What's Happening In Our Neck Of The Woods

So after the snow finally stopped for a bit, we decided to go and play! Sawyer was sleeping and so I actually got to go out and enjoy it with Brad and the other kids! Jarrin and Keeley got a snowball maker from their Nana and Papa Brown! It was so fast and easy for them to make snowballs. Brad and I played baseball with the snowballs and a shovel! It was great fun!
Keeley fell backwards trying to climb up the hill to go down the sledding spot that Brad and I built for them! We were laughing so hard. The kids were so tired and Jarrin had already gone inside by now! They both had a great snowball fight and they had been sliding down the smaller hill for a while!
We built the first one higher up our driveway and since we had some rain, it melted the snow on our driveway so Brad and I built a path from the hill across the driveway so they could go farther! I messed up on the recording so the shots of Jarrin weren't good at all. I will have to get some of him the next time!! To go down the hill Brad made them say "drop in" like we do on the Mountain!! We really need to go snowboarding! It's been a few years!! :(



Keeley was so very tired in the next video, that will explain the weird babbling! She really can talk normal :) :)



We now have a TON more snow on the way, so there will be plenty of play time!! Hope everyone else is enjoying the snow where they are (If you get any) !!

This was Jarrin trying to step on top of the snow to get to the middle of the yard. Right after I took the picture he went down to almost the bottom of the snow and I could barely see him it was so deep! We now have rain that has packed down the snow so it is only a few feet high now!

We went out to my Mom's assisted living home to celebrate Christmas Eve. It was so much fun to have all of the family together! Carisa, Tim,Cobin and Tekara came up from Rexburg along with Sariah, and Naomi, Dan and EmmaLynn came up from Florida and Gailyn, Nick and Aveindha up from Pullman. I don't know how many more Christmases we will get to be with our Mom so it was very special to be all together with her! Jarrin and Corbin had a blast playing together! Jarrin is so good with kids! He would just let Corbin grab him and pull him down over and over and over! It was so cute to watch!!
I just love the look on their faces! Jarrin's making the face and it looks like Corbin is trying to copy him! It is so cute!
I just thought this was an adorable picture of Tekara and Corbin.
I just love the look on Aviendha's face! She has such a great scowl or something going on! I thought Gailyn would get a kick out of this picture!! Tekara must have said or done something she either didn't like or understand! Who knows but it is a cute face!
Here is another one! She is so stinckin' cute! I love the faces that little kids make! I get such a kick out of it!

It was a great night though we ended up leaving in a hurry because there was a serious snow storm and Brad was really worried because all along the freeway, and well, all of the roads, there were cars and trucks off the road and in accidents. So we ended up taking the back road with less people and getting home a lot later than normal. It was a blessing to get home safely!
After we got home there was a lot of excitement and anticipation to open up Christmas Eve gifts.
Every Christmas Eve the kids get to open and wear their new PJ's that I make for them and they also get a new ornament to put on the tree. It was fun watching Sawyer ! He liked to eat the paper, bags and boxes! They all had so much fun opening presents at our house on Christmas and at Nana and Papa's where we had our delicious Christmas Dinner.
YES!! I actually did it! My first cinnamon rolls turned out more edible than I thought they would! I made Apple cinnamon Rolls and with cream cheese frosting and some with an Agave glaze. It is a new tradition I wanted to start and I am so excited to make more!!
Can you see how much fun it is to do anything with our Sawyer in your arms? He has become our " diver". If he sees something he wants to grab, he makes a mad dive for it with all his body pushing off of you to get it! There have been a few times when he was hanging upside down with me holding onto his feet and calves after a dive!! Going to the cupboards are great fun!Silly boy!
These are the monster ice sickles outside my in laws top floor. They actually almost hit the ground! Jarrin looks so tiny in front of them!
Jarrin, Keeley and Sawyer got some money from their "Neema" ( Great Grandma) and it was burning a hole in their pockets so I took them to Michael's crafts and they have a great $1 section to choose out of and they both got a few things. Of course Sawyer had a great time with bouncy balls that they both got! It looked so funny when he was trying to suck on them and shove them into his mouth! He is such a cutie and is such a joy to have! It is so fun seeing more and more of his personality come out!
I love Christmas time! I love the celebration of our Savior's Birth, being around family and watching the joy on my Children's faces in the morning when they see the presents and the stockings with toys and gifts in them! I just love it all and I hope your Christmas was a great one this year too!!

Okay so this was the first year any of my kids would go up to Santa willingly! Sawyer was okay at first and then he talked to him and then he got scared!! It is hilarious! Our Deacons were in charge of the party so it wasn't really Christmasy really. They ordered 50 pizzas and has bread sticks , salad and soda, but Santa did show up !!

This is Keeley's first time to sit on Santa's lap! It only took 4 years!

This was Jarrin's second time!
Jarrin even got cozy!!
Sawyer was okay. He grabbed his beard right away! Like I said though, as soon as he started talking it was over! Hahaha!!
Daddy rescued him quickly! He did get a candy cane though! ( of course he will never get to eat it!It did keep him on Santa for a few seconds longer!
Oh the fun of it all! Merry Christmas again! I though my last post was it until after Christmas but I remembered I had these!

Well, to let everyone know, Keeley's tongue is doing well :) As Joel asked, she wasn't dared.Thankfully Jarrin is still too young for that, otherwise we'd really be in trouble :) Our sweet Keeley assumed it would be okay since she has licked the ice on our chain before ( when it was at least 30 degrees out) and nothing had happened, apparently being 4, she didn't realize that a -4 degree temp makes a difference in ice licking outside! Hehehe. We had told her last year and this year what could happen, but as most parents know, in one ear and out the other happens extremely fast for kids:) Other than that, we got plowed out and now it is snowing again. They said a possible 2 feet of snow and some major winds, so we are preparing in case of an power outage. In Idaho though, the weather changes quickly from what we get told, so it may be like our storm 2 weeks ago that only dumped 6 inches or so.
On another note, I have been a sewing maniac these last 2 weeks trying to get Christmas Presents done. So far I have 2 blankets, 2 jammies, 2 skirts, 3 sets of mittens, hats and gloves, 2 aprons, jewelery galore for my Mother in law and Keeley and some boy hemp ones for Jarrin and I still have quite a bit left so it's been fun staying up till 1 am every night to finish, Brad is a big help too!! I am so glad it's getting done! I had to take a break because I stretched this morning and I pulled a muscle! I was stuck in my stretch position till I went running for Brad to help massage it out! I have spent too many hunched over nights cutting and sewing ,he says :( , he banned me from it today and possibly tomorrow depending on my condition upon waking. So needless to say I stayed home from church because I can't lift my hand up over my head and its hard for Brad to shower me and curl my hair(hahaha) with three kids around :) So after icepackin' and massage all day, I think ...I hope I'll be ready to sew tomorrow. I just want to finish so I can make some yummy apple cinnamon rolls Christmas Eve for Christmas morning. Plus all the wrapping!! Oh it is so fun! It will be nice to just sit back and relax and enjoy the celebration of our Savior's Birth!! Sorry there are no Christmas cards this year, I was too lazy... next year I am hoping to be better! I am so happy to be able to see all my family in a couple of days!! I hope this storm goes before everyone has to travel!! I hope everyone has a Very Merry Christmas this year and thank you for reading my ramblings!! By the way this is a really cute story about the symbols of Christmas! I think it is perfect for little kids to help them to start understanding all the different meaning behind things!! I hope you enjoy!! Again ....MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

So One of our favorite Christmas movies is The Christmas Story! There is a scene in it that always makes me laugh so hard and makes me feel sorry for the kid also. You know....the one where the kid sticks his tongue to the metal pole and it sticks :o hahaha..................Well, Keeley pulled that today. It will really make me look at that scene and laugh even harder, the poor girl. She stuck her tongue to it and started screaming so Brad told her to stay there and he'll be right back to get it off. Did she wait? NO, she decided in her major freak out screaming moment to just rip it off! SO she ended up coming into the house with a bloody tongue and a chunk missing. Oh yeah! Needles to say she doesn't want to eat anything with salt or pepper or any other spice that burns wounds. What a fun filled day! Our buddy finally got here and we are kind of plowed out, at least enough to quad run plow us the rest of the way out!!

Okay...I LOVE ALL THE SNOW!!! Brad and my F-I-L, Allen, were out side this morning shoveling for about 20 min just to get to the car!! They measured almost 2 feet! It snowed about a foot and a half last night and it is so beautiful out there!! I am so thankful that we are getting snow. That way we won't have such a drought this spring and summer! It's even sweeter that my SUV is almost completely covered! I'll have to put some pictures on too! When Brad let our dog Plum out, she had to go pee soooo bad that she booked it out the door and halted to a stop at the end of the porch, looked around, and then looked back at Brad and gave him a look as if to say"you want me to go pee where?" Brad then told her to go and she dove into the snow and disappeared! She's black so all you could see when she pranced up like a deer were her ears and tail! Poor girl had to bounce in a circle for a while just so she could squat enough to not be sitting in snow to go!! Hahaha.

I think school will be closed today. It is North Idaho so it would take a lot of snow to close our schools! They figure if you've lived here for a winter then you should have it figured out by now ;) ! Ohhhh....I am so happy for the snow! You probably think I'm crazy, but if it weren't in the negative degrees we'd all be out there! Plus we have a monster Mountain Lion that moved down with the deer , so since we saw monster paw marks we have to be a little cautious, you know, carry a gun outside when we let the dog out and such. They like dogs around these parts. Sad I know, but it's likely nothing will happen, but once in a while it does, so we just take a lot of precautions. So that is our joyous winter fun in North Idaho!!

I am wondering who else is having a monster Snow Storm going on! What does is look like where you are? You people in warm place.....keep it to yourself ;) just kidding, you can share so we can dream of a warm place while we are out and about in the freezing temps!!

Okay, so I had to stop because my babe woke up and so did the kids, but I just wanted to finish my post and go finish cooking my sweet potato. pumpkin pancakes...mmmmmm, they are my kids' favorite pankcakes now! So school I found out is offically closed and so are most of the businesses! So we are going to enjoy a day at home. The kids playing at Nana's , Brad cleaning, and me....well I have a ton of sewing and present making to do, then I think we'll watch Horton Hears a Who again and drink some hot chocolate! Hope everyone else enjoys this day!!


So this was suppose to be our snow storm the first time....
This is our real snow storm! Crazy!!

Plum with her curious look! It's too dark, I took this early this morning, it was cold and windy so I didn't have the flash on and I really didn't care because I was in my jammies still..brrrrrr. The snow is already past our porch!

This is my car!! This morning You can't hardly see any of the red now! That was only 2 hours ago!
This is our BBQ out back!! Haha. This was also around 7 am! So much snow! Love it!! I just hope We can all get to Mom's by Christmas Eve!

I've been tagged to display some Christmas favorites (thanks Gailyn)so here you go....

5 Favorite Christmas songs:(singers, groups)

1) Sarah Mclachlan(My absolute favorite!!!If you haven't heard her's you have
got to listen NOW : ) )
2) Frank Sinatra
3) Alvin and the Chipmunks
4) Brian Setzer
5)Muppets 12 days of Christmas


5 Favorite Christmas Movies:

1) Christmas Story
2) Prancer
3) Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer
4) Christmas Vacation
5) Scrooged


5 Favorite Christmas Treats:

1) Pumpkin Pie
2) Apple Red Hot Pie
3) Cookies
4) Cheesecake
5) Truffles



5 Favorite Christmas Memories :A lot are the same as Gailyn's

1) When my parents told us to get to bed one night and Gailyn and I snuck up the stairs and watched my parents come in from the garage with the bags of Christmas presents ( That was when we definitely new that there was no Santa)

2)When Gailyn and I would go into my parents closet and gently unwrap our presents and re wrap them so we would know what we were getting! There was no surprise!!

3)Before my Mom's side abandoned each other, we would go have Christmas dinner at Grandpa Tokarz's and before we could get desert, our parents would tell us that we had to run around the house 5, 6 (or whatever number came out) times so we could make room for it .

4).I can't remember if it was Christmas or Thanksgiving, but us kids were ready for some pie but the adults still were chatting away so my cousin Damen and I took a couple of pies, whip cream and spoons downstairs and we all ate pie!

5) When Brad and I had our first Christmas together and he hid my last present and I had to search for it. He hid it too well and he ended up pulling it out for me! It was a new snowboard!!!

Okay!! So I am so excited that I actually did this! I had said to Brad many many times that I was saving the baby food jars that I bought so that I could fill them with my own homemade food and guess what......I never did until NOW!!! It was so nice, the kiddos watched Baby Einstein while I was blending things together!! I bought organic veggies like butternut squash, yams,sweet potatoes, zucchini, yellow squash, peas, green beans, and some bananas. I had some picked fruit that I had like blueberries and apples. As you can see my babies eat a lot of veggies! I always start them on veggies for the first 2 months and then start adding in fruit, that way they don't just eat the fruit ones! It has worked beautifully! They still love their veggies!

I only have a smoothie blender, but it worked just perfect for Sawyers veggie smoothies!! This was the sweet potato batch! Mmmmmmmm, much better homemade I do admit.

So in the end I had jars of peas, green beans, squash, bananas, sweet potatoes, and mixes of bananas and blueberries, squash, sweet potato and yams, sweet potatoes, zucchini and yellow squash and I will get to do the apples another day! I ran out of jars! Good thing apples last a while outside in our freezing cold temps!! :)
So I now have 46 jars of baby food plus the other 8 in the freezer that will be transferred to a freezer safe bag asap! Yay!!! Brad came home and his jaw dropped, it was the best reaction! He said" I can't believe you actually did it!! Nice!" It felt good to do since it was 4 years ago that I had first planned to do this for Jarrin!!
I saved so much money too,even though it was organic, and it wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it would be!! I am ready for another round in a month ! :)

My Dad called me to show me this site and I know most people have heard about the light show as I had, but I haven't gotten to see it until now!! We were all glued to the monitor!! It is wow great!!!This guy is good!





This one starts slow, but it is my favorite!!

Amazing Grace Techno - Computer Controlled Christmas Lights from Richard Holdman on Vimeo.

So Jarrin always tells me how much fun school is and I always make a big deal about how fun it is because let's face it, he won't be coming home from school forever saying "I loved school! We did so many fun things today!" So as I was saying I don't remember my Kindergarten being so fun, Jarrin turns to me and says..

"Hey Mom. maybe you should shrink to 5 like me and get little again so you can go to Dalton Elementary and see how fun it is! You can go to centers like me and have snacks! You really should!"

Oh how I wish I could! No worrying about what bills to pay, fixing dinner..blah blah blah...etc....You know what I mean? I do have to say that there are pros and cons to it all! I just love the things that my children say!! Some of the comments and things that come out of their mouth just make me squeeze them so hard and tell them how much I love having them in our Family!! What a blessing to have such sweet spirits in my home!!

So Thanksgiving (the family dinner time) was great!! It was really hectic before that!! I was sooo glad that Sariah could come and visit!! Jarrin and Keeley adore her!!They always ask when she is coming home!! It was so cute, when Sariah was in the kitchen Jarrin stood in front of her and just giggled and smiled at her so she picked him up and he cuddled her for at least 5 minutes!! That is unusual unless it's Mom or Dad! They really do love you Sariah!!

We got to spend the Afternoon with my Dad, Allen and Rita(In-Laws), Grandma Brown and Sariah. So it was kind of small but nice!!

Brad doesn't like this picture, so I told him instead of smirks and goofy,cheesy smiles, give me some good ones and you will like the pictures :) hehe ! Brad was our Turkey carver!!
We always get a Turkey leg picture for our children's First Thanksgiving! He really dug into it!! He got part of the crunchy skin and started sucking on it! Haha! He threw a fit when we took it away! The boy loves his food!! I had to hold him while I ate and he started fussing so in mid ah-ah-ah, I shoved in some mashed potatoes and gravy and he stopped the ah-ing and went straight to the mmmm, ammmm, ammmm while he ate so that was the pattern for a few bites, ah-ah-ah...mmmm, ammm,ammm! It was so cute and funny! I know what his favorite part of the meal was!!
Sariah! I love you!! Don't kill me for posting this!! She was indulging in one of our favorite pies that we HAVE to make everytime she's here! Peanut butter cup pie!! It is soooo good!!

Here is the Famous pie! :) It's a really easy recipe if any one wants it!!

This was the yummy pie Grandma Brown made! It too is one that I have never heard of until I met her!! It's Apple pie with red hots melted in it!! Sooo good!!!!

I hope everyone else had a great Thanksgiving!! I am excited to see everyone for Christmas!!

So on Saturday Jarrin got to go to his first Birthday party( a Pirate one) without Keeley! All the kids were to dress up in their best pirate wear and they even got names, Jarrin was Scurveylegs-MaGee!! Well Jarrin was excited but Keeley was in tears. The days of both getting to do everything together is now coming to an end as school friends only invite Jarrin to things now. It's a tough thing for Keeley and she will eventually get over it, but boy oh boy was it a traumatic thing for her.....so I told her that while he was at his boy party she could have a ballerina party with me and we can bake pumpkin pie together and dance. That seemed to solve it!! It was fun and interesting! I say interesting because we don't own a ballerina outfit so I had to get creative!! Heehee...

Sawyer let Jarrin and Keeley dress him in Jarrin's pirate attire! He looked so stinkin' cute with his pirate hat, jewelery, hook and sword!!

This is Keeley dressed up in the pirate gear also! It made it even funnier because of her ballerina set up( tights, pink shirt, Hawaiian bathing suit and her tutu from her dress up box) I really meant that I had to get creative!
She was trying so hard to dance so gracefully, but my poor daughter got my coordination skills that left her on the floor A LOT! She still had fun though.
We then made our yummy pumpkin pie! We can't do dairy so we substitute the evaporated milk with canned coconut milk. It tastes soooo good!! I had to cook it for 35 minutes longer and take it out when it still looked runny because with the coconut milk the pie firms up after it cools down all the way, but it is so yummy if anybody wants to try it!! Keep it in the fridge to cool down and store.

Keeley gave quite the cute pose! All in all it was good Mother-Daughter time!

So need I say more!?! When they started to tape their mouths shut there was no complaining on my part. It was a house of silence. I tried to see if they could make it a game to see who could keep it on the longest...it didn't work.
Sawyer was quiet too because he had some tape to suck on! It grossed me out to think of what chemicals he was sucking off of the back of the tape so he wasn't quiet for long because he immediately protested me taking it away from him!! Oh well!