6 in the Sticks

Jackson and Jeromy went to Ashley's game last night. The won again! I guess it was a good turn around as well as they started the first part of the game losing, and not only caught up, but creamed them as well. Jackson took pictures for me as I stayed home with Charly last night and painted pictures of Christmas trees. Ash is the one in red and white just left of number 12 on the other team.

In this shot, she is just to the right of the ump.

Here she is in the center again.

Thank you Jackie!

There was only a couple of inches of snow on the ice rink yesterday. We got between five to ten inches since then. We are supposed to get another seven inches tonight.

Dad gave us an old riding lawn mower from the cabin and it has a snow plow attachment. It worked great as a snow blower too Dad! Thank you! Jeromy had so much fun!

WHEEEEEEEEE.

I think we have got about fourteen inches of snow since yesterday. The pictures I posted this morning were from yesterday. Jeromy plowed the driveway again this morning. But Mr, "I've been making an ice rink" was no where to be found when it came time to shovel ten inches of snow off of the rink and sweep it afterwards. That's okay, I should give him slack. After all, he's been working so hard at sprinkling water so delicately day after day. :) Love ya honey. Seriously. Where'd ya go?

It hasn't stopped snowing.

I came in to take a break and figure out how I am going to bake triangle shaped cup cakes tonight for Charly's birthday. Silly Charly. Hoping to get the kids outside again and make a snow fort to paint before we get everything set for school tomorrow.

How's it looking Ab? :) Jeromy will have to brush up on his camels.

Our little Charly angel girl at one week old. Her preemie clothes were too big for her.

"You sees, it's like this, ya know. I'm stuck here, with you, due to the circumstances of an offer I couldn't refuse, you sees. Are you talk'n to me? Are YOU talk'n to me?"

"I'm here for HOW long?! Aaahhhhhhhhhh!"

"Um..you hoo! Could somebody PLEASE get this guy off my back?"

Happy 4th Birthday to our sweet surprise babe! We love you and hope you have a wonderful day!

The HILLS are aliiiive with the sound of muuuuusic! Charly is such a happy girl, so full of life and thankful for everything.

She got a birthday card in the mail yesterday from my dad and opened it like it was a present and said, "Oh thank you! Thank you! I always wanted one!" Why yes, it was a Hallmark. Then hugged it.

Grandma and Grandpa called to wish her a happy birthday and when I handed her the phone, she said, "Grandma, it's my birthday now!"

We started the day out by taking Jackson to school. Picking up Ashley from school and taking her to get her driver's permit test done. SHE PASSED!!!

CONGRATULATIONS ASHLEY!!!!!!!

We had some time to kill after we took Ashley back to school and were waiting for Jackson's class to be done, so we took a drive and took some pictures. We went to the deer wintering area to see if we would see deer, and we did! Jessica and Ashley used to like to go there when they were little too.

A ridge that I climbed to the top of as a teenager. I took one step out of the van onto the road and literally, fell into the ditch. The snow plow pushed snow over where it looked like the shoulder of the road. Of course, that's when a car of a couple people drove past, thinking I was a clown I'm sure.

A "buried" cemetery.

The triangle cupcakes Charly requested. Her birthday menu choice this year was miniature pigs in a blanket with "brown beans". (Baked beans) The cupcakes ended up being cone shaped, Charly approved anyway.

I tried, not too hard, to make a triangle shape cup cake cup out of tin foil by molding the tin foil onto a candle holder. I really didn't have the time to intricately form the tin foil into twenty four triangles, so this was close enough. 

Then we went to Charly's ECFE holiday party. Every year, they have a holiday party which includes, numerous projects, most popular is the gingerbread house. Then Santa comes, walks through the room but keeps to himself, goes to a chair in the corner, sits down and waits for children who are not too scared to come and see him. Charly liked watching him but wanted nothing to do with sitting on his lap. Jackson sat near him for about twenty minutes and listened to him talk to children that sat on his lap. Jack said he already sat on his lap this year so didn't want to do it again. Next, a dance teacher in town(Ashley's tap dance teacher from when she was little) comes in and does some group songs and dancing with the kids to holiday songs. The kids really enjoy ringing jingle bells. We left before the dancing this year because we wanted to get home at a somewhat decent hour to celebrate Charly's birthday.

Charly smiled for me until she saw another parent looking at her and telling her she was cute. :) Below are the projects we came home with plus the dinosaur birthday hats with horns Charly wanted for her birthday. House in front is Charly's, and house in back is Jackson's.

Next, cake and ice cream time! I just realized we never had the ice cream.

Charly got the Princess doll she's been eyeing up. Speaking of eyes, very nice Ashley.

I think she had a good birthday.

Thanks for letting us take so many pictures too Charly!

BRrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

It's a little nippy out. -26 degrees with wind chill. That will be good for adding more water to the rink!

My aunt clued me in on an awesome web site for every kind of Christmas cookie recipe I could imagine. There are fun games for the kids to do too, so I thought I'd pass along. Just look into my magic SNOWBALL!

I've been playing a lot of Christmas music around the house since November, I'm not sure what's going on with me but I swear I could practically toot out candy canes this year as I have so much Christmas spirit. Maybe because this is the first year Jackson and Charly are really getting into it, and it's been quite a few years since Jess and Ashley were at that age, it's just so fun.

Yesterday I played the Red and Green Christmas cd with Kermit and Miss Piggy. I was doing chores and walking in and out of rooms putting stuff away as Jackson and Charly were playing. When I came back to the living room, I found them dancing together to the song, Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas.

It was so sweet. They were holding hands and swaying back and forth. Charly had put on her play dress, shoes, and Jackson had put on his baseball pants, as he also calls them him dance pants. They were pretending that they would go to school, and have dance class in the living room. It was so sweet. I need to start jotting down all of the different things they pretend. It is so awesome sometimes to just watch and witness how much they've grown, and how their imaginations work. Awwwwhhh. My cup runneth over again.

I know this shot isn't so good, but this twirl was pretty good, and I wasn't able to get a better shot.

These are pinecones I had the kids collect in the yard just after the first snow. They got a lot of them from a red squirrel's stash in one of our flower pots. I glued red decorative wire to them for tree ornaments for our little tree in the living room. I wonder if that red squirrel's mouth will water when he sees the tree through the window. Kind of funny when you think about it. Or not. Yes, I do have a life. Somewhat. Whatever.

Wahlah!

Kind of plain I know, but sometimes less is better. Besides, we have another tree to be flooded in the family room yet.

I was cleaning the bathroom while listening to Jackson and Charly play again. I heard Jackson, "C'mon! Let's go to No Wonder Land!" Charly replied, " Okay, let's go! LOOK! There's No Wonder Land, over there!" Jackson said, " No, that's the Sara Ghetties over there. I think No Wonder Land is that way."

It was very hard to keep from laughing out loud!

Jackson's fish. On this day, Jack made a bass with gills. He placed some bait, also playdoh, on a string and caught this bass. It slopped around on the table until Jack cut the meat off with his pretend fillet knife.

Today was the very first time Jackson and Charly got to be on the ice by learning how to ice skate! Charly was a little hesitant but with some one on one time day to day, she'll be booking around in no time. She tried a couple of times to glide all by herself. They both were both such troopers about not giving up and going with the flow even when they fell down.

Jackson, who has been good at every physical sport so far, (my little solid monkey), did so good at listening to my instructions on easy tips to balance fast. It was so awesome to see him try and try and not give up. He was booking around in no time.

He sat for a rest and gave the thumbs up. He told us he was so happy to finally skate.

After watching us for a bit, Jeromy decided to go and get his skates on and go for a whirl. Six years since he did a camel at open skating night with Ash, but proved he still has it.

Here's a smokeless camel shot for Aunt Abbie.

And, another one.

And, another one! Look at that! This next shot doesn't look so smokeless as the steam from my breath was a bit much as I giggled at Jeromy. What a maniac I must add. It's been six years since we've gone ice skating period. I took it slow and eased back into it slowly, meanwhile, there goes Jeromy, a little sloppy at first, but he's going. Going, oops, "Watch out for that...tree!" All ended well, just a little bruise on his bottom maybe. The kids thought he was pretty hilarious, they lost their breath from laughing pretty hard.

We'll give it another try tomorrow!

Jackson asks about three times a day, "Can I go skating?" He's so happy the more he does it, and he's great at it. Doesn't surprise us too much as his hand/eye coordination has always been ABOVE the norm.

Charly went out a couple of times, I missed pictures with her last night but Jeromy and Charly told me she glided quite a bit. Hopefully I'll get some more shots of her later today.

I've got some kind of bug that Jeromy was fighting last week, not fun. Hoping nobody else gets it, and if they do, that it comes fast and leaves fast. Hoping to be more productive today with chores around the house.

Our sweet neighbor dog, Maggie has been coming to visit us everyday again. Remember the mullet dog? I haven't seen her since deer season when she ran by four different times with deer legs from the neighbor's house. I bet her momma put the kabosh on that.

More skating pictures of Jack.

Who wants to place dibs on Charly being class clown in 2022?

I can't believe they only learned to skate four days ago! They've picked it up pretty good and managed to get their first crack at hockey as well.

Yes, we know that's not how a hockey stick is taped but we let them have it the way they wanted to make it more fun!

"Don't eat the yellow stuff Girl!"

It was absolutely beautiful outside today! The roads were very slick, but the view was picturess!

I am so shocked today. Ashley got a gift card in the mail the other day. It was for Best Buy.com. Not having a clue which friend or family member sent it, as we get several every holiday season from family that don't live near, I contacted Best Buy. I figured there was a slip up when the person purchased the card online. As I can totally relate as I've accidentally clicked the wrong button in a hurry to get off of the computer.

Bestbuy.com would not give me any information about the sender because Ashley is over thirteen years old. I was shocked! I told them I thought that was ridiculous because she is still a minor. He told me if Ashley calls, they can tell her directly. You bet your buns we'll be doing that together tonight!

I wanted to spread the word to friends and family, and whoever would be as concerned as I am. below is a copy of the comment I sent to the manager of Best Buy.com support.

Thank you SO much to all of you that send gift cards to the kids! That is the best gift you can get them. They love it because they get to shop with their own money and get a gift they actually want! Can I just request that you not get them a gift card from Best Buy anymore? I hope you understand. Thank you.

Dear Best Buy Privacy Manager;

I am contacting you after total shock from a conversation I had with a member of your Bestbuy.com Support team earlier today.

My situation is this. My fifteen year old daughter received a bestbuy.com $30.00 gift card via UPS. There was not any information regarding who the sender was. Being that the only gift cards my children usually get, come from grandparents. I was curious who the sender was that forgot to fill in their sender information so we could send off a thank you card.

After not only waiting on hold on your phone system for what I thought was twenty-five minutes. I was not only disconnected, transferred a few times, and finally helped by a person whose english was very hard to understand. And on that note, how can one give good customer service if they cannot properly communicate with your customers?

After carefully listening to your rep, he informed me that he could NOT, and will not give me the information of the sender because my daughter was over the age thirteen. I could not believe this was true, as my daughter is a minor! Since when do thirteen year old children have privacy rights from their parents?! And as a concerned parent, you can bet that I will investigate this further as this may open the door for any kind of freaky pedafile to send my teenage daughter gifts without my knowledge.

And you can bet, that I will share the word about Best Buy's policies with family,friends, and every kind of organization I can think of that would also accommodate concerned parents like myself!

I have always thought highly of the Best Buy company until this. Really, What ARE you thinking?!

A very appalled mother,

Kim Flom

customer order# BBY01-XXXXXXXXXXXX

Kim,

Thank you for contacting Best Buy about the gift card your daughter received.

I would be happy to help you with your inquiry. Because of Privacy Laws, we can not inform you of the giver of the card, unless that person gives us the permission to disclose the information. I apologize for any disappointment this may cause you.

Thank you for sharing your comments with Best Buy. Please do not hesitate to contact us with additional questions or concerns.

Best Wishes from Best Buy,
Michael and the Consumer Relations Team

Seriously, am I the only adult to not know about the Privacy Laws that keep me knowing who is mailing things to my child?!

Game on! I will find out!

Ashley and I just got back from basketball practice. She has absolutely no clue who sent this gift.

She calls Best Buy. I sat next to her. The lady she talked to was very nice and speedy. But she had one supervisor telling her that she could tell Ashley, and one supervisor telling her not to. They decided to have another supervisor call her back another time, and they would let Ashley know who it was that sent the gift as the sender requested privacy. Of course, that makes me wonder even more.

Now it will be a game of when the Best buy Supervisor can catch Ashley at home I suppose.

If the sender does not let Best Buy tell Ashley who they are, we will return the gift.

I am still investigating this, and have made a couple of phone calls already. I think this Privacy Law that Best Buy talks about, if it is a law, needs some tweaking. And I know I'm not alone with this opinion.

The Best Buy rep had told Ashley that someone would be contacting her in the next few days to let her know who the card was from. The rep also told Ash, "The good news is you have this gift card and you get to go shopping." Ashley replied, "Yeah, except ,my mom is kind of freaked out because we don't know who sent the card." Ashley said the rep told her she could understand.

Hopefully we'll get more answers after Christmas.

Does anyone else have a deer roasting by an open fire this Christmas? No need to be jealous ladies! :)

Just because we live in the sticks does not mean our lives are dull in any way.

The last deer from muzzle loader season hung in the garage to be aged. Oh it's aged alright! And it is frozen! Jeromy decided he needed to butcher it tonight, so brought it into the family room to thaw.

Granny and Jackson made a Christmas theme out of playdoh. Santa on the left holding a pipe,(even though Santa doesn't smoke anymore as Jackson put it) A sack full of presents, stockings to the right, Christmas tree with presents, and a chimney with smoke coming out.

She had just read the Night Before Christmas book to Jackson, I think the book was hers when she was a little girl as it's outdated and worn from all of the years. Jackson was wondering what the pipe was, and we explained to him that this was a book from the old days. Jackson said, "Well Santa doesn't smoke anymore." It was cute how concerned he was.

Jessica and Eddy came over with their little, pregnant Chihuahua for a little while.

Laurie came over too. We opened some gifts.

Jackson and Charly got their first ice fishing poles.

Jackson got baby alive. He wanted it so bad, he said he wanted to pretend he was a dad. It really drinks water, and wets his diaper. And to our surprise it is anatomically correct as well, which is funny as we all know how wet parents can get when changing baby boys diapers. The instructions had a warning to kids to be careful when changing his diaper as he may not be done yet.

Holiday Barbie stocking.

Jackson got the "jigg'n rapala's" he's been wanting.

Charly. Still in the silly face stage. She got wireless candles, and a vanity for the girlie-girl in her. She sat in front of her vanity for quite some time applying, and reapplying lip-gloss.

And what a way to top off the evening before getting nestled for the night but to dance to Alicia Keys new cd! Jeromy claims that he stayed in the kitchen while all of danced, but he snuck out a few times and poked his pointer fingers in the air!

Merry Christmas!

Jackson woke up VERY early morning to use the bathroom and was pretty excited, and had a hard time going back to sleep as well as waiting for morning to come and check and see if Santa came. I woke up to him laying in bed next to me singing jingle bells very quietly.

When an appropriate hour arrived, Charly was up first. Jeromy tried to wake Jackson up but he was pretty groggy. I leaned in close to his ear and said softly, "Jackson, do you want to wake up and see if Santa came?" He sat up immediately. :)

Ashley got the birthstone collector's Barbie, November since Ashley's birthday is in November.

Jackson got a toy chainsaw that he asked for.

Charly got the keyboard with microphone that she asked for.

And all three of them got a table top pool table to share. And too many stocking stuffers. They must have been good this year.

Uncle Brian came up late Christmas eve, and then Laurie came later Christmas day with her boyfriend, and boys. Dinner was later than planned but I don't think anyone cared as we were still digesting the wonderful shrimp mom brought up and made on the grill the night before. Yummy, my mouth is still watering.

Okay, time to put some clothes on and get ready for the day!

Uncle Brian got Jackson Hunter Dan, and Charly Hunter Ann.

And of course, a new shotgun for Charly. Good thing too because the one he got her last year broke and she had to always borrow her brother's. She was SO happy.

As I went to bed last night, I caught a glance at our Christmas countdown to see someone changed it to 0 days till Christmas.

When I got up this morning, I saw it had been changed again. Sneaky Brian.

Ashley says this is wrong because it is leap year and there is 29 days in February.

Being the scholar I am, have no clue if this is true without counting the days on my 2008 calendar. :)

Hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas this year. So many of you were in our thoughts and prayers even if we were not able to visit, or talk to you.

My dad comes tomorrow to visit with us. He said he'd bring his skates and get on our rink with us, can't wait!

We laid my sweet little kitty, Nitemare, AKA Boo-boo to rest yesterday morning.

He had deteriorated the last couple of weeks, and pretty drastically the last couple of days. Jackson came with me to the vet. The kids knew what our possibilities would be as we all talked about it. I held him as Jackson pet him and kissed him as we told him he was such a good kitty. He was nineteen years old.

I got him from the Humane Society. He was the runt of the litter, but just this cute little black hairball.

He has been there beside me through the toughest of times, best of times, and managed to get along with everyone as my family grew and grew.  It has always amazed me that animals have such unconditional love. And how they sense tragedy in your life and just lay beside you, and let you know they love you.

We could tell that Cally and Moose sensed the loss of their friend as well, especially Cally. She'd snuggle with Boo-boo and clean him up, she'd come over and meow at us for food when Boo was just too tired to move, but hungry.

Goodbye little guy, we'll miss you SO much!

We had a fun time while my dad was here, as we usually do. Dad brought up his "antique skates" as Jeromy told him, and his snowmobiles. We exchanged presents the first night he came. Jackson got a construction truck, and Charly got a Cabbage Patch school girl dollie. Charly has been getting tired of having pictures taken of her lately, and refused to sit with her new doll. She's starting to sound like a Hollywood premadonna because she says, "No pictures please!"

Friday morning Dad and I took Jackson and Charly for a nice snowmobile ride. They did pretty good as this was the first time that I can remember that they've been on a sled that was built after 1973. It was also the longest ride they've been on. It was SO fun! Snowmobiling has been something that my Dad's side of the family has been doing for years. I think all of us grandchildren have been riding since we were babies. I really miss those annual family get-togethers. Thanks again Dad!

Jackson on the left, Charly on the right, and my Dad holding her up. She was a little wobbly wearing a helmet. When I first put the helmet on her, she tilted to the side and said, "Whooaaaaaaaa." Silly little martians. Jackson was so excited to go when he found out we were going to go for a ride. He had to get his snow clothes on immediately and stand outside wearing his helmet the whole time while he waited for us.

This shot was taken on the trail. We stopped several times to make sure the kids were staying warm and doing okay. This spidey looking character is Jackson.

Did I blind you? This is Jackson and myself. I had to put my hunting shell on to keep warm. At least the other snowmobilers saw me coming! LOL.

Later in the night we went skating. Dad still has it, he checked me off of the ice and onto the ice around the edge. Charly didn't want a picture so covered her face. I only had this shot, and once again, forgot to hold my breathe.

Charly and Jackson were trying to get Grandpa after he pushed me down. Charly has never gone so fast, it was so funny because she didn't glide, she ran, and wobbled forward and backward and came close to wiping out so many times. Jackson can really book around now, but he only uses one leg to gain speed, but he is so fast and can turn fast. On this night he was so happy because he went backwards for the first time.

The next morning Jackson coaxed us to get the old Skidoo out in the yard to drive. The old skidoo's we have are the ones I grew up driving with my brother. I SO feel it important for people to still drive one of these to gain experience as you have to lean and move your body around and gain knowledge of how a machine rides. The new ones these days could be very dangerous for someone with limited experience. I'm really glad and thankful we have these old sleds, not only awesome for ice fishing, but an awesome tool to teach our children basic riding skills.

By the time Charly was ready to go outside, everyone was cold and came in. So Miss Charly said she wanted to go out by herself anyway. She walked around the trail Jackson and Jeromy made a few times. Grabbed a tree branch and came close to getting buried in an avalanche of snow, and then came back inside.

Dad took a chunk of deer fat and hung it form the tree for the birds to eat. At one point we had a grayjay, woodpecker, and a bluejay all around waiting for a turn to taste. This is the woodpecker.