Running a Little Behind

So, the last post I did was on Disney, which happened Dec. 12-16 and it is now the last day in February.  I think I better catch up with things or it might get out of control.  Prepare yourself for a long one.

Next on the agenda after Disney was Christmas, of course. It was the usual running around to all the functions and family get-togethers.  I totally failed at any kind of advent activity this year with the first weeks in December being completely out of whack.  I will have to make up for that next year.  Heck, I didn't even get out our Little People Nativity set this year.  Hopefully my kids still got plenty of the Baby Jesus message through books we read and things like that because I totally dropped the ball.  December also brought muzzle loader season for Daddy and another deer.  It was his first time hunting with a muzzle loader and he enjoyed it.  It also brought some snow fun!

Here are some pics from the fabulous holiday and other fun with family and friends.

Noisy Man got the bow he has been eyeing for quite a while



Birthday cake for Jesus!

decorating the tree!  (these pictures are not in order!)

A pink princess bike!!!

Opening presents with mommy's family

Watching "Brave" evidently this was during a scarey part

The boys

Noisy Man built a snow plow for his bike when we got our first snow

Making cookies with Gpa G

A picture of the grown ups, well most of us - no clue what Uncle M is doing!

Daddy's little muzzleloader deer

My lego-headed son

After the Christmas craziness, things calmed down a little bit.  January was filled with more normal activities here and there.  The girls started back up into gymnastics and mommy even got in on the action with helping teach Hollyn's class. (Six 3 and 4 year olds on gymnastics equipment is too much for one woman to handle alone.)  Kaden got to do a couple Saturday morning basketball pracitces out at school with a little 'camp' they do out there.  Mommy got in her scrapbooking weekend and surprisingly got a lot done.  (Too bad the calendar she did still hasn't gotten printed - goal for this week for sure!)  Daddy started playing basketball himself out at the school with some friends and twisted his ankle pretty badly his first time out.  It took him 2 weeks to get all the swelling out of it.  Thankfully, he is back to normal and back to the pick-up games.  Mommy got back to running after almost taking November and December completely off (I think I only ran 4 times both those months).

Here are a few pics from January.

Snow fun!

February was also fairly calm.  We actually had weekends we spent at home with nothing on the calendar and many evenings hanging out as a family as well.   Our most exciting event in February was the girls all going to the Husker women's gymnastics meet at the Devany Center in the middle of the month.  The girls thought it was a blast and can't wait to do it again. We had a fun Valentine's Day with too many sweets and our traditional pink, heart-shaped pancakes.  Mommy decided to take part in a 'fast' for Lent (I like the idea of making a 'sacrifice' to remind me of the sacrifice Christ made for us and everytime I am tempted it reminds me to pray or thank Him for that sacrifice) and give up chocolate.  So far it has been a challenge and there has been much prayer!  I love my chocolate.  We also gained a new nephew at the end of the month and can't wait to meet him.  Jeff's sister, Melissa and her husband welcomed their 4th child, their 3rd little boy on February 22nd.

A few pics from February.

Lil' Red was quite entertaining in the down time

Really loved watching all of it and had a lot of questions.  I am sure the people in
front of us were highly annoyed or amused. 

Miss Firecracker and her friend who met us there.  We had such a great time.

And that, I believe catches me up to where we are now and apparently I didn't take many pictures in January and February.  Hopefully, I won't get so far behind again!

Disney Photo Blast

There aren't quite the words to describe the fabulous trip gifted to us by my sister-in-law.  A trip for our entire family to the most magical place on earth was incredibly priceless.  I was so excited for my kids to experience every single thing and see the joy on their faces as they saw amazing things, hero's and princesses that once only existed on a TV screen or on the pages of a book.  Sometimes the mere thought of it brought tears to my eyes, so to experience it, well, lets just say it is an act of God I was able to keep it all together during the trip.  Heck, I was probably just as excited as the kids most of the time!

And of course, Disney World did not disappoint.  So many fun and exciting things to do and see, something new around every corner and smiles on my kids' faces every single second (well, almost, they are just kids).  The only thing I didn't remember from my last trip there as a 21-year-old college student?  How exhausting it was.  Perhaps I don't remember that part because it wasn't quite as exhausting when you don't have to cart around and take care of three littles?  Perhaps.  But the joy of it through their eyes, much more than made up for the physical end of things.

Here is our trip through photos (this is less than 1/10th of the photos I took!):

The girls in front of Cinderella's Castle all lit up

The electric parade.  Cinderella did not look at us as they were driving by
and Miss Firecracker was heart broken. 

Jasmine and Aladdin.  Our first princess sighting

Swiss family Robinson tree house - kids didn't really get it because they have never seen the movie

The infamous Dumbo ride!

Pictures with a fancy Minnie Mouse

Even daddy got in on a little ear action!

The royal carousel

Speedway.  The kids had so much fun on this, but were all over the place!

Astro Orbiter, it was a bit chilly on this ride!

Monster's Inc.  Miss Thumb Sucker wanted NOTHING to do with getting in this picture!

Star Tours!  I bawled on this ride when I was 7 - Noisy Man and Miss Firecracker
loved it!

Noisy Man's favorite part of the whole trip - Jedi training!

Watching the Indiana Jones show

Extreme Stunt show - this was pretty amazing

Beauty and the Beast Musical - one of my favorites

Waiting in line to see Buzz and Woody

Walking to a bathroom, Miss Firecracker was "abducted" by toy army men!

Finally in to see the stars!

Toy Story Mania - we got the very last fast passes for this ride at 10 am, finally got to ride at 7:30!

The absolutely beautiful main street of lights

Belle at the princess breakfast

Even the boys got in on the princess action

Cinderella DID come (she wasn't a guarantee at the place where we ate)!  The girls were so
excited it brought tears to my eyes.  She even took Miss Firecracker's and Miss Thumb Sucker's
hands and led them around with her on the princess parade!

So excited to be with Cinderella

The kids got to go down on the floor and help out with part of the music at the end
of the Lion King show!  It was amazing!

Noisy Man lost his 2nd tooth while eating lunch at Animal Kingdom

Mommy and Daddy snuck in a picture

We caught Mickey finally on the last day at the parks.  Amazingly we didn't have to wait
in line at all!



We got in one morning of swimming on the very last day there

Christmas Musical Wrap Up #3

So the musical has been done for over a month now, but as you can see, I am very far behind on blogging.

Again, this year I was a part of our church's Christmas Musical, "Flagpoles, Fueding and Fudge".  Again, it was a fantastic experience.  I even had a super-fun part to play.  While last year I was the 'villianess' part of the story, this year I had the pleasure of being part of the comic relief.

I got to play Fern, a not-very-bright, never-stops-talking-once-you-get-her-started, part of a gaggle of girls. 

My fabulous hair designer!!

The play was set in the 1920's in a small town trying to avoid the "Roaring 20's" that were starting to take place in larger citites.  It was a fun little town fued (hence the name) where my gaggle of girls' leader was dead set against having a washing machine factory brought to our town out of fear that it might bring in crime and corruption.  The town was split between this view and the view of the Senator who wanted the town to have the factory for economic stability. 

Through a series of events it becomes a story of encouragment and blessing by working together for the common good of the town and the fact that Jesus was sent to bless us and has, thus called us to bless those around us through love and working together to further His Kingdom.

Love this woman!

It was amazing to see God work through the cast and crew as we saw time after time how He pulled us through various things that, to the normal eye, would have been big setbacks or mountains to overcome.  He uses all of us ordinary people to carry His message in such a fun way, it is an honor to be included.

The trio of girls, Ethel, Mabel and Fern

Heck, He even found a way to get us a little plug on a highly-viewed news program in our regional area.  I'll put the link here, if I can find it again.

The whole crew!

Since I have already had a month of rest, I'm starting to get excited for what this year will bring!

Catch Up #2

November was busy with busy stuff.  Not a lot of photo-worthy events, but we were on the run quite a bit.  As of right now, I don't really have any pictures of November as I seem to have deleted them off my SD card before they were fully downloaded onto my computer.  UGH!  Now I am hoping that a friend's husband will come to my rescue and be able to restore them for me.

Anyway, our biggest even in November is Miss Thumb Sucker's birthday.  She left toddler hood and enter into the preschool age.  The big 3.  (Sad face)  She  was super excited about our upcoming Disney trip so she decided that we should have a Disney birthday.  We went with Minnie Mouse of course.  Sadly, these were the only pictures I still have of the party.

The cake didn't turn out quite as good as I had hoped...  It got a little melty



And of course, with every birthday comes the yearly photo shoot.  I was so thankful to have gotten so many really good ones of her this year!  This one is one of my faves!









 

Noisy Man got to go deer hunting with daddy for the first time this year.  He was so excited but I don't think he realized how much of a 'sit-and-wait' game hunting can be.  Daddy says he did pretty good with the quiet activities he took to keep him occupied in the blind, but come the 2nd day after a few hours he was getting bored and asking to go back to grandpa's.  Shortly after one of these requests a 'shootable' deer came in and daddy got it.  This quickly turned a boring hunt into the 'best day ever' for our little man.  I am hoping to get pictures of this off daddy's little camera he uses for his hunting and fishing excursions, since I lost the ones off my camera for now.

Not too much else noteworthy for November, Mommy had her birthday, but after so many those aren't too exciting anymore either. 

Playing Catch Up

Okay, so all of November I did my "Thankfulness" posts, which means I posted nothing else.  Then December was so incredibly busy I didn't get anything done in that month either.  I have a lot of catching up to do!  Actually, I didn't post much in October either so I have that month to do as well.  Yikes!  I'll try to condense.

Thankfully, October was a little laid back.  We got our Pumpkin Patch trip snuck into September and didn't really squeeze in much else, mostly likely due to the fact that we knew November and December would be so busy.

We got in a bowling trip with Daddy's family.

 

Miss Firecracker continued on in her gymnastics classes and Miss Thumb Sucker got to try out her first class.  They both love it, and I think we'll be watching some tumbling and flipping for our foreseeable future!

Miss Thumb Sucker loves gymnastics, but doesn't love that she has to wait in line to do all of the things she wants to do.
We have a little trouble keeping her on task and off the other equipment, but we are hopeful that she'll figure it out.

Miss Firecracker is quite the gymnast.  She can about do her backwards rolls on her own on the ground and
Ms Lisa even had her try a new splits summer sault that no one else did!

 

Our not-so-exciting event in October was smashing the van with a run-in with a deer.  It was no fun going two weeks with out the van while it was being fixed.  I didn't remember to take any pictures, even though I was on my way to a photo shoot when I hit it.

Lastly, we closed off October with some Halloween fun.  We had Anakin Skywalker, Fancy Nancy and Cinderella this year.