Pumpkins, New Babies, and Wife Contests

Well, I've learned yet another lesson about myself.....I do not have a future career as a pumpkin carver.....I like to keep back-up careers in mind just in case teaching ever falls through :) Anyway, I attempted to carved "KU" into a pumpkin (yes, I did have a stencil), but I accidentally dismantled the "U".........what resulted was a giant hole! Layne, who came to carve with us was much better; her Jayhawk turned out awesome! I think I'm sticking to traditional triangles and straight edges from now on.

I am very excited to welcome a new member to the Hammerschmidt family! Ana Hill, our niece, gave birth to baby Jordan this morning. He came a few weeks early due to medical concerns, but seems to be doing well! I'll update on him and his mama as I know more. Also, we found out last week that we will be having another girl!! Kale went to the sonogram with us, and with the nurse announced the gender he got very quiet. Dain finally said, "What do you think?! Another baby sister!" Kale said very somberly, "I DO NOT want to talk about it." He's since decided that he's not so disappointed about another sister......I'm not pointing any fingers, but his quick change of heart may have more to do with a promise from Daddy that "when the baby is old enough that a dog can't eat it, we'll get a boy puppy to even up the numbers." Bribery much?! :)

And finally, a story too good not to share.....

Kale came into the kitchen while Layne and I were carving pumpkins and (completely out of the blue) announced that when he got a little older, he would be holding a contest to choose his wife. I said, "Ohhh, that's a good idea!" "How will you choose?" Kale answered, "Well, she should be younger than me. I need to be a little older. And she should be nice. And pretty." I told him that sounded good and asked if there was anything else, like should she be able to cook? He said, "No, I don't think so, but she should eat my chocolate chip cookies when I make them."

I just asked Kale how old he'll be when he holds this contest, and he said (very seriously) "Fifteen." So if you meet any nice, young, pretty, chocolate chip cookie eating girls sometime before then, let me know............

He Must Like Us.....

Almost every morning after Dain leaves for work, Kale climbs into bed with me to snuggle and sneak in a few extra minutes of sleep before Bailey begins chirping from her crib.

This morning while we were huddled under the covers, I started feeling the baby move and asked Kale if he wanted to feel the baby in my belly.

He was so excited when he put his hand on my stomach and felt a tiny punch against his hand. As we were climbing out of bed, he said, "I can't believe God is giving us another baby!" I said, "Yup, that's pretty amazing, huh?" Kale responded, "Ya, God must really like us."

Sibling Talk

The other day Kale was sitting at the table coloring with his little sister. They were talking back and forth (well, Kale was talking, Bailey was doing her 1-year-old foreign language chatter).

At one point, Kale turned to Bailey and said, "Bailey, can I please have the crayon? Brother needs to practice doing his homework so he can get smart for school. I have to get smart for school so that I can play basketball, 'cuz they don't let you play basketball if you don't do your homework. Our mom says so."

He then told her how he'd have to go through "mommy's school" (elementary school), "that other school" (middle school), and "Grandpa Ballard's school" (high school) before he could play for the Jayhawks :)

Bailey's response? An ornery laugh before throwing the crayon onto the floor.

Picking Pumpkins

This is the first year since Kale was born that we haven't gone to Shaake's pumpkin patch outside of Lawrence to pick pumpkins....nonetheless, we had fun at the produce stand near our apartment in Utah. They had it all decked out for the holiday with lots and lots of nice, big pumpkins to choose from!

Boots...Part Two

We couldn't resist buying Miss Bailey a pair of cowgirl boots so she could be like the rest of the family.......

And a little Halloween preview.......

And Kale lounging in some of our luxurious living room furniture. Have I told you how much I miss our home and the big comfy chair in our living room in Kansas? :)



Could you tell that was Bailey in the dragon costume, not Kale? Kale and Dain both thought it was a picture of Kale when they first saw it....but it's actually Bailey Boo :) It shouldn't come as a surprise that she likes Kale's dragon costume better than her own sheep costume. Hopefully I can wrestle her into her actual costume long enough to get a couple of pictures........

Is That On Earth?

That's the new question I hear about 20 times a day from my 4-year-old as he tries to sort out real and imaginary :) It gets really challenging when it's something like TV show with real life characters (i.e. The Imagination Movers or Fresh Beat Band) and he says, "Are they on Earth?" I say...."Yes...but the show is just pretend......" This generally leads to a 20 minute discussion about what makes it real and pretend! If you have a better explanation for the world, please call my son and share it with him.....he's wearing me out!!

Kale's other new thing is telling jokes. We bought a box of Popsicles that had jokes on the sticks a while back, and every time he eats one he wants to know what the joke says. I tell him (for instance, the last one he got said, "Why did the computer squeak?.....Somebody stepped on it's mouse.") and he gives me a confused smile as a chuckle to myself. Well, since he doesn't actually get any of the jokes, he thinks telling a joke is just asking a silly question and giving a silly answer (none of which make sense). Let me give you a few from his routine:

"Why did the frog wear a hat?"......"Because he saw a dinosaur!"

"Why did the cattail cross the road?"......."Because it ran into the blinds!"

"Why do dinosaurs walk on plants?....."Because they walked on dinosaurs!"

See what I mean? They make no sense at all! Consider yourself forewarned so that next time he tells you a joke you can laugh hysterically......even if it doesn't make sense :)

Cold Weather is Coming....

This past weekend, temperatures in Ogden ranged between the upper 70's and 80's. Today (Tuesday) I think the predicted high is 85! And then there's tomorrow.....the weather forecasters are predicting a high of 50 on Wednesday. That "high" will come at 3:00 in the morning!! We will likely see snow on the mountain, and maybe a little around here. Yikes! Good news is, we should only have a couple cold days before nicer weather returns. Knowing that our warm days are limited, this weekend we took the kids back up to Pine View Lake so we could check out the trees that are changing to gorgeous red and orange, and enjoy a picnic on the beach. The next day we headed to Antelope Island on the Great Salt Lake. It was quite pretty too, in it's own dry, salty kind of way :)

(Here's my unofficial 17 week pregnancy photo :).....I'm getting a little bump but it's hard to see at this angle!)

Antelope Island on the Great Salt Lake

We also saw antelope and bison. Kale was soooo excited!