Sunday, December 26, 2010

christmas in review

Christmas Eve started with The Man in Brown bringing us this! Nick and Sara sent us Portillo's Italian Beef sandwiches straight from Chicago! Oh My Gah!
I told Jason that he would need to go to the store for rolls so we could have it for Christmas, but then we opened it. EVERYTHING was inside! Best Christmas gift to date.
We had spaghetti for dinner, then went to the rims to watch Santa fly over Billings. Unfortunately, the path wasn't where we thought it would be and he flew behind us. We almost missed it! There aren't any good pictures of Santa, but Billings looked beautiful from up there.
We drove straight home, and got started with the gifts. :) Ethan and Elliott passed them all out.
Elliott goes first of course. With it being just us, I went last but it didn't feel as bad as when I go right before Joe. Haha.
This was the first one Ethan picked. A bow and mallow from the Foster's. It shoots mini marshmallows, and I'm here to tell you, it's a serious piece of equipment.
Jason got goggles from Mom and Dad. He's such a goofball.
We got Ethan a Chicago Blackhawks RinkRat hat. It resembles a helmet, and even has a chin strap.
This gift got, by far, the best reaction. I didn't have the camera ready unfortunately. Abby and Chris got Ethan the NHL Slapshot for the Wii. Something Ethan definitely wanted. They wrapped it in a Chicago Cubs Soriano t-shirt, and Ethan was admiring his shirt and didn't even see it. I told him to look at the box that fell out and as soon as he did he yelled and held it high up in the air and cheered. He was ecstatic.
Nick and Sara even sent a box of gifts!
We saved the best for last. Jason had been anticipating a "really cool gift" from me and the boys. The box he opened from us with all his other gifts was a pair of lounge pants. Bwhaha. :) He was noticeably disappointed, but was polite. It was so funny. Then after everything was getting cleaned up we let him open his real gift. His reaction was a very close second to Ethan's.
He had to put it on, and I swear he wore that goofy smile for at least the next hour. Yeah, he likes it.
After gifts, everything needed opened and played with.
Ethan called Norad and asked when Santa would be arriving at our home, and they told him an hour (thank you Norad operator). The boys got into their pajamas, and went outside to sprinkle the glitter filled reindeer food so they would be able to find our house. It was so cute watching them spread it all around.
7:30 is a perfectly acceptable time to wake up, and the boys were ready to dig into their goods that Santa left them. Apparently Santa doesn't watch "all" the time. He was very generous.

A remote control car that does crazy tricks.
A super noisy guitar.
Puzzles.
Tech Decks.
And...........for the whole family......Guitar Hero!
The Portillo's gravy was warming up while the toys were being played with, and then it was time for lunch! I cannot even tell you just how incredible this stuff is!
We all got to wear "The Hat" while we ate.
Then it was back to playing. He actually shot me! That's how I know this is a weapon, and marshmallows do not mean "soft hit".
I didn't let Ethan shoot me. :)
This will be the way we do Christmas from now on. At our house. With our kids, just being together as a family and enjoying that. We didn't have to worry about the weather or packing up all the stuff to leave. We took in every moment and made Christmas all about the kids.

And now.........Let the packing begin. We will be outta here in ONE WEEK! Egads! Where did we get all this shit really good stuff?
Hope your Christmas was just as good.

Thursday, December 23, 2010

gettin bigger

Yesterday in an effort to fill the day, I pulled out some games for Elliott. It was so much fun for me to watch him and to see how much he really does know. He had a great time learning the games and playing them.

The first one I tried is a Diego counting game. You have to match the numbers, or pictures of the animals in his case. This lasted for one round and I was really impressed with his matching of the pictures.
The next game is one of my favorites. Well it was when I was little. I don't care so much for this version, I prefer the one with the video that we had growing up. :) Somehow it never fails, my kids beat me at every game. This was no exception, and I lost 2 rounds before we moved on. 
The last one was definitely his favorite by far. You might remember this one. The fish go around and open and close their mouths and you try to catch them with your fishing pole. Once he got the hang of it, he was on fire! He loved the challenge and it was really good for his hand-eye coordination.  
He played this several times. 
This is my favorite thing that he does right now. He can't get his fingers to work and only hold up 2 fingers, so this is how he does 2. He can recognize 2 things, and is excited when he does. Here he had caught 2 fish. :) 
Then when he started getting bored, he got curious. "What if I just put my finger........AHHHH". Yep, it bit him. I laughed so hard at his reaction. It was like he didn't expect it to really bite him. Silly boy. 
It is so much fun watching him grow up. It's times like these that make the other (not so fun) stuff seem to disappear.

Wednesday, December 22, 2010

something to brag about

I can't begin to tell you how it felt when this came in the mail. Jason has worked so hard for this, and to see that it finally happened almost brought me to tears. We have seen several of these papers come in with box number two X'd, but not this time.  
Jason is an official, full time, permanent Aircraft Mechanic at the Montana Army Aviation Support Facility in Helena! I am so proud of him.
So, YES, this means we are moving to Helena. We found a place to live and I spent my morning yesterday transferring our utilities and getting Ethan registered for his new school. We are so excited to begin this new chapter in our lives and finally live in the same house as a family again.

Monday, December 20, 2010

i didn't forget

The Billings Jr Bulls hosted 8 teams for their semi-annual Ice Breaker Tournament. It was somewhat bitter-sweet for us. This is the last time Ethan will rock the Billings Teal jersey. :(

Stretching, getting ready to kick butt.
Playing D is his favorite position, and he is awesome at it.  
We had to bribe Elliott with suckers. He spends enough time at the rink he thinks he should just run around and cause chaos. I can't wait for him to start playing. 
I had to add in a few action shots. He's in the green socks. 
He got a Hat Trick this game. This meant he got an eggnog shake from McD's.  
I am sure going to miss these kids and coaches. What a great group of people.  
Yep, they won. 4 games, undefeated.  :)  What a way to go out huh? 
Great job Billings Teal!  
Talk about a happy kid.
I just loved this picture. Elliott wanted to help get Ethan's skates off after the last game. I don't know if he was excited that they won or that the tournament was over.  
We were lucky to have 2 cameras watching all the games, and my parents and Chris and Abby got to watch him play. He does love knowing that they got to see it.

Next time you see Ethan's hockey pictures, he will be playing as a Helena Bighorn. Ironically, the team he had to beat for the Championship game at this tournament. Haha.

Friday, December 17, 2010

window jewelry

I was invited to the neighbor's house this morning for peach pie, coffee and a craft project. My 3 most favorite things on earth. She knows I make jewelry, and she had made a project she calls "window jewelry" a couple days ago and knew I would be interested. So I brought my goodies, and she brought out her box of random jewelry and we got started. First we just looked at everything. That was fun just doing that.
She has tons of jewelry that she never wears or picked up from the goodwill stores.  
Then we broke out the pie and the fruit pizza (I made that) and got to work. 
Ok, well really we just got to eating, then we got to work. 
We used odds and ends and pieces of chain and linked them together to make these!  


Then you just hang them in your window, and POOF! Decoration. 
Believe me, these pictures do not do them any justice.  

So fun and so, SO easy.