A bird doesn't sing because it has an answer...

I've been so busy at work over the past week, and with the holidays and loosing power, we haven't been home a lot, so I guess those are my excuses for not blogging. While my blogging stopped, life did not. Over the past couple of weeks, we endured a ice/snow storm, lost power for 3 and a half days, Bryan and I celebrated our third Christmas being married, Macie had her first Christmas (with a huge bone from Bryan's parents and a stocking from my bro) and we went on a weekend retreat with the Bernard family. I got a new laptop for Christmas from my wonderful husband, but unfortunately, the internet doesn't work well enough out at our house for me to put photos up. I will put photos up tomorrow of the ice storm, snow, and the weekend at the beach. Macie loved the snow. She was constantly chasing (and eating) snowballs Bryan would throw for her. The only part she didn't like was being left out in the cold when we had to go somewhere. Our house was slammed by the stor...

Here is little Isla Lute. I haven't had photos of her for a while, since our camera was gone for a while. She just got over being cholicy, and is really happy now. She really was smiling a lot, but not really for the camera. Kyle thought pinching her cheeks together would make her smile. It didn't work, but we caught her smiling by herself later.

Hooray for "Arctic Blast!" Macie and the kids had a great time out in the snow yesterday morning....Macie even had the chance to make her first yellow snow. She still hasn't quite figured out how to run on the slippery stuff, but now she loves running around in it so much that she won't come inside when we call her. This is her being sad that we are leaving her to go to church. Jae made a snowman yesterday morning and Daniel is trying to eat its head. This is us trying to get Macie to sit nicely for a family picture, but she would never face the camera. We are bribing her with cheese.

This weekend we are having four of our high school students over to spend the weekend with us! Since we aren't super interesting, and poor, our activities revolve around free things our families can provide. So far we have been to my parents' house to see the puppies...which was a big hit with the kids. Here's my mom getting some love from one of the pups. Now we are at the Bernards' house (they are in Hawaii) playing Wii. Next we will be going back to our house to eat dinner and then to the Corban basketball game. Oh the exciting lives we lead! Daniel (below) and Veronica (above) put the pups in their hoods. The pups seemed pretty content. Jae really liked this little guy (no. 5 puppy). He stole him from Daniel's hood and then the little guy fell asleep in his arms (below). I love this photo - notice the top puppy stomping on the one below him!

Latest things Macie has eaten -- a roll of scotch tape (including plastic holder) and bits of Christmas tree

This is our first Christmas in our house! It's so great to be able and spread out our Christmas decorations through the house, and have room to have people over for the holidays! Bryan and I went out to get our Christmas tree with his parents on Saturday...before the humiliating Civil War, and we got everything set up too! Our tree is about 9 feet tall and goes all the way up to the peak of our vaulted ceiling in the living room. It looks great with all the lights and we are loving walking into a house that smells like a forest. Here's a photo of our huge tree before we decorated it. It basically makes Bryan look like a little kid! Bryan and I were discussing that whoever thought of hauling in a Christmas tree, putting lights on it and presents underneath it was a genius. We love Christmas, especially Bryan, who would play Christmas carols year-round if I let him!