Here's hopin'!!

My neighbors can't stand me (hi B&U and J&B!!) cuz I'm cheering on the crazy weather headed our way. I took some calm-before-the-storm shots yesterday afternoon. It was in the mid 60s...we played out front in tshirts and flip flops...the sun was shining...it was gorgeous! This morning, the freezing rain is starting, sleet and thunder/lightening is coming and up to 16 inches of snow is forecasted (we'll probably get 5-8"...heck I'm happy as long as we get somethin'!). I'll post some "after" shots as I can snap them. School was cancelled for today and I'm sure the kids will be out tomorrow too as driving and power outage issues won't be half as bad today as they will be tomorrow.

So we are snuggling in for some fun. I've dug out all the camping gear (propane lantern and stove and sleeping bags to keep warm in from losing the heat) in case we lose power. Candles and board games are standing at the ready. And I brought the tub of snow gear down from the rafters so we are ready to bundle up and go outside and play in it as soon as we can!

For once I'm happy that Josh had a weird travel schedule this week and won't be home until Saturday night as they have already cancelled most of the afternoon flights for today...he's usually flying in on Thursday evening, so that would stink if he were stuck somewhere and couldn't get home.

Woohoo, let the fun begin!!

Carter!

[We've had a crazy busy few weeks around here so I had to take a break from most of my extra computer time. I'm hoping to be back at things and I'm picking up with finishing the spotlight I was writing for each monkey...]

Carter's post's title should be "I AM SO BIG!" He's grown up in a hurry around here! All in about two weeks' time (at the first of December) he potty trained and said goodbye to his beloved pacifier. Can I just say a quick AMEN to how easy he was to potty train AND that he was done well before his 3rd birthday? In less than a week he was done and it's soooo nice to be a diaper changing free household. Joshua pointed out to me in Target today that diapers were on sale and I got to say "I don't care!!" hahaha!! And he did pretty darn good with giving up his bink as well. We told him that we had given all his pacifiers to the babies and he was a big boy now. Only a time or two has he asked for it, and amusingly enough, he's decided that our friend Jenny (who has no babies) has them. So those nights he wants to go ask Jenny for them back...but we can usually distract him and get him snuggled happily into bed.

Here's the last known picture of him with his pacifier. It's also the last picture of him wearing pajamas. In his "growing up" he's also decided that he will sleep naked. And even on nights that we get him into pajamas before putting him to bed, when I go to tuck him in for the last time before I go to bed, I find him sound asleep naked with his pajama's defiantly on the floor beside his crib.



And here's one in the midst of potty training...


Cute goofy picture of Carter in the car...


Playing one of his favorite new Christmas toys...the airport that goes with his Geo Trax set...


Blowing off some blizzard/below zero freezing cabin fever in his sandbox in the backyard on one of the first tolerable days (notice there's still some snow on the ground...we had beautiful white to look at for exactly three weeks since the temps stayed so low).


This is a teaser picture for a blog post to come. What do you do with a "helpful" and "curious" and "wiggly" toddler when you are trying to paint the house? You plunk him on top of the refridgerator and tell him not to move of course (an he happily obliged since it was so "cool" up there!)!

90 days

Accountability is a powerful thing so here goes...I am going to read the Bible cover to cover in 90 days (or less!).

I gave a go at reading the Bible in a year about two years ago and stopped dead in my tracks the night that we lost power when Hurricane Ike hit. I told myself I'd get back at it when all of our "homeless" upheaval was over, but I didn't (I'd gotten just shy of halfway). So as one of my New Year's resolutions was to be more consistently in the Word, I started reading yesterday, January 6. I'm going to read cover to cover this time...instead of some Old Testament/some New Testament/some Psalms/some Proverbs as was the plan with the 365 day bible I'd started before. I'm hoping the Genesis to Revelation approach will be a bit easier as the other was a tad ADD for my already scattered brain to grasp hahaha.

Sooooo about April 5th, make sure and ask me how I did!!

blizzard -- pt 2

Here's some more pictures from the blizzard fun!

These "window" shots we took are amongst my favorite...they just seem so classic, I guess. I LOVE this one with a tad of the tree and a glimmering light in it!

In the deeper drifts between our houses, the kids dug tunnels and caves to play in. This is Emilee peeking out of one of them. They had fun for HOURS!

Had to throw a little homeschooling in for Carter...he's starting to recognize some of his letters, mostly C and R. He was tickled to do his "I/A's" in the snow (not sure why he calls letters "I/A's" but he's been doing that for months).

Carter's snow angel...

Reese enjoying playing in the snow...

Here's our first snowman...took a while for the snow to get sticky enough to make one. It was sooo much fun and I don't think we ever made one this big even in Idaho!

Here's Trevor with the snowmen...we had a family of half a dozen snowmen going at one point...and then it was hilarious to see them fall over as the sun melted them. Sorry, Frosty...

blizzard 2009--pt 1

So Blizzard 2009 headed into Oklahoma on Christmas Eve. We were pretty much the only ones we know that were excited. Of course, first thing when the white started collecting on the ground we had to head out to play in it. But the wind was pretty darned miserable so no one stayed long. Poor Carter bailed after about 90 seconds, the big monkeys held on for about ten minute intervals.

A quick pose with Daddy (notice the squinty faces, the wind was absolutely skin piercing)...

A dog pile after a good attempt at a snowball fight...Emi on top and Trev on the side, Joshua and Art on the bottom, and Reese looking on.

Em and Trev attempting to make snowmen, but the snow was so dry they couldn't get anything to stick together...

Trevor, Joshua, Emilee and Art posing and trying not to fall over in the gust of the wind...

Trevor on the mountain of snow that was drifting on the side of the house (it ended up about three feet deep by the end of the storm).

Christmas Day morning...chatting with our neighbors as they dug out their driveway and told of their wary night adventures of getting their car stuck and having to abandon it in the middle of the street and sleep at the relative's house.

This is their car before it was dug out. The front end and entire under carriage was buried in the snow about two feet deep. It took five guys to dig and push it out. Besides this car, Joshua and Art hopped around the neighborhood and rescued/dug out/pulled out about a dozen people. It was sort of like Joshua's towing service again lol. He enjoyed helping everyone, and had a BLAST hot rodding and sliding and 4x4ing all over our subdivision...Joshua to the rescue!

Our house in the calm after the storm.

One of the most amazing sights of the storm...the view out the front window with snow gathered on the sills.

Posing for some snow pics...


The bundled up monkey in this pic is Trevor...

Red neck sledding in a laundry basket with some rope...thanks for the ride, Art!

The three foot horizontal drift that formed from the snow blowing off of our roof. Poor Reese couldn't even jump it to go potty lol, we had to dig him out a path!

More rides in the basket!!

And this is one of the best treats of a blizzard...SNOWritas! We were out of ice so Joshua headed into the backyard to utilize nature. It made THE MOST soft and delicious margaritas!!

Merry WHITE Christmas Eve...

So us Californians who are Idahoan at heart but transplanted into Oklahoma were BEYOND happy today when we got the rare WHITE CHRISTMAS miracle. We got several inches of snow that ended up creating drifts of a couple of FEET. Really, we couldn't have asked for a better Christmas present...we had so much fun with the kids and our friends, playing in the snow and just enjoying the white scene out our front window. There will be a nice long blog post devoted to the snow very soon...

Tonight, our monkeys are nestled, all snug in their beds and I wanted to leave you with the monkey's Santa picture and one of Joshua reading them the Night Before Christmas as he does every year on Christmas Eve...

Our family hopes that yours has a wonderful Christmas!!!

Trevor!!!

Our monkey #2 is sporting a new cast...

The doctor says it's healing as it should. He's got this one for 4 weeks and then hopefully he'll have a clean bill of health.

After taking Trevor's first broken arm picture in front of what I thought was a weird random buffalo in the doctor's parking lot, we've been spotting buffalo in several places. So now it's become a project to get Trev's pic with each one we see. This one was downtown, across a lake so I shot it hoping to get the buffalo in the background...

This is another downtown buffalo, several blocks away from the one by the little lake.

Trevor having a chat with Santa about what happens when you jump over the couch and miss the landing. Santa was impressed enough to ask if he could sign his cast! And yup, just in case you are wondering, Trevor still believes in the magic of Santa!!

Our downtown does some beautiful holiday decorating and this backdrop is my favorite so Trevor posed for me...

Last but certainly not least...Trevor won this month's school character award for compassion. It certainly fits as we always describe Trevor as our "lover, not fighter."