This is Allison’s 3rd year of competitive gymnastics and her last year (thank goodness) that we have to do the “compulsory” routines which means I only have two more meets of listening to the same music over and over and over and….. It’s been a rough year for her. We moved from North Dakota to Las Vegas and she took three months off...

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I have always wanted to bake gingerbread houses from scratch, with our own patterns and let the kids decorate them. Unfortunately, it’s just never happened. But with older kids, Allison being home during the day, and Grandparents visiting, we decided it was the year to do it. Allison and I designed our houses with poster board, then used the pieces as a...

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Can you believe that there’s only two weeks left until Christmas?? I’m in denial and completely not ready. I don’t think we’ll be getting lights on our house this year, or most of the decorations, for that matter. But at least we DID get the tree put up about a week ago. I was a bit worried about it, too, since the poor tree was in our...

Peter’s mom is visiting this week. It’s wonderful. The kids all absolutely adore her and the ability to take Allison to/from gymnastics and run errands without hauling all the kids around is priceless! However….. getting her here was a bit of a challenge. I was planning on having a fun night with the little kids after dropped Allison off. It...

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I used to buy Rhodes rolls all the time and they are pretty yummy. But a couple of years ago I got a lot more involved in making my own bread and realized how easy it really is! I think I’d been intimidated by my mom hand-kneading four loaves of whole wheat bread at a time. And rolls were reserved only for Thanksgiving at my house. But with small batches and a...

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Shortly before we moved, I discovered Knock-Off wood and decided that Evelyn needed a new toddler bed. Had I known that things would shortly get as crazy as they did, I would have waited but, as it was, I decided to give it a try and get her crib mattress off the floor. It went well, even if took forever to build with a hammer and nails. (I’ve since acquired a...

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I keep forgetting that today is a federal holiday. Why? Because my husband is at work, doing his part to defend our great nation. And I can’t complain because the job he is doing now, though it doesn’t give regular weekends, a normal schedule, or holidays off is such a huge step up from the schedule he was on when flying the KC-135 tanker. Between the...