Our Neck Of The Woods

Autumn 7 Months!

2012-01-31T14:51:00.003-07:00

Autumn is now 7 months! I can't even believe how fast she is growing! She is starting to eat people food (and loving it!) and just started crawling around! She is so fun!

Cheer Camp

2012-01-31T14:51:00.002-07:00

Sierra did cheer camp this year. They learned a cute dance and performed the dance during half time at one of the girls basket ball games! She did good considering they only practiced 3 days. Check out the video below. So cute!

Misc Pics

2012-01-31T13:44:00.004-07:00

Here are a bunch of miscellaneous pictures from the last couple months. Enjoy!

Merry Christas 2011

2012-01-31T13:24:00.005-07:00

This year, we spent Christmas in Logan. That means that we got to see a WHOLE lot of family. We spent Christmas with my mom then cruised on over to visit my dad. I even got to spend my birthday with my family this year!

This is a Christmas tree the girls made all on their own. They found this tall weed outside and thought it would make a beautiful Christmas tree. The sat down and made all of their own decorations.

The girls got pretty competitive playing air hockey.

For my birthday we went ice skating. I haven't been ice skating since I was a kid. It was fun and the girls had a great time! In this picture is Lance (Nikki's hubby), Nikki, Kylee, Bruce (Lances brother), Maddie, Jake, Sierra and Me all holding hands! Good times!

My mom made me a snowflake cake!

A few days later, we got to spend a day with Jake's family. We went to the Natural History Museum in SLC. Here are all the Schall cousins.

Then we went to see the Zoolights at Hogle zoo. If you live in the SLC area and haven't seen the Zoolights, I suggest checking it out! I thought it was fun, but I am a sucker for Christmas lights!

broken

2012-01-18T13:02:00.002-07:00

fyi

sorry its been a while since i have posted. our computer broke and has been in the shop since before christmas. well, the conclusion they came to is that our computer is broken for good. so i probably wont post until we get ourselves a new computer... who knows when that will be. i guess check back from time to time to see if we are back up and running. i have lots of pics i want to share..hopefully, eventually, i will get them loaded up.

5 Months!

2011-12-06T12:13:00.002-07:00

Same Outfit, Different Girl!

2011-11-28T13:08:00.002-07:00

Autumn

Sierra

Madison

4 Months and Halloween!

2011-11-13T16:13:00.002-07:00

Autumn has been sqwaking and talking a ton lately. Here is a video that pretty much shows a day in the life of Autumn.... minus the hungry and sleepy cries.

This year for Halloween Sierra was a Monster High Girl (aka scary teenager). Maddie was Rapunzel. Autumn was a spider and I was a spider web, and Jake was a lumber jack. Fun Times!

Lunch At The Park

2011-10-26T14:36:00.005-06:00

This years school schedule is a little bit hectic. Sierra has been going to kindergarten half day, afternoon, 5 days a week. Maddie goes to pre-school, half day, mornings, Mondays and Wednesdays. On the two days that Maddie has school, we need to squeeze in some lunch inbetween the time that Maddie gets out from school and when Sierras school begins. This time is about 45 minutes.

Well, considering it takes about 20-25 minutes one way to/from the schools, there is not enough time to pick up Maddie, go home, eat lunch, then take Sierra to school. So the girls and I have been picnic-ing twice a week. :) This has actually been fun! We eat lunch real quick, then play until it is time to take Sierra to school. The time frame that we have is actually the perfect amount of time to get in a little play time (not too much

where I am bored to death), and I have a good reason to get them to leave right when I tell them (no lolly gagging :)). Well, as luck would have it, Sierra is starting full day kindergarten on Monday.. right when the weather has been too cold to picnic (we ate lunch in the car this week, then the girls still went out and played). Today was our last picnic at the park. It has been fun and not something I tend to do a lot in the summer, so I was really glad that the last two months provided me lots of picnic time with my girls.

I am very grateful for the bus as well! It comes right to our house and Sierra LOVES riding the bus. She waves good-bye to all of her bus friends every day. She comes home everyday with some gum that the girls give her on the bus. I'm looking forward to next year when Sierra will get to show Maddie how fun it is to ride the bus!

Sierra (pink) waving to the kids on the bus

Happy Birthday Sierra!

2011-10-12T18:51:00.003-06:00

Sierra turned 6! I think she felt pretty special on her special day! Here are some pics from her day!

Maddie anxiously waiting to help decorate the cake!

The cake! She wanted a scary cake, so we decided on a girly scary cake!

She really wanted to grill for her Birthday! Gotta love that girl!

3 Months

2011-10-12T18:42:00.002-06:00

Autumn is now three months old! I can't believe it! Where has the time gone? I feel like she has grown so much! She loves to be where all of the action is and does not like to be left alone. She is a little smiley girl and starting to laugh! We just can't imagine our family without her!

A Couple of Cute Girls

2011-09-15T09:28:00.000-06:00

Nevada 2011

2011-09-13T16:32:00.002-06:00

Over Labor Day weekend we went to the Elko County fair. We did this last year and are trying to do it every year! It is so much fun to spend time with Jake's family! This year we even got to meet three of our nephews that we had never met! As always, the races were fun and the company was great! We love this vacation and really look forward to it! Here are some random photos of the time we spent there!

Grandpa Fish and Autumn at the races

Great Grandma Jones with Autumn and Maddie

Maddie is a little mom. She loves pushing Autumn in her stroller!

Some of the gang at the fair.

Maddie and Cousin Noah

Cousin Cooper and Sierra

Jake, Sierra and Sara

Uncle Cody, Cousin Cooper and Uncle Ben

Preschool

2011-09-07T13:35:00.001-06:00

Today was Maddie's first day of Preschool! She loved it!!! She really feels like a big girl and is excited to walk into the school all by herself! They just grow up so fast!

2 Months

2011-09-01T23:17:00.004-06:00

I cant believe Autumn is two moths old already! Time sure is flying by! She smiles intentionally now, and just started reaching and grabbing for things dangling above her! We love this little girl and can't imagine our lives without her!

School and Hair

2011-08-24T13:22:00.002-06:00

Sierra started Kindergarten today!! She has been so excited to go to school! She is very excited to go to school 5 days, then have two days off.. same days as her dad!!! (Wonder how long the excitement will last.)

Sierra also got a new hair cut! She LOVES it! She was bouncing off the walls after her hair cut was done. I love the new look! Just so you know, Sierra thinks she is a model. She purposely posed for this photo. Hand in her pocket and all. She especially loves to bend her leg. She has been posing with her leg bent for a while now. Maybe she pays too much attention to the ads in the magazines. It's cute though.

Before pic with long hair.

Our Dad Is Cooler Than Yours!

2011-08-06T08:36:00.002-06:00

Last weekend, Jake helped the girls make their own see saw! He just used whatever was lying around. It turned out so good! The girls love it!!!

One Month

2011-07-31T14:10:00.003-06:00

Camping

2011-07-26T12:29:00.003-06:00

Jake and Sierra went camping this last weekend. They both had tons of fun! Sierra told Jake it was the best day ever!!!

Apparently Sierra spent a lot of the time picking all of the beautiful flowers!

Here is a waterfall that they hiked up to.

They found some willow branches and made roasting sticks out of them.

Mmm. Hotdogs!

Looks like she is loving her oatmeal!

They hiked up to this rock called History Rock. There are hundreds of names carved in the rock. Some dating back to the 1800's!

Jake showed Sierra how you can use Old Mans Beard to start a fire. She thought it was so cool that she brought some back to show us. I'm glad they had so much fun! Jake is already planning their next camping trip.

Happy Birthday Jake!

2011-07-21T16:57:00.002-06:00

Jake turned 31 yesterday! We had a nice little celebration last weekend with our neighbors. It was a pretty quiet Birthday for him this year... and only 2 pictures. One of him with his cake, and the other is a picture of his cake. He did say he had a nice weekend though (he did take Sierra fishing for a bit), so I guess that is all that matters.. right? I hope you had a good Birthday Jake!

A Few More Pics

2011-07-08T12:05:00.002-06:00

Jake built this birdhouse during the early stages of my labor (He did finish this project before my labor became more intense. He didn't neglect me, don't worry.). I guess you know you have a true passion for building when your're off building a bird house while your wife is in labor. Makes for a fun story and a memorable (and super cute!) birdhouse! :)

Autumn Margaret Schall

2011-07-02T21:20:00.002-06:00

July 1, 2011

8:08 pm

7 lbs 10 oz

20 1/2 inches

Summer Is Here!

2011-06-22T21:32:00.001-06:00

39 weeks

Happy Birthday Maddie and Megan!

2011-06-15T08:31:00.003-06:00

Maddie turned four this past week! Her Birthday was on a Wednesday, and since both Jake and I worked that day we decided to celebrate it on the weekend. Sunday was Aunt Megan's Birthday, so we did a combined birthday party at Megans house!

The Birthday girls! Sierra and Maddie love to go over to Aunt Megan and Uncle Nicks house! They always have so much fun!

The Birthday girls opened presents, then we had yummy BBQ dinner, then cake! I think Maddie thought it was fun sharing her Birthday with Aunt Megan!

Maddie wanted a crayon cake this year! This was a fun cake to make!

The girls blowing our their candles! We didn't have enough candles for Megan.. I guess that means she is getting old!

Jake also spent the weekend building bunkbeds for the girls! They had been wanting bunkbeds for a long time! The girls LOVE them!

Weekend

2011-06-05T21:33:00.004-06:00

This weekend was our nicest weekend so far. It was hot (we actually hit 80 on Sunday!), sunny and a weekend!! What more could you ask for? We had a couple projects to do this weekend, but for the most part we just puttered around not doing too much. I took a bunch of pictures through out the weekend, so I thought I would share our weekend with all of you!

We started out by planting our garden. We have had our garden boxes built and in place for about a year, but we didn't have any dirt. Buying nice black dirt wasn't really on our priority list, so the garden boxes just sat empty for a long time. They were going to sit empty this year too, but Nick (Megan's hubby) gave us a call one day and told us he was brining us a bunch of nice black dirt (what a nice guy)! So suddenly we had a garden to plant!

It is a little late to start a garden, but I figured we would still get some stuff, like lettuce and cucumbers and hopefully peas and greenbeans. We will see what we get!

Now that we had a garden, we needed a fence to go around it to keep the rabbits and deer out. We have had too many experiences with the deer destroying our gardens, so this was a necessity! So Jake spent most of Saturday digging through his wood pile to find enough lumber to build a nice sized fence around our garden area. We are going to put up a wire fence around it as well, but we didn't have enough wire fencing, so we still need to buy some to complete the fence. I am really excited to finally have a garden that grows veggies that WE actually get to eat, not the animals!

Sierra was cute. She told me she wanted to catch a butterfly really bad, and asked me how. I didn't know how.. I never really wanted to catch a butterfly before. Well, she told me that she needed to get her hands wet first, then she would be able to catch a butterfly. So she walked over to where the sprinkler was watering a tree and got her hands wet. About a minute later she came over to me and showed me the butterfly that she had caught. She was actually holding the butterfly on her finger!!! I was really impressed! I didn't know you could really catch a butterfly! I guess if you ever want to give it a try, you better get your hands wet first!

Sierra was Super Girl most of the day. Pretty stinkin cute! I'm not sure that she decided on an actual super power, but she had fun running around with her cape. She even made a mask, but never finished it, so she never did wear it.

Here is Super Girl running super fast!

And her sidekick, jumping.

Ok, on to Sunday. Me. 3 weeks left!!

Well, Jake spent all morning mowing. Fun fun. We finally broke out the old (and little) swimming pool. The girls have been dying to get it out, but it has been too cold. Finally today we were able to get it out. They spent most of the day swimming...

and running through the sprinkler.

They even got in a little 'dad time'.

We made tin foil dinners for dinner. Jake and I both decided that we hadn't had these since we were about 12. They were a little burned, so hopefully our next attempt will be a little better.

We ended the day with our usual weekend treat .... S'mores!!

I think we all had a great weekend! We are so glad that summer is finally here!

Memorial Day Weekend

2011-06-01T12:37:00.003-06:00

We had some visitors over Memorial Day Weekend. Grandma and Grandpa Slick came and they brought along Uncle AJ and counsin Olivia! From the minute Olivia walked in the door, until the time she left, the three little girls played non-stop, and loved every minute of it! The weather was pretty crappy for most of the weekend. The sun did come out one of the evenings, so we all took the opportunity to hang out outside.

The boys set up some targets and had fun with the guns.

Olivia told me she was jealous of them and wanted to try it out. I thought she looked kinda cute with a big ol' gun!

Grandma taught the girls how to knit. Maddie had fun knitting on the loom.

One of the nights the all the girls made cookies! Yum!

Apparently you can't get the Schall boys together without a little competition. They did push ups and arm wrestling

I'm not sure who won.

First Tooth

2011-05-24T14:42:00.003-06:00

Sierra lost her first tooth today!!! She is very excited! She even made the tooth fairy a cute little card that has been waiting for her under Sierra's pillow ever since she found out she had a loose tooth! I wonder what kind of surprise the tooth fairy will leave for her!

Graduation

2011-05-13T19:16:00.002-06:00

Sierra has officially graduated from Preschool!!

I was the class mom/helper this year in Sierra's class, so Maddie felt like this was her school class too since she was there every week, and I think the teachers pretty much treated her as another student (she is right up there with most of the kids with her ABC's and all that), so they let Maddie participate in the graduation too! I'm glad they let her, she had fun participating with all of the other kids.

Before the graduation ceremony, they had some fun games for the kids to play.

Potato sack races!

Even the parents got in on some of the action (although I don't think Jake was too thrilled)!!

Dinner

2011-05-08T17:23:00.001-06:00

Gotta love grillin' and eating dinner outside!!! Bring on the summer (hopefully)!!!

Easter!!

2011-04-25T09:43:00.007-06:00

I have tried writing this blog 2 times already, and Blogger keeps messing it up. I am sick of re-blogging. I am not going to re-type everything again, so you will just get some pictures with a few captions. Enjoy!

The Easter Bunny brought the girls each a new tool belt full of real tools! Now they have tools that are just their size to build their projects with!

It has been a tradition for a few years now to go fishing at Toston Dam on Easter. The weather was BEAUTIFUL!! A perfect day for fishing, excpet the fish weren't biting. Bummer. It was still really nice to get out and enjoy the day!

Nick and Megan came with us.

Jake met up with his friend Titus at the dam.

Hidden Treasure

2011-04-16T15:18:00.002-06:00

We got out and about this morning for our first hike/geocaching of the season. We went up to the Buffalo Jump State Park to hike around and to find a hidden treasure box. We had never been to the Buffalo Jump and it is only about 10 miles from our house. We didn't end up finding the treasure box because we ended up on the wrong trail, and by the time we turned around, it was lunch time.

After lunch, we decided to go find some treasure that was a little closer to our house and knew it was an easy find. Sierra spotted the treasure first! It sure is nice to be able to get outside again!

Olde Town Rustic Furniture

2011-03-28T17:47:00.002-06:00

Jake has a new blog with all of his awesome furniture he makes! Check it out! http://www.oldetownrusticfurniture.blogspot.com/

Bedroom Camping

2011-03-15T13:05:00.002-06:00

The girls wanted to go camping. Obvisouly that wasn't going to happen, so Jake thought it would be fun to pitch a tent in their room! Of course the girls LOVED it!

The tent pretty much takes up all the free space in their room.

They even have beautiful stars to gaze up at while falling asleep. The tent has been up in their room for a few days now, and I think it is time to take it down.

Jakes Latest Projects

2011-02-26T14:29:00.002-07:00

Jake made this shelf to go above our tv/wood stove area in our living room. The wall was just blank, so we decided it needed a shelf. The wood he used was just scrap that had been sitting out back. I like the weathered look. The shelf turned out very nice and looks good on the wall!

Here is another shelf he made. He actually made two of them. The other one is a little longer than this one, but is made out of the same material, so it looks just like this one.

I guess he got tired of building, so he started tiling. He tiled around both of our shower/tubs. Both bathrooms turned out so nice! I really adds to much to the feel of the room. This one is in our bathroom.

And these slate tiles are in the other bathroom. It is pretty nice to have a handy man around! Speaking of having a handy man, he is in the crawl space replacing our heating ducts as I type ... a handy man sure is nice!

Just Past Half Way

2011-02-13T14:43:00.002-07:00

Well, here I am. I have had family telling me for a while now that they want to see some pics, so, here I am. I am 21 weeks this week, and getting bigger by the day!

A Project For The Weekend!

2011-01-29T20:20:00.004-07:00

Jake had this fun idea to let the girls make their own bird houses! Jake cut all the pieces and pre-drilled holes, so the girls could pound their nails in and build their own bird houses! What a fun project (and dad!)!

Now its time to paint!

All done!

This is Sierra's. She painted a dinosaur on the front.

This is Maddie's.

ME

2011-01-28T14:30:00.001-07:00

I just had to show everyone this cute picture that Sierra drew of ME! See the belly? How cute!

My Little Crafty Girl

2011-01-21T13:35:00.002-07:00

I am very proud of Sierra's sailboat she made. She shut herself in the craft room, and went to town making this beauty! I love the cute steering wheel (or whatever you call them on boats). If you look hard, in the middle of the sail is a skull and crossbones. I guess this would be a pirate ship then! Love it!

Random

2011-01-16T16:21:00.003-07:00

Here are a bunch of random photos from the last few months. Enjoy!

Sierra crafted this witch all on her own. She designed it, cut and glued completely all by herself! Very proud mom moment!

Sierra drew these lovely designs all over their faces. Not exactly sure where I was during this fun time... probably napping.

The awesome outfit Maddie made for her baby!

Another look.

Sierra drew this picture. A girl riding her bicycle. Cute!

A dinosaur eating a person!

Just doing some finger painting.

She went out to play in the snow, but came back a super muddy mess!!!

Maddie is teaching her baby how to play the piano.

Maddies cute picture!

Snow Drift Tunnel

2011-01-05T11:39:00.002-07:00

A few days after Christmas, we had a nice blizzard blow through, which left us with a bunch of big snow drifts. We have a really big one right behind our house, so we thought it would be fun to make a tunnel through it.

The dos amigos digging the hole. Sierra is such a trooper in the cold. She loves being outside in the snow no matter what the temperature is. I think on this day the temp was single digits.

Maddie is more like me... we like to watch from inside the warm house.

Maddie decided that she had to at least try it out!

Of course there has to be a snowball fight before everyone heads back inside.

Christmas 2010

2010-12-30T09:57:00.002-07:00

Another Christmas has come and gone. Of course, Santa was good to the girls, and so was the rest of our family ;). Thank you everyone for your wonderful gifts! We had a great Christmas being able to spend it with Grandma and Grandpa Slick (Jake's parents) and Nick and Megan. It always makes the holidays better when you can spend it with family. Here are a couple pictures of our Christmas.. and don't forget to check out Sierra's awesome roller skate video at the bottom of the page.

Sierra got some new roller skates for Christmas. Those things do not leave her feet. She skates around the house all day. She is looking like a natural. It will be fun to go outside in the spring and let her loose. Here is a fancy trick she is pretty proud of. :)

Frames and Furniture

2010-12-18T09:08:00.003-07:00

Jake has been working hard perfecting his woodworking skills. Our next door neighbors dad is an artist and is in the market for someone to custom frame his artwork. So Jake has been working on making different styles of picture frames to showcase. Here are a few of the picture frames that Jake has been working on. The pictures inside are our neighbors dads art. He does mostly ducks, geese, and other birds... at least the pictures that I have seen.

Below are a few more pieces of furniture Jake made for a few of our friends.

Our Fabulous Christmas Tree

2010-12-03T13:15:00.003-07:00

A few weekends ago we decorated our tree. The kids loved hanging all the ornaments.. and quickly decided they were toys.... I'm sure most kids think that. Well, lastnight when I came home from work, I noticed that our tree had even more decorations on it! They added scarves as tinsel and barbies and ponies as ornaments! LOVE IT!!! How cute is that? It makes our tree look so cute.. at least I think so. Fancy trees are beautiful, but I love homemade kid friendly Christmas trees. I added a few closeups of the AWESOME ornaments.

Yes, we have a few naked barbies on there too.. oh well.

BTW Jamie.... our tree blows yours out of the water!!!

Sledding

2010-11-29T08:29:00.005-07:00

Jake built a little sledding hill for the girls in the back yard. It's a perfect size for them. They were having tons of fun sledding yesterday.

The top video is Maddie, the bottom one is Sierra.

We are ready for Christmas! We have all our lights and decorations up. Although, I think Jake wants to add more lights on the house this year.

Photo Shoot

2010-11-18T12:20:00.004-07:00

This past September, Jake's sister Megan got married. Since we were all dressed up and had a great photographer available, we decided to do some much needed family photos. If you live in the St. George area... or just Utah, you need to hunt down Rachel Steele from Steele the Moment Photography. She does a fabulous job!! I will be printing pics and sending them out with Christmas cards, so anyone out there (mostly talking to my mom and dad) who thinks they need to go ahead and print the pics from my blog, just be patient, and you will get some! I posted a bunch of my favorite, so sit back and enjoy!

Cousins

Baby Peter, Olivia, Elsa, Sierra, Madison

Happy Halloween!

2010-10-31T21:19:00.002-06:00

Fall Festivities

2010-10-23T18:54:00.002-06:00

Today was a fun filled day doing some fall festivitites. This fall has been beautiful and warm! I think it is rare to get this far into October and not even snow once! Although, they are calling for snow tomorrow....but today was beautiful! We took the girls to Rocky Creek Farms to pick out a pumpkin at the pumpkin patch... well, by the time we got there, all the pumpkins were gone! But they did have a bunch of hay for the kids to play on, and a petting zoo.

After the pumpkin patch, we headed off to the hay maze. This is the first time we have been. It was fun! Sierra loved it! She was the leader and took us everywhere through the maze. We did finally make it out.

After the maze, we ended up going to the store to buy some pumpkins. Sierra said she wanted the biggest pumpkin there! And Maddie said she wanted the smallest. Well, Sierra did find a pretty big pumpkin, and Maddie found a little one. I think we will be carving them tomorrow...

Pumpkin Patch

2010-10-21T09:23:00.003-06:00

I was flipping through the Three Forks newspaper yesterday (it only comes out once a week), and when I got to the back page I saw a surprise.... Sierra and Maddie!!! This is Sierra's preschool class on a field trip to the pumpkin patch. It isn't really a pumpkin patch, it is someones yard, that has spent WAY too much time and money making it look fancy. The pumpkin patch is actually his garden, with LOTS of pumpkins. The kids are posing near the pond next to the bears. If you can't spot them, Sierra is Miss Hollywood in the sunglasses in the middle, and Maddie is next to her wearing a navy blue dress. It was kind of cute to see their picture in the newspaper!

Happy Birthday Sierra!

2010-10-17T22:28:00.006-06:00

Yes, I am a week late, but Sierra's big 5th Birthday Bash Blog is finally here!! She had such a great day! She pretty much celebrated the whole day! It started out with a party with her friends, and ended with a family celebration. There were lots of cake, lots of balloons, and lots of fun memories!!!

Months ago, when Sierra decided that she *had* to have a party (um, I was leaning more toward NOT having a party, but she had her heart set on it), she told me she wanted Sariah (cousin from Utah) there. Luckily, Sariah has parents that are willing to bring her to Montana from Utah to celebrate Sierra's Birthday with her. The girls LOVED having Sariah around for the weekend!

Grandma Neela also made it to the celebration!

Oh, boy! What kid wouldn't love to have that many balloons?!

Sierra standing in front of *some* of the decorations.

Sierra couldn't wait for her friends to show up so the party could begin!

They played Pin The Tail On The Donkey....

and had a pinata!

Maddie was pretty proud of her candy stash after the pinata!

These were Sierra's Ice Cream Cone Cupcakes for the party. They turned out so cute!

Mmm, enjoying the yummy cupcakes!

After her party, we did a little family shin dig. One thing she got was a real digital camera. Oh boy, she really loves taking pictures!

But the best present was saved for last.....

A NEW BIKE!!!

She was so surprised and LOVED her new bike!!!

That evening we went for a bike ride to test it out. I absolutely LOVE this picture!!! It is so sweet! Daddy/Daughter going on a bike ride (BTW, Jake is riding Maddies bike).

Here is Sierra's Birthday Cake! Just so you know.. I did NOT make this cake. My mom was kind enough to take on that task. Thanks mom!!!

So, this cake has a bit of a story to go along with it. Months before her Birthday, Sierra had chosen a Barbie cake for the big celebration. I was so excited because I thought it would be the perfect cake for her! Well, a few weeks before her Birthday, they were celebrating a Birthday at her school. The Birthday Boy brought in a cake to share with his school mates. When Sierra came home from school she was so excited about the Birthday celebration at school. She told me she wanted a cake just like his. So I said "ok.. what it was it..?" Sierra was so excited and said "A SQUARE CAKE!!!" Um... doesn't she know we dont do square cakes at our house? So, we made a compromise.. a square cake with a barbie cake on top. Yes, this was a TON of cake (also, remeber the ice cream cone cupcakes we had earlier?), but I couldn't settle for just a square cake... nope, not at this house!

It was a great day and I know Sierra loved every minute of it!

P.S. I also learned how to ride a dirt bike. It is actually pretty fun!!

A couple of pics

2010-10-05T13:09:00.003-06:00

I was loading a bunch of pictures from my camera to the computer, and thought these two pictures were cute. So I thought I would share them with you!

Maddie loves puzzles (I love puzzles too). She sat there and did both of these puzzles all by herself. I was pretty proud of her.

Airplane Ride

2010-09-24T12:07:00.003-06:00

Grandpa Slick took us on an airplane ride this morning. Maddie has been so excited for days to finally ride in a plane! We all had a fun ride!

We flew over our neighborhood. This is our street. Our house is the one on the corner.

Here is our house.

Thanks Grandpa Slick!!!

Elko County Fair 2010

2010-09-09T10:43:00.006-06:00

Every year, the Elko County Fair is held over Labor Day weekend. Every year, Jake's family goes to the fair. This year we decided to go. It's a great way to be able to spend time with Jakes Moms side of the family. I think we are going to try to make it to the fair every year.

First off, I have to say that I LOVE the view from Jake's Grandparents deck. They own acres and acres of this beautiful land at the base of the Ruby Mountains. I could just sit out there all day long just watching the brids and the horses on the hill side.

Here is a picture of Jake and his Grandpa doing some work.

Sierra went to church with Jakes Grandparents, so while they were gone, we walked down to the sheep and snooped through the sheds... we found the tool shed and Jake was in heaven! This cute horse was found in one of the sheds.

I'm not sure how many sheep they have but I would say more than 10.

Trying to call the sheep in... it didn't work.

Most of our time in Elko was spent at the HORSE RACES! I had never been to any horse races before. It was actually quite fun! We spent three days at the races.

Sierra really got into it. She would pick a horse and cheer him on, yelling for the horse to go and everything. She loved it! See the guy in the green shirt sitting next to Sheral?.. Well, he saw Sierra's enthusiasm and decided to make a friendly bet. He gave her a dollar, and he had a dollar, and told her if her horse won she would win his dollar. Well, her horse won!!! The guy thought Sierra was gifted! He decided to place a real bet with Sierra's *special gift*. He bought her a ticket.. and she won again!! When the day was done Sierra was $7.48 richer!

Ben and Maddie watching the horses.

They had different events going on while we waited for the next race to start.... who would have thought branding was a sport? It was actually really fun watching the branding and the roping and all the other events. The Ellison Ranch used to participate in these events, but they don't do it anymore.

We did manage to drag the kids away from the races for a few fair rides.

We all had a really fun time! I am definately looking forward to the Elko County Fair next year! After spending those few days at the fair.. I have officially decided that I need a horse!

Yellowstone!!!

2010-08-28T21:57:00.006-06:00

This summer has been filled with lots of vacations. One of those vacations was Yellowstone. We spent two days and two nights (some spent three). I had a lot of fun camping (even with the risk of getting eaten by bears!), and the girls loved it too! This was their first time camping. We went to Yellowstone with the Jaggi clan... cousins and all! It was really nice spending family time in a totally different setting than normal (normal would be sitting at someones house chatting and trying to keep the kids entertained). Brace yourselves for a TON of pictures. Here we go!

Cooking dinner around the nice warm fire. We were very fortunate that both Jake and Richard brought wood. Lucky us!

Apparently Maddie wanted to climb the tree.

All of the kids rode on shoulders a good portion of the time.

They rode on shoulders even on our hike. It wasn't a stroll through the park either. It was a climb to the top of a mountain, and around and back down.

View of Old Faithful from our hike.

Waterfall on our hike.

We came across a big herd of buffalo and had to have a photo op. The girls were pretty nervous.

Close up of a little cluster along the Yellowstone Lake

Check out Maddie's new Yellowstone shirt. She LOVES it! It sparkles too!

Grandpa Scott and Maddie checking out the baby fish.

Papa and the girls checking out the baby fish.

The baby fish. Cutthroat.

This extremely gigantic buffalo decided to walk right in front of us. It was very scary.

Maddie keeping an eye out for bears!

They never did find any.

The falls. Not sure if this is the upper or lower falls, but VERY impressive!

Passing the time.

Tree hugger.

This picture cracks me up. The boys are playing in the water getting wet and dirty, and the girls standing back watching and giggling.

He looks like he's feelin' good.

I am very impressed by Mother Nature!

Fishing For A Day

2010-08-08T18:24:00.005-06:00

Our Neighbors (the green house), Mike and Dianne, invited us to go fishing at their cabin for a day. Their cabin is about a 2 hour drive North East from our house. It is a one room cabin built by Mikes grandpa (or great grandpa... can't remember), in 1935. Is it very cute and rustic. There are a bunch of small mountain creeks around the area that have lots of small cutthroats in them and are hardly ever fished. It was really fun taking the girls and just being out in the fresh mountain air fishing up a storm. There were plenty of fish to catch. :) Make sure to check out the video at the end of the page.... Sierra catching a fish all on her own!

Maddie helped Jake bring this one in.

This is Mike... our official worm finder. We kept him busy.

Everything was just beautiful!

Lunch time!

Busy Summer

2010-08-04T13:09:00.004-06:00

This summer sure has been a busy one! Mostly yard work and stuff around the house, but those are the things that keep you going... right? The girls are in swimming lessons for the first time. They both love it!... although I don't really know any kid that doesn't love to swim. Jake's brother Ben, and sister Sara, stayed with us for a week. Then we went to Utah for a family reunion (Evans family) and attended Jake's Grandpa Evans funeral in Boise a few weeks after the reunion. Here are a bunch of random photos of our summer.

When we were in Boise we were parked at a gas pump right next to a big ol' fire truck. Of course the girls were in awe. The firemen were so nice to the girls, waving at them and talking to them (I'm sure it's in their job decription). Then they came over to our car and gave the girls their very own fire hats!!! So exciting!

Elsa and Sierra swimming at the hotel in Boise. We are lucky this summer and get to spend a lot more time with the Schall's then we normally do. It is great for the girls to get to play with their cousins a bunch this summer!

I was watering the flowers and over watered which made a "river". The girls, being true Montana girls, grabbed their fishing poles and started fishing.

We have BEAUTIFUL rainbows at our house. This one was probably the best... although I wasn't there to see it.

Fishing at the reunion. For the Schalls and Evans reading this... look closely at the canoe....

Jake sure is looking more and more like his dad.

Evans family reunion.

The iPod is the new coolest thing in the house. We can barely keep it charged any more.. with the constant use it is getting.

Well, I guess that is all the pics for now. We still have a quick trip to our neighbors cabin, a trip to Yellowstone, a trip to Elko, and a wedding planned for the next couple months... with lots of yard work in between. Summers sure are busy!!!!

Jake's BIG 30!

2010-07-20T00:00:00.001-06:00

Happy Birthday Jake!!!

It's his big 30th Brithday this year! We celebrated it a little early this year... over the weekend, when we would have time to spend the day having fun! We started off the Birthday celebration with a good old fashioned parade. It was the annual Three Forks parade, kicking off the rodeo weekend. This was the first parade the girls have been too, and the first parade I have been to that after all the floats (and cars, and horses) have gone by, they turn around the come back the other way!! You get the see the whole thing twice!! I love Three Forks!

Waiting for the parade to start

Here it comes....

The girls got sooo much candy. We weren't prepared and didn't have a bag for candy. I totally forgot parades throw candy... what was I thinking??? But we managed to get their giant stash back home. :)

After the parade we came home and got ready for the celebrating. Megan, Nick and our neighbor Mike came over. We grilled steaks, ate cake, and just hung out. It was really nice. I hope Jake had a great Birthday!

Rainbow trout cake. :)

Birdhouses

2010-07-08T08:13:00.003-06:00

Jake thought it would be fun to build some birdhouses for the girls to paint and hang on our fence. Of course the girls had tons of fun painting.

Here they are hanging on our fence. We don't have any birds living in them. I think by the time we did them, the birds already had established their nests. Hopefully next year we will have some birds move in.

Big Birthday Weekend!

2010-06-08T12:19:00.008-06:00

In honor of Maddies Birthday, we decided to take a little weekend family trip to Billings. We thought it would be fun to take the girls to the zoo. They are young enough that the Montana zoo is cool. I think Sierras favorite part were the reptiles, and Maddies favorite part was picking the random flowers along the path. It was still fun though. One major part of our trip was SWIMMING! Sierra has been dying to go swimming, so we made sure to get a hotel with a nice swimming pool. After the zoo we all got in our swimming gear and went swimming. Of course we all had fun. Maddie liked hanging out in the hot tub with papa. Sierra and I stuck to the big pool. After swimming, we showered and got ready for a nice dinner. The next day we headed home to get ready for Maddies Birthday celebration! Maddie has been talking about her birthday for months. She couldn't wait to turn 3, have a ladybug cake, and invite Aunt Megan over to celebrate. All of her birthday wishes came true! We had a fun weekend. It was nice to have a family fun getaway, and I'm sure there will be many more to come!

At the zoo

Sierra was kind of scared of the tiger.

Checking out the wolverine

Animals from the zoo gift store. Sierra chose a baby deer, and if you know Maddie, you wouldn't be surprised that she chose the snake.

SWIMMING!!!

Sierra loved jumping off the side of the pool.

The big pool was too cold for Maddie.

Maddies birthday celebration. Showing her Happy Birthday card Grandma Neela made for her.

It was so fun to watch her excitement!

The ladybug cake.

She almost got them all out in one blow.

The Shed That Jake Built!!

2010-05-30T14:32:00.005-06:00

One day Jake and I were going for a walk... I asked him what he thought about building a shed. We walked around the property, talked it over, mapped it out and that was that, Jake was going to build us a shed! He got right on it and ordered all the lumber. As soon as the weekend rolled around, he got right to it!

He built the whole thing by himself.... well, I stained... but he did everything else. It's a 12x12 shed.

All framed up within a few hours!

Jake putting the siding up.

Getting ready to stain.

Jake cutting the tails off of the facia.

Getting started shingling

Time out for a few pics of the girls.

They were very good at entertaining themselves most of the time. They made their own see-saw.

A little too high for my comfort.

Back to the shed! Almost done!

I love this picture. You can see the big storm clouds all around. If you look closely, you can see the rain pouring down on Jake as he was finishing shingling the roof.

TA-DA! Finished! It took Jake about 2 days to build! It's nice having a carpenter around! :)

Visitors!!!

2010-05-22T23:07:00.002-06:00

(Sariah, Sierra, and Maddie)

My mom, Lena and Sariah came for a visit this last weekend. I had such a good time, and I know the little girls did too! It is ALWAYS nice to be around family. Lena took probably about 800 pictures (literally) and loaded about 400 of them on to my computer. But instead of going through the pictures and then writing a big blog about all the things we did, and how cute the girls were... I thought I would just link you to Lena's blog. She did a great job at blogging about the things we did while they were here. Click the links below to read about our visit. ;)
Miscellaneous
Madison River
Photoshoot

Congrats to the Grad!

2010-05-12T10:27:00.004-06:00

Congrats to Sierra! Her first year of preschool has come and gone. She really enjoyed school.... I'm sure most kids her age do. She has really learned a lot this year in school. She made lots of friends and made lots of cute crafty projects. :) She has one more year of preschool before she is off to the big school and full days. I'm glad that I have one more year with her at home.

This is a little video of one of the songs the kids sang for their graduation. (the boy next to Sierra is AJ)

OH boy!

2010-05-02T12:37:00.004-06:00

Sierra and Maddie had been begging me for days to make cards. Finally we had some spare time for the kids to get their hands sticky (Literally. They use WAY too much glue!). Anyway.... so I got their paper out and let them be. Sierra was so excited to show me what she had been making. She made this specail card for her friend in her class, AJ. She told me that AJ said 'hi' to her in school. Now, when I was in preschool, I remember liking a specific boy. Yes, it is way too young to like boys, but I guess I just couldn't help it. Not sure if Sierra is the same way... So on the inside of the card she drew a dragon and a snowman and lots and lots of hearts! Um... Right away I thought, 'Jake isn't going to like this AJ kid'. Then she wrote AJ's name (she spelled it JA) and her name at the top. I love her drawings. Her dragon and snowman are cute. I think I am going to snatch this card up and keep it before she gets a chance to give it to AJ. She only has 3 more days of school left. She will be going to preschool again next year. I'm not sure if AJ will be moving on to kindergarten or stay in preschool. I guess we will see...

close up

Here is a cute butterfly she made the same day. She is really proud of her butterfly. We hung it up on her magnectic board in her room. Super cute!

Lots of Horses

2010-04-24T18:14:00.004-06:00

Today was the annual horse drive that comes through Three Forks every year. Every spring they round up their horses (not sure how many... a couple hundred?) to move them from their winter pasture to their summer home, the Mantle Ranch. They bring the horses right down Three Forks main street. This was the first year we were able to make it. We have talked about going every year, but never made it out. We were running really behind today, but luckily got there about 4 mintues before the horses came through. It was really pretty to see all of those horses. There were so many different kinds, sizes and colors. It made me want to hop on a horse and ride off into the sunset.

Spring Time Fun

2010-04-20T17:30:00.002-06:00

This is what my girls have been doing during these HOT spring days.

Two Weekends

2010-04-17T21:39:00.003-06:00

I meant to post this last week, but the week got away from me before I posted. Last weekend we went Geocaching! We haven't been in a long time. I'm not even sure if we went at all last year, so it may have been two years since we have been. If you don't know what Geocaching is... I will explain a little. Basically, it is a treasure hunt. Fellow Geocachers hide a box full of 'treasures'. Then they log the GPS coordinates of where they hid the box on a Geocache website. We (or other Geocachers) get the coordinates from the website and begin our hunt. Pretty much you follow your GPS until you get to the exact coordinates. Once you are there you look around until you find the hidden box. We usually bring a treasure to trade with a different treasure in the box. The girls LOVE hunting for treasures. It is a fun and free family activity. One thing I love about Geocaching is that it usually takes us to places we have never been before.

Found the first treasure!

Headwaters, Three Forks

Poor girl needs a real camera.

Maddie showing us her telescope.

Found another one!
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Today we went fishing. I finally (how many years have I lived here now?) got my fishing license! We bought Maddie a new fishing pole (Sierra already had one) and went fishing. The fish weren't biting, and this spot was super crowded. Not really a peaceful fishing trip. But just as we were getting ready to head out Jake caught a fish! Yay! The girls were pretty excited to see it. Now that we are all legal to fish and have all the gear for the whole family, I'm sure we will be going fishing a lot more often.

Sierra caught a big stick.

Pics by Sierra

2010-04-09T16:41:00.002-06:00

Sierra got a hold of my camera today. Here are the two pictures that I kept out of about fifty. Most of the pictures she took were of her My Little Ponys and the carpet. I thought these were cute, so I decided to show them to you.

Easter 2010

2010-04-05T12:29:00.005-06:00

New Easter dresses!

Dying eggs. I saw the cool whisk trick in a magazine. Works great!

So...much.... candy....

It was a chilly morning with a chilly breeze, but we still had fun finding the eggs.

Later that day we went to check out the fish spawning. We did the same thing last year, although this year we didn't fish. It was cold and windy. It was still fun to get out and watch the fish.

Megan and Nick spent the first half of the day with us. The girls LOVE it when they come over!

Zhu Zhu Pets

2010-04-01T09:09:00.002-06:00

WARNING: Please keep toy away from hair.

It says that right on the toy when you get it out of the box. Maddie came up to me this morning, "Mom? I can't get this out of my hair." Oh man, it was a good laugh. I knew it was bound to happen with her. She had already had a few close calls. I couldn't get it out. I had to cut her hair. Oh well. These are actually pretty cute toys. My mom got them for the girls. I had never heard of them. You can check them out here if you have never heard of them either.

Movie Night

2010-03-13T21:09:00.002-07:00

Tonight we had our movie night. We have been doing a movie night about once a month for a few months now. We rent a kid movie, pop popcorn and cozy up in our jammies and watch our movie. We got this cool stove top popcorn popper for Christmas. We love it! The kids love to watch and listen to the popcorn. Plus it makes the best popcorn.

Here we are in our jammies waiting to start the movie. Maddie was super excited for this particular movie night. Not really sure why... I think it was the popcorn. We rented Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs. It was a cute movie. Sierra was really into it.. she even teared up a little at the sad part (do 4 year olds really do that?)... I think we have a true girl on our hands. It was a fun movie night with a fun movie!

On a side note.. here is a cute picture Sierra drew in bed tonight. A gigantic dragon up in the clouds and snow with the people below. She loves dragons!

Rainbow Cupcakes

2010-03-11T14:36:00.004-07:00

Mmm... Don't those cupcakes look so cute, springy and yummy?! The girls and I made rainbow cupcakes today. I got the idea from Family Fun magazine, although it isn't the same as their rainbow cupcakes they had in their latest issue, but it works just the same.

First you make a white cake mix, then divide it out into however many colors you want. I let the girls choose two colors each. Sierra chose purple and pink (surprise, surprise), and Maddie chose orange and green (orange is Maddie's fav).

Then we dished out the batter into the cupcake liners and popped them into the oven.

It sure is cute seeing cupcake pans full of rainbow cupcakes.

Of course we frosted them the same colors. They would be cute with white frosting too, but what is the fun is that?

This was a fun activity and very tasty too! :)

Cutest Show on Earth

2010-03-10T15:38:00.004-07:00

ETA: There has been some confusion why I put up a picture of Sierra when I said I went to the circus with Maddie... The very cute tightrope walking clown was Sierra. Her school put on a circus for the parents.

Maddie and I went to a circus today. It was the Cutest Show on Earth! They had lions and tigers jumping through flaming hoops. They had seals balancing balls on their noses and *very* cute tightrope walking clowns. It was quite a show!

Sleepover

2010-02-24T13:48:00.002-07:00

Sierra had her first sleepover. She slept over at Aunt Megan's house. I think they both had a really fun time. I know Sierra did because she came home with her hair curled, purple make up on and a pretty necklace. That is Sierra's ideal sleepover for sure! The only thing missing was her crown. I'm glad that Sierra got to spend some quality time with Megan. Sierra just loves her and always looks forward to seeing her. Thanks Megan!

Ski Day!

2010-02-15T17:58:00.003-07:00

Jake's boss called on Sunday and asked us if we wanted to have an Ebbighausen Ski Day in the morning. Well, sure... :) We got both Sierra and Maddie out there on skis. Well, they shared a pair. We got the skis for Sierra, but Maddie wanted to try it so bad, so we strapped them on her and she absolutely LOVED it! Sierra had fun too! I think Sierra was a bit more scared than Maddie was. Both of the girls did so good. Maybe we will have to go up again before the end of the year. I'm glad that we finally got the girls out on the slopes! It's sort of hard to decide when you think your kids are ready, but to my surprise, they were both more than ready! We only got Sierra a pass, so Maddie had to share Sierra's coat to get on the lift (because the pass was hooked to Sierra's coat). So, in the pictures both of the girls are wearing the same coat. The pink hat girl is Maddie and Sierra has the brown hat. There are also two videos at the bottom. These videos are from the girls first runs. Sierra ended up doing 6 runs down the bunny hill, and Maddie did 2. So fun!

Videos from Sierra's and Maddie's first ski runs - Sierra is the first one, Maddie is the second.

Crafting With My Girls

2010-02-12T14:15:00.003-07:00

Friday's have now turned into 'craft day' at our house. I spend Thursdays cleaning up the house to get ready for Friday, a full day of nothing but relax and enjoy! Usually it is just me crafting away, but slowly the girls have been crafting with me. Today was a 'craft day' dedicated to my two girls. We started out by making blackberry jam- I know, not a craft, but a homemakers kind of thing. Sort of fits with the craft theme. I have never had blackberry jam, and it is very good, especially after you add the sugar ;). The girls wanted to lick the bowl.

Then it was card time (I had to squeeze a little craft in for myself, it is craft day after all)! I gave the girls some paper, ribbon, punches, scissors, and glue and they went to town. I think Maddie used up a whole roll of ribbon, and I'm pretty sure Sierra went through a whole stick of glue. They had tons of fun.

Next was beading time. Sierra has been dying to do some beading. So I finally broke out the beads. Sierra didn't need any help at all. I thought she might need a little, but she didn't want any. Maddie needed help and quickly got bored. Sierra was very patient. It took her about an hour to make a bracelet, but she didn't get frustrated once. I was impressed.

BTW: Sierra is now a princess. She always wears her crown (even to bed), she dresses in gowns and wears high heels. Sometimes she does a little magic with her wand as well. Oh boy!

All things Crafty

2010-02-06T10:05:00.002-07:00

Maddie has been taking after her big sister and has been a drawing fool. Here are a few of her cute drawings. I just love her cute people she draws. :)

Yes, she is sitting on the potty. I am proud to say she IS potty trained!!!

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While I was getting all my paper ready for my card class this weekend, Sierra got her scissors and some paper and made her own card. She did it 100% herself! I am very proud of it. I even gave her my special pen (a white gel pen) to write on the inside. She wrote her name.

Then she helped Maddie make a card. There was a little confusion about whose card it really was. Sierra was showing Maddie how to decorate it, but since it was Maddie's card, she didn't want Sierra's input. It was funny to watch Sierra glue some hearts on, then Maddie rip them off. At least Maddie let Sierra put the ribbon on.

This is Sierra's AWESOME dinosaur! She cut it out and glued the legs on all by herself. It even had an eye, but fell off. I am very proud of my little crafty girl! She loves everything crafty! She told me yesterday that when she gets big, she wants to have a card class too! :)

ABC's

2010-02-01T10:36:00.002-07:00

Here is a little clip of Maddie singing her ABC's. She missed a few letters toward the end, but still cute. Sorry the quality is crappy.

Aww So Cute!

2010-01-23T13:23:00.003-07:00

Maddie: Thank you Sierra for sharing with me. (play doh)
Sierra: Your Welcome.
Maddie: I like you.
Sierra: I like you too Madison.
:)
Maddie: Mom! Sierra's being nice to me! (ha ha ha)

Spiders!!

2010-01-22T12:01:00.002-07:00

Sierra came home from school the other day with this cool spider that they made. She loved it so much that it had completely fallen apart by the end of the day. She was pretty sad about it. So I told her we could make some new spiders.

So today was spider making day! Really, it only took about 15 minutes - easy peasy!

Snow, Wands, and Coyotes

2010-01-08T13:44:00.006-07:00

We had a bit of a blizzard blow through our area the other day. We didn't get much accumulation, but we did end up with a good size snow drift in the back. The girls were so excited to see snow in the morning! After Sierra got home from school that day, they begged and begged me to let them go outside and play in the snow. Well, it was sunny, not warm (9 degrees), sunny, so, sure, why not. So they went out and played while I mopped the floor. I made sure to keep a close eye out for the coyote that has been lingering around. I made the dogs babysit and stay outside with the girls, just in case the coyote came around. Well, just as I was letting the dogs in and rounding up the girls, out came the coyote. I stood at the door and watched, curious about what he was up to. So I let the girls play a little longer while I watched the coyote. Then he spotted the girls, playing on the fence and decided to come a little closer. So I went outside, ready to beat him down if he came any closer (he was still pretty far, but not far enough). I guess he decided he better not mess with the mom, so he wandered off - slowly. I really don't like coyotes.
Anyway... the girls had tons of fun in the snow. Maddie especially liked making snow angels in 1/2 inch deep snow. She kept saying "This is fun! This is fun!"

snow angels

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Yesterday we made wands. The girls had so much fun decorating them. They played with them all day. Sierra even took her wand to bed with her. Little girls are so much fun!

Our New Neighbor...

2010-01-04T23:42:00.002-07:00

Actually, we are probably his new neighbors. This coyote has been being brave lately, coming out during the day. We heard plenty of coyotes yipping this last summer during the night, but this is the first I have seen one during the day. I've seen him a few times in the past couple weeks just walking in the fields behind our house. Kind of fun to glance out the window to see if you see him. But I wouldn't be disappointed if he mysteriously disappeared for good....

Christmas 2009

2009-12-29T09:08:00.006-07:00

We had a great Christmas this year! Maddie was especially excited for Santa to come. She got up early Christmas morning, dug through her stocking and climbed in bed with us, candy and all - little stinker. We even found a candy stash hidden under her pillow later that day... gotta watch that one.

We all had a lot of fun opening our presents- who wouldn't?

Santa brought Sierra some make up (she is a true girl), and couldn't wait to put it on. She made Maddie look beautiful too. I passed on that one. I think Sierra must have got her make up skills from her aunt Megan....

Thank you all for thinking of us this holiday season!

Christmas Program

2009-12-18T09:57:00.002-07:00

Sierra had her first Christmas program at school lastnight. Sierra was Mary. They did a little summary of the birth of Jesus, then the kids sangs a few songs. Sierra was pretty much clueless about what was going on. I wish they would have told us which songs the kids were going to be singing, so we could help them out at home, but they didn't tell us anything. It was short and sweet, and fun that they had a Christmas program at her preschool. Maybe next year she will get it a little better.

In the video, Sierra is the short one in front. I seriously think she is the shorest one in the school (both AM and PM classes). I didn't realize she really is short. When I brought Sierra to school the first time both of her teachers commented on how little she was. I thought it was funny - but it is true.

A Little Bit Of Christmas

2009-12-11T15:03:00.004-07:00

I just wanted to show everyone some of our Christmas stuff. We bought a new tree this year. We have hated our old tree for years, and actually had it up with lights on, then decided that we really hated it. So we went out and came home with a 7.5 ft, pre lit tree! I love it! It fits the window spot perfectly. And it looks so good from the outside looking in. I didn't notice when I was taking the picture that I cut off the top- oops. There is an angel up there (sorry about the blurry pics).
This is our first year of actully putting lights up on our house. I think we never did it before because we haven't had our own house - it's just not the same decorating some one elses house for the holidays. We had intended on putting up more lights - around the windows and down the other two posts, but I think we just settled with what we have for this year. I love it! I love coming home from work at night and our house is the only house still lit - looks so Christmas-y! See the tree? :)

For a few years now, I have been wanting to have home made stockings. I didn't really know what I wanted. I first thought I wanted knitted stockings - so I attempted to learn to knit - solely for the reason of knitting Christmas stockings - well, knitting is not my thing. So, I learned to crochet, thinking I can crocket stockings, but I never found a crocheted stocking that fit my idea of what I wanted. So finally this year, I decided to sew some. So I went out and just bought a bunch of different fabrics - came home, mixed and matched and this is how they turned out!I LOVE THEM!!! Exactly what I had been wanting for years! I threw out our old store bought, boring stockings (Jake still has his origianl stocking that he grew up with - he will not part with it, so just us girls got new ones). I just found a stocking pattern online and went to work. This one is Maddie's. She fell in love with the fabric before she even knew what was going on. She was so excited to see the final project. I just love the holly berry on the cuff.

This one is mine. This was the first one I attempted - the demo. It love these fabrics together - very home made to me.

Sierras stocking. She wanted a red stocking, but I didn't want to use plain red. I didn't have much to work with, since I only bought a few fabrics, but I think she is happy. I didn't really know what to do to embelish it- I thought it looked a little masculine - so I added a bow with a button. Now it looks girly. I love ribbons and buttons! I am very happy with the stockings- I just hope they hold up for Christmases to come.

Sierra Loves To Draw

2009-12-07T11:23:00.002-07:00

Whale

Turkey

She copied the snowman that you can see off to the left. If you notice in her drawing, she added the two patches on the front of the snoman, one of the patches has a button on it. I think she did a pretty good job!

Snowman

Person.

I was confused by this one at first. I thought it was a dinosaur or dragon. Sierra kept saying it was a hippo. Then that night when we were reading books I saw the hippo. She copied the hippo character in the Sandra Boynton books. Then it all made sense. It looks just like it!

Butterfly

The Most Wonderful Time

2009-12-02T11:25:00.002-07:00

Here are our 2009 Christmas ornaments! My family has always had the tradition to make a new ornament every year. We have done it ever since I can remember. Even though all of us girls are out of the house and have our own families, we are still doing the tradition. This year we decided to make a house themed ornament since Nikki, Lena and I have new houses this year. My ornament is on the left. Sierra's is in the middle and Maddie's is on the right. I love this tradition and am happy that eventhough I am way up in Montana I can still join in. :)

It's Been A Little While

2009-11-26T08:31:00.003-07:00

It's been a while since I have blogged anything. I guess our lives are uneventful. Just regular everyday life. Jake has been busy building benches and enjoying his new shop (garage). He has sold 4 of them! Sierra has been having so much fun at school. She has been learning so much. She comes home, sits down and practices writing her numbers. She told Jake the other day that she has a boy friend at school - hmm, I don't think Jake liked that one. Maddie of course wishes she could go to school, but until then she is getting really good at checking the mail. That is her job on school days. And me, well, same old thing. I had my first card class this last weekend. It was fun! Can't wait until the next one!

Anyway... on to the pictures. Sierra drew these bugs yesterday and I thought they were so cute. The top one is a cute little happy lady bug. The bottom on is a cool bee. I just love that she loves to draw!

My Neck of the Woods!

2009-11-10T15:19:00.002-07:00

For those of you who don't know, I have my own paper crafting blog! brookeschall.blogspot.com Check it out!

Sierra

2009-11-05T14:23:00.002-07:00

Yes, this is seriously how Sierra is dressed today. She is especially proud of her "X's" on her shoes. She looks very stylish from her head all the way down to her backwards feet. Today was a stay at home house cleaning day - if you couldn't tell.

Halloween '09

2009-11-01T19:04:00.005-07:00

We had a great Halloween this year! We had the two cutest ladybugs out there! I loved that the girls wanted to be the same thing. I wanted them to be fairies, and they wanted bugs, so I made them fairy type ladybugs- glitter and all! The girls loved it! Trick or treating was so much fun. The weather was warm-ish, nice enough to skip the mall and go to the streets. Maddie thought trick or treating was the coolest thing ever! She was so excited and ran to every house. It is so much fun to see their excitment.

Megan and her friend Bianca came with us. They were fun and dressed up. Jake and I didn't.

Maddie was so stinkin cute, but I was having issues with the camera and couldn't capture it. But I got a good 'flashy' picture. Just picture a little 2 year old ladybug running like 2 years do, wings and piggy buns bouncing - big grin from ear to ear- so cute!

The girls were very interested about the whole pumpkin carving process. Sierra thought the guts of the pumpkin were cool. Sierra carved a bat (with Jake's help), Maddie carved a scary castle, Jake carved a skull, and I carved a regular jack-o-lantern.

School Days

2009-10-19T15:38:00.003-06:00

Today was Sierra's first day of pre school! She has been so excited for months to go to school. The pre school in Three Forks wont take kids until they are four, so she had to wait until her birthday. Which was only a week away by the time I got a hold of the school. We have been counting down the days - and today it finally arrived. She was so excited to take her backpack to fill it with papers from school to bring home. I have been so excited waiting to get her into school. I knew she would just love it. She has been needing an activity - and this is perfect! We had been prepping her for us to leave her at school and later Maddie and I will come and get her. Sierra did fine. Maddie on the other hand had a breakdown. We should have been prepping Maddie the whole time. She wanted to stay and play with friends. She cried the whole ride home and I had to talk her into getting out of the car. Next time, I think I am going to have a special activity planned for Maddie, so she doesn't feel left out while Sierra is having so much fun at school. When I picked up Sierra she was so excited to tell me she got SNACKS at school! Funny. She told Jake she met friends, made pumpkins, sang songs and talked. They did some cutting with scissors, so as soon as we got home Sierra wanted to start cutting again. I can't wait to see the pumpkin she made in school. They left them there. I knew they were making them (out of paper plates), and was bummed when Sierra told me they left them at school. I am so glad Sierra had such a fun time. I was a little worried it wouldn't meet my expectations, but it does to a "T". So excited! She gets to be in pre school for two years until Kindergarten. I am excited about that too. I think I am more excited than Sierra is. I think I am just so happy that Sierra finally has something fun and educational for her to do. :)

Sierra has also learned to write her name. I love her "E" and "S". She really is growing up...

Sierra's 4th Birthday Bash

2009-10-10T14:30:00.004-06:00

Sierra had such a great Birthday! Thanks to everyone for the phone calls, cards, and gifts! She felt so special and loved every minute of it! :)

For her Birthday dinner we all made our own pizzas. We rolled our own little dough pieces and topped them all with pepperoni and cheese. It is so easy and pretty much a guarantee that the girls will eat their own creations.

After dinner we went straight to the presents. Fun for everyone!

Maddie checking out one of Sierra's gifts.

After the presents were all opened, it was cake time! Sierra has wanted a bee cake for months. One day she sat and look through all of my cake idea books. She still talks about her castle cake from last year. At first she wanted a dragon, then a dinosaur (not that there is much of a difference), then she saw a bee. Kind of a weird selection, but that was it... a bee! She talked and talked about a bee cake. She was so excited for her birthday so that she could have a bee cake. So, when the time came to make it, she was right there by my side the whole time. Checking out the whole process. After I cut out the shape and started frosting the yellow and black strips, it clicked in Sierra's brain. She could see how that was her bee cake. The one she has been dreaming about. She told me she was "super excited" for her cake! She was very pleased with the results. I stressed a little over it (which I do with every cake), but it did turn out cute.

We all had a fun time celebrating Sierra's 4th Birthday! Love that girl!

Happy Birthday Sierra Mae!!!

2009-10-09T09:38:00.000-06:00

A Moose In Elk Ridge

2009-10-07T10:40:00.004-06:00

I got a phone call yesterday while I was still in bed. It was Jake on his way to work, letting me know there was a moose down the road. So I got the girls up and we drove down there as fast as we could so we wouldn't miss it. I don't think moose come around here very often. It isn't what you would call moose country.

When we drove up all we could see was her little ears poking up through the frosty weeds. The moose wasn't very happy to have us hanging around. She got up, walked around a bit and kept snorting at us. We hung around for about 10 mintues or so, watching, then the girls talked me into getting a little closer.

So we drove down to the lower road. Soon as we got there, the moose started walking in our direction. If you look at the picture you can clearly see in her eyes, that we were not wanted. She walked across the road about 30 feet in front of us. It was very intimidating. If she were a male moose, I don't think I would have been comfortable being that close. Luckily she just crossed the street and headed up into the hills. It was really exciting to see a moose out here where we live. We may never see one out here again.

Eagle Ridge

2009-09-27T21:02:00.001-06:00

Now that the weather is cooling down a bit we have been outside a lot - taking lots of walks. We were walking down our street and I was watching the girls run and chase the dogs, and I was thinking how much I love my new neighborhood. There is nothing around (except a few neighbors and deer). The girls and the dogs can just run with nothing to worry about. I just love it. So I decided to take the camera on one of our walks to show you our neighborhood.

Red Shoulder Lane - our street. Sierra is way down there chasing Daisy, while Zoe and Maddie are way behind. Everyone was having so much fun.

Our Neighbors. All three of them. Our house is the red one on the end. The tan house, the one closest in the picture is vacant. I believe it has been sold though. So we actually only have two neighbors. Which are both very nice.

Our Neighborhood. Acres and acres of empty lots. This will be a fun before picture before more houses are built.

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While I was at work today, Jake and the girls went on a ride to find deer. Just down the hill from us they came across a herd of about 40. Here are a few pictures of the deer.

Daddy Date

2009-09-22T12:41:00.002-06:00

Jake and Sierra went on a day date last Saturday. Jake had been dying to take Sierra fishing, so off they went. They left in the morning, and went fishing for a while - didn't catch anything. Then they went out to lunch and made their way to the mall to get a hair cut from Megan. I think they both had a fun time. A nice change of pace. :)

Heat is Overrated

2009-09-21T13:13:00.004-06:00

Look what we ordered! A semi load of wood! This picture does not do it justice. It is a TON of wood. This is roughly around 15 cords - we are thinking that we will go through about 2-3 cords a winter (although I am thinking more like 2). So, this wood will last us a LONG time- which is the whole point. We will be nice and toasty warm for the next 6-7 years. :) Good thing Jake got himself a new-to-him chainsaw. Jake and the chainsaw have a lot of work ahead of them!

Palasade Falls

2009-09-13T21:47:00.003-06:00

We went on a nice little hike to a waterfall the other day. It was a short hike, and paved the whole way, but the girls loved it. Sierra was sure to let us know that there weren't any bears around. And both of the girls kept their eyes out for wild raspberries. We all had a very good time.

My Handy Hubby

2009-09-03T13:50:00.004-06:00

You might have been asking yourself - "I wonder what Jake has been up to this summer?"- then this is the post for you. I have finally taken pictures of all of his projects and loaded them up ready to blog.

Jake made this cute little birdhouse as a gift for someone, but I sort of adopted it and have in on display in my house. I suppose Jake can have it back when he is ready to send it off.

I LOVE my new cabinets! We have really been needing cabinets in our laundry room. So we went out to Lowes and bought some ugly unfinished oak cabinets and a little paint. We came home and Jake went to work painting and sanding to make these beautiful antique looking cabinets. I really am in love with these cabinets.

This piece of work is one of our newest additions in our home. Our spare room is our computer/stamping room. We had a huge computer desk taking up one side of the room, and another stamping desk taking up the other side. It was sort of a waste of space. Jake has been reading up on making small spaces feel bigger and came up with this... A built in computer/stamping desk all in one. You can see the shelves are for my stamping supplies and the desk is for the computer. When I am ready to do some stamping, I just move the keyboard over and go to work. I really like the "L" shape while I am stamping. I have a lot more room than my old desk. It really opens up the room more and looks so snazy too. We are eventually going to put a bed in there and make it a guest room. Love it! Our brand new fence! Here is a picture of Jake digging holes the old school way - post hole digger. Jake gets all the credit on this one for sure. He dug and dug and dug, then pounded dirt and got all the posts in. Then after a few hours of work on Saturday and Sunday he had all the rails put up and ta-da!!! A new fence!

LOVE IT!!! It is actually a pretty big fenced in back yard. But I just took a picture of a small section of the fence. It turned out so nice. Now if it would just keep the deer out. Yeah right!

The Mantle. Jake just put this baby up yesterday. This is a bad picture.. sorry. Maybe I should have taken a close up so you can see the detail in the wood. Rough cut, circle sawn wood. Jake gave it a little beating, applied a little bit of the concauction, a little stain... a bit of sanding and we have a mantle. It really completes the little stove corner. The wood is such a nice dark color and looks right at home in our home.

The red bench. Jake was asked to make two benches to display in a Parade of Homes home that they just built. This one is not a typical Jake style, but it turned out so nice. It is such a cute bench. Perfect for an entry way.

The wood bench. We are currently using this one in our mud room. We have our shoes lined up on the bottom shelf. It is the perfect size for sitting down and taking off your shoes.

Here is a close up of the top. Very nice!

Well now you know what Jake has been up to this summer. He is getting quite good at finishing all the projects he has started. Lucky for me there is a long 'winter' list. I can't wait to have more goodies around the house.

Some Summer Pics

2009-08-08T20:53:00.003-06:00

Sierra and Maddie

Sierra

Maddie

Happy Birthday Jake!

2009-07-20T16:12:00.002-06:00

We celebrated Jake's Birthday last Saturday. We started out the day by stopping by Jake's favorite breakfast place, Wheat Montana, for their gigantic cinnamon rolls. Then we were off to the fair. This was the first time we have been to the Gallatin County Fair. Of course we wanted to show the girls all the animals. Maddie hated the pigs, but loved the sheep. I think Sierra's favorite were the sheep too. Sierra got a little unicorn painted on her face, but later told us she didn't like the unicorn, she wanted a butterfly... maybe next year. They started the rides up just before we were ready to leave, so we bought a few tickets and went on two very fun rides.

After the fair we went to lunch and headed home to relax a bit before it was crunch time to make a cake. I wanted Jake's cake to be special this year so I made him a tape measure. It turned out pretty cute. We invited our neighbors and Megan over for some cake. Overall it was a nice day. Happy Birthday Jake! We love you!