Birthdaypalooza comes to a close

For those of you who know us, October 25 brings a close to the birthday MONTH. It has been whirlwind of fun, excitement, weddings, funerals, babies and new experiences. As is our custom we went out with a band. Addi celebrated her fourth birthday at preschool, at home and at her stud cousin's football game. GO MCM! Here is a visual story for those of you who love photos, myself included.

 Addison at preschool on the morning of her fourth birthday

 Opening lots of pink presents at home

Marathon cupcake sprinkling before the football game

 Opening more presents at the football game, it was chilly

 Playing with uncle Kelly, feeding him popcorn

 Watching the game in quilted style, did I mention how cold it was?

 Last night we broke out the carving kits and went to town on the giant pumpkins.

Addi shows off the pumpkin she chose from the visit to Paul's patch.

 Please ignore my messy garage.Yikes.

 OOOOOHHHHH. AHHHHHHH. So pretty.

Happy week before Reformation! Goodbye birthday month, schwew!

Family Time

squeezing out some family time these past few weeks...

 Madison Crazy Days

 District Tournament mustache fun

 a quick visit to the ZOO

 watching daddy at the state tourney

 waiting patiently for 50 cent foul balls

 sitting with Grandpa and Grandma at the ballgame

 visiting the Brookings childrens museum

trying to catch water in her mouth...

Nora Kneivel

yes, she does ride that way, thank you santa

Bonus: includes close up footage of hacked hair cut done by wicked sister

Recovering

Today the kids slept in till after nine. That is so rare. It almost scared me, no it did. It scared me. But considering the chaotic crazy Christmas 48 hours we have just experienced I should have just expected the sleeping in.
On Christmas eve we attended church. Usually the pews are so packed there are few seats left AND Maleah had to play a few songs for the prelude so we got there early. Which is sort of a miracle in itself. The service was wonderful and it ended with the traditional candle light Silent Night. Really sets the tone.
After church we all go to my mom's. We eat. We gab. We eat some more. We gave up giving presents years ago but this year mom decided to try something different with the kids.
My sister and I think alike:) Look at those handsome cousins.

Mom gathered the kids up and told them that they were going to draw numbers and then draw a name and choose a gift to give to a cousin. A lesson in giving and in receiving. It was wonderful to see them look at the gifts to choose the perfect one for the name they chose.

I think my brother in law had the most fun of the night, though:) Mom got the kids a few stocking stuffers, too. Somehow she always ignores the no gift rules:)

After the gifts were received we laughed, hugged and cried a little. Then we all went home to our respectable homes for the night.

We got up early to stuff the stockings and the kids were already awake. It was 6 am.

Tell me why I bought markers for her. WHY!?!?!?!

A homemade gift from Maleah.

We made it to Grandma and Grandpa Gordon's by dinner time. After dinner we cleaned up and opened gifts. Ryan's mom gets everyone a gift. I am not sure how she does it. Nine children and their families and significant others. Come to think of it I am not sure how she feed us all, either. She is pretty amazing. A living Saint, I do so believe.

Gavin playing the dice game
Uncle Brian giving nerf shooting lessons.

Maleah made a haul of birthday and Christmas gifts.

Addison got spoiled...again.

This year I got a special gift. I was so surprised, and elated! An e-reader, WOHOO!
Then we played our sort of new tradition of the dice game. Once for the kiddos and once each for adult males and adult females. This is probably the highlight of the day. This year I lost one of my die in a coffee cup and the whole table was screaming at me to roll. I also noticed Ryan's dad (when he had the gift he wanted and there was less than 10 seconds left) shake those dice ever so slowly only to roll doubles at the very last second! This year we had a tie at the end and there was a roll off for the winner of lottery tickets!
Kids getting the instructions from Auntie Kim about the dice game. More living Saints. Auntie Kim and Lisa provided all the gifts for the game! WOW!

We spent the night and got home late yesterday afternoon. It was fun, but exhausting. The kids were plenty worn out from all the partying.

Another Christmas come and gone. Another new year about to turn.

I hope your families are healthy and happy and exhausted from partying during this wonderful time of year.

Snow Day

I tried this new recipe for my cookie exchange it was a long and tedious process for dainty cookies. I don't know if I would do it again. The checkerboards gave me heck and I ended up making striped cookies and then marbles with the rest of the dough.

Marble cookies:)
Salted nut chews. Ryan's favorite.
8:30 am. The kids were out sledding in a blizzard.

They lasted 15 minutes.

sIgH...the weekend

has arrived and dad is working which gives the house some time to settle. It has been a crazy week here.

I just cut Gavin's hair and it didn't go well. I grabbed the three to do the back and accidentally started with the top. Sheesh.

Last night I bit into a piece of crusty bread and busted my tooth in half.

I have bananas on the counter waiting to be in bread with some dark cocoa chips. Plans to make runza's are in the works but are exhausting me just thinking about it.

My brother sent me two lei's from Hawaii and they. smell. so. lovely. I want to go to Hawaii. right. now. please. someone. buy. me. a. ticket. pretty please?

I spent the bday in the big city renewing my drivers lc. (that is AN experience I tell ya), eating lunch with a super great friend, thrifting and hunting for bargains until I couldn't walk another step, coming home to some fun mail and a nice supper with my hubby which may have included two margaritas and some cake...

The kitchen remodel is coming along nicely. Dusty and dirty, but wonderful none-the-less. Down came the wall, down came the beam, up went the new beam (I think we almost maimed a b-i-l with that one) and now the sheetrock is back over the beam just waiting for finishing. Hopefully we can get new flooring and perhaps some cabinets before Nora graduates from high school.

more Lake Herman

Nora pretends to fish with a stick, Maleah got tired of sharing her pole and convinced niave Nora that the stick with a bit of weed on the end was a pole and a worm. Nora fell for it; hook, line, and stinker :)

walking the shoreline, why have we never been here before, absolutely gorgeous...

a live one...

sneaking sips of daddy's coca cola...what a lover...of all things sugary and sweet

it took him all morning to touch one

Can you see the tooth she lost on Thursday? It took the tooth fairy two days to get here. Darn rain is hard to fly in... btw she was touching slimy things all morning...even putting worms on the hook...

No pants Nora AKA naughty nora, niave nora, nora boo boo, little lou...

squirting each other with the fountain