Days like these I want to remember.
Snowy and cold, too cold to play outside so we’re inside with our blocks. Big brother being silly with a bucket on his head. Digging through his bin for just the right piece. Little sister almost able to sit up on her own, incredibly interested in the action around her.
Love these two. Some days he drives me crazy with questions that have no answers. And most days I’m tired from feeding her at 2am. But I love them anyway and am so thankful to be their mommy.
On a side note, once she is mobile…how do you still let your bigger kid have his own space? Do you just try to have him play at the table or in his room? Ben adores Cassidy right now but we’re on borrowed time with the his space/her space thing.
Yesterday on his way to work, Andy hit a patch of ice on the 490 and slid into the guardrail. He’s fine and the truck just got a smashed tail light. A little shook up and not sure if anything else was wrong with his Explorer, he turned around and came home to work.
Today he headed off to work again with tube sand and shingles (yeah, a little ghetto) for extra weight. He still lost traction and slid around three separate times on the icy 490. Finally he decided to turn around and come home again. On his way home he drove by a deer with a broken leg that was laying in the middle of the highway. He pulled into an empty lot and called the police. The sheriff arrived a few minutes later, assessed that the poor thing really couldn’t be saved and pulled it off to the side to shoot it. Andy promptly asked if he could have it.
Here is where you get to make fun of him for bringing home roadkill.
Seriously though, it was good, fresh meat. He brought it home (always prepared with a tarp in the back of his Explorer) and strung it up in the garage. This evening he cleaned and processed it, pulling meat from bone and stripping off the fur and fat.
It’s not pretty, but I think it’s amazing. People have been feeding their families for thousands of years this way…the life and energy of one animal given for the nourishment of another. There’s almost something sacred to the whole bloody, messy process.
Our neighbors probably have no idea what’s going on in our garage.
Warming himself by the lights. It was coooooold outside today!
So you’re scrolling through all these cute kid pictures on my blog and then bam, this. Haha, sorry. It sure will be tasty when it’s all marinaded and cooked though!
They don’t happen very often around here, but we enjoy them when they do.
We spent Christmas morning at our house, relaxing and opening presents in our jammies. It was really nice to spend the time together, just the four of us because we’d already visited with family the few weeks before.
We have a tradition of reading the Christmas story in Luke before bed on Christmas Eve. We didn’t quite get our act together this year so we read it Christmas morning before presents. From the tablet of course.
We gave Ben a Fisher Price nativity set. I think I’ll put it down with the Christmas stuff in a few months and pull it out next December for him to play with too.
We also gave him the little tool bench that had been my brother’s. We’ll give it back to uncle Justin some day, don’t worry.
Got to start ’em young.
Although Cassidy just wanted to chew on the tools.
Ben also really liked his Haynes Thomas Manual! Haynes manuals are made for every car model to help you troubleshoot problems and see how parts of the car work. I found a Thomas the train one and knew he’d love it, all the engines and coal cars are illustrated and broken down into pieces. Super cute.
One of the gifts I gave Andy was this collage. Both he and Ben really like reading the I Love My Daddy book, but when Ben destroyed it one day all that was left was the cover. We did buy a new one, but this time have a board book.
Andy gave me a new laptop bag, 2lb bag of coffee beans (mmm) and this canvas print of a picture I’d taken of Ben and my dad. They were walking together inside a C-5 at my dad’s Air Force base. Super sweet picture and I love the flag in the background.
Hope you all had a very Merry Christmas!
Christmas Eve I sat the kids down in front of the tree and tried to get some pictures of them all dressed up. Ben wouldn’t let me touch his hair so it’s a hot mess, but we did get some cute ones. Andy’s mom made Cassidy’s dress, it was SO cute! Ben decorated the bottom of the tree so there is a mass of ornaments 3 feet and below and then all the breakable ones are spaced out at the top of the tree. It looked hilarious but I loved it ;-)
We went to the Christmas Eve service at our old church. Since our new one is just starting (and at the community rec center) we didn’t have one of our own this year. A lot of the launch team was away on vacation and the student volunteers we have were home on break anyway. It was a nice service, a bit more of an entertainment production than I really liked (I’d be happy with a little sermon and just singing Christmas carols) but they did a nice job with it. Ben actually let me spike up his hair before we left, it looked super cute.
After doing our Christmas with Andy’s family, we headed across the road to Justin and Kate’s apartment. Kind of neat they live across from my inlaws. These pictures can basically be labeled “family members with Ben and Cassidy” as you wouldn’t really even know there’s anything Christmasy about them. We had such a nice time exchanging gifts though :)
Baby still has a little bald spot on the back of her head, although it’s looking a lot better these days.
Nonna and Cassidy exchanging coos.
One of Ben’s presents was a sleeping bag. He climbed right inside with Bear and Moose.
A manly man and his manly dog.
Poppy and Cassidy checking out the festivities.
Ooh this beard is soft.
Uncle Justin snuggles.
All the kids went in on a wooden type tray for my mom.
Ben helping sort through the lead type letters. (We washed his hands after)
Paul got a helicopter!
Night night Andy. I think he was dreaming of Justin’s beard…he had a little beard envy ;-)
