Technically Overdue

Hello Blog.  I know you've been neglected lately.  I apologize in advance for the looks of this post.  I have tried and tried to get things back to normal and have no idea how to do such...and quite frankly I'm tired of trying.  So, if you don't already know my computer is a DINOSAUR.  It's about 10 years old and is still the same as it was way back when only it keeps telling me I have no memory left and it runs at turtle speed.  Well, my sweet hubby got me an ipad for Christmas.  I just took it out of the box yesterday (I know, I'm crazy!)  And I just can't figure out how to blog on the stupid thing.  I can put pictures on the ipad but I can't figure out how to get them on the blog on that little thing.  Anyway, I'm back on the dino and it's taken me all day long to get this post going.  Now, I don't know how I did it but the text is centered and doesn't want to go to the left like it's supposed to and every time I try to make it do so it goes back to the center.  So you're getting to read centered words today...you're welcome.  Also all the pictures are in reverse order but as long as it took for me to get them on here in general you're just going to have to deal with that kink.  If anyone knows a good tutorial on how to blog from the ipad please pass that along. 

Ok, here's what's been going on in our world since the beaver attacked our trees.  By the way, the beaver is still around.  He has gotten braver and has taken half a bush about ten feet from my back porch.  He's also eaten several trees from the neighbors yards.  I think we're going to get some trappers to get em!  Anyway, we just celebrated Henry's 4th birthday!  He wanted a bowling party so we bowled it up this past Saturday.  My pictures are limited b/c my card is full and I didn't empty it b/c I'm real prepared like that.  Anyway, here he is mad at William for blowing his candles out with that party favor blower thingy:

And here are some pics of the kids bowling.  We rented these dino ramp things that the kids put their balls on and pushed them off of.  And of course we had the bumpers up.  They had a ball.

Hey, what do you know, my text moved over where it's supposed to.  (the dino must be possessed or just plain stubborn, take your pick)
Here is what the girls did a lot until MA's finger got in the ball's way. 

My inlaws came for the par-tay and my parents came for Henry's actual birthday and we chuck e. cheesed it up.  I have no pictures as usual b/c I'm so prepared that I forgot to take the camera to CEC.  Here is a sweet one of the girls and Pa sound asleep on the couch.

Back in January (the 9th I think) we got some snow.  It wasn't a ton but we made the most of it.  My friend Heather and I spend a lot of time together and we just happened upon some sleds at Marshalls a few days before.  So when the snow started falling to Marshalls we went a calling and picked up a few and sledded down the hill on the side of our house.  Here are the girls going together:

She crashed and burned and jumped right back up and said, "I want to go again!"  They loved it!

Don't ask me which girl is which b/c I have no idea.  And Henry man:

Here is Heather and Hudson (her youngest) going down together:

Keep in mind all the pics are backwards so if you want to see the true descent down the hill look at the from the bottom up.  Here is my MA sweetie pie:

My honey made a snowman with the kids.  He fell over pretty quick.  I think he was a little top heavy personally.

Sweet Mary Collins:

Charlie man:

Henry:

William:

MC:

rolling rolling rolling...keep that snowball rolling:

We kept busy getting ready for Christmas by playing hunter a lot:

Here are the kids at our last and final attempt at a Christmas card pic.  We had pink eye for what seemed like the second half of the month so I finally decided just to stick them in their pjs and throw them in front of the tree.....only when I decided that it was almost 80 degrees and just too plain hot to sport their Christmas pjs so you get this instead:

We had school parties.  And here is a shot of Charlie and his little "girlfriend".  They are smitten with each other.  We had spirit night at Chick-Fil-A the other night and she tackled him when she saw him.  I guess that's affectionate for 1st graders, ha!

Here are some early attempts at Christmas card pics.  These would have work, only I think we had almost 30 mph winds this day and the kids almost got blown away!

My sister-in-law bought these Kelly Kids outfits for the girls and gave them to them for their FIRST Christmas.  We finally fit into them this year and I thought they looked so cute on them:

My three youngins love to play kitchen/tea party/restaurant while the older boys are in school.  I walked in on them on day and found this:

Remember way back when when I said we were hosting a Christmas party for Clayton's reps?  Well, we did.  And it turned out pretty good.  The getting ready part was stressful and busy but we got it done, with A LOT of help from my in-laws!  I tell ya, Meme and Pop are saints!  Here are some pictures of the house decorated for Christmas.  Our tree:

The living room mantle:  You can't see good but those cards are the 12 days of Christmas with the meaning of each day and the story of how Christians came up with the song to instill their faith in their families.  I came across them at Mistletoe & Magic (Christmas craft fair type thing that junior league does here) and I just had to have them.  They string up by a plaid ribbon.

Can't figure out why but I can't write above the above pic.  It's our front door.  And below is my dining room mantle.

Our kitchen table:

And that's it for my Christmas pics.  Unfortunately I have none from Christmas day b/c (since I'm so prepared and all) I waited until the kids went to bed Christmas Eve to wrap ANYTHING so I finally woke Clayton up (who was sick with the stomach bug) at 4:30 and decided we had better assemble some things in case the kids woke up early.  So we assembled until 6:15 and crawled in the bed.  I think the kids made it until 8 maybe....really can't remember...things are kinda hazy from lack of sleep.  Anyway, we had a great Christmas and went over to our friends the Seibs house for supper that night and had a big time.  Then I stayed up all night wrapping again the presents we had to take to our parents' houses and we loaded up and hit the road the day after and hit both sets of parents in a week. 

This year was Thanksgiving in Tupelo and we played in the leaves waiting on my sister-in-law and her fam to get in town for supper.  The kids had a blast....and the pics were pretty cute too!

And they did a lot of riding on the "Yerf Dog" too.  Here they are all piled up with Daddy:

And here's a random pic of Henry sledding that moves over when I type.  Don't know how to move it or how it got where it is.  I'll try to do better next time.  Hopefully I'll have figured the ipad out by then and have my camera card emptied so I can take some new pics.  Maybe if I make a flickr account or something like that I can get pics on there that way......