Saturday, December 27, 2008

The Most Wonderful Time of the year.

Post Christmas relief has to be one of the best times, where the excitement and anticipation of gift giving has passed and the realization of having to put away all of the decorations has not yet fully set in. We have a musical Santa where the calendar is on the 26th, and he is in his recliner with his feet in front of the heater, and is singing "Its the Most Wonderful Time of the Year!" I know how he feels :)


Even though this video is not the clearest, you can obviously see its Daniel and Isaac. Isaac's new thing is shaking his head NO. Im not ready to accept that he understands what NO means and that he understands that he is capable of saying NO. Where did my little baby go? The good thing is that he usually only shakes his head no with his brother :) Thank you God for that!
Daniels mom, Linda, has been eyeing the outfit I was SO CLOSE to getting Isaac on Black Friday. I could not justify paying that much money for an outfit he would wear only once, but she finally caught it on sale where it would be worth it. Thankfully there was only 1 12 month size left, the rest was 3-6 months in size. You can see it at the end of the video clip. It has Santa in the middle and his 8 reindeer (mius Rudolph) around him.
Our family was treated to a free meal at Longhorn Steakhouse for Christmas, and when I say free, i mean FREE. We had the freedom to choose WHATEVER we wanted on the menu, from appetizers to main course to dessert. Renee Johnson was our waitress and was so patient with helping the boys (and us) narrow down our choices, THANK YOU RENEE!! She made it so special with fresh flowers on the table and nice napkins. She made sure that we got all that we wanted (also who I will blame should my pants not fit :) and took home all we couldn't finish to enjoy again when we had room. It has been great not having to cook as much this week.
The best part for me was FINALLY getting a nice family picture of us all. I have been waiting a long time to get one where there were no bunny ears, long tongues, cross eyes, and attitudes from not getting to do those things in the picture.


Okay, Isaac is awake now so I gotta run. Hope you had a nice Christmas!! Don't get too sick that 2009 is only 4 DAYS AWAY!! Ugh, life really is like a roll of toilet paper, the closer you get to the end, the quicker it goes!!

Sunday, December 21, 2008

Twas the week of Christmas...

Wow, another quiet Sunday morning, 2 in a row!! Thank you Lord for the gift of silence :) It has been a fun week, making cookies, crafts, and celebrating 12 days of Christmas with Daniel and Payton. They are really enjoying looking in their stockings everyday. Can't you tell? Who knew that turtles and chipmunks could bring about such excitement!!



Of course, school has been all about parties, movies, and yummy treats this week. Payton had a blast sporting his new Batman jammies to school. I guess its turned into a tradition being the 3rd year in a row that they have gotten pj's this time of year. Thankfully the work van broke down and my husband was unable to work, so he was free to join us at school. Daniel, being in 4th grade, has outgrown the pj celebration :( Some days it feels as if they will never grow up then there are moments like these where you realize how fast its went by.

On that same day, Daniel had his 4th grade breakfast under the new pavilion at school, and boy was it good! I was almost 45 minutes late, with Christmas at UPS it was a miracle I made it at all! The breakfast hit the spot when I finally made it through the line. Thankfully they had issues with the power surging from all the griddles and ended up getting a late start, so I was right on time and was able to eat with the guys!!



It has been amazing how year after year, God has lovingly provided us with blessing after blessing to celebrate his entrance into humanity.

Through the school, the boys were invited yesterday to the Elks Lodge for their annual Chrismas party where they had pony rides, ate food, got balloons animals, and sat on Santa's lap before getting a present. We stood in line so long for the balloons and face painting that the ponies were leaving as we walked outside. Both boys received gifts they were excited about along with, along with candy, and small radio headsets! They got their faces painted and were showing off their balloon swords in this picture. It was a fun time.

Above it all, I want these boys to look back on their childhood and know they were loved abundantly as a vital member of this family. My husband and I cannot begin to understand what it is like to live in 2 homes and how that affects children in divorce situations. I never want them to look back and feel as if that caused them to miss out on a thing. I want them to look back and realize they had the love and acceptance from a complete family, regardless of the blood in our veins. I want them to look at their children when they are grown and decide what special things they will make with them because of the memories they have of their family.
And who can resist the cute baby outfits?!?!
Isaac is now brave enough to walk away from me towards whatever his eye is on. He is getting acclimated to his playpen and loves playing the ABC's on his new birthday present, over, and over, and over again! Someone coined his walk the "Isaac Shuffle!"
Who needs Santa's lap when you get a jolly warm heart with Isaac Claus?

Sunday, December 14, 2008

Sunday afternoon

The quiet of today is eerie, the boys are at their Moms, Isaac is sleeping, and my husband is in bed not feeling too well. To actually have free time is a rarity, and now that I have it I DON'T KNOW WHAT TO DO!!! I need a little chaos to remind me of what I would do "if i only had the time".
My little guy just turned one last week, and just got his 6th tooth! I looked at him last night as we sat in the recliner next to our lit up Christmas tree thinking, "he isn't a baby anymore". How many mothers have uttered those words quicker than they would have liked.


Here are my guys putting up the tree this year.

They did a really good job putting up the outside decorations this year too. Thankfully Payton was not injured when he accidently stepped through our skylight!
Daniel and Payton say this is Isaac's first Christmas, even thought its his second, because he "can see stuff" this year :)



Daniel found out last night that he passed both of his final exams for Firefighter 1!! Now he gets a break before taking FIrefighter 2 in January. Its going to be nice to have him around these next few weeks as it has been a challenge being outnumbered 3:1.

We are so proud of him and of the sacrifice he is making for our family. Being a full time husband and Dad, working full time hours, and going to school has been tough.
They boys really had fun putting on all of my husbands gear. My husband had fun going into the test building that was on fire too.

He is going to make a great firefighter because the more stressful and chaotic the situation, the clearer he thinks. That is one thing I have always loved about him because I fall apart when stress rises.