Christmas at Mimi and Donnie's

The Fanslers came up to Linda and Don's new house for Christmas this year. It was a full house but their layout is perfect for it! There's a completely separate kids room where we banish the rambunctious ones and take turns watching them. And plenty of sledding hills outside and room for a bonfire. New Year's Eve is there as well and I'll try to take more outside pictures:



Papa with his girls. That's baby Ali on the left
Uncle Charlie and Ethen
Shiloh with her Papa Don
Rylie received a baby stroller for Christmas. Unfortunately I think Shiloh and Ethen bent the frame before she got it home!


Shiloh loves her Tigger. Thanks Bonita and Charlie!

Dear Santa

I recently convinced Lincoln to (reluctantly) dictate a letter to Santa: At all times Lincoln is wearing 1 of his 4 'suits'. Batman, Superman, Spiderman or Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle
Playing on the slide at Ruby's house

The other day we were at lunch and John was entertaining (distracting) Lincoln while we waited for our food to come.

John held up 2 fingers and said: "Lincoln, what is 1 finger plus 1 finger. Count my fingers and tell me how many there are."

Lincoln: "one, two"

John (excited because our 3-year-old can count!): "So one plus one is?"

Lincoln: "Twenty seven"

Getting a good Christmas photo

All I wanted to do tonight was get a good picture of the kids that I can use as our Christmas postcard. It shouldn't have been so hard! Getting them both to just look at the camera at the same time (let alone smile) was impossible.
Oh well. Here's some of the ones I decided not to use--true life photos of Scherzerville:

Eventually everyone was grumpy and/or wound up, so I gave up. Merry Christmas Everyone!

Conversations with Lincoln

On the way to the movie store

Me: "Lincoln, I don't think they have both Justice League and Ninja Turtles in the same movie. You'll have to pick one or the other." Lincoln: "The yuther."

Playing on the slide at Ruby's house
Skiing on the grease drip trays for our Lean Mean Grilling Machine

Refusing to give up his superman suit even though he's exploding out through its seams

Sitting at the kitchen table the day after we constructed a gingerbread house with Mimi and Donny

Lincoln: "Mommy, here's how it goes: I like Beef Stick, Candy, and yiyiyum houses with candy and windows and doors on it."

I don't ever want to forget Lincoln at age 3

Random shots from Thanksgiving

John is shopping on ebay for "gifts for other people". Try to find something for less than 200$, John! Niisha from Parents as Teachers assists as Lincoln creates a glove Turkey with googly eyes and feathers.


Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

More faces of Lincoln

John and I were looking at old pictures last night. Lincoln has always had so many facial expressions! Even before he could talk his face said everything that needed to be said. His repertoire of expressions has only gotten bigger...


This boy does not WANT to sit in the cart, he wants to get down and promises to walk sedately beside us as we shop. Yeah right...

Lunch with Mommy

One day last week John had the weekday off from work. He and the kids picked me up at lunch time and we went for Pizza! Fun!
We brought some matchbox cars to try and prolong Lincoln's patience...
...but the pizza took a long time to come!
Isn't it fun going out to eat with children?
Time for everyone to get all bundled up and take mommy back to work!

October Happenings

The kids enjoyed the Halloween presentation that the Fairbanks Princess puts on every year. Shiloh-the-ladybuy toddled around entertaining herself While her Turtle-man brother literally ran laps. This is the only picture of him I got. He followed the big kids around asking them questions and trying to keep up. At one point I heard him say, "I don't care, I don't love you" to 2 boys he had never met before. Cruel words from Leonardo...
The next celebration in our busy month was Caleb's 5th birthday. Shiloh eats some snacks in her party dress while waiting for Mommy and Lincoln to get ready. Caleb's was a snowmachining party. Papa helped Lincoln get his helmet on so he could have a turn. Caleb's party was a tremendous success.


The next day was Shiloh's first birthday. Here she is removing all the pieces of Lincoln's train set from the box where I just placed them after picking them up off the floor.

The theme for her party was under the sea. Lincoln helped me make cupcakes and cookies and we all spent a ridiculous amount of time decorating them...

They were so cute. The fish-cakes had Nerds for eyes and pieces of candy seaweed and jelly bean rocks. The blue frosting was blueberry flavored. It was actually quite disgusting to eat.. but cute...
Downstairs in the garage we had a sand pile and a wading pool. We hung blue tarps up (to hid our messy garage!) and hung fish decorations from the ceiling
the water and sand were a hit with the under-2 crowd...
By the end of the night the wading pool had become the sand box!

I can't believe my little girl is one already. Happy Birthday Shiloh!

Saturday night Jam session

Saturday afternoon the fellas came over to play in the rock-n-roll band. Later everyone came upstairs for food and fun.

Shiloh loved playing the drum with John and Donny while Lincoln and Isaac played 'steam roller' with Charlie
Lincoln did a little flying
and some hopping-like-a-frog. Here he is in mid-ribbit while Isaac gets tickle-tortured in the background. Fun!

Visiting Granny

Mom and Dad flew down to Seattle with Shiloh last week and met up with me after Princess Tours End-of-Season meetings. We all headed over to Libby, Montana to visit Grandma for a few days.

While Grandma rested Shiloh got to play with 4-year-old Chloe. First they played cars

next was Strawberry Shortcake puzzle. We discovered that Chloe is very patient AND that Shiloh isn't very good at puzzles yet, but she enjoys eating the pieces...

Shiloh took time-out for a little snack

Next we all headed over to Uncle Bill and Aunt Mary's house where Grandma would live with us for the rest of the week. Mary and Shiloh were instant friends.

Do you remember

these animal body toys

like Shiloh is holding?

Fun from the past!

Shiloh squealed and crawled as fast as she could while she and Mary played "chase"

We took a drive up to the very scenic Libby dam and took a few pictures. Doesn't the background in this one of Shiloh and my mom seem like one of those fake background screens like they have when you get professional photos done?

I only post this picture for John who complains that I never post shots of myself.

Shiloh is fascinated with shoes right now. She hauled my cousin Chrissy's shoes all over the place (I hope you found them both after we left Chrissy!)

Grandma and Shiloh had some sweet moments...

especially moments involving Grandma's walker, Shiloh's favorite toy!

I wish I'd gotten some good shots of Bill, Dani and Chrissy who were there too. We all had a wonderful, relaxing time doing puzzles and playing dominoes and soaking up time with Grandma and Shiloh.

Thank you AGAIN Bill and Mary for you gracious hospitality. We enjoyed your beautiful home and good company again and look forward to the next time!