SNOW

We were more than ready when our first snow finally hit West Lebanon this past weekend.  It started on Sunday while we were trying to drive to and from church and continued all night long.  In the end we probably had about 2-3 inches of beautiful white snow blanketing our little town.  

The next morning the school announced late start (2 hours) so that the roads could all be plowed.  That was a huge blessing to me.  First off I hate, that's right hate getting up in the morning.  Secondly, I worked Monday from 11am-11pm, so this gave me several hours of time as a mother with my children.  We had so much fun watching cartoons in the morning, eating a lazy breakfast, and then putting on snow clothes and heading outdoors.  My children love to shovel snow and will spend hours clearing the sidewalks near our house (Eli is not quite so keen on snow and does tend to come inside and hide away). 

 {Robby really can be quite a good helper when he wants to be. He was very excited to help outside, including clearing the snow off our car}

-I can't get over just how big and grown up he looks in this picture

Little Miss

{and yes, E does have a GIRL scarf on, it belongs to Miss M but he absolutely insisted that he needed one as well}

"Boo-Hoo Buddy" face on Mr E

The only sad thing for Eli was that he REALLY REALLY wanted to build a snowman and we never really got a chance to do this.  

Thank heavens we played that morning though because by afternoon the rain had started and turned everything into a slushy dirty mess.  We are already watching the weather constantly on the look out for another round of snow!

tree

Until I can successfully steal away my husbands phone for the evening and download all the pictures we have been taking for the last month, I will settle with posting a few pictures of decorating our freshly cut down, super yummy smelling Christmas tree.  

This year we had the opportunity to go to a real Christmas tree lot and cut down our very own lovely tree.  It was a particularly cold Saturday morning and started to snow just slightly as we were searching through the rows of trees. 

We showed up to clean our church house around 8:45am only to realize that the ward Brunch would probably just make it dirty again AND we didn't have any keys to get in.  We quickly altered our plans and bee-lined it straight over to the Christmas tree lot.   After walking and walking around the kids found our perfect tree.  Robby and Jesse took care of sawing it down and then Jesse and I carried it up to the front. The three children were rather cold and wet so we bought hot chocolates for all and quickly had our tree firmly attached to our roof.  We headed back to our house to change clothes and make it back for the tail end of our Christmas brunch party.  We spent the next few hours cleaning our church building, but managed to keep enough energy contained to come home and clean our own house and then put up/decorate the tree.  

It is always slightly chaotic trying to string the tree lights and manage three children bouncing off the walls with excitement at getting to hang ornaments.  Despite all of this I LOVE how excited they get to pull out our family ornaments.  Our tree may not look fancy like those trees you see in the Home Decorating magazines and is definitely not Pinterest worthy, but all the same I love looking at our ornaments we have had for years and remembering memories associated with many.  Some of my faves include:

*water-skiing Santa- I got this one the year we went to Hawaii with my parents 2007

*Tiffany head with pipe-cleaner body in a wreath- from gymnastics when I was at Starfires club 1994

*Suns mini ornament jersey- the year we purchased season tickets 2005

*boy on top of a mail carrier bag- I got this when we moved from Utah and was mailing TONS of letters to all of my friends back in Bountiful 1994

*Nurse Bear- I received this one from my parents the year I graduated with my RN 2004

*Bear with a ring- the year Jesse proposed to me and we were married 2003

And now that my children are all finally to the age that ornaments don't get pulled off constantly, we have a tree with a fairly equal proportion of ornaments spread throughout.  

 Eli, Maddie, and Robby

--loves these three, even if the pic is somewhat blurry

*For some reason, I cannot seem to take a decent picture of my Christmas tree.  Every time I try I get this funny blurry glare near the mid-section of the tree. Nevertheless here is our tree in all it's glory.  And if you can't tell, my children LOVE Christmas lights and they love to do a full room decoration-fest.

Fall Overview

Some fun things we have done this fall include:

1. Attend the final Dartmouth football game (thanks to scoring several tickets from a friend)
**it was amazing how few people attended the game. My kids kept asking me if it was a "real" football game

2.  Dress up in full winter gear {minus warm pants} and pretend it is really colder than the temperatures show.  Okay, I guess the only one in our family that really likes to do this is Miss M.  She made us all laugh near the end of October when she would dress herself such as the picture below in preparation for going to school.  By afternoon bus pick up she had stripped herself down to her normal clothing and maybe a jacket.
#can'twaitforcoldweather

3. Running running and more running in the early fall.  I joined several friends in training for and running a half-marathon this fall.  Although I definitely didn't do as well as I would've liked on the actual race, I enjoyed the motivation and dedication it gave me to run on a regular basis and enjoy the much needed "me-time".  Although after the race was over I have now turned into a total lazy person and have hardly ran, I am proud of myself for doing this and I know I will be back at it again in a few months.

4. Tiny Tuckies Annual Halloween parade/party.  Our party ended up being delayed by one week due to Hurricane Tropical Storm Sandy.  We had a weather alert placed on our area so the school had early release and all other parties and festivities were cancelled that day.  This ended up pushing the party to the next Monday, after Halloween.  I have to admit it was a bit awkward to pull out the costumes post-trick or treating, but luckily the kids didn't seem to mind in the least.  They were excited to put on their costumes one last time and collect another bounty of candy.  It was a fun night to remember!

Eli with his "Captain America" buddy JJ 

5. Ice skating with Uncle Ben two days after Thanksgiving.  One of the only requests Ben had when he came to visit was to ice skate. So we looked up a rink that was open on Saturday and away we went. We had a really great time and luckily no one needed stitches at the end {Ben took a particularly nasty fall a few weeks prior to this on the ice and ended up cutting his chin open.  I had the pleasure of removing his stitches while he came to visit}

**once again the one and only picture I had on my camera phone before the whole thing died. I am seriously counting down the months until next July when my contract is up and I can finally get an I-phone

6.  Had lots and lots of one on one time with my Mr E.  I have sure enjoyed this fall having some well deserved time with my youngest.  He has been so helpful, quiet, funny, quirky, and easy to have home with me and I am not looking forward to a few years from now when he will be sent away from me all day.  But for now I am cherishing these moments I get to hang out with him.  He is easy to please as the only child at home and loves to do puzzles, play with toys, watch television, do the dishes, etc. 

7. Watched Robby's school class perform at Morning Sing and was a total proud Mama! (every Friday at the local elementary school they have a sing-a-long type of activity where parents are invited to come and sing with the school.  Each week they feature different classes and groups of students performing for the school)

 **Robby is the boy in red in the middle left walking on stage

**in this picture, Robby is the 5th child from the left hand side

8. Attended a super fun Christmas Party at Brud and Jen Fogarty's house that included a "crazy ornament swap".  It was fun to get together with a bunch of our Tuck friends and not have our children running around.  We had plenty of laughs through the ornament exchange that was done White Elephant Style.  I have to say that I was plenty pleased to end up with a cute high heel ornament for Miss M for Christmas and a shiny star ornament.  Thanks for such a fun night all!

9. Maddie's pre team group at gymnastics did another "Secret Sister" gift exchange the last few weeks before Christmas.  I loved to see her grin as she came up with inexpensive thoughtful gifts for her secret sister.  She was pretty pleased when she got a jewelry box that was decorated in lots of bling---her fave!

10. The whole Elementary school went to a special Holiday music program at the high school and Maddie was chosen out of the audience to come down and help conduct the musicians for part of the program.  She was bursting with excitement when she came home after school.  I was even more pleased that the front office lady was thoughtful enough to take a picture of the occasion and e-mail it to me. 

Second Missing Tooth

Robby was so excited to come from school today with a loose tooth.  

It wiggled somewhat, but definitely not enough to really pull on it.  

So off to ice skating we went and later on that evening after dinner it was barely hanging on.

  One little pull by Mom and it was out free and clear.

Robby was ecstatic to have caught up to his sister in number of teeth lost thus far.

Maddie was NOT happy to have her little brother catch up to her and promptly inspected her own mouth to see if she happened to have any wiggly teeth {she did not}

Robby was also excited to be able to add his name on the tooth count calendar at school.

Maddie was not quite so unhappy when she found out that next month she is having TWO teeth pulled so then she will be back in the lead.

Robby also has ANOTHER wiggly tooth and is now working on that one in hopes he will pass Maddie up.

LOVE those two, even if they are just slightly competitive 

(can't imagine where they got that from....definitely not the parents :))

{We do have our fair share of fights around our house, but I love the fact that they also have their fair share of sibling love time.  For instance, I love the fact that they scoot their chairs as close as possible to each other during meal time.}

TP Ice Skating

One of our {meaning the kids and I} favorite past times in New England is ice-skating.  We have really enjoyed having a rink nearly in our backyard and in the dead of winter we love having frozen ponds/lakes to practice our glides, stops, and sometimes fancy falls.  Already we are watching our favorite ponds to see when we will be able to fit in some ice time.  

--our cute friends Candace and JJ with Maddie 

(I promise my boys and I were at the rink that night, just no pics due to a nearly dead phone)

The amazing Tuck Partner group arranged a special ice skating night at Campion Rink and we immediately signed up to go.  Although Jesse ended up missing it, the kids and I still had a great time skating around the rink.  Maddie basically stole the show (as always) and loved showing everyone just how good she has gotten at skating.  She always starts out with a full winter wardrobe and by the end she has stripped down to regular clothes and gloves.  She says that since she "never falls" she gets too hot on the ice and "the pretty girls that ice skate only wear tights and a fancy dress".  Maddie loved skating with our friend Carreau, who nicely took her to the center and taught her some figure skating moves.  Who knows, we may have a figure skater in our family?!  The boys focused on staying upright and we even pulled out a chair for Eli to push around the rink.  E really enjoyed falling to the ground on purpose and would proceed to lick the ice because "it tastes so nummy".  Robby is very serious and focused on everything he tries and tends to get frustrated if he doesn't pick something up right away.  He really is starting to get the hang of skating and although he still falls a lot, I can see the beginning steps gradually moving forward.  I think by next year he will be whipping around the ice like Maddie.

TT Christmas Party

***most of these pictures are NOT very good.  Let's just say my old camera is struggling right now and my camera on the phone is broken. Nevertheless I don't want to forget this precious time in our lives.***

Once again we attended the Tiny Tuckie Christmas Party, and once again it didn't disappoint.  Candace and Stephanie are the co-chairs for the Tiny Tuckies and they literally go ALL OUT when it comes to these parties.  Beautiful decor, amazing treats, cookies to decorate from King Arthur Flour, even a real, life Santa was there (he looked amazingly young this year....how does he do it?!).  My kids were thrilled to tell Santa what they wanted for Christmas.  In fact, I had to drag them all away so they wouldn't keep harassing Santa.  

One of my very favorite families to move in this year as "1st years" in J's business program is the Monteleone's. I have loved getting to know Candace through road trips, Museum and playground playdates, girls night outs, etc.  She is one of those amazing girls that is beautiful (obviously), talented, giving, and hilarious to be around.  We have spent lots of time together and somehow I think this is one of the only pictures we have of the two of us together :)  

Maddie thought it was fantastic that they could decorate gingerbread men and she was very methodical in how hers was decorated.  The finished product then came home and sat on our fridge shelf for a number of days.  The boys hurried through theirs a bit quicker and immediately went to town eating their creations....BOYS.  

After the cookie decorating was over, Robby picked up some treats and sat on the closest couch to Santa and wouldn't budge for the remainder of the time.

This is how we kept Eli from running off for the rest of the party.  #thankheavensforkindles

We are a Family

We were so excited to get to take pictures during the fall in New England {the most beautiful place to experience fall beauty in my opinion}.  We were just slightly bummed when a ton of leaves fell off the trees just days before our scheduled pictures.  Nevertheless, when we got our proofs back we ended up thrilled with the results; especially since our children were little demons during the photo session

Although taking pictures was a stressful time, I love having these memories to look back on and remember our time out here in New England.

*I love the missing tooth in Robby's mouth----his first of many.

*I love how lovable Maddie is right now; despite her sassiness she really does think the world of her Mom.

*I love Eli's goofy smiles and pictures of him laughing because that is so my Mr E

*I love the Connecticut River that is in the background throughout quite a few of our pictures.  Growing up in Utah and then Arizona, I never had any rivers close to our house.  The only time I would see large bodies of water would be vacations or trips to the lake.  I have never understood the tranquility and soothing power of being near water until now.  I love my daily drives along the banks of the river; they are so relaxing and calming to me.  Now as the ground is blanketed with snow and with the cold weather the top of the river is frozen, I enjoy the beautiful scenic view.  I know this is going to be something that I really miss when we move.

*I don't love the bags that were/are under my eyes in nearly every picture {although I do love photo editing software that Jesse is a pro at using}, but I do know that I will always remember how little sleep that I lived on during these graduate years and wonder just how I survived.

*I love how all three of our kids are a little troop together, they play together, they fight together and they love together.  I hope they will always remember the feelings of love that they have for each other and I hope that when they look back upon this time they will remember the laughs and cuddles, the joy they brought each other and not the tears and anger during the daily sibling fights.

*I love how we have become our own little family far away from the rest of our family.  I love how we have learned to depend on each other and have grown closer to one another.

*Most of all, I love the people in these special pictures, my loving and supportive husband and my fun loving, excited, thriving children.  They all mean the world to me and I'm thankful every day for the blessings and joy they bring into my life.

Maddie at 7 years old

Robby at 5 years old {and a half}

Eli at 3 years old {almost 4}