Our Chirstmas adventures!

This year we had a new little friend come visit us!  One of Santa's elves!  It was SO cute watching the kids and how into him they were!  He came to be Santa's eyes and flies back to the North Pole every night to report how naughty or nice they have been, then flies back to our house and gets into all kinds of trouble!  Some days more than others!!  The kids lovingly named him BoBo.

Coloring the milk green...

Snow angels on the counter 

Watching over the kids from the mantle 

He kept track of how many days until the big day! 

He got into our candy and then after watering the plant for 3 days we grew lollipops! 

And even had a sick day with Kason.  Poor BoBo 

Instead of coal we got underwear in our stockings! 

Playing candy land with the potato heads and a picture of us with Santa... I think he must have been missing his bud Santa! 

He was also found making a toothpaste mess in the bathroom, reading to toys, making a mess while looking at family pictures, had Santa send an e-mail message to the kids, took Barbie on a joy ride in the Barbie car, even hitched a ride in our car back to Mimi and Pops, and took sweet notes from Kaid back to Santa.  It has been such a fun Christmas tradition to start!  Who knows what the next 3 days will hold before he heads back to the North Pole until next December!

Merry Christmas from Kaid and Kason! 

I'm not sure what this was all about!  Haha 

Every year at work Santa comes to visit the new babies and the employees kids.  It is SO much better than waiting in a mall or out in the cold for 2 hours to see him!!  We always bring food and have a nice time!  Kason STILL wouldn't sit on Santa's lap... so like we've said for the past 3 years... maybe next year! 

Stay warm this Christmas Season,

love, Eylie, Bop and Belle 

I love how our Christmas cards turned out this year!  For all of our friends and family, have a blessed Christmas season! 

What a whirl wind of a year! We started off the year with tons of house showings, a crazy mommy exhausted from keeping the house spotless for the showings and another shoulder surgery for Randy. We finally found out on April fools day that - no fools about it - our first house was SOLD! The next months were a blur! We moved in our new home in record time with the help of so many friends and family - we are very blessed! Randy got very sick starting in March and has undergone many tests and procedures. I am so thankful to our families for helping me during this time as I was hanging on by threads with all we had on our plates. We pray daily that we are on our way to getting him back to the healthy active man he has always been and thank God that as I type this he is going on almost 2 weeks of feeling better. Sometimes it's hard to dance in the rain but we've been doing our best.

Even though we have had another rough bumpy year we have had so many blessings to count. We are loving our new home and have had fun updating and decorating (and NOT so much fun tearing up the lawn, picking up rocks and re-planting so Randy doesn't have to mow a bumpy yard for the next 20 years!)! We have thoroughly enjoyed having land to roam, hiking through the woods, bonfires to sit by, riding on 4wheeler paths, making a dirt track for the go-cart, & meeting and playing with our new wonderful neighbors (but will ALWAYS miss our daily walks & plays with our old neighbors!). It is wonderful to be at a place were the house is done and we just can relax and enjoy it! Yep, we are officially country folk again and it feels so good!

We celebrated Kaidrie's 6th birthday in March. She has found her love for now - dance, cheer leading and tumbling! She practices her handstands about 50 times a day! This year she learned to ride a bike, got her ears pierced, finished Kindergarten and started 1st grade with gusto (she is so excited that she is starting to read chapter books!) and has made some great new friends. What a busy year! Although she's still holding onto that girlie girl look she plays the country girl roll very well! Her favorite thing has been welcoming Eylie's first litter of kittens (SIX of them!) we let her keep 2 of them, Bop and Belle.

The kids have handled the move better than we ever expected! Although Kason has been known to ask to "go back to the old house now" (missing the neighbors is too much for a 3 year old to understand sometimes!) He has adjusted just fine to having Kaid gone at school all day and I think he enjoys the mommy/daddy alone time! This kid definitely is an ornery little guy! He has been found sneaking downstairs in the middle of the night to watch TV and eat cookie dough or candy, tackles anyone in sight, and as he says "I am a one man show!" Yes Kason, yes you are! He still loves race cars, "hiccup" trucks, and has been known to carry worms or frogs around in his pockets for hours! He is all boy!

I'm sure knowing where our Christmas letter left off last year, you all are wondering... we still haven't given up our dream to someday expand our family. If we have learned anything over the past few years it's that life isn't in our hands. God is in charge and His plan is always best. So we trust, we thank God for our blessings, pray as He carries us through the difficult times, and dream about what the future may hold. We know it's better than we could have ever planned. So as words from a wise 6 year old: mommy - "How do you get closer to God?" Kaidrie - "Go Upstairs!" Or perhaps it's just "Look upstairs." :)

Hoping this is finding you and your family in good health and blessed!