My favorite time of year

Lombardi Ranch is the place to go just in case you guys didn't know

I was too tired to carve pumpkins this year so I had the kids color them instead they still thought it was fun.

Halloween adventures

This year my sweet hearts had their very own ideas of who they wanted to be for Halloween. Holden always changes his mind several times before the big day so we always wait until the last min to actual set it in writing but little miss Ashlynn knew the minute I asked and never changed her mind she could be no one else but Snow White. Holden's mind changed from a ninja turtle to karate Elvis to a vampire and finally to an 80's punk rock vampire as in the movie the lost boys their current favorite movie thanks to Dad.

Billy went to a concert that night that he just couldn't miss so I enlisted Sarah the great to help us trick or treat and to keep us safe she knows tae kwon do and is a kick boxer and punched a guy in the face while in the MTC (jokingly of course but everyone heard it and turned around to stare in shock and he never joked with her again about punching him in the face) Nobody messes with Sarah

No one in my house is shy of strangers when candy is involved


After about half hour of this neighborhood Ashlynn batted her eyes and made Sarah carry her, but the almighty Sarah picked her up and kept on trekking only to turn around to tell me I'm a slow poke good thing she came cause I wasn't going to carry her

The kids had a blast and so did Sarah and I and then we had fun checking the candy after the kids went to bed.

Holden's first day of 2nd grade

My Birthday Present

Yes I know it was in August.

Holden's birthday is three days before mine but it just so happened we celebrated his birthday on mine which is fine by me I really don't like making a big deal just a nice dinner with my hubby is all I need but this year Billy gave me a beautiful surprise before Holden's party. Oh he knows me so well, I need new hobbies to keep me sane and he is all the happier supporting my silliness. This year I decided to try my hand at carpentry and it turns out I'm actually pretty good so he decided to add some more pieces to my collection, it even has a laser level. I already have a skill saw but this one makes me so happy, the first thing I built was a couple of chairs for the kids table which they enjoy every day.

Next I need to get my hands on a jig saw and a nail gun and oh the possibilities. I suppose I'll need to be building a couple more chairs to match

I don't have time for this

I'd rather be taking a nap since this is the last while I'll be able to, it won't be long before Ashlynn gives up on her nap time. If stupid blogspot didn't take so long to upload pictures I would be up to date on my blog but alas I don't have time so all my updates are late.


There I'm done complaining now, stay tuned for fun adventures

Family portraits

I don't know how long it's been since we've had family portraits that I actually like. I mean the studio kinds are nice but just not my style so thankfully Greg lent us his time and took some really good pictures, ones that I can be proud to hang on my wall and it's about time too we have lived in our new house for 7 months now and still don't have any pictures on the wall just empty frames that everyone always asks if they are empty on purpose as decoration, no I just haven't found the pictures of display in them. Thats what I get for being too picky.

beautiful

How dare I make them wear nice clothes and pose for pictures .

My brother Greg was nice enough to take some family photos of us and these are just the funny ones he got some really nice shots too.

I feel old now

2555 days ago I reluctantly faked being in labor and to my surprise it actually resulted in a baby being born. Lucky for me I was only in labor for 8 hours, pushed for half an hour and out came a perfect little person/creature with red peach fuzz weighing 8 lbs 6oz who was now my responsibility, his name, William Holden Dassler!

Over the passed 7 years my darling son has been nothing what I had expected I foolishly assumed he would be mellow and calm and always stay right by my side afraid to leave the security of my leg, I thought he would be shy and need my encouragement to go play with the other kids and have fun, but oh how I was so very very wrong. He is exactly opposite of everything I imagined. He is confident and outgoing, he makes friends very easily and never sits still, he has more energy than I thought was humanly possible, and quite the little ladies man apparently, he's already had two sweet young ladies plan their future nuptials. I love his personality and I wish I can say he gets all these great qualities from me but alas it's his Father with the personality and confidence in life that has giving him such a good example and inspired me to help him become such an awesome little man. Here's to you El Guapo even though you make me feel old.

Dear Holden, you make me smile and laugh everyday, you wear your shirts backwards or inside out or both on purpose just because you want to, when I say thanks for behaving so well today you tell me it's because your starting to act like a man now, you want to be just like your dad and think he is so cool. You like to wear deodorant even though you don't need it, you love your vegetables and get excited when the bread they pass in sacrament is wheat bread, you ask for green smoothies with lots of spinach, you love your family especially your Oma you can talk her into almost anything, I don't know why but you want to go to China and ask me several times a week when I think we'll be able to go there. You never clean your room, you take your sweet time to do things which is pretty annoying when we're all waiting to leave and you still don't have your shoes on or have brushed your teeth. You tell me that snakes are God's creatures too so I have to like them, you hold them up to my face even though you know I'm scared, you shout where to go and what to do when I'm trying to play super mario bros. You can always talk your Dad into getting you Slurpee's you usually start by saying oh dad it's such a hot day don't you think, maybe we should get something to cool us off, Slurpee's would cool us off how bout we head to 7-11 real quick. I love you very much and I hope you never change. Love Mom.

thanks for the info

As if I wasn't self concious enough about the weight I've put on my son informed me yesterday that I was probably going to have another baby and when I said I"m not pregnant why do you say that he responded because you're getting fat and last time you were fat you were having a baby. And only because I love my son and know he wouldn't have said that if he had know it was hurtfull I didn't cry.

Maybe my brothers are the ones with bad karma

It's awful, every time a member of my family comes to stay with us our plumbing decides it's not going to be help full to our bathroom and laundry needs. The very first weekend we lived in our new home (new to us no where near new) and my brother and his wife and kids come to visit, our main sewer line choose to let an enormous amount of tree roots infiltrate it and clog it completely causing it to back up into my bathtub and shower fun to clean up right, because it was a weekend we couldn't get anyone out for two days which means going back to our other house, which was thankfully still our house, to shower and take care of business all other bathroom needs and for those little ones that couldn't hold it long enough to drive across town had to be taken care of at the gas station up the street or walmart, fun weekend right. The second plumber was finally able to clear the sewer pipe of the roots and said it needed to be replaced as soon as possible before the roots overgrew it again. Of course I assume my darling husband is going to take care of this problem and oversee that it gets fixed, stupid me that's what get for assuming you think I would have learned over the past 9 years that when I want something taken care of it's best to just do it myself and save the frustrations and possible anger. FYI it only takes about six months for roots to takeover an eight inch sewer pipe and I'm talking six feet of roots down the pipe. So this is the pleasant surprise we got when we got home from camping with my brother Zach in tow who is on vacation from being an embassy guard in Peru, the man deserves descent plumbing! At least it was a week day and we were able to get the plumber out right away so we could at least resume bathroom and all water supplying functions within a few hours but now we need to get the pipe replaced ASAP and at a price of an estimated $1800 who would pass that up. And since it usually makes me feel better to blame things I can't control on other people I'm just going to assume it's my brothers that bring bad Karma with them.

Just a funny picture

she weighs 30 lbs and thinks it's fun the "help" I don't know how much longer I can keep carrying her in slings but they still work so well when she is sleepy or not feeling so well or I just can't have her running around and need both hands like mowing the lawn or buying lumber at the hardware store and yes the guys at Home Depot think I'm all sorts of fun. FYI Billy has terrible allergies therefore I mow the lawn since he bought me a car and had to cut back on gardening expenses, so I guess I really don't mind because while I'm putting away the lawn mower I get to look at my beautiful durango that I love so much.

so sad

My poor Princess Buttercup died yesterday. I guess it was from the heat stupid global warming. The hardest part was hearing Holden start to cry when Billy came home to tell him, I didn't have the heart to tell him myself. I think it was a good lesson on the facts of life for him that all living things must die at some point and it wasn't anyone's fault it was just an accident. I don't think it took very long for him to get over it though, and by that I mean it didn't take very long for him to start talking me into letting him have a pet snake his reasoning was that they don't die for a really long time and it would stay in his room and snakes are God's creatures too so I can't hate them. I don't know what I'm going to do when he's a teenager, his reasoning skills are just way too advanced for what I am prepared for. I haven't desided if we will get another bunny or not we still have another one that was givin to us but I liked Buttercup way better she never bit me. So long buttercup sorry we accidently killed you .

don't tell mom I'm drinking coke

My cousin's daughter kacie is in town for the week and wanted to take all the kids in the family bowling it was fun they got to drink sodas and eat pizza and licorice. We would set the ball in front of the lane for Ashlynn to roll down but she thought kicking it would be more fun it didn't get very far they had to go down the lane and rescue the stranding ball. Holden did a pretty good job he even got quite a few spares. Ashlynn didn't last very long she was over it after 2 frames so Holden got to bowl for her so she got a pretty good score too. In the last frame she finally let Kacie help her and right after they rolled the bowl she laid down on her stomach with her head in her arms up on elbows kicking her feet back and forth watching the ball it was the cutest sight but of course I didn't have the camera out. Holden was so excited to get to drink soda just like all the other kids and somehow talked me into letting him get candy from the vending machines I told myself it was ok since it was a party and it's ok to do that every once in a while.

No more fluffy bums

After 20 months of washing diapers every other night I am so excited that I wont be washing anymore for a very long time. Making the choice to use cloth diapers was easy for me and I never minding washing them because I knew the benefits far outweighed the inconvenience, but boy am I excited to not be doing it anymore. We said goodbye to diapers and packed them in a box to send to another baby who needs them because my little girl is now a big girl and wears panties all day and all night and as of last week goes all by herself without even telling me. Last week I did catch her faking that she went potty to get a gummy bear, so funny. The best part is when she puts her underwear on backwards and pulls them up real high so both her cheeks are hanging out and wants to leave them that way, I should take a picture but I feel that it might be considered cruel when she's older. Of course I won't miss all the times she peed on my couch or the floor while learning or toilet paper unrolled just for fun or cringing every time I gave her a piece of candy really not wanting to but that was what worked for her so I did it, a little bit sad she is growing too fast but most of all love watching her becoming this little person and see all the fun things her life brings into ours. so here she is unfluffdified
p.s. you are very welcome my darling husband that you don't get to enjoy all the funness that comes with potty learning. Although you did get waken up in the middle of the night by being peed on I'm sure you'll never forget it.

If I had only know

If I had only know sooner that all I had to do to get something is to write it in my blog my life would be so much easier.

To my surprise and maybe a few pouty looks and a couple of hugs my sweet amazing thought full all around awesome hubby bought me the blendtec blender. It is amazing and everything I thought it would be and so much more, I made Delicious fresh organic fruit smoothies for breakfast and everybody loved them and had their two servings of fresh fruit in before they were even dressed. oh I'm so excited!!!!!!!



So since all I have to do is write it down to get what I want here is my short list universe



-an extra $125 every month so that I can sign Holden up for Tae Kwon Do

-a miter saw

-the ability to tan

-a nice comfy swing in the back yard

-a swamp cooler

-a second ice maker (to keep up with our new smoothie habit)

-real bedroom furniture

the list could go on on but I don't want to push my luck so I'll just start with these 7

you will be mine oh yes you will be mine (someday)

Seriously this is the most amazing blender in the world it can grind wheat, it can juice without extracting all the nutritious parts of the fruits and vegetables it can make soup and frozen lemonade drinks or virgin margaritas or the real kind. it is everything I need in my kitchen and my life right now but the problem is that is costs $500 but there's hope Costco is selling them right now for $375 with an extra 4 year warranty on top of the company's 3 year how can I pass this up oh wait that's right my blendtec blender budget/savings jar doesn't exist.

only half enjoyable

My brother Doug lives in Arizona and my brother Zach is in another country being a marine or at least that's his story, so when zach took leave to hang out with Doug and his family we crashed the party. We were all having a great time and even got the spend the day on the lake in a real boat something I've never done before, and why you might ask have I never done this before partly because it's way too expensive and mostly because I am terrified of large bodies of water. I know right how can I grow up in southern California and not love the ocean, well I love the ocean just not being in it or lakes or rivers or basically anything that I can drowned in. However I am very easily pressured so I went on the boat and tried to put on a happy face just so my kids and their cousins wouldn't thing I'm lame. My niece and nephew had a blast on the tube, they loved it they were the first ones to go out and they went the most times so I figured if a 7 and a 5 year old weren't scared how can I be so I did it for exactly 2 and a half minuets before I gave the thumbs down, but the important thing to remember here is that I did it.

look how much fun they are having I guess I better at least try it
nope they were wrong not fun at all

this is me almost in tears because I realized that my fate was in the hands of the three men controlling the boat and tube that were staring at me laughing and that one of these men was my husband who probably would have left me out there longer claiming I was having fun and just didn't know it at the time, another who tortured me growing up having fun just making me among other siblings cry and one who still hasn't gotten back at me for putting makeup on him when we were kids, I was terrified!
Luckily they pulled me back in and didn't make fun of me too much.

I still had fun though, watching everyone else have fun.

I feel so grown up now

I have a sexy husband

we have a couple of cute kids

I have the family sized suv for the above mentioned kids and husband to fit in

I have a dishwasher


and now I have officialy been on a boat for water sport activities

see I'm all grown up..

Everything I ever imagined my grown up life to be is finally in my grasp and boy have I been waiting for it. It was probably silly of me to have such expectations right when we got married but I foolishly did and most of the time felt disappointed, finally I realized those were goals that would come in time and it would be just way too unfair for the rest of the world if I had everything I wanted right now. Finally these things that I thought would make me feel like a grown up come, and then while we were having a little vacation with my brother and his family in Arizona while I was sitting on a boat watching everyone else have fun (I'll tell you why I was watching instead of enjoying later) it hit me " I'm sitting on a boat with my own little family just like real adults and holy crap I'm all grown up now I am an Adult"

I like to hug trees

One of the main things I've been working on for the past few years is living a more natural and healthy life style or as Billy likes to call me a tree hugger.

There are lots of things we do as a family do be more environmentally friendly and over all healthier but the one new thing we get to take advantage of now is beautiful fresh local organic produce thanks to abundant harvest organics we get a nice box of goodies delivered right up the street from us (we literally walk up the street to the delivery location) this is the first box we got and I'm so excited, this week we got peaches, nectarines, plums, tomatoes, lettuce, fava beans, turnips, onions, potatoes, chamomile, kale, summer squash, carrots, and another type of lettuce. They even have add-ons you can order too I can't wait to try their wheat, oatmeal and gorgeous beans.

now I just need to figure out what you do with fava bean and turnips.

step 1. buy organic -check

step 2. make everything home made from scratch- half check

step 3. never eat fast food again- work in progress.

half a year down and almost all my goals

A review from my previous post from new years

http://dasslerfamily.blogspot.com/2010/01/2010-is-going-to-be-amazing-with.html

1. Germany was Amazing

2. Love our new home

3. not exactly a 4 runner but an even better new to me Durango which is indeed amazing in every way especially my seat heaters

4.oh how I love that it only takes 6 step to bring groceries in

5. a dishwasher, I can't explain in words how much my dishwasher has improved my life and still can't believe I hand washed for 8 long years

6. I still need to make a sign that says NO KIDS ALOUD and probably replace the door with one of those half door type things so they can see me they just can't come in or maybe a 3/4 door so they cant climb over it either. but oh how my family has enjoyed all the amazing things I can make now in half the time since I can leave them out and come back to it after little one's bed times

7. sadly my seeds blew away and we didn't have enough time from settling in to prepare the garden this year but next year for sure

8.learning how to make new things every week from scratch, so far the kids favorite is home made yogurt now I just need to perfect my granola techniques to pair them together and my next adventure will be home made bread from freshly ground organic wheat as soon as I can get my hands on a wheat grinder

9.Haven't made much improvement on the hot body department still working on that one probably will be well into next year too.

10.still working on Aslynn learning how to use the potty hopefully this summer will be the perfect time for her to decide how awesome it is

11.our conversations usually go something like "why did you just hit your brother?"

"because" while shrugging her shoulders and looking so sweet and Innocent

or "I don't want to" to pretty much anything I ask her to do

12.now that we have the piano I just need to learn how to play

13.I've given up on my children sitting still and quietly some kids do and some kids don't so far mine don't

14.love love love telling the kids to go play outback

15.fireplaces looks great still looking forward to actually using them it will be amazing to hang Christmas stocking by the actual fire this year

16.happily combing hair and tying bows

17.to my surprise Billy has been to church with us every single Sunday except one that he had to work, and actually enjoys it

18.Family time was great while we had but now that Billy is back in school we don't get to enjoy it very often (only two more years of single parenting)

19.still working on the homemaking goal although I have improved quit a bit on the housekeeping front my home is now clean the majority of the time

20. Now I'm all clean that I have a normal size bathtub

so the next 6months to do list is to work on having a hot body, learn to play the piano, do the dishes every day, preparing the garden for next spring, and helping Ashlynn find her love of wearing underwear and not peeing in them

Spring has brought us a very nice surprise

We have a hummingbird's nest

it picked a terrible spot for it's nest right in our front walkway

but we can see it so well with it being right in front of us

one of the eggs hatched today it is so amazing how small it is I've never seen a humming bird's nest or baby hummingbirds. I can't believe one of natures most beautiful things is right out our front door.

something I've always wanted

We finally got a piano something I've always wanted and am so excited to learn how to play and for the kids to learn they both have always loved pianos too always going straight for them when they see them (church can be sometimes dangerous). It's so beautiful, an antique and right in my very own family room. It obviously needs some love but it's the perfect addition to the space like this wall was made for this piano.

high heels and hand bags

She just loves them