Sorry...We've had the Flu!

We are here and we are on the mend. 
Long story short over the last 10+ days, the Man, M.E. and all three boys have had, what we know believe, was the flu.

The Man never missed work, how I do not know.
I was on the couch for three straight days.
The boys finally returned to school yesterday still sneezing and coughing.
Babe finally went to the doctor today, because he just couldn't shake it and now has a ear infection.

Hopefully this weekend will give us some more rest, relief and we will be right as rain soon!

Arrow of Light

Last week, LG's scout troop had their Arrow of Light ceremony.  This is when the bigger kids (Webelo II) graduate to become boy scouts.  Its a pretty cool ceremony.

 Of course, LG loved it because it was dramatic.

We are in the Indian Nations District, hence the Native America theme and costumes. LG likes scouts a lot at this point, hope he continues.

Cooky-Cook

On Christmas morning, Babe opened a huge gift from Santa. It was a super cute Melissa & Doug Kitchen set.  He immediately exclaimed "it cooky - cook". Yes, a cooking kitchen.  He was so excited.  Unfortunately is being so large, we had to ship it back to OK and not put it together. It arrived Tuesday night, therefore yesterday was the day to dive into it.

I rolled up my sleeve and began the moment we walked in the door from school. 

 2+ hours of this and I didn't even take a picture of the enormous mess the my kitchen was from Styrofoam and packaging.  ugh.  BIG THANK YOU to Buddy for helping M.E. clean up the entire mess and taking out the trash.

 The mess and labor was worth every second. Babe loves it! Completely and with great excitement; couldn't wait to cook.

 Yesterday at lunch I ran to the Dollar Tree and purchase some real kitchen utensils, pans, bowls, salt&pepper, spices, washclotes, etc.

 The food is also Melissa & Dough and its all wooden pieces that velcro together, so he can use his big wooden knife and actually cute the food apart.  Grampa and Nana got him the sandwich set and I manage to score a vegetable set at Michael's for 50% off.

It was so cool, LG had to play too. I'm proud of myself for making this happen for him.  And its going to be so cool to eat his pretend food.  Bring on the imagination!

Organize

Another Pinterest related post... this time on organization.
I'm not saying that I'm resolving to be more organized. Frankly I stink at resolutions, but I saw this on Pinterest awhile back and I knew I could do this. 

Christmas Ornament Storage

First of all, I love my ornaments and I'll do just about anything to ensure they are cared for. So I loved this idea. And it was time to take the tree down, so it was now or never.

 1 - I hot-glued dollar general plastic cups to a piece of cardboard that I cut to fit snug inside a new rubbermaid tub.

2 - in the process of creating an identical second layer, I realized I didn't have a large enough piece of cardboard, so I made two small half sizes.  This worked out to my advantage.

3 - I grabbed a large piece of bubble wrap we had in the garage. It was about 25 feet long and I used nearly all of it.  I cut it down into smaller pieces and individual wrapped ornaments not make of metal or cloth.

4 - I placed them inside the cups. 

5 - I also used some of the orginal boxes for some, like my hallmark ones.  And for those that were too large for a solo cup, I used a couple of left over boxes from my original ornament storage. Only having a half layer on top allowed M.E. room to add those right to the tub as well. 

6 - Done. All my ornaments, everyone, tucked nice and snug into a cup and I have about a dozen empty cups to use in the coming years.  Awesome.  

Thanks Pinterest.

Happy Holidays!

Christmas Vacation Highlights

 The Cousins... Let M.E. just say it took some time to get a group shot without them wiggling and its still not the greatest photo, but its got them all.

 Presents and more Presents... Babe can hardly see about his stack.

 Cooking with Nana... Nearly every meal found Babe at the counter cooking with Nana.  He had such a great time and no wonder Santa brought him a kitchen.

 iPod... Santa brought Buddy a new iPod two months early. He was so surprised and LOVES it.  Here he is dancing to the music.

 the Horses... Babe simply could not get enough of the horses, from cleaning stalls to feeding them apples to help Poppa bring them out of the pasture.  He loved every minute of it.

 Playing Games... from playing Sorry to Buddy's new iPod and building legos the boys kept busy playing games.

 Seahawk Country... It was awesome for the boys to get new Seahawk gear and to watch the game in Washington.

 The Valley... I think it makes the Man homesick to see views like this.  But I can't blame him, because its pretty rad.

 Gramma... As always it was super wonderful to visit with Gramma and spend Christmas with her.

 The Great Outdoors... Buddy and the Man got to both hunt and fish on this trip with cousin Matt and Uncle Josh. Buddy really had a wonderful time.

New Year's Fun... we camped out in Josh's living room and played games with the kiddos.  I bought balloons that they got to pop every hour on the hour until midnight.  Too Fun!