SEVEN?!?!?!?!?!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY SWEET MCKENZIE!!! Rich and I are having a hard time with how old our kids are getting... ok, let's be honest - we are having a hard time with how old WE are getting. Still hard to believe that my baby macadoodle is 7. She is such a beautiful and caring girl. She transitioned so well to her new school after we moved. She has wonderful new friends that she loves to pieces! We are so proud of you, McKenzie, for all of your hard work at school and for being such a great big sister and good example to everyone around you. We love you! HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

Our sweet girl... (Daddy has his shotgun ready... gonna need it!)

 This year McKenzie BEGGED to have a "real" party with friends. Thanks to groupon we made it happen. We had a fun-filled diva day all about the birthday princess. We had a girl date and went and got her hair cut. She kept telling everyone "My mom took me to the salon to get my hair styled". Nope, try an $8 great clips trim with a coupon HAHA. I will let her think it cost a fortune though. We got smoothies and went shopping for party favors. Then her best friend, Tessa, came over to play before we headed out to the parteh at the family fun center. We ate pizza, played arcade games, had a red velvet cupcake decorating bar instead of a big cake (Chef Kenzie's idea of course) and bumper carred our brains out. It was so much fun! Even the moms of the girls who came rocked the bumper cars! We all had an absolute blast! Thank you to family and friends who helped to spoil the crud out of her!

Presents, playing and big haircut...

PARTY TIME!!!

Blog slacker repentance

Uuuuuugh... are you kidding me? Its the middle of January 2013??? I didn't realize how far behind I had gotten on our blog until Rich reminded me that I haven't blogged since SEPTEMBER 2012! SHEESH! We have been just a bit busy (Bought a house, renovated a house, Braxton's Birthday, Grandma & Papa Bowman came for Thanksgiving, we moved to the new house, Bailey's Birthday, Andy & Jenni came for a week to be our handyman & woman on the new place, Mike, Sarah & the kids came for Christmas, followed by the Doellman's and then my mom & dad and Matt came to join the rest of us for New Years then Kenzie was crazy sick for a week.)  HOLY CRAP! I just can't skip the past 4 months, so thank you in advance for your patience with the barrage of very belated blog posts that will be coming your way...  Wish me luck (I'm gonna need it!)

Happy New Year People!!!

New Year's Eve has never been a huge deal for us. Pretty sure we slept through it last year haha. This year we had great company and great grub to make it that much more fun! Kenz & B were just excited to fill their fancy glasses with some bubbly (Martinelli's). The boys put together some puzzles, Hunter ate handfulls (literally) of spinach dip, Dylan & Hunter stripped down into just diapers (partners in crime) and we all gave lots of hugs since Mike, Sarah & the kids headed home after midnight. We will miss everyone so much when they all head home but it was still a great night!!!

SANTAAAAAAAAAAAA

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

We stayed in STL this Christmas - way too much going on (and too many boxes unpacked) to go visit family. So family came to us!!! So grateful to be only 9 hours away from Texas family and 2 hours away from my sister! Mike and Sarah and the kiddos came on Christmas Eve and Amanda, Chris & the kids came the day after Christmas and my parents and Matt came a couple days later. It is so nice to have enough space in the new house to have guests (and a basement to throw the kids in haha). We had so much fun. I loved seeing my kids play with all of their cousins. Makes me smile pretty big : D 

Christmas day was a whirlwind of wrapping paper, stocking candy, squeals of joy and squeals of "YOU OPENED MY PRESENT". It was pretty hilarious having Bailey, Ragen & Hunter trying to open presents as fast as they could - they didn't care much what was inside or who the present belonged to. They figured it out about the time we hit the last present of course (after lots of snot and tears)

THE CORNUCOPIA!!!
Our itsy bitsy teeny tiny tree makes the mountain of gifts look MUCH more impressive haha


The kids were banned to the basement until
the adults were awake and good n ready to start the present opening frenzy. Kenz & B were NOT happy (as you can see) about being locked down there watching the little kids while mind-blowing joy was waiting up stairs.



Bailey got a sweet grocery basket &
Braxton got "Brock" - a talking dino robot thingy


This was absolutely hilarious! McKenzie has had some serious listening and obeying problems the last month or so. We kept telling her Santa knew she wasn't being very good but she STILL asked for a stinking swing set! Of all the NERVE! Well the big day came... B & Bug got what they asked for from the big man. McKenzie was very confused when she got a swing - just a swing - not the set - and a card from Santa. The card explained that she hasn't been 100% good so Santa told the elves not to build her 100% of what she asked for. If she was really really good maybe her mom and dad would help her build the rest of her present. It took until Jan 9th for her to be good enough for us to build it. Maybe that'll teach her. Nope - doubt it!

 The second picture I snapped to get her reaction to seeing pieces of a swing set on our hot mess of a back deck. I did not realize until looking at the pictures later that BAILEY, not McKenzie, had the best reaction of the whole day caught on camera! SHOCK AND AWE PEOPLE! SHOCK AND AWE! HILARIOUS!

CLOSE UP! ... I can just hear her little high-pitched voice...
 "AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH"

Ragen, Hunter, McKenzie, Bailey & Braxton in front of the tree. The best of about 20 pictures we took in this same position hoping they would smile and cooperate. Taking good pictures of one kid sucks -  5 kids sucks 5 times as bad!

Some of my favorite present opening pics and some of the kids very favorite presents! I loved that anytime Bailey opened clothes or dress-ups she immediately stripped off what she was wearing to put on her new outfit. 

The next day Amanda, Chris, Rilea & Dylan came to play! 

Which also meant more presents to open!

Magic House day of fun (and exhaustion haha)

The kiddos were SO excited when Grandma, Pa Pa & Uncle Mashoo got to our house! Again - more presents to open and more pictures too take : )

I am so grateful we got to share our Christmas with people we love SO much. Thank you to Mom, Dad, Matt, Mike, Sarah, Amanda & Chris for sacrificing so much to be here. MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Christmas is coming!

I absolutely love Christmas time and the month of December. Our December was extra busy and fun this year with the move and reno, lots of family visiting, decorating, our first "snow" (barely stuck), ward party (which they put me in charge of - no one knows why) etc. Here are some fun pics of Christmas prep and December goodness. Dont make fun of our sad little pipe cleaner - i mean our cute tree LOL. The fireplace pic pretty much sums up our life right now. It is our home reno headquarters and storage area with some added stocking flare haha.

GIEGENVIVE!!!!!!!!

Oh my GOODNESS WE WERE SO EXCITED TO HAVE JENNI & ANDY COME VISIT US!!!! Of all the fun vacation spots for a young, kid-less, married couple they picked St. Louis and a huge list of home reno stuff to do at our new place. I think they are crazy - I would have picked Mexico, but i am GLAD they are crazy! We had such a fabulous week! We went to the Science Center, went to an Imax Omnimax movie, we toured a chocolate factory, got hooked on Duck Dynasty, we bought a smoker and got our smoke (& eat) on, we had pictures taken with Santa at the Bass Pro Shop Winter Wonderland. we saw Wreck It Ralph at a dine-in theatre, we were gluttonous on our double date at an all you can eat crab leg buffet, we ate (TWICE) at Ted Drewes frozen custard (in the middle of December) and had some Jilly's Cupcakes. Ya... we ate a LOT... we are Bowman's - that's just what we do! On top of all that fun we worked Andy & Jenni pretty hard painting doors, doing electrical work, installing roof vents etc. They were a huge help and we are so grateful that they actually enjoy projects haha.

As I was going through pictures I was SO sad that i only took a handful while they were here. I must have let my photo mom guard down because Jenni takes such incredible pictures and she always beats me to the kodak moments : ) Good thing she is just as amazing at blogging. Her blog post of the trip was so awesome and hilarious. Plus the great pics of course... check it out at  http://andyandjennibowman.blogspot.com/2012/12/heyjack.html

So here is my sad mini collage ... don't laugh... it is embarrassing...

We love you Andy & Jenni & hope to see you two soon! Thank you for all your help!!!

Happy Birthday Buggie!

I cant believe my baby is not a baby any more : ( She is a big girl now. Two years flies by so fast! She is such a sweet little mamma's girl who loves to talk, dress up, sing and play with her brother and sister. Her favorite foods are fruit snacks, "nuggies", and sausage. She LOVES nursery time at church and her bff's are all the older girls in nursery and Aubrey, the 2-year-old I babysit during the week. 

For her birthday she wanted nuggies so we went to Chik-fil-a and had dinner and played at the play place. Then we went home for some presents and cake! We just moved the week before so our kitchen was a disaster but we made do. 

Goofball at Chik-fil-a



She loves her sisiter... and her self...



CAKE!



PRESENTS!



Baby Belle was her favorite!



Her awesome shoes did NOT fit : (



Cute girl & not so cute (yet) kitchen



Smile Bug! Or not...        BFFs




Thank you to all of our family for helping us spoil our little buggie!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY SWEET PUNKINDOODLEDOO!!!