what my kids are doing now

My kids are playing in the guest room shower. They don't even want me in there! Awesome.

Yeah, it's all good b/c no one ever uses this bathroom, much less the shower. It's all dry and clean. Noah is calling it his house.

They are both playing with the white elephant gifts we got for them at the youth group Christmas party last night. For Noah, a cool sword. For Evie, a sock monkey. I only realized after I saw how much they each liked them that we could have given them for Christmas presents. Oh well. They're "just b/c we love you" presents.

modified sledding

It's been very cold here, so cold that the snow hadn't vanished from the roads the day following a storm like it usually does. Well, today it's mostly slushy and gone, but yesterday it was there on untraveled streets.

And since the kids have got their snow pants, they've been going out to the back yard almost everyday. So yesterday after they played for a while, we took off in their bigger sled down the neighborhood streets and alleys. I was the reindeer pulling the sled. But it was quite easy, though I got warm after a while.

Well, it was fun.

09 Christmas program

Mid-December was the third Christmas program that we have attended since we moved here. It was also the first time that Noah stayed on the stage for the entire performance, which was only two songs. He sang and participated in the actions as well. Last year he was in no mood to be on stage so we were quite proud that he did it this year. Way to go Noah! You were SO cute.

Very few of the kids wanted to wear their sheep masks. Of course Noah didn't. He doesn't really like to dress up, preferring to be just himself.

Next was the big kids. They sang several songs and stayed on the stage between video clips that Terry made for the program. For the video, Terry was one of three reporters doing a story on the wise men who were searching for baby Jesus. It was quite good =)

My friend Karla's kids were Mary, Joseph and baby Jesus - though her baby is a girl, Briar, and 5 months old. Here is Grant and Briar. They did SO great. It was adorable.

It took me forever but I finally have the video up.

lazy Saturday

Evie is wearing Noah's old snow pants, which he was wearing until two days ago. They are 3T! We had to finally admit that he had outgrown them =)

He's a good reindeer, eh?

Who ever said the trampoline is for only summer use? I guess I did see him slipping around on it quite a bit. But take note, this shot is mid-jump. Sweet.

Noah was so valiant as to save Evie from falling over on this small drift =) "I a hero!" he said.

He's such a good brother. Evie loves him. If he's not up in the morning when I get her, she goes to his door and tries to open it.

artistic testing...

I'm messing around w/ our Mac again. I'm learning how to edit photos. I also want to try to enlarge them.

I like these two shots that I took during our tree hunting expedition back home. I sharpened them up and adjusted the colors a little bit.

Kevin's pet project is...

Terry!

For almost two years now, Terry has been lifting weights at the wellness center with Kevin. They have been talking about making themselves shirts for a long time and finally got around to it.

KTB Bodybuilding is Kevin, Terry and Brent.

And here are all their frequently used sayings...expressions, phrases or slogans.

trimming the tree but not my waistline

My mom found me the perfect star tree topper at Target. It's our first one. Ever. Five years into our marriage and we finally have a tree topper.

And the tree is straight, even though it's a little unevenly trimmed.

Noah's favorite part of the tree is under it where he can put the lights on his eyes.

Our small nativity. I was just playing around with the camera.

This was a gift from a MOPS friend. I like it. =)

It's crazy that Noah used to be this small. His ear still does that little flop =)

Yuuuuuuummmmm. Fudge. It's difficult to have only one piece.

2009 tree hunting

Last year was our first time tree hunting outside of a Menards or the good ol' hills of home (sigh, how I miss the hills). But we did find a pretty good replacement in a tree farm last year.

We returned again yesterday despite the frigid temperatures of like 15 degrees. We had to go b/c we had heard it would snow today and they were right - it's not stopped all day, cancelled school and all that. Next year we are totally getting our tree before we go home for Thanksgiving.

At any rate, we got 'er dun.

We are just heading out to the field w/the trees.

These were good sized ones for the kids but Noah said they were too small. Go figure.

It was SO cold that I ran ahead and found one. Here Noah is showing it to us.

Evie is cold and probably starting to feel sick (she threw up after her nap when we got home and couldn't keep anything down). All you can see is her unhappy crying mouth =)

Once I found the tree I had to run back and retrieve the tree cart. I did a lot of running.

Terry just got the tree down.

It was quite a handy cart.

Noah still remembered the little gray kitten he carried around last year so we had to go look for it. Here we are in the barn where they make wreaths. No gray kitty but a friendly enough black one.

Um, excuse me. Did I say friendly? I meant friendly enough for most kids. Noah is a little much even for the nicest cat to put up with =)

The cat would rather hang out with the bear sized Irish Wolfhounds, the biggest dogs I have ever seen. Both dogs were licking the cat after she joined them.

The trusty Blazer.

Cutest squishy.

are we a Mac or a PC?

Turns out that we're turning into Mac people...

Forgive the lame-o photo of me using our new Mac, but there was no one else around to model it (it's that wonderful time of day where the kids are either napping or resting and I can do as I please. And what I please today is to learn about our new Mac.)

Yes, we bought a MacBook while we were home for Thanksgiving. Terry needed to upgrade to something else for his shirt shop needs - artwork and a computer that could handle it - even his new Gateway laptop can't handle too many programs.

I'm doing this lame-o post as a test. I wanted to see how and if I could upload photos to blogspot. Looks like I can!

house crossing

Interesting things have been happening in town...

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A brown house was seen driving down the road and then east into the country.

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High school students were distracted (more than usual) from their classes by the spectacle.

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Traffic was stopped.

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Power lines were taken down or lifted up.

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But one family was super excited.

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Congratulations Rehmerts! You're almost there!

Now all they have to do before they can move in is...well, A LOT!

how to build an I

While I was vacuuming today Noah exclaimed, "Mommy look, a I!"

He then proceeded to make several "I's" from every variation of colored Lego blocks that we have, but keeping the orignial long green block ends. Red, purple, light green, gold, yellow, etc. He did them all and then went back to this original green. He's nothing if not organized.

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I guess the boy is learning something =)

tails

First pony tail, that is! It is getting so long that I just had to try to put it all up.

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The front wants to keep falling out, but still, most of it is up!
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Had to have one of the boy as well.

You can see the other side of her head now. This side stays up better.

Even though it's cold out, they still play like it's summer. The tub is full of sand after baths.

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I have a lot of memories of walking around town while Noah pushed that rolling toy. Now Evie is doing it too!

Evie's chase

A week ago we visited some friends out in the country. Their daughter was nice enough to watch Evie for me and take these photos!

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This shed of theirs had a five foot drift in front of it from the big snow a couple weeks ago. Evie is chasing their two ducks and two chickens.

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Here she is chucking the ball at the poor ducks. She laughed so hard every time she did it.
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Looks great huh? She pulled her hair out during the drive...

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Thump thump thump. I love how her foot falls are so heavy.

She's loaded up and ready to hit something.

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