Weathered the Storm

So we had our first Missouri ice storm this last week. We were kind of excited! and I told the lady at Walmart that when I was buying our provisions, and of course she thought I was crazy. The last two years they've had horrible ice storms, with power out for days, if not weeks, trees breaking everywhere, bad bad stuff. So no one here was excited for it! But we wanted to see what all the hubbub was about. So we filled our propane tanks, made sure our gas fireplace was working, got plenty of necessity food, i.e. chips, ice cream (it'll keep in the snow), and fruit snacks, and hunkered down for the storm. It was pretty fun to keep running to the window to see what the weather was doing, freezing rain is an interesting thing to see, hear, watch. It's like rain, but frozen! :-) in little droplets, and freezes again when it hits anything. It coats everything, the roads, power lines, trees, grass blades, Chris had fun taking shots of it the next morning. It's very beautiful, but very dangerous. If the power lines get more than about 1/2" of coating, they sag and snap. Trees often snap as well onto the power lines and cause outages. Nobody goes anywhere after an ice storm. Maci's school was cancelled for 3 days! But we never lost power and have been fine, besides trying to keep the kids occupied! We got about 3 inches of snow on top of the ice, so the kids had fun playing in that, although it is NOT the greatest snow on earth. Anyway, I'm glad to say our first ice storm is behind us, although I doubt it will be our last.

A Great Day Off

I totally meant to get this post up much sooner, but this week has been crazy! with a cold, about 10 orders to fill, and just general family business, or busyness. . . but here it is a little late.

We had a fantastic 3 day weekend last week. On Saturday we headed down to Branson to the 4th annual Ice Scupltur Contest at the Titanic Museum. It was free :-) And actually fun to see how creative people are and the kind of tools they use to cut the ice. I leaned over to Chris as they broke up their mega Dremel tool and said, "I could get into this!" but I think I'll stick to wood for now. Maci's favorite was the Pegasus Unicorn, and Gavy liked a cool Gecko. The weather was really warm and windy, probably around 50 degrees, which is warm when you're carving a block of ice, so the competitors were struggling with that. But it was still really fun to watch. We didn't stick around to see who won. We took off to the outlet malls instead! I got a new pair of tennis shoes, mine were 7 years old and had holes in them, and of course I had to stop at the Children's Place and check out their deals. I got lots of stuff for Maci and Gavin for next fall at killer prices. Anyway, it was a perfect "vacation" day and we had a great time.




On Monday, we told the kids we could go to the Children's Discovery Center, we bought an annual pass so we can go whenever we want. It's a great science center and the kids love going. We got to do a couple things we haven't had a chance to do before, they let us light a lightbulb with our fingers when we touched the globe thing with the electric currents running through it? I'm sure that makes no sense. And then the thing that makes your hair all static-y and you can shock people when you get off it, anyway those were fun things we haven't done before. We walked around there for an hour or so, and then went to Lamberts for Lunch, where they throw the rolls. Yummo rolls. Then we went home to tackle some house stuff.
This is like a hamster wheel that creates energy when you run on it, I think we'll get one installed to run the washer and dryer!






Walking on the "keystone"

I've been working on my craft room since we moved in, but have never gotten it completely functional and "done". Well I think I'm about 75% there now, which is closer than before! It was in a complete state of disaster, with boxes and bins everywhere, stacked, unstacked, you couldn't even walk in the room for the most part. So we really wanted an Ikea piece with about 9 shelf boxes on it, so all my stuff could have its own compartment. But seeing as the shipping was as much as the piece, and we didn't want to wait till summer to get it cleaned up so we could buy it in UT and drive it home, we decided to make our own, less fancy but just as functional piece. Chris made me some shelves and we just put them on brackets. We got a ton of rubbermaids, all the same sizes and colors so they matched and looked nice. We got them up and filled on Monday and it looks SO much better! I even have room and bins to spare, so I can buy even more stuff! Just kidding. But it feels good to have a functional space, now I just have to keep it that way. There's one wall that still needs to be painted, and has space for a crib someday when we have another baby. It sucks the baby will have to share the craft room, but he/she won't mind for the first couple years I don't think!



So that was our fun and exciting weekend. It was the perfect combination of fun and productiveness, family time, and togetherness! Now that Chris is back in school, we take those weekends when we can get them!

My Little Man!

So there was one more important development during Christmas Break, Gavy got somewhat potty trained!! Thanks to Grandma Sharon for some needed motivation and a small potty seat so he wouldn't fall in! He's pretty much done with diapers during the day, and even most nights wakes up dry, which I'm so relieved about, as I've heard that a lot of boys have trouble with not waking up and having accidents. Gavin must have a bladder of steel, he can hold it all day! or maybe he's not drinking enough? but he can go in the morning, and then not go again until like 4 pm? crazy. I'll ask him all day, do you need to go? and he says, no Mommy, I'm holding it! and he calls it "I did my water Mommy!" he's so proud of himself. Poops are another story, seems like all kids have trouble pooping on the potty! But I don't want him to start holding them in, we did that with Maci and it was a horrible painful three months till we could convince her it wasn't so scary after all. Anyway, we're working on #2, so to speak, and hopefully in a month or so be diaper free!!

I'm also struggling with naptime with Gavin. He'll still take naps pretty willingly, but ever since we got home from our trip, if he takes a nap, he's up till like 10pm. We'll put him to bed at 8, and he'll mess around, talk, sing, play, whatever until he finally falls asleep. This keeps Maci up though, and gets us frustrated with his constant coming out of bed to say he's not tired and can't sleep. So do I give up my 2 hrs of quiet during the day for an easier bedtime??!?!?!? I really can't decide. Have any of you tackled this problem? if I only let him sleep an hour will he go to bed better? Most days he gets really grumpy by the end of the night if he doesn't have a nap, which is why I've still been giving him one, but maybe he just needs to go to bed at like 7? I don't think that will happen either. I'm at a loss, but don't want to give up my hour of quiet!! Any advice from you seasoned moms out there?

I haven't gotten a pic of Gavin on the potty, but this bath one was cute I took the other day. The kids each got bath soaps and toys for Christmas, and Gavin's came with shaving cream soap. I walked out of the bathroom for a minute, and came back to both of them with huge handfulls of cream. I told them to put it to good use and at least let me take a picture of them! Cute kids.

10 favorite things from UT

So we had a fantastic trip to UT. We arrived safely on the 16th, even if it was a couple hours late due to a sensor on the plane malfunctioning. We headed off on a 3 week whirlwind of friends, family, parties, Christmas, snow, and FUN!! Here were a few of our favorite things on our trip.

10. Decorated trees at Grandma Reesa's and Great Grandma Cleo's.



9. Played ShuffleBoard, Horseshoes, and swimming (even if it was a little cold!) at the Condo in St. George with Grandma and Todd

8. Let Missy pull the kids on the sleds.

7. Went caroling with the Boren clan.

6. Saw friends and caught up on the last 4 months.


5. Played with cousins!

4. Got to know Uncle Todd again, he was a good sport in the wrestling department!

3. Seeing Comet and Blitzen, thanks to Todd, at Thanksgiving Point.

2. Going sledding in Cedar Hills w/Katie and Brett!



1. Having the Best Christmas Ever with ALL! our family and friends.


Thank you all for making our Christmas Vacation such a great time. I'm sorry we didn't get to see all of you, we hope in the summer when there isn't a big holiday to schedule in, we'll have more time to spread around. We had such a great time though and it was great to be back in UT for a while. We did miss home though, and find it nice to be back in a routine and actually accomplishing a task during the day instead of just eating and having fun!

Since we've been back we've just been cleaning the house, cutting out lots of orders!, getting back to school for Maci, Chris is working full time for a couple weeks before school starts, and basically just getting back into the swing of things.

One more brag, Chris got 4 A's and 1 B his first semester of grad school, and got on the Dean's List! I'm so proud of him and how hard he's working. He's really enjoying it too, and that's the best part!

So TTFN, until something exciting happens?!

An Early Visitor!

We're heading out for UT tomorrow!! and due to limited space in our suitcases, we let Santa know that he may need to make an early appearance at our house! So the kids wrote letters and asked for their things, and let him know we'd be in UT on Christmas Day. He wrote back and said that he was going to bring their "big" presents a little early so we didn't have to pack them home in our suitcases. So he came on Sat. morning, bright and early as promised. He even ate the cookies and milk we left and Rudolph snarfed up the carrots. We had a fun time, even if the kids were still a little confused at the small amount of presents they received, only 2 each. We kept having to say, you're getting some more in UT, not a lot more, but SOME more. . . I think it finally sunk in. Maci got an oversized Barbie doll, that she has dressed up several times already, and a new 2 wheeled scooter. Gavin got a remote control 4 wheeler and an Iron Man Big Wheel, so he doesn't have to use Maci's old Barbie one anymore ;-) They were both thrilled with their gifts and have played with them a lot already. I'm not sure why Maci looks drugged in all these pics, I think I need to NOT say, 1,2,3 cheese?! or something.

After the big wind up of Santa and the toys, it was apparent that Maci was NOT feeling well, she had said the night before that she was feeling sick and she had a pretty high fever that we were treating with Tylenol. So when it got up to 102.7 we decided we better take her in. There's an Urgent Care really close to here, I haven't set us up with a Pediatrician yet, stupid I know, so we went to the Urgent Care first. I get there and the lady at the front desk says, Oh, you have a child? the Dr. on call today doesn't "do" kids." I was like, WHAT?! I guess they really have a no pediatrics on the weekends policy, but if a pediatric Dr. is working, then sometimes he'll take kids. But I was flabergasted that there would be any urgent care that didn't take kids at all?!? very weird!! So I had to drive all the way into Springfield, and then when I got to the "Pediatric" urgent care, they take appointments, so the earliest I could get was 2 hours later. Do we wait? Do we drive home to stay for an hour and drive back? We chose the latter. . . but at least next time we'll know that we can call in advance, which is actually nice so you don't have to sit there waiting for 2 hours which we HAVE done at an IHC instacare. So anyway, she has strep, and I'm kinda glad because at least we can give her medicine that will actually help and make it go away. Gav, Maci and I all caught the stomach bug last week, it has not been a good health month! But she's feeling much better today and went to school for her last day before we leave. I'm hoping no one else gets it, but if they do at least we'll know what it is! So that's my first experience with the MO health services. The Dr. was actually really great and I'm considering signing up with him just because he was so nice. But we'll probably go with someone closer here in Nixa. Sorry to bore you with that story but I was just so frustrated that day!

So here's fun pics of the kids toys. See some of you SOON!!!

Ginberbread House

We took a crack at decorating a gingerbread house tonight for FHE. We had intentions of doing it this weekend so Chris could do it with us, but the weekend got filled up somehow! So we decided to do it tonight even though Chris was studying. Gavin had been feeling icky tonight, throwing up several times. Maci had this a couple nights ago. Well I thought he was feeling better, they were running around wrestling and stuff, so we decided to start in on the house. Well. . . he wasn't feeling better, and had several more bouts while we were decorating the house. You can see his progression as he starts to feel worse and worse, poor little guy. He made it through the night pretty well, and only was up twice, but it was still while Chris and I were up thank goodness. I think he's feeling much better this morning, hopefully we'll have a "clean" day! The house turned out cute though, thanks to Maci finishing it off for us!



Our Stake here does a BIG Nativity Celebration that's open to the public for two weeks on the weekends. It's a big deal here, and a great missionary opportunity. They have a live nativity outside for part of it, with sheep and horses and everything, and then they have a display of over 1000 nativities in the cultural hall. On all the evenings for about an hour they have one of the big Branson acts come and play. All of the 6 acts that played here are LDS members, there's a big group of them down there in Branson which is pretty cool I think. So I signed up to help with refreshments on Sunday, and then the kids and Chris joined me at 6 to here the group play from Branson. It was so fun! and really got me in the spirit of Christmas. The group was great, and played very appropriate Sabbath Day Christmas Songs, some with guitar and piano accompaniment and some just Accapella. Anyway, it was really great and they had the best turnout they've ever had. This is their 10th year. I think this last Sat. night they said they had over 800 people just at the performance part! So it's a great missionary experience and hopefully some of those people will be back to see what we're all about! I'm glad we got to experience it this year, and many more to come.

A couple weeks late

So I'm behind, I know! My friend says she's a bulimic blogger, I think that aptly describes me as well, at least lately. I have lots of great stories and intentions to write them, but then never actually sit down and do it, and then have to "purge" them all out at once. So here we are with 2 weeks to catch up on, with one major holiday among them! Here goes. . .

We had a great Thanksgiving. We invited our friends the Winter's over and had a great spread. It was actually fun and quite fulfilling to make some, even if not all, of a full Thanksgiving meal. I made the turkey, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, and green bean caserole. Janessa made the rolls, fruit salad, and dessert. We had enough food to feed about 20 people probably, but it fed the 7 of us just fine, with plenty of leftovers :) We talked for a while, let the kids play, just generally had a nice leisurely afternoon. Chris put up the Christmas lights earlier in the day and even mowed the lawn one last time. It was a balmy 60+ degrees, really nice weather.

We went and saw Bolt after dinner, the new Disney film out. It was REALLY funny, much better than I thought it would be. I hadn't heard much about it but I guess you don't have to publicize Disney movies much, if they make it, you will come. But go take your kids to this one if you haven't seen it yet, I thought it was better than Madagascar 2, and didn't have some of the "adult" jokes in it that M2 did.

So Turkey day was a success, even if I did really miss going out with Chris's family or eating around a huge table with 30 people with my family. But when in Rome. . . We hope for many more wonderful MO Thanksgivings.

This last week we've had our first bit of "snow". It was really cold, and now I can see why they get freezing rain here. The roads got suuuuper slick, and Chris saw loads of accidents on his way to work, even though it had only snowed about 1/2". It just freezes as soon as it hits the ground. So Gavin really wanted to make a snowman, so we got bundled up and attempted with what little snow we had. It did feel good to get our hands in some white stuff though.

The kids trying to scrape all the snow that had collected against the fence, into snowballs.

Frosty ain't got nuttin on this guy.

Maci was sick this week and missed 2 days of school. She had a stomach bug, and it has been going around, lots of friends have been sick as well. Luckily none of the rest of us picked it up, yet. Chris is winding down the semester and getting ready for finals starting the 15th. He's really excited to be finishing up his 1st semester of grad school! I decided to close down the booth in Branson, the fee was too high for how much I was selling, and the Etsy business is going pretty well so I think I'll focus on that and branch out a bit more. I might attempt a few craft fairs this next year as well. I had an open house today to get rid of some of the inventory, it went pretty well. I still have lots of tiles w/vinyl, so if any of you need a cheap Christmas present, let me know! If you're in UT I'll pack it in my suitcase for you ;)

Chris and I just went on an actual date tonight! It was very fun, we went out with our friends the Eckersley's and had a great time. We went to Panera, a really good bread and bagel store that sells sandwhiches too, kinda like Einstein's? We saw Quantum of Solace which we hadn't seen yet, it was very good, very James Bondish, I think I'll have to watch it twice more to get the full story behind all the action. But it felt good to go out and have fun, and get to know our friends a little better. So I think that catches us up for the week! Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving.