Christmas Celebrations...

Here's some Christmas in MN 2008.

The fam

1st cousins

3rd cousins I believe

Christmas morning with Daddy, Reba, meema, and bumpa

Playing Outside at Grandma's

Well before we went to MN for Christmas I had a very hard time getting Grace to go outside in the cold weather. We had battles numerous times with boots, mittens, and bulky jackets. I finally gave up and said to myself, "Fine, you can learn how to play outside from Grandma. I don't want to fight anymore." Sure enough, first day at Grandma's all the kids were going outside and my little darling was just as excited as the rest of them. No taking off boots or mittens or jacket at Grandma's, just a contented toddler enjoying the fresh air! She has been great since we got home too, now she wants to go out every time the door opens.

the girls

my sweet snow bunny

Grace and Daddy

Grace and cousin Tanner

House Pictures

Here are some pics of our new house. We could not be happier here! We knew when we were going through the whole fiasco of...
showing
no offer
showing
no call
showing
no show
showing
selling for less than imagined
buying
not buying
mortgage OK
mortgage industry collapses
renting

finding house of our dreams

mortgage OK again

and here we are

....that "God always works for the good of those who love him." We have everything and more than we desired in a home and we're so thankful to be here!

formal sitting room

kitchen and dining area

family room

master

library/office

The Christmas Card Progression...

This is a typical Christmas photo shoot for anyone with kids or animals I'm sure!

And of course these are the only ones left after the "bad" ones got deleted!

1--NOOOOOOO I don't want to sit

2--Let's both look away and make Mommy crazy

3--This one will have to do

4--Let's make break

NEW HOUSE!!!

I know many of you know that we recently purchased a new home. I have to clean my house, then take some pictures, but hopefully I'll have them up soon!

Thanksgiving...

I got my beautiful baby all dressed up and ready for Thanksgiving and when I went to find her to take her picture, here's where she was! So HAPPY THANKSGIVING from Grace and Roxy.

Grace riding her bike on a chilly day. Rick calls her the little Russian girl in this get up.
Our dog? Part human? (so she thinks)

Potty Time!

Well I decided to take Grace's Royal Potty out of the box and leave it in the bathroom so she can start to get used to it. That night she wanted to use it, so I took off her diaper and told her to sit. That was not enough. She wanted her pants, diaper, t-shirt and sweater off to use the potty. Shoes were OK though. So she sat on the potty for 1 minute and then ran around the house naked for about 10. After the 10 minutes I thought, "I better get her diaper back on unless I want pee pee all over my new house." I told her to sit once more so I could snap a photo and when she got up to put her diaper back on I saw a little puddle in the potty! She actually went pee pee the first time! It was so random and funny. We did a big celebration and she got to put tp in the big potty (special treat). Since this day, no potty has taken place. The Royal Potty just ends up in random places around my house and she now thinks it's a great place to put her babies. But at least it's out of the box. One step at a time!

This is the night Grace pulled "the old marker without a cover that I had thrown away" out of the trash. I found her very quietly "coloring."

Grace and Daddy in Maine.