He's FIVE!!

I can't believe our Josh celebrated his fifth birthday this weekend.  We decided to have a friend party and invite his pre-K class and have it at the local gym.  It was a great time!  I know our little guy had a great time with his friends and brothers. 

Friends

At the riverwalk with good friends!  It was a fun night, filled with yummy food, playing at the park, chasing geese (and getting hissed at), throwing rocks, laughing, running, and just having a wonderful time!  We are blessed to have such great friends!

Bunny ears?

Yep, bunny ears!  Jackson learned how to tie his shoes this week!!  He's doing the bunny ears and it doing a great job!  I'm just thrilled he's not in third grade!  :) 

Jackson has really been working hard at doing well in school and this week he got his name on the Character Counts door for responsibility!!  We are so proud of him!!  He also has mentioned several times that he's proud of himself!!

Way to go, Jackson!!!

Cabinets, cabinets!

We've only lived in this house for a year and a half, so projects and updates are still going on.  This house is perfect for us, but cosmetically needed some work.  The biggest thing that I wanted to change were cabinets (they're all oak!) and the trim.  I want white trim throughout, which will not be easy to change.  The cabinets have been our project since January.  We have done the kitchen, the downstairs bathroom, and now our master bathroom is a soothing grey color.  I love it!  Our kitchen was less than $100 to update!  Two panels of beadboard for the island, one gallon of paint, and some sanding supplies, that's all I needed for this project!  I really love the way it looks!!  (And I'm pretty proud of my work, since this was my project and my hubby did very little!) 

The island, with beadboard on the side--all the other cabinets are still the orangey oak color. 

The finished kitchen!  Love how the white cabinets make the granite countertops and appliances stand out!

The bathroom cabinet door, before we painted.  This orange oak color is everywhere in our house.  (hopefully not for too much longer!)

I painted the bathroom vanity a dark gray color that I absolutely love!! 

Service Project

Our church participated in a wonderful service project this morning, and J-man and I were so glad to be a part of it!  We packed 1,100 boxes of food that will be passed out to hungry people in need!  It was wonderful to share this experience with our oldest, and I think he really enjoyed helping and being a part of it all.  (I took these pictures with my phone, so they are not the best quality, but it gives a good idea of what our morning was like!)

Getting ready to add the oatmeal to the food boxes

That was our station---we were the oatmeal table!  :)

After helping with the oatmeal for a while, we decided to help pack the boxes.  Jackson was so proud of his boxes!!

Lots and lots of empty boxes, jsut waiting to be filled!

A finished box that we are about to load up on the food truck!  Love that smile!!

An update

Well, it's been a while since my last post.  OOPS!  Life has been quite busy this last month or so.  Let's just do some highlights!

• Boys have been super cute! 
• I turned another year older
• I started a new adventure by becoming a consultant for Thirty-One
• We realized we have way too much debt, hence the 31 work
• We are painting our kitchen cabinets white
• Work has been going okay
• Valentine's Day was cute, we got little gifts for the boys and shared some fun gifts with each other
• We realized that our church is awesome and we love it!

I'm sure there's been much more, but those are some of the highlights.  I hope to get back to more regular posts with pictures, once I feel like things have settled down and we're into some kind of a good routine! 

Q and A with the boys

I recently asked our boys some questions...

How old is mommy?
Jackson--32
Joshua--29
Jonathan--48

How old is daddy?
Jackson--36
Joshua--91
Jonathan--38

What is mommy's job?
Jackson--Teacher
Joshua--to take care of us (!!!)
Jonathan--homework

What is mommy's favorite food?
Jackson--eggs
Joshua--cookies and cream ice cream
Jonathan--eggs

What is daddy's favorite food?
Jackson--bacon
Joshua--eggs and bacon
Jonathan--cheese

My mommy likes to...
Jackson--teach
Joshua--teach
Jonathan--homework

My daddy likes to...
Jackson--work
Joshua--play
Jonathan--eat a cheese sandwich

Their answers made me smile!

Goodbye 2011, Hello 2012

Our family had a lot of fun ushering in 2012 and saying good-bye to 2011.  I saw several different ways to countdown the hours until midnight online, but my favorite was to put an activity in each balloon and then pop them to reveal the fun thing for that hour.  I made balloons that would take us from 9am until the boys' special late bedtime at 10pm.  Jackson really wanted to stay up till midnight, but we didn't think he was quite ready for that yet.....maybe next year!

Joshua was so excited to pop the first balloon

Pop!  The first activity was...

painting with shaving cream!  I added drops of food coloring to add to the fun!

  We took a break to go out for lunch and then it was back home for more family fun. 

The 2pm activity was playing games.  Jackson chose Chutes and Ladders.  (The little boys were sleeping.)

At 4pm we were reading books by the fireplace---first time we had it on all season

This was probably the highlight of the night---a sock snowball fight!  It was kids against parents and it was so much fun!! 

So much fun!!  They wanted to grab as many socks as they could and then throw them all at once, saying "AVALANCHE!!"

After watching Cars 2, it was time to put on party hats and celebrate the new year!  They each picked out their own hat at Party City. 

My goofball, handsome hubby!

Sparklers were so much fun!!

Love that face! 

Our littlest! 

Happy New Year, boys!!  Love you to the moon and back!

All of our activities.  It was a very fun day!! 

Happy New Year!  Have a blessed 2012!

Low-key Christmas

Earlier in December we had read an article that convicted us both to do things differently this Christmas.  The article talked about how much emphasis was being put on material things and how the focus had really shifted away from Jesus' birth and the real meaning and celebration of Christmas.  This year, we did not put out our Elf on a shelf--that has become a toy for the boys to play with.  We did not set out cookies for Santa, we did not label any gifts from Santa.  We talked more about Jesus' birth than we had any other year.  We also went very low-key on gifts.  In the past, we would charge gifts on credit cards and end up with huge bills the following months.  This year, we took what the article said and toned it all down!  For each of the boys, we bought "Something you want, something you need, something you wear, and something you read."  They each got a game (want) (Operation for Jonathan, Sorry for Joshua, and a model helicopter for Jackson).  They all got new toothbrushes (need) in their stockings.  On Christmas Eve, they all got new pajamas (wear) and then Christmas morning, they each got new books!  It was wonderful!!  And we have no credit card bill to dread in January!  I love this new way of taking the focus off gifts! 

He was SO excited to get Sorry

J3 was so happy to have two gifts that were for him

Jackson couldn't wait to start building his model

We are so blessed, not because of any material gift we have, but because we have Jesus!  That's the biggest blessing of all!!  Thank you, Jesus, for being born and coming to save us!

Christmas Eve

We have the tradition of opening stockings on Christmas Eve. We came back from church and after seeing the lights around our neighborhood, opened our stockings.

Not a great picture, but it shows just a small part of the lights of this house in our neighborhood

Stockings hung by the chimney with care...

Jackson

Jonathan

Joshua

This was the best shot I got on Christmas Eve

When can I see what's inside?

If I smile cute, can I dig in??

I'm grumpy and don't want my picture taken!

Daddy gets a stocking, too!

Our three little hams!

Love that chocolate coins make him happy!