Thanksgiving week SNOW!!

Reagan's first time in the snow-she doesn't remember anything before.  She loved the sledding the most!

Our backyard scenery.

Pretty, isn't it!

La Nina is coming through as predicted.  This is the earliest we have ever had snow in the 3+ years we have lived here.  I must admit, I'm not loving being snowed in-lots to do and no way to get out and do it!  The kids are enjoying it though, which is a pretty fair consolation prize.

One of my favorite things about making hats.....



A customer appreciation pic. sent to me on my etsy site with baby wearing "the Santa Hat inspired Santa Hat."  What a cutie!



This pic. was sent to me on my etsy site as an appreciation photo, and I just LOVE it!  What a compliment that she used my hat in such a creative way, and was nice enough to share it with me.



It is SO great to know that the hats I take such time and care to make end up taking part in some memorable moments in other people's lives!

Some Funny Things

August was very happy to come home from school with this!  He won it in a raffle related to the walk-a-thon, so thanks again everyone for supporting the boys and their school:-)))

Lastnight we were at Tae-kwon-do watching August-he won a $150 gift card there-see it in the pic. above.  Anyway, I'll post pics. of that at a later date when he has a uniform and I am able to get some photos of him.  So, we were watching August, and Reagan had asked for an altoid mint, which I gave her.  She had it for a couple minutes and suddenly she turns to Alyssa and I and says, "look guys".  I look down to see the altoid hanging half-way out of her nose.  She thought it was funny to stuff the thing into her nostril.  It was actually halarious, but I tried not to laugh and told her not to do that. She quickly pulled it out, but not before other parents saw her.  She is a complete crack-up.
Another case in point: This morning Alyssa turns to Reagan and says in a frustrated tone, "no thank you, sir!" I then said, "actually, she is a mam."  Reagan looks at me and says, "NO, I not a man, I a GIRL!"

LOL. 

Halloween 2010

Two flying horses.

The whole gang.  Ryan was actually just on his way to an air soft war, but he looked dressed up to me, and I'll bet you wouldn't even realize he wasn't in costume otherwise.  Two flying horses, one ninja with flames, one skeleton, and a partridge in a pear tree!

Tra-la-la...getting candy in the rain!

Carving pumpkins in the kitchen.

Halloween night-heading out.

Being silly.

Happy 15th Birthday to Ryan

Chocolate Cheesecake homemade by me with love to Ryan for his birthday!  I am SOOO happy to have him here with us-finally!  He is a great boy and it is a blessing to have my whole family under one roof.  Happy Birthday, Ryan!  I can't believe how old you are getting:-)

Pumpkin Patch 2010

These cows were here to greet us at the parking lot.  There were a lot of them and they were moo-ing and making me nervous.  I don't know cow behavior but all I could think of was how Reagan was wearing a red hat and that they could charge or something!  We didn't visit with the cows for long.

The hayride out to the pumpkin patch.  We didn't catch the horse-drawn trailor this year-darn!

Reagan didn't love the pumpkin patch as much as I thought she would.  She didn't like trying to step over the vines.  I remember when Alyssa felt that way, and now it is no problem for her!  The pumpkin harvest this year was poor due to weather, but we were more after the adventure anyway!  We picked one large pumpkin from the patch, and one goard for Reagan, which she called "her pumpkin", and we purchased the rest of our pumpkins from our local IGA-we like supporting local business:-)

I liked this chair with the pumpkins around, and thought it make make for a good photo.  I think I take after my Dad in this way!

Repeat caption above.....isn't this a cool pumpkin launcher!  I thought this might make a good photo as well.

We love our down-home farm pumpkin patches, found in Oregon and Washington.  Our family got in on this traditional pumpkin shoot/launch. Matthew got to select the pumpkin, and Mike was the "big guy" anchor in the set up, and he was the guy who launched it!  He did a great job, and sent the thing flying....the remains were fed to the pigs by the kids.  Our kids loved that part!  Mike's childhood friend from Fresno was at the patch as well-our second year running into him there (Mike Williams), who you can see in the above photo (far right).  We got to catch up with him and his parents, who were visiting from Fresno.  Small world!

Ready to launch!

Pigs like pumpkin!

What visit to the pumpkin patch is complete without a trip through the hay maze??

Also not complete without a ride on the ponies!

And the best part of all....I wasn't sure if we would make it to the pumpkin patch this year in between our busy schedules and weather being right, but we made it and finished up right before the rain really let loose!  Yeah!

A video clip from ballet

Observation Day in Ballet

Sitting right next to her primary teacher, Miss Kelsey

Taking center

Just getting started.

I need to learn the names of the ballet positions, but here she is doing one of them across the floor.

Another ballet move done across the bar.

Add caption

Time for Tap drills

Warm up stretches.

To Say that I enjoyed watching Alyssa at ballet is an understatement, as any of you who know me well would know!  All girly and sweet....it was great:-)) Observation day happens once at the end of each session.  Today was the end of her first nine week session.  For this day, the girls get "free dress" and the parents get to stay.  I knew right away that this would be a good reason for me to try and make a new tutu, as I am working on perfecting them so I can add them to my shop someday.  I designed her tutu in pink and brown to coordinate with her standard uniform for the academy.  We coordinated some long brown socks with pom poms, and I finished off her look by tying some brown tulle around her hair bun cover to match the tutu.  She got loads of compliments on it and looked great:-)  Performance-wise, I thought she did an excellent job.  She has great posture and really follows direction well.  She is a graceful ballerina and I can't wait to hopefully see her in a recital someday!