December

Overall, December was a fun month for our family. I've tried really hard to establish some Smith Family traditions for Christmas. Here's a few...a construction paper chain that we start on December 1st, each day Noah gets to tear off a link of the chain and it says something fun that he gets to do that night (like eat popcorn with m&m's, look at Christmas lights,etc..). We also started the Elf on the Shelf this year. Noah named him Hotwheel the Elf. He is magical, he flies to the North Pole every night and reports to Santa about Noah and Reid. Each day when he flies back to our house, he lands somewhere different. Noah would have to try to find him every morning. We do Christmas cookies on Christmas Eve after the Christmas Eve Service at church. We have a nice breakfast Christmas morning and mom and dad toast to Mimosas. This year, I'm starting a new post-christmas tradition. I love all of the beautiful christmas cards that we get and this year, I'm going to put them in a book. We are going to pray for a different family each night at dinner. I think this will be a fun way to save the cards and remember to pray for our friends and family regularly. I'm always a little sad when December ends. Next year, the boys will be one year older and one year closer to being grown. Ugh..I don't like to think about that. These years are precious and I try to make the best of the Christmas celebrations with them.

Smith Family Christmas

We celebrated Christmas with the Smith family in Texas the weekend before Christmas. We enjoyed our visit with them. The boys were thrilled with all of their fun gifts. We posed for a family picture in the den.

Christmas Morning

Santa Came! Noah was at such a fun age for Santa this year. He really got into the whole experience. Before bed, we set out cookies and milk and then we put reindeer food on the front porch. He was so .....excited!! He woke up early Christmas morning and came into our room, he said "mom, I think santa came, I saw Reid's basketball goal in the living room". We woke Reid up, so we could all go in and check it all out together. Noah got a Wii and Reid got a basketball goal and a shopping cart. They were both really excited! It was so fun for us to see the sweet glow of excitement on their faces.

Hudson Family Christmas

We celebrated Christmas with the Hudson family (my mom's side of the family) on the Saturday after Christmas. Noah enjoyed playing with his cousin's Conner and Cy that he doesn't get to see very often. We had all of the 2nd cousins pose for a picture, but unfortunately we were missing a few of them.

Tillery Christmas

We celebrated with my family at my parent's house on Christmas night. We enjoyed each other and got entirely too much stuff. All of the cousins had fun playing. Karson and Noah both got Starwar's Helmets and Lightsavers. They played with them most of the night. They play really well together. Hudson and Reid were a little overwhelmed by all of their gifts and didn't really know which way to turn or which gift to play with first. You notice my mom dressed up in a goofy outfit with a crazy looking wig. Well, we have a tradition of playing a little game where she brings out a tray with lots of random stuff on it, and we have to memorize what's on the tray while she's parading around the room with it. Then, as a couple we complile a list of what was on the tray and what she is wearing for a prize. Ugh..Rod and I never win. It's also a tradition that I will always ask to see the list of the couple who wins..I want to confirm that they won. My sisters hate me for that. ;) The most treasured tradition is my dad reading the Christmas story from the bible. He has done this for as long as I can remember. I am so thankful that we take the time to read the story and focus on the true gift of Christmas.

Christmas Cookies

Rod and I started the tradition of decorating sugar cookies on Christmas Eve the first year we were married. It was so fun and romantic when we did it the first time. Then....came kiddos. Not so romantic anymore, but still loads of fun. They add so much spark and life to Christmas. We enjoy a lot of traditions, but this one is my favorite. This year I simplified things by preparing my dough during naptime, so that we would only have to cut out shapes and frost with the boys. Noah really enjoyed frosting and he was very proud of his masterpiece! Reid didn't enjoy the decorating part so much, but he loved eating the frosting. By the way...can you tell that Reid's a rascal? Look at that grin in these pictures....

Noah the Helper

Noah loves to help me clean the house. His favorite chores are mopping and vaccuming. The only problem with his mopping is that he doesn't quite understand the concept of ringing out the mop. He's an awfully handsome housekeeper, don't you think?

Happy Birthday Hudson

We celebrated my nephew Hudson's 1st birthday on October 29th. He is such a cutie. He and Reid are only 4 months apart, so I look forward to them getting older and becoming playmates. Right now, they're not so..sure of each other, but they'll start to appreciate being the same size and age soon.

Fall Festival

I'm a little late on posting this one, but I think these pictures are too cute not to post. Noah is getting so tall. He wasn't even 4 in this picture...and I think he totally looks 5 years old. He's getting too big too fast! The other picture shows him and his best friend Adam. He was pretty excited that Adam was a blue power ranger for halloween. Too bad Noah wouldn't wear his Mr. Incredible costume to the carnival, they would have been quite the pair of super heroes!!

A day at the park

On a beautiful October day, we went to the park with my parents, my sister, and my two sweet nephews. We enjoyed seeing the ducks and as always picking up sticks. Noah has always loved to pick up sticks, now Reid has also decided that he likes sticks. I'm telling you, they are 110% BOY!

I'm such a slacker

I'm so behind on blogging..I apologize to those of you who frequently check my blog for updates. I'll try to do better in the future!

I ran a Half-Marathon

Thanks to Rod for becoming a serious runner a couple of years ago, I am now an addicted runner! I finished my 2nd half-marathon in Tulsa on Sunday. It was a great run, and such a beautiful day. I had a nice get away to Tulsa with my friend and running companion, Abbie. We went up on Saturday and had some nice "free mommy" time. We did some shopping and had a nice dinner. We carb loaded on pasta on Saturday night as we set out to achieve our running goals on Sunday morning. And.....We DID IT(we both achieved our goal)! I won't tell what my exact time was, but it was 13 minutes faster than my time in April. (which isn't really saying a whole lot...because I'm pretty SLOW) However, I did better than I expected to and I'm ready to do even better in the OKC half-marathon in April. See you all on the course!! ;) Come on... YOU CAN DO IT!

Home Decorating

Some of you know that I have been redecorating my living room. I have been wanting some floral sconces to hang on my walls. As I was shopping around for them, I realized how expensive they were. I found out that the new Hobby Lobby in Edmond does custom floral. A sweet lady named Mary works there. I went in with a picture of what I was wanting and she walked the aisles with me and helped me pick out my floral stems (while they were 1/2 price!!). She put them together for me for only $15 in labor charges. I was amazed how inexpensive the whole project ended up being! So....if anyone is wanting some pretty floral arrangements in their house....call Mary. She'll hook you up.

Noah's "FORE" Party

This year we have gone birthday party LOCO for Noah's 4th. Due to the fact that we have such a big family and several neighbor friends (that are like family), we decided that Noah could have two parties this year. On Saturday, the 1st we celebrated with family and neighbors and had a golf party. We transformed our front yard into a golf course and had some fun games for the kiddos. Rod is the creative brain of our family. He set up a dizzy putt-putt game, closest to the hold and the longest drive. The kids all enjoyed getting to play golf.

Trick or Treat

The boys had a blast on Halloween. Noah was a big strong "MR. INCREDIBLE"...we thought that suited him well. When he saw that costume in Target...he just had to have it! He loved having big muscles..he couldn't get enough of them when he put his costume on. It was pretty cute. Reid was an adorable puppy. He loves his little snuggle puppy and "puppy" was one of his first words. I thought that costume was perfect for him. Noah enjoyed trick or treating around the neighborhood with his friend Mattie. You can imagine how much candy they ended up with!

The Bird Man

Reid or "J-Bird" as we call him is quite the character. He has been cracking us up lately with his desire to wear knee pads. I don't know what his obsession is, but he picks up a knee pad several times a day that came in the package with Noah's bicycle helmet and wants us to put it on him. We strap it on him and he just grins from ear to ear. He thinks it's so funny, and it REALLY is. Noah's aunt Masey shared her old gameboy with him a while back, now he has his own Nintendo DS. The gameboy has been passed on to Reid since he thinks he needs something to play too. When he wants us to turn it on, he says "Booooey", "Booooey"...until we turn it on. It's hilarious..he will sit there and push buttons like he's really doing something BIG like his brother! Too cute! Here's a picture of him in his knee pad playing the "Booooey".

Pumpkin Patch

Fall is my favorite time of year! It seems like that's when we start our "holiday fun". We have a tradition of going to the TG Farms Pumpkin Patch in Newcastle. We always take a trip with friends. This year we went with our neighbors, the Aishman family. We had a great time. It was a beautiful evening and there weren't many people there. You know how I love the "Norman Rockwell" moments...well, I had planned on getting sweet pictures of Noah and Reid sitting in a pile of big pumpkins, but needless to say it didn't happen. I have boys that don't like to have their picture taken. No perfect "Norman Rockwell" pictures for mommy this time!!

A True Blessing

We are so blessed! We were able to celebrate my grandpa's 80th birthday party this weekend with family. Unfortunately, I didn't get a picture of my grandpa and the boys, but I got one of my grandma and Reid. The party was at my aunt's house. She lives out in the country, so Noah and his cousins were in paradise. They "chased bears" with sticks.

Pumpkin Time

We took the boys to pick out a pumpkin today. Noah magically turned his into a Pirate! I have a feeling the pirate will lose all his body parts and accessories before Halloween even gets here. Once Reid discovers they're removable...IT'S OVER! Big brother is not going to to like it.

Reid Loves the Environment

Reid has decided to go green! Wouldn't this make a cute advertisement for Crest?

Home Rennovation

We have made a few changes to our house this past month. We ripped out our fireplace and had an entertainment center built in to the wall. We absolutely love it! Our fireplace was really nice, but we never used it. It was a wasted wall in our living room. Now our living room seems so much bigger. We also had our carpet ripped out and had stained concrete put in our living room. It looks amazing! It was a real pain because we had to move out of our house for a week, but we're glad we did it. We actually enjoyed the time at Nana and Pop's house and at Gramma and Pa's. Thanks for letting us shack up!

Trip to Gramma & Pa's House

We took a little trip to Rod's parents last weekend. It's always nice and relaxing to experience country living for a few days. As you can see Noah clearly enjoys being in the country and running around in his undies! Rod and Noah enjoyed fishing in Pa's pond. Noah caught a big catfish. He was pretty excited about it!

Motherhood Trials

Do you ever just feel like you're in a pit and you can't seem to get yourself out? Well, I've definitely been there recently. I'm overwhelmed with being a mommy...the house is a wreck, the kids are out of control, tantrums all day long, someone constantly needs a snack, drink, or a diaper changed...it's always something. In turn, all of these things send me spiraling downward into "THE PIT". The pit of self-pity, the pit of I'm not good at this job, the pit of searching for answers that I'm never going to find in earthly things. The list could really go on and on, because it's a very deep pit. I'm not "down in the dumps"...it's not something that people can see on the outside. In my heart though, I know I'm in "THE PIT". I know when my heart is out of check and out of balance.


It's naptime for Reid and rest time for Noah and normally I would spend the entire time occupying myself on the computer, cleaning the house, or talking on the phone, cooking, anything to keep myself busy. Today, I felt an overwhelming calling from the Lord. He said, come spend some time with me and let's talk. So, I went into my quiet and dirty bedroom and took the much needed time to just sit at the feet of Jesus and pray. I poured out my heart of frustration. Then I turned to a devotion book and the holy spirit spoke very loudly through the writer of the book....the devotion was about finding joy even in the midst of difficult circumstances. While circumstances could certainly be worse, sometimes just being a mommy and dealing with kids temperaments can be "difficult" circumstances (for me it can anyway..it can rock my world!). Can anyone else relate? Then I turned to Hebrews and read God's word, after all, that is the only place that I can truely find answers on how to get out the PIT. Here's what I read...in Hebrews 12:1 ....and let us strip off every weight that slows us down and easily hinders our progress. And let us run with endurance the race that God has set before us. We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, on whom our faith depends from start to finish. Oh....that was so refreshing to me today! I was thirsty and tired and that was just the drink that I needed to encourage me to climb up out of this funky pit of negativity. I also realize that the things and people that I reach for to give me encouragement every day...things like friends, exercise, the computer, Rod, my family, my boys....just don't do it for me. I have to go to God..he's the only one who can truely understand me and meet me with strong enough arms to lift me up out of the PIT. I felt compelled to share this on the blog today. It encourages me just to type out my feelings. I hope this can encourage you too!

1st day of Preschool

Noah had his first day of Preschool at Warm World last week. He loved it! I was a little nervous, because he somtimes has a hard time with change. He's had the same teacher at Mother's Day out for the past two years. I thought that going in to a new room with a new teacher might be challenging for him. Fortunately, it didn't seem to phase him. I asked him to give me a kiss goodbye and he wouldn't . It's already started..kissing mom bye isn't cool anymore! Makes me so sad. He has 3 of his good friends in his class. He and his buddy Adam are 110% boy. They broke their teacher in good on the first day. Noah said he and Adam were pretending to throw up during lunch time. Oh my...boys will be boys!

Reid also had his first official day of Mother's Day Out. He jumped right out of my arms to get in there to play with the kids. He loves to play! They both had a good day. Mom enjoyed going to the dentist and having lunch with a friend.

End of Summer 2008

The Smith family went out with a bang for the Summer of 2008. We took a trip to Big Cedar Lodge on Tablerock Lake for a little family fun. We had a blast! Noah loves to go to Big Cedar..or should I say he loves to go anywhere that he can experience the outdoors. Reid also enjoyed splashing around in the pool. The hightlight of our trip was going out on a boat and riding a ski tube. Noah and Reid had their first boat ride. They took it like champs. Guess..we'll just have to get a boat! (wink, wink) We also saw the best fireworks show we've ever seen. We had the perfect "Norman Rockwell" moment (as Rod says...I'm always wanting things to be perfect) in the hot tub watching the fireworks over the Lake. It was truely amazing. It was a sweet time for our family. I will always remember Noah being 3 and Reid being 14 months in the hot tub at Big Cedar...It truely was a Norman Rockwell moment. Only moms understand this sort of thing.