Electric Light Parade 2008!

Every year our town has an electric light parade to celebrate the Christmas season. This year the kids were really into it and got very excited. They got to see all kinds of neat floats and even got a few pieces of candy to munch on during the parade. I didnt realize how hard it would be to take pictures of theses floats in the dark. Sorry if they are a little blurry. These are some of the clearer ones.

Waiting in the car for the parade to start.

Once the parade started we got out and stood near the street for a better view. It was pretty cold that night and Tyler was shivering so after a few floats she took Daddy back to the car to watch the rest in warmth.
The snowman that zooms down the streets every year.

The famous dancing firemen. This is one of my personal favorites. Usually they are all dressed up in lights and dance to the Christmas music.

Of course Santa is always the last one to come through town.

There was a few more pistures but they were just a little too blurry to really see what they were. The parade is something we always have fun at and look forward to every year. Merry Christmas!!!

Remembering Chase, One Year Later.........

Here we are one year later and Chase is still very much missed by all. It has definitely been a challenge for everyone this past year. Thankfully there is alot of family and friends for everyone to turn to for support and comfort. Chase's memory is still very much alive and that was apparent when we went to visit his graveside yesterday afternoon. There are many little trinkets and pretty flowers that show that everyone still thinks of him often. With so many friends and so much family, he will never be forgotten. We miss and love you Chase......

Our everyday life.....

Here are some of the more recent pictures of us and the kids. Now it is getting cold but we still try to keep busy and get out of the house from time to time. Also, we discovered that Brandon can now ride his bike with NO training wheels!!! We noticed that the training wheels were not hitting the ground so much anymore, and decided to take them off. It was like he had been riding this way all along. He was so proud of himeself he told everyone he saw that day and still talks about it! What a big boy!!

These are from our Veteran's Day parade this year. It wasn't very long but there were a few neat things in it.
Our American Legion

A neat military truck

Our VFW , I think

A mini submarine a man had built

Another military vehicle

Our boy scouts

A motorcycle group

More boyscouts....

Tyler was being a big girl helping daddy get wood up to the house for rhe night.Watching a movie after bathtime
Our big boy riding withouth training wheels for the first time!!!

Go Bubba!!!!

A chilly afternoon at the park

Pizza night with cousins!

It's my Birthday!!!!!

So our baby is not a baby anymore. This year Brandon turned 5 and is now our little man. We are so lucky to have such a great little boy. We could'nt imagine life without him. He is so smart and has such a personality of his own and he makes our lives better everyday. Happy 5th Birthday Brandon!!!!!The morning of his birthday Brandon woke up to his Birthday boy chair( his dinner chair with balloons attatched to it.) and Mom made everyone Mickey Mouse pancakes.

This is the first of three wishes..........................

Here is the second..... since Daddy had to work on his actual birthday we were going to have a party the next weekend. But I always want to make sure we celebrate their "real" birthday, so we had Gooma and Goompa over for dinner that night when dad got home from work. Brandon wanted a pie so i made him a banana cream pie with 5 candles to make yet another wish.............

We let him open his gift from us that night as well. He is still really into cars and i found a cool book about hot rods that i had saved for his birthday. He also got a real wheel barrow from us that we let him have a few days before so he could have time to play with it before the snow came.

"Happy Birthday Bubba!"

Here is his cake for his party we had the next weekend. One of his favorite things is still cars, so i made him a racetrack cake for him. He thought it was neat because he got to keep the cars off the top afterward.

Here is the top view........
And he is still shy when it comes to singing happy birthday. You can see him hiding under the table during the song, then he quickly darted out so he could blowout the candles and have cake.

Being the little gentleman that he is, he helped me take off the candles and instead of "Birthday boy first" he insisted that he serve everyone before he ate. I did'nt want to tell him not to so he helped serve cake to almost everyone at the party asking"who else can i give cake?" and then he finally sat down and had his piece of cake.

Thanks for the cool ninja Ricky!!!

Cool hot rod trucks from Uncle DK

He's already shot mom in the head.

An awesome transport truck that holds his cars

David and DK

Brandon had a great birthday. Thank you to everyone who came to celebrate his big 5th birthday party with us!!!! He had a lot of fun and was really excited to see everyone come in the door!!!!

Halloween Pt. 2

Well unfortunately we did'nt get as many pictures of Halloween as we had hoped. That afternoon Brandon wasn't feeling so good but he insisted on going trick-or-treating. So we did the trick-or-treat on mainstreet and then hit up just a few families houses before we had to get home.Even though it did'nt last long both the kids still had a lot of fun and got a lot of yummy candy.

Our little princess and our heroic firefighter Our first stop is always Gooma and Goompa's house. While we were there we got to see alot of our cousins as they were coming in to get their treats.
Our jack-o-lanterns. I don't plan on doing the spiderweb again anytime soon......

Illuminating the entryway to our porch.

Even though it was a pain, it still looked neat all lit up.

This does'nt really have much to do with Halloween, we thought some of you might like to see what our puppy looks like. We got Daisy back in August and she took right to the kids. She's not the sharpest crayon in the box but the kids absolutely love her and she is becoming our little watchdog.

Gearing up for Halloween

So here is one of two posts for halloween. This year I thought it would be fun to pick a few gourds from a little patch that is down the road from our house and paint them. The kids, especially Brandon had fun with them. Soon there will be costume and pumpkin carving pictures to add to these few. HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!!



I know this one was already posted but it had to go with the Halloween grouping. We now have two pumpkins that are waiting to be carved that are sitting in the yard with the scarecrows!

One afternoon we went and picked a few wild cattails on the outskirts of town and I thought they would look nice as part of an Autumn bouquet. Paired with a few ddried "weeds" from the yard and some old silk flowers our kitchen table looks a little more festive.

This is our little gourd family after we were all done. Brandon painted the most and you can make out a face on a few of his masterpieces!

Our little artists!

Tyler really had fun but it was close to bedtime and she was tired , so she only painted one but she admires it all the time.

Brandon painted 5 and kept wanting to paint more and more. He is a great artist and loves our little projects we do for "learning time".

So content on making her little "punkin", she calls it.