Happy Birthday, Oldest Brother

We had a birthday dinner for The Prairie Daddy's oldest brother at our townhouse.  

Happy birthday to you!

The kids offered to "help" open presents

And there was a brothers/sisters only game of Catch Phrase

And then we played cards.  Lots and lots of cards.  : )

A Big Christmas Blessing

This was a SUPER special Christmas for my husband's family.  He is the youngest of seven.  Four live locally and three live out of state.  It was the first Christmas since 1989 that they were all together!  And many of the nieces and nephews were able to come as well.

Have you ever had a Christmas with 25 people around the tree?  Well, to simplify things we played the gift exchange game, unless you were 7, and then you got gifts from everyone.  Oh, how nice it is to be young. ; )

There is a special tradition that my father-in-law started.  He has bought a belt buckle from the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation for each of his grandkids.  Not all of the grandkids could make it but he was able to take a picture with all but 3 of them.  What a crew!

Here is Mom and Dad with their seven kids.

  I wish I would have noticed my dear hubby and moved him before I saw the picture after-the-fact. ; ) 

And then we got the whole crew together!

Oh, and I like this pic of my sis-in-law and I. : )

I will post more pics of all of the fun we had during the week together!

Strike!

Bowling proved to be a bit safer for this family than basket ball.  We went on the brother's birthday before family dinner.  It was really fun!

And, I just might have taken a picture of the score board in the final game against the girls.  I just might have had a friendly competition going with one of the sis-in-laws that beat me the first game.  And I just might have beat her the second.

Hee, hee.

Family Fun

We weren't going to sit around and play cards the whole time everyone was here so we planned some fun outings.  Some of us decided to go ice skating.  The Prairie Kid had never been before and I had only skated 2 times, in college.

I gave him a pretty good pep talk on the way.
"It might be really frustrating at first, you know."
              "You might want to quit or cry but you have to try hard and be tough."
"You can't whine and throw a fit if you're frustrated."
              "If you keep trying you will get better."
"You might fall down and it will hurt but I know you are tough and can get back up."
              "It will be fun eventually."

Okay, okay, maybe I was a little depressing but I know my kid will enough to know how this goes.  It goes something like this:
1. Child thinks he is invincible and is a professional at something he's never done before.
2. Pride and ego get in the way of reality.
3. First time trying something is HARD and awkward and ends up to be DISAPPOINTING with previously stated delusion if not prepped accordingly. 
4. Whining, crying, quitting are typical reaction to the reality check.
5. Mom has learned valuable lesson of verbalizing her REALISM to the DELUSIONAL child.  She hopes that some day she can influence her Realistic Hope to her child.  Life is much easier if you prepare for the worst, hope for the best, usually end up somewhere in the middle, and are pleasantly surprised by the good and not wrecked by the bad...because you were PREPARED.  : )

Like my soap box?  How about moving onto some pictures...

I think this hesitant look of fear is the result of my "pep" talk on the way to the rink.  No more invincible delusion going on here...

Stepping out for the first time!

After the REALITY hit and the kiddo started to whine and complain, I let his auntie work with him.  He won't pull that on her! ; )

And then he was able to hold it together with me

And he even went on his own a little bit!

But it was hard to get him to smile!  Next time will be easier!

Here I am with two of my sister-in-laws

And a goofy picture! 

After ice skating we watched The Men play basketball. 

The oldest nephew has a unique, vintage look...

 

It's all fun and games until someone gets an eye poked out tooth knocked out.  Yep, as we watched I saw one bro-in-law accidentally jab another bro-in-law in the mouth with this hand.  And an object FLEW through the air.  The jabbed bro-in-law grasped his mouth and said "Where's my tooth?"

I got up from my seat and pointed as I walked onto the court.  "Here it is."  I picked it up and carried it to the rightful owner.  After many phone calls we got him in with a dentist who was able to fix it for him.

Maybe we should stick to cards, folks!

500

Have you ever heard of the card game 500? It is THE family pastime.  We did sneak in a few fun rounds of Catch Phrase but we played a LOT of cards!  Four people play at game.  It is similar to Yuker if you've ever heard of that. 

You can see that some of the kids were learning to play

Now there are two peas in a Norwegian pod!

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas from our little Christmas tree!

We had our own little family Christmas tree time before heading over to the in-laws for the rest of the day.

The kid got canned food again!   

Wow...and he hasn't even EATEN the sugar yet!  Great!

Is it that hard to unwrap? ; )

Mmmm, COFFEE!!!  That's the PERFECT gift for this woman!

New mind-benders

Cheese!  And Merry Christmas!

Psalm 33 on Christmas Eve

The Prairie Kid and I were invited to be a part of a special performance at our church for the Christmas Eve services.  I was asked to put together the sign language to a specific song and teach it to a group of young people.  The Prairie Kid was one of the young people.  : )  One of the other moms was gracious enough to send me this video.

Handsome Little Man

Here is the growing-up-too-fast, handsome Prairie Kid with his Christmas Eve outfit on

I am so in love

Crafting

I decided to do a few homemade gifts this year. I enjoyed painting my heart out and decoupaging clothes pins.  I may have had a fight or two with the glue gun though.

Here are a couple of my projects: