Our January

It's cold here and after the holidays and with nothing else to distract me I find myself begging for summer to come so I can move past all the gray days and cold...and the sun going down at 4:00.  That might just be the worse part of living in Montana.  The seasonal depression really gets ya!  

I got a new phone this month which was awesome.  It's nice having a nice camera I can take with me everywhere.  Rae is growing so much and I can't handle it.  Her words are exploding.  

Audrey lost a tooth this month and she wrapped it up nicely with a note attached to it.  The tooth fairy was late in getting to it, so guess who found the tooth package sitting on Audrey's kitchen shelf, yep, Rae.  She was wandering around playing with it and initially I thought it was a piece of paper. I quickly found that it was Audrey's tooth.  Audrey started giggling and calling her a tooth thief, she thought it was pretty hilarious.  Rae can't stay out of anything.  I finally had to lock up some of the cabinets, which I never had to do with Audrey because Rae is so so curious about everything.  Her favorite is a drawer in the kitchen where she pulls out dishes as fast as she can before I get to her and then runs off with both of my strainers.  She also likes to empty my bathroom drawer.  I still do my makeup with her in my lap and have found that to be a bad thing.  She learns really quickly how to open things and now she knows too much.  I guess it's time to lock up the mascara.  

Montana has some of the best sunsets and sunrises in the winter when there's no cloud cover.  Audrey was lucky enough to grab this one.  She has such a gift a seeing beautiful things where most people would pass by without a thought.  I hope she's always that way.  

Paul came to teach at our co-op.  He did a fabulous job drawing the kids in and showing them practical examples of what he does.  They all loved it and some...even the adults stopped by afterward to ask questions.  I'm grateful he took time away from work to teach them. Happy January!

 

Christmas Vacation

My pictures loaded backward so the timing isn't quite right.  It's been a while so I'll so my best to re count the moments that stick out in my mind as being my favorites.  

It's so hard to travel for Christmas but I love it so much.  I love celebrating with my family and Paul's.  It's pretty magical.  I was so grateful for so much time taken off to spend with our family.  It means so much that we got to see so many of our family members.  I enjoyed seeing Michael's family, playing Minute to Win it games with them and Karalee and Benje was one of the highlights of the trip.  We also got to spend time with Michael and Chrissy at the mall and painting bowls at Color Me Mine.  
Benje and Karalee are rock stars.  Karalee has been terribly sick during her pregnancy.  Despite receiving fluids through an iv and puking regularly she insisting on spending time with us and even made us a couple meals despite our trying to stop her.  They were there Christmas morning with Mom and Dad in addition to every other day we spent with my parents. 
We watched Encanto, drank hot cocoa, played Mario Party, ate good food, opened gifts, baked cookies with Kimberly and played games with her kids, and enjoyed Christmas Eve with all my local siblings.  
Dad read to the kids on Christmas Eve which is always one of my favorite things.  Jenn's kids came over for another movie, and there was definitely a lot of eating pie.  
Paul's brother took time off to spend time with him which was super sweet of him.  We socialized, we played games, went to the traditional Chuck a Rama which is always so good and watched some Christmas shows.  Audrey sewed a couple of her Christmas gifts while we were there.  We had second Christmas of course and went and checked out the Orem Temple.  It was so beautiful and despite all the temples so close I'm happy that people are attending the temple enough that God sees fit to bless us with more.  
 Each year we go back to our parents houses things change a little bit as our families change and I find myself being so grateful for each year we get to spend together like this and the memories my kids are making with their cousins, grandparents, Aunts and Uncles, and of course with us.  This is what life is all about folks and I'm just grateful I get to be apart of it with these people that mean so much to me!