A Snowy Day

So far this is my favorite picture of the year.  

I know it's only January, but I think it will be the best photo of 2012.

And there he goes.  Off to adventure with a friend...wearing shorts...in a snow storm.  Now for the record, he only walked about a block to his friends house; he wasn't really playing in the snow in shorts.  But still.

Mid January

Brandon got this little guitar for Christmas.  He is quite proud of it even though he can't play anything...yet.  Hopefully he can get some lessons and become the star I know he is inside!

And this is just one of the those classic personality shots.  Jordon carefully arranged all his gifts in a nice pile and wanted to get a picture of them.  It has been interesting to hear Jordon process and think through getting all these gifts.  He kept asking who picked out each of his gifts.  He wanted to know which ones I picked out and which ones Pete picked out.  It was so cute how important that was to him.  He still occasionally asks to be reminded who picked out what gift for him.  (Makes me glad that we didn't give Santa any credit for giving the gifts because I can see how important the giver is to him!!)

I've been in a wintery-weather mood ever since taking the Christmas decorations down (just two days after Christmas).  I've been considering crafting all sorts of cozy winter decorations to "warm" the house up a bit.  Although I have a long list of ideas to do, only one thing has actually been created.  This is the inspiration that I found online.  I love this winter scene.  It turns out the creator of this picture must have been inspired by the paper cups at Panera because I was recently there with a friend and saw pretty much the same scene on their cups.  I was very glad to see it because then I didn't feel so badly for completely copying off some one else.  There is inspiration and there is copying...this is clearly copying...with a few mistakes that we'll call purposeful changes.

So here is my "interpretation" of the piece. The worse part about it is the surrounding [lack of] decor, which I have since changed.  But besides all that, I like the painting and it adds a nice wintery feel to the room, which is exactly what I was hoping for.  Now if only I could get some extra time to make some of the other cozy pieces to go along with it; that will be great.  I still have at least another month to stick with my winter theme!  So maybe I'll get something else made.  If not, there is always next year!

We've been able to go to a couple different Butler games over the winter break.  It's been a lot of fun.  This was a particularly funny picture of Gids that I thought I'd share.  It also reminds me how much I love the shirts that I've made for all the boys and I need to make the next size bigger for little Gids.  This one is getting a bit tight. I also want to make one for myself.  I just can't decide on the design.  I thought this huge bulldog right on the belly was perfect for little kids, but now I'm thinking that might be what I want.  But then again, maybe that would look weird on me.  I guess it is better for little kids who are supposed to have round bellies!

Thanksgiving

Despite my amazing efforts, I still got a few of these posts out of order.  So sorry.

Gideon saw all the kitchen activity and wanted to be a part.  He really was only interested in doing the most dangerous thing though, cut something with a knife.  So I set him up with a cucumber and butter knife.  I know that wasn't really a great combination, but he worked quite hard for a long time and did pretty good.  Thankfully Gideon's first knife encounter didn't land us in the hospital.

However, later that day, Jordon's climbing event did land us in the hospital!  He sliced the bottom of his foot on a wing nut!   Nasty!

He was quite a trooper though it all...the cleaning it out, the x-rays, and the five stitches.  My favorite story from this event is that the doctor asked us what he cut it on, Jordon heard Pete say "a wing nut".  Then later the x-ray tech lady asked Jordon how he cut his foot.  He said in his low voice, "on a golden nut".

Jordon's mood lightened up when they let him choose a stuff animal.  He chose this marbled colored chameleon and immediately named him, Lizzy the Lizard.

There were 19 people in our house for Thanksgiving when Pete, Jordon and I quickly left to go to the hospital.  When we returned in less than an hour Jordon was welcomed with a room full of claps and cheers.  He was a true champ that day!!

He didn't walk on his foot for about 8 days.  Instead he hopped, crawled or was carried (the carrying ended after about day 3!)  But he was pretty normal and did a great job keeping his wound clean so no infections complicated his super deep cut.

This isn't a great photo, but I wanted to document how I joined up with my cousins and uncle for a super-fun midnight shopping event at Target.  It was absolutely insane.  I had no clue what I was signing up for, but it sounded like an adventure and I knew I'd be with fun people, so I went.  It was absolutely crazy.  But my cousin Kim and I had a great time!!

They boys were able to paint some Christmas tree decorations with Nini.

December

On December 1st we went to Wendy's to get Frosty's (or course I got suckered into also buying kid's meals for all of them).  I brought a blank calendar for Dec., tape and lots of pictures of things to do.  So we went through the month and taped on pictures of the activities that we wanted to do each day.  Some of these included basketball practice, small group, things we already had planned.  But the fun part was adding in game nights, baking nights, card/art nights, movie nights, etc.  We haven't been completely faithful to the calendar, but it has certainly been fun to have and force us to be more creative with the kids in the evenings instead of getting stuck in a rut.

Part of the reason for all this is because we aren't going to be able to have a "normal" Christmas this year because Pete is going in for jaw surgery on Dec. 22nd.  He will have his mouth wired shut and most likely be quite miserable for about 2 weeks.  The hope is that this surgery will alleviate some of the pain he has in his head/jaw/ear region.  But he will definitely have a rough recovery before we know if the surgery will help take this pain away.  And unfortunately all that will be happening right around Christmas.  So we've been doing what we can to celebrate throughout the whole month.  It's actually been pretty fun and I've liked to re-think how to celebrate.  Hopefully we can remember some of these fun things from this year and make them December traditions.

Jordon got his stitches out.  He was a trooper and our friend was the doctor on-call that day.  So it was to get to see her and have her help us.  

This picture also clearly shows Jordon's amazing fashion ideas.  He picks out his clothes everyday and comes up with the loudest color combinations I've ever seen.  Pete thinks he's really good at fashion and tries to encourage it.  I'm not convinced that he's very good at it.  The day he wore plaids and stripes to church was not a proud day for me...but of course Pete thought it was awesome!

Brandon's been playing on a basketball league at church and has games many Saturdays.  This particular Sat. Gideon grabbed his chair before he got in the car.  He carried it into the gym with him and sat a few seats away from the rest of us.  It was hilarious to his little independence shine.  Of course a few minutes later some other people came in and sat down next to him.  He wasn't so into that and found himself on my lap soon after.

The boys have been big into all sleeping the same room...mostly because they love figuring out the bed situation because it means they can stay up later.  This is how I found them the other night!

Jordon asked him if he could "take a haircut".  So I shaved the back and sides a little bit.  Then he asked for some gel in his hair.  He was so proud of this do!  I also can't believe how he's stuck a pose for this picture.  This is not at all what is normal for Jordon, but I've seen him do it for pictures some recently.  I guess Brandon's love for posing has had a pretty big influence!

brothers

Jordon wasn't quite feeling the love at this time.

But he did get into making funny faces!

This just cracks me up!  Because of times like this is why I have given them the names Frick and Frack.  The two of them together are a recipe for disaster and fun, no matter where they are.  Mess and destruction surround them, yet they sit calmly in the middle on a soft blanket.  Their expressions are void, but say so much!

Halloween-the 3 ninjas

Brandon had a fun school project of dressing up a pumpkin like a character in a book.  He chose Speed Racer and he and I together came up with this pumpkin version of him.

All four boys carved these pumpkins together.  They had a lot of fun and were quite proud of their creations...especially when they saw them glowing at night!

And here they are...the 3 ninjas!  Watch out world!

Brandon really got into character!

backsplash update

We decided to take on a project here at home.  This is no small task for us to do.  But we love the results and had a lot of fun doing it.

Before

After