MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!!

This is the first year that we have spent Christmas with Joe's mom since we've been married, and the first year i have ever spent Christmas away from my family.  We are down here in Fort Worth, TX in the sun (kind of) and it's a white christmas back in WA....  very strange to not have it at least be cold on Christmas day.  The kids had a great day today and loved all their gifts.  Molly was the first one awake at 4am! I was not very pleased about this and fortunately about 6 she went back to bed, but Caroline was up at 7.  Thank goodness for coffee!!!!!!

I had a hard time trying to pic out a "good" pic of all of us, but this one will just have to do  :)  This was us after church...

Molly trying to get into her first christmas present

Joe and his babes... 

Nicholas got the coolest remote control Ford Truck for christmas.  It's 1/6 scale and it makes noises and lights up, even has spinners.  The kids and Joe took it across the street to the parking lot of a school and had a ton of fun playing with it. It's pretty darn neat! 

    

Molly and her new best friend.  She absolutely LOVES this dog and just can't get enough of her.  Unfortunately the poor dog just doesn't feel the same way.  She's 9 and in a rough part of life and doesn't feel the best all the time. But Molly just loves her!  

We hope that all of you who read this are having a wonderful holiday with friends, family, or where ever you are.  We are so blessed to have a great family and circle of friends.  We love you all....  MERRY CHRISTMAS!

hmmm...???

YES! It was the bangs!!! That little stinker! The other day I looked at her and I'm thinking "something's off...." and sure enough she admitted to cutting her bangs! She didn't do a very good job so i had to help a little bit with fixing them. We had a long talk about her not liking her hair and that she has to come to me if she wants it cut. She said they were too long. But when I showed her how long my bangs were and that i could tuck them behind my ears, she thought that was pretty cool and now she wants to grow them out again... this child is never going to have long curly locks... ARGH!!!!!!!!!!!

Can anyone guess what is different or wrong about this picture?? I'll give you a little while.....

The Zoo

Last week we went to the zoo.. Usually the Hippos are in the water, but we got to see them eat their lunch and walk around a bit..


From a different spot in the zoo we could see this Anteater pacing back and forth. We figured out how to get closer to him.. it was pretty darn cool, but he wouldn't stand still long enough for us to get a good picture of him. He seemed to sense us stalking him and at one point he completely disappeared. Fortunately he came back and I was able to get a couple pics... They are SO strange looking!

The other kids didn't cooperate when it was time for pics, so I only got a couple of Molly. She found this racoon (fake!) in a tree log and just wanted it to play with her. Right now she loves little animals. It's a good thing we're moving a lot and shouldn't get a dog!

Caroline's Birthday Party

Yesterday we had a little tea party (with Lemonade) for Caroline with a couple of her friends. It was fun finding cute little things for the girls to do.. They each got dress up shoes, bracelets, a ring, earings, pink lemonade lip gloss that Caroline and I made and hand painted tea cups with their names on it. We had snacks and cupcakes and the girls got to make beaded necklaces too. It was a total girly party. Fortunately Joe took Nicholas and Molly to the zoo!



Caroline, Raelynn, Sage, Adyson, and Hannah

Happy 5th Birthday Caroline!

Our little baby is 5 today! I can't believe that 5 years has gone by. It seems like yesterday that I was in St. Joe's hospital with visitors coming to oooh and aaahh over her. She woke up this morning like she had grown up over night...

But, we had a great day full of fun and lots of "girl stuff".. This morning the first thing she wanted to do was open her cards.. (in the first pic, her eyes were barely open...)


necklaces from Grandma...


Tinkerbell card and a subscription to Highlights! Can't wait...


The first girl thing we did was go get her ears pierced..... she was a very brave girl even though it hurt a little bit.

right after.... she was crying. But as soon as I told her she could go pick out some new earrings for when she could take her studs out she was happy again. :)

Showing off her sparkly ears...

Then after lunch we were off to get pedicures.. and the nice guy who did her toes also painted her fingers. She was in heaven... and so was mommy. Our good friend Kelly came with us too and we all had a great time!

Yesterday at school Caroline was given this crown to wear around so everyone knew it was her birthday. She would put it on at various times of the day today so people would know it was her birthday. Goofy girl. The one not so fun thing we did today was go to the dr. Her dr. is only in on Tuesdays so it just made sense to go in today. She's 43" tall and weighs 40.5 lbs.. She is struggling with some allergy issues down here and her dr. is wonderful with her. Everything was great except she has an ear infection and she had to get a flu shot. I did LOTS of bribing to get her to be ok with the shot after she had been told she wasn't getting any today. But, when we got to the immunization clinic, they had run out of the flu shot that morning! Caroline was very happy and I kind of was too.. much easier not to watch her kick and scream! But we do have to go back in a few days... shhh.. don't tell her yet.

Thanks Aunt Kendra for the camera!!!!!

blowing out the candles :)

Grandpa Paul sent a gift for Nicholas too... he was very excited and LOVES his new little cars.

A beautiful charm from Grandpa Paul....

The princess.... or Fancy Nancy, all ready for her tea party this weekend!

Thank you to all our friends and family who have been a part of her life these last few years! We love you all and miss those that we weren't able to celebrate with today!

sleeping angels...

Our kids...

As rough as life can be sometimes, and as crazy as my kids can drive me... I am very thankful for them and for their daddy. I am one lucky girl who gets to stay home and hangout with them. Although it's not really "hanging out.." we do get to do some pretty fun things. This weekend I got ahold of grandmas camera and had some fun playing around and trying to take some pictures of them. I LOVED photography when i was in middle school, but for the life of me I can not remember a what an f-stop does or any what any of that "lingo" means! I need a crash course again! Anyway, I don't like our little point and shoot and it was fun taking pics with an slr again....


CAROLINE.....
Little miss Caroline. She's 10 days away from being 5. How in the world is my firstborn already 5? I can't believe how quickly she has grown up. She came out of the womb grown up so it's all gone by too fast! She is a little mommy.. loves to try to take care of Molly even when Molly doesn't like it. She loves to help in the kitchen, even if it's washing dishes. But, she can not keep her room clean for even an afternoon... and she loves to collect things behind her bed so that doesn't help either. But, no matter what, we love her and are blessed and thankful to be her mom and dad. I still can't believe she's almost 5!!!!!!!!!

NICHOLAS.....

Mr. man.... what to say about him. He can be such a little pill, but he can also be SO sweet that I just don't know what to do with him. He's 3.5 and growing like a weed. Sometimes I feel a little bad for him. He and Caroline can do almost everything the same, but she's 5, and he's 3.5 .... sometimes I have to remember he's 3.5, and I try to remember what Caroline was like then. He is still learning a lot and it's fun to watch him discover things. He loves his little sister too, but also likes to sneak up and just knock her over... Silly little boy!

MOLLY........

And then there's miss Molly, or as Caroline likes to call her "little mischevious one".. and that she is!!!! She loves to get into EVERYTHING she can... there's a pic of her below sucking her thumb, but she' sucking paint. The pie she's eating in another one is Nicholas' pie... she snuck up and stole the rest of his when he wasn't paying attention. She is a goof ball who brings lots of joy to our lives just like the rest of them. Again, we are very blessed to have such great kids!