christmas 2012

well, we're half way through january...as much as i'm overly ready to move out of december, we have some christmas pics to take care of.  i was uncharacteristically negligent with my picture-taking this christmas...but it pretty much looked like last christmas. the kids are just taller. ;)

the day after our little family christmas at home, we went to Nana's house because my one and only favorite sister and her beautiful family had just arrived from iowa.

and here is the one and only picture of me and my sissy from her 2 week visit here.

all the little cousins..smiling dutifully before opening presents.

story time with nana

christmas #2  with handy andy's wonderful family.

little madeline with one of her most favorite people in all the world- auntie bethany

and the next day we went to my dad's house for christmas #3. well, most of us. will came down with a fever the night before, so he and andrew stayed home.  with all the craziness and chatting with family we rarely get to see, i completely forgot to get my camera out except for this one picture. :(

and that was christmas folks. the day after this pic was taken, we began our 2 week bout with the flu...pictures to come, don't you worry.

our little family christmas

the saturday before christmas we had our little family celebration.

it started with a fancy cinnamon roll breakfast. :)

 followed by a few presents.
 the kids picked names for secret santa with each other this year. it was such a great opportunity for them to take their minds off themselves for a bit and they really had a blast with it.

 
 After presents and some playing we got dressed and headed outside to drop off little treats to our neighbors. It was especially sweet to be invited in by our 2 elderly couples on our street for a little chat in their homes.

 In the evening we went on a christmas light hunt, followed with hot cocoa at Starbucks.

 
 madeline with the starbucks bunny :)

 such a sweet, low-key day with our little family.

family pictures. check.

 my sweet, talented sissy took our family pictures last year. she found cool old buildings and chippy painted doors and took a lot of wonderful shots. but now she's in iowa...which meant we were on our own this year. :(
so on a whim,  we went back to the sites from last year and thanks to our tripod and nana's entertainment behind the camera, we got some pictures.

 after just a couple pics, this huge train came steaming and blowing by and stole everyone's attention. and gave ben the FRIGHT of his LIFE!
he trembled uncontrollably for at least 10 min. and kept covering his ears and murmuring "choo choo, choo choo, bye bye...choo choo...bye bye." it was pathetic, poor boy. but i did get a lot of snuggles...

this one below is last years version....oh ben! be still my heart, i love you so much.

2 of my 3 favorite guys...awww, that chubby little hand!

then we went over to this cool green wall...also one of sister's finds from last year

and one in the street.

 
and here's last year on the same street. little people are getting taller..,

and then we ran out of posed smiles and nice light so decided to let the crazy came out.

or rather it would seem, the parents needed to let their crazy out. :)

 will was definitely keeping his crazy contained...

ta-da! ;)

the end.

thanksgiving..better late than never

i just can't post christmasy pictures until i get this important holiday documented. so here it is. thanksgiving was lovely and full of family and fabulous food.

my lovely mama and the beautiful spread

yum

sickie benny...cute as ever.

and then the day after, as per tradition, we cut down our tree. now on to christmas!

Indie Arts Winter Market this Saturday!

hey friends! just thought i'd let you know that tomorrow (saturday december 1st!)

is the annual craft show right here in our own little town.

if you live around these parts, you should come check it out! there's always a great vibe and lots of indie art and handmade goodness.

 handy andy and i will have a booth again this year. we have a lot of new items in addition to the regulars...like tooth fairy pillows! (pocket is on the back)

 more bunting and chalkboards!

 and the best of all, our new item this year is the giant ruler growth chart. these were hand screen-printed by the one and only handyandy and look quite fabulous if i do say so. ;)

our kids are shipped off to grandparent's house for the night so we can finish up last minute details.

looking forward to a fun fun day tomorrow with this guy. :)

we voted on tuesday...

 thankfully the lines weren't too long...especially since sophie was a little sickie poo.

 we got a nice instructional talk from the cute election judge, signed our ballots then we each filed into the voting booth.

 we, of course, took it quite seriously...i even got a glare from one voter for breaching the booth's privacy walls to snap a quick picture...(where's a scrutineer when you need one?!)

 there was a good bit of deliberation within these walls...

then the ballots were placed into the ballot box and stickers were passed out.

i'll spare you from the final election results...but i will say, i think ben made the best choice with his write-in candidate. how could our country go wrong with mr. balloon in the oval office??


**p.s. a great big thank you goes to handy andy for his tireless efforts in making this voting experience a reality for the citizens of schmidtville. he constructed the booth, ballot box and ballots and procured the stickers. our thanks and love go out to you.

super hero candy night

our little super heroes dressed up yesterday. well, to be more accurate, we actually only had one "official" super hero and that was ben. will was a ninja [super hero on the side] as was his green sidekick, sophie. and madeline was [naturally] a princess super hero.

 

here are a couple costume conversation snippets from the last week:

will: "if i can't be a ninja then can i just dress up like a kid who goes to school? i could wear what i'm wearing now [motions to his clothes which happened to still be pjs]...wellll, not pajamas, but regular clothes and i could carry around my math book."

madeline upon seeing that i was sewing "sparkly" ribbon onto her cape: "mommy, i love you because you are nice. and i love you because sometimes you buy sparkly things for me." 

{i will be sharing this little tip to her husband-to-be one day}

sophie: "am i scary in this mask? did i scare you??" 

anyway, we had a great time trick or treating with a group of friends in the neighborhood i grew up in.

true story: we pulled up to our friends house where everyone was meeting and realized that
1. i (the lizard blood girl) was wearing a short sleeved shirt and didn't grab a jacket
2. i also didn't grab jackets for the other short-sleeved members of our family
3. madeline was barefoot.
now, if i was a type A person we would have had to drive back home...well, never mind, those people would have never forgotten these things...but either way, if we at least had a clean car we would have been out of luck. BUT we didn't have a clean car. we instead had one stock full of necessities. i found a jacket for me, will and sophie, a long-sleeve shirt for madeline AND a pair of shoes! moral of story for me: don't ever clean out your car

and this is what really topped it off for the evening. as we began trick or treating i realized that even though madeline forgot SHOES, she did remember to grab a stick of celery for the road. we love every bit of this "sparkly", spacey princess girl.

ben loved every minute of his cape, mask and legging-wearing night. loved. it.
(and loved the candy even more)

sophie loved it too. cutest green ninja/super hero ever.

then we had soup and pizza and it was loads of crazy fun.

will bemoaned on our way home, "it really is sad that halloween only comes once a year. getting candy is so much fun."