Pre-Christmas activities!

What a busy pre-Christmas week we had! It was so much fun with two little ones this year, Kyler and Brynlee were so spoiled and we had so many fun things to do and memories to make. Below is everyone opening our Christmas pajamas at Josh's parents house a couple days before Christmas...
Brynlee kissing Grandma Chapman...

Kyler had his first school program on Dec 23rd with his preschool class(of 8 kids), which consisted of singing Frosty the Snowman, Santa Claus is comin' to town, and Kyler's favorite - Jingle Bells. He was a little shy, but did really great! Cute cute boy. The kids got to hold and shake some "jingle bells" during the chorus of the song... but Kyler tried to secretly shake them through the whole entire song(as if no one would notice hehe).
On Christmas Eve we celebrated with Josh's parents and his Grandma Case and that side of the family. Grandma Case is so amazing, having raised 7 kids all by herself never having owned a car, and now has many many great-grandkids and grandkids to shop for, and every year she gives gifts to every one of them. We celebrated at the Incredible Pizza Company and had lunch, and in the Christmas spirit, all the 23 children present were very well behaved!

Below is Christmas Eve at our house; Kyler making Santa cookies with daddy and Reindeer food with mommy, and dumping it outside for them to eat! So many fun things to do in preparation for Santa to come!

(not so)Silent Night

Somebody hospitalize me. please. I'm exhausted! I have the best husband in the world when it comes to helping out with the kids at night... but even then, nobody is sleeping in our house. With everyone having colds that won't go away, an almost-6-mo-old baby who still never sleeps for more than a couple hours without waking up(and is a total mommy's girl), a 3-yr-old with a recurring bad dream about a scary butterfly(what?) and wants to sleep in mommy and daddy's bed, and a deep, dry ache in my chest and constant headaches from lack of sleep... if I didn't try to laugh at all this, I might cry. so here are some cartoons :) happy sleeping everybody!

It's December!

Merry Christmas everyone! I love this time of year, the smell of our wood-burning fireplace, Christmas lights in the dark night, flannel sheets and hot baths, cinnamon candles and pumpkin pie... and family time playing board games and such! We've been busy as usual, so here are some random things that we've been up to.

Took this picture out my window... cute little doe Deer season was definitely a frustrating one this year... but at least we were able to go(thankyou to family who watched the kids!), there wasn't any snow on the ground, and Josh did finally end up getting at least a spike buck before the season ended, so we've got some venison to process hopefully today or tomorrow... mmmmmm... deer jerky! We might be picking up stuff to make bratwurst too. and I think one of us might try to go out somewhere close for anterless season.... hopefully me ;)

I can't believe we made it into December without any snow... but not to disappoint, the first snowfall was a blizzard, literally. And below are some letter blocks I made for our bedroom.

The kids already got to open a present - Thank you for the Christmas ornaments Gma & Gpa Brown! What a fun tradition, they look adorable on our tree! Brynlee is getting obsessed with grabbing & playing with everything around her, so it was fun to have a preview of her opening presents... she's going to love it!

Here is our new GINORMOUS television that lurks in the family room now... needless to say the Iowa bowl game party is at our house this year ;)

And yes, I can't believe I haven't posted a pic of my HOTT hubby ;) no, I'm not just bragging for no reason... this is an "after" shot of his Farrell's eXtreme Bodysculpting challenge he did, and WON $1000 for it. Now he's training to be an instructor and coach there!

I LOVE my kiddos!

Going through pics tonight I just had to share how blessed I am to have such wonderful children. They are healthy, they are happy, and they are simply magical. Kyler has such a witty mind and hilarious sense of humor, and Brynlee, well, is just a glowing bundle of sweet right now. And sometimes I'm in awe that I get to be their mom. In awe that they could even need and love ME an ounce as much as I do them!

Above is Kyler rubbing lotion on my feet. Yes, awwwwww! He has a bit of OCD when it comes to a couple things, one of which is getting stuff on his hands(can you tell from the pic?), but he happily grins and bears it to rub lotion on mommy's feet, and then he runs to the bathroom to wash it off as soon as he's done.

And below, is him comforting me when I got a little exhausted and just laid down on the floor. As annoying as it is sometimes, I am rarely left alone. I can shut myself in my bedroom, and it will only be seconds before I hear Kyler asking daddy if he can go see mommy, and if mommy is okay, if mommy is tired or sick, and if he can go give mommy a kiss.

Can we say sweeeeeeetie pie?

Halloween 2010

Kyler was a little bit scared of his costume this year! Thankfully, with effort and tears, he got over that and was able to go trick-or-treating. He was a very polite Mr. Incredible, using his soft sweet little voice and remembering to say thank you. Everyone loved him. For her very first Halloween Brynlee was a sweet little fairy, my mom picked up this cute little tutu that even has tiny wings!

We had a Branch Halloween party at church this year - yes, if you don't know, we are currently serving in a Branch (: It was lots of fun, I helped the Youth put it together and did some face-painting.

Pumpkin carving... yeah, the gourd was not so easy to cut. I drew by hand the bat, the cat, and the witch, Josh picked out a trace design, oh, and I should probably add that he also did all of the yucky dirty work this year(thanks babe!). And below are my adorable kids with their pumpkins, what can I say.

Above is a wood-block decoration that I made! I got the idea from someone else of course, but I saw it and knew Josh had some scrap 2x4 laying around, and lets be honest, I couldn't live without keeping modge-podge and random ribbon on hand, so it was just the cost of a couple sheets of scrapbook paper ;)

I must add that I even hand-drew the letters and cut them out... but I'm SO looking forward to using something on my Christmas list in the future if I was a good enough girl this year ;)

Pumpkin Patch

What an awesome trip! We went to Patch's Pumpkin Patch here in Adel, and it was wonderful! Their petting zoo was really great(and Kyler got super-friendly with all the animals, not scared at all!), they had free "cow train" rides, and horse rides! I can't believe how hot it was too, what a nice warm fall. The funniest part of all I didn't even get a good picture of - for his pumpkin, Kyler picked out a green, wart-covered gourd! He cracks me up! haha, but hey, they were only $.75 each, any size :)