I'm SO Excited!

This is such a cool shot of Rylan I just had to share. Ryan throws the ball up the stairs to Emily, Alaina, and Lila and they try to catch it. Rylan sits at the bottom with his daddy and claps and cheers for them. As you can see from the picture, he gets VERY excited.

Happy New Year!

Just wanted to share some pics of our time in Idaho and all our Christmas fun. We had a great time and saw lots of snow on the roads, but we arrived there and then back home safely. Emily and Alaina had a lot of fun spending time with their cousins - especially Ashtin who is closest in age to them. Lila had a ball with Evin, their youngest cousin. Grandpa Far Away dressed up as Santa on Christmas Eve and here are some pictures of the kids with him. Rylan, as you can see, wasn't too impressed with the white bearded man. Now we are back home, all the Christmas stuff is put away and we are ready to start the new year. We are praying God will use us greatly for His glory this year in Cathlamet!

Out with the old, in with the new

Emily is so excited! She lost her first tooth! We were at Grandma and Grandpa's in Idaho when she lost it so the Washington Tooth fairy didn't visit until she was sleeping at home in her bed. Its been loose for awhile and Ryan wanted to pull it out for her but she wouldn't let him touch it. It fell out when she was eating one day and now she has a lovely gap in her bottom teeth.

Take 35

When you have a large family it's very challenging to take a good family picture. Traditionally we always take a family pic at Christmas so we have one to send out with our Christmas letters. This year we took a total of 35 family pictures at different times and in different settings hoping for just one where we were all smiling or at least all looking at the camera. Needless to say the kids are good at their fake smiles and "Cheese"s now. Thought I'd share a couple that just didn't make the cut. This was taken in the evening and Rylan just wasn't his happy self. Lila also looks like she can't believe we would ask her to do such a thing as smile at this time in her life. The next one shows Rylan feeling the same way and Lila going into shock that yes, we are taking ANOTHER picture. This next one you will notice Lila is distracted by the fact that Rylan is holding her cell phone. At least she is smiling. I also look like I am going to fall asleep because we took this shot at about 7:30 a.m. before Emily had to go out to catch the school bus.

Swing Hogs

Just call us the swing hogs. You may be joyfully playing at the park with your little one and see us coming in the distance. That's when you know the fun is over. Might as well just leave. Here is a pic of our kids playing at the park. They take up all the swings! What a bunch of bullies - hogging the swings from all those other little kids! Actually when I took this picture we were the only ones at the playground. There was a dad and his little boy there when we first showed up, but they left pretty quick when they saw us!

Ready, Set, WALK!

Exactly 15 months after the day he was born Rylan started walking. He has been so close for so long and he finally got up the courage to try it and realize yes, he could do it! Now he is ambling all over the house. Ryan and I couldn't help but think he was behind since all three of the girls walked at or before 11 months. We've been told by others that boys are usually slower to accomplish things. Whether that is true or not, its just so amazing to see our little boy walking around!

First Snow

The first winter snow fell this morning. The girls had to go outside and catch some on their tongues as soon as they noticed it out the window. It was pretty fun to watch them running around celebrating God's wonderful creation of SNOW! There wasn't any accumulation on the ground after the little storm, but we are hoping God will send more soon and we will have enough to make a snowman.