Kids in the Kitchen

Khara and Kelsey both love to create things in the kitchen. (Chip off the old block maybe?? :-)). Kelsey found the picture for this in October and wanted to make it that day. I convinced her to wait until a little bit closer to Christmas.

Tis' The Season...

You just have to love this time of year...but I do question my thought process in starting to really get going on my blog right during the holidays. I will try to keep up a little better after we say hello to 2007.
Kelsey always wants to know what we will be doing the following day, " What's tomorrow?"..."Thursday"..."What do we do on Thursdays?". Well, this morning when I went over what we will be doing I filled up every day between now and Christmas. Church program, 2 school programs, Christmas parties, Christmas suppers, .... lots of fun but WOW... Mark told me last night that I have got to start saying no. In a small church why do they always think the young couple(with 3 kids) needs to be in charge of everything?? I'm really not complaining just thinking on paper. :-) I really do enjoy it (for the most part).

Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow!!!

Last week we were blessed with about 14'' of snow in one night. It went from 65 down to about 20 in 24 hours. I just love that kind of weather. I think the anticipation is as much fun as the snow and ice. Looking out the window, checking the radar, getting lots of phone calls to see if we were ready for "The Storm".

For the past couple of years we have not even had enough snow to make a snowman. This was really a storm for our part of Missouri.


Khara and Kelsey were dying to go out at the first sign of a flake. I bundled them up
and out they went (for about 10 minutes), right in the middle of the storm.


Kaden loved it as long as he was being held.








Then we let them do what all good parents do... eat a bowl of clean (we hope)
snow. That was their favorite part.

Goodbye Fall, Hello Christmas!!

What a great time of year!! Fall has been so much fun. Trips to Branson, playing outside, trick-or-treating, pumpkins, popcorn...

But, as of Tuesday, we said goodbye to that part of the year. I drug out lots of boxes, emptied a couple of storage places and got out the Christmas tree and all of the decor. Have you ever tried to put up a tree with 2 very excited, overly anxious to help little girls, and a very curious "hands-on" 17 month old?? Wow, what an experience.

I just love this time of the year. I sit here beside a twinkling tree, the smell of cinnamon in the air from homemade ornaments the girls made today, and my first pumpkin roll of this year in the fridge...life is good.

*advertisement break*- I took the kids to have their pictures done with ANTIQUITIES picture company today. Our local MOPS group did it for a fundraiser. If they are ever in your area- give them a try. A little pricey but they did an awesome job. They provide all of the outfits and lots of props. A great experience. Hopefully I will have some to post in a couple of weeks.

The Results Are In!!!

The tiny knife in the above pic is what Mark had to use to gut out his deer. He has a great hunting knife, but since it's only used once a year-- "oh where, oh where has my hunting knife gone, .. oh where, oh where can it be..."


__________________________
Friday night we had 5 family members join us. (see previous blog) Three serious hunters and two faithful wives. Kary Arender, Anthony and Adrian Arender, and Timothy and Holly Arender. Mark along with the 3 guys and Holly headed into the woods early Saturday morning. I had three children as my excuse to stay under the covers and Adrian is due in three weeks with her first.

Timothy and Holly were back hanging their deer up before 8:30 a.m. They all came in for lunch then the men headed back out. Mark got a 6 point buck, and a nice doe that afternoon. Best of luck this week Kary and Anthony!!

Adrian, Holly, and I got to catch up on a lot of "girl talk". It was great getting to know each other better and lots of fun!!!
For those who may have a weaker stomach, this is part of the process before it goes down your throat. :-)

Watch out, BAMBI !!!

For those of you who may not be aware of certain activities that take place in the country, deer season opens tomorrow. I personally do not hunt but I get the priviledge of housing several hunters every year on Friday night. (Grandpa Englund owns a couple hundred plus acres and that's just a little enticing to hunters :-))

If the hunt is successful I may have oh...twelve, fifteen pages of pictures. If you see no pictures in the next couple of posts you will know there were some slumped shoulders walking out of woods Saturday evening.

A couple of weekends ago we went to the great outdoors store, Cabellas. We were in K.C. for weekend with several of the family: Jeff and Vicki and their 4 children, Aaron and Brenda, Kendall and Leanna, and my parents. What a neat store!! They have tons of really great mounts.

We finished the evening off with a trip to Famous Dave's Barbecue. Sorry I don't have pics to post of that. After arriving there around 7:30 p.m. (already hungry), and waiting for almost 2 hours, photography was one of the last things on my mind. We did have a party of 17 but come on, aren't larger families "in" these days.

It was a delicious meal and Mark says well worth the wait. Great weekend!!





Kelsey, cousin Kaley Englund, and Khara
Aaron, little Camen, the back of Jeff, Kendall, Mark and Kaden

Exercise your American Right- VOTE!!!

Another beautiful day in Missouri- perfect for getting out and voting!! Missouri has several critical issues on the ballot and some close races. Anxious to hear the results.

I am kind of wondering what they will fill the air waves with after all of the campaign wars are over-- music maybe???

Well, here we go. We are finally getting this "blog thing" going. I enjoy looking at others, so decided to start one of my own.


Monday (Halloween eve) my girls gave their final answer on what they wanted to dress up as. We loaded up and made our 30min. drive to Wal-Mart. After frantically searching the very much picked over costumes I headed to the fabric department. The clearance fabric section is wonderful!! About an hour later, I was headed home with 3 types of fabric, beads, and yarn.

Wow, what an evening. Sew, fix supper, sew, bathe the kids, sew, tuck them in bed and then... sew.

Three very happy kids. Well, maybe two happy kids and one bewildered pirate. Holidays are GREAT with kids!!!