Christmas in March

Since we've established that I'm running more than a bit behind, BUT I want to have the memories in the future, let's continue to pretend that his isn't in March but actually December.

Or not!
Christmas this year was magical!  It's really is the most wonderful time of the year, and we have lots of traditions to soak all that up!

 With the addition of the new fireplace we moved where we put the tree.  I really liked it!  We had to cut a hole in our star so that it could fit under our 10ft ceilings!  I think it looks professional:)

 Hands down my FAVORITE thing about this month was decorating the mantle!  Never having one in this house made it so much fun.  I LOVED having the stockings up!  On top of the mantel is the advent calendar of books I made for the kids.  Tons of work, but it was fun.

 This is our normal advent calendar, and we had a lego advent.  Seriously TONS to so each morning.

 And then we would read the book!

 And find our Elf, who was a bit mischievous this year!

 The boys helped Seth with a gingerbread house, that never was eaten!

 I got Seth to put lights up on the high roof this year, totally worth it, well for me at least!

Colin (in the Crestone shirt duh), give us a beautiful concert with his class.

  We had a wicked flu go through the house hitting me first and then the kids, Seth managed to escape this time.  Christine refused to take chances.

 And Santa brought us Rudy.  An 8 week old Wheaten Terrier puppy.  A wonderful addition to our family and an amazing dog!  Still a puppy but getting better each day. 

 I love getting to watch how each of the kids needs, and gives something different to the dog.  Colin and Rudy, whom we call RU RU at times, are the best of buddies, but everyone thinks that.  Except for Seth who knows rightful so that Rudy dislikes him:)

Why yes I do have the cutest dog ever thank you for noticing!

 

I do hope that your family had a magical Christmas as well and are still enjoying your gifts!

Colin is 4!

 I know you know how late this is but let's go with the better late than never approach :0)
My landscape loving guy, had 4 friends over to celebrate his 4th birthday, in grand mowing style. 

My $1 grass table cloth has been used 5 times now, best deal ever!

 Small goodie bags, with a mower guy on them.  naturally.

Mac drove Emerson around all day.  She really liked it!

Giving Alex a ride

  Can you see the little mowers on the cupcakes?  Mad skillz yo.

It was a very low key party with nothing purchased except food.  We brought out the tractors from grandmas and everyone had lots of fun.  I was SO happy the weather cooperated! 
That night all of our family came over and we celebrated one more time.  It was lovely.

Colin at four is amazing!  The most kind hearted boy I know!  He loves his sister and dog immensely, and can be caught being kind to them often.  He loves legos, mower equipment, and forts, in addition to riding his new two wheeler, and scooter. 
He has always been my outside guy and he continues to be so.  I wish he would wear a coat and hat when it's snowing, but I think he will come in when he is cold.  Right?
He is still my snuggler, especially at night, but I kind of like it.  He also is still a great eater, out eating both of his siblings combined most days. 
He can't say the /k/ sound still and so introduced himself as Tolin.  He is experimenting with naughty language and has gotten into trouble because of it. 
Even so, he is a fun spunky kid that makes me laugh, and yell, every day and I don't think it would be possible to love him any more! 

Ugh, Blogger hates me!

Clearly, that last post with nothing in it, was a mistake.  It was a really cool this is what we're up to post.  Boo.  And now after struggling with it for an hour still nothing.  Double boo.  With a new resolve, I hope to be back to blogging soon! 

Quick catch up

 The fall is already upon  us and I haven't posted since summer!  Part of it is we've lost another camera and what fun is a post without pictures?  I've been taking them with my phone which has worked well until I was unable to upload... Ugh, but problem solved and here are my cuties!

Kindergarten John and Preschool Colin on their first day! 

 Oh brothers!

 Sister after a bath, doesn't she look stunning?! 

 Soccer season is upon us and it's Colin's first season.  Though you wouldn't know it watching him play!  This was after his first goal, which was followed by another during that game and 5 more the next game.  Meanwhile John is still dancing....

 Em LOVES the wagon, seriously can't get enough!  You can pull her all day and she wants MO

 Tree climbing fools!!

 After bath silliness!  I adore these children!

 Emerson took a header off the coach and got quite the goose egg and our family's first black eye, it's even more impressive now.  Poor girl!

Prince Colin, well that is what they  will be calling him next week when he is the LHS prince for the Homecoming.  I figured I'd be there anyway...  Such a ham.  He tells everyone how fancy he is...

Okay hopefully more soon!  Already working on our fall bucket list!! Big Loves!

Summer Bucket

There is NO WAY we only have two more days of summer!  It feels like we just got out of school, how can we be going back.  But alas, it's true the lazy days of summer are just about over and the crisp morning air is helping usher in the scheduled school days.  Lots of pictures to come from the first day I send TWO kiddos on Thursday.

As for the summer, clearly we were busy which is why there isn't many posts, so let's play catch up!
This year we made a Summer Bucket List and put it on the kitchen chalk board so we could see it every day.  Everyone added items and that helped everyone buy into it!  With only 2 more days and 4 more things I think we've done an awesome job!  We have plans to do the final 4 too:)


Our Summer Bucket List

1. Make homemade ice cream (Made vanilla that we are still enjoying, it is just SO good!)
2. Make ice cream sundaes (At a birthday party, the boys were in heaven!)
3. Mow (Like every day, with bubble mowers, plastic mowers real mowers the works)

4. Landfill (Seth took the kids this weekend, Colin was in heaven)
5. Make S'mores (A couple times, camping and with friends)
6. Go to a new pool (We went to The Bay with the big boys, so fun)
7. Go to a new farmers market
8. Pick fruit (went this morning and had a blast, it was a perfect day for it!)

9. Have a lemonade stand
(Wednesday)
10. Swim at a beach
(tomorrow)
11. Camp in the yard (Seth is such a trouper, and yet they slept in until 8)
12. Go camping (In our new to us pop up camper, SO fun, but hot... Really should do it again) Here's a post Katy wrote about it
13. Go hiking (Mimi took the boys, they had a blast)

14. Run through the sprinklers (Probably more than 10 times, it was a hot summer)

15. Play putt putt
(schedule for the 19th)


Awesome list right? And we did so many things NOT on the list that were so fun. And yet, because of yet another lost camera, not a ton of pictures, I know you're not surprised:)

 Weekend at the condo

 Downtown Denver with friends, rode a bus and got frozen yogurt

 Another weekend at the condo, got stuck in a crazy rainstorm.  Colin's not thrilled

 Seth rode over 150 miles on his bike for the Children's Hospital

 John lost 2 teeth!

 My green thumb finally came in, seriously best garden ever!

 Emmy sat on a potty, no pee pee yet, but we'll give her a bit more time. 

This summer has been amazing, I can't believe it's coming to an end and yet, I'm already excited to make a Fall List.  It really focused our days at times and made us do things we wouldn't have done otherwise.  I will probably come back and add more pictures. 

Just call me Martha, or Happy 4th!

 Fourth of July is serious business around Longmont and my bff Katy and I took it to the next level this year, competing in the Longmont Picnic Contest. 

It has now become our tradition to have all of our friends meet up before the big concert in the park and have all the kids decorate their bikes. Last year after we all about died from the extreme heat parading from our house to the park, we decided that we would meet at the park and just parade around the park before the concert. We did just that this year, and it was perfect. Our parade has changed from mainly strollers and wagons to scooters and big kid bikes as our kids have gotten older, and we have some new babies in the group, so it just keeps growing each year!

And they're off! Notice John and Colin's shirts that I made from a handme down tie die.

Each year, there is a contest for the best picnic set-up at the park. We have never participated before, but this year we really got into it combine all of our party planning experience for a tablescape that we can now call award winning.  All of our friends and families humored us and we set up a pretty awesome patriotic tent/tablescape/picnic spread. Here is most of the crew.

 Here we are with our finished tablescape. We got to the park at 9am to stake out an ideal shady location next to the playground and spent time perfecting our decorations before everyone else arrived.

Every single thing on the table played into our Stars and Stripes theme.  We warned them it wouldn't make the table if it didn't.  Luckily we have really understanding friends:)  Highlights included: sliders, which made the paper here, layered Jello shots , custom water bottle wrappers and other stickers, a red, white and blue layered punch, 7 layer dip with an American flag on top , a trifle with a star on top, table runner sewn for the event, fruit flag , patriotic pasta salad, and pretzel sparklers.

When the judges came to our table, we had our kids sing Yankee Doodle Dandee. We thought it added that little something extra.

There were 24 entries in the contest this year, and we came in 3rd. Not too shabby for our first time. We took notes and are already planning next year's tablescape. We figure if we had won the first time we entered, it would have been kind of anti-climatic anyway. Now we have something to work towards. We won a family movie night themed gift basket with candy, popcorn, and movies, and a gift certificate to get our oil changed.

Both of us felt very validated by all of our over the top efforts in decor and food when no less than 10 strangers stopped to take photos of our spread, and multiple people also stopped and asked if they could buy our food. We are good at picnicing!

We headed home for naps after the concert and reconvened at our house that evening for a barbeque. All the kids had a great time playing together, and the adults enjoyed patriotic mojitos, good food and Katy's patriotic playlist that has been accumulating songs for the past 4 years.

The kids' table chowing down on hot dogs and/or black bean burgers, fruit, chips and pasta salad.

How many kids can fit in a wagon?

4 kids didn't seem to be pushing the limits of the wagon enough, so Mac and Cam crammed themselves in for a few spins around the yard.

All the kids had patriotic outfits, and Em even had a day AND night outfit.  I think she is just the cutest kiddo!

John, Colin and James doing an impromptu jam session/dance party on the picnic table after dinner. I really wish this was a video because Colin and James' had some seriously awesome moves.

Patriotic bomb pops are really the only way to end a 4th of July meal if you are a kid.

Look how much everyone (Minus Riley and the babies) has grown from last year:

Longmont, along with many other Colorado towns has a fire ban for the rest of the summer, which includes ALL fireworks-even sparklers. I have to admit that I was a little bummed, fireworks are one of my all time favorite things, but we all came inside, turned off the lights and watched NYC's fireworks show on tv and all the kids had a dance party to Katy Perry's Fireworks.
Like most Nichols' parties, this one ended with a little nudity and table dancing.  Just checking if you were sill reading:)

Happy Independence Day!

Most of this post was clearly stolen from Katy's blog, and used for my own :)  Thanks Katy!