Just when you think...

.... what else could happen.

I am so thankful that Matt will be home from the slope tomorrow. What a challenging few weeks. I had to write this so I would one day look back and remember to smile and laugh about everything we go through as a family. Every day we learn something new and know that God will carry us through. This might sound silly but throughout this week all I could think about was other people. I kept thinking, this is so stressful, BUT I know someone else out there right now is going through something so much worse.

I guess it all started with me going to the Dentist to get some work taken care of; over 3 hours in the chair and several days of soreness I now have almost painfully sensitive teeth. ugh. After that we were okay for a few days and then it hit. Colt got the most horrible tummy bug I have ever seen. Poor guy is on day 5 of throwing up, gas, diarrhea, and a reduced appetite. Day 3 I got to join in on the 'fun' but only had to suffer for about 12 hours. I can not believe he has had to go through this for 5 days now. I have tried it all. We have done the BRAT diet, Pedialyte, Probiotics, crackers and 7up, even Pepto. I have talked to several Docs and nurses and they all say I just have to let it run its course. Thats so hard for me to do! I can not even began to count the loads of laundry I have done, the time I have spent scrubbing carpets, or the amount of wet wipes, pull ups, and clorox wipes I have gone through. I have been a bleaching, lysoling, clorox wiping, crazy momma and....... it still didn't keep Laela bug from catching it. Day 5 for Bubba is Laelas day 1. Im hoping and praying she gets over it quickly; she isn't use to being a home body and she isn't a big fan. I do have to admit that Colt has gotten so much practice with the potty here lately he has been doing exceptionally well with his potty training. The kids are much more aware of germs, the importance of hand washing, and Colt has now learned how to wipe down every surface of our house with a Clorox wipe. It really is cute to watch him walk around and mock me.
Between all of this craziness I have been trying to pack and prep the house for our trip to Oklahoma. I feel like I take one step forward and three steps back most of the time. Once Matt gets home we will be in what I call "frantic packing mode". No matter how many lists I make or how prepared I am, I always feel like it comes down to the wire. All in all, we can't wait to see everyone and enjoy some of the incredible warm weather that OK is experiencing right now.

Down to the wire....

     We are days away from jumping on a plane and heading South. I have been trying to check things off my list, but it just seems like everyday I come up with more things that need done. Either way its OKLAHOMA or bust :-) Laela is beyond excited to see everyone; she has been talking about it a lot. Between the trip and Christmas she is on cloud 9. Colt is basically along for the ride; he doesn't really get the whole concept BUT he is ready to "go, go, go"! Thats his new thing here lately... usually "go, go, go" means he needs to potty, but when Laela starts talking about going to OK he definitely chimes in. 

     We got to have some fun with the kiddos!!! 

Brittney and I got the kids all Chirstmased up and we took some adorable pics. It is a lot of work BUT my kids never fail me. They were such troopers; we even did a mini 3 min shoot outside and Im pretty sure it was around 10 degrees. Overall I was more than happy with them! I feel like Im a broken record but I just can not get over how old they both look. I still feel like they are my babies, but they are growing so fast and changing at a more rapid speed than I could have ever imagined. 

     I hope everyone is ready for the Hamm family to barge in and make ourselves at home. 

We will be seeing you soon! 

He may not speak BUT he goes to the POTTY

Not that everyone really wants to know this tid-bit of information BUT I could not go without sharing. Colton Scott has been potty training the last few days and I couldn't be more proud of him. He has been doing such an amazing job!!! He doesn't talk yet, but he will come grab my hand and drag me to the restroom when he needs to go. Sometimes I will ask him "Colt, do you need to go potty" he shakes his head one way or the other and he always tells me the truth. I would say that he is 75% of the way there within just days of very casual potty training. I was a little nervous to start because he is so young, but he showed so much interest including climbing up on the potty himself and pulling down his diaper and heading to the bathroom himself. Its looking like we will finish this box of pull ups and then go straight to undies. My baby boy is growing up so fast; Im loving every minute and enjoying even the hard days!

~ I couldn't resist sharing this toooo cute image of my Colton! ~

We love Alaska... BUT...

     Its getting darker outside, its cold season, and the activities have slowed down a bit. The kids have already been through a round of yucky sickness and I was even down for a day with horrible head congestion. After a few days in the house we all got a little edgy; I will admit... it was mainly me. When our normal routine gets thrown off for several days in a row I seem to get grumpy. Im thinking that is a good thing in some ways because that means our schedule must be working for us. Im just so happy Matt was home to help me take care of the kiddos, especially when I was down for a day. We are all doing much better now, but it got us talking about our family and friends. We really do love living in Alaska, but we definitely miss having our families and friends close by. We are excited to head back to Oklahoma for the holidays and we are very thankful we are getting to spend so much time with everyone.
     We, of course, are missing everyone but Im needing to see my Meme so bad! She has been having issues here lately and I hate it that I am not there to see her, help her, and hold her hand. I have been through a lot with my Meme and she has always been there for me; I love her so much. Im ready to spend time with her over the holidays!
     The next two weeks will hopefully go by quickly; Matts on the slope and we have a ton of Halloween activities planned. The kids are enjoying their extended Halloween festivities. Since Matt isn't going to be here for Halloween we went to a Reindeer farm with a Halloween theme and we carved pumpkins last night; kids really enjoyed it, but Laela wasn't a fan of the "eeeewwwyy goooeeeyy" insides, it was hilarious.

This was her reaction... Matt bribed her with Candy just to touch it! 

My boys; I sure do love them!

                               Matt and I really liked the Potato shooting range they had set up!

We did the "Hay Maze" and Laela loved it!

She really wanted to ride "The Hay Tractor" so we did! 

We left with a rice crispy treat that the kids devoured in the car; it was the hardest, most stale, yucky rice crispy ever BUT Laela picked it out and they loved it. 

We carved pumpkins and carved pumpkins and carved pumpkins... 4 to be exact

I will post the final results of all 4 pumpkins very soon! 

I don't even have to tell you who these belong to! 

     I hope you enjoyed my family photos as much as I do; I can't ever pick just a couple! I better head to bed; more fun and crazy life ahead of me tomorrow... Im not sure how I got so lucky! We have a pumpkin painting party tomorrow, we are doing Halloween sugar cookies here next week, we have a Conocophillips party, and then a play group party on Halloween. If we can manage, I'm hoping to also hit a few houses on our street for some actual trick or treating! I think the kids will end up having a very extended but Happy Halloween! 

Yes, its been months... as in 4 months!

I am most likely the worse blogger in the entire world!
When the sun is out and the weather is nice in Anchorage AK, you take full advantage! We really did enjoy our Summer to the fullest. I was in denial at first but I just cant ignore it any longer. FALL is here; its been raining like crazy, chilly, and super windy! We broke out the jackets and have been wearing our boots and sweaters for about a month now. I feel like its been ages since I have written and the only way I can even try to remember all that we have done is to put my IPhotos into date order and relive all of our wonderful memories over again. June, July, and August were so much fun! We had family visit, we went on several new adventures, and we enjoyed every minute! I would say that our summer full of camping, white water rafting, zip lining, riding the RZR, boating, and fishing will be one that won't be forgotten!

We got to go camping several times this summer and were lucky enough to enjoy sunsets like this!

We did the above family pic mid September!

We did these only days later.. Sept 28th

As you can see we had an early snow fall this year! 

My favorite purchase this summer = My camera remote. It has allowed us to catch a few super fun shots that we wouldn't have normally gotten! AMAZING

Now that it has cooled down and the darkness is coming back with a vengeance, we are spending more time inside. We have been doing tons of play dates and watching football :-)

This next week will be exciting because after 3 weeks, Matt will be back from work, and the kids will be absolutely ecstatic. Matt Garner will be here from Canada and we get to show him all around; we really do love this part of hosting... means we get to eat out at all of our favorite restaurants, visit some awesome places, and enjoy some of what AK has to offer.

Ready, set, go... here comes winter fun! 

There went April and May...

WOW...... Just when you think that life couldn't possibly get any busier and that time couldn't possibly go by any faster... it does! We have been hosting hosting hosting! In the last 2 weeks we have been all over Alaska having so much fun! We had Annette, Jerry, and Jeron come up to visit; it was Jerrys very first time to ever fly on an airplane and I think by the end of his trip he thought it was worth it :-) I hope so anyway!!! We got to celebrate Laela bugs 3rd birthday with everyone. It was a little early but she really enjoyed getting to share her special day with family; she is very excited about getting to celebrate her Bday on 2 separate days. We went to Whittier to check out the Port and drive through the tunnel; its a one lane tunnel through a mountain to get there and it was awesome. We also made it up to Talkeetna hoping to see Mt. McKinley but it was super cloudy and we weren't able to catch a glimpse. We were able to check out the really unique little town where ATVs can just drive down the road and there are cafes everywhere! Of course we also made it to Knik River to ride the Rzr and spent the day hanging around the River. Our adventures weren't halted by rain and even a little bit of some chilly weather! We went on walks, checked out the panning for gold place, chatted with a real gold miner that has a cabin in the woods that they built from the trees, Matt and Jeron went hiking on McHugh trail, the guys also made it to Bird Creek to take the Rzr on a short trail ride. Overall we packed in as much fun as we possibly could during their time here!  

Shortly after the Hamm family had to return to Oklahoma we had more visitors :-)  Larry and Teresa Conger, friends of ours from Elk City, came to visit us on their way to an Alaskan cruise. We had a little time to take them around town and show them a few things that we enjoy. We took them up to Flat top Mountain and got to watch a guy hang glide down from the top, it was amazing. We took them out to the Peanut Farm for breakfast and sat by the river to eat. After that we headed over to Alaska Wild Berry to show them the worlds largest chocolate fountain, the reindeer, and the awesome chocolates that they make there by hand! 

Once all of our company had left us we decided to head out to Sutton AK on a blind excursion. Matt had overheard some guys talking about the area and we wanted to check it out so we loaded up the kids, the Rzr, and of course DeOGe and we headed North. We ended up finding the best riding place ever. Sutton is an old Mining town (they still mine Coal) and there are trails ALL OVER the place. We rode for miles up to Wishbone Lake and the views were incredible. We knew after finding that area we would be back soon. 

(The swamp was swallowing machines, NOT us though... the Rzr went through it to easy) 

A few days later... we were headed North again. We went up to check out the other side of the Mountain and some different trails. When we got there we found out that the weekends were a lot different than mid week. There were people riding, camping, fishing, hiking, and even target shooting. We actually found several other riders that were heading in the same direction; we all rode together for hours toward the falls. It was a bit foggy so our views were a little obstructed but what we could see was beautiful. We will be making that trip again sometime soon. 

Its become a monthly thing!

It seems like I am constantly using 'Im so busy' all the time, WELL... its because I am :-)
Apparently my blog has become a monthly thing vs. a weekly thing! O'well..... March flew by!
We had tons of family up from Oklahoma; Mom, Dad, Syd, Connor and Em came to see us and we made the most of their time here! We were able to see the Aurora Borealis, saw a few moose, went to the zoo, lots of dining at AKs finest, made it down to ski Alyeska, went sledding, took Syd and the kids ice skating,  we celebrated bubbas 1st Birthday, did s'mores on the fire pit in our backyard, and got to play and enjoy lots of family time!

Apparently 1/2 mustaches are the trend :-)

Matt was home for the majority of March but is now missing the majority of April; once he gets back from this hitch he will be back to 2 on 2 off. While he was home we splurged a little bit. We bought a new Polaris RZR 900, we have been looking at them for awhile now so I was happy when we finally took the plunge! We also tried Cross Country Skiing and fell in love with it; we loved it so much we went and bought both of us new skis :-) we only have a few weeks left for this season BUT we are all prepared for next year!!!

Easter 2012 was a lot different than we have ever experienced before! Instead of sun dresses, flip flops, and green grass, we wore long sleeves, boots, and hunted eggs in the house due to the several feet of snow still covering the ground! The kids still had an absolute blast; we went to Easter with the Calcotes and Laela adopted a new Grammie and Papa. The whole family was so sweet to us and spoiled the kids rotten. 

It was a very nice sunny 40 degree day. Its was extremely nice considering yesterday we broke the all time record for the amount of snow fall in Anchorage! We have gotten over 133 inches of snow this winter which is a lot compared to the 74 inch average! 

Overall we have enjoyed the snow and all the activities its allowed us to enjoy! With that said, we are looking forward to Summer... we are ready to hike, bike, and enjoy the sun! Hopefully the snow will melt off by May, but maybe I'm being optimistic... we will see!