12.28.2011

Christmas Morning 2011

Christmas morning. This is what it is all about. We work and work for months all so this one hour comes together. It was worth it. Every second.











It was magical.
It was calm.
There was love.
There was excitement.
There was gratitude.

This could be it's own post but these pictures make my heart so happy. This little five year old is a pure believer in the magic of Christmas. One of his friends told him there was no such thing as Santa. Can you even imagine? We went and saw Santa and confirmed that yes, he is real. All he wanted was a rocketship from Santa and a space suit from us. Space suits aren't all that easy to come by but the heavens opened up and I found one. Santa came through on Christmas morning and delivered a rocket ship.
We launched it and it went so high. All the way to the sky.
This my friends is what pure joy looks like.
Absolute.
Untarnished.
Pure Joy.

Christmas Eve 2011

preparations were made
gifts were wrapped and delivered

myles was so excited to have lucy open her present.
he picked this one just for her.
playdo.

jammies were opened


sibling gifts were opened

"i got this for you dad because you like music and now you can make your own music"



cookies for the big guy
merry christmas to all and to all a good night...

12.15.2011

First Semester


It has been a while since I was in school. A long while. So this year I decided it was time for me to go back to school and get that college degree. I was super excited. I got all registered, bought my books, bought a super cute large purse to carry all my books and new sharp pencils in. I showed up for my first class. It was at this point it really dawned on me that I was old. Like my teachers are younger then me kinda old. Like my classmates are the same age as my oldest child kinda old. I am not gonna lie. It was tough. I never did quite figure out the balancing act of family/5 kids/husband/house/school. Some days I knew I was in over my head. Bit off way more then I could chew. My brain is old and it was literally hurting. And it turns out I am either not as smart as I thought/or I have forgotten EVERYTHING I ever learned in school. BUT I finished. My first semester done. I cannot even explain the feeling of relief as I walked out of my last final. And at the same time the feeling of pride. I did it. More then once I wanted to give up and quit. But I am doing this for me. Now I only have to do that about 11 more times :)

11.22.2011

November. National Break a Finger Month

Okay. I totally made that up.
But we have had two broken fingers in our family in the past month.


***** Break 1 *****



It all started with a story... And a story it ended up being. Liam came home from school complaining that his finger hurt. He "APPARENTLY" had been tapping his finger on his desk, you know, playing a little finger drums while he should have been learning about distributive properties when suddenly he got a pinching sensation in the back of his finger. He immediately sought medical attention at the nurses office. According to him she told him it might be a pinched nerve. Sent him back to his class. I informed him he would probably survive. The next morning he woke up and his finger was HUGE and bruised pretty bad. We decided to take him to the doctor. Diagnosis Proximal interphalangeal joint dorsal avulsion fracture. If he had broken his finger from tapping it we needed to have him evaluated for either brittle bone disorder OR bone crushing strength...

The next day his school called me to inform me that he had a few unexcused absences and I told the "counselor" that he had broken his finger at school and that is why he had missed yesterday. She was shocked. Surprised. Usually they fill out incident reports if a child gets hurt at school. Okay, not usually, ALWAYS. 5 minutes later the school nurse calls me. Apologizing. She HAD seen him in her office, right after he had gotten in trouble at lunch for messing around. Truth came out. Incident report was filed. We received a copy of it. He wasn't tapping his finger. Lesson learned. Don't stick your finger in places it doesn't belong. EVER.


****** Break 2 ******

Remember when I said that cute little 2 year old was a handful? Case in point... It all started with a 2 year old and a plastic toggle...

I was standing talking to my parents. Noah was playing beside me. I was wearing a jacket that has elastic cording around the bottom. The elastic is coming out of the casing a little. He was pulling and playing with this. He pulled the elastic a little harder then he should have and then fell backwards taking the cording with him. At about 6 feet away he released the cording from his sweet little cherub hands. At which point it SHOT back at me. The little plastic toggle SMASHED into my hand. Immediately I said a few words... (insert your choice of cuss words here)... I have never been shot. I hope to never get shot. I am not making light of people who have been shot but I swear it felt like I had been shot. In the finger. By a 2 year old. With a plastic toggle. HURT SO DAMN BAD! It took 2 days to get into the doctor. Sure enough. It was broken. In the exact spot the toggle had hit. The upside? (because yes there is one) For the next 3-4 weeks I get to flip everyone off.



11.13.2011

Marathon.



Matt ran his first marathon a few weeks back. 4:36. 26.2 miles.









my baby is 2...



I cannot get over his cuteness. But do not let that face fool you. He is crazy. loud. opinionated. bossy. demanding. He draws on everything. He can destroy a clean room in seconds flat. He can be a shit. He's 2. And we absolutely adore him.

halloween

gutting a pumpkin with a broken finger




...The finished products...







...the costumes...

Football Season 2011





Our cheering section (lucy, grandpa, matt, jessie and jessica)

James, Brady, Coach Smith, Andrew, & Darius (MVP)

Football has been a pretty big part of our lives the past 10+ years. It seems like every fall is welcomed in by Friday night football games. It has been a crazy emotional season knowing this would be our last high school football season for a while. James did awesome this year. He came back from a pretty bad injury and played amazing all season. His team had a varsity banquet at the end of the season and James, along with two of his friends, won the Coaches Award. We are very proud of him.