10 on Tuesday

1. A few pictures from the baby blessing last weekend.





2. And I set up a little "studio" in my basement for a newborn shoot and thought I needed someone else to try it on, so Whit was nice enough to bring Oscar over. And it worked out good since it was his 1 year old birthday this past week.


3. We tried moving Eli downstairs with Alden just for the night to give it a try. It did NOT work out.


4. These are so seriously loved boots. They started out with puppy tails (both ripped off). He wears them EVERYday. Seriously. All the time. We have to hide them so he won't wear them to church on Sundays. They are cracked and full of holes now. I need to find something worthy to replace them.


5. Oliver is SUCH a happy baby.

6. I had a fun b-day party for my SIL whit at my house a couple nights ago. I love throwing parties.

7. I love this girl. I miss living close to her SO BADLY. Glad we still can talk on the phone sometimes and text.



8. All the Steed Grandkids at the blessing. And Eli and Gavin aren't even crying in it :)


9. Last night Regan was on call (well Sat and Sun) and sometimes the hospital calling me wakes me up totally and sometimes I sleep right through it.

10. That's about all I have to say.

Advent Calendar days 3, 4 & 5

I just not going to be able to keep up posting our books & activities every day. But that is okay.

Our books we've opened in the last three days (well including today) were...

And I couldn't find the other book's image but it's called the Christmas Story and it's a huge board book.
The crafts and activities were....

...a snow man pizza (yeah the one on pinterest looked way cooler but this one my kids would actually eat!)


... writing stories in Christmas shapes. I just found some christmas shapes that were empty and let the kids pick which ones they wanted and let them free to write whatever stories they wanted. Alden's was called Yoshi's Christmas. And Lucy wrote one called the Snowman.



....Eli decorated his Santa face instead of writing a story in it.... for obvious reasons!


... Lucy's Paper plate Christmas tree from a couple days ago that I forgot to take a picture of


We all hung around the table for quite a while and relaxed and the kids did crafts. It was great.


On Sunday night we hung out with family and enjoyed a baby blessing.
Tonight we had a short Family Home Evening using this idea from latter day homeschooling.

Advent 2011 Day 2

Today's books were:

Well yesterday Shannon's comment was how do you remember to take pictures of all the stuff and haha I forgot to take pictures of their crafts.
They made paper plate Christmas trees and wreaths. (like these and then just a plate with the middle cut out and painted green with red dots on)

Then we attended Raymond's Old Time Christmas. They served donuts and hot chocolate, lit the tree outside and sung christmas carols, had a wishing well, and Santa came to town on a Fire engine.

Here's THE tree.

My older kids were okay with Santa, but Eli no way! Although right before we got up to him (after waiting in line for WAY too long) Lucy turns to me and says, "but mom, won't we actually be sitting on a stranger's lap?"


It was a good day. And we ran into Lethbridge and Regan picked up my birthday present. An old vintage camera to add to my collection :) LOVE it.

ADVENT 2011 Day 1

Our Advent activities this year are a little adjusted. Well it seems each year I do that a bit. But this year we are going again with the 24 Christmas books all wrapped up (I forgot to take a picture so I'll take it today!)
We had two books today since we've got more than 24 - some are wrapped with 2 in the package. We opened these two books...
Polar Express and Gingerbread Pirates

And then this.

This year instead I put all the activities inside the jar and each day the kids pick out two or three.

Our craft pulled from the jar was this. A very simple santa hat. Red construction paper and I wanted to use cotton balls but I couldn't find them, and these cotton pads worked just as well!


My kids plus two neighbor kids who were over while we did our Christmas craft today.


And then we opened some pjs and went driving around town to see all the lights.


They also have a Lego Christmas Advent Calendar all the kids are sharing and one of those chocolate ones each. That way they always get to open one with chocolate and each third day they get a small lego guy.

What are YOU doing for your advent calendar this year?

10 on Tuesday

1. Yesterday Crystal commented about a raymond story about sports. Yep, it's a sports town. Who knows if our kids will ever be fully involved or not. We'll never push them to sports but if t hey want to play we'll support them. But in a completely normal way.

2. My friend Carlye made this for me... isn't it AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!! I looooove it!!


3. I finally hung up a few things!!! This is in the basement with spots for my kids to hang their art up and a chalk board and a white board.


4. I love this little man. And I am enjoying him so much!! My Aunty Ilo sent this outfit plus another to Oliver! (And a book to all my other kids!)


5. Sunset. Just down the road from my parents house!


6. To me this is the essence of Southern Alberta.


7. My Grandma lives with my parents now which means my kids have a great grandma. Something I always had and always loved!


8. I never really felt nervous about the fires. They were far enough away that we were totally okay. But I did want to go closer to take pictures BADLY! Wish I could have taken some of the fire fighters and such. Cool! Takes me back to school when I took photography for newspaper stuff.

9. Eli plays with Nathan literally every day. We love having him over. Too bad they are moving soon! BOO!


10. We have a Christmas work party tonight and I need to make something tasty!

Lucy at six

I always like to do a list of things about my kids at their birthdays and I never got around to it, so this is a make-up post!

At six Lucy is....

• a great reader! Reads above her grade level and finds it quite easy to do.
• has decided that she needs to read the scriptures each night as personal scripture study (we have Alden do it since he turned 8).
• still has major flip outs from time to time (more often than you'd imagine for a 6 year old!)

• loves wearing dresses and skirts but finally can be convinced on some days to wear pants
• favorite foods are chicken nuggets, fries, Hawaiian pizza, smoothies and cranberries
• seems quite interested in boys lately (constantly talking about some in her class and how smart and funny they are)

• loves to give a scowl look at you when you tell her anything that isn't what she wants to hear
• loves to play with barbies, littlest pet shop and also lego with Alden
• Alden is truly her best friend
• has asked if we can go back to Lethbridge since that is where her REAL friends are
• loves having her picture taken
• every night at bed she has Regan do a reciprocal quadruple Eskimo kiss
• loves to hold Oliver and thinks it is hilarious when he does baby cooing

• thinks her teacher, Miss Jensen, is hilarious!
• loves to be read to
• has an insatiable thirst for knowledge. She drinks it in. She loves to learn anything about anything.
• she asks a LOT of questions
• she loves to help in the kitchen
• has to make at LEAST one art project a day. But usually it ranges a lot higher per day.
• wants to keep everything. Has trouble throwing anything out.
• has an up and down relationship with Eli. Either they are having tons of fun together or they are fighting.

• has very sensitive feelings
• has the loudest cry of anyone in our family
• has her own unique sense of style in clothing
• loved playing basketball at the elementary
• is a very social child. Always learns people's names and loves to say hi to everyone
• loves to giggle and laugh and can really brighten the room with her smile
• is taking tap dance and looooooves it
We Love Lucy!

10 on Tuesday

1. I'm glad Halloween is over.

2. At the school here in Raymond they have a costume parade. Where the parents and family sit in the gym and then each class comes through and parades their costumes. Great idea. :) Lucy was too worried about keeping up with her class to stand still for me to take a picture of her. But here is Alden aka Mario.


3. We split up the trick or treating. I took them around our block. Alden did our street with a friend.


and Regan took them to his parents street. Which provided more than enough candy!
Halloween at Dusk on our street.


4. We went to two dress up parties. One for adults and babies on Friday night. My nephew Oscar.

And mom and kiddos one on Saturday. I actually kind of dressed up as an angel. :) I'll have to show you some pictures from Nichole to prove it! Having a small baby makes it hard to take pictures during events so I didn't get many of my own!

5. mmm sunday dinner. Pork loin stuff with goat cheese, raisins and fresh herbs.


6. My throat feels TERRIBLE.

7. I am trying to get back into the habit of taking just every day shots again. Like this one. Cause it 20 years these are the ones that will really represent our life now.


8. Did you notice the wall color? It used to be red like the background in this one.

Thanks to Derek it looks way better. Some things are getting done on our house! And I got my new chairs! Note to self to take a picture of them so you can see them and the current living room look.(in the middle of the changes.)

9. We tried two different times to get a few shots of Sage. Newborn shoots are hard work. Add in two newborns and two new moms and wow. I feel lucky with the ones we got!

Oliver and Sage


10. Oliver was up every 2 hours last night. wowzers! I sure love snuggling that little boy! In fact I think I'll go do that right now!