Family Game Night

A few years ago we used to do "family game nights". Then as our kids got a little bit older and had homework, different activities we just seemed to not have the game nights as often. Then we just didn't have any game nights for several months. Well I am happy to say that we have started playing games again at our house. Yesterday I bought a new card game, Pictureka! So we had a game night last night.

We enjoyed playing this game, and the great thing about it is you don't have to play the same game over and over. There are 4 different games that you can play with this card game.

Some of the other games that our family has enjoyed playing over the years are:

This is one of my all time favorites.

When my sister comes over and

and we play a game, this is the

one we usually play.

Can you believe that I got this

Yahtzee Free for All game last

Christmas at Target for just $8.00.

YES, I am smarter than a 5th grader.

There are some pretty tough questions

in this game.

A family favorite.

You know, game night is a good way to spend time with the family without breaking the bank. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that spending money to do something fun with your family is wrong or bad, but sometimes it is nice to just stay home and play games. However it is that you choose to spend time with your family, enjoy it.

I'ts The Great Pumpkin.....

My nephew Wyatt has been a busy little guy. I decided it would be fun for him to make some "artsy" things for his sweet Momma. Wyatt just loves to make things, he especially likes to glue with "his glue" and he also likes to use my stamp pads. Yesterday I gave him a small circle sponge and a cut out of a pumpkin, and he went to town stamping his pumpkin orange.

Notice the intense look on his face.

Still working away.

One proud artist.

Then last week we made a scarecrow out of different shapes and colors. From what Crystal told me, Wyatt took his scarecrow home to her and told her about some of the shapes that we used. So he was listening to me when I was telling him the different shapes.

Okay, so I know it doesn't look like the work of a two year old. I do admit to helping him quite a bit on this project. He was more interested in that darn glue stick than anything else. I would give him the paper and he would put the glue on it and say, "here Aun (Aunt) Tan (Tania)" so I did piece the thing together, he did put the eyes, nose and buttons on.

Wyatt has not been the only one doing fall crafts, my daughter Kaelyn made a cute fall wreath at school. They used a red paper plate with the center cut out and two holes punched out at the top to string the ribbon through. She arranged the fall foliage onto the plate and then added an orange ribbon to hang it with. I think that she did an excellent job with her arrangement.

A Winner lives here....

Last Wednesday I was reading The LPM Blog and Beth was announcing her daughter Amanda's 30th birthday. So in honor of Amanda's birthday Beth was doing a giveaway of two tickets to any Living Proof Live event in 2010 to 30 people. Of course I registered to "try for those tickets", thinking that I would probably not win. They held the drawing last Friday, (I was out of town at a counseling conference and did not get home until Saturday night) and posted the winners of the giveaway, that's right all 30 of them. So when I got home Saturday I signed on to my blog page and saw that I had a comment that needed to be moderated. It was from my new friend Annie, her message to me was "TANIA!!! Oh my word, you WON one of the Giveaways on the Living Proof blog!!! Ahhh!!! How exciting!!!! Out of almost 2500 people you WON! How cool is that?!?!?!?" A big THANK YOU to Annie for her exciting comment to let me know I won. I was so excited when I read that! So I went on over to The LPM Blog to see how to get the two tickets that I had won. I am so excited about going to see Beth Moore and to hear her teach the word of God. Now for the hard part, who do I take with me???????

She's not a baby anymore.....she's now ten!

Kaelyn is officially ten years old today. Yesterday I told her, "Today is the last day that you will ever be nine." She just looked at me like I was crazy or something, (who knows, I sure have felt like it over the last week, but then again I feel like that every year around my kids birthdays.) Since we celebrated her birthday this past Saturday, I really don't have a large post as far as words go about her birthday. I do have some pictures that I went through earlier today and decided that I would share some of my favorite pictures of Kaelyn.

Here she is at 3 months old.

With her big brother Tyler.

Kaelyn at 12 months.

All smiles

How sweet!

                                                      Christmas 2001 - 2 years old      

 

Kaelyn and her Daddy

This is one of my very favorite pictures of her.

She is 2 years old.

Kaelyn and me sharing a homemade milkshake.

Kaelyn and her best friend Emily

at Kaelyn's 4th birthday party.

A Tea Party for her 6th Birthday.

My sweet girl.

HAPPY 10th BIRTHDAY KAELYN!!

My Little Baker

This morning after taking my nephew Waylon to school, his brother Wyatt and I stopped by the store to buy some cookie dough. I decided that we would bake cookies today and surprise Kaelyn for her birthday. We had her party with cake and all on Saturday, so I knew we didn't need anymore cake today. I told Wyatt we were going to make some cookies today for Kaelyn. He was fine with making cookies, he just didn't want to make them for Kaelyn. He told me "not Kaeyn (Kaelyn), make cookies for Wyatt." So I suggested we make cookies for Wyatt and he could share with Kaelyn and Tyler. He said, "share with Kaeyn and Tyr". I just love to listen to him talk.

Here is the package for our cookies.

Working so hard.

(The cookie sheet really is clean, just old)

Our freshly baked cookies.

After letting the cookies cool, I put them on a plate and showed them to Wyatt. Of course the first thing he did was smile and grabbed a cookie and started eating. He finished that one and lo and behold if he doesn't grab another one. I covered them and put them out of sight so that we would have some left for Kaelyn and Tyler when they come home from school today.

Partying at the Park

Today we celebrated Kaelyn's 10th birthday (her birthday is on the 13th) with some of her friends at the park. We kept it pretty simple with just a few friends (Emily, Susannah, Faith)  and then my parents and sister Crystal with her husband Jesse and their precious little boys Waylon and Wyatt. Of course my husband Chuck and son Tyler were there to celebrate too.

Kaelyn and her friend Susannah.

Faith and Emily eating pizza.

Her Birthday Cake.

We had pizza for lunch and then some cake. The girls had a good time playing, but boy was it hot out there. I thought that it was supposed to be cool in October. It did rain a couple of times, once before the party guests got there and then when we were almost finished with the party. I think the girls enjoyed the coolness of the rain as it started coming down on them while they were out there playing.

I wasn't able to get any pictures of the boys, for some reason they thought the playground was so much better than staying still for me to take their picture. As you can tell I didn't get many pictures, too busy talking to take any pictures. Please tell me that I am not the only one who remembers to take the camera but then forgets to take the pictures. Oh well.

So close....

Tyler had his second flag football game this past Thursday. They got there jerseys just before game time (thanks Mr. Alan Harmon at http://www.harmonpublications.com/). Tyler played three of the four quarters of the game and I have got to say that he did  pretty good out there on that football field. It was a great game with Riverside making the first touchdown of the game. While his team (Riverside) did not win, they had a pretty close game with the final score being 26-25. I am so proud of my son and his teammates. Way to go Riverside Wranglers!!

Getting some water after the game.

A Beautiful Reminder

What a beautiful reminder that we have from God. When I saw this rainbow I was quickly reminded of the following verses in Genesis.

12 Then God said, “I am giving you a sign of my covenant with you and with all living creatures, for all generations to come. 13 I have placed my rainbow in the clouds. It is the sign of my covenant with you and with all the earth. 14 When I send clouds over the earth, the rainbow will appear in the clouds, 15 and I will remember my covenant with you and with all living creatures. Never again will the floodwaters destroy all life. 16 When I see the rainbow in the clouds, I will remember the eternal covenant between God and every living creature on earth.” 17 Then God said to Noah, “Yes, this rainbow is the sign of the covenant I am confirming with all the creatures on earth.”

Genesis 9:12-17
New Living Translation (NLT)

Hobby Lobby

Yesterday, my sister and I took a little trip to Hobby Lobby. This was the first time that we had ever gone there, we have heard several people talking about shopping there and all the great things they have purchased. Crystal kind of had in her mind what she was going there for and I was just along for the ride. I did however make a couple of small purchases.

I bought this cute little notepad set for less than $2.oo.

I also got some cute little party favor bags to give out to the girls at Kaelyn's upcoming birthday party. I'll post pictures when I do her party post.

There has been quite a bit of complaining going on at our house from our kids. Nothing real bad, but just enough to drive me crazy some days.  So when I saw this I knew I just had to get it. The price was $7.99 with 50% off. It is made of metal and very light weight, which will make it easy to hang up.

We took Crystal's son Wyatt with us. He was so well behaved while we were gone. He was so very patient with his momma and I  as we spent several hours looking at stuff at Hobby Lobby and even at a little antique store that we stopped at on our way back home.

Of course since I had my camera with me I had to get a picture of him. Wyatt loves to have his picture taken, so as soon as he sees the camera he starts saying "cheese", then proceeds to pose for the camera. What a cutie.

Tyler's First Football Game

Tyler had his first football game last week. His school has a flag football team, (it has been said that the reason it is not "regular" football is because someone might get hurt- don't know if that is the real reason or not), anyway this is the first football team his school has ever had. The school is in their third year now. Tyler enjoys football so much, and was so glad when the school formed the first ever Riverside Wranglers Flag Football Team. He plays center and did a good job. I am sad to say that I don't know what the ending score was, in my defense there was no scoreboard for me to keep up with it. I'm not feeling to bad about not knowing what it was because Tyler nor his Dad could tell me what the score was either. I do know that his team lost, but they also made the first touchdown of the game. Way to go "Wranglers"!  Guess I'll have to ask the coach at the next game, hopefully he will know. Here are some pictures that I took while at the game.

Tyler getting ready for the game.

Tyler and his coach watching the team.

Tyler getting ready to hike the ball.

Kaelyn and my nephew Wyatt watching Tyler play ball.

(That is a bandage on Wyatt's foot, I didn't take him out with just one sock on.)

Looking forward to this week's game, and I will try to keep up with the score.

Flowers... from a marvelous Creator

Often times we, actually I take things for granted. Just this past week as I was outside with my nephew Wyatt I looked around our yard and beyond, at all the trees, flowers, birds, clouds, and the sun and realized that I don't thank God enough for all that he has made. I am usually busy with something or in a hurry to get somewhere that I don't reflect on the beauty around me that was created by our Heavenly Father.

As I was going through some of the pictures that I took while on our vacation to Colorado this past summer, I came across some of the ones of flowers that I had taken. (My son Tyler still doesn't know why I always want to stop and take pictures of flowers). Needless to say, I love taking close up pictures of flowers and once again am reminded of what a great artist God is. Just look at the colors He used in making each of these flowers. It is amazing that no two are just alike. Each one is made special, just like each one of us.

Thank you Father for all that you have created. May I not take for granted the works of Your hands.