friendly Christmas! (December)

it seems to have become a little tradition for us to "do Christmas" with our bestest friends here - Dino, Jill, 

Jacob, and Diana!  each year we so enjoy their company and we enjoy gifts too!

they super spoiled us - those silly guys - but we loved our gifts and are so thankful!

I don't know what we're gonna do when we finally have to leave here and won't be close ...

we get together weekly, so it's gonna be super hard to say good-bye to our special friends!

I don't want that day to come!

but, we'll always have these awesome memories!!!

Liam LOVES it! (December)

this was Liam's favorite Christmas decoration!

he figured out how to turn it on and did so - often!

it is a super cute tree - and there's a tiny train that goes around inside - pretty

cool for a sweet little four year old boy!

Christmas crafts with Nana (December)

here's a couple pics of the kids doing crafts with Nana!

hmmm ... this face remind me of my son!

the son who looks so much like me and my dad - go figure!

it's beginning to look a lot like Christmas (December)

the first weekend of December the indoor decorations went up - it's always so exciting to decorate at Christmas time!  Zoey loved her little people nativity (so did Liam) and though not maybe overly impressed, the kids did think the Christmas tree was pretty cool!  speaking of the Christmas tree, this year I was lazy decided to do something different - and I put no traditional decorations on the tree!  that's right!!!  you read it here!  instead, I put only hand-made (by the kids) "ornaments" on it!  then, the kids added to that with lots of new decorations and ornaments!  I thought it was pretty neat and I think it really did make them feel like they had more part of the whole decorating thing!!!

anyway, a few days later we (and by we, I mean my dad) put up our outdoor decorations!  Liam was Grandaddy's "helper" and he really enjoyed that!  he also really liked our new decorations, particularly the penguin - because he is loving penguins these days!  (skip forward to January:  I must mention his stuffed penguin, Penguino!  how cute is that!  I love the names Liam gives his little stuff friends!  I should get a pic of all of them, there's: "Beary", "Elephanty", "Penguino" - and a few randoms, but you see how the naming process goes!  that kid is amazing!!!)  after it was all set up, the other kids got to see it!!!  (they were too busy to hang around while the work was being done)  Zoey liked it and had to give each animal a hug, adorable!  then later that night Jericho accompanied me while I got some "night shots" of our fun little set up ... and, the sky was too pretty to resist - so I took a pic of that too!

wrapping up (November) ...

in wrapping up November:

Zoey got clean, lol!  no - but check out those amazing eyes!  I love her eyes so much!!!

I still can't believe my (loving) husband sent me a pack of reeses peanut butter cups - knowing full

well that I'm trying to lose weight!  oh wait, it gets worse, they were 1/2 pound peanut butter

cups!  yes, that's why I have that "shame shame" face up there in that pic (in which, incidentally, I 

managed to crop the pic and you can't even see the giant peanut butter cup - oh well)

Liam finally got to wear his "new" rain boots. new, as in, bought back in March!

Nana & Grandaddy arrived!!!

Annicka found a heart shaped corn flake!!

Zoey is really into books now, I'm guessing the reading every night (which isn't so consistent

now) really influenced/helped that!

there's that stupid frickin GIANT peanut butter cup again, Annicka is only pretending though - she

doesn't like anything with peanut butter in it!  (btw - I didn't have any of that one, my mom and

friend each ate half!  I did have a bit of the second one, that we froze, last month though!)

and, we started a earn/lose marble system!  

it was most successful with Liam ... however, we're not really doing it anymore!

and that's a wrap!

for November, anyway!

oh that awful sick spell (November)

I think it was the sunday before thanksgiving that we noticed the "white bump" (actually, my older kids noticed) on Liam's hand!  a toy had been thrown his direction at preschool, which had cut him (I'm guessing he raised his hand to block it).  apparently the cut got infected and I, being the awesome mom I am, hadn't noticed!  (he got the cut wednesday, and it still just looked red friday)

anyway - I took him to urgent care that day (which is how I found out it was, indeed, infected) and the "doc" squeezed out the puss and gave us a prescription for a antibiotic cream to put on it.  no biggie.

... later that day, he started throwing up.  we went to the ER.  it was undetermined whether it was coincidence or related the infected cut.  argh.

... I can't even remember all the details, but by the day after Thanksgiving Jericho was throwing up.  over the course of about two weeks, each of the three youngest kids had battled something - if not two things.  it was hairy.  it was not a fun time.  I didn't enjoy it and frankly even remembering it now makes me very upset. 

I can't stand having sick kids, vomit especially bothers me - but just having them not feeling well is so upsetting and then you start worrying about their eating and their fluid and fevers and UGH!!

I'm so glad that is all behind us, phew!

Happy New Year - 2013!!!

ugh.  yah, here it is already the 13th of January and I'm finally saying Happy New Year!  We won't even talk about how long it's been since I've blogged!  

... but don't cry lonely little blog, I will be updating you - and hopefully it will be relatively soon!

p.s.  kids:  some day you'll be reading this and I'd like to know that I love like crazy, but good grief could y'all give me a little break so I can record your ever fleeting childhoods?  I mean, really!!!

p.p.s. anyone who hasn't given up on me, and still reads the blog (hi babe, yah - I know it's probably

pretty much down to just you now!) ... I hope to be back to somewhat of a blogging routine

this month!  ha ha ha, yah - I'm laughing too - we'll see how that turns out!!!