A look back at 2008

First of all... WHERE has time gone?! I can't believe that Kelsey is 9 and Braden will be 3 in exactly a month. We had a great year and stayed very busy. As I said in previous posts, we did some landscaping in the back (still a work in progress and pictures can be found in a previous post) and also remodeled the bathroom.
Here's my favorite part and THANK YOU to my Brother in law Ray who did the excellent tile work.

In addition to that, we considered moving and repainted the living room from the gawd-awful green (see below for last years christmas tree and green)
that I should shoot myself for painting in the first place and actually had a "packing" party where people came over and helped us muck out the house in case we actually decided to move. I'm still working on putting pictures up on the walls. OOPS. I'm glad we didn't move though, with the extreme down turn in the economy and drop in housing prices, it would've been a bad choice. Instead we stayed here and dumped money into the house, which means my savings account is seriously depleted at the moment.

We did make some time for fun and took a trip to Great Wolf Lodge with our good friends and neighbors

and also had some fun camping trips at Sun Lakes and "the property" that Scott's parents own.

I'm sure there were more other defining moments throughout the year but I've already forgotten them. It's not like 2007 (pre-blog) that started just before Braden's birthday with a leaking fish tank which required the replacement of much of our flooring, a new car to counteract the rising fuel costs and our trees being taken down.

For now, I'll leave you with this not very exciting post and get back to preparing the house for the small NYE party we are hosting.

Merry belated Christmas

Yes, I am behind in posting a Christmas blog, but in my defense, Christmas is a busy time! However, this year was more relaxing than any of the others. It was only the 2nd time in 10 years that we didn't travel on Christmas day. I even neglected taking the camera out for most of it, but here is the one picture Scott got of both the kids first thing in the morning.

The kids got a lot of loot, Kelsey an entire new wardrobe from her favorite store, Braden more cars and an awesome Black and Decker tool bench, which he loves and Scott and I both got things we wanted/needed. The rest of the day was spent sitting on the couch, playing the Wii and having dinner at Bob and Paulas. I think we've got Scotts parents addicted to the Wii and Paula and I had a great time driving Mario Kart while drinking wine. :)

First Snow

Our first snow! The kids had a lot of fun playing in it. We're expecting more snow by wednesday and it's supposed to remain cold through the coming weekend. They are even talking about a possible white Christmas. Something that is very rare around here!

Happy Holidays

The holiday parties are now in full swing. This past weekend was busy enough that by Sunday, I spent most of the day unproductive and on the couch, pretending to nurse my "cold" which was really just a slightly sore throat and I wanted to be lazy. But, I had an excellent visit with my grandparents, my great grandma, my cousin's family and my friend Katie for the first portion of the weekend.
Hey Great Grandma Ann, if you are reading this, isn't the tree pretty? I bought it last year on clearance, put it up about a week ago and yes, I think it's gorgeous. Oh, and it's fake. For those of you who spent friday evening with Great Grandma Ann, you'll understand that great grandma really really liked my tree and was sure to let us know every 10 minutes or so... although each time she told us, it was the first time.... That's okay, Great Grandma is 95 and she made it through the entire Victorian Country Christmas pushing the 9 year old (Kelsey) around in the wheel chair we'd rented for her... we'll forgive her if she sometimes forgets she already asked a question. This was really quite funny to see and no, Kelsey didn't hijack grandmas chair the entire time... Grandma preferred to walk and she certainly wasn't slowing us down, so Kelsey climbed in and Grandma pushed her for a bit until we made Kelsey get out and use her perfectly good legs.

In other holiday news, I am proud to report that I've gotten more than half of my shopping done, wrapped and heck, most of it has even made it to it's final destination. I feel very organized this year, which is new and different.... usually I'm running around like a mad person during the winter and I end up losing 3-5 pounds. Unfortunately, this year, I've cut back on my shopping and am doing it early, so I'm actually GAINING weight, even though I've started going back to the gym on a regular basis... if by regular basis, two times a week counts... that's about all I can handle.

Lastly... a note to myself... I will have to come back and read this I'm sure. When potty training a boy, do NOT let him aim it himself..... this was a disaster. Braden was standing on his stool, getting ready to go, usually I make him sit down, but I thought, he looks like he knows what he's doing, lets see how he does. Well, he aimed and let the stream fly.... it proceeded to hit the wall behind the garbage can, then the garbage can itself. By this time, I'm trying to help him and then he overcorrects and the stream goes to the other side of the toilet, hits the shower curtain, floor, toilet (although not IN the bowl) and by the end it takes 6 clorox wipes to clean up the walls, floor and toilet, not to mention we had to wash our hands and his legs. Ugh..... Scott of course, laughs at me and says, well, Of course you have to aim it for him. Forgive me for not knowing how this works, it looked pretty well aimed to me, I've never tried to do it myself! Girls sit nicely in one spot and there is never a question about where their stream is going to go. The last time I checked, the only child I've potty trained was a girl and it was atleast 7 years ago.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING

I am of course, late in posting this! But, I hope everyone had a great Turkey Day. We had a nice, relaxing day. We had planned to go to my grandparents, but there was a change of plans and we ended up going to Scott's parents instead. Grandma Verla has had a rough month so we wanted to make sure we got some visiting time with her, just in case. I'm happy to say, she looked remarkably well for the month she had, just a little pale and tired, but overall upbeat and even had a half a glass of wine. The kids were happy to see her and Braden showed off his ball throwing/catching skills with Uncle Boyd, while Kelsey helped Grandma Paula with most of the cooking. We stayed after dinner and watched a movie, so it was a long day for the kids with no nap for Braden, but he handled it like a champ and even slept in the next morning for us.

The rest of the weekend passed too quickly even if it was extended for the holiday. Scott braved the crowds on Black Friday for a toolbox he's wanted since his birthday. He's happy to report that he survived the crowd and was able to order the box. We also put our tree up, which is a record for me. We purchased a prelit, fake tree on clearance last year, so I don't have to worry about the needles dropping on my carpet or it drying out before Christmas. While we were decorating, I turned on "National Lampoons Christmas Vacation" rather than the usual Christmas music.

Now, the holiday season begins and we will have a busy month of family, shopping, Christmas parties, baking and wrapping. I'm sure I'll be back to fill you all in soon.

Coffee, Twilight and Soccer

First of all.... Coffee.... coffee is much needed this morning after the day I had yesterday, which was a lot of fun, a lot of driving and a lot of running. :)

Ahh.... Twilight. My new favorite book series, the only book series I have enjoyed more than Harry Potter. In my mind I had moved for Forks, Washington and joined the world of fictional Vampires and Werewolves, completely forgetting that I had real life duties that needed to be performed in my house. I only seemed to come out of my reading induced stupor when Braden would do things like knock my coffee over onto the book (page 84 in book 1 will always be easy to find) or Kelsey would dangle a piece of paper in front of my face saying, "MOM, I need help with my homework." My eyes would unglaze just long enough for me to send her to find Scott for help with her math. Yep, for 6 days, I was a completely worthless lump that sat on the couch with a book, blanket and glass of wine. Oh and Edward Cullen...... Mmm.... the vampire we all wish our husband could be.

Yesterday, I took Scotts niece Taylor and we met Carrie to watch the much anticipated movie. Which.... could not quite compare to the book. It was good, yes, but there were some cheesy spots. It's difficult for the movie to capture all of the emotion that went into the book. But I did like it and when I got home, I told Scott, I hope you don't mind, but I'm going to leave you for a 100+ year old Vampire who will forever be 17. His response.... an eye roll and "sure, you do that." Of course, I will be leaving him for the Edward of the book and not the Edward of the movie.... Sorry Robert Pattinson, I'm sure you are a great guy, but you don't compare to the picture of Edward I had in my head by the end of the books.

Now that I'm done mooning over the fictional Vampire, I'll fill you in on the rest of the day. Taylor and I had a great visit and I was glad to see her. We went to lunch at the Rock, which has THE BEST Beer Battered fries I've ever had and then I took her back to see Braden, Kelsey and Uncle Poopy (Scott). Oh and on our way to my house, we discovered some more Twilight addicts... standing on the side of the road were a couple teenage girls with a sign that said, "Honk if you love Twilight." Following that short visit, I drove her home, only to turn right back around and head to soccer - which thankfully Ben offered to drive to. The game was extremely long with sudden death over time and finally a shoot out, where we ultimately lost by one goal. I believe it was our first and only loss of the season.

Now that you are all caught up on my weekend, it's time for me to refill my cold coffee cup and find some productive work to do for the next 6.5 hours of my work day.

The Backyard

Remember I said, our lives are finally slowing down? Well, I decided since, at the moment, I have nothing of importance to add to my blog, I would give everyone some background at what we got done this summer. We had two big projects... why? Because I wanted to do the yard and Scott wanted to do the bathroom. So, the bathroom is done, but the yard is a work in progress.

Here is what we started with, with the exception of the trees we took out last summer....

After Jared finished destroying our yard, we put Braden to work...

He's a great pond digger and worm hunter.... he comes cheap too, gold fish crackers and apple juice

The goal was to finish the new patio, which I LOVE by the way. We've only had it since August and we've used it for several barbeques, games at the table and even fires for the small fire pit I bought.



The other projects we are working on but haven't completed are garden area (see the rock wall) and the dog run, which we've made great progress on, the bricks are down, the grass is in (but you can't see it from these pictures), the shed is up so they have some cover and the gravel is ready for them to do their business in. The only thing we are waiting on is for Scott to finish the rock wall and put the fence up. This was supposed to happen by the time the rain came, but the rain is here and the fence is not. Oh well, atleast the weeds are keeping the dogs from tracking most of the mud in the house.

Here I am....

Well, I've gone and done it, I've *gasp* started a blog! Carrie finally convinced me, so she better get hers going too! Don't get me wrong, I enjoy reading other peoples and catching up on my friends and families lives, but I was pretty adamant that I wouldn't start one and now that I have, I'm still not convinced I'll share it with the rest of the world or even those closest to me. :)

Currently, it seems life is winding down... as in, I don't have every minute of every day planned out for the next month. Of course, in less than 2 weeks, the holidays will be here and I'm sure it will very quickly become a frenzy of activity between baking, visiting, shopping, wrapping and... well, you know the routine.

For now, Kelsey and I are both finishing up our soccer seasons - thank goodness! The rain seems to purposely wait until the weekend and then dump on us, so that our car constantly smells like a wet and sweaty soccer sock and there is constantly dried grass in the form of rings on the floor which has fallen off of a muddy cleat. Let me say, EWWW... I love the sport and I don't mind the rain, but pile 7 wet people (we carpool) into a car after a game and.... I'm glad the season is over. :)

Braden is in the midst of potty training - totally on his own. I tried a couple months ago and it was a total failure. He refused to go near the toilet and cried each time we attempted. But, last wednesday, he miraculously decided (ON HIS OWN) that he wanted to go potty in the toilet... and he did. Typical male, once it's HIS idea, it's okay. *insert eye roll here* So, overall, he's doing remarkably well with the exception of going #2... but we'll leave that topic for another day.