A few more from the holidays...

Happy New Year!
Tonight we are off to make/eat pizza with the Lewis fam, Sibleys, and Turners! Pictures of all the little people to come...
Here are a few from the past week that didn't make it in the last round:)






And, here's a video clip of Madelyn reading "Good Night Moon" to her baby.... She shuffles off in the middle to get another book, "The Run-away Bunny." If you speak Maddie-dialect, you can hear her telling baby about the moon, "the end," baby bunny, and "(get) another book:) Becoming quite the reader, it's exciting to watch!

HAPPY HOLIDAYS!

Happy Holidays to all of our friends and family!

Hooray!!

Hooray! Michael passed the final Wyoming State Appraisal exam today!! It was an 8 hour beast... he reported that he got worked towards the end, but it appears that he came out on top! One more step in the final process involving sending in some work to the State and he's done! Job well done!!

In other news, my parents and brother are visiting for the week. We are having lots of fun - my parents did two days of "daycare" while I was still at work - they hit the pool, Maddie got to drive the "car" grocery cart at Whole Groc., went on some strolls, pretend tea parties, playing in the sink, and hundreds of other fun odds and ends. Now that I'm out of school, we are really focusing on the potty training for the next two weeks. Maddie had 6-7 "hits" today! Another hooray! She's quite proud of herself, and I think having such an audience is really helping move things along!

Snow has finally arrived! We had a few days of really nasty below-zero/single digit weather - it's exciting to finally have some of the white stuff! It makes cold temps far more fun! Yesterday we got geared up, hopped on the sled, and picked up Leah. We had fun sledding in the park between our two houses, trying out both Leah's toboggan and Maddie's sled. Pictures of that adventure to come later.

More character than you can shake a stick at!

Well, Madelyn saved the day in a round-about way... she peed on the couch cushion as we were reading good-night books, causing us to take the cushion off, and there it was! The missing digital camera downloader thingy! Ahh, the silver lining to potty training:)

Anyways, I had to laugh at the collection of pictures that were backlogged on the camera - this little person has such big personality in such a little body! And the camera hardly does it all justice....

Here is Madelyn, just figuring out what pockets are all about. She toted her crayons from the kitchen to the livingroom and back, taking them out, putting them back in her pocket, over and over again.


And Madelyn going to daycare on Friday wearing her tu-tu. It started out as a "fancy" (her word) hat on her head, but eventually made it's way to midline...reverted back to fancy hat once we got to daycare!


This is Madelyn "helping" me to make cookies in the kitchen. I assumed she was quietly spooning flour on the floor from one bowl to another... so wrong:) When I turned around, she was on her belly licking up the flour in the bowl like a kitty-cat drinks milk. I think that was the image she was going for... the flour had turned to paste on her face and took multiple scrubs to come off:)



And finally, here is Madelyn playing with one of her grandparents' latest gifts... some holiday garland, that quickly became a stylish belt and bracelet. Baby-doll (not pictured) got one as well!

Thanksgiving at the West Nest!

We headed up to Ennis, Montana last Wednesday afternoon and met Margot, Andy, Kevin, Laura, Hazel, Leah, Aaron, Mark, and Ryland at Margot's parents' house. What a gift to be all together, for multiple days! A four-day slumber party and eat-fest with so many of our closest friends and favorite people!! It was great. Every night I was so torn, knowing that we would be up EARLY, but also knowing how valuable time with such close friends is....like Laura and I discussed, there's nothing like doing 5:30 a.m. morning duty with those we love:) It certainly makes the grogginess much sweeter!

It was SO good to see everyone, especially our out-of-town friends Kevin, Laura, and Hazel... seeing Madelyn and Hazel was SO MUCH FUN! Maddie was instantly in love... and was asking about Hazel any time she left her line of sight. We drove out of Ennis on Sunday afternoon and Madelyn feel asleep immediately, but as soon as she opened her eyes further down the road, the first thing she said was, "Hay-hay?? Go???" (translation - where did Hazel go?!). It was really endearing to see them interact together. And therapeutic to have parenting time together with Kev and Woolfy:)

There are a few pictures of our dress-up birthday party - Leah celebrated her 28th birthday while at the West Nest... the ladies hit the thrift shop and brought back snazzy attire for everyone:) Complete with a full set of some pretty good-looking trucker hats! Although Aaron's high-water polyester pants really took the cake in my book.

Thanks to Margot and Andy, and Nancy and Sandy for providing such a great time/space for all of us to enjoy! You are the best!

Here are a few pictures of the trip (well, OK, mostly the first 2 days because we ran out of memory on the camera because those girls were so darn cute together!!). I will try and add more pictures from others' cameras as they are posted...

quick fix

Here's a quick fix for some of you who are needing more pictures.... Tate and Madelyn made some delicious banana bread with Hatilie yesterday - thanks Hatilie!!

We are still working on getting Thanksgiving pictures posted - we lost our picture downloader and had to be crafty about getting them off the camera. I will try and get that done tonight. Needless to say, we had a fantaastic time at the West Nest with so many close friends, and watching Maddie with Hazel was about the best thing I've seen in a long time!
More to come soon...