December

Well, we hope ya’ll had a very Merry Christmas and happy New Years. Can you believe we had a white one? The whole time Jared was saying all he wanted for Christmas was snow and we would always laugh and I would tell him to keep praying. In the last 105 years here in Oklahoma, there have only been five white Christmases. We don’t get much snow here. More ice than snow. Well Jared kept checking the weather every week and about a week before Christmas he says to me, “There’s supposed to be some snow next Thursday (Christmas Eve).” I thought nothing of it. The weather here is really hard to predict (hello tornadoes), and half of the time they get it wrong. And when it does snow here it is usually a dusting and is gone the next day. Jared keeps checking the weather and I think he must have had some kind of premonition about it this year because every day the weatherman’s snow prediction would grow until it got to 6 inches. So we waited it out and sure enough, Christmas Eve gave us a blizzard like I’ve never seen here and we woke up to 14 inches of snow on Christmas! The kids had a lot of fun with it and since we have a pretty steep driveway, we blew up the pool tubes and did a little sledding. Even me :) So yeah, we had a fun day. In fact, there is still snow on the ground and I am ready for it to be gone!






Kaia and Brandt were happy to be done with their first semester of school. Our Utah grandpa and grandma came to visit before Christmas and that was fun for all of us. And Aunt Celeste and Uncle Layn came as well with their two kids after Christmas, braving the long drive from Arizona for us. It was cold, icy and my kids got a nasty bug while they were here, so I don’t think they had the most fantastic trip, but it was fun to see them and the kids had a blast playing together.



Santa was good to the kids this year and got them exactly what they asked for. (Thank goodness it was all something realistic this year!) They went and visited the Santa at the mall for the first time ever. They were always pretty scared of him before, but all three of the oldest decided they wanted to do it this year. Brandt was saying to me a couple days previous, “Is it the real Santa there, Mom?” Think fast, think fast…”I don’t know. We’ll have to check him out. How can you tell?” He thinks for a minute and says, “If his mustache doesn’t move around.” Perfectly logical. They all three went up together and stood there and told Santa what they wanted and then Brandt runs over to me after and says, “It’s the real Santa, Mom! His mustache doesn’t move!” And after Santa brought Kaia her Littlest Pet Shop clubhouse, Brandt his Millennium Falcon lego set, and Tatum her Wizard of Oz movie, even Kaia was convinced. She says to me, “That must have been the real Santa at the mall Mom, because we got what we asked for.” And if you can read between the lines here, yes, she had been disappointed before at Christmas, ha ha. One year she asked for a talking parrot and instead got a bleating lamb. Santa really did try to find that parrot…




Kaia and Brandt finished up their first semester of school and were ready for a break. We did some fun things with everybody—I usually feel bad going places during the day without Kaia since she’s at school, so it was nice to have everybody around. But, harder to keep tabs on everyone too. One day I put the youngest two down for naps and told Kaia and Brandt I was going to shower. I come out 15 minutes later to find them on the computer, watching YouTube videos! Whoa, how did you get on YouTube? “I typed it in Google.” Kaia says. I guess it’s easy to spell and every once in a while Jared will find funny videos for them to watch so I suppose that’s how Kaia knew what it was. Pretty scary huh? My seven-year-old knows how to surf the web. No more computer without mom or dad’s permission, okay?



Tatum is so obsessed with Dorothy and the Wizard of Oz right now. Jared and I got her red, ruby shoes (or slippers as she likes to call them) and she has to wear them everywhere and tell everybody about them. She is a crack up when she’s watching the movie and Dorothy and the other characters start singing We’re Off To See the Wizard and skipping down the yellow brick road. Tatum gets this focused look on her face, hurries and puts on her ruby slippers and starts taking giant skipping steps around the house until the song is over like it’s her job.

Maren is pulling herself up on everything and is getting quite vocal. If she wants something, you know it. She is a great eater, but still kind of a scrawny thing. Looks like someone left their ring pop out...



I love the dynamics of our family with the four kids. It made me laugh the other day when Kaia gets out all her candy she had gotten from her party at school the last day before winter break, and announces to Brandt and Tatum she is opening a candy store. Brandt runs to get all his money and Tatum just kind of hangs back watching her get it all out. A couple of minutes later, Kaia is charging Brandt $1 for ONE smartie (she is SO like her mother was at her age, it cracks me up!) which Brandt is only too happy to pay, and Tatum has snuck in behind the transaction swiping whatever she can grab before Kaia turns around. And then Maren finds her way in there and I hear, “Mom, help! Get Maren!”

And that little role play is our family in a nutshell.

P.S. Don’t worry, I didn’t really let her take advantage of her brother like that :)