On a roll!

Seth was on a roll this morning - 119 - his highest score ever!

Lighten Up

Lacey had a beautification day. Her hair has a tendency to get rather mousy looking in the winter and lightening it up a bit gives it a nice shine and some body. Here she is just getting started.

Now the "stinky" part. I'm teasing her that it looks like little white worms on her head. = )She also wanted to have her eyebrows plucked, so Lynn is applying just a small trim.

Not a good picture of the hair, but here she is after her primping. She keeps pulling the hair up into a ponytail so she can show off her angled bangs so the frost doesn't really show much. I will try to add another picture to this post when I get a good one.

50 Miles!

Seth is still on a roll, walking 10 miles a month. Here is his 50 mile certificate. Way to go Seth!

Am I Being Petit?

Now I know that Jennifer and I are a little strange in that we notice every misspelling out there, but this one takes the cake, so to speak. There were other strange uses of quotation marks and apostrophes, but I will save those for another day.

Meet Fancy

Meet Fancy, our new transportation. Lacey originally named her Sandy because her color is Sandstone, but because the kids are enjoying a couple of the comfort features, we decided that Fancy Nancy is her name. The kids and I spend a lot of time in the car so we love her touch screen stereo , extra storage and other features. It took me a day or two to warm up to the new body shape, but it's growing on me. I think she looks more like an SUV than the "Mommy-Van".

Here's the control panel. I haven't even had time to figure it all out. There is a hard drive so CD's can be loaded on, as well as pictures and MP3's.

Here is one of two major selling features for the kids -- sliding back windows. We have owned a van ever since Lacey was born so she has never had this feature and thinks it is the best -- well, actually it is second on her list. See next picture.

This is both of the kids favorite feature, at least now that it is winter. Heated seats! Lacey especially has been jealous of me warming up in the front while she had to cover with a blanket. Seth loves it too. We have been using this feature every day!

Another feature that doesn't seem like much is the pull up shades. Seth does not like to have sun in his eyes and even with tinted windows, it still seems to bother him. These shades add another layer of tinting which he is very excited about.

Here's a little feature that I just noticed last night. It's an umbrella holder. Obviously, they have finally employed moms to assist in design.

I am impressed with the amount of storage in this van, and storage is an important factor for me. There are two glove boxes, four compartments in each door, a very spacious console and storage in the back seat area too. Overall, we are very pleased with her.

Enough Already!

I never have been much of a snow freak, I like to watch it but then it is supposed to be gone when I want to go somewhere. But here are a few more pictures. This one was taken at 9:30 p.m. last night. You can barely see the tip of my handy blue ruler.

It started snowing again today. Oh joy! I had to give up on the ruler and go with the yardstick. Not a lot of difference showing on the table but that is because some of the snow blew off of it today before it started snowing again. I have another measurement area where I am keeping track of what fell today. Starting at 1:30 p.m., it has added another 2 inches. Forecast is for 2-6" tonight. ENOUGH ALREADY!

Winter wonderland. Not looking quite so wonderful to me anymore, but I guess it is a little bit pretty. = )

This really needs to get done soon. There is not a single present under my tree! It is either in transit (UPS cannot even dream of getting to our house), or it has not been purchased yet. Yikes!

Snow pics from Thursday

Here are just a few pictures of snow around our house. I haven't been home during daylight hours the last few days so I was not able to take any pictures, Erik took all but the first one. Hopefully, tomorrow I will be able to catch a lot more since I am home all day and it is supposed to snow plenty before turning to freezing rain in the middle of the night. This first picture was from Friday morning before I caught my ride to work.

Here's Seth on Thursday playing in the snow:

And Lacey enjoying some big flakes:

You may need to click on this picture to zoom in on the squirrel hanging from the shepards hook. There was a pinecone with peanut butter and bird seed hanging from it, but apparently he had successfully liberated the pinecone for his own enjoyment.

Pictures via Lacey

I found these pictures on Lacey's camera and thought I would share. Lacey loves to play with the timer feature on her camera and here she is catching pics of herself peeking around the Christmas tree. I don't think I would have thought of taking a Christmas tree picture in black and white, but I kind of like it.

She also caught these pictures of Lily and Chloe. I love the way Chloe looks like the giant Pug on the attack -- kind of like King Kong. = ) Her paws appear enormous!

Zoo + Lights + Baby Elephants = FUN!

We have had a very busy weekend, with plenty of holiday lights and fun. Despite the threat of rain, we went to ZooLights in Portland.

It rained like crazy while our group of 20 ate a great meal at BJ's Restaurant. Nothing like having 10 adults and 10 kids and going to a restaurant together! It went very well with absolutely no problems -- if we don't count Logan's near miss at practicing knife throwing! Good thing Jennifer had that incredible Mommy speed and thwarted the near disaster.

There was no way we could go to the zoo without visiting the newest member -- Sumadra. He is adorable and he was being quite a clown tonight. Flash photography was discouraged, but I did get this cute picture of him and then took a video because he was being so adorable. Isn't he the cutest 614 pounds you have ever seen?

The eagles were quite regal tonight too. This picture is only zoomed a tiny bit, he was only about six feet away. Beau-ti-ful!

Baldy and his buddy. They almost look like statues.

Oh yeah....zoolights....that is why we went after all.

Here the crocodiles and hippos are hanging out together in the yard.

Seth had to have his picture with the Christmas Cow. Don't ask, I have no idea what significance a Christmas Cow has, but he was there and Seth liked him. = ) Probably because he was taller that it!

Lacey giving me a "face" instead of her pretty one. Seth, on the other hand, is actually trying to figure out which wheel I set the brake on the stroller because Lacey is perched on a hill and he thought sailing her down the hill might be a great idea. (He never found the correct wheel so Lacey was saved!). What are brothers for anyway?

MyLeigh was all bundled up getting her pic taken in front of the Gingerbread House. Underneath all of that is a little 20 pound bundle of fun, she looks mighty cozy.

ZooLights were pretty as always, the rain held off for 99% of the night, we got a slight sprinkle soon after going in the entrance but that was it. Temp was about 46 degrees which is significantly warmer than last year when it was freezing and threatening snow. I'll do the ZooLights with the threat of rain any day -- we literally had the zoo to ourselves for the first hour. We were done and gone before the crowds really started.

On Saturday, 14 of the same group gathered for the local parade. Logan is getting an overhead view of the fun here with his dad. The parade was a whopping hour and half with about 100 entrants.

Seth watched from the chair only briefly until he decided to collect some of the candy that was being offered.

Lacey sporting her Santa hat that she got during a train ride earlier in the day with Great Grandma Lila. Missy and MyLeigh are both drawn to Lacey like magnets so it's not surprising to find them like this.

And, here's the prize for the most beautiful eyes, of course a boy would get them! Even though he was fighting off the remains of an eye infection, they are still drop dead gorgeous!

The Beach is Made for Beading!

Last week, my girlfriends and I had our annual beach beading soiree. This is a blissful time for us beadaholics as we enjoy five days with nothing better to do than bead. We sleep as little as possible (or as much as you wish), bead a lot, drink if we want, tell stories, and basically have a fabulous time. Thank you Grandma and Grandpa for loaning us the location, we are truly grateful!

Just to prove that we really do bead, I thought I would share what I got accomplished. For those non-beaders, it may not look like much, but I was pleased with the outcome. Some of you may know that I have been working on an extremely large undertaking -- a 20" x 14" Christmas tapestry of the North Pole. Here is a picture of what it will look like when finished:

There are over 400 rows to the pattern and I am only on row 89. I did 14 rows at the beach. Each row takes approximately 1/2 hour to an hour. So, for the first two days, I worked on the tapestry, here is what I have done so far:

To give you an idea of 14 rows, it is about 1/2 inch. I did the area between the bottom of the light, down to the bottom of the picture. Pictures do not do it justice, the use of beads in this pattern is incredible. The stars in the sky appear to twinkle, the snow on the roofs glisten and the light has a soft glow to it. Doing a project like this is as close as I will get to painting, I guess it is my version of paint by number. = )

Besides the tapestry, I made a couple of bracelets. One was this cute snowman pattern. It is finished except for the button closure (I forgot to bring buttons so the bracelets I made are almost finished).

I made this mini-tapestry using the beads that were called for in the pattern. I am not happy with it at all because the sky is way too dark. After I was halfway through it, I made the decision to finish thinking it would be better. Wrong decision. I will probably end up taking this completely apart and salvaging the beads. It is a cute pattern, just a poor bead selection.

My next bracelet is my favorite. It is a goddess bracelet and is quite colorful. I just love the wild colors. It was a very fun pattern to do! Now, I just need to find the perfect button to close it up.

The last bracelet is a cool snowflake pattern. The colors do not show well in this picture, the beads have a metallic finish and it glistens quite nicely. As you can tell, I didn't get it quite finished before it was time to pack up and go home.

Well, there you have it. This is what I have to show for myself. I had a great time and I'm already counting down the days until next year's getaway!