The Christmas bouncy horses from Nana and Papa have been a HUGE hit!
Lily's orange one is named Blossom
Amelia's purple one is named Rainbow.
Mack's brown one is named Cocoa.
Thanks, Nana & Papa!
Monday, December 27, 2010
C'mon sleepy head!
Not suprisingly, Lily and Mack were up early on Christmas morning while Amelia was sawing logs in my bed. Once Mack saw the Toy Story figures with all the stockings, he was desperate to open Jesse. I told him he had to go ask Sissy.
Friday, December 24, 2010
Monday, December 6, 2010
Friend of the Week
Lily is the Friend of the Week in her 3rd grade class this week.
I spent an inordinate amount of time making her poster, but I wanted to make it extra special since we haven't done this since she was in kindergarten. If there was a spotlight in first grade, I didn't get the memo, and I totally blew it for second grade because Lily was the star of the week right after Christmas break and I totally forgot. So I stayed up into the wee hours of the morn to complete her poster. And let's face it- I'm an anal perfectionist (except when it comes to housekeeping).
Lily was especially excited about putting her baby picture and others of her growing up on the poster. (Click to view larger.)
Facts about Lily:
Born February 25, 2002
Oldest of 3 children
Nickname "Biggie"
Sister Amelia (4)
Brother Mack (almost 2)
Tall for her age
Got baptized this year
Barrel Racer & Calf Rider
Has lost 10 teeth
Has lived in 5 houses
Early Riser
Lily's Favorites:
Riding her horse
Reading
Helping her Dad on the ranch
Animals of all kinds
Baseball
Clogging
CHS football games
Swimming
Sledding
Ice skating
Alone time with her Mom
Bacon
Popcorn & Kettle Corn
Meatballs
Cheese Pizza
Ice cream
Chocolate
Hardy Boys & Nancy Drew
Purple
Stuffed Animals
Family Reunions
Crafts
Things Lily wants to do:
Have her own bedroom
Get a house pet
Visit her cousins in Missouri
Cook by herself
Build something with her Dad
Get a new horse
Take pictures
Have another sibling
Love my big girl!
I spent an inordinate amount of time making her poster, but I wanted to make it extra special since we haven't done this since she was in kindergarten. If there was a spotlight in first grade, I didn't get the memo, and I totally blew it for second grade because Lily was the star of the week right after Christmas break and I totally forgot. So I stayed up into the wee hours of the morn to complete her poster. And let's face it- I'm an anal perfectionist (except when it comes to housekeeping).
Lily was especially excited about putting her baby picture and others of her growing up on the poster. (Click to view larger.)
Facts about Lily:
Born February 25, 2002
Oldest of 3 children
Nickname "Biggie"
Sister Amelia (4)
Brother Mack (almost 2)
Tall for her age
Got baptized this year
Barrel Racer & Calf Rider
Has lost 10 teeth
Has lived in 5 houses
Early Riser
Lily's Favorites:
Riding her horse
Reading
Helping her Dad on the ranch
Animals of all kinds
Baseball
Clogging
CHS football games
Swimming
Sledding
Ice skating
Alone time with her Mom
Bacon
Popcorn & Kettle Corn
Meatballs
Cheese Pizza
Ice cream
Chocolate
Hardy Boys & Nancy Drew
Purple
Stuffed Animals
Family Reunions
Crafts
Things Lily wants to do:
Have her own bedroom
Get a house pet
Visit her cousins in Missouri
Cook by herself
Build something with her Dad
Get a new horse
Take pictures
Have another sibling
Love my big girl!
Monday, November 15, 2010
Smell My Feet
Dan has been after me for awhile to get some pictures of the kids posted, so I'll start with Halloween.
Because we'd spent quite a bit on the girls' costumes, we opted for a freebie hand-me-down for Mack. We raided our friend Karla's large dress-up stash and Mack was happy as could be in his little lion costume, complete with his own blond curl peeking out the front.
Dude, little bags of chips? A little salty to balance out all the sweet...Genius!
Our friend Katie (Brian's sister) had a scarecrow hanging by her front door. Mack wasn't too sure he wanted to walk past that thing.
Then he realized it was just pretend and thought it was a pretty cool guy.
Mack was totally diggin' on all the candy. He even mastered saying, "Tandy!"
Who doesn't want a giant cowboy boot outside their front window?
Lily was such a sweetheart, helping Mack walk up to all the doors and get his candy.
Amelia had a little trouble getting her helmet to stay on (here she is at her preschool Halloween party with the thing falling back on her face!)
But it sure came in handy when it started to rain!
We had a great night trick-or-treating, despite the rain. We walked around our corner of town for about 30 minutes, then we took the car and went to other parts of town. We finally got rained out and headed home to check out the loot.
Lily is really into Nancy Drew books, so originally that's what she was going to be for Halloween. I searched online and it said to just wear a plaid skirt and cardigan, but that's more the style of the recent movie than the actual books. The pictures on the book covers have Nancy wearing conservative 1950's dresses:
(this is what we're reading right now, The Ghost of Blackwood Hall)
I searched online for vintage 1950's dresses and all I could find in Lily's size were dress patterns and I did NOT want to sew a dress! We were talking to Dan on Skype one night and he said, "No one's going to know who she is." After some consideration, I asked Lily if she wanted to be a 50's poodle skirt girl, a costume I found while searching for 1950's clothing. Once I showed her the picture she was sold.
Aside from the awesome twirly skirt, Lily's favorite part of the costume was the cat eye glasses.
Amelia had her costume picked out ages before Halloween. While Dan was at mud school in Houston, home of NASA, he got Amelia a complete astronaut outfit. She was totally in love with it and for weeks before Halloween she went around telling everyone that she was going to be an astronaut.
Because we'd spent quite a bit on the girls' costumes, we opted for a freebie hand-me-down for Mack. We raided our friend Karla's large dress-up stash and Mack was happy as could be in his little lion costume, complete with his own blond curl peeking out the front.
We carved pumpkins with our friends the Toomers a few days before Halloween (that's Kallianne and Karla in the top left.)
I made the mistake of looking up templates online so we'd have something easy to trace. Then the girls saw the dog templates on Better Homes and Gardens' website and I got roped into doing two very intricate designs. Turned out cute, though, huh?
We headed out to trick-or-treat before dark so I could get some pictures and Mack could actually see what was going on. They're like the Three Musketeers of Halloween!
Dude, little bags of chips? A little salty to balance out all the sweet...Genius!
Our friend Katie (Brian's sister) had a scarecrow hanging by her front door. Mack wasn't too sure he wanted to walk past that thing.
Then he realized it was just pretend and thought it was a pretty cool guy.
Please try to ignore the purple girly hand-me-down boots. Mack just got some cool ones from his cousin Alexander this weekend, so the boy police won't be after him anymore.
Mack was totally diggin' on all the candy. He even mastered saying, "Tandy!"
Hands down, this is the coolest front porch in Cokeville:
Who doesn't want a giant cowboy boot outside their front window?
Lily was such a sweetheart, helping Mack walk up to all the doors and get his candy.
Amelia had a little trouble getting her helmet to stay on (here she is at her preschool Halloween party with the thing falling back on her face!)
But it sure came in handy when it started to rain!
We had a great night trick-or-treating, despite the rain. We walked around our corner of town for about 30 minutes, then we took the car and went to other parts of town. We finally got rained out and headed home to check out the loot.
Trick or Treat, Smell My Feet!
Monday, October 18, 2010
Saturday, October 16, 2010
Saturday, October 2, 2010
Love This Guy
Dan heading off bright and early for his first hitch as a mud engineer. Who can resist a man with his name embroidered on his shirt (even if it says J Bown)? Totally hot!
Saturday, September 18, 2010
Reflections
I just finished looking through the pictures of Zoe's funeral. What an emotional day it was. The most poignant image was of Michael, chair pulled right up next to the casket, peacefully looking at his mom...
I know it seemed weird to some people that I was taking pictures. You're supposed to take pictures at happy events, right? But I guess that's just my way of giving, of contributing, and of preserving a moment in time that someday the family might want to remember. I asked Kevin beforehand if he wanted me to get pictures of people and the flowers and such, and he said that would be nice. At first I was somewhat timid because I didn't want to intrude on people's privacy, but after awhile I figured that we would never get this day back and it was better to have too much than not enough. As Kevin said, "just take them and we can always delete them later..." I won't share them here because it's not my place, but there are some wonderful images of people talking and sharing support, some darling pictures of the kids, and tender moments at the graveside.
One thing I was able to do for the funeral was prepare a collection of images from Zoe's life. It was such an honor to do that, to give everyone a visual reminder of the full life that Zoe lived. Kevin's sisters did a wonderful job designing the table, using several of Zoe's Willow Tree sculptures. Many people commented that their favorite image was from Zoe's baptism day, before she and Kevin were a couple, when Kevin was a missionary in England. To see them both in white and think of the eternal nature of their relationship was a great comfort.
Now that the funeral is over, we all face the difficult task of adjusting to a new normal, without Zoe. It just seems so unreal sometimes. It's been hard not to be melancholy and I find that I just don't want to be alone. I need to be around other people who love Zoe, or I just want to sleep.
Dan is coming home from mud school in Houston in 7 days. I'm so anxious not to be alone anymore, yet I'm having mixed emotions about how our future is going to proceed. Mud school seemed manageable because it was a specific amount of time with an end in sight. We were anticipating that Dan was going to have a consistent schedule of two weeks on, two weeks off at a site only 3 hours away. But currently the natural gas rigs in Pinedale are pretty much tapped out, so there's no work there. Dan will likely have to work out of the Casper office and will probably be on a rig in northern Colorado. Not exactly within driving distance for a day trip. And they're short-handed on mud engineers, so Dan will likely have to work much longer than 2 weeks at a time until Halliburton gets more mud engineers trained.
It's so disappointing to get to the end of this big challenge and realize that it's probably not going to improve a lot in terms of our time together as a family. While I have learned a lot about my capacity to handle day-to-day life on my own, and felt empowered by my relative success, we are not a whole family like this:
I'm ready to feel whole again. And my heart aches for Kevin because he's feeling that emotion exponentially. Zoe's death has brought an insecurity, an uncertainty to all of us. We're not sure what to do with ourselves. I'm not sure I can have confidence in the future right now. My whole world could be ripped away at any moment. I have faith that God can make all things whole, but it's so hard abiding. A strange combination of worry and indifference cloud my mind right now. I'm afraid to feel too deeply, to need too desperately. I hope this soon passes so that I can be a proper wife and mother to the family I adore.
I know it seemed weird to some people that I was taking pictures. You're supposed to take pictures at happy events, right? But I guess that's just my way of giving, of contributing, and of preserving a moment in time that someday the family might want to remember. I asked Kevin beforehand if he wanted me to get pictures of people and the flowers and such, and he said that would be nice. At first I was somewhat timid because I didn't want to intrude on people's privacy, but after awhile I figured that we would never get this day back and it was better to have too much than not enough. As Kevin said, "just take them and we can always delete them later..." I won't share them here because it's not my place, but there are some wonderful images of people talking and sharing support, some darling pictures of the kids, and tender moments at the graveside.
One thing I was able to do for the funeral was prepare a collection of images from Zoe's life. It was such an honor to do that, to give everyone a visual reminder of the full life that Zoe lived. Kevin's sisters did a wonderful job designing the table, using several of Zoe's Willow Tree sculptures. Many people commented that their favorite image was from Zoe's baptism day, before she and Kevin were a couple, when Kevin was a missionary in England. To see them both in white and think of the eternal nature of their relationship was a great comfort.
Now that the funeral is over, we all face the difficult task of adjusting to a new normal, without Zoe. It just seems so unreal sometimes. It's been hard not to be melancholy and I find that I just don't want to be alone. I need to be around other people who love Zoe, or I just want to sleep.
Dan is coming home from mud school in Houston in 7 days. I'm so anxious not to be alone anymore, yet I'm having mixed emotions about how our future is going to proceed. Mud school seemed manageable because it was a specific amount of time with an end in sight. We were anticipating that Dan was going to have a consistent schedule of two weeks on, two weeks off at a site only 3 hours away. But currently the natural gas rigs in Pinedale are pretty much tapped out, so there's no work there. Dan will likely have to work out of the Casper office and will probably be on a rig in northern Colorado. Not exactly within driving distance for a day trip. And they're short-handed on mud engineers, so Dan will likely have to work much longer than 2 weeks at a time until Halliburton gets more mud engineers trained.
It's so disappointing to get to the end of this big challenge and realize that it's probably not going to improve a lot in terms of our time together as a family. While I have learned a lot about my capacity to handle day-to-day life on my own, and felt empowered by my relative success, we are not a whole family like this:
(Photo taken at Zoe's funeral. Her favorite color was blue.)
I'm ready to feel whole again. And my heart aches for Kevin because he's feeling that emotion exponentially. Zoe's death has brought an insecurity, an uncertainty to all of us. We're not sure what to do with ourselves. I'm not sure I can have confidence in the future right now. My whole world could be ripped away at any moment. I have faith that God can make all things whole, but it's so hard abiding. A strange combination of worry and indifference cloud my mind right now. I'm afraid to feel too deeply, to need too desperately. I hope this soon passes so that I can be a proper wife and mother to the family I adore.
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