Lens Envy Satisfied

We had our annual Poxleitner Christmas party prior to Christmas.  Some of favorite nieces and nephews - Joe and Jen and their kiddos - were the first family members to descend upon us.

We always enjoy them and their little ones.  As you can see, sweet Natalie is quite the ball of fun!

And Ellea can never get enough of the little Henry.  He is sometime skeptical of strangers, but she worked her magic with him.

And they gave me a wonderful Christmas gift..... Sweet Joe apparently found a 50 mm camera lens in a pawn shop that was just like the one I was lusting after.  It's lucky for me that he reads my blog.  And frequents pawn shops.  And is so generous!  Thanks Joe, and family!  I LOVE my new lens.

Christmas 2013

Now that Christmas day is past, I am not feeling so overwhelmed, so I suppose I should resume my semi-regular blog posts.  Delightfully, the kids and I have all of this week and next off from school and work, and Glenn is taking some time off also, so I'm looking forward to some time to just be together.

Christmas morning didn't arrive as early as it sometimes does.  We kept the kids up late opening a couple gifts and playing games with Hal and Nancy and their daughter, Shari on Christmas eve after our shrimp, crab and lasagna dinner (yumm-o!).  The girls are usually up before 5 am on Christmas morn (which is especially odd for Nicole who inherited my non-morning ways).  They didn't get up until almost seven which I found to be delightful.

My favorite gift for the family were these Idaho Vandals sweatshirts that my dear friend, Candi, picked up for me in Moscow when there was a big "Buy One Get One Half Off" sale back in November.  We all love our Vandal gear, so they were a big hit.  (Thanks, Candi!!)  She even got one for me as a gift!  She's the best friend a girl could ask for!

And Ellea was tickled with her owl hat that Nicole gave her.  Same one they sampled in the store!

After opening most of our gifts, we hung out with Grandma at her house since she's still recovering from the compression fracture in her back.  We opened gifts, watched a movie and played Yahtzee!  It was  a great, relaxed day.  We are so blessed.  Wishing you all Christmas peace and the love of sweet baby Jesus now and as the new year approaches.

Two Teens

We had a child get another year older yesterday.  We officially have two teenagers.  I think that means we're old!

We had a bit of a wrinkle in our well-laid plans for dinner, cake and presents with family.  Poor Grandma found some ice a couple miles from our house and hit the ditch.  Hard.  She will be fine after a few weeks of laying low, but the compression fracture in her back and all the other bruises will be sore for a while. Needless to say, that slowed down the lasagna dinner.

And dear Ellea, good sport that she is, made her own cake.  Red Velvet.  It was yummy.  And it wasn't even chocolate.  Go figure!

I had to wrap all the presents after I got back from the hospital (mom stayed the night so she could have some stronger painkillers).  It was all a bit delayed, but no less special.  We were sad Grandma couldn't join us, but we're grateful, she wasn't hurt worse.  Her guardian angels were watching over her.  There was a light pole in the ditch she barely missed.

Happy Birthday, sweet girl.  I love you bunches!

Christmas Tree 2013

I've done a terrible job keep my blog updated lately.  Just like most people, things are crazy right now.  We just finally went out to get our tree last weekend.  The poor thing got put up, but still isn't decorated yet!

Of course, Nicole uses every excuse to ride her horse.  The rest of us rode the snowmobile and that crazy snow track four-wheeler from work that Glenn still had at home, while she rode her horsie.  It was tricky to get this big tree home on the back of a four-wheeler.  Should've made the horse drag it, but might not have had any needles left to decorate!

Every year we get the tree home and marvel at how much wider it seems at the base than we think it is when we cut it down.  Looking at this picture, it's obvious this tree is pretty wide at the base, but out in the big wide woods, it seemed fine.

You'll also notice that our dog, Zoey, is hiding under the branches.  We could hear far-off gun shots while we were waiting for Glenn to down the tree, and Zoey hates gun shots.  She starts shivering and acting like a scaredy cat!  (She also freaks out if a balloon gets popped or the smoke detector starts beeping!)  We set up the tree to take our picture and she burrowed underneath the branches.  Must've looked like a safe place to hide from the big scary world!

Owls

Okay, so I realize the quality of this iPod photo is poor, but how cute are my funny girls in this picture?!! They found some adorable owl hats while we were out Christmas shopping a couple weeks ago and had to try them on together!  Love the beautiful young women these two are becoming!

Snow Tracks

 Glenn brought a "toy" home from work last night and he and Morgan bundled up for a ride.

Morgan thought it was super cool, despite the 20 degree weather.

The rode up on the Cottonwood Butte.  Look at that backdrop!  Morgan was so excited to come home and tell me that he got to drive a little!  Watch out world!

Grandma's Tree

We haven't put up our own tree yet, but we went over to Grandma's house and helped her last weekend.

This is what Glenn did....  He has always been a little bah humbug when it comes to decorating the tree.  That's okay.  We'll let him read his book.

Snowman Party

Every year, Glenn's employer has a Christmas ornament contest for all the employees children.  Today was the due date, so we were busy yesterday putting together some cute ornaments.  Thank goodness for Pinterest!  Found some great ideas there for simple ornaments with stuff we had around the house!

Ellea made the ball ornament.  She thought it looked like a disco ball.  She saw it sitting there with the two snowmen and decided they would have a party!  (Instructions here. For the ornament, not the party.)

Morgan made the twig snowman (with some help from dad!).  And Nicole made the bottlecap snowman (with some help from dad - he only had to drink one beer as he was able to find two other bottlecaps!).

They all turned out super cute.  I'm so glad IFG has this activity every year so we're forced to be crafty!

Spoons

One of the favorite family games around the Poxleitner clan is a rowdy game of "Spoons."  I had never played this game until I joined the family, and frankly, I can't take the stress of it!  I know it sounds lame, but the adrenalin gets going and it's just too much pressure for me.  

I sat in for two rounds with these crazies.  It was fun, but I was okay being done with it.

Glenn took a video of this high stakes game.  Ellea is on the top left and Nicole is on the bottom right.  (If the video won't work, try going to here.)

Exploding Pumpkins

We had a little target shooting on turkey day.  But not just any old target shooting... exploding pumpkin target shooting.  

I was most impressed my little miss Jen.  Her pumpkin exploded after just a couple shots.  She's quite the marksman.

Other boys took turns, of course.

Boys and their toys.  At least they're good at sharing!

And I heard all about this cool product that was put in this poor, unsuspecting pumpkin.  When you shoot it, it explodes!  So exciting!  And loud!  Boys.  They like blowing things up.

Happy Thanksgiving 2013

Thanksgiving was lovely again this year.  Twenty-plus members of the Poxleitner family, plus my mom (thanks for coming, mom!) had a great day together at sister Nancy's.  Lots of turkey and other goodies, of course.  Some game playing, visiting, and other random activities.  And a little wine.

This guy found a bottle he particularly liked.

But he may have over-indulged.  It happens.  Don't judge.

Another Flashback

Someone very special had a birthday yesterday.  She came over and hung out with us for dinner, some Mexican train, and birthday cake.

We made a valiant attempt at making a gluten-free carrot cake, but used my kitchen aid stand mixer and may have over mixed it because it rose a lot and then fell, and wouldn't set up right.  It was more like carrot cake pudding.  Still tasty with a little vanilla icing, though.

Apparently, this is flashback week.  This would be me and my momma in our matching dresses that she made for Easter (way back in the 70's!).  She's still just as beautiful both inside and out.

Hope this year is a good one, mom.  God bless you always.

Date Night

Last night was our first annual Daddy Date Night at the high school.  It's a yearly event of pictures and dinner and an essay contest for girls to write about their awesome daddies.  Nicole wrote an essay.  Glenn didn't get to read her essay until last night and he read it about 10 times, I think!  They both seemed pretty excited about their date.

'Cause this daddy sure likes his little girls (and boy).

And the feeling has always been mutual!

Another

So, I know I just posted a bunch of photos yesterday from Nicole's photography class, but I found this picture on my computer this morning and I was positively blown away.  The wispy clouds, the silhouette of the tree, the fence, the glow of sunlight.  Wow.  Just wow.

Photographer

My oldest is taking an online photography class through school.  She's using my "big girl" camera, 'cause I'm pretty good at sharing.  It's been really fun to share what little knowledge I have and watch her experiment. She's becoming quite the little photographer.

This is our favorite, but she's got a great eye.  Good job, kiddo!  Thanks for letting me share!

Front Row Seat

After some outside fun with the cousins, we came inside for dinner and more play.

After awhile, we turned on the TV and Morgan was laying down "plugged in."  Apparently little William walked right up and swung his leg over for a sit down.  Best seat in the house.

Envy

At the tail end of our time playing outside with our cousins, we noticed that the sky was lighting up with a beautiful sunset.

I was frustrated that my camera wasn't quite capturing the beauty the way I saw it.

After a few minutes, it was getting tricky to have enough light to capture the sky without blur.  Then I looked at Christina's photos of the same sky.  Because she has a different lens that has a bigger aperture (which is what allows light to the image), her pictures weren't so blurry.  I admit it.  I had lens envy.  I went in the house and told my hubby that I needed a new lens.  Okay, I don't need a new lens.  I guess you could get it for me for Christmas.......  And if you didn't buy it for me for Christmas, I'll just buy it myself.  I love adulthood.

I may have lens envy, but I don't have toddler envy!

She's so patient.  I remember those days.  Vaguely.  I had two little girls about the same distance apart as these two.

Mostly, I try not to remember the difficult moments of toddlerhood.  It's better that way.

Horses and Cousins

No trip to the Poxleitner place is complete without a visit with the horses.

Ben, seemed to think horses are pretty fun.  At first he only wanted to sit on him, but then decided he wanted a ride.  And then another ride.

Last time they were here, little brother Will wanted nothing to do with the horse.  He didn't want to be anywhere near it, in fact.  So I was pleasantly surprised that he seemed interested in saying hello this time.  He even pet him.  Cautiously.

But, by the time I got my camera out, he was over it.  Doesn't he look happy?  This is fun, mom.  I like horses.

Boys and Cars

After some fun cookie making and inside play, Ben suggested we should go outside.  These boys love playing outside.

Taking it all in.  Look at those sweet curls.

Will was serious about his truck-pushing activities.

He picked up this dozer and immediately announced it was heavy.

So he pushed it to where it needed to be instead.

And THEN...... they discovered Morgan's remote control car.  It warmed my heart that my boy was able to share this treasure.  Sharing is hard.

Will kept wanting to pick it up (or kick it!).  He seemed mystified that this thing was driving around by itself.  It took some convincing that he should leave it alone.

So Ben drove the car and Will chased the car, the rest of us laughed at Will's fascination, and a fun time was had by all.