Merry Christmas! I know it isn't Christmas but what better way to take your mind off the mid-winter blahs than to reminisce about some better, more sparkly winter days.
Christmas Eve. We finally had some good snow and the kids decided it was a great time to play in it. Ashlyn had never really played in the snow. She couldn't walk until the end of last winter and so she missed out. She was a little skeptical at first but seemed to like it as long as she was in the sled.
Tim the reindeer. I almost felt bad for him running around the backyard pulling two sleds again and again, until I remembered how he left all his Christmas shopping until Christmas Eve and was gone most of the day. He got back from shopping and went straight to sled duty at the behest of four eager kids. 
The kiddos plus one locked-out neighbor friend.
These two were perfect partners. Neither liked going very fast, they didn't want to be tipped over or fall out of their sled. None of those things happened, so they were happy.
I wish I was a better photographer.
Christmas was great for a lot of reasons this year. 1) No one stayed up all night crying like last year 2) We all got to sleep in our own bed which I think solved problem #1 and 3) Everyone was healthy and happy and it was just fun.Ashlyn even recognized Santa and would shout "Santa!!" every time she saw him (in person, on TV, in a book, any elderly person who had white hair). She also watched the "baby Jesus" movie every day for a month (by request) just to keep things balanced. : ) She was really excited to open her things Christmas morning. She got a kitchen with food and some babies with all the gear. Sometimes she mixes the two and puts one of her babies in her fridge for a while. She is such a good mommy.
All of Jace's dreams came true in the form of a Wii left by Santa. It was for him and Braxton, and as you can see Braxton was just as excited. (Jace really was excited even though he doesn't look it there, maybe he was in shock or something.) It hasn't disappointed and they are still just as excited about it as they were on Christmas morning. 
Jace is six. He says a lot of funny things. Like one day I decided to try and bring a little of the gospel into our conversation while I made dinner. Here is how it went:Me: Jace, where do you want to go on your mission? Remember when you are 19 you can go on a mission almost anywhere. Daddy went to Ukraine and Grandpa went to Japan, and Papa went to some other states here in our country. Where do you want to go?
Jace: I already know where I am going on my mission, mom.
Me: Really? (I was thinking, maybe I'm not doing so bad after all, maybe he has thought about this on his own, or had some spiritual prompting or something)
Jace: Yeah, I'm going to outer space.
Me: Wait, what? Outer space? (Crap. No spiritual prompting there)
Jace: I'm just kidding mom. I'm just going to Mars. With R2-D2.
Me: Alright, well make sure you tell me before you leave.
Clearly, we were talking about very different kinds of missions. Me: church mission, Jace:Star Wars mission. Oh, well. : )
Here is my little monkey Brax. He likes to ask me awkward questions at embarrassing times. Like when we went to get the oil changed in the car and he saw one of the mechanics smoking outside, he yells "Mommy, look at him, he is smoking!! Is he a bad guy or a stranger?" (The two worst things you could be to Braxton.) Then in the same week at Wal-Mart he asks me in front of a hostile looking checker "How do some people get really fat and I don't even get really fat? ". This is also the boy, if you remember, who asked another poor checker if he had a p****. Bless him. He keeps me humble and embarrassed.
Ashlyn is 1 going on 12. She is bossy and likes to be in charge of her siblings. She really is my daughter. She usually has a baby or two close by that she is "taking care" of and she is talking in little sentences now. She wants to wear my all my jewelry and be in charge of my make-up. She is my shopping buddy when the boys are at school and seems to love Target just as much as I do. I am so glad I got my little ladybug.I started the new year off by turning 29. (the title of this post is about to make sense) I had a great birthday. It made me think about my twenties, since this is my last year in them. My twenties have been big for me. I have become a wife, a college graduate, a mother (three times), a daughter-in-law, a friend to new people, and a resident of four different states, among other things. All that thinking made me want to leave my twenties with a bang. To do something big this year. I started thinking on a pretty grand scale. Go on a European tour, see the Great Wall of China, go back and start my Masters degree. Then Braxton called for me to wipe his bum, and I came back to reality and started thinking a little more practically. I thought about five minutes and came up with running a race. Then in the next five minutes I signed up to run a half-marathon, complete with non-refundable registration fee. So, I will become one more thing in my twenties: a runner.
When I tell people what I am planning to do they always ask the same thing, "Oh, are you a runner?" I ran cross country and track in high school, but that was a decade ago, so I say no. Plus, I weighed in at 92 lbs. my senior year of cross country. How hard could it have been to run my tiny little 92 lb. body around? Not hard. Three kids and many pounds later, I am ready to be a runner.
I have two goals. 1) To run the whole thing and 2) To finish. I use the word run loosely. To me anything more than a walk is running. Me and Usain Bolt--both runners.
My next purchase after signing up was this:
and we have become good friends. I have a good routine of running and watching Supernanny on Hulu so I get in shape while I get tips on becoming a better mother. Win-win. If you have ever wanted to do a half-marathon, come join me. I will even email you my Half-Marathon for Beginners training guide I printed off Google. Come on, you know you want to.
