Amazing Christmas Tree!

The huge Christmas tree in the middle of Silver Dollar City had an amazing light show at night. Here is a quick clip of how it lit up in so many ways and to the music! (Sorry-I am learning how to do videos and this was supposed to be at the end of the last post so look at it first!)

Christmas!

So, this is very late but I am proud of myself to accomplish a post before a month has passed! We mostly enjoyed being able to spend time with family and friends and the time seemed to fly by! We began the break by visiting my family and exchanging gifts (thanks for spoiling us as usual!) and then we went to Brian's parent's house in Hempstead and began the 12 hour trek to Branson, Missouri. How do you accomplish this with a 12 month old? Thank goodness for technology-Madison loved watching movies and Veggie Tales on the trip.

We arrived late on the night of the 23rd and Madison was so excited to get there she didn't want to go back to sleep. We all had our own way of dealing with the lack of sleep the next day and Brian's approach was very humorous!

One of the best parts about vacation with family for a mom= A BREAK! I was very lucky that Uncle Brent immediately began helping and became Madison's favorite very quickly.

Brittani also helped out tons-I loved this picture of the two working away on their computers!

Here we are Christmas morning opening up presents and enjoying family time! We had lots of fun and the girls got to go see National Treasure 2-which was very good!

Madison came down with RSV and required extra work for some of the trip. Then I became sick and passed something to Brittani and then to Brian. It was lucky that we had the extra time to recooperate-so even though we were in a new, exciting town- some of the time was spent just laying around.

Don't worry-we weren't too sick! We still enjoyed a lot of the attractions. I loved the shows and wished we could have stayed for a couple weeks and saw them all. The first one we went to was called Amazing Pets and it was really amazing what these animals could do-Madison loved watching their tricks!

We also went to the Jim Stafford Show and Brian and the boys enjoyed "57 Heaven" which had an amazing collection of classic cars. The most amazing was the Dolly Parton Dixie Stampede-but unfortunately no cameras were allowed. As far as talent goes, I was amazed at the show "Six" which had six brothers who sang acapella and were able to make the sounds of the instruments for their songs with their voices! They were very entertaining.

Our last day there, Hal and Jolynne watched Madison while we went to Silver Dollar City which was similar to an amusement park with shows and shops galore! Unfortunately a lot of the roller coasters were closed because it was too cold but we still enjoyed ourselves. I loved this Christmas tree!

After dark there was a parade that went through the little streets. The little city was covered in christmas lights and it was so amazing!

All in all, we had an amazing time and wished that all of our family could have been there. We are so greatful to The Black's for making such an amazing vacation possible. We mostly enjoyed the opportunity to reflect on the Savior's birth and the many blessings that have been bestowed upon our family.

Happy Anniversary!

Well, it has been way too long! A lot has happened in the last month and my goal is to blog an event every day for the next couple of days. Dec. 17th Brian and I celebrated our 2 year anniversary. It was a lot of fun to spend time with him alone (thanks to Jamie Smith!) and we had a blast! I would give more details, but Brian wanted this post to be short and sweet and he revoked my bragging rights! Anyways, I am very lucky to be married to such an amazing person and I look forward to many more anniversaries in the future!

Speaking of the future: tomorrow I'll be posting Christmas!

Madison's Birthday. . .and Brian had one too!

The highlight of the month so far has definitely been Madison's 1st birthday party. We held it at our home on Monday the 10th and combined it with playgroup. Aunt Brittani came over early that morning and set up a lot of the decorations!

Brian brought some butcher paper home from school for the kids to draw on. It was a big hit until we realized most of the kids were eating the crayons!

Linsay made another impressive masterpiece! The flower cake matched her decorations perfectly and everyone loved it! (Linsay I think you may have some business coming your way!)

I love the next few pictures demonstrating her stages of emotion during the present opening portion of the party. Here she is very excited and clapping at the sight of all the presents!

Realizing all the kids swarming to help with the process, she soon became very possessive! I can't believe how evil she looks here.

Like most children, her attention span does not last very long and soon she was tired of opening presents. She must be crazy-presents are the best!

Here are a few pictures of all the guests:

After lots of fun with all the kids and opening presents, Madison's favorite part arrived: Cake and ice cream. At first she had to scope it out and make sure this was really happening-I never let her eat a whole tray of sweets!

As soon as the realization sunk in, she was in heaven!

And the best part: Grandma came and played with me for four days!

And the day before we celebrated Brian's 26th birthday! Now just because his portion of the post is only two pictures doesn't mean that we weren't super excited but Brian hates having the spotlight and a dinner was all that I was allowed to do. Regardless, we had a lot of fun and enjoyed having a lot of our family there and awesome friends and neighbors-Marcie and Jamis! (We miss you tons!)

Brian enjoyed helping Madison practice for the big party except we let her go to town on fruit salad instead of sweets!

Family Pictures!

We FINALLY got in to do family pictures this weekend. They turned out pretty good. Here was one of the pictures we liked.

We ended up choosing this one!

And that was about all Madison was in the mood for. This was the closest thing to a smile we could get, so we'll be going back in a week or two for her one year pictures.

Thanksgiving!

I figured I should probably go ahead and post our Thanksgiving vacation before Christmas arrives, so here is a quick recap of our trip to the Ranch!

Madison and I had some bonding time on the trip down. It was good practice for our 13 hour drive we'll be making for Christmas.

The kids were great sports and endured the cold better than I expected. Some of their activities included:

Madison practicing walking (more my idea than hers-it just seemed like more fun than crawling and eating dirt).

Eric and Madison loved the rocking horse Grandma has down at the ranch. (I think Eric preferred the four wheelers though!)

We bundled them up in a wagon and they loved the bumpy ride. Both were constantly trying to dance as well as jump out!

We kept pretty busy keeping them entertained while the men were busy hunting and working on different feeders and cooking the acquired game!

Here Brian demonstrates the precision used in hunting with a bow

His form paid off and I was impressed to learn that he killed an 8 point buck with his bow. He also shot two turkeys and a pig with his rifle.

Here we are cleaning the turkeys. I agreed to help pluck the feathers but that was about as far as my service was extended!

And then we feasted! Harold deep-fried a delicious turkey and we also ate some of the pig that grandpa cooked in a pit underground. It was so tender!

And the best part about Thanksgiving was that it was also Jamie's birthday! It was so much fun driving around the ranch following the scavenger hunt Paul planned with her gifts.

Jolynne brought a yummy cake and Jamie opened all her gifts. She is demonstrating her delight of finding several dollar bills in a box [one of my favorite gifts if anyone feels like being generous :) ]

On a more serious note though, this vacation was so much fun because we truly got to be surrounded by nature and ponder all the wonderful blessings that we have.

And here are two of the greatest blessings in my life. I am so thankful for Brian and the extremely caring and considerate husband he is. I am so grateful for Madison and the blessings as well as patience that I have gained from being a mother. They are so amazing!

And we are so thankful for our FAMILY! We sure did miss seeing my parents and are very thankful for them. The Black's and Smith's are also amazing and it was so much fun making memories with them as well as being uplifted by each of them. I was especially grateful for the devotional that Jamie and Paul gave on changing our lives by pondering the decisions we make. I have been blessed this past week as I have tried to change my choices from just good and better to best and have already noticed a change in my attitude and overall happiness! Thanks also to Jolynne and Hal for making everything possible-you are so very generous to our family and we are so thankful for all you do!

Hope everyone is enjoying this holiday season and may we each remember the Lord's hand in our lives!

Our Little Lady Bug!

This past Saturday was so crazy! We started the day by going to the gun show (I go for the yummy jerky) and looked at all the booths, including jewelry! Jamie and I went to Rachel Bassett's baby shower after that and had a lot of fun, Christine did an awesome job. Then we headed to the Halloween Party at church. There was lots of yummy soup and so many awesome costumes!

Madison and I are posing with our neighbors Chuck and Madi (she is the cutie that I babysit).

Marcie is so awesome with all the kids, she always hauls Madison around for me (not to mention she made the adorable lady bug costume Madison is wearing!) I couldn't believe how Daniel looks like he is the same age or older than Madison-I love big babies!

After the party, we went over to Brittani's to celebrate her birthday. Madison had fun posing in front of the pumpkins.

This is my favorite picture. I just picture her saying "Life is easy when you are young and beautiful!"

And here is the birthday girl! I can't believe that you are 21 now Brittani! We are so excited about her getting into nursing school so she'll be here with us through dental school. After her party, we stopped by the Konkle's pie night which was also a blast. I ate way too much pie but who could pass up having 10 different selections? It was so fun hanging out around the fire and enjoying everyone's company. Overall, a very fun day but I don't think I want to be that busy again for awhile!