Goodbye 2011…..

It was a good year!! I can’t believe how much the kids have changed in one year. Harper was a BABY last January and now she is 2 going on 16 (don’t believe me? spend 10 minutes with her).

In honor of the year that was 2011, I have compiled a recap of pictures from our biggest events. Mainly because I have no life, so this is how I spent my Saturday and also because……..welp can’t think of another reason, basically I have no life, that’s all.

{The words in red have a link to that blog post.}

JANUARY-First snow!! ~ First day of school!! ~ Harper is 13 months and gets hair!!! (ok peach fuzz, whatevs).

 

FEBRUARY- Valentines Day!! ~ Trip to Kansas City’s Union Station!!

 

MARCH- Went to Manhattan, saw Bailey for the last time, she passed away 2 days after we left. So glad we had that last visit with her ~ Starting to warm up, yeah for getting outside!! ~ Trip to the zoo.

APRIL- Papa Hall retires ~ Josh and I go to Vegas with our good friends DJ and Leslie ~ Easter ~ Sarah’s bachelorette party (how did I NOT do a post on this? It was such a great time!!!)

 

MAY- Sarah and Derek get married (top 3 pics are all from wedding) ~ Mothers Day ~ Memorial Day/ Sarah’s birthday celebration at our house!!

 

JUNE- Annual Long family trip to Milford, where the kids enjoyed sunbathing in the lake and chowing down on s’mores (I never did a post on that!!) ~ Pax starts t-ball ~I got mono ~ My 29th birthday ~ 5 year wedding anniversary.

JULY- Paxton’s bible school show ~ 4th of July ~ Paxton’s first plane ride to Denver ~ Paxton’s first time seeing the mountains ~ Meeting Baby Jackson ~ Started half marathon training.

 

 

AUGUST- I took a photography class ~ 1st day of school ~ Butler and K-State football starts!

SEPTEMBER- I got nothin’ for this month. Basically I was runnin’ runnin’ and runnin’ runnin’. So here is just a random post from that month.

OCTOBER- Derek’s 30th Birthday party ~ K-State game with Josh (same day) ~ Annual trip to the Pumpkin Patch ~ HALF MARATHON!! ~ Halloween

 

NOVEMBER- Paxton turns 4! ~ Dino Dig Birthday Party ~ Thanksgiving ~ First visit to Auntie Sarah’s and Uncle Derek’s new house.

 

DECEMBER- Harper turns 2, Aiden turns 3 ~ Breakfast with Santa ~ Christmas!

Holy shiznipp that post took all freakin’ day to do!! Note to self: never do a year in review post again. Ridunkulous!

I would give you my New Years resolutions but I don’t have them yet. Lose weight and run another half marathon. That’s probably it. That and don’t sell my kids on e-bay, think that may be illegal anyway.

Happy New Year everyone!!! Here’s hopin’ 2012 is as good as 2011……………..and that the world doesn’t end like they say it will on December 21st…………yes I worry about that kind of stuff (read, obsess) don’t you? Oh.

Christmas….Part Deux

I think there are only 2 reasons Paxton would get up on his OWN before 7:30…..the house is on fire or Santa came. Sure as shiznipp he was up at 7:20 a.m. Christmas morning. We made him wait until 7:30 before we all went out to the living room together. Poor Harper, I had to wake her up, she was so confused. Once she figured out she had a crap ton of toys under the tree, she got over it.

 

Check out that bed head on Harper, bahahahaha!! Cracks me up!!

Pax got a barn and tractor set (just like Papa Hall), Transformers (duh), game cartridge for his V-Tech reader, giant dinosaur, slippers and a superhero cape and mask.

Harper got a Little People dollhouse, game cartridge for V-Tech, baby dolls, bracelets and her own superhero cape and mask.

Their stockings had practical stuff in them like toothbrushes, hand soap, band-aids, etc.

After checking out the Santa presents, they opened up their gifts from Josh and I……. more Transformers, more dolls, shocker.

 

 

 

 

 

And there are only 2 reasons why my living room would ever look like this; we were robbed, or it was Christmas morning.

Somehow we got everything cleaned up, everyone dressed, car packed up and were on the road by 11:30 (all with no fights, BONUS!)

The rest of the day consisted of food, more food, family and even more food. And presents, lots more presents. And a tearful “congratulations on your engagement” to my brother and Tara by yours truly. We had brought some champagne and my sisters were both like “no way I can’t do a toast, I will cry” and I was all like “pshaw, wussies, I got this shit!” and then 2 seconds into the speech I was all like “blubbering blubbering love you blubbering blubbering (loooooooooooong pause to try to stop blubbering) so happy, blubbering blubbering, cheers.” Yeah should have just stuck with CHEERS or CONGRATULATIONS. The Long girls are all a bunch of emotional cry-babies when it comes to that kind of stuff. His poor fiance probably thinks we are this close to having to be committed. Wait till you see us at the wedding girlfriend, it won’t be pretty.

We got to spend the day with my Dad’s side of the family, which was great. It’s hard for all of us to get together, now that my siblings and I all have families/husbands/fiances of our own now. So it was nice that it worked out and were were able to spend Christmas with them too!

Harper is ob-ses-sed with the dogs!! She is in “dog heaven” (ha ha, good one Amy) when we go to Dad or Sarah’s house.

She played in this closet (a closet!! wha-at!!) forever that day. I think she was probably just trying to hide from the 2 crazy boys who went around the house calling each other “poop heads” all day. Guess what Harper calls everyone now? Yup, poop head, awesome.

Have I ever mentioned my love for my Dad’s house? I freakin’ love that place!! Can you see why? What is there not to love?

The kids (and the dogs) FINALLY fell asleep and the adults had “adult time” and played poker until (ahem) 4 a.m.!!!! That’s just crazy talk!

And now, a little funny face photo montage. Sorry family, I couldn’t resist. I got a kick out of them and thought others would too. Who am I to deprive other people of laughter and joy?

Amber, you knew these would come out to haunt you right? She found this old Starter jacket in a closet at my Dad’s and was joking that she was going to wear it to the Cotton Bowl next week (that’s a separate post coming soon to a blog near you).

And now I have probably been dis-owned by my family. Love you guys!!! (Sarah, you got lucky, couldn’t find any funny ones of you).

We had an awesome Christmas, the older I get, the more meaningful it becomes.

Happy New Years everyone!!! 2011 was a great year and here’s hoping 2012 is even better.

Christmas Eve

I decided to break Christmas up into 2 posts so that you don’t fall asleep at your computer, you’re welcome.

I am so bummed Christmas is over. I remember being sad as a kid that Christmas was over, but I still had a crap ton of new toys to play with, so it wasn’t THAT bad. Now, as an adult, Christmas is over and I DON’T have a crap ton of toys to play with, just a crap ton of decorations to take down. Total bummer. I hate the way my house looks after I take the tree down, depressing.

Moving on………..a couple days before Christmas (Thursday?) we got our first snow of the year!!!! And I declared it a snow day (we literally got a light dusting, but hey snow is snow). I really didn’t have anything pressing at work to do anyway, so no biggie. THIS seemed like a better way to spend our day:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It was a messy ordeal, SUPER messy!!! But the kids loved it, so I sucked it up for the day and just went with the mess. And no these cookies were not edible after the kids got done with them. Each cookie had about a pound of sprinkles on it, gag me!!

Onto Christmas Eve (cause I know you are just on the edge of your seat with excitement!!!)

We have had Christmas Eve with my in-laws at our house for the last 3 years. This year Josh smoked (SHOCKING!) a prime rib all day.

Pax got a treat that day, a friend of Josh’s drives a semi-truck and brought it over so Pax could take a ride in it. Pax thinks every semi-truck is Optimus Prime, so he was pumped, but he told me “Mom, don’t worry, it doesn’t transform.” Thanks buddy, I had no idea.

He looks so tiny compared to the big truck.

He sat in the drivers seat while Josh put his booster seat in the truck. Guess who DIDN’T like the truck:

Bahahahahahaha!!!!

Deb, Dave and Justin came over around 5:00 that night and the kids were going batshit crazy waiting to open gifts.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Deb and Dave got these bean bag chairs for the kids to go in our basement (which NOW has electricity AND a working bathroom…….next up? CARPET!!!)

After presents were opened, Harper had a little dance recital for us in the living room. She LOVES dancing, and starting in January she will start taking a 2 year old dance class on Tuesdays. I die just thinking about little baby 2 year olds in their little baby leotards and little baby dance shoes.

 

 

Next up: family pictures (the group shot was taken using my self-timer, hence the odd angle) then Christmas Eve mass at Church, then home. Pax sprinkled “Reindeer food” before he went to bed. I am pretty sure Harper was terrified of the idea of Santa coming. Every time we talked about it, she got this super stressed out look on her face.

Check out Paxton’s RAD Transformer socks!!

Josh and I were up until midnight getting everything ready. Santa doesn’t wrap in our house, he gets everything out of the boxes and sets everything up so the kids can just start playing in the morning. I think Josh wishes Santa would wrap the presents, but unless Josh wants to be Santa’s helper and wrap them all for him……..SANTA IS NOT WRAPPING…….mmmmmmk?

 

Santa came, Jacob left. Sad.

 

Santa ate most of his cookies, and then he may or may not have ran to the trash to spit them out. I don’t blame him, they were 2 days old and had a pound of sprinkles on them!!!

Christmas morning came bright and early the next day, and then we were off to Manhappiness to go to Papa Long’s house where we had MORE presents, a teary champagne toast (by yours truly), lots of laughs and a SUPER late night (er morning?). Stay tuned…..