Luke's busy day

To start the morning off, Luke cut a hole in his favorite shirt with some scissors...

Then he had a fudge-pop and used his sleeve as a napkin. Thank you, very much.

To top off the day, he was laying on the floor watching a movie (seems innocent enough, right?). Come to find out he had a broken ink pen in his hand which he used to mark all over his body, shirt and the carpet. Here's the evidence...back of the left ear,

On top of the head right through the super blond hair,

on his forehead, eyebrow and even eyelid,

all over the right ear and the back of the hair,

and my personal favorite: the carpet. Trying to remove it seems to only spread the mess. Lovely. Thanks again, Luke.

P.S. His hands and one foot were also covered in beautiful black ink.

Luke and the cake

While Ryan and I were outside hanging wreaths on Saturday, Luke was inside getting into mischief. We had a cake on the counter with about 1/4 of the cake left in a glass cake stand. Luke helped himself to the rest of the cake. Thankfully, he did not break anything. I am amazed. When I came in the house, he had chocolate all over his face. And there was cake all over the floor. I think I'm turning soft because I didn't even really get mad and we let him just sit there and finish his piece and called it dinner. Now I see why older children have issues with the younger ones getting away with everything.

He's at it again.

My kitchen was so clean when I got into the shower...this is what Jack managed to do before I got out of the shower. An entire bag of trail mix scattered all over my table and under the table. The pictures are not showing the extent of the damage.

Then another day this past week. The medium:Sugar.

He is going to have to be allowed a cartoon during my showers from now on...it's not worth the clean up time.

hairtastic

The top picture doesn't quite do it justice. But you can see the subtle differences between it and her Kindergarten pix (gratuitous pix of buffalo is just a bonus). Yeah, Bryn has been biting her hair off. So much so that we finally chopped it. No hair reaches her mouth anymore.

Busted

Morgan is a little thief. I catch her rummaging all the time. And the other day, she snuck a packet of instant oatmeal and ran to Aaron's office. When I discovered her, she had scattered the entire packet all over the floor. No pix of it, just another run of the vacuum. And yeah, I had already run the vacuum earlier that day. Little sucker.

it gets me every time

A few weeks ago, we were at the store and Ava said, "Mom, I gotta go potty." We didn't run fast enough and she says, "Mom I pooped." And sure enough she had pooped her panties. Then a few days later, we're at another store, and Ava says, "I gotta go poop." My heart flips trying to run her to the potty and then she says, "April fools."

A girl after my own heart...she's done it to me several times, and I panic every time. She's got great timing. I want to ring her little April fool's neck.

The power of pudding

While I checked my email, pudding ensued. See that glistening? Yeah not to many kids can do that. At least they're dressed.

Oh Little Jack!

I was blow drying my hair and realized I hadn't checked on Jack for awhile...and this is what I found.



Bottles of Jonathan's shaved ice syrup lined up...a bowl and a huge red syrup stain. (Why is it always red, the hardest color to get out, that is spilled on carpets. Why not the yellow syrup or the white one? Seriously!)
Luckily I splurged for the carpet cleaning warranty awhile back and the company came out and finished what I couldn't get out with folex (The 2nd picture) the next day.


Oh little Jack you're cute but you've become a menace.

Luke and the toothpaste

Luke had locked the bathroom door which is always a bad sign. When I got the door opened, this is what I found. Luke was hiding behind a towel, wearing Mia's shoes nonetheless. Watermelon toothpaste was all over the place...

the floor...

in several places...

the toilet, etc. And I found some later on the carpet, too. Bonus.

Lipsmacker Masterpiece

Mia came running to me in the laundry room to report "Luke's a BIG brava!" I wasn't sure what I would find. She told me on the way to the kitchen he had colored all over his hand. Not a big deal. Even the lipsmackers all over his face, I wasn't upset about. He has 4 sisters and the house is really overflowing with the stuff. I can't blame him. I washed his hands and face and threw away the destroyed lip smacker. It wasn't until a few minutes later that I noticed where he had created his masterpiece, the front of the dishwasher. Thankfully, it wiped up super easy with just a paper towel. No harm, no foul. I was just glad it wasn't smashed into the carpet or anything worse.

Do you AR wanna?

Sunny begged for it, here it is:

http://6ftdrift.com/ar/

The Amazing Race Fantasy League
Sign up, make picks, and watch the Amazing Race this Sunday.

"The Toy Snuck In My Pocket."

Emily pulled out a little Halloween stamper from her pocket about an hour after arriving home from the Party store. At first she said it "Snuck into her pocket" and with further probing she said she got it at school...Which I almost believed because they do come home with little toys like that.... But my interrogating skills clicked in and I probed further.

I asked, "Are you sure it didn't come from somewhere else." She then changed her story to "Ummm I got it from my class at Church." Which immediately made my heart sink and I knew my little girl had stolen it from the store. I told her it was better to tell the truth and go and pay for it, than to lie and get into big trouble. Which is when Ben decided to sing..."She stole it from the store, she stole it from the store...she's going to jail." Despite Ben's threats...Emily confessed that she had picked it up off the floor of the store and put it in her pocket. So then of course, we had to drive all the way back down to the Party store where Emily and I explained to the cashier what happened and that she was ready to pay for it. Emily paid the 39 cents out of her own money and the cashier thanked her for being honest.
Hopefully this little life lesson sticks with her the next time she's tempted to sneak something into her pocket.

"Um.. he was in the potty."

While I was on the phone with Sunny, I thought the kids were just playing in the hall with all the doors closed. Apparently, Evie had to go potty and forgot to close the door when she was done and more importantly forgot to flush. Stewie came crawling up to me sopping wet. When I asked Evie why he was wet, she said, "Um.. he was in the potty." My picture isn't very good, but there was pee potty water all over the floor and of course he had to pull out the used toilet paper and shred it into little bits.

"Oh, Stewie!"

These pictures aren't doing it justice. Stewie got a hold of Evie's bike streamers and went to town. There were sparkly streamers scattered throughout the house. I was worried about Evie when she saw what he had done. Bless her little heart, all she said was, "Oh Stewie! He forgot to put those streamers back on my bike."

Pooh-Disaster

Last week a Pooh-Disaster took place. I went to change the laundry to the dryer and within that 60 seconds there was a pooh explosion. I came back and found little Stew covered in pooh. I looked at Evie and she said, "Um.. Stewie went poop." It was all over him- his shirt, his hands, his legs. Luckily, he had a pacifier in his mouth, otherwise I'm sure he would have gone in for a taste. It was everywhere. It was smeared on the baby gate, on the wall and several places on the carpet. I've never seen so much come out of one little person in my life. He knew he was busted and when I went to grab him he took off crawling and as his little bum went back and forth poop would fly out the back. It was awful. In hindsight, I should have taken a picture but in the moment all I could think about was how do I contain the mess.

Why I have a lock on the pantry.

So I've been lazy. The kids have been fairly good lately...thus, I've been getting into the shower without another thought. Not anymore. I came out with my towel on and found that the kids had dumped an entire new box of fruity pebbles (which is one of Jonathan's favorites) on the floor and decided to eat it like dogs. I told Ben to get the broom and clean it up since it was still fairly contained. I left to put clothes on and when I came back...all the cereal had been crunched on and lodged into all the crevices of my distressed floors. And of course I had just mopped the day before. I had to sweep, then vacuum, then mop once more because of all the tongue smears of chewed up cereal. The picture shown is the one of fairly contained cereal. I was too mad when I came out and saw what had happened in the two minutes that I was gone.

Hmm ... Butter.

I was letting Evie butter her own toast at the table, when I turned around a few minutes later and found her under the table eating the butter by the knife full. She knew she was busted and would not look at the camera.

ABC easy as 123

Morgan's new favorite thing: ABC gum. She finds it at the pool, creates a sticky web of it, then brings it to me to peel off of her. Yesterday, she did it three times before I banished her to a floaty in the deep water (I was with her). Sticky messy difficult to peel away--that is why I hate gum and our kids never get it.

Ava (tonight at dinner)

"Yeah, I like turds. I had a turd at Grandma Patsy's once, it was yuuuuumy...it is stinky, yeah."

Quinn has arrived

I turned my back for 2 minutes... arrrggghhhh.... I don't know if Mr. Magic Eraser can save this one. I think it's going to pull the paint off. Crayon is not my friend. This picture doesn't do it justice, but Quinn was looking pretty proud of herself. The crayon goes all the way up the wall, up the stairs. I also found some later on our fireplace.

Zoe tried to help me clean it up. The whole time she kept making comments like, "Quinn is a naughty cat, huh, Mommy?" "Quinn is a stinker, I can't believe she did this." and my favorite, "Quinn really needs a time out for this." She was glad it wasn't her in trouble, for once.

Filling up the tank

Last Saturday I went out to the garage to find Luke like this. He smiled up at me and said "Mom, pee, car!" He had dropped his drawers and was filling up the tank of his little car. He was pretty happy about it, I might add. I guess Ryan and I are to blame for creating this little monster. I tried to explain to him that we only pee in the potty but it was pretty hard to stifle my laughter. 

Partners in Crime

Mia and Luke have really become a dynamic duo lately. I really think they are my twins just born 21 months apart. They are always together, always playing, and lately, always up to something naughty. Saturday night we asked Mia to go get her pj's on. A few minutes had gone by and I thought maybe I should check on her. Luke was with her, of course. I came in her room to find Luke pulling up his pj pants in her closet while she was getting dressed and then I saw it...the puddle in the closet. Luke had peed on the carpet. I asked Luke why he peed in the closet and he just pointed to Mia and said "Eea" (his word for Mia) and smiled. I asked Mia if she had told him to pee in the closet and, after much coaxing, she admitted she had. Ryan and I were soooo mad. We quickly threw both culprits in their own beds as they were crying for each other (Luke had been hoping he could sleep in the girls' room that night--request denied). When I went to clean up the mess a few minutes later, I noticed there were TWO distinct places. I asked Mia if she had also peed in the closet and she admitted she had. Boy, was I mad! I don't know what we are going to do with these two. 

Stinkin' it Up - Kusch Style

Zoe: it looks a little forced to me.


Quinn: She's channeling jack black from Nacho Libre


Quinn: I thought the crazy hair complimented the look.


Sorry it took so long to get these posted.

Zoe's back

It's been awhile since Zoe's made the brava awards. Mostly becuase I haven't documented anything. She is still a little stinker. Today I actually had a camera around.

Zoe sprayed 1/2 a bottle of perfume when I wasn't looking, and then after being sent to her room for timeout, I let her use my bathroom to go potty, she decided to color with my eyeliner. Not fun.

Mia's Stinkeye

Mia loves to do the combo stinkeye/roll your eyes. It's her favorite. 

Poop Meister Morgan

Morgan loves to take her diaper off, especially when we put her down for naps or bed. Almost every morning I wake to a fresh puddle on her sheets and a crumpled diaper discarded on the floor.

party in the front...business in the back

Morgan is a she-beast of a mess. She is filthy all day long. But her favorite thing to do is take off her clothes and diaper while sleeping...and then pees. So after every nap and almost every morning I go into her room to find a puddle on the sheets. It has been a problem for several weeks. We tried one-ises, but she just uses hulk strength to rip out of them. This is my daily bane.

Today was the worst. I went into get her from her nap and discovered that she had peed a giant puddle AND she had dropped a deuce the size of a great dane. Seriously, it was bigger than my hand stretched out. I know that is graphic but it needs to be said. I thought about taking a picture but it was soo nasty, I abstained. She had also spread her deed all over her, her blanket and a toy. Awesome. Awesome day for me.

Get out your rain boots

Ava has been potty trained for awhile now and she has had fewer accidents than her sisters. She rarely needs reminders and can go for several hours without a potty. Still, for safety, on Sundays I take her after sacrament and then between class and sharing time. This Sunday I forgot to take her between classes.

About five minutes before church ended, Ava shouted at the nursery workers, "There's a puddle over here. I'm standing in a puddle!"

Awesome. So Aaron got me and I cleaned up a puddle.

We've been clean for awhile, or so I thought

Yeah, so not too many bravas coming from the Faveros and I think this is good. Maybe, just maybe my kids have grown tired of being crazy insane. But then I thought about it and realized, they haven't been angels, I just don't have proof of their crimes and more critically, I'm numb to the everyday bravas. Such as:

Morgan playing, scooping, and dumping things in the toilet. Yesterday she was playing in Bryn's pee (she forgets to flush often) and had dumped a whole bag of handi wipes into the pee. Sweet for me.

Bryn has several pen drawing on the seats in the back of the car; and then a couple of days ago she dumped a whole bag of flower seeds all over the back of the car; and then today, because I had not vacuumed the tiny seeds up, dumped a bottle of water all over the scattered seeds to see if they would grow. Serenity now, serenity now.

Ava is a silly kid and loves to snitch. I caught her with a hand cupped full over her mouth. When I finally pried it away, I discovered a mouthful of sprinkles. She swallowed them and told me she was magic. I asked, How? She replied I can open the sprinkles without Bryn. See, I'm magic. And then pointed out the splash of sprinkles all over my freshly mopped kitchen floor. It was awesome.

So you see, I think I'm brava free but really I'm not. I'm just too tired to take pix to prove it.

commiserations.

Ben's Poor Choices This Past Week.

The top 3 major offenses for this week:

1. Using his mattress as a slide. Which wouldn't have bugged me too much but they broke Jackson's crib in a major way and broke of a slat of his own bed while doing it...and it's questionable whether Jack's crib is still safe to even use.



2. He discovered that wet clumps of toilet paper stick really well to walls and ceilings. The kid's bathroom (that I just cleaned the day before) was covered in toilet paper wads as well as the playroom ceiling. Arrrrrrr. I only took a picture of the playroom ceiling because I had already made him clean the bathroom wads.



3. Finding out that Ben had pooped in our window well outside some days ago. Apparently he didn't want to come inside to do his business. (Unfortunately he learned this one from a friend a month earlier who had pooped in our window well.)

Ben and Jack's Stink Eyes

Evie's Stink Eye

Clearly, Ava's got us beat, but here's Evie stink eye.

stink eye challenge

The master of stink eye.

If your kid can do it better, that I challenge you to prove it. This is an official stink-off.

[Note: Ava is dressed.]

thank you easter bunny, bawk bawk

Easter was a success and the girls dove into their baskets of sweet treasure. We adopted the get-it-over-in-one-day method to candy allocation and the girls made good time of it. By 8am, they were flying high on sugar. Aaron and I decided to make breakfast, and I asked the girls, "Who wants an egg mcmuffin?" to which Lauren responded in utter disbelief, "You don't want to eat candy?"

We didn't get any takers and they continued feasting on candy. Still we had to try. So we asked if anyone wanted something real to eat. Bryn dug deep into her basket, retrieved a rice crispy treat, and said, "Look cereal." At that point we gave up. And today, it is successfully all gone (except for Lore, who still has half, and she should--she still has Halloween candy.)

Help Needed!

I'm trying to figure out what to do with the girls' sleeping arrangement. Right now they share a room, and it is not going well. They keep each other up late or wake the other up when one goes to bed before the other. I told Zoe when we move to the new house we are going to split them up. You would have thought I told her Quinn died. She was devastated. They love to be in the same room together. So I'm torn... what to do? Do any of you have thoughts on how to make sharing a room between a 4 yr old and a 18 month old work? Or should I just take the tears for awhile a split them up?