A Blast From The Past Part III: Christmas!

We had a great Christmas Season! It started off with a visit from Aunt Chelsea mid-December. She only got to stay for a couple days, but we sure enjoyed her!!

 We attempted a family photo for Christmas cards. It was soooo cold outside, and not a single member of the family was in the mood for picture taking. Not even myself. But I was not about to let another year pass by without a dang card. I got my tripod and camera all set up, got everybody situated, realized the sun was in everybody's eyes, set the timer, ran to position, the camera captured what you see here, and everyone was DONE. Nobody wanted to cooperate with me. Nobody wanted to move to a different spot. Nobody wanted me to try again. It made me grumpy. I think a few unkind words were said and we packed it in. Needless to say, it was another Christmas-cardless year. 

I give up.

The girls dictated their letters to Santa to me. I wrote them in pencil and then had them trace the letters with their markers. They had writer's cramp by the time they were done, but they were pretty proud!

This one is Matty's:

 And this one is Anastyn's:

We had lots of fun decorating for the holidays this year. We have an artificial tree, but we did make a trip up the Wood River to the mountains and cut a fresh one for the girls to decorate downstairs. They loved decorating their own tree!! We had fun wrapping presents for each other and we even made snowflakes to decorate the windows with! There were Christmas parties and programs. We listened to a LOT of Christmas music. I finally had to hide all the Christmas cd's downstairs just this month because the girls were still asking to listen to them!

We spent Christmas Eve here at home in Meeteetse with my mom and dad. We had a very delicious prime rib dinner, which will definitely have to become a tradition! It was so fun to have Grandma and Grandpa here Christmas morning to witness Santa's sleigh wreck! The kids enjoyed every second of discovering their treasures and unwrapping all their gifts. Mason had a blast tearing the paper off his packages! We had cinnamon rolls for breakfast (Pilsbury, of course. No over-achieving here!) Then in was off to church. I actually love it when Christmas falls on a Sunday. After all, Jesus really is the reason for the season!! After church, we drove to Lovell for more present opening at Grandma and Grandpa's house. Whew...who knew opening gift after gift could be so exhausting!! :) Next stop: Grandpa Leithead's! We had a yummy dinner and the highlight of our Christmas this year was talking to Kaleb (a.k.a. Elder Leithead) via skype! We got to listen to all of his amazing missionary experiences and his strong testimony of the gospel of Jesus Christ! What a blessing to be able to see him and talk to him! We are so proud of what he is doing!

And last, but not least, we mustn't forget the very special and unforgettable visitor we had in our home for the month of December. We heard a knock at the door the first evening of the month and were surprised to find a package had been left on our doorstep! The girls opened it and found this little guy! They named him 'Trick the Elf'. He provided much entertainment for our family while he was here. Some of his shenanigans included helping himself to the candy jar, fishing for "goldfish", making snow angels in the flour, messing around with our camera, toilet papering the girls' bathroom, providing a movie night for our family, fraternizing with the Barbie dolls, leaving notes, painting Rudolph noses on the girls in their sleep, and many, many more silly pranks! The girls looked forward to finding him every morning. He even took a few trips with us! We will miss him terribly until he returns next year!!!

A Blast From The Past Part II: Halloween Fun!

The kids carving pumpkins. Does it look like they are having fun to you?? This picture makes me laugh. I can't really remember what the malfunction was at this point...but they really did have fun carving pumpkins! Matty carved a bat and Anastyn carved a cat. Mom and Dad carved a haunted house.

 What cute kids, if I do say so myself. We went with a 60's theme this year. I was not super-mom. I was more like super-lazy-mom! We dug out the poodle skirts I made them for the Lovell's Day Parade a couple years back. Luckily they still fit. And luckily Mason had some jeans and a white t-shirt in his dresser. All we had to do was slick his hair up and voila!! They did look adorable. :)

 And this year we did our trick-or-treating in Lovell again! I can't remember why we were in Lovell instead of Meeteetse (that's what happens when you wait 3 months to blog about something). But, hey, they got to trick-or-treat for heck sake! It was Mason's first time and the girls were so kind to show him the ropes!!

There ya go...that was Halloween in a nutshell!!

A Blast From The Past: Part I

So since I did some serious slacking over the last few months as far as blogging goes, I am going to try to catch you up to speed. Nothing major happened....just the girls first hunting trip with their dad, Halloween, and Christmas.

Now, since I missed some pretty big things that deserve their own posts, I am going to split this up into parts.

Part I: Matty and Anastyn's Antelope Adventure!!!

 I should probably make Kyle write this post since he was there and I was not....but he's not that into blogging. :) I really don't know what all went down on this little hunting trip. Here's what I do know: According to the photographic evidence, my children had their hands all over a dead animal. And since I didn't see the photographic evidence until a little later...I'm not quite sure I washed their hands well enough when they got home! Another thing I know is that the girls had a Fantastic time. I figured they would get very bored driving around looking for animals. I thought they might be a bit sad to watch their dad kill an animal. I even thought they may get a little sick to their stomachs watching it die. Well I was wrong. They were unbelievably excited about the whole entire experience. They were right out there with their dad trying to help him gut the thing! Couldn't believe it...but I'm glad they can make these memories with their daddy. And it is looking like they will be going along every chance they get!

A Handful!

Yes, Miss Anastyn is officially a handful! She turned FIVE the other day! I just can't believe how quickly time is speeding by. This year she will be off to Kindergarten, and I just don't know what I will do without her. She had one of those extended birthdays this year. She actually missed her first birthday party so-to-speak. :) She has a blonde mother. A really super (blonde) mother that sent out a very mistaken text about the date of her actual birthday party! It was a good practice run for everybody I guess. Anyways, her birthday party was a couple days before her birthday. We ate at Pizza On The Run and she got to play in the bounce house. She wanted a chocolate Barbie cake. I was pleasantly surprised that it turned out half-way easy on the eyes. :) She got many fun gifts including clothes, jewelry, a jewelry box, Leap Frog games, and money. She was given the royal treatment on her birthday. We stayed home and focused on her every whim! We painted her fingernails and toenails, cuddled and watched movies, she got to take a bubble bath (instead of the quick shower her mother prefers) and got to eat spaghetti for dinner! She had a second (very small, very casual) party on her birthday. She got to help decorate the cupcakes and had some of her very favorite friends over to enjoy them with her. And a couple days later, she was delighted to find another package in the mail from Aunt Chels. It came in one of those fancy envelopes you can buy at the Post Office. It had cupcakes on it. She couldn't believe her eyes and wondered how in the world Aunt Chelsea could possibly have known that she had cupcakes on her birthday! he he! 

So what do I have to say about Anastyn and her five years? A lot, actually:

She's just a great girl. She loves her kittens and her dog. She takes such good care of them! She loves to help with her little brother. She loves him dearly and thinks he is the cutest thing in the whole wide world. She has a beautiful voice. She goes to preschool and loves to learn anything and everything. She is like a sponge. She is hungry for knowledge and asks an almost unbearable amount of questions in a day. She is very fashion conscious and will not wear 'just anything'. She has many friends and loves to be around other people. She is forgiving. She loves her family 'more than birthdays and chocolate, more than anything in the whole world - except for Jesus' (in her own words). She loves Barbie movies, Angelina Ballerina, and the Backyardigans. She enjoys listening to storybooks and playing games. She is very fond of spaghetti and ham sandwiches and candy and not-so-fond of anything else. :) She likes everything to be 'just right' at bed-time and can't go to sleep without several hugs and kisses, a drink of water, and the reassurance that I will wake her up if there is anything that I might need to tell her in the middle of the night! She loves to prance around the house in her ballerina dress. Every once in a while she is allowed to wear it all day long...that's when she's in heaven! She is definitely our favorite 5-year-old and she could definitely never be replaced. She is a blessing to our family. She brings countless smiles to our faces and an endless supply of warm fuzzies to our hearts. We love you Anastyn! Please don't grow up too fast!!!! xoxoxo