we have early intervention, sign language, and speech therapists coming 5 times a month to help us with her speech. We are so grateful for good insurance and the knowledge and help of the doctors and therapists. Do you agree that little girls with butterfly ears also have cute smiles?

Halloween Carnival

Tonight we went to a Halloween carnival put on by Easter Seals (the early intervention program in Nevada). We had a blast celebrating Halloween a week early!

Audrey is Walking

Don't just take my word for it:

One more reason I am glad I married Kirk

Every year for our anniversary Kirk writes me a poem, and every year it makes me cry. This year was our 5th anniversary and he took writing his poem a little further and made me a website of our lives together. Yes, I cried through the whole thing. He said he will add to it each year and I'm excited to have that become our new anniversary tradition. He seriously is the best. Check it out:

http://www.wix.com/croft50/igoththebestwife

"Teacher, my mom said rain is just water"

It is finally fall here in Vegas and this afternoon it actually rained! After opening all my windows so we could enjoy the smell we all ran outside to dance in the rain. Kirsten and I made it down the driveway before we both agreed it was too cold and ran back inside. Kirk and Audrey were die-hards and convinced us to come back out and catch a few raindrops on our tongues. The girls were so cute and pretty amazed with the water coming out of the sky.

After coming back inside the girls loved their dad tickling them until they were dry. PS Clearence rack at Target means matching outfits for my girls!

The costume search ended today at Target

We found the perfect Halloween costumes for the girls today. I figured we could pull off another year of matching costumes before we dive head first into princess costumes. Want a sneak peak? I thought so!

3 against 1

After bringing in the groceries this evening Kirsten and Audrey were playing with the umbrella stroller in the garage. Kirk brought the stroller in the house and strapped Audrey in so Kirsten could push her around. Devastated that she wasn't the one in the stroller Kirsten dramatically threw herself on the ground sobbing. Kirk eventually pulled Audrey out of the stroller and let Kirsten climb in and took her to get the mail. (There is a point to this story I promise) A few minutes later Kirsten is wanting help putting Audrey in the stroller so she can push her around.
Kirk looks at me and says "we could have saved a lot of drama if they would have gone with my idea in the first place."
To which I promptly respond "they are girls and don't want to be told how to do anything."
He didn't miss a beat " oh I know, I'm married to you"

funny Kirk

But the girls had fun and it was cute, see?

Young Love

Audrey and Adam hit it off instantly. As soon as they had the chance to crawl around on the floor together it was apparent their relationship would be a constant game of catch and release. But leave it up to my Audrey to make the first move.

It was a couple months ago, when they had only known each other a few weeks. I was on the floor changing Adam's diaper when Audrey crawled over to him, took his binky out of his mouth and leaned in for a kiss. Oh she didn't kiss him at first, she's a flirt and knows how to make him want it, but she only kept him waiting for a second because before I knew it she was planting a big open mouth lots of tongue kiss on Adam. Oh he really liked it! Yes I am jealous, she never comes up to me and gives me kisses. Boys are already causing drama in our house.

Audrey's first word? "ada" as in Adam. Anytime I mention his name she gets really excited and starts looking around for him. When his dad drops him off in the morning Audrey is ecstatic, complete with giggling, smiles, and shaking limbs. She then crawls over to his car seat and tells him hi babbling like crazy still with the giggle and smiles. He is excited to see her too and doesn't mind that she likes to take his binky in and out of his mouth a hundred times a day. She wakes up from her nap before him and as soon as she hears him wake up she says "ada" and starts crawling to his room before I have time to blink my eyes.

I love having these two crazy babies crawling around my house all day. They are always getting into the fridge and like to feed each other grapes. They are each starting to walk taking about 10 steps at a time, trying to out do each other. They love to climb up the stairs and slide down. It's a mad house when Adam is here and by 5:00 I'm usually flat out on the couch waiting for Kirk to come rescue me. I have not figured out how to have a clean house with 3 kids, pretty sure it's not possible. Anyway we love Adam, and I couldn't be more thrilled in Audrey's choice in men!

Be Warned: Trip Itinerary

A couple weeks ago Kirk and I celebrated our 5th year anniversary. We drove up to Payson Tuesday night and stayed with our friends Joe and Brenna. Audrey spent the entire night screaming and when she finally fell asleep Kirsten woke up and picked up where Audrey left off. Nothing sounded better to us at that moment than a few days away from the girls and a chance to sleep uninterrupted for a few nights! Brenna was sweet and made us yummy pancakes even though she had to listen to our girls scream all night. Part of me wished we could just vacation at her house with her green backyard, fields surrounding her house, and swing for the kids we were all in heaven!
Maybe next time.
We then were able to visit Dione and her sweet 6 week old baby boy. Seeing my friends swoon over their baby boys makes me think just maybe we should order a boy next. It was kind surreal to sit there with my friend and realize there were 6 kids between the 3 of us.
Weren't we just driving the "roller coaster" hills in Vernal?
Next we met up with Kirk's mom at his brother Aaron's house. Joriel made yummy coffee cake and we spent a few minutes visiting before we kissed our beautiful babies good bye. It was a big deal for us to leave them, since it was our first over night trip without them. They waved goodbye to us with wide eyes that were screaming "are you seriously leaving us? seriously?". But we totally did and did so before Karen realized how much like the girls like to scream at night!
(But they both totally slept through the night for her, SO not fair!)
We met up with some of our best friends Mark & Camille and had lunch. It was awesome to have time with friends without the kiddos around, even though all we talked about were the kids!
We stayed in Salt Lake that night and were delighted that we could go out at night and didn't have to stay home with sleeping babies. We spent time shopping at Tai Pan and Gateway before driving up and over Big Cottonwood Canyon into Midway where we enjoyed our honeymoon suite at the Johnson Mill. It was heaven and it turns out Kirk and I still like each other, alot!
But we were more than ready to see the girls on Friday. It about killed us to wait until 9:00 for our breakfast to be delivered so that we could get on the road and see our girls. They ran(crawled) up to us as we got out of the car, those girls are our piece of heaven.

In Vernal we were able to meet Eliza Jayne, have a Tea Party with my mom and some of my sisters and nieces, go boating with Liz and Derek(yes Kirk was really hot wake boarding), go to Women's Conference, go to the movie You Again with my mom, aunt janet, and kristy, Kirk and the girls went to Alex's birthday party, but mostly the girls loved playing in their grandma's backyards swinging on the swing set, playing with the dog, and rolling around in the grass (which was Kirsten and Audrey's piece of heaven). We met up with the rest of my family (Riley, Josh, Brett, Amanda, Garrett, Chelsey, and spouses/boyfriend) on Sunday at Riley's house. It is so much fun to be with family. It was the perfect trip! Maybe, just maybe we will do it again :)