Love my new camera

So for Christmas we got a new camera and I absolutely love it, it took my about 3 weeks before I actually took 1 picture, because I do not have the greatest history with cameras, but Ryan informed me he bought insurance that no matter what I do to it they will replace it, I started snapping pictures....Sadie wants to be like the big girls so much, she was trying to wear one of Paige's basketball headbands, is there anything cuter than that? And my little baby boy is becoming a man before my eyes....

Basketball/soccer

I absolutely love this time of year...super busy, but what else would we be doing? Well maybe I can think of a few things like sleeping in :-) Anyway currently Paige is playing WHAM basketball with 2 practices a week and Saturday games, Hayley is playing Arsenal soccer with 2 practices a week and games every Saturday, Riley is playing for the Grinders club baseball team with way to many practices and games and Sadie is taking a combo tap/ballet class....so our weeks are pretty busy when you add in birthday parties, activity days, scouts, and all the other miscellaneous things that come up, but honestly I wouldn't trade it for a second, we kind of have a routine....we either split up if we have games at the same time and then meet for lunch later or we call caravan from game to game eating lunch when we have time.

Paige is a defensive diva...she will get a rebound like no one who have ever seen, sometimes she ends up with a foul but we love her aggressiveness! You are awesome, keep up the good work The "Red Nijas" had a record of 5 wins and 2 losses, so fun.

This is Hayley's 4 season with Arsenal soccer and this was the season she stepped it up! The first couple games Ryan tried to bribe her with by offering her different things if she scored a goal (Justin Beiber Poster, $ for shopping, 1 week of getting the family itouch) needless to say, that's all it took, first game 3 goals and she never looked back. She was a goal scoring chick. With are crazy schedule every Saturday, on her last game I accidentally wrote down the wrong time and we showed up just as the game was getting over and I am pretty sure I got the worst mom award, she was devastated and I felt horrible but there was nothing I could say to make it up to her.

Dirt field

Riley built a jump at the dirt field this week on winter break with some friends....this kid has way to much energy. He loaded up my bike trailer with tubs of water, shovels and other tools and built a sweet jump and thankfully no trips to the emergency room!

Christmas afternoon

Christmas with the bonds...dinner/appetizers, white elephant and kids name exchange....organized chaos is how I would describe this! We ate yummy food and played white elephant exchange with a twist which turned out to be pretty fun....the hot gift was $20, $1 dollar bills and a lottery ticket.

Christmas Morning

gum ball machine...would turn out to be horrible for Sadie

new shoes

flat iron


RC truck




This was the aftermath of a great Christmas morning!

We were so excited for Christmas morning because Sadie is at such a fun age and was so excited for Santa to come and the big kids got super fun gifts too, but 3:30 a.m. might have ruined it for us...Yes one of our children (not going to name names) woke up at 3:30, and then woke up everyone else in the house. It was horrible, we were so tired and decided to just check out the stuff that Santa brought (bikes, kitchen & RC truck) and then go back to bed and when the sun actually came up we could open the rest of the presents and go outside and play with our new toys! I am pretty sure this was painful for the kids as about every 45 minutes to an hour they were waking us up asking if it was time yet! AHHHH this could really kill the spirit of Christmas for me.

Anyway once we were up for the day it was super fun...the girls got beach cruiser bikes, Riley got an RC off road truck and Sadie got a kitchen from santa and then a bunch of other fun stuff from mom and dad. Hayley saved up her money and went to target and bought her sisters and her brother something special that each of them wanted! This has been a great Christmas...especially with the news that baby boy number 5 (Nixon Nate) will be coming in May of 2011.

Christmas Eve 2010

I am pretty sure this baby was as big as she was...


Yes we have a basketball hoop on our patio...little ghetto but that is how we roll!



Christmas Eve is always a super busy day for us, but so fun. Papa Bob and Grandma Suzanne take the kids to the movies and lunch during the day while we finish up our last minute stuff. This year they saw Yogi Bear, which I think brought back memories for Papa Bob and the kids thought was pretty funny. We then open presents and hang out with Papa Bob and Grandma Suzanne and the kids for a few hours before Grandma Patsy and her family all come over for dinner and a white elephant gift exchange, which usually lends itself to some pretty comical gifts and not to forget the dollar game...which by the way, this fun party is always held at my house and I have yet to win and some patio basketball!

Christmas Cookies

Hayley and Andrew

Making shapes...


Maybe a little too much dough...crazy girl!

Hopefully this is a tradition I can keep up every year....Christmas Cookies. I made all the dough without any help from little fingers that way they were eatable! We had our cousins Aden, Andrew and Casie over to help. We rolled out the dough, made fun Christmas shapes, cooked them and then frosted them. Yummy, yummy! Most of them looked a little suspect, but they sure tasted good!