It's Gumbo weather

It's Gumbo weather!! Unfortunately El Paso is limited on the sausage required for Gumbo - unless you enjoy chicken and hotdog gumbo which we do not. So we decided to special order some wonderful cajun sausage. It showed up yesterday in a cooler - still frozen. Ryan thought Jack would enjoy getting mail so when he ordered it he put to be mailed to Jack's House. Well when Jack opened the package and realized it was just sausage he got a little weepy. " I always get the lame gifts in the mail" was the response. Little did he realize that the sausage was packaged with dry ice and the genius that Ryan is helped Jack see that the real gift was the wonderful things you can do with dry ice. First he put it in a glass with soda and the boys oohed and aahhed appropriately. But the real excitement came when the question came up : I wonder what would happen if we put the dry ice in the toilet. So in response to my sister Michelle's blog post --- this is what having little boys is all about. Is it wrong to enjoy watching two little boys put dry ice in the toilet and discover what happens when you pee on it? I say no! Have you ever heard my boys laugh? It's a glorious sound!!

And in this corner...

Well I took Benjamin to the Dr earlier this week and he weighed in at 13 lbs 7 oz. His doctor seems to be quite impressed with my ability to breastfeed - I think I'm supposed to take that as a compliment. As you can see from the photos : this boy ain't starving!

Apparently he thought he was hungry and decided to eat his hand

It's just not possible to look at this boy and not think he is the cutest thing on the planet! We love him! And as Jack says nearly everyday " He's so adorable"!

Is this a good activity?

Christmas is absolutely one of my favorite times of the year. And what makes it even better is having a new addition to our family. Here we are putting up the tree - and it only took us two days to put it up and decorate it. I remember mom always saying how she enjoys sitting and watching the lights. I always thought this was a little odd (sorry mom) maybe its a mom thing but I find myself doing the same thing these days. It seems every year we have the discussion "white lights or colored lights"? I like the white light, uniformed tree. Ryan likes the colored light, mismatched. children made tree. Not that I don't like that as well but I've always thought it would be nice to have the family tree and a "just for looks" tree. It seems like I'm getting less attached to the idea each year. It is pretty fun watching the kids get so excited about decorating the tree and deciding exactly where each decoration would look the best. And I find myself watching the colored lights and feeling very happy.

Can we do the activity now? Activity - Nativity : to a five year old same thing. The boys get pretty excited about this as well. I have 3 nativity scenes. This one was given to us from Ryan's mom when we got married. It is fun to watch the boys decide where the best place for everything is. Somedays I notice that a shepherd or a wise man has moved but I'm sure its just to get a better view.

Red Ryder BB Guns

When you think of Christmas - do you think of a Red Ryder BB Gun? My children actually own one so I can say with confidence that it will not be on anyones Christmas list this year. So what do you do with a Red Ryder BB gun? I think the more important question is what do you do with a BB gun and expired soda that no one will drink. Well this is what you do.....

There is nothing like watching soda cans exploding! And since I was taking these sweet photo's I didn't get a picture of me shooting at the can's. In case you didn't know I am actually quite good at shooting things from a short distance as long as they aren't moving. Not everyone can say that!

Thanksgiving

Did you have snow on Thanksgiving? I did! We made the trip to Alpine to spend Thanksgiving with Ryan's family - everyone was there except Faron and Jenny. Now you would think with all the fun people that were seeing Ben for the first time that I would have tons of pictures to show for it. Well we definately left with something and it wasn't lots of pictures.
I started out good though - Thursday morning it started to snow and of course the kids all dressed up in their snow gear. Jack and a couple of the cousins were anxious to snow angels which turned out to be mud angels with a dusting of snow but they had a great time doing it. It really was a beautiful sight to see the snow and the snowflakes were HUGE. So I managed to take a few pictures of the snow. Unfortunately by afternoon the sun came out and melted most of it.

I think Jack was one of the first ones outside anxious to play in all the snow. OK so you have to look real closely to see it but it was there. This of course is at the beginning of the snowfall - there really was much more.And I managed to take a picture with Uncle Aaron and Ben sleeping

By Thurs night Jack was throwing up with diarrhea. We decided to leave Friday morning in the event that the rest of us were fortunate to enjoy the same fortune and neither Ryan or I wanted to make the drive back feeling like that. We thought if we made it home it would be better to be sick at home. One by one Amy and her kids, Aaron, and our family have been cursed with the plague. It seemed to be a quick recovery for the kids but Ryan and I for some reason are still trying to recover. You know it just wouldnt' be Thanksgiving without someone throwing up mashed potatos!

It's always fun for everyone!!!

Nancie came to visit this past weekend and we loved having her here!! Even though all we did was sit around - I'm a little lacking on the entertainment skills right now - it was nice to have family here. The boys loved having her to play games with so I'm sure she got her fair share of Bingo, Clue, and Chutes and Ladders but hey who doesn't enjoy a good game of Chutes and Ladders.

Our favorite Aunt Nancie!!
I know many people have been asking me to post more pictures with Ben with his eyes open. Babies change so much day to day and to be honest I think he looks different in pictures then he does in real life but he's still adorable!

I'm thinking he is at about 11 lbs by now - we have his month check up on Monday but I weighed myself with and without him today and thats what I came up with. He should be putting on the pounds with as much as I feed him. Don't you love the double chin? I wish it was as cute for me to have a double chin. I guess that's why you won't see any pictures of me for a while.

Jack really wanted me to put this outfit on him yesterday but its a 3 month outfit and I told him it probably wouldn't fit. Well I tried it out today and it fits pretty well.

As always I will try to do better about posting more pictures. It's just hard not to want to sleep every chance I get. Some nights he's only up twice and goes right back to sleep other nights he's up for a couple hours. Even though I seem to be exhausted I try to keep things into perspective. I love this little boy! I love Ryan for giving me this little boy! And I would much rather be sleep deprived and up all night with him than to not have him in my life. I am so grateful for a Father in Heaven who allows us to experience having these miracles!

Guess who's 2 weeks old!

You just can't tell that Jack absolutely loves his little brother. It is not uncommon to hear " Hey there little buddy" and to hear Jacks sweet little voice singing to Benjamin. Unfortunately it is also not uncommon to hear the two older boys argue over who held him the longest and who's turn it is.

I have yet to capture a smile but Ryan has managed to get this semi smile
You can see he has light brown hair but I wonder if it will change to blond - he has no eyebrows !

Our good friends Benny and Maria (Tia Nena and Tio Guero)came to visit with their girls on Sunday