Let It Snow, Let It Snow

Our annual Park City Ski vacation is upon us.
We are soooooooooooo excited!

Watch out fellow skiers...
this 4 yr old is going to try and conquer the mountain.

Christmas Morning

We had Christmas morning yesterday. Yeah, I know, it was December 12th, but our kids don't know the difference. Actually, we told them we were "starting" the Christmas holiday, because in a few days we will be flying to the snowy Rockies where we will "end" our Christmas holiday. We didn't want to lug all the Christmas loot to Park City and then haul it back just so our kids could open their presents on the 25th. And it really isn't a lot of loot...Daniel got an easel and James got a musical toy. The morning went something like this...

Once upon a cold snowy morning, there were two little boys, one in strip-ed jammies and the other in monkey jammies (quite appropriate). They ran down the stairs on Christmas morning to find treasures under and in the tree.

The first treasure to be found was a hidden pickle within the branches. According to German tradition, a pickle was hidden within the tree. The child to find the pickle on Christmas morning got a special treat.

The boy in the strip-ed jammies found the pickle. His special treat was a whole bag of Twizzlers...the lucky little guy. With much persuasion he reluctantly shared the licorice with the boy in monkey jammies. Did the strip-ed boy really think his parents were going to give him reign over the whole bag of candy?

After the jammied boys opened their presents, it was time for breakfast.

And they lived happily ever after.

Merry Christmas!

It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas

I tried my hand at wreath making.
It's kind of full, but not bad for my first try.
Now we aren't the scrooges of the neighborhood, but a wreath is the only Christmas decoration I am putting up outside.
We are enjoying our neighbor's lights though.

"Here we come a caroling"
Santa joined us this year...
we just picked him up off the street...
he looked lost.

I love waking up to a winter wonderland.

65 Degrees in December

Back to Virginia

Last week we drove through 7 states. James complained that his "bu" was hurting. Our kids watched "The Polar Express" 7692837502487 times. We got stuck on the New Jersey Turnpike, but it was all worth it, because we got to hang out with these guys again!

"Happiness is time spent with a friend and looking forward to sharing time with them again."
- Lee Wilkinson

24 Days Until Christmas

There are 24 Christmas books wrapped under our tree. Every night we get to unwrap one and read it. Well, to be totally honest, there are only 23 books, I thought we could read the real Christmas story out of the Bible on Christmas Eve, but I can't wrap my scriptures up quite yet.

Once In A Lifetime

Daniel will be graduating from Sunbeams at the end of the year (he will be graduating because no one can fail). To graduate from Sunbeams, you need to participate in the annual Primary Program. This is how it went...

Daniel sat in the front row, by the banister, that to him resembled railroad tracks. Soon his hand became a "train". No train is complete without the proper sound effects. There were plenty of "chugga chugga, chugga, chugga" sounds made as his hand made it's way up and down the "railroad" tracks on the banister. At one point, the train conductor...Daniel, made the announcement

"All aboard!"

For the most part, Daniel was consumed in his train world during the hour long program. He did however do a great job saying his part very LOUDLY and clearly into the microphone. He even sang one of the songs.

There were a couple incidents of pawing back and forth between him and the boy next to him. There was also many times where he was just hanging over the edge and dangling his arms. And there I sat, in the congregation...helpless. Sometimes I wish I had Elastagirl's superpowers.

But really, for the most part, I just sat there beaming, watching my little Sunbeam do his thang!

Letter of Apology

Dear Blog,

I have neglected you. I'm sorry. So much time has passed since I last posted that I don't even know where to start to get you completely updated. I'm very grateful for you, blog. You help me relive my memories. You do a much better job of keeping track of my family's history than my journal does.

My journal throughout my life has entries like this

"I've decided to be consistent about writing in my journal. Life is good. I can't complain. Talk to you tomorrow."

Six months later...

"I really need to be better at writing in my journal. I'm recommitting. A lot is going on right now."

One year later...

"Well, another year has passed. This year I'm going to write in my journal once a week."

Well, you get the idea. My posterity is not going to enjoy reading my journal. But, they will enjoy reading you, Mr. Blog. Besides, I can insert fun pictures like this

and this

and this

to make the page not so sterile and boring like my journal.

Love,

The Hahns

Fall Photos

Escaping to New Hampshire

We spent the week in the White Mountains...without giving a second thought to time.

But, it is good to be home.

Miracles

This morning I took the kids swimming. When we came home, Daniel curled up on the couch and fell asleep. He has NEVER done that!

I AM GETTING SO MUCH DONE!

Dirty Laundry

Today as I was sorting the laundry my mind wondered back to Brazil, where I served a mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. My mind often wonders back to Brazil when I do laundry, because for a year and a half I washed my clothes in a bucket.

Brazilian moms have super powers. I'm sure their kids come in looking like this...

or leave clothes in the laundry basket that look like this...

but their kids always looked clean. Those moms have to scrub each little sock by hand. If I could, I would give each mom a washing machine. I should stop complaining about doing the laundry...but I probably will again...because I still don't like it. I am very grateful for a functioning washing machine with a "Heavy Duty" cycle on it.

I Love Little People

This is just one reason why it is so great to have little people around the house...they can fit and are willing to army crawl under my bed to retrieve objects. It was (and still is) nasty dirty under there.

Fall

Saturday was warm...and windy.
It rained leaves all day long.

They smelled so good...

and made a fun sound when you played in them.

James is cheating in eating his doughnut on a string.

My Golden Life

Bog Blog

I've been wanting to go to a cranberry bog since we moved to New England. I was hoping to visit a flooded bog. I think the sea of red floating berries looks so pretty. Alas, a dry bog will have to do...unless I decide to farm cranberries myself.

Collecting our fall bounty

Not much of a bounty

James popped cranberries like he would candy.
Crazy kid! Who eats raw cranberries?
I like mine with some suga suga.

Just Day Dreaming

The Children's Museum added a new water play exhibit since we were last there. While my kids did this...

I wrote this...

October 18, 2009

Dear Al Gore,

Check this out

taken October, 18, 2009

Your's truly from MA.

Warriors

I was a desperate mom yesterday. Both my kiddos were bouncing off the walls and had a hard time sleeping last night. Desperate times call for desperate measures, so today we started Navy Seal training. Not just Navy Seal training, but more specifically 'hell week' of Navy Seal training.

It started this morning when I woke James up from his slumber. How could he possibly think I was going to allow him to sleep in after he stayed up until 10pm last night? At least I didn't splash cold water on him when I did wake him up like they do during real Navy Seal training.

The first day of 'hell week' went something like this:

• Bike ride to the park
• .5 mile racing run
• Soccer
• Playground play
• Library visit
• Hour long P90X workout video (James dropped out at this point and napped)
• Mat room obstacle courses at the YMCA
• Swimming

There were some tears from this guy

but it was mostly squills of delight. Both kiddos licked their dinner plates clean. Then it was scriptures, prayers, brushed teeth and off to bed where they both insisted on reading a little before dozing off. Can you believe they both read books in bed for about 15 minutes before falling asleep?!?!? Tomorrow needs to be more challenging.

A more challenging day may kill the Navy Seal trainer. I'm afraid this training is going to come back to bite me. I'm creating bionic boys. If only they were old enough to build walls out of boulders.