'Winter'wonderland!

 Our temps have dropped down into the low 80's and high 70's which means WINTER on the island :) Seriously, you adapt to your surroundings, and 75 degree weather can be a good excuse to wear your jeans that you never get to wear, leave your hair down because you won't sweat all day and wear a nice jacket when the sun goes down (maybe even before)! We had just that kind of night for the Christmas Tree ceremony in town this year.

 The boys we're absolutely ecstatic about going out...in the truck...at night. They knew they were staying up a little later than usual, and they were totally psyched. We got in the truck to drive to town and picked up a few friends along the way. These guys did not stop chattering the entire ride. "Oh, look at that Mom. It's a LIGHT!" "Look, it's Smitty's at night!" "ooooo, look at all those lights on that car!" "Look at that tree dad!" "The clouds are glowing", etc. I guess maybe I should get these guys out at night a little more :) 

 They had so much fun playing with this little girl here running around the park at night time. We got to see the first part of the ceremony, but it started later than we thought it was going to (shocker) and 45 minutes into it and we were still on the committee's responsible for this event's introductions.

 By time we left the boys were just about ready to crash. The whole ride home Emit kept telling me, "I not fawin' asweep mommy, I not!" (I'm not falling asleep mommy, I'm not) Usually if he starts dosing off in the truck on the way home (if it is right before nap time) we'll start tickling him or something and say, "don't you fall asleep" so I guess he was just making sure I didn't think he had dozed off on me or was trying to keep himself from doing so :)

 I had the boys help me snap a couple of these shots below for their storybook that I linked to in the previous post. However, I will say that this is a very common 'look' in our house with the boys playing trains. Don't you just love Joss' Choo Choo lips :) For the book I needed specific train characters in the shots though. 

 Here he is listening to his dragon friends tell him a story....he will soon find out exactly what that story is about!

 I wrote a little bedtime prayer/story and I wanted to get a picture of them praying for me. Joss cooperated very well, as you can see by these sweet shots!

 PURE JOY!!!

 Emit was being quite the stinker on this particular day. He didn't want to pray or do anything I asked him to do. "I keean't (can't) mom. It's too hard for me!"

 And this is his classic "sticking his tongue out at me" face. Little Booger!

We had an exciting interruption in our morning routine the other day when this forklift (aka-Forky!) came to load up these old boat engines for someone. What a hit, with my little guys, this was!

Daddy brought home a washer box the other day. Well, actually, he went by A.I.D (one of our local stores) and asked them if they had any old boxes they boys could have to play in. They didn't have any lying around, so the guy there went and cut one off one of the washers :) Things like this make me LOVE living in a 'small town'. They had fun most of the this week playing in their 'house'. 

I moved their little table and chairs into their room the other day so we could setup a little school area in there instead of our here in the main room. They have been using that little table to eat at since I built it, and it really worked great for that. I threw together some little booster seats for them out of scraps one day and they were having fun (and concentrating very hard) on painting them for me. 

Of course, whenever we paint anything it always gets started and nice and messy and then, "Mommy, my hands are turning red from painting, I need to stop." or "Whoo, I'm started to sweat, I need to go back inside." :) So I always end of finishing things off it seems. 

There's something so sweet about all four of us being together doing things in the same spot. Dallas is sitting on the stairs here cleaning fish, the boys were painting their stools and I was working on a furniture piece right next to them all. We talk and converse back and forth and it is just a really nice feeling having us all near each other. We usually are together though, but this particular afternoon it was nice and peaceful! No tv on in the back, no phones ringing, no fighting, just everyone doing something they enjoy :) 

We took the boys hiking on Stocking Island for a bit the other day and came across a few remains from Hurricane Irene back in the summer. I can't help but notice the paint on my legs and pants...I was a MESS when we went out this day, but it didn't stop us from having fun :) 

Dallas took some of the guys deep sea fishing for the first time the other day. These guys are growing on me :) Left to right we have Mazzy & Tazzy (twins obviously) and Alex. They've come to church with us a few times and they've been playing lots of games with Dallas lately. He taught them Rook the other night and he was pushing them out the door at midnight :) My heart is opening to these guys and I pray we can be used for some good in their lives. 

I was so proud of Joss the other day. I was cooking and he was working on his ABC's. He has been able to put them in order for a while now, but I just loved the way they curve around and still stay in order :) Bethany... I don't know if I ever even THANKED you for this little fridge toy you gave Emit for his b-day, but Thank-you! They love it!!

Pasta and Mighty Machines...always a good time!

Dallas and I finished up our P90X regime last week, and I'm actually very sad it is over. I feel overloaded with holiday and b-day stuff right now, so of course working out hasn't been a big priority the last couple days, but Jan 2nd (at the latest) I'll be getting back into some kind of routine. I felt great having a workout to look forward to each day. 

I really enjoyed the Yoga throughout this workout. It was awesome to see how insanely hard it was the first couple times and how I could actually feel the difference as we progressed. They were all killer workouts the whole time though. Hoping P90X 2 will be on our summer 'To-do list' :) 

Remember the Ana-White project that I told you I was going to be doing? Well...here it is. She's about to go live with it on here blog too, so I'm pretty excited about that. I LOVE all the storage it has given me. I'm also very excited to be transitioning the boys' room, or at least starting the process. The letters here were my first attempt at cutting out wooden letters, so I've got some improvement to work on there. I covered them in some waterproof chartbook pages that show areas we do our trips in. Emit keeps pointing to the E and saying "E-Emit!" That's right baby, E for EMIT!!

Anyway, tomorrow starts some crazy days for us with Joss' b-day and then Christmas festivities so I wanted to get caught up for now. I'll be back soon if all goes well!