My gift to you: a Christmas photo montage

The only bad part about Christmas this year was that it ended. I hope everyone else can say they same.

Happy New Year!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Merry Christmas to all of you. May you have a wonderful holiday filled with family, fun, friends, food, and the peace and joy that come with knowing the true meaning of CHRISTmas.

Elf Yourself Disco Style

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Who need Tae Bo?

I sure don't. I shovel snow to get those sculpted arms and rippling abs. Then, because the driveway and front steps haven't shoved me into an anaerobic, muscle ripping fervor yet, I shovel huge paths in the backyard for the kids. I'm one tough mother.


Dane hasn't gotten to experience the snow in its natural habitat. Four feet drifts don't make for nice crawling spaces. This is him checking out some snow in a cup.
MMMM, I bet this tastes delicious!
Here Mommy, do you want some too?
WHEE! I love the snow! Catch!
I'm the queen of the world! (Mind you, this is about a seven foot fence that she's resting on.)
The kids told me they were mountain goats, climbing to the top of their snow hill.

I know, everyone knows we have snow...

...but still, it's blog worthy, even if it's just for my own posterity.

This was Wednesday morning, after it just started snowing.
Aubrey and Nathan on Thursday morning, in the path that Greg shoveled out for them.
This was Dane's reaction to seeing the snow start falling. See all that grass? The following pictures were taken 24 hours later.
Nathan, with some rocking hat head.
This was only the first 19 inches. Only 6 more inches to go!
Our back porch and patio
The size of the pile on the side of our driveway. The broom was the only reference I could think of. It's about 4 1/2 feet tall. (That was Thursday night. As of today, Sunday night, that pile has grown and blown and drifted anywhere from a couple feet to six feet high.)



The snowfall in Spokane blew away the previous record for snow in a 24 hour period by over six inches. More snow is expected tonight, Wednesday, Friday, for the rest of winter. You get the idea.

For those of you who grew up around snow you will understand my next sentence. The snow we have is that fine, non packing snow, that BLOWS and DRIFTS. It doesn't make good snowmen. It isn't very wet, but that also means it's not nearly so heavy to shovel. We have areas of our yard where we can see the grass and other places where the snow has drifted to over six feet high. It's like white sand dunes.

I have blessed my parents everyday for last year's birthday present: a pair of industrial strength, Columbia, SNOWBOOTS. These bad boys keep my feet toasty warm, don't slip on anything, and look lovely with a mini skirt. What can I say, winter in Spokane is no time to make a fashion statement. Nothing says pretty like the broken nose you get from slipping on the ice.

I hope you enjoyed the pictures. The kids have a love/hate relationship with the snow. It's great fun to play in but we are all feeling house bound. Aubrey has said multiple times, "Mom, it's a long time until summer, isn't it?" The dinner time conversation tonight revolved around how much fun going to the beach and going camping next summer will be. All in good time, my little pretties. All in good time.

10 years, simmered to perfection

This Thursday, December 18, marks the 10 year anniversary of Greg's and my first date. Greg stole my heart that day by baking cookies, watching Christmas movies, and trying nothing more than a tentative hand on my knee.

After that, we moved fast. You know, in a chaste emotional way. Sheesh. This is a family blog. We first talked about getting married the following February, got engaged in September, and were married the following August 5, 2000. I was only 20 when I got married but it didn't seem imprudent to me then and it still doesn't today. I'm not a girl to over think a decision and when I met him I just KNEW he couldn't live without me. Or me without him for that matter. :-)

Here's my question to you. What was the time line with you and your spouse? Were you the slow simmering type, taking years to make sure, or did you dive in head first, with a prayer and a kiss? How old were you when you got married?

I'd love to hear the responses. All you no comment blog lurkers, this means you!

Another harmonious Sunday morning

For any of you other church going families out there, I hope you hear what I'm saying. I never intend for Sunday mornings to be a cry/whine/rushing fest but somehow that's what they turn into. I admit, I'm usually the one who slides into the grumpies first. I think every week that we are going to do better but somehow getting everyone out the door by 8:00 a.m. just doesn't bring out the best in any of us (okay, mostly me).

"PLEASE finish eating so we can get dressed! Nathan, take a bite right now!" (Christian attribute: showing patience and grace.)

"Aubrey, you have to wear tights today, it is 0 degrees outside. It is not up for debate." (That my friend is true. Both parts. That is is that cold outside and that I'm not debating the necessity of proper clothing during a Northwest winter. Christian attribute: raising children up in the way they should go. )

"Greg, are you out of the shower?!?! I still have to get ready!" (Christian attribute: showing love and respect for one's spouse.)

As we are walking out the door: "Do you smell something?" Yep. I smell our Dane, who didn't have the good graces to save that mess for the church childcare workers. (Christian attribute: putting others ahead of one's self.)

Unfortunately , today was no exceptions . We got up late, scurried around like intoxicated crabs, couldn't get the sliding doors on our van open because of the extreme cold, shoved kids through the middle front door console to get in, drove straight past our exit (the one we take every week you know), and were on our way to being fifteen minutes late. I hate being late for anything. When we got to church there was a poor soul standing in full body coveralls at the drive entrance who cheerfully told us that church had been canceled because the church had no heat and no power. The man had ice on his beard and was still smiling.

For some reason, that cheered me up. Not that we couldn't go to church, but that we would not be thwarted in our efforts to have a Sunday service, which we would conduct at home. We then decided that we were not leaving the house today and have nestled in for a day at home. The days' activities are shown below, along with a token picture of the kids with Mr. Crusty Santa.


Happy Sunday to you!Nathan looks like he he'd rather be sitting on a cactus.
This was a gingerbread house kit that Grandma Marian brought over for the kids yesterday. It was excellent. Gingerbread already made, frosting the perfect stiffness, a base with grooves to hold everything in place, and plenty of candy to decorate with and sneak into one's mouth. The kids had a great time. Thank you Grandma!
Aubrey is so fun to do projects with now. She loves crafts and was so careful and precise with this one. She decorated the tree all by herself, icing and all.
Nathan did some decorating but mostly snuck, or didn't sneak, pieces of candy.
The finished product. I think it turned out great.
Dane's contribution to the project was to be irate that he couldn't contribute (I mean IRATE) and then to be mollified with eating a broken gingerbread tree.

p.s. Dane took three steps yesterday and is taking little steps all day long now. He is so close to being a man on the run. Time for another baby! (HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!)

p.p.s. GU vs. Arizona at 3 p.m. Go Zags!

Inquiring Minds Want to Know

We took the kids to visit Santa in the mall. Undoubtedly, this is a thankless job for which you probably get paid little and endure every type of crabby, pants wetting, greedy kid around. I'm sure you don't have to actually love children to fake it for a few weeks each year.

STILL, our Santa looked like he was employed through a work release program. Pick up trash in orange jumpsuit at noon, let little kids sit on lap at 5. He wasn't plump or jolly and the kids sat in stiff silence on his lap. He didn't even muster up a "HO HO HO" or a "Your parents sure look like outstanding people."

I feel bad sounding so judgmental. I'm sure he's a good man who is working for a living just like anyone else. It's too bad that he has to represent someone so famous. It would have been like people lining up to see Angelina Jolie and getting me. Not bad, just mighty disappointing.

So, here's the question. If you took your kids to see Santa, who did he remind you of?

p.s. Mom, I tried to post pictures but blogger keeps giving me an error.

My addition to Saturday night

You blog spies (don't feel ashamed, I do it too) out there may already know that we got a unexpected chance to hang out with THE BAERLOCHERS on Saturday night. Angela posted about it and eluded to the fun and the mayhem. I wanted to add my two bits.

It really was a blast. Swimming and dinner and Cherry Pepsi and conversation equaled fun that only two families with three little children each can appreciate. You know things are good when one little boy teaches another little boy to lap water out of the hot tub because it's "hot cocoa". Nothing says good times like hot chlorinated water.

The part I liked best was that we all had fun. This is best because very few other people would have even appreciated the time, let alone enjoyed it. There was rarely two minutes of uninterrupted conversation, no lazy strolls through downtown, and certainly no slow chewing and digesting of dinner. What we did have though was shouted laughter over the sound of our kids' laughter, talking through a bathroom stall while kids were peeing, enjoying our dinner in a hotel lobby, kids that play together so well, and knowing that no one else was frustrated or irritated by the situation. It was what it was and it was good. Thank you Angela, Justin, Adam, Tyler, and Gracie for your awesomeness.

Death by Daddy

Aubrey and Nathan slept on an air mattress in our room last night. (The mercifully short version of why is because Dane shares a room with them and sleeps like a...not sleeper.)

The game of the day was for the kids to run on the air mattress at Greg as fast as they could and he would launch them over his head into the air.

On a side note, but still up for consideration is this. Greg/Daddy=Rocking Jolly Awesome Time

Sara/Mommy=Maker of food, kill joy (I prefer preserver of life), and somewhat lovable servant.

Note: No children were severely injured in the making of this post.