Happy Day Holidays

Has everyone had a great holiday...and now recovering? ;)

 

After our wonderful Christmas day, we packed up and drove the beautiful 120 miles to Kalispell. We are always welcomed with lights glowing in the night, greeting us, beckoning us inside from the cold night air that smells ever so lightly like, uh, pigs :)

 

Logan's wonderful parents watched the kids and gifted an early anniversary meal out to us! It was a beautiful night and a very nice and tasty restaurant called Jagz in Whitefish. After our meal of steak and pork tenderloin and pecans, we decided to go for ice cream. Yes, ice cream, in the winter. Never felt warmer though, walking hand in hand with the man I said "I do" to 7 years ago!

It was beyond beautiful at the farm...and the sledding hill took up all of one morning and part of an afternoon. Cousins ran up...glided down, time after time after time. Their amount of energy is incredible when they're sledding. Kids never complained of being tired once when going back up the hill....so now I KNOW they're lying when the boys say they're "too tired" to pick up their train tracks ;)


Here's Kadyn and Kase ready for a run down.


Boys brought their Strider bikes, and Grandma and Papa had some skis to put on them. Wonderful invention..they all had a blast on them! Even daddy took a ride down. Ha!


Kase was the luckiest sledder of all...help down AND up every time :)


We were so lucky to get to go see Adrian and Anna TWICE that weekend! We played Tetris, Rook, and Thump while the kids all played incredibly well together. The bounce house is a magnet, and the boys like older kids to hang out with, and of course another couple boys to understand they're boy kind of games!



How adorable are these two? Their giggling made my heart smile quite large :)



We stopped for lunch on the way back home...and this guy was super pleased to get a cookie with his turkey sandwich. It's the small things!


Throwing this picture in here too...this is what our house looks like post-Costco. I love having all these good groceries, but it's a half days worth of work just to prep and put it all away! Kids love helping though, which may or not be actual helping ;)


For New Years Eve, the boys got new jammies to stay up till midnight in! We had a grand time over at Nick and Beth Ross's house, fortunately just up the hill a mile. There were lots of kiddos there who all played hard, being sure to spend every ounce of energy trying to keep themselves up till midnight. And, they did! The men all talked about guy stuff and the rest played a massive game of  Apples to Apples and Thump.


Look at this guy. Unbelievable. Too big.


Even though the kids stayed up 3 hours later...they didn't, however, SLEEP IN 3 hours later. They woke up for pancakes for the first breakfast of 2014 and opened a new gift to welcome the New Year with a smile and a toy.

We're now 3 days in, and I think 2014 will be a GREAT year! Here's to hoping happiness, good health, and peace to all of you!

Dec 25th

Most people wouldn't believe that we had the most perfect Christmas Day without any presents to be seen or any tales of St. Nick to be heard! 

Christmas Eve was spent playing with the 5 most important boys in my life...and then cuddling with the ones who wouldn't go to sleep :)

This table spread...before the food got there. Around our table was Pablo and Olga, Clara, matias, Gma Mary, Sandy, and the 6 of us!

Farm To Market Pork ham with oranges and cranberries...'nuff said 

Matias and Kase are special buddies. Mathias looks out for kase, carries him across the yard after he fell on the ice, gets him what he needs and is his protector. He's so sensitive to the kids and I love to watch them. It was one day that Matias was cuddling Reid that Olga looked at them and just knew that she was pregnant!! Oh, by the way...this sweet family is going to be adding another baby to their fam! So sad that they will be back home In Chile when baby will be born!!

We decorated cookies with the kids and Aunt Sandy and Grandma Mary!!

Making memories, playing Memory <3

And...we closed the days making pans and pans of cinnamon rolls for our next stop of fun... Kalispell!

I hope you all had a relaxing week with lots of love in your hearts! 

Wordy Wednesday

So, this post here is quite the opposite of the "Wordless Wednesday" posts that appear mid-week....

This guy..sigh! Incredibly cute, growing too fast, no sleeping, irresistible dimple...that pretty much sums up this guy!  

 

I had a moment to myself one Saturday morning. Alone. Like completely alone...imagine that! :)


I am documenting this picture of No.2 and No.3...they appear to be friends, right?


We finally got a bit of snow...so what do the boys go out and do? Dig thru it to get to the DIRT! Good thing is was all frozen or we would have had a massive mess!


Vroom vroom! Missing the snowplow on front, Grandpa!


Coy has been asking and begging for snow since October so that he could go and make a snow angel! The boys made snow angels indoors on top of a big pile of puzzle pieces, but it wasn't the same as the real deal!


Kids are crazy about steamers, which is their number 1 request after coming in from a snowy play day. These are vanilla almond milk, honey, and cinnamon and taste just like cinnamon toast crunch! :)


Sigh.


A lot of kids watch popcorn pop nude. Am I right? Right? No?


Story hour is just a few miles down the road, at a decent time of 10:30 and our friend Bonnie does the activities there....but we still seem to have trouble making it there. Lets just say it's uh, challenging going there with 4 kids, projects that require parent assembly for 3 of them, clean up for 3 kids, plus either nursing or bouncing a baby whose naptime happens to be store time, keeping close tabs on him cause he gets stepped on...
But our awesome Bonnie (Coleman) often brings left over activities to the boys! Here was candy snowmen...most of the candy was eaten before a snowman could be made too intricately...but they were for sure cute. And tasty.


4 kids in a cart leaves no room for any impulse buying. Big stuff anyway.


Now 4 in a chair! :)



This past weekend we got to celebrate with Kadyn for her 11th birthday. Where have the years gone? I seriously cannot imagine having an 11 year old....


Another picture of the 4 boys dressed about to head out to Special Meeting! So handsome, huh? They did very well during meeting too...second one was more challenging obviously because...well, ya know!


3 boy had dentists appointments the other morning and did so good! Bentley took the opportunity to relax after an excellent check up while waiting for the rest to finish up. This dentist office gives out more toys than any place I've known...seriously, I feel the strong need to purge toys after they come home from the dentist...argh!


After the dentist we stopped by the Birth Center and they just happened to have some raindeer antlers that fit these little heads perfectly. And it often sounds like the living room below "up on the housetop" around here too!


We were lucky to have Jane MacCloud from New Foundland for a night. The kids were quite embarrassing, but it pleased my heart to see them "helping" her up the steps to the potluck.

So that sums up the last 2 weeks. 2 weeks have flown by, can you believe it? Here's to hoping that I post again before another 2 fly by!

If not, I hope that the next 2 weeks bring you joy! :)

My Scene on Dec. 3rd

I had plans today. 

The 3 big boys are at preschool with Beth (I'll introduce that amazing woman later) and I ran to get a coffee and then was going to run in the treadmill once Reid was down for a nap. Excersize for 40 minutes, load the dishwasher, fold the 2 baskets of clothes, then pick up the boys. I was finally going to be productive!!

However....that's not what's happening. And I'm totally ok with it. The house is in ok condition...living room is still picked up. Wow.

The boys room has already started to be disaster-fied..but it is ok, they had fun..

My sewing station has been abandoned mid-stitch on a special skirt I'm making for a special girl. It can wait. (Oh look, there's my americano. Ahhh!)

It can all wait ...cause I'm doing this right now ...

So when we're all wondering why I haven't lost the baby weight..it's cause I have a baby. :) I'm a very lucky mommy!

That's my scene this morning!

He's FOUR and we ADORE

We celebrated another birthday this week.

This deep dimpled spitfire we named Bentley Armour turned FOUR!

 

On Wednesday, his actual birthday, we went in to have lunch and ice cream with Daddy and Gramma Mary. How delicious does this ice cream cone look? The birthday fella was fighting a bug so he didn't take more than a few bites, but when he wants to try again, we will concur. Gladly :)

 

At 4 years old, Bentley's deep dimples bring us joy and we experience a love for him that comes from deep within our hearts. He's stubborn, strong willed, a screamer, a stomper, a major fit thrower, a "NO!!!"-er - but is also a tenderhearted brother, a nuzzler, hand kisser, giggler, inquisitive, great sharer, and focused. Bent brings a smile to our faces and an exploding love to our hearts!

 

Bentley's sweet smile and dimples often reminds me of the inner beauty of people. He's a sassy guy and often frustrating but he's also got that face and sweet eyes that bring me back to center...that remind me of just how beautiful and tender God created people. He is my reminder in so many ways that we are not our own and we need to be led by the hand by the One who knows all! And I love him SO much more for that!

 

Wow, this is THE day we welcomed him into our family. I can remember it all SO clearly, as if I had just experienced it. Auntie Sarah was living with us then and she had brought an unsettled little Coy in to the Birth Center to be with us. They dozed downstairs while Logan and I labored so hard to bring about this little guy into the world. After an undescribably incredible water birth, Coy came up to meet his brother. It was an overwhelming moment...these two meeting and knowing they'd be lifelong friends. Our days got busier, but hearts got bigger!

 

 

 

So, I HAD to share this picture too :)

And this one. Is there anything sweeter then loving siblings? We know their future will always include eachother! And their other brothers too, of course, but these two have an extra special bond.

Bentley wanted an airplane birthday, so here's the cake I tried to decorate. We had a few great friends over for pizza, popcorn and chocolate cake.

 

 

It's kind of hard to see hanging up, but the banner says "Flying High at 4". I'll admit that he's not flying too high a day after all that sugar! We even splurged and got soda because they were in such cute little cans. :) I know, bad mommy move! (I've learned my lesson)

 

It was satisfying to hear the laughter and screeches of these kids! They can all relate to eachother and somehow understand eachothers goofyness :) Plus, they all love Lego's and basketball. WIN!

 

 

So tonight we are going to kiss our not-so-little Bentley Armour and say a prayer of thankfulness for him and the joy he's brought us since second 1!

 

And also bathe him....we all know how dirty little boys can get! Eww!

 

 



In 9 Months Time..

In just 9 months time, our sweet little Reid bug went from this......

To THIS!

He crawling now, loves to eat avacados and bananas with raspberries and spinach, talk (hollars) along with his brothers, has that smile and dimple that stops everyone in the grocery store, and loves sleeping snug in our arms at night.

He makes our hearts feel full. He makes us so proud, growing well and developing into what we can already see will be a bright little fella.

He's finally getting a tooth and were so lucky he's been a fairly mellow tether. Maybe when he gets more teeth he will be more interested in food, as he eats a little but prefers to nurse yet. Which I absolutely love :) That however didn't stop him from chomping on Beth's caramel apple!

Oh yup, there's an avacado...more smeared  on the table than his mouth! Reid loves his daddy and always wants to be where his brothers are.  But the curious little guy usually ends up getting dragged to a secluded corner, giving brothers 32 seconds of 10 less little grabby fingers in their pile until he appears again...teehee!

Happy 9 months to our precious little B-Bug! You are a bright and warm ray of sunshine in our hearts and home!