25 foot Lego Stick

A couple weeks ago, Ryan had a friend over for a couple days. The two of them play real well together and always come up with some pretty creative games to play. They made a 25 foot Lego Stick one day. They put together several pieces to create this very long "stick" of Legos.

Family Portraits

A couple weekends ago, we shot family portraits. It's long overdue! The last official portraits we had done - you get all dressed up and go to a studio for the session was 10 years ago. We have all changed quite a bit since then! Especially Ryan. We were getting down to the wire to include pictures in our Christmas cards so we had to do it. I was fighting that wonderful winter cold that has been going around here for about a month. I moved the couch away from in front of our black wall, set up the camera and lights and started shooting. Here are a couple of the results. Boy after we were done, I was pretty worn out and ready for a nap. Gladly, I have recovered from the cold and the cards were mailed out - with picture. Success!

Animal Update

A couple of weeks ago it got really cold, so we decided that it was time to bring out the hoodies! The "boys" are being kept warm by their matching hoodies. So far, Ranger is actually keeping his on. Sam loved his from the moment we put it on him last year. We couldn't keep it on Ranger last year. I think this year he figured out that it's nice and toasty in there.

The "boys" sporting their hoodies:

Ranger:
Sam:

Sam wearing his hood up. I was bribing him to sit still with a tater tot:

Beardie, our bearded dragon taking a bath while his home gets cleaned out:

Project Time for School

Well, it's project time again at school. The kids had a choice of making a poster or a 3D model of a redesigned or original memorial. So, naturally Ryan decides to build a war memorial out of lego's. He worked on it a little bit every night after dinner. I think he had a fun time building it. He knew exactly what he wanted to do for it as soon as he came home with the assignment.

Top view of his Korean War Memorial:

Entrance:

Statue of the various uniforms from the war:
Scene of soldiers entering a Korean forest from the water:

Back side of the battle scene, with people visiting the memorial:

Ryan with his project:

Sam & His Happy Little Tail

Our little Sam is a pretty funny dog. I've posted about some of his crazy behavior before. He always keeps us entertained. Well, in this video, you will get to see him wagging just the end of his tail. He even does that when he is sitting. He will wag just the white tip of his tail. It's pretty funny.

First Band Concert

On Tuesday, Ryan had his first Band Concert. It was very nice. We saw performances by the Beginning, Intermediate and Advanced Bands. The beginning band did a wonderful job. We had a lot of fun watching Ryan play.

The Beginning Band before the concert began:

Ryan playing his French Horn. The whole brass section contains one French Horn and two trumpets:

After the concert, we went out to Cold Stone Creamery with Shawn, one of Ryan's friends who plays drums, and their family. That was fun. They have a new ice cream flavor Dark Chocolate Peppermint. And as tempting as that was, I decided on the Brownie Batter Peanut Butter Perfection (or something like that!) It was yummy! How can you go wrong with brownie bits, brownie batter and peanut butter!!! Ryan had his traditional vanilla ice cream with chocolate chip cookie dough. It was a real nice evening.

Piano Recital

On Saturday, Ryan had his second piano recital. He did very well. He played a Japenese song called Indian Rock. I think this was one of his favorite songs to play so far.

Ryan with his piano teacher:

Decorating for Christmas

Last weekend, we started putting up our Christmas decorations. We got everything up but the trees and we finished with those one evening after homework was completed and instruments had been practiced.

Every year, Ryan gets a new ornament. It represents something from that year - whether it be a favorite toy or activity, one to represent the new dog that we got that year. Each one has had a meaning for that year. So, this year, he got a French Horn ornament since this is the year he started playing that instrument.

Checking out the box of ornaments to go on the tree:

Ryan took this picture of me decorating the tree that we put up in the front room:

Adding more ornaments:

Taking a break for some cuddle time with Sam:

Doug & Ryan getting ready to put the star on the tree:

The tree is lit:

A tree full of memories:

A snowman collection. Now this is the ONLY snow that I like - FAKE!

The entertainment center all decked out with Santa's and Coca-Cola:

Decorating the tree in the kitchen. This tree is filled with our Coke ornaments, dalmatian ornaments and anything that is red, white and black:

Finishing it off with the red star:

Both trees are decorated, now it's on to all of our other fun holiday activities:

Thanksgiving Night Time

Ryan was sick a few days before Thanksgiving and missed school. When he started feeling better, he was pretty bored yet not up to really playing. So, we kept talking about playing a board game. Finally on Thanksgiving evening, after coming home from our feast, we set the board up, put on the Christmas Tunes on the iPod and played Star Wars Monopoly for a couple hours. We had to finish the next day.

Star Wars Monopoly game underway:

The board:
Doug was Commander Cody. He must've gone to jail at least 9 times. I've never seen one person go to jail so many times in one game before, it was crazy. It seemed like every time we turned around he was being sent to jail.

Ryan was Anakin Skywalker:

I got to be Obi-Wan:

Thanksgiving Day Time

This year for Thanksgiving dinner, we went to my brother's house. Each family brought different favorite Thanksgiving dishes to share. Doug made a turkey and I made sweet potatoes. As usual, there was plenty of food to be eaten, conversations to be had and fun memories to share.

Just one table of food:

Doug carving the turkey:
Ryan enjoying his meal with his cousin Cotton:

After eating, the kids had fun jumping on the trampoline: