Dells Vacay '12, in the room

My hubby is a vacation finder king. Time and time again, he scopes out the possibilities and narrows in at just the right time to find us one heck of a deal for a family trip. If it weren't for him, and a little creativity when it comes to meals on my part, we wouldn't do any trips near as often!! He always finds us a great place to stay, fun things to do, and I usually can organize some meals so we don't have to eat out all week. I think we make a good team :)  One thing we love about the Dells and why we keep going back... the complete relaxed atmosphere. The rooms we stay in are so nice and we love just sitting around, relaxing, hanging out, catching up with Aaron & Heidi (we do this trip with Dave's sis & fam), playing games, eating a lot of snacks, and just being together. It's pretty great. Here are some pics from our "in room" time... I will post water-park pics next! And, a special perk this year... two of our family friends were our neighbors this year! Bonus!

 wii games

 checkers tournament

 movie night!

 cousins hanging out

 more games

 Austin tried to skip his name one day while we played long into the afternoon at the water slides... he cashed out on us around 5 though :)

 Carson and Aunt Heidi

 Laying around...

 Snuggling before bed

 Lots of eating together! Lots.

 Sweet jacuzzi tubs in our master suites! (they have swim shorts on!! :)

brothers hanging out :)

our 6 month baby

Yes, it's true! Our baby is 6 months old and counting...my how these months have flown by! He is cruising along towards 1 year old at a rate I can't seem to slow down (except the sleepless nights, they seem to be sticking around like forever!). As I viewed my 5 month post about him I find it sad I am still dealing with a sick boy. He has spent the last couple months battling croup, RSV, runny noses, and ear infections.... currently on his 3rd round of ear infections (both ears might I add) and the wheezy breathing started in the night just last night again. Can this kid get a break? Gheesh! Poor babe!! Other then constantly trying to get better, he is a happy boy who loves to be held, loves to kick his legs, bounce in the jumpy thing, look at books, and watch his brothers. He also loves the outside (we've gone on a few walks this winter, crazy!) and turns out he loves the water. He took his first trip to the Dells last week and LOVES the water. Good thing. since we live at the pool in the summer :) He weighed in at 18lbs 11oz this week, seems to be turning more blonde, and reminds me of a butter ball at the moment :) He has his first two bottom teeth, is up on all fours all the time and scooting around the floor, but not sitting up yet, loves his binkie and his fingers too. Little Mister is learning more each day!

Answered prayer!

We have a prayer wall at our house and for about 2 months now, Austin has consistently put "snow" on this list. It was sometimes hilarious to listen to him pray for snow every night before bed while Jaxon was praying for the military, his friends, or a family member. Austin was sure that God would send him some snow. God answers prayers in His own timing and the arrival of snow for this 4 year old was no different. The morning he woke up to find enough snow to sled in our backyard with was a VERY happy day...for him at least. Dave started the morning complaining about the snow at the breakfast table. Austin's response... "well, I love the snow, Dad. It's amazing!" Happy SNOW day to him!

A Christmas for the ages

Christmas is almost a month gone, but I have to post a quick few comments on this year's celebrations...  Let's just say...it was a Christmas for the ages! Whew, leading up to it was pretty normal holiday season happenings. We did a lot of our family traditions and it was really fun to have another child really grasp onto some of them this year. It is such a joy to watch Jaxon and Austin both remember and look forward to some of our family traditions. I was so looking forward to having a baby boy over this holiday this year. There is something magical about holding a sweet baby boy as you celebrate Jesus's birth.... however, my sweet baby boy got VERY sick a few days before Christmas and lets just say... that magical feeling was hard to find a lot of the time :( None the less, I did my best to make the most of it and not let a very fussy, achy, can't sleep or eat or breathe well, baby get me down. (I only had 1 melt down on Christmas Eve... sorry fam!! :) 

As the fog of sleepless nights and long days started to lift I stepped away from this time period feeling a little beaten up and decided I did not want to let circumstances define me. They got the best of me at times and nobody benefits from that. So, being a not very New Year Resolution type gal...I turned over a new leaf. I made about 7 New Years Resolutions this year!!! And I have to say the effort put towards really making some changes on paper has been very helpful. Number one on my list... laugh more, complain less. If I am to survive this life of motherhood with 3 boys I better learn to laugh things off or I may be doomed. My attitude over the holidays really only hurt myself in the end and I was a overly tired pouty baby inside...boo me, but seriously, get over it already. Looking back...my circumstances were just that. A circumstance that was only for the moment. And I tripped and fell flat on my face as I tried to walk through it. Sigh... thank goodness for grace. The white snow has been a beautiful picture of God's grace for me these last few days... though our sins are scarlet, He washes them away and makes then white as snow. Christmas had some magic left in it after all...

Christmas Eve... got everyone dressed and decided it wasn't wise to take Carson out. So we stayed home...

...and good thing we did, because this is what he did :)

after a breathing treatment... big brother checking in

Christmas Morning! Smiles and a great slow lazy morning...

Carson's 1st Christmas

Dad's clone :)

Our only family picture over the holidays... on our way out the door to head home. Sure loves this crew!

happy to see you

We just returned home from a little winter vacation at the Dells! We left with blue skies and hooded sweatshirts on... we returned to cloudy skies and winter coats on! It was a great week, but I think we had some that were happy to be together again :) Updates soon on Christmas 2011 and Dells Vacation 2012!

1 down, ?? to go...

I make too many lists. Lists for books I want to read, lists for people to call back, lists for what to do today, lists for ideas to try, lists for rooms I want to tweak around the house, lists for people to send cards to, lists for the grocery store,  and so on. Most of my lists are mental ones these days as I need a list to remind me what lists I need to write down :) One thing on my list for way too long has been this HUGE open blank space on my front room wall. Thanks to a little pinterest and some old ideas I had and a couple new things I received as Christmas gifts, I was able to check one thing off a list of mine! The gallery took me all day of laying arrangements on the floor and in-between chasing, er I mean, taking care of my kids and everything else that happens here... I finally finished a project. Yeah me. Oh, and I'm also catching up on my blog... check out the links to the right :-)

A's birthday "day"

We always start our birthday boy's off with their favorite breakfast and a few gifts from mom & dad. This year it was egg biscuits for this birthday boy!

Austin was so fun to watch open gifts this year! We don't spend a ton on birthday gifts, but instead try to get one thing they really, really would like and I pick up a few things here and there on major clearance through-out the year. As he opened I calculated in my head and figured I spend about $20 total on 6 gifts. His reaction to everything was priceless.... I should have had a camcorder going!! Everything was "this is amazing" "thank you" "this is awesome, look Jaxon, this is amazing". Simple, genuine joy. I loved it.

A few amazing birthday toys and two excited boys!

His birthday was a Monday, so we had usual daycare kids here and enjoyed a quiet little play day doing a few of his favorite things. Playing cars, coloring & painting, baking cakes, reading books, watching a cartoon, and just hanging out.

The birthday boy before his "G'ma & G'pa" party.

 He was so sweet opening gifts from family.... he took his time, opened carefully, read the card, and thanked each person. And I think every gift got an "this is amazing" response :)

 4 year old!

It was a wonderful weekend celebrating our newly turned 4 year old!!! Thanks to all who helped!

Our boy turned 4

December is a busy month for everyone and having a birthday boy this month is something we work really hard to separate from all the Christmas season hoopla. We really want our boys to be celebrated on their birth-days and use that time to honor them and who God made them to be. Austin was so excited to turn four for many reason, but one of the most anticipated reasons was to have a friends birthday party.... like big brother Jaxon. He has tagged along to all of Jaxon's friends parties and knew they were pretty fun :) Being he was only turning four, we kept it very simple and small this year.... more of a glorified play-date with a good buddy cousin and two pals he regularly plays with. It was a simple little party doing a couple of his favorites things, eating his favorite foods, and playing with some of his favorite little pals. It was really fun to focus in on Austin this year as he turned four. This is one of my favorite ages of all children and I am looking forward to this next year with him at home!!

He LOVES Cars anything and that was the theme for the night...

He helped decorate his cake (had a sick babe this year so the track shaped cake quickly turned into a simple double layered circle track cake, but Austin was still thrilled.... all that mattered! :)

Dinner with his friends...

His favorite food requests... pigs in a blanket, orange slices, cracker sticks with cheese dip, and fruit smoothies.

He loves to paint, so the kids all painted little wooden cars...

Carefully painting...

He loves to race cars, so the kids raced around the track that our friend, Natalie, spent a good chunk of time creating :)

And he loves cake and ice-cream...

Presents.... the Under-dog costume was a hit! He wears it almost every day.... over his clothes, over his pajamas, over his coat.... pretty much all the time. (Thank you, Mark!!!)

And what's this 4 year old's party of favorite things without his favorite pal, Natalie!! 

Everyone had gone home.... and he sat quietly and drew in his new note-book pictures of his friends and the number "4". What a sweet little way to celebrate becoming four.