Couple Pictures from our Thanksgiving...

Because my children, and husband know how to eat, then sleep... the true activities of Thanksgiving...


Happy Thanksgiving again!

Thanksgiving

With Thanksgiving tomorrow, I am looking back on 2010 and really reflecting how much we are thankful for as a family. I thought I would put together somewhat of a list to share with my family and friends.

• We are grateful for Ben coming such a long way, and being discharged from the Birth to Three program in October.
• We are grateful for the health, and well being of our children, and the light they bring into our lives on a daily basis.
• We are grateful for the big September surprise we got in a third child we never planned on having.
  
• We are grateful for all the opportunities Will has got for school, and certifications he has obtained in the past year. One more and he will be ready to start applying for paid fire departments, and be able to have a career he truly loves.
• We are unbelievably grateful for the writing positions I have picked up, especially in the last three months.
• We are grateful for the new car we were able to purchase.
• We are grateful for our families, and their active involvement with our children, and support in all the new choices we have made.
• We are grateful for our health.
• We are grateful for a roof over our heads, food on our table, and utilities, as well as having jobs to be able to afford these opportunities.
• We are grateful for our good friends.

There is so much to be happy and grateful for, and thankful for in 2010. Here is to another great year in 2011 too!

16 Weeks

The kids helped me take a couple pictures last night...

The Tale of a Saturday

Saying that Will and I have had a funny couple days would probably be a serious understatement. Last night we had a car behind us laying on the horn, literally for a good 5 minutes while we sat behind a school bus. Needless to say it turned into a joke, after we both ended up pissed off. LOL

Well today we had a nice lazy morning before bringing the children to get haircuts before the holiday. The day started off like this...

This... driven by Daddy dropped off special "sprinkles"

A special Saturday treat! Seriously, how many children do you know that have a fire truck stop at their house to bring them donuts? Camden is totally the coolest kid around. Haha!

After playing for a couple hours, and before leaving for hair cuts, Ben decided he was going to play until he fell asleep. The boys were playing with their toys on the living room floor, and then of course my couch pillows became a toy.
This is how it ended...

This kid could sleep anywhere... He curled up on the floor with his blanket and knocked out. He proceeded to sleep there for about an hour. I was scared to move him because I knew he would be up, and super cranky because he didnt get a nap.

Then we went for our hair cuts, and on our way home stopped at the ATM. The local bank only has a drive up, so we waited behind 4 cars for our turn. There was an elderly lady in front of us that really didn't know what she was doing. You could see her shaking while she was using the ATM, and then quickly pulled away.
We pull up to the ATM and her account was still open. It was asking how much we wanted to withdraw.
I quickly hit "return card" to close it out and I handed Will the card and he RAN to try and chase her down. Luckily she had pulled around to the other side of the building and park. She was going to try to go into the bank to get her card back. :( The bank was closed.

Needless to say I felt horrible for her, but I am so glad we are the people who pulled up after her. How many people would be honest and do what we did? How many people would have taken the maximum amount of money they could have out of the account? My heart broke thinking about what could have happened to her!

Thankfully she had honest people pull up after her!

That... was our Saturday in a nut shell!

Christmas Check List

I have been thinking about things I must get done before Christmas... Obviously I have a lot of shopping to do, although I got a ton of it done already, mostly for the children. I also saved a ton of stuff I picked up at BlogHer earlier in the year and stashed it at my parents house for the kids.

In an effort to really help me get things rolling... I needed to get my list up :

• Make a list of people we are shopping for
• Get the Christmas decorations down from the attic
• Put up the Christmas lights outside - DONE
• Plan our Christmas Eve, and Christmas day calendar so we know where we are going to be on what day and at what times.
• Pre-write posts for December... Considering I have obligations for X amount of posts a week, etc.
• Buy the kids Christmas outfits
• Take pictures of the children for our Christmas cards
• Actually fill out and mail out the Christmas cards
• Get pictures with Santa done
• Bake for the Holiday Party at the fire house
• Bake for the Festival of the Trees through the fire house

I am sure there is so much more that is going to end up getting tacked on to the end of this list between now and Thanksgiving though... Speaking of Thanksgiving.. 8 days from now we will be celebrating it.

I know last week I was kind of in the skip the meal mood, but the past year has brought so much happiness, success, and blessings to our family, we have so much to be thankful for... and who isn't excited for my mothers amazing Chef like cooking?

Christmas Lights

As promised, a couple pictures of the Christmas lights we got up.
I plan to take some better ones in a couple weeks though.

P.S. Don't mind the blinds my children broke!
'Tis the Season!

Over Doing It : Mommy Style

Yesterday like any typical Sunday I headed to my parents house with the children. Will had the long awaited live burn for training... so you can see why I would be needing to get away and totally take my mind off of it...


Yes, clearly you get the picture of why I would be worried. LOL! So the boys and I went down to Mom and Dad's house, and we decided to go on a nice walk down to the beach. It was beautiful out... how could we not take full advantage of it? 60 degrees in mid November after we have already had snow!

We packed the wagon up and headed to the beach...


Me and Grandma took turns pulling the boys, and Camden even decided at one point he wanted to get out and pull Ben. It was tooo cute!

We let them play on the beach for a while, Ben was in his glory! He ran after a seagull going "Ducky Ducky" until it took flight. He kind of looked at me with the expression of... "Uh... Mom catch him!"

He clearly had big plans for the "Ducky" which probably included his mouth... ICK!

We walked back to the house, had dinner, the kids took a nap, which I took advantage of myself and laid down too. Woke up, and snacked some more before heading home.

I landed myself in the ER that night though. I am not sure if the walk, having to lift the wagon over the fence, or what did it to me but by 6pm I was in bad shape. Cramps, stabbing pain, a headache... I was miserable and worried.

I was taken in immediately, even before the poor guy in front of me who stepped on a nail. Everything with me looked fine. Blood pressure, temperature, all that jazz. The on call ER Doctor strolled in moments later with an ultrasound machine.

They weren't messin' around. He seemed kind of excited to get to use it too. I am sure they don't have a ton of pregnant women coming through the doors that they actually have the chance to check out since Labor and Delivery typically does most of that.

I was really happy to be able to see little Elwood #3. He/She was waving at us the entire time, and it also confirmed that the movement I think I have been feeling for about a week or two now, is in fact the baby moving around. I got to see him/her move around and feel it at the same time. Totally awesome.

The doctor was so excited using the machine, he even gelled me all up a second time to make sure I had a nice picture of #3 to go home with. Which is the above picture. I need to go scan it, but I wanted to share. The baby had it's hand right next to its face waving.

He totally tired to check out a crotch shot, but he/she wasn't showing much so we can wait till our big scan on December 9th.

Needless to say, it was a hectic Sunday.
Today, I am resting!