Merry Christmas!

 We had a great Christmas this year!  We started off Christmas Eve at Jay's parents' house with gifts and dinner.

 We finished the evening at the annual gathering of Jay's old neighbors.  I think this is the first time we ever thought to take a group selfie!

 We didn't have to be anywhere early on Christmas morning so the kids actually slept in a bit, which was a first.

 Pretty sure it doesn't get much sweeter.

 Alice loves to give gifts!  She works really hard to come up with ideas she thinks the person will love.  She's great at it!

 A new OU sweatshirt

 A HUGE book on one of his favorite topics

 She saw Quigley Down Under for the first time a few months ago and loved it!

 Who doesn't want a giant box of Nerds?!

 A new Julie doll!

 Beckham got a new (larger) bed.

 Neville got a kick stick--which Seamus took over.

 Seamus got a fountain, which he isn't too interested in.

 Tycho got a new toy, which they all love!

 We watched A Charlie Brown Christmas while I cooked.

 Time to eat!

 I was so excited to get this Nest Egg!  Also, the kids surprised me with The Waltons Board Game.

 Later we went to my mom and dad's for gifts and dinner.

 Alice painted gifts for my mom and dad.

Wrapping up the evening with a game of Murder.

December Fun

 December was so crazy busy!  We had lots of different activities going on and we celebrated some fun days, too, like Cookie Day on December 4.

 After their final gymnastics classes before break they had a gingerbread house and cookies.

 Trying out a photo area while we waited on Alice...

 Treats in their shoes for St, Nicholas Day!

 We went to the German American Society's Christkindlmarkt for the first time.  It was a lot of fun!

 I got this cute ornament for the tree there.

 Dressed up for the Christmas parade!  The theme was Christmas Then and Now.

 

 Our 4-H club had a float where the front of the trailer was Christmas Then (where Jack rode) and the back was Christmas Now.

 

 Alice walked along and handed out candy.

 Donuts on Dozens Day (12/12)

 Hot chocolate to celebrate the end of PE for the semester

 Decorating Grandma and Grandpa's tree

 On Friday the 13th we watched The Nightmare Before Christmas...

 ...and had Jack Skellington cupcakes.

 We packed food boxes for the Salvation Army with our 4-H club.

 We've done this for several years and the kids always enjoy it!

 Santa came to our club Christmas party!

 We spent a beautiful afternoon at the Gathering Place.

 Group selfie of our annual trip to Philbrook!

 

 All the kids saw Santa at Utica Square

 Checking out the Nutcracker scenes

 Everyone in the phone booth!  This year another lady stopped and took their picture, too, because she said that was something you didn't see every day.

 Sweet babies

 Alice's dance class had their winter program.  She is loving this class! 

 We all had a good time at the county 4-H party, too! 

 

 A chilly night at Rhema!

 Last weekend we had some Christmas movie marathons.  On Saturday we watched all of the Santa Clause movies and and Sunday we watched all of the Home Alone movies.

 Monday the weather was beautiful so we went to OKC and got the special Christmas Moldaramas at the zoo.

We're enjoying a bit of a lull this week, so hopefully I will get a few more posts done!

10 Year Friendiversary

 

(Starting off with this one because it's cute.)

 10 years ago (on November 2) we met up with some new friends at a local park.  I had known Rachel for a couple of years online through the FIAR boards and when we moved back we decided to get together.

 I wish we had known how much we were going to hit it off because I would have taken more pictures!

 The only close up I got was of the two littlest ones, now 10 and 12.

 So on November 2 of this year, we went back to the same park!

 It looks quite a bit different now, but they still had fun.

 We tried to recreate the one close up shot and I don't think we stopped laughing the entire time.

I'm so thankful for these friendships.  We have made so many wonderful memories over the last decade and I know we'll make many more!

Where I Am (Twelve Years Later!)

Twelve (!) years ago today I started this blog as I was preparing for my husband to deploy overseas, and I was pretty faithful to write until the last couple of years.  As my kids have gotten older it's been harder to find the time to sit down and write, but for the last several months I have been thinking more and more about starting up again.  There's no way to post about everything we've been doing, so I'll start with the biggest change.  Since the last time I posted we added two cats to our house!  In August of 2018 we started going to Street Cats each week to play with the cats who are waiting to be adopted and in January we brought home Beckham, a six year old Russian Blue.  In July our vet posted a picture of the most adorable little orange kitten and I texted a picture to Jay.  When he came home from work that evening he had Tycho with him.  These four keep us busy around the house and we're still involved in 4H and swimming and gymnastics and more. With all of that going on, I know some memories will get lost in the shuffle, so I hope to get back to posting a time or two each week so we can remember the details!