More mail!

Mom said: "What? This package has your name on it. What do you think

it's going to be your birthday or something?!"

What is it Josie?

THANK YOU BECKY!

Becky this is adorable and really made Josie happy. She is VERY lucky to

have such a wonderful Godmother. We love you very much.

Here, the girls are all dressed up before the guests arrived for Jo's party. You can see someone is especially happy with a super big smile!

mail and a goof

Josie got mail!!!

"What's it say Dad?"

"Hey they gave me a bill"

Thanks grandma and grandpa H.

My big goof!

I was doing one too many things when I took these cupcakes out of the oven. As you can see I got a little side tracked talking to the kids, took them out and plopped them on the counter without poking them to see if they were done!

Making them again! :(

An infant's curiosity

I have a tall skinny tree that I use to put the kids decorations on. We decided to get it out and light it up for Emeline tonight. All kids love lights, so she enjoyed exploring and feeling the bristles. She especially wanted to see what it tasted like.

Lake Effect fun

We went to the grocery store tonight and walking in it began to spit some snow. When we walked out of the store we found ourselves in the midst of a lake effect snow shower. The flakes were enormous. It didn't last long but made the kids (and Dad) very anxious to go out to play.

Right before this picture snapped they were all on the ground making snow angels. I only captured Brad in the act - of course!

We tested Brad's tree. Looks good!

They created this "snow man" as they called it. Looks like a martian snowman to me.

A little pre-Christmas spirit!

Well we got really bored yesterday so I took out a foam craft kit I picked up to do when we got really bored one day!! I just didn't expect to get really bored so soon :)

It is Santa's house.

Emeline bounced around as we crafted.

Brad took advantage of a warm(er) afternoon and put lights up on a tree beside the house. I was VERY surprised to peek out the window to discover he had climbed up the tree in order to get the lights up to the top! Way to go Dad!

Weirdo! I told him just to throw them up there.

A couple more pictures from Thanksgiving

Here is Grandma trying to make Emeline happy. She is getting to that stage where she only wants her Mommy. It is nice to feel so loved and needed but it can be a BIG pain. You all can relate!!
Theresa and Anthony enjoyed their dinner. Good luck with this last month of school Theresa and good luck with basketball Anthony. See you soon!

Russell donned Emeline's pilgrim hat. Doesn't he look cute!

Elsie looks way too interested in this beer can. She won't take a bottle yet? Maybe if the bottle was shiny and silver and black she would give in!

Sorry Jessie and Matt it was too cute of a picture to leave out!

Thanksgiving at Mom's

Here are the boys after a delicious dinner sitting back and relaxing. They look like they are up to no good!
Grandma admiring her Grandson and Grandson admiring his Grandma.

Matt seeing if he (still) knows how to handle a 'newer' baby.

It was great visiting with Theresa. I was very happy that she could come. Her nieces also anticipated some time with her. We love you Theresa and miss you a bundle.

More pictures to come!!

Thanksgiving!

This is what our Thanksgiving morning looked like. We woke up to freezing rain and snow! Looks more like Christmas!

This little Indian and her Pilgrim friend came to celebrate with us today :)

Later (after her nap) another little pilgrim joined us on our "Happy Thanksgiving"!

We love you all and wish you a great Holiday Season. It begins now!! (so they say)

Lazy Wednesday.

We had fun with hair and had piano lessons today!

p.s.-Thanks for letting me know that the pictures are ok!!

problems

I have encountered a problem uploading my images. As you can see from the previous post they are coming out blurry. So until I get this resolved I will have no pictures. :(

Church calendar

Josie and I made a church year calendar while Georgia was at school.

Here is our result!

State Police Open House

Today we went to an open house at a new State Police Headquarters. This is me trying on a SWAT team vest that weighs 50 pounds.

"Bad Guys" look out. Here comes Officer Big Bad Mama.

Little Josie tried on a SWAT helmet. You could see "night vision" through the scope.

This is just some of the gear that the SWAT team uses. Tremendously accurate and powerful machinery. It was very very interesting.

This is a submersible camera that the the scuba unit uses to search for bodies in the water. As you can see Georgia is standing in front of it and is projected on the television set.

We all found this pretty cool as well. They are standing next to a pack and in the back is the suit.

We learned that they don't rescue but recover.

There was a ribbon ceremony to celebrate the opening. Here we are listening to the officers. As you can see we also met a K9 officer.

This was pretty cool for the girls. They got to hop into this $250,000 vehicle and play around for a little bit!

This is an armored Hummer that the SWAT team uses. Georgia and Josie are getting a hand getting down out of it. Surprisingly the officer said that this vehicle gets used quite a bit.

Lovely Lady Dressed in Blue

This past Thursday we had an Ecumenical prayer service that Mom and I provided music for. She asked if I had the prayer card with the prayer "Lovely Lady Dressed In Blue" on it that we had when I was little. I remember this prayer. We made a melody up to the words and used to sing it. I just searched for it and found this. Beautiful prayer and beautiful memories!

http://www.catholictradition.org/Mary/lady.htm

Company

No mistaking this is a boy. Brendan decked out in camo. TOO CUTE!

Elsie is "coming alive". She is turning into a "real" kid.

Elsie enthralled with Emeline. Emeline enthralled with our conversation.

This was Brendan's reaction to the show (mentioned next). I guess those girls will have to clean it up a bit. According to his expression he wasn't impressed.

Of course while the girls were here they had to put on a show for everyone. Georgia led the vocals and Jo and Ava choreographed a particularly intense number.

Brendan was quite sleepy. Boy does he look like a little angel.

Here is a beautiful Jessie with Elsie Rae.

I know my girls were very excited to have Ava over. I think I can

safely say that Ava too was happy to be here.

The three amigos playing together.