A-Haunting We Will Go

The kids were so excited for Halloween night to finally be here! Poor Claire was sick (second time this month - we've had some serious issues lately) so she wasn't her usual happy self, but still managed to enjoy the night. Cole had yet another costume. He had very originally wanted to be a skeleton, but when we couldn't find a skeleton costume he decided to be Harry Potter, then Ron, then the pumpkin that he was for the party (see earlier post). I happened to find one later on so for the official Halloween night he was a skeleton.




Ava wouldn't get out of the stroller that Daddy was going to push her in for trick-or-treating, so these were the only shots I could get of her.


Being Scooby-Doo, tongue and all.




The kids by their jack-o-lanterns, making spooky faces.  Ava's absent because I couldn't get her out of her stroller.  I even tried carrying the stroller with her in it over by the pumpkins, but she got out and pushed the stroller back onto the sidewalk while yelling at me.  Oh well, guess there's next year. 








Yay!  Ava's out of her stroller!  All three kids in a Halloween picture!







I stayed home to pass out candy and Grant took the kids trick-or-treating.  Grant said that almost everyone who gave candy to Ava thought she was a boy.  She got a lot of, "Here you go little buddy!" Surprise, surprise!

Finally on their way...


Our pumpkin lights.


After the kids went around our neighborhood, we drove to (yet another) party someone was throwing in our ward.  On our way, we stopped at this AMAZING house that had built a pirate ship on their lawn.  Yes, you read me right, a pirate ship.  As you can see from the picture, it's almost the size of a real ship.  It was the most incredible thing I have ever seen.  The pictures definitely do NOT do it justice.






Some pictures without the flash so you can get a feel for what it felt like at night.




These are some shots I took of it while it was being built.


I'd hate to be this guy's neighbor!  No way to keep up with the Jones's here!


Ever since Halloween Ava has not gone anywhere without her bucket of candy.  This has made it quite difficult to stop her from eating candy all the time, but she's so dang cute that I can't bring myself to tear it away from her.


The other two needed pictures with their candy bags, too.




Ava coloring (Scooby Doo, of course) with her bucket right beside her.


We'll miss you 'til next year, Halloween!!!!!

Bootiful

I love Halloween decorations and as many of you know, I suffer from OCDD - Obsessional Compulsive Decorating Disorder.  Whenever I have any sort of decorations to put up I literally cannot sleep at night because I'm thinking of where everything should go and what things I need to buy to complete my decor.  I'm dead serious when I say I really have a problem.  I mean, who cares where my Halloween decorations go?  Is there anyone else in the world who lays awake at night debating whether a ceramic pumpkin should be put on the mantel or on the kitchen counter?  Like I said, it's truly a disease.  So, in order to help myself (and my family who has to live with my insanity) I decided to take pictures of where I put everything so I don't have to try to remember or re-think it next year.  I decided to share it with you, although I know it would've been a lot more fun if I'd put the pictures up BEFORE Halloween to get everybody in the mood.  I'll try to do that with my Christmas decor, though, how's that?

We'll start outside and then tour through the house.  

Here's one of the two wreaths I semi-made for our two front doors.  I bought them for $5 on clearance last year at Walmart and then took all the stuff off I didn't like and added stuff I did.

I made these little guys...

...and hung them on our chandelier along with the balls Cole and I made last year.

I added lots of candles and a few more skeletons for a spooky effect on Halloween.

Dining room table.

My friend gave me this door she bought at a garage sale and didn't want anymore.  The backside had a tons of hooks to hang pictures off of.  I didn't really have a place to hang it on my wall, but thought it'd look great as a Halloween prop.

Thanks for touring my home with me and helping me with my OCDD!

Creepy Creations

We made lots of fun things for Halloween. First was a haunted house cake (the cake was Red Velvet since it looks like blood!)


We made sugar cookies.

We painted pumpkins, which was actually a nightmare.  I thought I'd bought paint pens that were like markers, but they were really paint in tubes shaped like pens.  The kids got into them before I knew it and paint was everywhere.   Needless to say, the pumpkins aren't quite as cute as they could've been because we did a very quick job and then cleaned up!

And we, of course, carved jack-o-lanterns.  This one's Claire's.

Ava's (although Ava had absolutely nothing to do with carving it).

Cole's.  You can't tell in this shot, but he has vampire fangs.

Fall Festivals

Cole and Claire had their Fall Festivals at school (they can't be called Halloween parties anymore, of course, just like Christmas is now a bad word) and Ava and I were lucky enough to attend.

The kindergarten festival was pretty impressive.  There were tons of booths set up for the kids to make ghost suckers at, get their faces painted, toss bean bags, bowl pumpkins, etc.  

Cole with his friend, Savannah.

Cole's trying to make a "Frankenstein face."

Ava and I then went to Claire's festival, which was just in her classroom.  This is the only picture I took because my lens wasn't focusing.  I was freaking out about it (I had two shoots the next day and a wedding in Denver with Shannon a week later) and called Nikon when we got home.  As I was on the phone with them, I looked down at my camera and realized that the lens had been switched to manual focus instead of automatic.  Ava must've messed with it when we were in Claire's classroom, little stinker.  Glad that was all it was, though.  Whew!!!!!  Too bad, though, it meant Claire didn't get any good shots at her little party.

Wicked Fun

We had a lot of Halloween parties to attend this year. The first was at one of Claire's friend from school's house. Unfortunately, Ava and I were sick, so we had to stay home. Grant took Cole and Claire.

Claire was a spider princess this year. Not exactly sure what that is, but it looked cool!


Cole was going to be Harry Potter, then Ron.  Right before the party he changed his mind and wore this old pumpkin costume we have.  Whatever!  


He's trying to look tough here, but it's hard when you're wearing a neon-orange poofy pumpkin outfit.

Cole made the pumpkin pin he's wearing.

Next, Grant and I went to a Halloween party at our friends', Matt and Kim's, house.  Grant is Gilligan, which makes more sense when you see him with the Skipper and Mary Ann (a few pictures below).  There was no way I could find a maternity Ginger outfit, so I went as a witch.

I'm not quite sure what is going on in this picture.

Here's the Skipper (Scott) and Gilligan.

Mary Ann (Cami), the Skipper and Gilligan

Lots of witches came to the party (and a black cat).

All the girls.

We also went to the ward trunk-or-treat.  We dressed up as the Scooby-Doo gang.  Let's just say Velma's outfit is not the most flattering on my pregnant body.  Oh, well.  I did it for my kids.  My hair was pinned up better at the beginning of the evening, but this picture was taken at the end of the night after I'd been running around everywhere (I was partly in charge of the event) so it looks really scraggly.  And, if you can't tell, we sprayed Claire's and Grant's hair.  Grant's hair looked more green than blonde, but everyone got the point.

This was how we decorated the trunk.

And this was what we passed out.  

Halloween is such a fun time of year and I love all the dressing up and going to parties!  We've definitely been spoiled moving down here and we always have lots of fun events to go to.  We love it.

Our House

Ok, so I know I'm only a year late, but I'm finally posting pictures of every room in our house. It's finally all done. Well, mostly, of course. I still have little things here and there I need to add but most of those things are going to come slowly. So, as promised, I have pictures of every single room, including the bathrooms! The only room I don't have is our bedroom, but it hasn't changed too much since I posted pictures last year, and we're planning on getting a new bedspread anyway, so I'll post a picture of it when that happens.

So here goes.

Formal living room.  Needs curtains, a green pillow on the couch, and a picture frame on the piano, but otherwise finished.

This is a painting I did in college.  There wasn't a good place for it, so I found one of these easels and put it on there, which fills the corner nicely.

Dining room.

The office.  I made the picture board thing on the wall and I LOVE it!

Downstairs bathroom.

Family room.

I know I posted basically this same picture last time, but it's still my favorite shot in the whole house so I couldn't resist posting it again!  :)

Kitchen.

This is the view as you walk up the stairs.  I had to figure out what to put on this enormous shelf.  Kinda tricky. Do you see the little toy that's on there?  I meant to edit it out, but it's kinda cute to see the kids' addition to the decor.  :)

Claire's room.  I would LOVE to paint her headboard pink or green, but she won't let me.  Wouldn't that look so cute?  I decided to let it go, though, since it is her room after all.

I made the little birds that hang on her canopy.  I had a few extra, so I think I'm going to use them for Easter decor.

Haven't ordered all the pictures to fill the frames yet, but you get the idea.

I made the picture board on her door.  It has since fallen down, but I think I've figure out a way to make it stay on without totally ruining the closet door.  I have to make one for Cole next.

Cole's room.

Cole added the stickers on the drawers.

Kids bathroom.

Ava and the new baby's room.  I haven't totally finished it since we're going to be putting a baby in here soon.  Yes, I know it's the girly-est room in the house and Ava is the least girly one of all of us!  Hopefully the new baby will be girly enough to make it fit!

The loft (i.e. playroom).




And that's it!  I promise I'll post another picture of our bedroom when I get a new bedspread.

White Collar

I've written about my famous friends before (see Pushing Daisies-My Famous Friends) but now my famous friend that I was closest to, Matt Bomer, is on another t.v. show. This one's called White Collar and it premiers tonight on USA Network at 10 pm EST (7 pm Arizona time). Matt's the main guy, the con artist who starts to help the Feds. So, tune in tonight!

Addendum:

I realized I never posted a shout out to my friend, Lynn Collins, who was Hugh Jackman's girlfriend in Wolverine.



And this is one of my bestest friends in the world, Markus (and my most talented friend, in my opinion) on Barney.

Princesses, Pirates, Pouts and Puppies

Here's some of the latest Lundgren activities.

The Stake threw a Princess Ball for Dads and their daughters.  Claire's too old to want to dress up like a princess and Ava, well we all know I've never gotten Ava into a princess dress, so this was as princessy as we got.

Claire said she had a blast and I could tell she felt as beautiful as a princess all night, which is what it's all about.  Grant, unfortunately, had to hold Ava most of the night, but I guess it made for good bonding time!

The kids' school mascot is a pirate and so a few times a year they have "Dress Like a Pirate" day.  I think the kids took their hats off the second they got on the bus, but oh well!  They still look cute!

I know, I know, Cole's too shaggy.  I promise you he's had a haircut now.


Ava needed her photo taken, too.

Ava and I went to the zoo with some friends.  Ava was grumpy, though, because she had to share a stroller with my friend's daughter and Mommy didn't always push it.  So, she wouldn't even look at the camera.

Nor would she smile AT ALL.  But, I have to admit, I think this is a pretty darn cute pouty picture!

Lastly, I'm not sure if I've mentioned Ava's love of Scooby Doo.  The first words out of her mouth every morning are, "I wanna watch Scooby Doo" and she will watch the same Scooby Doo movies over and over and over if I let her.  My friend Raschell and her mom knew of this addiction of hers and saw a Scooby Doo Beanie Baby that they had to buy for her.  It was so sweet of them.  Let's just say the picture says it all.

Labor Day at the Lake

We went to Lake Pleasant with some friends on Labor Day.  Unfortunately, being on the boat made me feel pretty sick so I wasn't able to do much, but everyone else had a blast so it was well worth it!

Bathing Beauty #1


Bathing Beauty #2


Not surprisingly, Ava was the only one who was excited to go on the tube with Dad.  I'm telling you, she just might be our only shot at having any of our kids in athletics!


That little giggle just melts my heart!


We finally convinced Cole to go (yes, I know he's looking shaggy, Tyson-he's since had a haircut).








Ava loved watching Daddy and Cole.


Mike, our friend and owner of the boat.


Go Grant!


That's my babe.

Grant would like me to pretend that this is him, but it's our friend Mike.  He is probably the best skier I have ever seen with my own eyes.  If I wasn't pregnant, I could've given him a run for his money, though.

Someone's Been Eating My Porridge

Our ward did a talent show about a month ago and I came up with the brilliant idea of singing my "Jazzy Three Bears" song with the kids each being one of the three bears.  Of course, the kids did not do what they were supposed to and just acted goofy and silly most of the song, but that's more fun to watch anyway, right?  You can access the video here (hopefully):

http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=159968803997&ref=mf

Grant was the MC for the evening.

The kids watching other performances.


The Lundgren Family debut!

I'm being Goldilocks.  

Ava wanted to say her part to everyone instead of letting me sing it.  Each time I sang about the baby bear she tried to grab the mic from me.

Ta Da!

Overall, I was very impressed with the kids. I thought they'd freeze up in front of everyone, but as you can tell from the pictures they did the exact opposite! It was fun for everyone and gave me hope that maybe one of my kids has a future on the stage!