November so far....

I lied...the first two pictures are from the week Q was potty training back in October. I felt like we were doing so much "bonding" that we needed a self photo.....

I was able to coax his thumb out of his mouth with a "CHEEEESE!" 

Poor klp.  Sometimes he just gives up on keeping his pants up when he's scooting around.  We were playing at a friend's house the other day, we looked in playroom and busily playing in the kitchen was Kanyon with his pants at his ankles.  

This pic makes me laugh out loud. He lookes like a grown man doing the Reader's Digest crossword puzzle.  

I usually save the boys' "MOOMEE" (movie) time til I'm cooking dinner.  They watch a little Praise Baby or Sesame Street (they think all movies are only 20 min!!). I  just think they are so cute watching TV. I mean on the one hand, I'm saying its cute that they're brains are turning to mush (haha...I'm being dramatic) but on the other hand, its just so sweet that they are so tuned in to it.  

q man lounging in his unders.  These are NOT boxer briefs, they are just undies that are TOO BIG! heee heee

klp had an eye Dr. check up the other day and he sat in the chair all by himself while the tech did the exam. He was so brave :)  Look at this big boy...

waiting on the Dr....playing with the phone....

While we were at the eye Dr., Quinn played at Chandler's house.  When I drove up, they were playing out in the drizzle and he was sporting this sweet lady bug raincoat! :)  So cute...maybe not his manliest look, but I about melted right then and there.....

klp, Quinn, and Chandler all on the tricycle.  

Our friends Cole and Ryan let Quinn borrow some cowboy boots until he gets his for his birthday.  He was SOOOOOO SOOOO proud to have these on.  He was lovin' it! 

KLP was hiding behind the counter the other night when he got in from work and couldn't make it til supper without some Cheetos. I said, "You BETTER NOT let those boys see you eating those!" So this was his solution.  He hideout worked.  

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving from the Phillips Phamily!!

Big Boy Quinn

I took the plunge with Quinn!  I NEVER thought I would potty train my kids by 2.  I just wasn't in a hurry and thought it would be way harder than waiting til they were older.  But for some reason a few weeks ago, I just thought to myself, "I really think Quinn could potty train".  So the last week in October I decided to give it a shot. I wasn't dead set on it working, I just thought I'd give it a good try and if it didn't work that was fine, I'd wait til later.  No pressure at all.   The first couple of days it was accident after accident but he got better and better.  He still has some accidents and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little potty trained too....meaning I have to watch how long its been and take him sometimes because he doesn't always tell us until about 1 second before he REALLY needs to go! :)  All in all I'm really proud of him!  Not having to buy him diapers is not the only great thing about being potty trained....here are the other things I love about it...

His unders sticking out of the top of his pants....

whitey tighties and a wife beater....maybe my favorite combo ever!  (he's jumping off the couch, thats why he's blury!)

whitey tighties on little ones may be the CUTEST THING EVER! The big belly and thumb/blanket never hurts the cute factor.  

I have an embarrassing amount of pictures of him on the toilet because of the random things he takes with him to the bathroom.  He cracked me up sitting there with his gun!

underwear wedgies! 

We also LOVE LOVE LOVE how he says "underwear". I have GOT to get it on video...if I do, I'll put it up for you to hear because it will make you melt.

**I hesitate to say potty trainED. I think he's still potty trainING.** We don't have 100% trust in him yet and I think I'll have to trust him a little more before I say potty TRAINED.

We've been busy

We've been pretty busy around here.  Busy doing lots of things: 

Like playing with our hand me down train set that we LOVE.  

sweet sweet brothers  

klp has been busy reading.  

And at any given point, one of these boys is busy "writing".  They take it very seriously!

We've been busy eating with friends!

And eating the tops off of cupcakes!

We love being busy with our friends!  I love this picture of Mindi swinging with Kanyon AND Trent! Contrary to what it looks like in the pic, klp was NOT choking little Trent.  

Kanyon has been busy riding his new BIKE!!!! He outgrew his other one and he is loving his new one. It is a little bit different, but still an Amtryke.  We are thankful for their generosity! We passed our old one on to hopefully find a good home with a little one ready for their first bike! :)  He is good at pedaling it and is even learning to steer it pretty good.  

We don't have the bar yet for us to hold, so Celia (our PT) used the dog leash! I'm tellin' ya, these home therapists are creative and resourceful! 

Busy busy tending to our loved ones.....brushing bear's teeth. 

And we have been busy lately building lots of cool towers!  

We're never too busy to have an Oreo!  (this was qsp's first one ever and he LOVED IT!)

Quinn was too busy riding his alligator to even look at the camera.  Notice the little one beside him?  Right after I took this picture, he moved and tried to sit on top of the little one.  hee hee.  Silly boy.  

Herman and Marion

I have some new family members that I'm very proud to introduce you to!  They are both new to me thanks to my brother Clint and SIL Rachel.  

This is Herman the squirrel!  Growing up we had a pet squirrel for about 10 years.  It was lots of fun, and one of those things that I didn't realize was weird until I left home and married someone who makes fun of me for all the crazy animals we had in our home growing up.  This little squirrel literally came to Clint and my Dad one day when they were out at the land hunting (not squirrel hunting).  He probably fell out of his nest and was in need of some HELP. AND he was at the perfect age for raising.  They fed him 'round the clock for a while and that is what we were doing here the first time I met the little guy.  His name is Herman because that is what Roselyn and Nolan keep calling him.  I'm not sure if its official, but thats what he's called most of the time.  

Herman was cute and all, but he's not the best, coolest, or cutest addition to our family!....(or the only thing Clint and Rachel are feeding every couple of hours around the clock)

Meet MARION JAYNE SPENCER!!!!!

Man oh man I have another niece!!!!  And my awesome sister in law knows my obsession with childbirth and how fascinating it is to me. It really was heartbreaking to me that my experience was so critical and emergency, and therefore changed the way I'll be able to deliver from now on.  SOOOO since I'll never have any more children without a C-Section, Rachel invited me in to the delivery room!!!!  I was BEYOND excited!  She decided to labor all night long and then have the baby at about 6:30 am so we were sleepless and food-less but it was ALL WORTH IT!! It was INCREDIBLE and AMAZING and so MIRACULOUS!!!  I loved hearing that sweet cry and just being a part of the buzz of a delivery room.  I will NEVER forget it and I get teary just writing this.  Rachel was a total trooper and managed to make it look easy, like she does everything.  Funny thing is I didn't end up holding Marion until way later that day (after we went home and took a nap) so I actually ended up holding Herman the squirrel first.  Haha. We are thankful for another healthy baby to love!

Its time...

It's time to get new shoes for Kanyon.  Seriously, I'm embarrassed that I left him in these for so long.  These are the low tops he wears when he wears his AFO's (leg braces).  I think its safe to say he wore these out.  He now has a new pair and I decided to change things up a bit and steer away from our usual black and I went with gray for his low tops.  I like the new look.  

Its time....to get Quinn some shoes of his own.  I was planning on just giving him klp's hand me downs, but after putting these on Q for a few weeks, I started feeling a little bad that they were holey and falling apart.  So, I got qsp his own shoes! Of course, I stuck with our tried and true black high top chucks. I just think its so cute on little boys. So classic little boy. 

Its time to see Quinn in the Montana hoodie! Yeah! Some hand me downs are spared from the torture of klp's scooting.  

It's time for HOT WEATHER TO END!  Not just because I'm tired of sweating, but because klp is running out of shorts!!!  He's scooting through them all.  I took a picture of these because they were favorites, but I've thrown away at least 3 other pairs.  SHEESH.  Its time to start scooting through some pants! :)  

Its also time to update the blog! So I'll be posting a lot the next few days.  :)

ps. i realize i'm an overly sentimental person when I take pictures of worn out clothes but I just can't help it.  I try to throw away most things, but sometimes my heart can't bear to let go of things they've worn so much.  I like to think I'm a healthy mix of hoarder and minimalist.....leaning more towards hoarder....way more towards hoarder.  :)

Halloween

Don't miss the post below...there's a pretty sweet little voice on it :) 

Ok, so here is this year's Phillips Phamily Halloween: 

A Cowboy (and his trusty steed) and an Indian!!!

I wanted to get a pic of Cowboy Kanyon off of his horse so that we could see his whole get-up, chaps and all......we had no idea there was an Indian creeping up behind us!!!

Q with his bow doing his best war cry

....and still doing the war cry! 

klp leaving our first trick or treat house.  We dropped by a friend from church's house that lives in our neighborhood then we went on to visit a couple of houses.  

We made our first stop at Gary and Sharon's house. We love them so much and wanted the boys to get to show off their costumes.  Q was a little "overwhelmed" when they answered the door and were so excited to see them!! haha.  We had to explain Indians don't cry, they are BRAVE!  haha!

We LOVE the Sanders! 

Gary playing on the stairs with the boys

and having some Indian fun with Q

These 2 are two peas in a pod! Kanyon gets so excited around him! 

Then we stopped at my aunt and uncle's house....Q was reverting to his squat and "cheese" pose.  

Yeah for Great Uncle Steve and Aunt Mary Lynn!!   (and the blind Indian and the horse with the broken neck)

and finished the night with 50 cent corny dogs from Sonic at their house.  

It was a fun night for these little boys....and their parents too!

About the costumes:
Cowboy and Indian was one of my ideas when I found out I was having twins (boy cowboy girl Indian).  Not sure what got us thinking that again, but we just decided that might be a fun classic and not too hard to make.  THEN I thought of the horse thing and that sealed the deal. I can't take total credit for that because last year, my friend Jodi dressed her daughter (who was using a walker at the time....NOT ANY MORE) as Bullseye and her other daughter was Jessi.  It was so cute.  So.....I figured I could come up with some way to make the walker into a horse.  All I did was drape fabric over the walker and duck tape it where you couldn't see it.  The neck and head is out of padded poster board that I just happened to have in the garage. I drew and cut out the head and then covered it with the same fabric as the body.  I ended up running out of fabric so I didn't get to cover the inside of the neck which I hated because the masking tape I used on that part was totally visible.  The mane is felt and the tail is yarn.  All rigged somehow on to the walker.  The hooves are felt wrapped around the legs of the walker.  The cowboy already had just about everything. We did buy the cowboy hat which probably otherwise would've been a Christmas presents, but we HAD to have it. We knew he would love it since he's so in to hats right now.   I also bought the belt, but we've been looking for one for a while anyways.  I made the chaps out of that plasticy fabric that is soft on the back. I just cut the shape out and cut the fringe, then added a little star  "coin" thing on the side.  I cut slits in the stop so they would just loop through his belt. I planned on putting straps on the back and ended up not doing it. I should've because they flapped around when he scooted. It wouldn't been way better to have them secured down to his legs.

The Indian wore $3 sweat pants and a $3 tshirt. They didn't have his size so I got one in klp's size so at least SOMEONE could wear it again.  I bought some fringe at Hobby Lobby and safety pinned it on the clothes. I didn't want to sew them because I wanted to be able to use the clothes.  I know....cheap.  The headdress was a bargain deal at our western store and we would've NEVER guessed that he would wear it but he wore it all night. I was going to be happy with just long enough for a picture.  I just painted the little lines on his face as the finishing touch. I REALLY wanted it to be warm enough for him to go without a shirt so I could paint his belly, but that was not the case.  My dad made him the bow and we had a cool little quiver that the Kerbys let us borrow, but he was scared of it.  Yes, scared of it.  I wasn't going to push it since he was happy with the headdress.  I didn't want to loose it all!

This was by far the best Halloween.  Both old enough to have fun and enjoy the excitement.  We didn't do a lot of door to door trick or treating since its quite the ordeal to do the whole carseat, walker, in and out thing so we just made a few stops to visit people. It was perfect and fun!