Picture

Natalie and Josey got coordinating outfits from Nana and Papa. They were so cute (and hard to tell apart) I took a sweet picture of them together. It's fun having the girls so close in age, especially being that neither have a sister. While it's fun having boys, I think Heather and I often mourn the fact that our girls won't have the same sister relationship that she and I share.


Jacob gets a little jealous when Josey and Natalie play together (or when Natalie plays with anyone who isn't him) He was pretty upset when I wanted a picture of the girls together. He decided he needed a picture taken with Daddy. But first, we had to have a picture with him making a funny face.


Then he had to put his gloves back on for the next picture. I'm not sure WHY he was wearing gloves in the house, but I've learned sometimes it's best not to ask. He was pretty upset with me for taking this picture. I'm not ready Mom!!


For this final picture he stood in front of Daddy and I don't think his Dad minded one bit. Brett does NOT like having his picture taken. If you look close, you can see Josey peeking out from behind these handsome boys...and Natalie's head is right behind Jacob's. The girls didn't want to be left out either!

Family, Friends and Good Meals

This year we had quite a lot of snow during the Christmas holiday. My poor parents were without power for 4 days (and 16 hours according to my mom) Thankfully during the evening of Christmas their power was restored. In part because of the lack of power at my parents and part because of the snow, my sister and her children didn't make it up to us for Christmas until the day after.

So, on Friday afternoon, the six of us piled into the truck, which has 6 seatbelts, but proved to be a VERY squishy ride. On the ride to my parents house, my oldest remarked 'I wonder what kind of presents we're going to get' In motherly fashion, I pointed out that Christmas isn't about presents but about many other more important things. I asked him to name 3 things besides presents that were important about Christmas. He responded with Family, Friends and Good Meals. Sounded like a good answer to me!! At 9 he is constantly eating and gets really excited around holidays because of the meals.




Papa carves the turkey with his ELECTRIC knife. We tease my dad every time he uses this knife. My parents think they got it as a wedding gift (40 years ago in July)



Nana prepared the meal while the kids were playing in the snow. I think she was just happy to have the lights on while she cooked!



Here are 6 sweet children lined up waiting to open presents. Miracle of miracles we actually got them to all sit still and look in the same general direction!
Left to right: Ben, Orion, Natalie, Josey, Jacob, Brett

Appropriate

Lately Natalie and I have been having chats about things that are appropriate and inappropriate. It all started when we saw a commercial for Bratz. I just don't feel like these are appropriate toys for a child her age and I have told her that.

Now each time we see a Bratz commercial she says "Bratz aren't appropriate are they Mommy?" The best part is how she says appropriate....po-pree-ate. We have also determined that the cartoon Chowder is inappropriate. But BARBIE is appropriate.

Brett, my almost 9 year old, asked why Barbie was appropriate but Bratz weren't. 'They are practially the same thing" he argued. Sadly I couldn't come up with a real answer! Something about Barbie is just classier than Bratz. I guess if you really got down to it, both Bratz and Barbie could damage a girl's self image, but I had Barbie and I never expected to have a tiny waist and hourglass figure. To me, Barbie is just FUN!

Regardless, Natalie got her first Barbie for Christmas this year!

Jake's Jammies

Last night, we were sitting on the couch watching a movie. Soon Jake comes out talking about his jammies. It took us a few minutes to figure out what he was saying. He needed help getting his shirt on, on top of the red footed jammies we put in him before bed, on top of the OTHER jammie shirt he had put on on top of the original jammes My silly boy was wearing 3 pairs of jammies!

He could hardly put his arms down. It was so funny I had to hide my face so he wouldn't see how hard I was laughing! Eventually he got everything on and he headed to bed. I honestly don't know what goes on in his little head, but he usually has a plan of some sort.

My First Blog

So here is my first blog. I've debated blogging for a little while. I'm the mom of 4 kids and as you can imagine, we have some pretty crazy adventures around here.

My oldest son will be 9 in February. He's pretty high energy, and like his Dad, he needs to be entertained constantly. My 2nd son is 7 1/2. He's calmer for the most part but can be pretty goofy too. My daughter is 5. We call her M.I.T -Mom-in-Training. She's very nurturing, very bossy, very sweet. My youngest son is 3. He is trouble! Sometimes my husband and I just shake our heads at him. Other times we are trying to hide our laughter and put on a stern Mommy face.

I guess we'll just have to see where this blog leads us.