Camping Buddies at Christmas

The party continued with our camping friends into the evening the other day when we invited the parents and other kiddos to come hang out with us for a post-Christmas, pre-New Year's gathering.

We see these people many times from Memorial Day to Labor Day weekends, but not much in the off season, so it was nice to get together with a few of them.

The kids had fun playing games on the living room floor.  The moms discussed joining them.  We decided that we would last about 3 minutes in that position.  And then we'd need help up.

And Morgan was happy to see his two best girlfriends!  These three amigos had great fun hanging out together.

They've been hanging out together for a LONG time.  This little blast from the bast was from three and a half short years ago.

It's so fun to watch them grow up together.  I hope they always get so excited to see one another and find things in common despite their differences.

Thanks for spending some of your Christmas break with us, camping buddies.  See you this summer!

Girlfriends

Happy day-after-Christmas!
























This is a very special group of girls who see each other often during the summer camping season.  They're the best of buddies.  Two of them live out of town, but are in Cottonwood visiting family for Christmas, so they get to hang out together this afternoon.

Zip approves.  (Kind of.)

Fourteenth Birthday

Another birthday down for this sweet girl.  Fourteen years ago she came to us as an early Christmas present. (She was only three weeks early after four weeks of bed rest - she's always kept us on our toes, this girl!! )

Grandma and Ellea made a yummy "cookies and cream" cake (just mix 15 crushed Oreos into a white cake, and 15 more Oreos in the frosting, in case you're interested!)

As an aside - I took a bunch of pictures of Ellea with her cake and candles and could not figure out what the weird reflections by her face were..... ghosts or a weird smudge on my camera lens?  No.  She was wearing a dress with sequins on it and they were reflecting the candle light.  Just thought you might like to know.  My house is not haunted.  At least, not in this picture!

She's so beautiful.  I wish she'd quit getting so grown up, though!!

Made her open this box last.....

She had asked for a laptop, and was surprised that we actually got her one!

So exciting!

Took a quick phone break to receive Happy Birthday wishes from her favorite Auntie Barbara....

And then back to breaking open that computer!!



Happy birthday, dear Ellea.  I love you so very much.  I am so blessed that God placed you in my life.  I love your compassion and fierce loyalty, your happy smile and your mischievous grin!  You are so smart and sweet and funny and fun to be with.  Thank you for trying to keep us organized and the house clean!  God bless you always.

With Much Love, Mom

Poxleitner Christmas Party 2014

We hosted our annual Poxleitner Christmas party last weekend.  There were 32 people in our home and a grand time was had by all.

It takes a lot of Chicken noodle soup to feed 32 people!

Look at that pre-dinner spread.  We never go hungry at our family gatherings.

I had such good help getting everything ready for the soup.

And lots of great help eating the soup!

But my favorite help is after we're done eating.  I can always count on Nancy's boys to cover clean up duty.  (And Ellea's always a good cleaner-upper, too!)  It's my favorite part of the whole night!

More Basketball

Glenn took a group of 8th graders to a nearby tournament last month.  This group will be playing for him at the Boise tournament we have gone to the last few years in February.

They played really well and had a good day.

Nicole and a friend are his assistant coaches.

Strong Family

After the photo shoot was over (because we were too cold to remain out-of-doors any longer), this strong girl helped carry in the chairs.

So many strong people in my life.  I'm so lucky!

Couple Pictures

Of course, no family picture taking session is complete without some pictures of Glenn and I.  Ellea didn't like this, and I have to admit it does look a little awkward.

But this one's hardly an improvement......

Better....

But not for long!

Sometimes, I wanna.....!

His silliness does make me laugh, though!

And if you just crop out his leg over mine, it's a pretty good picture!

He keeps me on (off) my toes.  That's for sure.

And I love him.  Goofiness and all, (usually!)

 Thanks for the pictures, Ellea.  You do good work considering what you have to work with!

Family Pics, Part 3

Our final backdrop for the cold family picture adventure was the old International pick-up that belonged to Glenn's dad.  (Zoe's not very good at looking at the camera!)

We've actually had people out taking senior pictures stop and ask if they could take pictures with this old beauty.  And I can see why - I think this shot is my favorite.

And, of course, it's always necessary to take a few kiddo shots.  Not too many, because by this time, we were all thoroughly chilled!

Our kids are cute enough it that not too many takes are necessary for a good shot!  Thanks for your patience, family o' mine!

More Family Pics

The next backdrop for the family picks was Glenn's idea.... the good old hay bales.  I thought they turned out to be a great background.

You'll remember that last time my family thought I was crazy to haul our ugly red chair all the way to Lewiston for pictures.  Well, Ellea and I found another beat up old chair (it's covered in paint drips) at a yard sale.  Some people thought it needed to be repainted before we could use it, but I think it works just fine as an ugly old paint-spattered chair!

And these hooligans can never resist a silly version of every picture we take!

This one was, "put your left foot in....."

This is one of my favorites.  Too bad I'm not in it!

I felt pretty silly when I realized that I had re-positioned the tripod to make it more level and succeeded in cutting off Nicole's head.

 But I knew we'd get it right eventually!  It was cold enough that my family wasn't quite as patient as last time, but they sure were good sports about taking pictures in the snow!  (And there's more to come!)

Telephone

Morgan had the idea of playing the old "telephone" game when we were hanging out at grandma's on her birthday last week.

I was skeptical, but we had so much fun whispering in each other's ears.

 We started trying to think up crazy things to say to each other.

And we discovered that Nicole is terrible at whispering.  Her whispering is anything but quiet!

There were lots of laughter and even tears.  It was so fun to be silly together and have a good laugh as part of our birthday celebration.  And to teach Nicole how to whisper.