December Already!?!

I can't believe it is December!  I know I say this all the time, but seriously, where does the time go?  I hope you all had a safe and Happy Thanksgiving.  We were supposed to go to Utah to spend time with my family and see my Grandparents who just returned home from serving in the Nashville Tennessee Temple, but as last week started we wondered about the weather.  We were going to try to beat the storm and leave as soon as we could on Tuesday, but then Kaylee ended up getting sick with a fever and sore throat.  She started complaining that her chest hurt to breathe, so I took her to the doctor that day and she ended up testing positive for Influenza B.  Brailee was also sick but hadn't been nearly as bad as Kaylee, but since we were there we ended up testing her as well - another positive.  Then the next day Trysten woke up sounding yucky as well, so our Thanksgiving feast consisted of 3 kids on Tamiflu :-(  It was actually nice to get to stay home and relax - this was the first time we have EVER done Thanksgiving on our own, and we enjoyed it despite the sick kids.  So at the last minute I got to plan my menu and hope the store still had turkeys ;-)  This was the first time I've cooked an entire turkey all by myself, and the first time I've ever made pumpkin pie, and it turned out delicious! 

This is Trysten and our Christmas train - he currently LOVES trains.  We spent Thanksgiving Day cooking and putting up all of our (inside) Christmas decorations - still not sure how we're going to do the outside, we're not quite sure what the wind is going to do to it here!  We got a lot of other things done around the house - FINALLY hung up some pictures on the wall, but only because they've been sitting on my piano for the last couple of months and I needed to clear that space for my Nativity collection ;-)  Now I just need to find the *right* mirror for the space above my piano between my two wall fixtures - I'm thinking either small square mirrors like THIS or one big 3-4 foot circle mirror, or if I can find a big rectangle mirror in the right price range then that might be nice - thoughts?  I'm looking forward to family pictures this month with an AWESOME photographer so I can have some more things to hang on the wall! 

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The kids and I made pinecones out of egg cartons:

Plus, I got a lot more hats made while snuggling with sick kiddos and David got the sheetrock up in Kaylee's room, so it was a productive holiday!  Brianna and Trysten are David's biggest helpers ;-)

He loves power tools!

I'm so disappointed with my pictures lately - our camera is acting up and our old Kodak is still packed somewhere so I don't even have a back-up, so most of our pictures aren't turning out.  If I try to use the flash the pics turn out really dark, but then if I close the flash they turn out bright, but blurry.  If the subject is perfectly still, my pictures turn out just fine without the flash, but we all know with kids that just doesn't happen!  We're trying to work it out and get a new one for Christmas - any suggestions?  I have my eye on the Canon Rebel and tried to order one with a nice telephoto lense on a bundle that I found online but I accidentally transposed the numbers in my address, so they couldn't verify my info to place the order, and by the time they notified me more than a day later, the lense was out of stock.  So, now we're just trying to decide what to do.  Any suggestions?  Here's an example of what the camera is doing - here is a pic WITH the flash:

 and here it is with NO flash -

As I push the button to take the pic I get the notice 'Raise the Flash!' on my screen so I end up yelling at my camera a lot lately ;-P  Not really, but it's just so frustrating to have no pictures, especially around the holidays, since I love to take pics, and I take a LOT of them!

Okay, so I only had one person guess (thanks for playing along, Jeanne!) but here is the reveal!
#1 - this is ME!  I think it looks so much like Trysten, just with lighter hair.

#2 - this is BRAILEE, but Trysten looked a lot like her as a baby!

#3 - this is BRIANNA, but she looks so much like her Dad when he was younger, just a blond hair, blue eyed version.

#4 - this is KAYLEE, and she used to look a lot like me when I was younger - I don't see it so much anymore, though.

#5 - this is my brother, Spudd, holding Brianna (7 years ago), though you wouldn't recognize him now!  But in this picture I was amazed how much Spudd looks like my Grandpa Lancaster from some of his younger pictures that I've seen.

Thanks for visiting!

What I've Been Up To...

Sitting in front of the fire listening to Christmas music and making some of these...

and these...

and trying to decide what to do with all of these fleece hats...

and flower hair clips that I just can't seem to stop making...

I'm thinking I should finally start putting items in my Etsy Shop that I started a couple years ago - what do you think?  Any thoughts, advice, or suggestions?

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What else we've been up to lately...

...spending lots of time lately at the pool - having fun getting our money's worth out of our year membership ;-) and trying to get used to the settings on our digital water camera

...enjoying the beautiful winter weather - I LOVE listening to Christmas Music when it's snowing outside.  Now that I'm the Ward Music Chairman AND the Ward Choir Director, music is taking on a whole new meaning, it's going to be fun!  BTW - I just love the look on Trysten's face here...

...watching my kids grow up way too fast

...visiting with Santa and Mrs. Claus when the National Christmas Tree came through town on Sunday - I think it's so cool that the tree is from Wyoming this year, especially from my neck of the woods!  Kaylee and Brianna were the only ones who would go near Santa, even with a candy cane bribe - oh, well!

...spending time with my kids at preschool - they have so much fun there, it's such a fun program!

...and trying to keep the darn mice from destroying our stuff - here's what they did to the firewall in our truck last week - grrr, we might just break down and get a cat or two and hope the coyotes leave them alone ;-)

Well, there's a brief update of what we've been up to - thanks for visiting!

Mom, the snow is leaking!

This is what Brailee told me this morning as the snow was melting and dripping off of our roof - I just thought it was too funny ;-)  Here are a couple pics of the fun in the snow yesterday!  Kaylee and Brianna didn't get a chance to play in the snow, it was dark by the time they got home (darn that time change) but Brailee and Trysten had fun tromping around and exploring in the snow.

Thanks for visiting!  I hope you're all staying safe and warm where you are - just don't rub it in if you're on a tropical beach ;-)

Yes, now it feels like November!

On Saturday it was 76 degrees.  We took advantage of the nice weather on Saturday and roasted hot dogs and s'mores over our campfire.  We usually hear coyotes when we're out at the campfire but this night we heard an owl.

It didn't feel like late fall, but then I'm reminded, yes it's November and that means Kaylee's birthday!  Here is the birthday girl...

...with her presents

...blowing out her candle on her cake that she decorated...

It was a fun day!  Then as we were getting ready for school yesterday we saw this beautiful sunrise - my pictures don't even do it justice, the colors were gorgeous!

But not to worry, the wind blew yesterday and brought in a nice storm that started with rain and now finally snow and totally changed the scenery!  We haven't had snow this year until this morning - this is Wyoming, it seems like we always have snow by Halloween!  It's not that we're just dying to have winter here, we're just a little excited to see the white stuff for the first time in our new house ;-)  The kids were SO excited to wake up and see snow outside this morning.

Here is what it looked like about an hour ago in our backyard - I love the contrast with the red rocks, the white snow, and the green trees.  We now have just a little more than this skiff and I think it's beautiful! 

Thanks for visiting - have a great week!

Flashback Friday - Guess Who!

Can you guess who each one is???  Some of the similarities are amazing as I look back at old pictures - nobody really looks exactly like someone else but once in a while I just come across a picture and think, "wow, that looks like so-and-so!"

#1

#2

#3

#4

#5

Halloween Fun

For a look back at our Halloween costumes over the last few years, click HERE!

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This year my girls wanted to be...guess who...

Well, hopefully you guessed characters from Star Wars.  They love to watch the Clone Wars on Cartoon Network, so that was where we started! 

Kaylee chose Ahsoka Tano

Brianna choose Shaak Ti - I'd never even heard of her until we watched the first episode of Season 3 back in September and as soon as Brianna saw her she knew that's who she wanted to be.  As I started researching the character, I was surprised at how much I found on her.  I started the face make-up for Bree but she changed her mind, so we don't have the full effect.

Brailee at first wanted to be Belle from Beauty and the Beast and I was a little bummed that they weren't all going to coordinate this year but then as her sisters were picking their characters, she got into the Star Wars spirit as well and decided to be Padme.

Since Trysten is still too young to pick his own costume, I got to pick for him, and decided he would be cute as Yoda.

And here are some various pics from our Halloween Fun this year!

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Brianna helped me color in her headpiece for her costume - it took a LOT of permanent markers to get that whole thing colored ;-P  But that and the stuffing were the only things I had to buy for her costume, the rest I had just around the house.  Her robe was made from some old curtains that were left with the house when we bought it.  The headpiece I drew out on some old white curtains that I had, sewed them together, stuffed, colored, and attached them to a headband.

Brailee thought she'd try the Haunted House at the Trunk-or-Treat activity at the church - she freaked out the moment they shut the door ;-)  It took her a while to recover after that!  Look at that face - tears, pouty lips - poor thing!

That Yoda can move fast!  It was hard for me to get a picture of that kid this Halloween ;-P  For his robe, I used an old sling hamper that I had saved for some reason - the frame to it broke years ago but the fabric hamper was still good, and it was the perfect color and perfec size for Trysten's robe, with a few adjustments.  Sometimes I'm glad I'm a hoarder ;-)

I was in charge of Mommy Preschool last week, so the kids came in their costumes and I even got a little dressed up - just grabbed some cat ears from the dress-up box, put on a little eyeliner for whiskers, and I was good to go!  Brailee took this picture...

We were making sugar cookies and were going to make skeletons using gingerbread men cookie cutters.  One of the heads fell off one of the gingerbread men, so Kaylee turned him into the Headless Horseman - which is also what she carved on her pumpkin!

Trick or Treat!

We made a new favorite treat this year - Monster Eyes!  Just a package of Oreos, a package of cream cheese, some Almond Bark, M&M's and red gel and we made lots of these - yum, yum!

Making the costumes this year I realize what few options I have here in my new little town.  I used to be able to run to WalMart and find just about anything I needed to make costumes.  Well, this year I ran to one of our only shopping options, Pamida, to find some white pants for Brailee's costume since I didn't have any white fabric and no fabric stores here either.  Well, I found nothing that would work for Brailee until I browsed the women's clearance section and found a large pair of white pants for $4 - I was able to cut them down like this and they actually turned out perfect, the easiest pair of pants I've ever had to sew, I was even able to use the original elastic waistband and pockets!  What was left of the pants, I used to make Kaylee's headpiece - not bad for $4!  For her shirt I just used an old white turtleneck and added fabric paint and silver cuffs (which were recycled from Kaylee's costume last year).

If I had bought costumes this year I could have easily spent over $100 and not even found one for Brianna, but by making them and using what I had around the house (felt, fleece, fabric paint,  I only spent $4 on pants, $5 on stuffing (which I still have a lot left of), and about $5 on permanent markers.  But next year I will NOT wait until the week before to make costumes - I will get started well in advance!

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Thanks for visiting!  I hope you had a safe and Happy Halloween!