Merry Christmas!

Happy Thanksgiving

This was a huge Thanksgiving in our house.  It was my first time ever making a turkey.

And I had absolutely no idea what to do.

I knew enough to know that I had to thaw the dumb thing. But I had to google how to properly make that happen. Google told me that I had to let it thaw slowly in the fridge. So Sunday I squeezed the huge thing in our refrigerator. By Tuesday it felt just as frozen to me as it had on Sunday. (It had been in my freezer for a complete year - that's okay, right?!) So I figured I'd let it sit out in the garage for a while on Tuesday night.

Wednesday morning, on my way to get out the door to take Jake to preschool, guess who greets us in the garage? The stupid turkey. I had totally forgotten about him. At this point he is clearly unfrozen. So I quickly stick him back in the fridge and tell no one.

So now it's finally Thursday. Thank the Lord above for Skype. Sitting on my counter? The bird and the computer... my mom walked me through the whole thing. And I'm happy to report that in cleaning out the insides I found ice! (Among other things. That nasty neck is another whole post.) I guess he didn't thaw out as much as I feared!

Here are a couple pics from our first little Thanksgiving at home.

Doesn't look bad, does it??

My boys.  My world.

They loved using the fancy glasses!

Sweetheart.

Me & little JD.

Thank you times a million

My mom is a teacher.

Each school year she has 3 personal days that she is able to take off.

Last week she selflessly gave up ALL THREE days in order to come to Erie and watch our kids while Colby & I went to a conference in Alabama.

And my dad drove back and forth from Toledo to Erie to drop her off and pick her up.

That's four 3.5 trips.

I have amazing parents.

Again

Have you ever had so much going on in your life that it was hard to wrap words around it??

I don't mean that you're so busy that you don't have time to do it.....

There's so many wonderful, awesome, encouraging, god-sized things going on in our life right now that it's hard for me to put in on paper.  Well, the blog anyway.

Let's just say that once again we are being rearranged.

And I love it.

Can't wait to share more.

Stay tuned.

Happy Birthday Nathan

Happy Birthday little brother!!!

May you eat chicken squares until your heart is content.

We love you and are proud of you!

Enjoy your first birthday as a married man :)

Love, K & the boys

Cousins

We miss you Ella & Hallie!!!

Atkins Family Pics

On our way home from vacation this spring, we were able to make a couple stops and see some of Colby's family. Below are some pics with Colby brother's family... Matt, Jamie, and Bram (we missed you Hannah!!) We were also able to spend the day with Colby's mom, Sandy. It was so great to be able to see you guys!!

Moving

My sister is moving in less than a week.

Yes, I live in Pennsylvania and she lives in Michigan. It's not like we're neighbors right now.

But as of next week this will be her new license plate.

Jealous? Yes.

Sad? Even more of a yes.

She's going to be so far away.

The New Mr & Mrs

My little brother married his high school sweetheart the first weekend in June. The entire weekend was so fun and it was so great to get to see so many people that we haven't seen in forever!

Colby officiated the ceremony and Wade & Jake were the ringbearers along with their cousin, Ella, who was the flower girl. The ceremony was beautiful and the reception was tons of fun!! I've never seen my boys dance like such crazy lunatics before.

Congratulations Nate & Bethany. We love you both and wish you a lifetime of love & happiness and bunches of little Ensey babies!!

The Next Mrs. Ensey

This past weekend Wade, Jake, Park & I headed to Toledo for my soon-to-be-sister-in-law's wedding shower. Check out the ladies below... the current Mrs. Ensey with the future Mrs. Ensey. Aren't they both beautiful?!

The concept of the shower was an around the clock shower. Everyone was assigned a time on their invitation and your gift was to correspond with that time of day. It was a great idea and awesome way to not end up with 3 toasters!

Bethany's grandmother had 10pm... Bethany got a box load of wonderful *nighttime* presents complete with the Yanni CD pictured below!! LOVE IT :)

Ella helping out

Mom, sweet baby Hallie, me & Bethany

Easter Eggs

First off... I've never been so thankful for tree-cutting-down-people. Here's a pic of what kept the 4 cousins busy all morning! (see the man in the tree??)

Next? Easter eggs!!! We put Park down for his morning nap and got to work. First, we decorated by painting on pieces of tissue paper. Ella loved using the little paint brushes. Then we moved on to dyeing the rest of the eggs. I love little girl giggles. My boys just dye the egg, take it out, "cool mom." Ella? She giggles in between each step. I love her!!

Just getting started

Such concentration

The finished products

Cousin Fun

Guess what I have in my house?!?!?

A little girl!

My sweet niece, Ella May, is hanging with us here in Erie for the week. You should see me in the mornings trying to put together her outfits and comb her hair. She's probably thinking, "What is this woman's problem?!" It takes me about a whole episode of Phineas & Ferb to make her hair look semi-decent.

And potty time is extremely nerve wracking for me. I'm used to being able to AIM my children's liquid waste. Now I know I'm a girl so I know I should be used to this... anyways, moving on.

Yesterday I took all four kids grocery shopping at Wegmans. Really? The kids place doesn't open until 11??? Ugghhhh. Needless to say, my shopping cart was full. Mostly of little humans.

Today we opted for something a little more fun. We met friends at the Erie Children's Museum and the kiddies had a blast. Here are a few pics.