Wednesday, December 26, 2012

Little Stuff....

 Drew and Madelyn came home from school both very excited.  Drew was excited because he and his little desk group at school were chosen in their class as the "most well behaved" and earned this adorable little hat!!  The girls sure enjoyed trying it on....
 Lily in the hat...
 Madelyn came home excited because she had lost another tooth at school!  That girl.  Her teeth seem to just be falling out of her head.  ;)
Drew was able to go the Boise temple rededication.  He had his little recommend and was ready to go.  I was so excited to go with him and Jed and arranged for a swap with another family since there were rededications gonig at different times.  I failed to realize that babies could not go......so then we ended up not being able to go together because it was too late to drop off Claire with the other family.  It worked out just fine, I went later on all by myself.  I just tend to be sentimental about those sorts of things....
 Jed shot his first goose.  I loved having it in my kitchen.  ;)  It could stay long enough to get a picture and then it was kicked out!  We had it for Sunday dinner.  It actually wasn't bad, it was a whole different world than duck.  Duck is just plain gross.  Goose, actually tastes similar to beef and has the same texture as a beef roast.  I wasn't way gung ho about it, I just am weird like that, but it really wasn't bad.  Our leftovers were left out and the kids licked the platter clean.  They loved it.
 Drew was dancing so cutely with Claire.
 She loves her big brother Drew.  He is such a good big brother, I love that.
 Drew has gone duck hunting with Jed a couple of times this fall/winter.  He loves it.  He takes his bb gun and practices his shot too.  He got to keep this duck foot.  It kind of grosses me out just typing about it.  He loved that it was so soft and smooth.....  He wanted to keep it in his bedroom, but my thoughts instantly saw this rotting duck foot in the basement......no no no.  I allowed him to keep it in the garage--atleast it would be chilled out there.  I don't even know what has happened to it at this point.....yikes.
 I got a picture of my little blue-eyed girls together.
 Those little cuties....
 Claire thinks her sisters are so funny.  They get her to laugh all the time!
 Jed was gone for a week at the beginning of December for work.  Man am I ever glad when he gets home.  I kinda miss him... ;)

 He always comes home with goods and random trinkets that the kids are so excited about.  I always ask for t-shirts.  So here we are in our matching "drilling at every angle" t-shirts.  Take notice of my super cool macho wrist band I found in his treasure of trinkets...I later found out, it is a pop can insulator....dang it.  I sure thought I was cool.  :)
This is a "random photo of every child's activities one night"  photo series.  
Claire is hanging out.  
 
Lily is throwing a fit.
Madelyn is reading.
 Drew is playing on the computer.
 Hannah is sucking her thumb and snuggling whilst watching Drew on the computer.

 Little Claire is fascinated with our tree.
 We finally got around to feeding our little sweetie her first meal of solid food.  The kids could not have been more excited!
 She was not impressed.  I totally remind myself of the mom on the Incredible's in this picture who is mimicking the baby's mouth while feeding them food.  And check out  that nice bald spot on the side of my head....I always lose a bunch of hair after having a baby.  luckily it has started filling in.....
 She is starting to like it better since these photos were taken.
 random picture...
 Drew read and loved Harry Potter.  He was reading it on the stairs.  I love it when they find books they love.
 I thought this was pretty cute....
 Hannah fell in love with a box we received in the mail.  Seriously.  She slept in it for 3 nights straight.  And in slow times during the day....I knew where to find her. 
 This was at nighttime, having a sleepover in the box.  We had a smaller box come in the mail too that Lily tried, but it was a little too snug...so you can see she decided to just sleep on the floor.
It had to be labeled lest anyone came to steal her box too....

We did it!!

 A couple of weeks ago we did something monumental as a family:  we finished the Book of Mormon together!  After years of reading board book scriptures, then the next step up of scripture stories, we finally read the real thing from front to back!  We knew we would have to do something monumental to celebrate.  We all went out for pizza, bowling, and glow golf.
 We don't do that sort of thing all that often so it was a real treat.   And, oh my goodness, I thought those little bowling shoes were too adorable.
 We had a really fun time together.







Oh yeah, cosmic bowling.  Things started to get really exciting....
I think Hannah won out of everyone.  
It really was fun.  And after the tragedy that happened across the nation that day, it sure did feel good to be together.
Lily playing glow golf.
 This is actually more what she really looked like.

Lily's heart was torn when the last hole took her ball and the game was over....  :(
 The fam.
My big baby girl standing....with help of course.  But nonetheless, she looks so big!
Anyway, the kids are kind of interested in what kind of celebration we'll have after we we finish the bible.....   :)

Tuesday, December 18, 2012

In front of the camera....

Being the official family photographer, not a professional term in my case by any means, I rarely am in the front lines of camera action.  But recently, my children have taken more of an interest in that little device of mine and tried their hand at capturing moments.  They may not be flattering works of art, but they capture beautiful moments shared by me and the little ones I love so very dearly.
They capture us.  They capture my adventures as a mother.  They capture the love we share.  They capture  the relationships we have.  
To me they are priceless.
One of my little girls favorite pastimes is doing my hair.  It is fun for all of us.
Also, all of the girlies wanted their own Harry Potter scar....
 One night we laid by the Christmas tree together in our blankets and told stories.  Not any stories....silly stories.  We were all laughing as I told a random silly story about a dancing pickled egg.  I love that we remember that story with such fondness and I think it will make us laugh for many days to come....
 Playing together.
 Snuggling first thing in the morning.
 It's too early in the morning for Lily to be happy about whomever was behind the camera's idea it was to zoom in a little closer....
 This may just be my favorite.  Baby kiss from my little baby sweetheart.
Here we are together after sharing a night of fun with our little family.
I love my children.  I hope when they see these pictures like these, they get the slightest inkling of how much their mom loves them.