the neverending break

Today marks the end of our winter break. 

 This break included a trip to Nannie & Papa's house; Grandmommy & Granddaddy coming up to our house on Christmas Eve; Christmas Day; the kiddos going down to G&G's house on their kids' only vacation; some shopping, taking down decorations, movie watching, eating out while kids were away; Ryan & I going down to G&G's house; two more Christmas's while down home; spending New Year's Eve down there; the remodeling of the boys' room, and STILL we have had LOTS of downtime at home! 

Has this break been LONG or what??  

I am ready for routine and a schedule to return...and to get out of the bitter cold of today!  I won't let anyone know how long Avery might have played Skylanders for today...oh boy!

Here's some pictures of the other things that have been going on since coming back to our house after Christmas.  Not in any particular order...

{Today Ellie actually wanted to dress all of her babies since it was so cold out...I think this was a first!}

{Then she took all the babies and put them to bed.  What a good mommy she must be to get all her babies to sleep at the same time!  The boys are playing skylanders!}

{No this is not from today... The boys LOVE jumping on the trampoline and even in the colder 20-30 degree temps we have been having they will run out and jump for a few minutes all throughout the day...they can't wait until warmer weather!}

{Do your kids do this too, after getting NEW toys for Christmas they get out old toys that they probably haven't touched for several months to play with...and then suddenly 6 months down the road they will start playing with their Christmas toys.  Are my kids the only ones who do this??}

{You beat we have been looming here!  We have even ventured out to the fishtail and DOUBLE fishtail around here...yes big time folks!}

{Evan displaying Avery's creations}

{Ellie has started to enjoy the trampoline too!}

{Our snow plow hill has returned!...I think this is the highlight of the boys' winter every year...hopefully snow plow man never decides to shove the snow somewhere else...}

{A little snow ball fun with dad.}

{A little snow shoveling...}

{Goodbyes to our real Christmas tree...it's the one on the top flying through the air ;)}

{Ryan and the kiddos on the trampoline...I think he might love it as much as them ;)...I also love my view from my kitchen window!}

{Yes, there's that skylander playing again...}

{Evan & I had a squinkie battle today.}

{And a little pool & Foosball time}

Wow yes it has been a long break! 

Thank you teachers for coming back to work tomorrow ;)!!!

superheroes & skylanders in one room?

My superheroes are growing up quickly and they have kind of outgrown their little boy farm room...I am not sure when this happened??

I decided to spend the weekend turning it into their big kid superhero/skylander room {of course they couldn't agree on one theme}.

First, here's a little look at what their room looked like before.  

This room was the first room Ryan & I painted when we moved into the house.  The yellow was to match a purple & yellow bedspread I had.  This room was originally used as the guest room.  I regretted the yellow as soon as we painted it...I was looking for more of a pale yellow, but it turned out a lot brighter than I expected.  It stayed the guest room until little baby Evan came along and we moved Avery out of the nursery next door into this room.  I didn't want to repaint the room again because we just finished painting every other room of the house so we just put up the farm border and called it good.  

Evan then moved into the room with Avery when baby Ellie came along and needed the nursery.  Ryan built the barn bookshelf for the boys when they moved into the room!  It lived it's life as the farm room for 6 years.  Time for a change I guess.

When you have two kids sharing a room, they also have to share the decorations...of course my boys couldn't decide on the same room color.  Avery was adamant about it being green {his favorite color since...always}.  Evan on the other hand changes favorite colors like he does his socks...he went between gold, silver, peach {yeah I don't know who else says those are their favorite colors besides my Evan}, blue, red...  Okay so a decision had to be made.  I told Avery we would paint the walls his green, but the accent colors would be Evan's blue {I kind of persuaded him to choose this one, especially since their comforters were already blue}. 

We then got to work painting!  A big thanks to Ryan for helping me do all the painting!  Things get a little crazy when you have to get a huge bunk bed out of your way!

We got the painting done...so on to the next problem what the boys want to put in their room.  I am so over having to re-decorate every time my boys choose a new passion to love so I knew I wasn't going to include anything permanent in the room that I would have to put a lot into changing out.  Therefore, I went with removable wall stickers...so easy to put up and change!  I also love using the picture of the item in a picture frame on the wall, again easy to change {these frames used to have parts of their farm border framed up}.  Just like the paint my boys did not want to choose the same thing to put up so we went with both their choices, superheroes & skylanders.

Besides the picture frames on one wall, the only other place that has their favorite theme is by each of their beds.  That way it's not overwhelmingly a superhero/skylander room, but they are very happy because they get to see what they wanted in their own beds.

Finally, we did a little rearranging of the furniture too...it seems to give the feel of having more room this way.  I also covered up the old window seat cushion we had with the red plaid on it for the farm theme with one of our blue fitted sheets so it would match along with our new blue curtains.

Our barn bookshelf is still there...not quite ready to give up that yet...

My big boys now have their big boy room.

On to my next project...

ziplining now & then

What did our kiddos get for Christmas from Grandmommy & Granddaddy this year?  A zip line that has been installed at the grandparent's house!  Yes, this is why our kiddos want to go to their house on vacation ;).  Ellie is not quite a fan of it yet, but the boys loved it {including the big boy}.

{Yes, that's Ryan ;)}

This reminded me of a little ziplining Ryan & I did way back in the day...so here's a Throwback Thursday for you...

Ryan & I actually first ziplined during our honeymoon over the rainforest of Costa Rica.  Yes, it was a bit scary, but it was fun too.

{This was also the days when Ryan took most of the pictures...man things have changed!}

{A little crazy to go on a little cord across the rainforest where you can't see the other side..maybe??}

And a look at both of us on our honeymoon...man we look young! It feels like yesterday, yet also a million lifetimes ago!

Here's to ziplining both in our past and our present!

a new year 2014

Happy 2014!

I hope everyone had a wonderful new years.  We spent some time at Grandmommy & Granddaddy's house to wrap up the year and had lots of fun playing and just relaxing!

Another year has flown by...2013 was a great year for my family and I hope 2014 will be just as good!

  

Here's some highlights of 2013:

One big girl was potty trained

We got hit with so much snow last winter...it was unreal!

A big kindergartner turned 6

I completed my first half marathon and then 6 months later I completed my second...who am I??

We played lots of sports! {And it was probably talked about too much to link about every time!}

{And our biggest player...our little cheerleader who cheers on her brothers' at every game!}

The saddest news of our year...when our Hippo died...

Our newest family member arrived!

{Oh my goodness our baby Bella has grown up fast!}

Avery graduated kindergarten!

I got to celebrate being married for nine years to my best friend!

The kiddos went on a summer vacation to Grandmommy & Granddaddy's house!

Avery finally learned to ride his bike without training wheels!

We took a road trip to Michigan!  So beautiful!

Then we had a first grader all of a sudden...

and a preschooler!!!

The princess turns 3!

And our little superhero turned 5!

And that's just the beginning.  We are blessed!

Did we meet our New Year's resolutions from last year?

Ellie - Use the potty :)!  Done...at least for daytime :)

 

Evan - No help from mommy using the potty (don't worry all the resolutions don't involve the restroom...), writing his name on his own, learn all his abc's, and ride a big boy bike  Done, done, done, and done!!

 

Avery - Become a better reader (this was his idea), ride his bike without training wheels, and learn to tie his shoes  Done, done, done!!

 

Carrie - run a half marathon  Done...and then I did another one!!  Although I didn't write it down, I also accomplished taking a picture every day for the entire year!  That's 365 days that I took at least one picture, but most days it was a lot more.  This was a lot easier than I thought it would be!

 

Ryan - run a half marathon with Carrie (but I don't think this is really a challenge for him since he could wake up tomorrow and run one without any training...)  Done and then he had to do it with me again :)!

Our 2014 New Year's Resolutions:

Ellie - Now we need to be FULLY potty trained...that includes night time!  Learn to write her name.

Evan - Learn letter sounds.  Get better at the trampoline {his goal ;)}.

Avery - Learn all math facts.  Become a better soccer player.  {Both his goals}

Carrie - No new goals here... Continue to take at least one picture every single day, make working out a priority, and continue to keep up with memory keeping through my scrapbooks and this blog.

Ryan - {he is apparently perfect and has no goals...although he did tell me that his is to "run a full marathon with my wife"....sorry this will NEVER happen!}

Today marks the one year anniversary of this blog!  I have enjoyed writing here way more than I expected to and {love} all the memories I now have saved forever!  I don't want to stop now and want to keep this blog a priority in my life.  I wrote so much {over 500 printed out pages} and uploaded so many pictures {2,500 photos} that if I want to get the blog into a book, I apparently need two books for it {as says any book binding resource...}.  Wow, I guess I had a lot more to say than I originally set out to do!  Now the challenge after writing for a complete year, will I start repeating myself?  Will there be anything new to say?  I am pretty sure that the superheroes & princess will keep things lively around here ;).  If you, my readers, have anything you want me to write about more, or maybe something I haven't talked about yet {if you can think of anything :)}, or just want to tell me your favorite post please comment and let me know!

Here's to a great 2014!