I know it's been a long time since I updated, but life is just so busy! It's good though....we never have a dull moment! Since Christmas, I've been busy getting the kids caught up in their school work. we took off quite a while for the holidays. It was SO nice to enjoy the holidays without having to teach but now we are putting in a little bit extra time each day to get caught up to where we were before.
I also have been busy doing a little bit of babysitting and sewing on the side. The extra $$ is always nice. As for the sewing, I will try to post pics later.

Caleb enjoys his pancakes!

The two boys having fun on a dino at the Creation Museum. Yes...we went for the third
time a couple weeks ago. We haven't yet tired of it :)

The kids just itching to get the presents opened!

Caleb loved his Mega Bloks he got

This pic deserves quite an explanation! Lauren had started embroidering a
towel this fall, but when she ran into some trouble with it
and then started back to school, the sampler got neglected. One day back in early Nov. she
told me to NEVER look under her bed. On two different occasions she sneaked
the sampler to her great aunts and her grandma for help. The
end result was what I opened for Christmas. She made the towel
into a pillow for our bed and also had made a "wall hanging" all
on her that said "I love you Mom". When I opened it and saw what she
had been hiding under bed, I immediately started crying. It was just TOO Sweet.
I am so proud of my little girl and all her hard work!

Lauren also took her own money and bought Fire truck fleece for
the boys and made them each a blanket. The only thing
I did was cut them to size and slit the edges. She did
the rest, The boys were quite excited and
she was thrilled!

Michael and his new firetruck!!(Quite a battery hog! LOL!)

Caleb inspecting his new toys

Lauren and the art set she was wishing for!

The only thing on my list...a new coat. Guess I was good this year!

Caleb LOVES his new ball pounding boat

I love that look of surprise!!. Made all my hard work worthwhile!

A rare moment....Chris laughing for a camera. He couldn't contain his
joy. I knew he wanted a IPOD Nano (Gen3) pretty bad, so I put aside
babysitting money for a while. The joke was that I had to work pretty hard to throw
him off. For some reason, he was pretty sure he was going to
get one. I went so far as to wrap a Target gift card and included
a picture of one. So after all the gifts were all unwrapped, there was still no
IPOD. I think he gave up by that point. The trick was....I had it in his stocking. So
the picture is the result of finding the IPOD in the toe of his stocking. It
was worth it......and I might add, he's putting it to good use!!!

Lauren with Kirsten in one of her new outfits she got

I made Lauren and Kirsten matching night gowns. Lauren was thrilled
so it was worth the many hours I put into them.

For Christmas, we went to N Carolina and stayed with Kendall
and Leanna in their new house. I know it's not
a very good picture, but I think you can still what a lovely house they
have. I realized as we were getting ready to leave, we needed to get a picture!
Maybe a better one next time!

We had LOADS of fun eating and playing games. In this picture, we were playing "Pit".
If you've ever played it, you know how lively and noisy it can be. I guess it
made quite an impression on Caleb. Whenever he sees this picture, or if we talk about
Kendall or Leanna, or Josh, he starts saying "two, two, two." Its
so funny!

Opening presents Christmas Day

Michael playing his "car driving game" he wanted so badly! He
had plenty of help showing him how to play!



The kids with Uncle/Officer Kendall. They seemed a little
more subdued after seeing him in his uniform :)