What was up with us in 2011

Here is what was up with us in 2011!!
What a GREAT year!!

I hope 2012 is just as Great!!!
Happy New Year!!!

New Years Eve 2011

Me and the kiddo's

Best Buds-Bodie & Brylee******Brylee June havin' Fun

******Isabel***********************Tanner*************Tyler***
I love traditions and this is one of my favorites. We go to Huntsville on New Years Eve. Growing up we would always play in the snow, go sledding, get pulled by the truck on the sleds on the back roads, or go ice skating at Pineview. As we got older things changed a little, but now that our kids are getting older, we have started to do some of those same things. We ate dinner or should I say munch on dinner all night. We got our skates and collected from the neighbors as well and Curt brought a heater down in the wheel barrel along with wood for a fire and we all brought our lanterns and set them up around so we could have light to see where we were skating. It was awesome!!! Then we had the church reserved and went and played dodgeball to finish off the night!! What a fun great night with lots of fun for everyone!! Tanner forgot his coat, as we were leaving the house I told him to grab his coat and snow pants, but he didn't. He was fine and used my jacket. Brinley was taking her skates off and started to slip so grabbed a lantern and burned her hand but didn't tell anyone, then told her Mom when we got back to Darla's, she was pretty tough! Jason had to talk in church the following day, so he was preparing his talk at Darla's while we were having fun skating & playing dodge ball, not that he would have skated, but he would have played dodge ball for sure, poor guy, he did a great job on his talk on New Years Day!!

Random Dec Shots & Thots

So December was a busy crazy month and I thought it would slow down, but it hasn't. I guess my holiday seasonal job is ending up being more then seasonal, but I guess we have the Valentine rush and then Easter. Since we want to finish off our basement and don't want to completely deplete our savings it is good getting the extra money. Plus it is completely ideal for us. Brylee thinks she owns the place as she gets to go with me to work, now she even has a blanket named after her. I work when I can and I am starting to do more of the management part of the business, so some of it I am starting to do from home. Plus working with my sister and cousin has been a lot of fun too. And best of all, it is STRESS FREE, well a week or so it was stressful with as many orders we had to get out, but NOTHING like my other job was. These are just a few random pictures from December, I always still love the sleeping pictures and keep taking them of my kids, maybe I am crazy, but they are so cute when they sleep!!! The kids always have fun when cousins come around and they were doing pillow wars, or who knows what with the pillows. Also the kids when they wake up on the weekends, they always come in and we cuddle I will be sad when they quit asking if they can sleep in our room, I don't know what it is about sleeping on the floor in our room verses a nice comfortable bed in their very own room. They are growing up too quick, so if anyone knows how to slow that down let me know. Brylee did say to me that she will always be my baby girl even when she is bigger.

Movie with the Kids

I took the kids to a movie while Jason went to a movie with his parents, Ty, Mike, & Alex. We went to get a bite to eat at our favorite Chick-fil-a, and we saw "We Bought A Zoo" It was a great movie, I really enjoyed it and Tanner even said "Mom that was so good we should buy that one!" We don't go to the movies a whole lot, the kids don't do too well at movies, Tanner does now, but Brylee 1/2 way through always says can we go now, or has to go to the bathroom more then once during the show. I made sure they both went to the bathroom before it started and told them I didn't want to take them out during the movie. They did good & good think I had a snack pack of little candybars that were in my purse I forgot about from Grandma Bowen that helped distract Brylee when she wanted to go.

OUR CHRISTMAS

Ready, Set Open!!!!

Our Christmas Breakfast & the mess.

Presents to each other & New PJ's
This year was a little different since it was on Sunday, but it was GREAT!! We had our Traditional Christmas Eve Dinner with the Rays at our house, and after we open our PJ's & we let the kids open the presents they got each other as well. Christmas morning Tanner thank goodness didn't wake up as early as he did last year. He woke up at 10 to 6, so we did decide to let them wake up and start early. We did better with the video camera this year then the camera, so didn't get too many shots of that morning, too early I guess to think about. The kids got a WII this year, so needless to say Tanner was thrilled to have time before getting ready for church to play. It was so nice to stay home for a while and let the kids actually have a chance to play with what they got for a while rather then running off before they got to enjoy their gifts. I made French Toast, with strawberries, blueberries, whip cream and of course Bacon was a must since it the kids favorite. We got ready, went to church then rushed home to open presents with the Rays at the Foits, then head off to my parents for the rest of the day. It was a great day and I actually enjoyed having the spiritual aspect and TRUE meaning of Christmas in the middle of it all by going to Church. We had a great meeting.

Christmas at the Bowen's

Grandma Great with her new Blanket & Brin

The Rays Christmas Day at Grandma/pa Bowen's

Bowen Grandkids minus Matts kiddos & Navi was napping

Tanner, Brylee, Chubby Runner & Grandma/pa Bowen

Coloring Time Fun with the Castle from Grandma/pa Ray**********The Potatoes

***Brylee June********Passion***********Asher****

Stocking For Mom & Dad*****Lymway & Dylan

*****Max***********Crew & his Magic Set***

Dylan************Laura & Lily*******Chandler******

***Izzy**************Brinley**************T Man***

Huddle Spencer's got something cool

We headed over to Grandma & Grandpa Bowen's to open presents and I was in charge of compiling our stories this year and handed them out. We also have fun watching Mom & Dad open their gifts too and see who got Mom to cry first this year. She pretty much did it herself as we had to tell everyone an adjustment to Moms story that she wrote about Grandpa Shurtleff as he earned 2 silver stars and was the Tank Destroyer Commander. Talking about them always tears everyone up. We then cleaned up our messes and got ready for the Shurtleff Family to come over for our traditional Turkey Dinner, Hanging Out, White Elephants, & Loads of Desserts. Darla asked when making calls for what to bring if we really wanted to do White Elephants still, and me along with many others said "OF COURSE!!" It would NOT be Christmas without the white elephant exchange!!