:: christmas ::

Christmas went by way to fast!  I can't believe tomorrow is the weekend and then New Year's!  We had a great Christmas!  We went to the parent's on Christmas eve and stayed home all day on Christmas day!  Larry got me some brown boots that we picked out together 2 weeks ago and he suprised me with diamond earrings (to replace the old ones I lost) that he and Grace picked out!  My kiddos got a ton of toys and I am still trying to find a place to put them all and Goodwill ones we do not need!  For my kids I got them a used item and spent money on their gifts from there.  Crazy I know but this is how it worked.  I was given a free easel earlier in the year and kept in my works basement and took it to my mom's house to have her put Grace's name on it and to cover up the marker prints from the kiddo before her.  In the pics it doesn't show it but the stuff my mom did is on the other side. Super cute with her name.  A couple weeks ago she said she didn't want to be clown anymore and wanted to be an artist so I was already ahead of her!  I got a ton of new markers and paints for her and a bag (the one pictured) to put them in.  Her nana has a bag like it so she was excited!

Here she is the next day after Christmas!  Coloring away on her easel :)  I didn't have to spend much cause Crayola products were buy one get one free and I used coupons and saw sales! :)

  

My Buddy loves one of the daycare kids DS and I know that the new thing is the Nintendo 3DS but it was over $150 and came with the mario game.  I so was not going to spend that much on my kiddo I know I should but I was trying to keep cost down.  So I asked my mom if she was using her DS and she said no and let me have her's for free to give to Buddy!  Thanks mom!  So I went to town and got him the Mario game which was the most expensive and got him a case and 5 other games I knew he would love that were all under $10 cause I was watching for sales and Amazon!  He loves it and is super excited about it.  I do feel bad I gave him something used but now he has 6 games instead of just one and I would have turned off the 3D part of the new style DS anyways for his eyes.

Needless to say he loves it!  For Larry I got him some traveling stuff and Battleship to play with Hunter!  So far they are 1-1 they have played everyday since Larry opened it except for today. :)  I think it was a good idea of this mama cause both boys love games and this one is a good strategy kind and they both are good at that!

Me and my girl watching the Fox and the Hound.  I taught Grace to call it the Fox and the Hoooooound! You make the Hound part sound like a hound dog saying it. :)

My girl got another stuffed animal she got about 4 at Christmas but this is Boo she really likes him.  :)

And she took great pictures with him. 
I have only got 1 out the 5 goals done of my Christmas break goals!  But I hope to power through the other ones soon!  Larry and I watched the Hobbit last night so that was nice and it wasn't even one of my goals.  It is amazing how cleaning and cooking and playing with your kids makes you not get your goals done but they will in good time.  I got 2 more days! Merry (late) Christmas everyone!!!

The next big thing is my girl's birthday's!  Misha turns 7 on the 4th (I think) and Grace turns 4 on the 8th and her party is on the 1st so her Papa will be here for her birthday!  This will be a first he was here for her birth but has worked in Canada during the winter term for all her birthday's.  This should be fun!!!


:: vacation ::

I am offically on my Christmas vacation!!!

What does that mean exactly?  It means that I can be a mom with my kiddos for a week!  I don't have to go to work until New Year's!  Whoo Hoo!  And it means my whomps are out of school too so we have no plans whatsoever other then celebrate Christmas!  Larry came home tonight and he is home until after the first, too!  Double whoo hoo!  I already have my Christmas Break goals written out.  I got only 5 goals on it so will see how I do!  I am such a happy mommy right now cause my man is home my kids are asleep and all is well (expect my laundry room is a mess but it is on my list of things to do!) and I am just happy that we are all together and longer then a week! Whoo hoo!We have no skating or swimming lessons this week and we are so open for whatever and that is the cool part! So hello Christmas vacation please go slow and be full of fun and alot of sleeping! :) 

:: cancer bites ::

I deal with cancer ever day at work.  We check for it, look for it, diagnosis it, see patients with it, and watch patients die with it.  Usually I am ok with it but if it is a child or someone I know I get twittered about it.  My side of the family has been blessed without getting it, but my Grandma Betty on my dad's side died of a brain tumor a year or so ago.  My father-in-law has cancer and he is doing awesome. My past co-worker who got ovarian cancer 7 years ago is not doing well and now she has 6 months or less to live and is in the hospital and might not get out and if she does she will be on hospice and it just bums me out and makes me mad.  I am not a fan of cancer but when it hits home likes this makes me wish a cure could come soon!  The bummer part for my friend is she has tried so many different types of chemo treatments in the past that were new and experimental and wasn't sure the outcome but the way I see it is she made the decision for her life to prolong it to see if she could live and see if they did work that she has expanded so many other peoples lives that haven't even been diagnosed with cancer just cause of her trying.  Do I make sense?  She paved the way for her kids future if heaven forbid her kids get her type of cancer or I get it in my future or any of my family and friends because she tried fight her cancer with all these crappy new chemo's that will maybe one day cure cancer.  I wish that we could find a cure cause cancer bites and my heart goes out to this family.  The kids already lost their dad to cancer and now their mom is dying.  Sucks.

:: 12-13-12::

I think this date will be a memory to me just like 9-11.  20 innocent Kindergartener's and teacher's and a Principal was killed by a young adult.  I don't watch the news and there is a reason for it.  But this is too much for me.  I still haven't turned on the news to watch any of it cause I can't.  It hits to close to home.  My buddy is a Kindergartener and if anyone did this to him and my family I would go crazy, not going to lie.  I have been reading some on Facebook and when I open up my email on MSN but today I had to stop reading it because they listed the names and ages of the kids.  This is too much for me.  It is hard enough to understand why it happened but I don't need to know their names and how young they died.  I already think of the kids thinking they were in a safe place to learn in school cause we their parents want them to go to learn to get to first grade and I just hope that their families and friends can come to peace sometime in their lives and for the police, parametics, and fireman that had to deal with what they saw and the after math of the whole ordeal.  I will never forget this day and I am sad for so many innocent children and I just hug my kiddos more now because of it.

:: instagrams ::

 

I love my Instagram app! It makes my pictures so darn good. The bad part is I don't bring out my good camera and keep using the camera on my phone. My best subjects with my Instagram are my girls...Grace, Lucy, and Misha. They are troopers when it comes to me taking pictures of them! Here are some I have taken this month and last! You gotta get the Instagram app!

:: whomps DVD's ::

I love, love, love to organize!  My house is 50/50 organized.  I am behind on so many projects that I want organized that I finally finished one I have wanted to do for MONTHS!  I got this from a blog I love...iheartorganizing!   Project Whomps DVD's is finished!  They are horrible about putting their DVD's back in their cases and it just makes me crazy.  And it got so bad that my hidden bins that housed their DVD's looked like this!...

You can understand why I have wanted to do this project!  The bins are horribly out of control!  No organizing at all.  The blog said to get DVD/CD holders that are 2 sided and put them in order of kids, adults, and so on.  I just did all the kids videos.  No rhyme or reason to the colors I just tried to put them in some type of order.  I haven't done it yet cause Grace was not happy with me but the cases for the DVD's are going in the shed in a bin she didn't like that idea but it will happen under her nose. 

 Don't the discs look so pretty and organized?!  And yes Grace already took one and and put it back in the slip so it is kid proof!  I used an old bin that I got at Hunter' baby shower that I reused for this project. 

Then I found a home for the DVD's where both whomps can get them.  Under the Wii controllers and if they make a mess Grace who loves to organize and put things in colors I am pretty sure will keep it looking good.  Win win situation.  I love it when a project gets done!  No more DVD sleeves on my desk glaring at me to do this project!  Now I have 2 free bins to put stuff in after doing this.  Score! :)

:: just hatched ::

I just finished Grace's birthday party invites and it just amazes me that my kids will be a year older in the next couple of months!  Grace turns 4 in January and Hunter will be 6 in March!  So I went to the archives of our pictures and we put all the pictures of the day they were born in a folder called " Just Hatched" .  It is truly amazing how they both look so much alike at birth and so different now. They looked so much alike with their head covered but without the hat a whole different story!  Hunter had very fine light brown hair and Grace had black hair with side burns past her ears!  Hunter was bigger and longer and Grace was petite and smaller.  But you can't tell in these pictures.  :)

 

Here is Hunter's Just Hatched pictures...

And here is Grace's Just Hatched pictures...



• 

:: music ::

Music is my help mate.  I never really understood music until I was at my lowest and went to counseling.  I learned and my counselor taught me to find something that helped me and got me through whatever was my issue.  So I learned to turn on music.  And listen to the words, and the actual melody, sing, and dance to it.  I love all kinds of music but my fav would have to be country and Celtic.  I am starting to actually sing again too.  I don't feel embarrassed about it anymore.  I sang in grade school and high school but I think it was more of a pressure to sing and they needed kids to sing to make it to convention and competitions.  So I did it.  But now it isn't forced.  And I dance to music.  I dance crazy with my kids or just dance with my kiddos in my arms showing them how to dance. I posted another song that I am loving right now!  I gotta get myself a Kenny Chesney album cause I love all his music but Pandora is my ultimate friend and I can listen to him on that!



My next new find is finding Christmas music that I love!  My past favorite Christmas artist is Amy Grant.  I love her 2 old Christmas albums.  I haven't found them yet for this season but hopefully will get the right bin out next week!  My fav, fav, fav from the last couple of years is this one...



Faith Hill!  Love this song!  I could sing it at the top of my lungs. :) 

This last week I have been overwhelmed and it happens every time Larry is gone every month and I am not sure why.  I think it is because I want my family to be like so many out there all together and not have to be apart.  But mine isn't like that and I hope someday it is but I get overwhelmed with life, kids, house, work, and being the one in charge.  So I have to take out my music and sit back and let it work its way into me and either listen, sing, or dance to it.