This Is It!!!

I promise!!! Reece just made me laugh, and I didn't want to forget why.

Today, we went to the Library. When we were walking out, we heard some sirens. Every time we hear sirens, I have a habit of saying, "There must be an emergency somewhere."

Reece responded with, "Yeah. It might be a fire, or someone is hurt. Or, someone is in trouble, or it's a bad guy."

Well people, there you have it. Reece, one way or the other, had it right. One of those things listed above, happened in Gardner today!

2010 Resolution

This will be my last 2009 post. Tomorrow my goal is to make my blog into a book. Hope it's not too much of a task!!

I never make resolutions. I know myself better. I'll never stick to it. Well, some of my blogging friends have decided to create a 2nd blog. So, maybe this could be my resolution, because I'm fairly good at keeping the blog updated. This will be more of a personal, journaling blog. Of course, I look at this blog as a journal, but this will still be different. One of my friends found a couple of lists of questions to use as our topic. So we will all have the same topic, just very different stories. The goal is to do this daily. I can't promise anything, but I'll do my best. It will be so much fun comparing our blogs. If you want to peek in, I've put my link to my new blog in the upper, right corner. Wish me luck, and bring on 2010! Happy New Year!!!

First Sledding Experience

Yesterday, Uncle Shawn invited us to go sledding. I was excited, but nervous. I knew Reece would be excited, but Riley is the kid that just this year made his first snow angel. I'm super sore today, but it was SO worth it, because we had a blast!!
WARNING: I couldn't decide which pictures to use, so I posted all of them. Sorry!!

Riley & Reece before the fun begins.
Camryn's ready!

Camryn on her own.

Colby, Riley & Camryn

Colby & Camryn pushing Dad down the hill.

Camryn & I

There we go...

Mommy & Boys

Off to find a bigger hill!

Colby

Camryn & Riley

Last night we got another couple of inches. I've never seen a storm, where there was so much snow, that they haul it away! As soon as Main Street was clear, we got more. Yuck! I'm over the snow! We had our big snow, now let it be gone!! On the bright sign, Reece finally got his snow that was capable of producing a snow man. Yay!!

The Life of White Teddy (in glimpses)

Reece the White Teddy Destroyer!

So, every time I glanced at my "White Teddy" post, I had a hard time imagining how cute W.T. used to be. I knew he was, but couldn't remember. This inspired me to find some pictures. Although, none of them are great pictures, I've been able to get my mental picture back. Forgive the next 3 pictures that were scanned, so they are a little fuzzy...
This shows off 3 things.
1. How chubby Reece was as a baby.
2. How WHITE, W.T. used to be.
3. How fluffy he was before losing all of his "boogers" aka, stuffing.

This is where it starts getting U.G.L.Y.

Reece caught in the act. But, it's B.T being tortured. It is hard to tell, but in the above picture, W.T. is terribly discolored on his nose/mouth. W.T. was washed almost daily, and it never helped. Yuck!

Habits!! Not always pleasant. Thank goodness for the washer that gave these 2 baths often.

Poor White Teddy & Brown Teddy...

White Teddy's injuries were way more extensive, but I did have to operate on B.T. and was able to save his nose and mouth. Go me!!

The Decade in 7 Minutes

Well, here I am shocked I'm entering my 10th year out of high school. Where did the time go? I guess here is a reminder... It's literally 7 minutes, so if you don't have time don't click here.

White Teddy

Over 5 years ago, before Reece was born, we were given this adorable white teddy bear from a co-worker. (Wish I would've known it was going to be such a huge part of Reece's life, and taken a picture) It didn't take long for Reece to love this white teddy, and he may have over loved it at times! He even named him, White Teddy. Reece had a pacifier as a baby, and when we took this away, he began chewing on the edges of his baby blanket. When he was done with that, he moved on to chewing on White Teddy's nose. It wasn't long before I had White Teddy booger's all over my house!

This drove me to try to find a new teddy to replace White Teddy. I found a brown teddy, which Reece named Brown Teddy. (clever huh?) In the mean time, I had to perform plastic surgery on White Teddy's face, to get rid of the boogers. Reece didn't like this much at all. Thankfully, he got over it within a few hours.

We went through a short span of time, where Brown Teddy was his first choice. Then one day I noticed B.T. was in the toy box. I asked why this was, and Reece said,"B.T. is in jail, because he hurt W.T." B.T. didn't come out of jail for a long while, and ever since B.T. hasn't gotten as much attention. He is still played with, but not loved like W.T.

Well, a couple months before Christmas, Reece took the blue bow off of W.T. , and threw it away. A couple weeks later, when we were making Christmas/Birthday wish lists, Reece asked for a new W.T. because he forgot he did want a bow on his bear. Crazy kid!! So, we were able to find an acceptable W.T. who was given the same name. It's just either "new" or "old" in the front.

Oh, the things we do for our kids! Now I have 2 W.T. voices coming out of Reece's mouth...

Believe it or not, but the old White Teddy really was adorable!!

Reece's BFFs!

BLIZZARD 2009

While we were gone, Kansas City got dumped on!! It snowed in Wichita, but WOW!! we got way more here. Jake heard about 12 inches was the total. With the wind, not sure how accurate, but I can't remember the last time I saw this much snow!

Riley, shockingly, made a snow angel. This is the kid that didn't want to touch the snow last year!

Unfortunately, it wasn't packing snow, and this is the best snowman the boys had patience for.

Reece wanted the piles of snow bigger, so he is shoveling the grass.

Guess what else was waiting for us when we got back. It was awful! We accidentally left one of Riley's presents at the house, which means he was short one gift on Christmas morning. It just was in a spot under the tree, that it got looked over. When Riley did finally get to open it, it was the best! He was SO happy!! What's so cool about this game, is we can all play at the same time. What is not so cool about this game, is that we can all play at the same time. Talk about frustrating!! You see, if some of the players get too far ahead, it kills the slow ones. It was challenging to not yell at the boys for going too fast!! In fact, we yelled a lot! I can imagine a WWIII erupting, when a family that can't contain their frustrations well, plays this game!! It was still a lot of fun!

Christmas Day F.U.N!

After a night of very little sleep, Riley was slightly disappointed he didn't hear Santa. He was so sure he was going to be able to stay awake long enough to hear Santa's sleigh on the roof. Riley and I woke up before Jake (who did make it safely) and Reece. Riley discovered a letter from Santa. You see, both boys asked for "Mario Galaxy" from Santa. This was after we had already wrapped the item for Reece's birthday, so Santa left us new Wii remotes, wheels, and nun chucks. Now we have 4 of each, and the entire family can have fun together!

Finally, Dad and Reece woke up and we did our family Christmas, before the rest of the family came over.

In between our 2 Christmas present times, Reece checked out his stocking, and was ready to eat the candy Santa left. It was 7:30 am, so that was a big NO!

When everyone came over, it was more presents. Because there are 20 cousins, we draw names.

Aidan, Reece, Riley & Alex

Aidan, showing off his Nerf swords.

Reece really wanted a Nerf basketball goal. Don't know why, but he got it!

Not sure what this was, but I'm pretty sure it had to do with the Wii.

The boys each got a gift of new, warm pajamas, cute warm robes, nice warm slippers, and a movie. Here they are modeling the pj's and robes. So cute, and they really are enjoying them!

Finally, us adults do a gift exchange. We buy a generic, non-gender gift, and pick and steal from each other. My Dad ended up with a KU Snuggie! Reece is modeling it!

Christmas Eve Fun!

The boys and I went down to Wichita on Wednesday, to ensure we missed the bad weather. I was very hesitant to even go, because it would've been the worst Christmas ever if Jake would've gotten snowed in, up here. On the morning of Christmas Eve, it started snowing around 8:30 am. The wind was SO strong, that it wasn't sticking very much, but the wind was the worst I've ever seen. The boys, Aunt Jaime, and I were brave enough to head over to Aunt Jody's to make Christmas goodies. On the menu, homemade carmel, toffee, sugar cookies (not homemade), a peanut butter/white chocolate popcorn mix, and my favorite, a carmel puff like treat. SO YUMMY!!

Reece has such great concentration, or as I say, the Michael Jordan tongue.
Riley, Aidan, and Reece decorating cookies.

Owen, after a nap, observing the decorating!

Then it was back to my parents for the preparation for Christmas. This is what the tree looked like before the Christmas madness began. This picture does no justice for how beautiful my Mom's tree looked.

The infamous stockings! 34 handmade stockings, hung with care!!

Santa's plate of treats, and some carrots for the reindeer. I bet you can't guess which 2 cookies were made by my extremely talented sister, and which cookies were decorated by the boys...

Bed time!! Hopefully, no coal for these boys!!