After ALL the complaining and whining I put into my last post, mother nature delivered. Last Thursday (one week ago), Maddie's school was cancelled and we played and played and played while we received about one foot of snow. It was heavenly to see my children expend so much energy outdoors digging, sledding, making forts, throwing snowballs, playing monsters trucks, etc. We finally ventured back indoors for awhile until Daddy came home and then we headed back out for more fun. Eli was the only one not quite so enthused and flat out REFUSED to come back outside. He wouldn't put snow pants and had an emphatic shake of his head even when we begged and pleaded. "Too cold" was his response. He enjoyed a movie indoors while we joined all of our neighbors outside and eventually our cute neighbor girl went inside and joined him.
Another fun thing we started up this month is ski lessons for Maddie and Robby. Every Wednesday we load up all of M's gear, pick her up from school, and head to Whaleback Mountain. She has loved all of her lessons thus far. I always enjoy her huge grin on her face after finishing lessons and she has been very enthusiastic. This excitement makes the two hours of pure torture with the boys during the lessons completely worth it. I have found out the hard way that there is NOTHING for two little boys to do at a ski resort lodge other than movies and running around like crazy. The longest we have lasted is about 45 minutes, and then I give up and sit in the car the rest of the time with them. Robby also started skiing and has his lessons on Saturday mornings at 9am. It was a little shock for him that he actually had to learn how to put on his skis and figure out how to walk sideways up the hill, before they would let him "fly down the mountain". I have been so proud of his positive attitude while learning something that isn't easy at first. I know he is going to love it once he learns how to ski a little better and can go down "speedy fast". Last Saturday I came to his lessons kid-less and was able to capture a few photos of him.
We have also had Natalia (our next door neighbor) over quite a few times and she is obsessed with Maddie. She is so cute and comes running into our house whenever we leave the front door open calling out for Maddie. The other day Maddie put on her Sundevil shirt and J was trying to get a picture of her. Natalia immediately ran over and wanted in on the photo shoot :)
{never mind the rag-muffin hair on Miss M. At the moment she insists on brushing her own hair and doing it "all by myself" most days. Don't worry, if we are headed out, I nearly always do her hair before we leave}
With all the cold weather we have had this month (including several days where it was below zero--11 degrees below to be completely accurate--for a good chunk of the day) I have really tried to encourage a joint play time activity with all three kids. Luckily the boys love to play all the same things {sometimes a good thing, sometimes not so good} and Maddie is extremely laid back when it comes to playing. She is not a toy kid and so she doesn't own very many girly toys, but she is always willing to sit down with her brothers and play what they want to, even trains. I took this upcoming picture last Saturday when I was cooking dinner. At that point I realized that we had had very little fighting all day long. I walked into the front room to check on the children and my heart melted when I saw them all playing trains together. This was exactly what I envisioned when I found out I would have three kids in three years. I thought about the strong bond and friendship they would all share together.
One of the things I am constantly reminding my children of is that they are all "built in best friends for life". As hard as it has been to move all the way across the country and start a new chapter in our lives, I know one thing that has grown stronger is our friendships within our family. Maddie doesn't have the same friend structure she had in AZ, so when she is home from school she spends a good deal of her time playing with her brothers. Robby went from having a whole street full of boys to play with to literally no friends out here, but has really learned to play more with Eli during the day. Those two boys fight a lot, but they also play a lot. Even through all the frustrations of having a pesky brother, Robby sure likes having a play mate that wants to race cars, drive trains, play pretend, etc. I feel so lucky that my children can experience such a completeness in our home. I rarely have my children telling me they are bored or begging for friends to come over and play. Number one, they know that really isn't too many options of friends near us, and most importantly number two, they fell fulfilled with their friendships in our house. On the day of the above picture, they all played with the trains for about 2.5 hours without any fighting or tears....yeahhhh!!
Last but not least, a cute picture of Mr E in the kitchen "helping Mommy" cook dinner. He is a sweetie that's for sure!
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