Fun Food

While my parents were here we had a triple date with them and my in-laws. We went to a yummy Japanese hibachi style restaurant. The kids were a little miffed they weren't invited on the date, so my dad suggested we bring them back some chopsticks. It turns out Logan is pretty good at them!

Eli felt pretty special one night getting to help Grandma make the salad. He kept saying, "More cut!"

Grandparents!

We are all so grateful that my parents come out to visit as often as they do! They were here a couple weekends ago, and we had a great time!

For a change, it was Ali who didn't want to take pictures this time, and the boys were grinning ear to ear.

We love Grandma and Grandpa!

Pack Pack

Eli loves this Elmo back pack, and he looks SO cute wearing it. 

And he loves to "practice his writing" in this Elmo book like Ali and Logan do. What is it about that little red guy that makes all two-year-olds fall in love with him?

Old Friends

One great thing about getting older is having friends you've known for years and years. Jason's old college roommate and mission companion came to town last weekend with his family. It was the one weekend we had our house for sale which made for an even crazier weekend than normal, but it was fun to see them. Here are all the kids:

And one of the adults (Logan took this one!):

Come again soon Baileys!

Valentines Day

We started some new Valentines Day traditions this year that made it a really fun family day. We had a family candlelit dinner, shared a yummy ice cream cake, and then opened the cards and gifts we'd gotten for each other. We had the added benefit of having Uncle JD and Aunt Lianna here this year too. We can see we're really going to enjoy having even more family around! Here we are showing off our fun new gifts! I'm so grateful I have so many people in my life to love.

Boating

Who says you need water, or a real boat for that matter, to have a great day boating?

Staging

Since the day we bought our current home, almost nine years ago, we've been talking about how we wanted to move the summer before Ali and Logan started Kindergarten. We love our house, but we're growing out of it and it is not in the best school district. A new house with a fourth bedroom, a basement, and a good school district was a blessing we really wanted for our family.

So we did everything we could think of to make our home as sellable as possible: touched up paint, fixed a few cracks and dings in the walls, emptied out the closets, packed up a few boxes of things we still want but could live without for a few months and got them out of the house, put most of the toys out of sight and the few still visible only in the kids' rooms, moved some furniture around, and took down all the family pictures. I tried to make it as easy as possible for someone looking at our house to imagine it as their own. And I wanted to be sure I did everything humanly possible so that I could honestly tell the Lord I'd done all I could when I asked Him to bless us to sell our house.

Taking down the pictures was the hardest part for me. Honestly, I kind of liked making my house look perfect (if only it would have stayed that way without constant cleaning and picking toys up), but I missed our pictures. To make myself feel better about that, I decided to replace them with pictures of mine and Jason's travels. I love looking at these pictures that Jason and I took on trips by ourselves.

Stonehenge in England:

The Coliseum and some of the Forum in Rome:

Chichen Itza in Mexico:

Bath, England:

 Niagara Falls:

 An old church in Mexico:

And all of this staging we did must have helped: our house was on the market for four days, we had three showings, and then two offers! We even got more money for the house than we thought we would. But while I am glad we did everything we did to get the house ready to sell, I know that this was a wonderful gift from a Heavenly Father who loves us. I am thankful for both that fact and my knowledge of it! Now we just need to find a new house!

Snow!

It's February, and we finally have snow. A couple inches every day for a few days in a row. And I have patted myself on the back for being a Good Mom and taking the kids outside to play in it (which requires hours to get them in and out of their snow stuff...ok, maybe not hours...) But I was very handsomely rewarded with happy kids, especially this girl who tells me all the time how much she "loves snow!"

Get ready to be involved in a snowball fight:

 

Here are my angels making angels:

This little guy doesn't quite get what "playing in the snow" means; he just pulls out his car, bike, and other summer toys and wants to play with them. Which is fine by me since I don't have snowpants for him. Eli was also the one who would let us know when it was time to go inside, and his idea of "long enough" often agreed with mine.

And ta-da! Our very first snowman! Can you believe that? Four years old (nearly five) and this is the first snowman creation of the Eldredge children. Illinois snow just doesn't seem to be made for it like Colorado snow. Every winter we've been here and I've seen snowmen in others' yards I've wondered how they accomplished it. I've tried in other years and could get it to work. Even this guy wasn't built the way I learned how (making a snowball and rolling it around until it had picked up tons of snow), but with determination and lots of patting and smooshing.

I'm glad the kids finally got some snow.

Lovey

Loveys are a pretty big deal around here. Honestly, Ali could probably go without hers at this point, but they are still very important to the boys. Logan was excited to show me how he had made this little bed for lovey.

Little Cook

This little Cook was so pleased to get to use the mixer all by herself!