Fondue'in it up

Even though we live near a lot of family, we still don't see them a lot. So we made up an excuse to get together by having a fondue party. My sister in laws brought a cheese fondue, chocolate fondue and white chocolate fondue and I made a crab fondue. It was soooo good. I swear I could have eaten that whole pot of crab fondue by myself. It was a good excuse to get together and we stuffed ourselves! Logan was especially excited to eat!


And it wouldn't be a blog post without an updated picture of the house. The foundation has been poured and the basement walls have been poured as well. It's been really cold the last few days, but luckily hasn't snowed. Brent drives out to the house during his lunch break and sends me pics of the house from his phone. After years of commuting an hour each way, we are looking forward to living 7 minutes from work! This view is from the back of the house.

Groundbreaking!

Yay!! It's actually going to happen. The builder broke ground this morning on our new home. He called Brent and asked if we would be okay if he finished the house ahead of schedule. He's thinking April or May depending on weather. Uh...sure!! The picture attached is our home, except the garage will be on the other side of the house. We are still debating colors, but I guess we have some time before we have to worry about that. This is a picture that we took from our property. This will be our view out the front. Originally the builder had the house on an angle so that the side of the house was pointed towards the mountains, but Brent and I really wanted to have this view, so we've rotated the house so it faces the mountains. We are so excited!

In other news, I had to give a talk Sunday. My first one in almost 6 years. I'm not sure how I managed to stay under the radar that long? The topic was "teaching by the spirit." I feel like it went really well, despite the fact that I was a nervous wreck and my hands and voice were shaky. Ugh...
Cole finally got his new glasses last week. He better not lose these ones or else....
Brent signed up for the Coeur d'alene triathalon this summer (august) anyone else interested in joining?? You can come stay with us! He tried to talk me into signing up, but I think my racing days may be over? That and it's a hundred bucks and i'd rather buy a cute new outfit :)
And that was our week....

Best big sister award

I love this girl! Sure she gives me a hard time sometimes. She rolls her eyes and let's out big sighs...kind of like (ok exactly like) I did as a teenager. But she has such a big heart. Every week she brings home her library books from school and every week she has a couple for herself and one that she has picked out for Claire. Today was library day and the first thing she did when she got home was pull out Claire's book and offered to read it to her. She is such an amazing big sister. No wonder why I feel like I have it so easy! Malia is doing the hard part, like playing babies, playing doggie, playing kitchen. Even though she is probably wanting to do something else, she is always willing to play with her little sister. Love ya Malia!
House update: Septic has been approved (whatever that means) and permits have all been finalized. So now we are only waiting for decent weather. Basically we could start anytime, but realistically it will probably still be February. Pray that it will not be an unusually cold February in these parts!

A whole lotta nuttin'

I realize that committing to blog weekly may result in some boring blogs. I didn't sit down and do this last night, because I couldn't think of anything to blog about. That still hasn't changed, but here's to another typical, non-exciting week!
I signed up at the YMCA for the "new year, new you" program. So last week I met with a trainer who tested me in different areas. The results...i'm strong and overweight. (obese, if you listen to the experts) (I did manage to pull out 100 chest presses, the most done up to that point) So the goal over the next 8 weeks is to become strong and not overweight. They'll set me up with a trainer and customize a workout plan for me and hopefully in 8 weeks i'll improve in all areas. Can I just add that I hate the gym in January. It's so crowded...is it bad to say that I can't wait until everyone gives up on their resolutions and clears out?
Progress is happening on our house! We are only in the permit getting stage, but the builder called today and said that he is about 2 weeks ahead of schedule. He's staked out where the house will be on the property and now we continue to wait for all the permits. Hopefully the weather will let us start on time.
We never did find Cole's glasses...we went to get him a new pair last week. If he loses these ones, he's buying.
I've been released from nursery and called to teach the CTR 6 class. (Cole's class) I'm not sure if there is a reason that I keep getting called to be Cole's teacher?? I've only taught one week, but I LOVE it!
Also...just found out that I will be having a new niece! Congratulations Deyce!

Our happenin' Holidays

Every year for Christmas, Brent gets me a book that contains all of the years' blog posts. Sort of a family journal you might say. Well, this year, the book was pretty thin! Looking at it made me vow to do better at blogging, so that next year I can get a nice fat book! My sister suggested blogging every Sunday night and I think I might just take her advice.
The holidays flew by this year. For Brent's work holiday party, we took a holiday boat cruise on Lake Coeur d'Alene. The boat takes you out to "santa's island." Santa is waiting to greet you. They have light displays along the lake as well. I just had to throw in the picture below. I was giving Jacob a nice big "public" kiss and you can see how much he loved it! Christmas was spent in Albany. The downside of the trip was that it rained the whole time, and not just rained...poured! Despite the close quarter, we had a great time. The kids were so excited for Christmas. After opening their (surprise!) jammies Christmas eve, the kids were sent to bed. Jacob claims he never even fell asleep that night. We were up early at 6:30 am to open presents. The kids posing in their jammies, claire is such a little diva. Cole looking cute in his new glasses that he has already LOST! Dangit.
Bowling the morning of Malia/My birthday. Bowling with a bunch of little kids can be Chaos, but after about 10 minutes we figured things out and had a great time bowling. Of course Brent won, surprise.

The boys asked for Legos and more legos. They spend hours putting them together. Christmas morning Cole opened his presents but seemed pretty unexcited about things. He was sprawled on the floor by his stocking with his eyes closed. 15 minutes later he was throwing up in the toilet. Poor guy, luckily he felt fine afterward and was able to do some major lego creatin' the rest of the day.

All of our stocking are in Storage, so last minute we ran to the dollar store to get some stockings. Of course they were out. So we used WINE BAGS for stockings. AWESOME!

Malia holding up her new camera/video camera. She spent a lot of time playing with this over the break! She also loved playing with her cousins. She was a little teary pulling away from Grandma's house.

Sunday was Brent's birthday and we were able to go up to Keizer and go to church. After church we went to visit some friends and enjoyed spending time with them. We got home in time for dinner (lasagna, of course) which I burned. Happy Birthday Brent! I'm afraid this birthday won't be going down in the excitement hall of fame. Maybe next year :(
My birthday was awesome. We went bowling in the morning, then my sister and I went to bath and body works to stock up on some smellies. Then we went home for Malia's requested lunch of burritoes. That afternoon some of my sisters and I headed up to Keizer to take a spinning class from my old gym. I loved that class! That evening all of the adults went out to a restaurant and just enjoyed each other's company. The picture below is what we returned to in Spokane. Snow, and lots of it. It's so cold here, I think it will take me a long time to get used to this!

After we got home, Brent and I were able to go on a Birthday date to Spokane's riverfront park. I purchased a groupon that allowed us to go to an imax, play mini-golf, go ice skating and ride the carousel. It was great, despite the frigid temperatures. I even grabbed the gold coin on the carousel and won myself a free ride. That worth at least a dollar or two! :) It was a great vacation and the kids are already whining about going back to school. Me, I'm ready to get back to our normal routine and hit the gym. Happy new year!

O Christmas tree, O christmas tree

I've been spoiled. Living in Oregon you can find a beautiful Christmas tree for a bargain. I figured here in Spokane, land of the evergreen tree, it would be the same. I was wrong. I called a u-cut Christmas tree farm and they wanted $50 for a tree. Costco wanted $40. I couldn't bring myself to pay that much. So we went and got a $10 permit and cut down our own. It looks like a $10 tree too, but the experience was worth it. We found two great sledding hills, this is the first one we found. We did some sledding, drank some hot chocolate and then decided it was time to hunt down a tree. We spent so much of our time sledding that it was getting late in the afternoon and we didn't have a lot of time to hunt for the perfect tree. So rather than stay with the whiny 3 year old, I went in search of the tree. I found one, which took me about 20 minutes to cut down (would have taken Brent about 5 min). But I got it down and back to the truck. It was a great day, minus the whiny 3 year old. Next time she stays home!

Malia having a snack. :)

Claire posing in front of our Charlie Brown Christmas tree. It's a little sparce in places :) Claire calls this her "Miley Cyrus" pose.

Cole showing off his new glasses. Yep, both boys now have glasses. They were so excited to pick them up. Although I give it a week before the novelty wears off. I think he looks a little like Ralphie Parker in "A Christmas Story" (see pic below)
We are headed to Oregon for Christmas, we are looking forward to seeing old friends and spending time with family. Merry Christmas!

Brent czech'd out

Last week Brent was able to fly to the czech republic for work. Just a little perk of working for a great company ;) I was excited for him to go and "czech" out the countryside (sorry had to do it) Unfortunately he was pretty busy with work, lame-0. But he had a few hours on his last day there to take some pictures. The first picture is actually in taken in Prague. The bridge he is standing on is called the "Charles Bridge" It has these really cool old statues on it. They started building it in 1357! I didn't take this next picture, but thought it gave you a better idea of what the bridge looks like. It looks like a bridge that would be used in some mission impossible movie, where a guy is murdered and then thrown over the edge of the bridge. Really, doesn't it? Looking at the rest of the pictures makes me want to be a world traveler. I'll add that to my "someday" list.