It's the Little Things

Chris has been in China now for over a month and everyone is missing him horribly.  Overall, we are all doing great, but we find that we need to look for little things to bring some extra happiness into our lives that we would normally get just by seeing Dad walk in the door at the end of the day.  Some of the little things that have helped have been having Grandma come stay for a couple of the weekends, a trip to Taco Bell to experience it for the first time (Chris doesn't like Taco Bell so we've never been before), painting Valentine's T-shirts, Frostys and dinner at Wendy's to celebrate filling the piano treat jar, and a shopping trip at Walmart to buy toys with Christmas gift cards from Uncle Mike and Aunt Sarah.  While at Walmart, we also browsed through the clearance racks and found these adorable T-shirts for $3 or less.  The girls love their cute shirts so much, I can barely get them to take them off to be washed.  Sometimes it really is the little things that keep us going.

In the Nick of Time

 Just as we thought that Spring would get here without any snow to speak of, we woke up on Monday morning to this beautiful sight.

 Monday was President's Day and as many of the schools were out, it seemed like a perfect day to let the kids play with their friends in the snow.  The older kids were brave enough to go down the hill by our driveway.

 The girls were out running around in the forest and they looked tired when they got back.

 Especially after climbing up our hill.

 After lunch, they went back out for some snowman building and snowball throwing.  Jared made a head and named him General.  Then he put him downstairs in our freezer.  We haven't told Chris about it, we're waiting to surprise him when he gets home from China, won't he be surprised to find a frozen head in the freezer!

 

On Tuesday it was really warm, but there was just enough snow to build a fort and have a great snowball fight.  I hope the kids enjoyed it because Spring is on it's way, we've had several days of 70 degrees lately.

It's a Palooza!

The 8-11 year old girls have been planning a family dance at church for several months. Clarissa has been so excited for us to go to this dance and see the decorations that she made. Plus, we love dancing.

I am 24 weeks pregnant and ready to go dancing!

Amber, dancing with some of her friends. The best part of the evening was when one of her little boy friends asked me to dance and she was just standing there with her hands on her hips, so put out that her friend asked me and not her. I convinced him to dance with her and she was glowing. So cute.
Krystal was trying out some of her ballet moves to rock music, it was pretty cute.
Clarissa and Amber's friend Danielle are dancing to the Wii Just Dance.

Jared was so good, he danced with all the little girls. These are some of the decorations that Clarissa made for the dance. We all had so much fun. We just missed Chris because he was in China on a business trip.

Family Clown

Umm...need I say more? The best part about this girl is how she keeps a straight face when she's making us crack up and she comes up with this stuff all on her own.

We're Half Way There!

For some strange reason, I seem to be humming Bon Jovi's "Living On a Prayer," I just can't figure out why :). I am now 20 weeks along in the pregnancy. I have been feeling pretty good, other than needing to take a short nap most days. I just love feeling the baby move, it has got to be one of the most amazing feelings and it feels like my own little secret every time I feel it. (BTW - everytime I see a picture of a pregnant model I always laugh at the way they seem to be arching their back. Now look at me, I certainly wasn't trying to, how funny).

"Cause You Got Personality"

’cause you got personality,Walk, personality
Talk, Personality
Smile, Personality
Charm, personality
Love, personality
(anyone remember this song by Lloyd Price from 1959?)
I think of this song whenever I look at my girls who each have such different personalities that just seem to be bursting from their beautiful bodies.

Clarissa has been helping Chris work on the cars the past couple of weeks (yes, it's been cold). After helping with one set of brakes, she came home looking like this and telling us how much fun it was. I am taking notes now that if I'm ever caught in the snow with a flat tire, this is the kid I want to have with me. She is so tough and talented, but still a little girly, she just started dance classes back up again and loved her first day back.

On the other hand, Krystal is all girl. One evening she was busily playing in the basement when Chris tried to go down the stairs and found this scene. Apparently her Barbies were dining at a posh restaurant with many levels. Maybe she'll design upscale restaurants in her future or at least cook the food for them, she's a great cook. In the meantime, I hope she remembers to put those Barbies away or we might have a repeat of my all time favorite comedy act (dangerous toys Part 2, it's not politically correct, but it's funny).

New Year's Eve Bash

We love that the kids are getting older, they are so much fun. For the past two years, we have actually stayed up until midnight for New Year's Eve with Jared and Clarissa and this year we decided they were old enough for a party. We invited three families over for a total of 20 kids. The evening included...

Dancing to the Wii Just Dance

Lots of board games and food

Some crazy tower building

Some even crazier dress-up

More Wii dancing

Sparklers at midnight!

It was fun for the ones who made it to midnight...

...and the ones that didn't.