Double Happiness

A White Thanksgiving... {updated}

So much to be grateful for this year!  A beautiful white Thanksgiving holiday at my brother's house in Northern Idaho.  We bundled up the girls in snow pants, fluffy jackets and insulated boots and gloves and they spent hours outside playing in the snow, sledding and building a snowman with their big brother, Michael.

Gwen quickly ducked outside (into the falling snow) so I could snap a quick photo of her without all of the overstuffed snow attire. 

Maddy loved the way the soft snowflakes felt on her upturned hands!  A few minutes later, we all pulled on our snow pants and fluffy coats and gloves and built a sled run!  Then we played on that for the rest of the day!

Michael built this cool snowman.  More about that later.

David and Barbara have this beautiful mural painted on the wall  near the stairs to the master bedroom loft.  A perfect backdrop for our handsome family!  From the left:  Barbara, Michael, Andrew, Gwenny, David and Madeline.

This is Maddy and Gwen with their Aunt Barbara.  My brother had the good sense to marry this very special woman almost 23 years ago (he knew her his entire life).  I never had a sister so it's incredibly cool to have a Sister-in-Law that is so easy to love! 

When we weren't outside playing in the snow (or eating!), we were watching the Harry Potter series or playing "Angry Birds" on our iphones/ipod.  We're big fans of H. Potter and A. Birds!

Here's a fun artsy "Hallmark Card" version of Michael's snowman creation.   Uncle David tried to find some coal for his eyes but the coal sack was buried under several feet of snow so he offered up some big buttons to use as eyes instead.  And what to use for buttons on his body?  Well, Dibs ice-cream bites of course!  In the 18 degree weather, they'll probably last until spring (if the deer don't decide to eat them first).    The carrot nose froze quickly and was so heavy that it hardly stayed attached to the face!  Who knew making a snowman was so challenging!?  ;)

This is Gwen and Maddy with sweet playful Zorra.  She's a hunny of a dog and a solid member of the family.  My brother thinks she's a Rottweiler/Border Collie mix but I think she might  be a Rottweiler/Labrador mix.  What do you think?

I hope everyone had many blessings to count this Thanksgiving holiday!

Bye Bye Ear Tube!

After more than two years, Maddy's one remaining ear tube finally came out.  They're only supposed to last for 4 to 12 months but this one held on with annoying perseverence.  She's had lots of trouble with it because it makes her ear itch and her skinny little finger can easily fit much too deeply into her ear and she hurts herself when she tries to scratch the itch. 

Over the years, I've kept an eye on this ear and I could see that the tube was still in her ear drum.  But when I checked last week, I saw that it was in a different position so I suspected that it was out.  A quick Dr appointment confirmed that it wasn't in her ear drum any longer and they easily removed it from her ear.

I took it from the Dr and showed it to Maddy and she seemed confused.  All this time, I think she was imagining that it was more "tube" like.  She said she thought it would be long and thin - like a long skinny straw.  I think she was disappointed that it was only this teensy little white thing because it's been such a BIG annoyance for the last year or more.  I slipped it onto a sewing needle so you could see the size comparision.

Maddy had a cleft palate and some recurring ear infections so we had the tubes put in when they did the cleft palate repair.  While they were in, they worked like a charm - no ear infections at all.    It's amazing to me that the ear drum repairs itself when the tube falls out and we're hopeful that we'll never have to get tubes again!     

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For more Black & White Wednesday fun, check out The Long Road to China.
More of our Black & White Wednesday posts here:  Black & White Wednesday

Who's that girl?

Ever since 1st grade started, our mornings are pretty action packed and crazy and dragging a hair brush through Gwen's super long locks causes way too much agony for both of us. 

For months, I've threatened to cut her hair and she finally called my bluff so, last weekend, I chopped about ten inches off!  It's still what most people would consider "long" but it's nothing like it used to be and the biggest surprise of all is.... I like it. 

After school today, I asked her to come outside so I could snap a few photos of her new 'do' in the sunlight.  These aren't the best quality but I just love the images I captured of this little Thief-O-Hearts.

I keep lip gloss in the camera bag because her lips are always chapped and it's so hard to fix that in photoshop.  She usually HATES the lipgloss but today she wanted to put it on all by herself. 

I handed it to her and she slowly unscrewed the top.  Then she looked at her reflection in my sunglasses and smeared the pearly goo all over her mouth and chin.  I was laughing so hard I could hardly see through the viewfinder!

We cleaned up the glossy overflow and then she decided that she needed to "paint" her fingernails.

This is a kid who has NEVER let me paint her fingernails with actual nail polish.    She had so much fun covering each fingernail with lip-gloss and I had even more fun taking photos of it! 

But weren't we here to take pics of her new hairdo?

Here's a pretty motion pic of her amazingly thick hair from the back.  Don't you wish YOUR hair was this thick?

Here's the swingy hair shot when she turned around.   Oh, if only they gave out hair scolarships to college.

Ah, what a sweetie!

You might notice that she's wearing a skimpy little shirt in these photos even though we're a week into November.  I dressed her in three layers of shirts this morning but this is how my little goofball came home. 

B&W Wednesday: Renaissance Gwen

You sure wouldn't know it from looking at this photo but our little Gwen is a major tomboy!  In fact, we joke that she's our 'other' son.  And would you ever guess from her utterly charming pose, above, that she loathed this dress? 

She was a Navi Princess (Avatar) for Halloween and that's the only thing she wanted to wear but we made her pose for some photos in this Renaissance style costume too.  After a minute or two of hysterically pathetic pouty poses, she got her groove back and let her real personality shine through.  Wanna see some of the color costume pics?  They're lovely and they're here.

Our Halloween over the years: 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010.

 

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For more Black & White Wednesday fun, check out The Long Road to China.
More of our Black & White Wednesday posts here:  Black & White Wednesday

Trick or Treat!

Without a doubt, this was our favorite Halloween so far! 

The girls were counting the days and minutes until they could put on their costumes and beg door to door for candy.  What a weird tradition!  We attended a neighborhood costume party then hit the streets.  An hour later, we had more candy than any family should eat and two extremely tired kids! 

And, as if getting candy wasn't already the most awesome part of Halloween, they got to HAND IT OUT this year too!  Seriously, I think they liked that part best of all.  They parked their kiesters just inside the front door and worked out all of the details about who would open the door and who would dole out the goods.  When the task was complete, they dismissed their door-guests with a sweet duet of "Happy Halloween!" then plunked back down to patiently await the next round of trick-or-treaters.  We're sure they would have kept this up all night if we let them but, alas, it was a school night so we eventually had to wash faces and brush teeth and trade those costumes for pajamas.  Even though they thought it was incredibly unfair and wholly unnecessary, two minutes later, they were both sound asleep!

(Since I'm sure someone will ask, that arrow Gwen is holding isn't real.  I Photoshopped it in!)

Here are a few more photos of our costumed cuties (minus the makeup):

Maddy walks like an Egyptian

Pretty little darling!  Don't you just love those shoes?

Gwen hated this dress.  She only wanted to wear her Avatar costume.  Even though she was miserable, she sure did take some pretty photos!

Dreaming of getting to wear the Avatar costume?

Getting totally fed up with these photos?

Ah!  There's my happy (and beautiful!) Avatar girl!

I saw Mr Bones laying in a box in our garage and thought he might be perfect for the November theme over on We Picture {this}.  The theme is "Body Parts"!  Hee hee... even though I'm sure they had something else in mind, I like my take on it!

I hope everyone had a fun halloween!  We sure did!