The British are coming!

Brett's class did a play about the Boston Tea Party - they're studying the revolution right now. So Brett was a British soldier in the play. He was so cute! We put the costume together with stuff from home, we didn't make anything special. So he wore the top from his Musketeer costume from 2 years ago...yeah it was tight. But he put my red shirt on top since he needed to wear a "redcoat", and he insisted that one of his red sweatshirts would not do. He taped a construction paper buckle to his slippers, and wore Jeff's socks so they'd be knee high. One of his friends asked if I made his hat because it was the most hilarious hat he'd ever seen, and although it has gotten kind of smashed it's the hat from his Jack Sparrow costume I don't see why it's the most hilarious hat...


so cute!

I was knitting up a storm for Christmas gifts, and once I finished the last one (which was actually last week or so) I just don't know what I want to work on next. I see so many patterns and pictures of things that I'd love to make, but just can't get started.
So here's a few of the things I made for Christmas gifts...
Gloria's socks (my mother-in-law)

Mike's USC hat (brother-in-law)

Kari's mini-sweater aka:shrug (sister-in-law)
Todd's pumpkin washcloths (my brother - and yes his kitchen is pumpkins, or rather jack-o-lanterns)

my mom's blanket

Ruth's socks (my step mom)


I have also made several hats for my dad to send to injured soldiers, but I'll take photos of those later. My dad doesn't want gifts for himself, all he asks for is that we do things to help other people and so he sends me yarn to make hats for injured soldiers. I have also made wool hats & a helmet liner for soldiers in Iraq & Afghanistan and squares for Warm Up America (and Ashley also made a square).

So now that I've finished all of this, I am at a loss as to what I should do next...

Far & Away

One thing that sucks about living in such a small town - you have to wait for specialist doctors to visit or go to Anchorage. Orthodontist, veterinarian, etc.

The kids had dentist appts. last week & he said that they need to see the orthodontist. So we said it was okay for him to give the ortho our phone number and give us a call. A few days later we get a call and the girl on the phone (receptionist I'm assuming) tells us when he's coming to town and it just happens to be the weekend we were planning on going to Anchorage (we need to get Roxy fixed before she goes into heat again). What can I do? I don't know how often he visits, and although I've said I wasn't going to worry about ortho until we left here I do know that my kids teeth need help. So I scheduled the appointment and we'll just take the kids out of school for a few days and go to Anchorage during the week.

how bad is it really?

So today I am 30...

I don't think it'll be a huge deal for me, but everyone else makes a big deal of it so I worry a bit about what it means to be 30. Will it be better than my 20s? And let's be real, I had kids at 19 & 21 so I didn't have time to party all the time.

The things I have been thinking about a lot are taking better care of myself - take my vitamins, get enough calcium, eat healthier, workout more (it's only going to get harder to lose this weight now). Should I use eye cream so I don't get as many wrinkles? What do I need to be doing for myself?

Really, what is so different about 30?

Photo Sharing

My kids each got a digital camera for Christmas, and they are having a great time taking pictures. I would like to have a place for them to share their pictures with family. I have a flickr, but don't want to pay for theirs (and I don't even know if you can have 2 accounts). So my question is what other photo sharing sites are there? Any recommendations of one over another?

all sorts of new things

This vacation was full of stuff we'd never done before. We had a nice holiday and visit with my mom, it was nice to get away from the cold for a while, but good to get back to our own beds and routines. So here's the rundown of our vacation.

We slept on the floor in SeaTac airport

We slept on cots in Chicago O'Hare airport

We flew first class - we got on the flight on stand-by since our flights kept
getting cancelled

Our luggage didn't make it on the flight, it was delivered at 3:30am Dec. 26 (even though we hadn't showered in 3 days as soon as my mom picked us up we had to make a shopping trip to Target for necessities & gifts for the kids)

We went to Pinehurst to see their huge Gingerbread village

We went to the North Carolina Zoo

There are stables at the community where my mom lives and kids were able to get horseback riding lessons and it wasn't just the riding, they had to take care of the horse & tack before and after riding)

Ashley got her ears pierced (I don't have a memory of getting mine done, so I tried to prepare her as much as I could & she did so awesome, she did not cry or anything)

The flight from Raleigh to Chicago was not bad until the pilot said that we were going to be a little later coming in than scheduled because they had to slow down due to maintenance issues (say WHAT?)

We got to Anchorage fine and while waiting for the shuttle from to the hotel it felt like I was going to have icicles hanging out of my nose, because it was -13 degrees! Honestly it was not as cold as I figured below zero temps would be, but not something I care to experience on a regular basis.

We did lots of other regular stuff - tons of shopping & eating!(I had so much Starbucks while we were there, had to get my fill), watching movies, just enjoying the sun & warmth.