Very Pinteresting...

Do you Pinterest? (I just heard Rhonda say No) well I do. It is a great place to collect images, ideas and other things and sort them all the way you want to, for when you want to. If you need an invite let me know, I'll shoot one your way.  I have gotten so many good "pins" on my 'pinboards' and I finally and getting around to sharing them! I have so many more pins to do, so I am sure this won't be my last Pinterest post. I wanted to show you the ones that I was inspired by for a side by side, but Pinterest won't let me save the pictures. Ergh. So just check my pin boards if you wanna see em.

 (I know you saw these on the Bunco post already)

 I got ideas for filling my glass apothecary jars and the "Keep Calm" printable from it. Actually the frame stays there and I have a rotating list of Keep Calm pictures that go in it.  Right now it says 'Keep Calm and Snow On'.

 The popsicle stick snowflakes were a little bit of an obsession once I started making them. The inspiration looked like the bottom far right, but was done with standard size sticks. I used variations of large sticks and patterned sticks.  Below you can see they took over my staircase.  I want more next year. And it was so cheap. I had everything on hand.

I made this little gem for Rhonda for Christmas.  By the way, I am in LOVE with the Martha Stewart line of craft paint. It is more expensive but so worth it. I used the red, and it covered in one coat. I was hooked!

And these were the cutest gifts for my Mom and Mother-in-Law. I wanted to use various shades of green for the boys hands. And then I used a star stamp. You can't see it but around the edge I glued a glittery red rickrack. On my MIL's we added 'ornaments' in red using my niece's fingerprints. I love Boss's hands, too cute huh?

So THANK YOU PINTEREST for making my holidays a little cuter, and yummier too. My 'Wanna be Foodie' board has brought me some awesome new recipes! I already have another post with Valentine's crafts inspired by Pinterest so that will be coming soon!

Boston lately...

Here are just a few cute pictures of Mr. Boston. He is such a joy.  He could sleep better for me at night but he is a happy kid, so it is manageable.  He just got started on a new formula, Nurtamigen as well as Zantac for his reflux. After, seriously, 8 different formulas his body really seems to tolerate this one the best.  The medicine isn't really helping his reflux, so I am going to have to give it another week and take him back to the doctor to see what we do next.  I can't believe he is going to be 3 months old this week!

 This is how we spend a lot of time, him screaming and me holding him upright so he spits up less...

 I absolutly LOVE these swaddleme blankets.  I got one from a friend and immediately ordered a bunch from Amazon. They have velcro and keep baby swaddled so tight. As you can see, he loves it.

 He is my bestest snuggle buddy. I got to take a lot of naps with him while Rusty was off.  Thanks Honey, I really needed all those mornings of sleeping in and taking naps.

 Did I mention his hair is getting curlier and curlier?

Seriously, even with spit up all down his arm and belly he can still smile.  Oh, and he is ticklish !

Prepare yourself for cuteness overload.

Are you dying right now? I know.  His feet are ticklish too!

ChRiStMaS 2011...

Christmas morning was an early one for me and Boston.  Then came the next early riser, Berk, at about 6:30, Braden woke next and we woke up Brenner so by 7 we could open presents.  The boys loved everything, of course.  We unwrapped for what seemed like forever, and again, despite really trying to cut back on the number of gifts the kids got, they were spoiled. It was only 2 weeks ago, but I can barely remember it.  Newborn brain and all. Here is a rundown of the gift highlights...

Rusty- Lots of new (smaller) clothes, an assortment of running related items,

Caryn- Ice cream maker for my Kitchenaide, PINK sweatshirt and  campus pants, cookbooks, books,

Braden- PS3 Motion and games, Airsoft gun and ammo, and a free wheel for his bike

Berkley- 3DS and games, Wii games, soccer ball

Brenner- Cars ball pit, Batman trike, Scooter, Elmo instruments

Boston- clothes, small toys, activity playmat,

Family- a black Wii, a digital Piano (from Becks), handmade wooden blocks (my parents)

 This door/wall of cards is one of the things I most look forward to each holiday season.  I am always so sad to take it down.  I love looking at them and running to the mail box each day to see what new photos we had gotten.

 Here is our biggest gift of the day. We got a piano! It is technically a keyboard, but it has so many bells and whistles and I love watching the boys and especially Rusty, learning and re learning to play the piano.

It's funny as the boys are getting older our house looks less like Toys R Us threw up in it and more of a Toys R Us/ Best Buy combo kind of thing.  We got to see the Becks that day and my sister the MacMasters came over in the afternoon.  We missed seeing my parents and Rhonda's family because they had the 24 flu.  Yuck!

Christmas Eve 2011...

Christmas Eve 2011

My boys are so silly.

Good thing these two littles are usually happy, it helps me through my day!

We had a nice dinner at the Becks before playing the Right, Left game (Boston and I scored $10 each!) and then the nativity.  We opened gifts from the Solomon cousin gift exchange and then we opened our PJ's!

All our PJ's this year were blue and super soft.  LOVED them!

And here are a few pictures of my house this year. 

Zoolights!

I cannot believe we have had our zoo membership a year already! We got it the same time we went to the lights last year and now here we are. We used that membership a ton- until I got hugely prego, then not so much. But I am excited for the cooler weather and once Boston is a little older we will be zoo bound again.

We dropped Boss off with Aunt Jill and took Jaci with us instead. We thought she'd like the lights better than the baby. Following tradition we went to Chic-fil-A first and then to the zoo with the Robison family. There were lines when we got there, but we were able to buy tickets at the members window and not wait at all!

Just like last year the kids were a little disappointed they couldn't see all the animals.  And they got a little confused at first when we would say, "Look! There's a gecko!" because they would be looking for a tiny lizard, not the 6 foot long light display.  By the end they figured it out.  We did see the otters swimming and the kimono dragons, so they were happy about that.

On our  way in they passed out these glasses. At first you thought they were 3D, but they were so much cooler! As long as you weren't trying to walk while looking, it made lights look like the picture above. The top is just regular lights, and the bottom with the glasses.  We kept having to hold the kids hands because they wanted to keep the glasses on, but they couldn't walk straight with them. It was pretty funny.

When we left the lines were outrageous! I would never wait in those lines. I mean the lights were cool, but to wait double the time it takes to see the lights does not for a fun night make! Thanks for the outing Robison family!

(Hey Addi, I need the picture of all of us with our glasses on-k?)

Rusty's Work Party...

Every year at the holidays we get to get together for dinner with Rusty's co-workers. Since most of his team are actually in Texas it is usually a small group.  This year there were just 7 of us. We ate at Rigatony's and it was a super fun, relaxed night.  I am still having a hard time with this whole post baby body. I would prefer to be in my PINK pants and a tshirt most of the time -- oh wait, I am.  But since I got all dressed up, and was having an amazing hair day, I had to share this picture.  Rusty has lost a ton of weight running. Not on purpose- MEN! I tell ya. So we have had to buy his new two size smaller clothes.  So proud of you and all your hard work. You are the best provider and I love your job at AT&T and how much you love it and are so good at it!

Seriously, good hair day.

Soccer is DONE!

Berkley's season got cut short by a week due to a really rainy week the week before. We still got to have his year end party and he was so excited to get his trophy, of course!

 Berk with his buddies Max & Jack

 Thanks Coach!

So proud of how hard you worked this season Berk! Way to go! (Braden was here too, but he was off winning a million tickets, so he wasn't in the pictures!)

My Bunco Group Christmas Party...

I have been playing in a constantly evolving Bunco group for the last eight years. I host every December and we have done a bunch of different things at it. We did an ornament exchange a few years and those were fun but getting 12 new ornaments every year is a bit much so last year we started a new tradition. So here are the pictures from the 2nd Annual Bunco Ugly Sweater/Sweater Vest & Turtle Neck/ Holiday Accessory Party.

 I made these two for the prize pool. My Dad cut the wood for me, and I used my Silhouette to do the vinyl.  I actually made one more that says SNOW, but I had to keep it, it was too cute!

 Here were the rest of the gifts.

 All out on display. You can see Berk pointing to the super soft blanket. He was very happy that I actually ended up with it.  He has since taken ownership of it and I will never see it again...

 Here are our two subs. My sis Chelli ( who plays with us a lot, like a perma-sub) and Jess, who used to be in the group and we love when she gets to come sub. They both came early to help me with the kids.

 Jess got Boston to sleep, and he stayed asleep for hours. I told her she had to come over every night.

 All the girls playing. We usually throw a stuffed pig and yell "Travelers" for one part of the game, but we threw a little Santa and had to yell "Santa", it was pretty funny.

 Kim brought her baby Klohe to bunco. She's pretty cute. Kim and I actually had our babies on the same day (she delivered HOURS before me, lucky) but we labored across the hall from each other and were texting all night and day.  It's a fun memory.

 Rhonda's sweater was definitely in the top of the contenders, her turtleneck and antlers put it over the top.

 Me and Jess and my homemade ugly Tshirt.  It was fun to make, and I will be archiving it for future Christmas parties.

 Dano, Jenn and Scarlett were looking pretty fine that night. Wowza.

 The Rasmussen sisters in their holiday finest. Man, we rock. For the record my turtle neck has scotty dogs and Rhonda's had poinsettias.  Mine was was uglier.

 Our 2011 Bunco group (minus Sherry and Parie).  Sara (between me and Rho) was the winner. Everytime I looked at her sweater I giggled.  Minnie Mouse, blinking lights in the sleeves and jingle bells on the band.  It was truly amazing.   I even made ornaments for the winner of this year and last.  Love you ladies!

(Back) Scarlett, Jenn, Danielle, Addi (last year's winner), Jill, Chelli

(front) Rhonda, Sara, me and Kim