A very long update

So it has been a while since I last blogged!! Blame it on the fact that my cord that connects my camera to my computer and allows me to upload the millions of photos was lost until a couple of days ago. Actually it was in the first place I looked for it, I just hadn't gotten around to looking for it until a couple of days ago. Same thing, right? It has been a crazy hear so far and I haven't felt like blogging much. But I do want to keep track of what our sweet little family does, so I'm gonna do an update.

***Warning: This will be a long post. With lots of pictures. But I want to keep a record of our family happenings so here goes.

December:
A couple of days after Christmas we loaded up the kiddos and drove to Louisiana to celebrate Christmas/my birthday/New Years with my family. We went to Natchitoches to see the lights, always a fun tradition.

And we also decorated a tree in the woods for the animals. Let me explain. For years I've loved the book, The Night Tree. Only I couldn't remember the name of it. I just remember reading a magical story in elementary school about a family who would hike through the woods on Christmas eve and decorate a beautiful pine tree with popcorn garland, apples, oranges, and nuts. They would sing songs and enjoy hot chocolate and leave the decorated tree for all the animals of the forest to enjoy.

 I would always tell Kyle about this magical book and he would sweetly nod his head the way he often does when I become mildly obsessive about something. I searched and searched for this book. I couldn't remember the name of it or the author, just the general story. Finally a few months ago, I happened to stumble across it on amazon and started jumping up and down and excitedly called Kyle and told him all about my awesome magic book. I ordered it and when I finally held it in my hands, it was even better that I'd imagined.

Anyway, I told my parents about the magic book and explained my desire to decorate a tree in their pasture. Being the loving, indulgent, parents they are, they agreed. So I spent more time that I'd like to admit stringing popcorn and making apples and oranges into ornaments. And we hauled our goodies into the woods and decorated a tree. On our neighbor's property. Without their permission. We're such rebels. We laughed so hard. My vision of the perfect tree, like the one in the book, fell flat in about 2 seconds, but we had so much fun. I don't even quite remember what was so funny, you would just have to had been there. But in the end, the tree was decorated and my child-hood dream was full filled. I don't think the rest of the fam was as quite as excited as I, but they didn't let it show.

 I turned 26 and we rang in 2012 with my crazy family!

January:
January was a blah month. Between getting back into a routine for all our holiday travel, a severe cold that plagued our house for 3 weeks and by back being completely out for a week, we were pretty much on survival mode.

Throwing pretend snowballs (our snow covered mountain is in the background) during our winter theme

Working on our nursery rhymes

Playing the piano that once belong to their great-grandparents

Having fun at the park with our friends

"Wee!!!!"

February:
And then February came. Got back into our routine, I finally saw the chiropractor and our family was well once more. And then super bowl Sunday came around. I woke up from an afternoon nap and immediately rushed to the bathroom to do some serious vomiting. Afterwards I felt better, weird, but better. On a whim I decided to take a pregnancy test, you know just cause. "Wait, why are there TWO pink lines!?!?"

  Once the initial shock wore off, I was really happy. Kyle was on cloud 9 from the get go. We were hoping to had a third bambino to our clan latter this year/early next year, it just happened a little sooner! My due date is September 30, three days after my youngest turns 2. So I'll have a 3 yr old, a 2 yr old, and a newborn. And I thought life was crazy before! We are so very excited!!!

The next weekend we went to my hometown for a family gathering and the girls made cute little Valentines to pass out to my family that said:
                                                     "Roses are red
                                                      Violets are blue
                                                      Our mommy is pregnant,
                                                      In September she's due!"

Our parents already knew the good news, but it was fun to share it in a different way with my sister, grandparents, and aunt and uncle. Everyone was thrilled, although my aunt and uncle had the BEST reaction ever, I think we really surprised them!

Valentines day came around and I made the girls heart shaped pancakes for breakfast and filled little goodie bags for the girls-crayons, stickers, and home-made cards from their daddy & I. Kyle brought his girls some flowers and a jar of pickles for his preggo wifey!

 

And that's all for now. I'm pretty sure I set a new word count record in blog land!! I hope to post tomorrow about March, and later in the week I've got some fun school stuff and cute videos to post. Hopefully I'll post sometime this week instead of three months from now!