Another month went by and I obviously slacked in the blogging department. I did, however find some more pictures from Thanksgiving, including the one above of Ethan & Grammie making pies.
Pudge received a dog house from my aunt, who's dog recently passed away. Their dog was HUGE, so Pudge had a palace.
Kamden thinks it is so big, that Pudge has room for visitors.
This is where we found Kamden on Thanksgiving.
Thankfully we were able to coax him inside with the promise of a Thanksgiving feast.
This is where we found my brother, Jeff, after the Thanksgiving feast...
There were also lots of football games to watch, which we enjoyed being able to have family over again to watch with us, now that we no longer live on a mountain...
The boys thought they would show their team spirit by wearing Uncle Brian's sweatshirt...
We decided to spend Christmas break traveling around Eastern Idaho since Jeff had to work in Twin Falls the week before and Idaho Falls the week after. The morning that we were leaving, we had the boys come upstairs for their Christmas present...
Things I love about this picture:
1) Ethan has his shoes on
2) Kamden is in his undies
3) Kamden's expression
4)Owen looks like he could fall asleep any moment, but he still made the effort to scratch his belly
Grammie & Grandpa Van Leuven also brought Christmas early since we were leaving & also because they were heading to Iowa to spend the holidays with my older brother.
The boys loved their gifts, & you can tell by their expressions.
I especially loved watching Owen's face as he tried to tear the wrapping paper off his gifts, usually only getting a tiny piece of paper each time.
Tuesday was Ethan's last day before the break, so we picked him up a bit early since he & Kamden both had dentist appointments. Jeff had left that morning for Twin Falls so after the dentist, the boys & I hit the road & met him there.
We stayed at a hotel Tuesday-Thursday & the boys did so much swimming that their skin was dried out & itchy from the pool chemicals.
On Thursday we went to Declo & watched the last BSU game of the season. Other things we did while there:
Owen loved playing the Fish Game
& getting bundled up to play outside...
We even spotted some deer, although there weren't nearly as many as in Orofino...
We drove around & looked at Christmas lights, spent time with family (which is why there are no pictures of Ethan...he was busy playing with Addie), & went to dinner with friends.
Thankfully Jeff did not wear this on our night out:
His dad's shirt from his mission in the Philippines.
On Christmas Eve we went to Jeff's Grandma's house. Every year she has a party & we have never been, the last time Jeff was there was right after his mission.
After dinner the kids dressed up while we listened to the reading of the nativity story from the Bible. Then we sang Christmas songs before Santa stopped by with a gift for everyone...but we all had to sit on his lap before we got our present...
Owen was not thrilled about it at all...
Then there was a talent show & we eventually were able to tear the boys away from their new-found friends, who are actually Jeff's cousins. But they couldn't quite grasp the concept since they were close to Ethan & Kamden's age.
I had to wake the boys up on Christmas morning so that there was enough time to open gifts before going to church at 9:30.
Jeff & I were on the Naughty List this year.
On Monday we celebrated Ethan's 7th birthday a day early, with the first store-bought cake in our family. Last year I hauled his Star Wars cake to Declo & there was no way I was doing that again. He wanted a Transformer cake & this is what he got.
He went to the store with me & picked it out himself, then he stuck his Transformers on it & it was done!
Tuesday morning Jeff left early for Idaho Falls & we met him there for lunch. Since it was Ethan's birthday it was his choice & of course we ended up at McDonalds.
I offered to take them to a movie but all they wanted to do was get to the hotel & swim, so that's what we did until Jeff got done working. Thursday morning they swam again but I was able to get them out of the water for lunch & then we went to the movies. They were back in the pool that evening after dinner & on Thursday morning I packed up the car & we went home. Our plan had been to stay until Friday, but 9 days was all I could do of living out of a suitcase & being in a hotel with these 3 boys.
It was a fun & hectic break but by the time school started back up I was pretty close to being insane. I came to realize the truth behind the line of the song "It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas" when it says "and mom and dad can hardly wait for school to start again!"
It's good to be home!
