Happy Halloween

Once again, Becky is left to do the blog. Peter is off at a friends house tonight & so cannot do it.

Today was a fun day, but at this time is such a blurr that I don't know if I will get it all.

Jess, Paul and Becky went to Grand Junction today for an Orthodontist appointment. The roads in Colorado are not much like the roads in Utah (in a grid pattern) and so Becky got sort of lost. However, Denise's map helped us to get back on the right road and to the appointment exactly on time. The appointment was really quick and Jess got green/blue elastics in her mouth. Her teeth are hurting her pretty bad now. She couldn't find the gum-numbing medicine, so we dosed her with as much tylenol & ibuprofen that Becky was willing to do and sent her to bed. Hopefully, it will kick in and she can get some sleep tonight.

While we were in Grand Junction we got a cute little outfit for Paul. We didn't have time to get his picture taken as planned, but we might do that tomorrow or Friday. We got the outfit at Ross. I love Ross! The outfit was less than 5 dollars! It was great!

When we got back to Cedaredge we picked up the kids from Famous People class. They learned about Hellen Keller today. They said they had fun and Peter even learned how to do his name in Braille.
When we got home we played around for a little while. We read the letter from mom & dad. Nicole was mildly bummed about the room situation. Peter grinned from ear to ear when he read the comments that mom & dad had posted on the blog. The kids are all very excited about the house and are praying that the family will be able to get it.

We then got ready for the Halloween party at the church. I wish I had gotten pictures of the chaos, as it was chaos getting all of us ready. We sprayed Nicole & Rachel's hair green. Jess and Peter got themselves dressed in their costumes. However, while Jess was putting on her make-up, Buzz Light Year (aka Paul) decided he needed some face paint as well and grabbed a chunk in his little hand and smeared it across his face. Oi! When Becky left the house she looked around at the mess and thought to herself (how does Denise do it!). At the party, our double headed dragon (Nicole and Rachel) needed to use the bathroom right away. That was a challenge. Then they only made it through dinner before they were begging to be removed from each other. So we removed their costume and they were the green faced, green haired girls.
The kids had fun at the trunk-or-treat. They got tons of candy. Becky isn't quite sure how their parents would handle all the candy, but she is going to make them pick their 5 most favorite treats for themselves and then the rest is going in a big bag for everyone (to be dispensed at Mom & Dad's will). When we got home Becky was exhausted. The kids took a bath to get rid of their greenness while Becky cleaned the mess. Oh it was a long day, but it was fun! Oh! I almost forgot. Peter lost a tooth today! One of his molars on the top, left side. He said it wasn't even loose and just fell out (this was before all the candy I must note).

Well, Trick or Treat and Happy Halloween...it is off to bed with me now!

Becky's posting - The pool is FINISHED?!

The kids were up too late tonight, so Becky gets to post for today. Today started a little late as we were all exhausted after the pumpkin carving last night. Even Jess came home and went back to bed after Seminary this morning. And worst of all, we forgot to start the dishes in the dishwasher last night and so alot of the dishes were dirty this morning.

After breakfast and chores the kids started working on schoolwork as I (Becky) started painting the pool. It was soo close to being finished that I really wanted to get it done. After Jess finished her schoolwork she helped me paint and together we think we did it. (Granted, it still has to be approved by the parents before we can fill it with water and start using it).

Peter and Wyeth (a friend) came to help but they decided it was too difficult to paint the skull so close to the bottom of the pool and opted to watch a movie instead.

Rachel helped a little, but more or less supervised the work.

(The video feed of the finished pool was supposed to go here, but I stayed up putting the finishing touches on Peter's costume and thought to myself "I will do this until the video loads"...two hours later I cancelled the video upload and now am going to bed)

Paul did us a great favor by watching a movie instead of trying to help as his little hands and feet probably would have gotten into everything!

Nicole was my steady worker, as in school work. She stayed at it for much of the day and after that was finished she went on to Rosetta Stone to learn Italian. She seems to me to be the most determined to grasp the Italian language of all the kids. However, when she struggles with the spelling she comes to me and asks me how to spell certain words. I really think she would do better guessing as I didn't even know how to say "hello" in Italian until two days ago. But I try to be a good sport and help her spell it by helping her sound it out. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.

Tonight Terri (a friend) came over and offered to take the kids so I could have an afternoon/evening to myself. She has been so helpful these past few days. I let Rachel, Paul, and Jess go with her. Nicole went to Achievement days (they went to a cornmaze). And Peter and Wyeth and I went to Walmart to get the final stuff for Peter's costume. We also had to get candles as last night after carving the pumpkins we realized that all the candles we had left were birthday candles (which don't stay up very well in pumpkins).

All things considered, I think we had a very good, very fun day today.

So tomorrow we hope for fun & maybe spooky things, because it is Halloween!

Monday October 29

Hello again. well today my sister and I were lucky because we got to spend the whole day at my friends house. So I don't really know what went on while I was away. But I do know that my cousin, little brother, and one of my sisters went shopping for pumpkins. After that we carved them and had pumpkin pie. It was great!

Until next time, you know who.

Sunday October 28 2007

Hello again! I know that by now you are getting tired of the usual. What you are!>:( Thats ok I am to. But we do the same stuff every day. (Almost every day.) Today our church did what we call the primary program. Every one did a fantastic job! It was a big success (in our church.) After church, we lazed about all afternoon.

Then we had some friends come over and the fun started. We were wrestling with the best of them! It was fun!

After dark, we went out and played on the swings.

When it got to cold we went inside and had HOT CHOCOLATAY. It was really good. I decided to rip up a big marshmallow and put it in mine and well every one else had to have one too.


Well, it's the end of the day, but before we go, we would like to to leave our parents a message in the video below.

Until next time, see ya.....

Saturday October 27 2007

Today after we did our chores we painted some of our pool. It was lots of fun. We made lots of cool stuff too on the walls of the pool! My cousin painted a fish, a jelly fish, a turtle and some coral. My sister and her friend finished a treasure chest they were working on, and then when we went to town my sister painted coral all over the place. It looks awesome!
We also went to watch one of our friends play in a soccer game. His team lost 5 to 0, but the team he went up against was undefeated. After that one of my sisters went to a Hallowen dance with her friend. I hope they have fun. She is the Corpse Bride. Scary! We didn't get to see her costume because she went to her friends house to get ready and then went straight to the dance. But we will get to see it on Halloween day. She dyed her dress last night a light purple/gray. It didn't dye itself evenly, but it looked ok considering it was a Corpse Bride.
We were going to work on my Eragon costume today also but we ran out of time because we stayed and played at the soccer fields. One of my sisters and my brother played on the playground while me and one of my other sisters talked with some of our friends.

Join us tomorrow for more McCollaum family fun.

the start

Today we did the usual, which includes: morning chores, playing with friends, school work, etc. The only thing different was our dog Addy got shot. DUN DUN DUN!!! Actually, she just got some vaccines....but its more dramatic saying it the other way. She needed vaccines because we are taking her to Italy with us.

That actually wasn't the only thing different, Addy also got her first haircut and nail triming. Jessica did them both. They both look good. It is perfect.

Yesterday, poor little Paul got stung by a wasp. His little hand is kinda red and kinda swollen. He was hurting a little today, but we gave him some ice for it (which less of it ended up on his hand than in his mouth) and he was feeling better.

I have to go to bed now.

Until next time, the McCollaum fam...