Our Family 2011

With each passing year we seem to change so much.

And unfortunately I forget all the simple little things that happen in our day to day life. I don't want our kids to come to us in 20 years and ask us what they were like when they were this age and not be able to tell them what I remember. Sure there are the big things that hopefully will be remembered, but the little things are what make us who we are as a family.

So starting this year I want to capture what we are like at this time.

Here we are in 2011:

Sundays are so important to us right now. Not only because it is the day we worship at church, but more than ever it is a day we set aside all wordly cares. No school. No work. No errands. And just be with each other. We could spend a few hours just playing games.

We have been playing a lot of Monopoly Deal and UNO. Corbin can play forever, Taylor is good with one game, and Levi pokes his head in every few minutes to help put a card down for one of us.

Our favorite way to say I love you is through sign language.

We don't do extra curricular activities right now. It's not worth it to us. It would just take more time away from each other and they are only this age for so long. We will play sports with them, we will karate chop with them, and we will teach them piano until we are no longer able to. But, for now it's important that they get the chance to be a kid and not have a scheduled life. I just know it will come all too soon.

Corbin is in charge of the putting away the bowls and cups and categorizing them into colors. Taylor is in charge of putting away the silverware, one by one by one.

Friday night is movie night. We hope to create something to look forward to at the end of the week that will make our kids want to be home with us.

Snuggly up with the boys and reading a book to them is the best feeling.

Corbin is getting better each day with reading. He does not love it, but he is getting more confident with it, which is making him like it more.

Many nights we find that all three boys are snuggled up (or rather laying on top of each other) in Taylor's bed.

Taylor is our biggest home body.

Since Friday is early out, that afternoon is the designated friends day. Saturdays are our family day.

Levi doesn't take consistent naps anymore, but when he does, he puts himself to sleep in the most random places, which often times ends up being the kitchen floor. (once on the kitchen table)

Justin spends so much of his spare time studing up on taxes, estate planning, and investments. This man of mine is amazing! What he goes through to give us a better life! The boys often pray for their daddy and have been extremely understanding why he can't play with them even though he is home. This is a big reason why Sundays have been very valuable to us. We can't wait until July is over with.

We still have our house up for sale and plenty of showings. The one downside is that Legacy is right behind us. But if only they could see this view. I think this is one of my favorite things about our house.

Such a small glimse into what life is like right now. But it sure is a good.

Not a baby anymore

Yesterday I looked at Levi and felt like crying. Only because when I looked at him he did not have the super chubby little face that I know was there the day before. He didn't look short and plump, but rather he looked tall and lean.

I asked Justin if he noticed it. He said he noticed Levi has been looking older lately. It happened over night for me. He is no longer our 2 year old baby, but instead our 2 1/2 year old big boy.

This has got to be one of the saddest stages.

Right now he loves Star Wars. Yes that's right. Our 2 1/2 year old LOVES Star Wars. He plays with storm trooper legos all day, he wants to fight with light sabers, he loves talking about Darth Vader and Yoda, and then sings the Star Wars Anthem as loud as possilbe.

He's got a bit of a two year old, third child, I'm awesome attitude.


But when I still see that he has some good sized cheeks, chubby little hands, and comes to me with his mee-mee and wants to cuddle; I know that he is still our little baby boy.
So, I am okay. For now.

Project Organize...Coat Closet

This is the coat/winter gear/game/kids craft/vacuum closet.

Is that impressive for such a small space? Or maybe we really just don't have a lot of places to put our things?

Every time I opened the door the shelf would scream at me. There were small craft things stuffed in the blue basket and little things scattered all over the shelf. It drove me crazy. All the fun stuff that was up there was so impractical to get to.

However, thanks to high ceilings and a clever idea that I got from my sister's friend. This space has become so much more functional.

It does not look like a big difference, I know. But it feels way better to me.

A shoe organizer. This did it for me. It's all the small things that were hard to find a place for that I couldn't ever see really well. The boys now love opening it and asking to use the foam stickers, color, play Uno and other card games that they never saw when it was up high. Love it.

(I was storing part of this stuff in another area of our house, it was annoying trying to find where things were)

This doesn't look quite as nice when there are three pairs, but oh well.

We are a puzzle family. We love to do puzzles! The big stack that we had (which all came from the Dollar Store, score) were piled so high and hard to get to. It will be much easier to grab a container and do a couple of puzzles at a time. (containers...also just purchased from the dollar store, they are the disposable food containers, but why not use them for this, they are the perfect size.)

Besides loving puzzles. We love games! It seems to be tradition to play every Sunday evening. Plus Fridays, Saturdays, Monday nights, or some time during the day in the middle of the week.

Our favorite is at the top. It doesn't look the best there, but it's so easy to get to and one that we play quite often. But we love a good game of Mancala, Sequence, Memory, Superminds, Connect 4. All very highy recommended.

But again, our favorite! Blokus! Where do you put your games and kids crafts?

2011. January Goal.

I love the start of a new year. I get so excited to think about ways to make the next year even better. After all the craziness of the last couple months, it's so nice to pack it all away and start fresh.

When I think about setting new goals, they need to be practical. Need to be doable. And I need to be excited about them so I can accomplish them. This year, more than any other year I have been so excited about changing things slightly. The little things that bug me about myself and things that I want to do to make our home have more peace and love and laughter.

And I do love a good list of things to do.

One goal for the month of January is to get more organized. I LOVE to be organized. I LOVE to clean. I LOVE to declutter. It just makes me very happy. It's not my number one focus. But I will admit I am much happier when things are a certain way.

I feel I have found a pretty good balance with three little boys in our little home. I (mostly) love seeing legos spread out across the floor and seeing their creativity flow for hours on end, and to see them built houses out of the cushions and pillows and then play family in their little houses. That does not bother me, but still in the back of my mind there are little areas in our home that drive me crazy.

I just can't live with tons of clutter, you know, like this picture.

My excuse, taking down the Christmas decorations.

The boys had a great time, and you can see how exhausting it was. So how could I ever get upset?

So for this month I am taking each weekday to organize something in hopes that our home and each day can run a little more smoothly. And it's not just spaces I need to organize, it's schedules and systems that need help. I hope to be able to share any small bit of advice that I have along the way and would love to have anyone else join in the fun!

My four boys will have one happy mom!

New Year's Eve Party

2010 will always be remembered as a great year for our boys, because it was the year that their cousins moved back! Our boys couldn't be happier

(except Corbin was sad here because he didn't get to hold Cael for the picture. See how much he loves them)

We celebrated by having Pizza, donuts, a movie, and a sleepover.

(Which is a HUGE deal for these boys because no sleepovers otherwise. Times have changed.)

And plenty of pictures.

We love having them back and are thrilled they celebrated this night with us!

Joy to the World

The Lord is come!

Have a holly jolly Christmas

These three did!

Just dreaming what would be under the tree when they woke up.

Even though Corbin does not really "believe", he is still a great sport to make it fun for the younger boys.

We left Santa a cookie and Corbs wrote a nice letter.

Having a hard time reading it? He was in a huge hurry...

Merry Christmas

Santa Clause these Cookies

are for you. Corbin

Taylor and Levi

was trying to be good.

Then off to bed.

In the morning I wasn't sure how tired we would be so we left the boys a scavenger hunt to find their stockings. It wasn't planned super well, but it would do.

However, we were up an hour before Corbin and Taylor.

In my family stockings were opened last, it was so exciting to have opened all our presents and then realize we still had our stockings to open. In Justin's family they were opened first, that way if the kids woke up super early, they could go open their stockings and play with the toys in there until mom and dad woke up. Listening to Justin talk about how exciting it was to wake up at 5:00 and go downstairs and play with his little toy car forever made me excited to carry on that tradition.

Breakfast came next.

This really was a Christmas Tree Cinnamon Roll, however Santa got to it before I could.

And the tradition carries on from my family. Omelets. (with Orange Juice)

Since we had breakfast first (we are just mean) Presents weren't open until 9:00.

Levi's favorite gift. He even swiped his brothers teddy grahams.

We didn't finish opening presents until 11:00.

and it's not because they got alot

They opened, then played, opened, then built

Thanks to daddy!

oh, and they are playing on my gift from Justin. (now we can finally prop up our feet and relax)

That's what Christmas Morning was like at our house.

And according to the boys,

It was the Best Christmas Ever!

And they hope they will get a Christmas like this again.

How was your morning?