Christmas in Ruidoso

Is there anything about Christmas that isn't just so.much.fun? (It's clearly been 8 months since then and I've forgotten all of the work and stress and late nights and exhaustion). This Christmas was a lot of fun. I think I say it every year, but this stage was just the best. Everything was so magical for them. Even Harper got pretty excited about the details. We baked cookies, did the stupid Elf on the Shelf, helped Eli and Landon shop for gifts for everyone and loved watching them get more excited about giving than getting.

We went skiing in Ruidoso, NM with all of Dustin's family for Christmas. It was Eli and Landon's first time to go skiing and they did pretty well. Harper stayed with Nemo and Papa while we were on the slopes. There wasn't a whole lot of snow, so they only had a few slopes open, but it wasn't terribly crowded and it was the perfect opportunity to just take it easy and help the boys.

We went on a horse drawn carriage ride on Christmas Eve. It was a lot of fun and about half way through, snow just started pouring from the sky. We had a white Christmas and it was beautiful and exciting...for the first five minutes...and then it was just wet and cold.  It was much more enjoyable from the comfort of our warm cabin.

Eli and Landon got new bikes this year and Harper got a pink kitchen :)

Thanksgiving 2012

So, it's been quite a while. I haven't made blogging a priority because at the end of the day, when everyone is finally asleep, I just can't give one more ounce of energy to anything other than drinking a Dr. Pepper and watching whatever sitcom is my current guilty pleasure. I know I'm not the only one that feels that way, right? From their very waking moment to the moment they fall asleep with me held prisoner in the bedroom, I promise to you that there are not three consecutive minutes where my attention is not needed by one to four people (not to mention the dog). So I'm laid up on the couch today, sick and watching a constant stream of Jake and the Neverland Pirates and I thought, "what better time could there be to dust off the old blog?"

So I'm going to do a couple of catch up posts, mostly consisting of pictures because let's be honest, this was a long time ago and I can't even remember what I had for breakfast this morning, so the chance of me remembering noteworthy details of our lives nine months ago is slim. Which is one reason I'm back. There is this nagging voice inside of me, telling me that I Will regret it if I don't continue to record the important and unimportant happenings of this little family. And I know it's true.

So, we'll pick up where we left off: Thanksgiving of last year. We spent this holiday in McKinney with my family and had suuuuch a good time. It seems like it had been such a long time since we had all been together for Thanksgiving, which made it that much sweeter. We did everything that makes Thanksgiving so great: ate amazing food, played lots of cards and dominoes, did a puzzle, shopped at midnight on Black Friday, watched Football, went to the movies, and gave many thanks for the incredible blessings we enjoy.

My greatest blessings

Cousins

The whole crew

It was also Katelyn's 16th birthday, so she (of course) got the traditional red velvet cake with roses on top.

Halloween 2012

We have a Peter Pan book that the boys want to read every.single.night. The funny thing is that while they are a little obsessive about that book, they had never even seen the movie. So, it was no surprise that they wanted to be Peter Pan for Halloween. I decided it would be so much more practical for me to make their costumes instead of buying them (whatever!), so I spent every spare moment of two weeks combining several different internet tutorials to fashion them the perfect Peter Pan costume to wear. We had a hand-me-down Tinkerbell costume, so there was never any question what Harper would be. Dustin made Eli and Landon the most perfect wooden swords to finish off their costume.

We had such a fun Halloween. We went to the United Way Fall Festival at the coliseum and ran into plenty of friends there. We played games and ate candy and then finished the night off with fajitas at our little hole-in-the-wall Mexican food place. We also had a big party with all of the young families from church. The Hinton’s were kind enough to host it at their house, complete with a hay ride through the cotton fields, a pumpkin carving contest, and a Mexican pile-on feast. It was a lot of fun! It was supposed to be a costume party for everyone, so I was able to talk Dustin into being Captain hook and I was Wendy. When we showed up, we were the only adults that were dressed up (except one other couple who I had threatened.)  Dustin is such a good sport! 

By the time Halloween rolled around, I was kind of over the whole thing and ready to be done. We had celebrated just a little too much already. Since it fell on a Wednesday, we decided to take the kids trick or treating for just a little bit before Bible Study that night. They had a great time running up to all the houses and getting candy. I mean, what is not to love about dressing up as your favorite character and eating unlimited candy?  

I was kind of relieved when all of the Halloween festivities were over. Eli and Landon still dress up in their Peter Pan hats almost every day and Eli carries his sword with him absolutely everywhere he goes. I finally ordered them the movie to watch and it has definitely become a favorite around here. I, personally, find it a little creepy, but to each his own.  

The Puppy Fiasco

Eli and Landon looooovvvveee animals. They have always loved Penny and Annie (Nemo’s dogs) and Max (Grammy’s dog). And for the last two years, they have asked for a dog of their own, but our fence needed to be replaced and we just had been busy with other things and projects. So, Dustin and I agreed that he would have the fence rebuilt by their 4^th birthday and I would come to grips with the idea of owning a dog (they didn’t get their animal love from me!)

I have no idea how you go about getting a puppy. Do you just grab one off the street? Go to a shelter? Wait until someone is selling them in the Wal-Mart parking lot? I had some major requirements for this dog: it couldn’t get very big and it absolutely could not shed. That was non-negotiable. And we wanted a girl. So, I figured the stray dog approach probably wouldn’t yield the results we were looking for and nobody had been selling puppies at Wal-Mart recently. Dustin had been way too busy at work to focus on getting the boys a dog, so I just took it upon myself to get one the only way I knew how: the Thrifty Nickel. 

I made all the arrangements and my mom picked up this puppy on her way to our house (it was in Abilene). So on the day of the boys’ small, family birthday party, we gave them their puppy. It was definitely not the reaction I was expecting. They were totally and completely speechless. I think they were either overwhelmed or in disbelief or just not impressed at all, but for whatever reason, they just didn’t make a big deal about the dog like I thought they would. This was on a Saturday.

By Sunday, I knew something wasn’t right. The dog had NO energy whatsoever. It wasn’t playful. It laid in the same spot I left it in. It didn’t eat. And although it was sweet natured and liked to cuddle…it just wasn’t the run, jump, play in the backyard with the boys and wear them out kind of puppy I was expecting.  

So Monday morning, we took the puppy to the vet. A couple hours later, we were back home with special food and two medications. Our puppy had hookworms: a nasty parasite that was slowly sucking the life out of this poor dog. So I brought it home and started nursing the puppy back to health, but the more I read about hookworms, the more disgusted and completely overwhelmed I got with the whole situation. By the afternoon, I had made a call to the woman we bought the puppy from and I told her I just couldn’t handle it. I was returning the puppy and I wanted my money back. So I loaded up my three kids and the sick puppy, got some corn dogs and slushes at Sonic for dinner, and we headed towards the dog lady to return Eli and Landon’s “forever puppy” as we had so stupidly called it. Turns out they liked the puppy a whole lot more than they let on because they wailed when we gave it back. I was pretty much annoyed with the entire situation. I’m pretty positive that anyone who knows anything about dogs (and even those who don’t, since I was able to pick up on it) could have told that something was wrong with that dog. I was sad that I had given my boys a puppy that “they could love forever” and then took it away two days later. And then I was really irritated when I came home, put all the kids to bed, and then had to bleach every square inch of our hookworm infested house (or it was in my mind at least). And the next week at Harper’s 18 month checkup, I had to notify the pediatrician that my kids were almost positively going to end up with hookworms (he assured me that it was very unlikely). 

Eli and Landon ended up taking it a lot better than I expected. We explained that the puppy was just really, really sick and that we couldn’t take care of it the way it needed to be taken care of and we couldn’t let the puppy get Harper sick, so we had to give it back, BUT we would get a new, healthy, playful puppy that would be our best friend. 

Several weeks went by and we just kind of did nothing. For someone that doesn’t even like animals to begin with, I was a little burnt out by the whole thing and I couldn’t even think about bringing a new puppy in after that. Plus, I was NOT about to be the one to pick our next puppy, so I told Dustin that it was completely up to him to handle this. 

So, he did what any responsible, adult man would do. He called his mom. 

Neva was sweet enough to find our boys a puppy, drive to get it, take it for a complete check-up at the vet BEFORE we showed it to them, and then bring it to us. She is really too sweet to us.

Meet Libby.

She was just seven weeks old when she came to us and she is completely precious. She has the cutest personality, she’s playful and fun, she loves to cuddle, and she is soooo good to my kids.

Of everyone in this house, Harper loves Libby the most. This is just a peek at their goodnight routine. It takes longer for her to say goodnight to Libby than all four of the rest of us combined. 

 After her second round of shots, Libby got her first haircut. She's so precious.

This was Libby's first road trip with us for Thanksgiving.

This little rug in front of the dishwasher is Libby's favorite spot, which by default makes it Harper's new favorite spot too. 

 

So this "I will never in my life own a dog" girl has been converted. I can get over just about anything if it brings my kids so much joy. And Libby definitely brings us some joy.