Christmas Morning

Grandpa and Grandma with Elizabeth and Jared and all seven of their grandchildren on Christmas morning. I'm so blessed with a wonderful family and to be able to be together on Christmas.

Olivia is still smitten with Baby Jane.

All seven tearing into gifts. All were spoiled as usual.

Olivia opening her Princess Tiana doll from Grandma and Grandpa. One of her favorite gifts this year, but there are many on her list of favorites.

Santa came!

I just love Olivia's priceless look on her face when she sees that Santa came and left presents! These are the childhood memories to cherish!

The tree and all it's goodies below.

Someone must have been good, because she got her boombox CD player she asked Santa for.

After going through all the photos, I realized there aren't many with Mia's face. She was just on the go, but at least her chocolate marshmallow Santa brought a bit of a smile to her face and slowed her down enough to get a face shot. Christmas morning was great at the Feyes' home and we hope it was at everyone else's as well.

The Eve of Christ's Birth

Olivia starred as an angel in Holy Angel's Children's Christmas Eve program this year. She was so cute up there. She kept signing "I love you" to me as well as doing the "I've got my eyes on you" hand signal to all the family in the pews. She also had to scratch at her lady parts for all to see. She was giving all of us quite a laugh as well as others in the pews behind us.

It was a pleasant Christmas Eve service and Mia did surprisingly well. It was great to be able to attend church with both sets of parents as well as Andy's sister Jennifer, brother Aaron, and his wife Christy.

The whole Feyes Gang together on Christmas Eve

The McNeil troop

After church we headed to my dad and Patty's for a delicious meal and opened our Christmas Eve gifts. A wonderful evening to celebrate with family.

December Days

Grandpa McNeil carrying his dirty laundry.

Olivia helping to decorate our Christmas tree. It by no means is a tree like one you'd find in a hotel lobby or department store, but it is filled with keepsake ornaments from the past to the present. I wouldn't have it any other way.

Mia giving Olivia hugs and kisses. Immediately following she grabbed a big chunk of her hair and pulled it. That's my Mia for you.

From L to R: Max, Olivia holding Zane, Noelle, Violette, and Mia

Towards the beginning of December, we were finally able to go meet the newest Roehrig baby, Zane. Such a fun family, and the girls had a blast playing with the kids. The adults enjoyed some time with other parents. It was a wonderful visit as always.

It's beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas!

This blog entry is long overdue, from our Thanksgiving trip up to Alpena. We had a great time, as always staying at Jere's. On Thanksgiving Jere's mother Hilma and his sister Doris came for a big feast. We watched a little football and relaxed. The next day we did some brief shopping, visited with my Aunt Julie, Uncle Dale, and cousin Jennifer, and Olivia went out hunting with her daddy.

Going out hunting for her first time!

She fell asleep sitting in the deer blind. After she was freezing cold and did not want to go into town for the Christmas parade. We convinced her to, and all of us bared through the frigid cold. The parade was very neat at night with all the lights up in town. We only watched part of the parade and walked to a local favorite restaurant of ours for some hot soup to warm up. While walking back to our vehicle we saw that Santa was in at his little house in town. We couldn't pass up the chance to see him!

Is that candy cane for me Santa?

Mia did better than I thought she would, but Olivia was all smiles as predicted!

Olivia put in her request for a CD player boombox and a pillow pet, and also let Santa know that Mia wanted an ironing board.

The tree lit up in town outside of Santa's house next to the fountain.

The parade, seeing Santa, the lights, and a beautiful fresh blanket of snow really helped get all of us in the Christmas spirit. We had fun going outside of Jere's and onto the golf course playing in the snow as a family.

Olivia had fun following animal tracks around. We even saw a porcupine. The nature is just abounding up north. It's the perfect setting for the holidays!

The girls had fun playing together and got along quite nicely. We thankfully had fairly clear roads home and look forward to our next trip up north.

Cookies and Cousins

Pictures from Sunday, November 14th. The cousins, minus Jadon, came over to bake Thanksgiving cookies with the girls.

Cracking eggs

James mixing the dough

Olivia and Titus decorating their cookies

James and Asher working on their masterpieces too.

Mia eating more frosting than spreading on her cookie.

Yes, that's an entire bottle of sprinkles atop Mia's tiny cookie.

Elizabeth and Jane all smiles

Olivia's marvelous cookie creations.

Cousins

My sister's family is in town for the weekend, so they stopped by briefly and left me with the middle 3 while she went out shopping. It's always great seeing them.

Olivia holding her favorite girl cousin, Jane

Jane sticking her cute little tongue out.

My naked little jaybird, Mia. She's gone over to the dark side I think. Seriously, I cannot keep clothes or a diaper on her. If anyone out there has suggestions, send them my way please.

Titus, Asher, and all smiles James

Mia Monster!

So many posts are mainly about Olivia that I thought I'd dedicate one to our little monster, Mia.

Mia is now over 19 months old and developing quite the personality. She is definitely different than her big sister Olivia. Mia talks some and has a decent vocabulary, but Olivia was using full sentences at one year. Often Andy and I have found ourselves thinking Mia hasn't developed as fast as Olivia, which is completely fine, just because she doesn't talk as much. But we now know that isn't true either. Mia is developing just as fast as Olivia, just in different ways. She lets us know other ways how smart she truly is.

She knows what belongs to everyone! She constantly brings things to you, (phones, toothbrushes, remote controls, glasses, shoes, etc.) if they belong to you. As soon as you set it down, she picks it up and hands it right back to you again. We can ask her to bring us specific items from another room and she will go and get them for us. Andy, who has way too many shoes to be a man, asked her to go get him his green shoes, and she brought them right to him. Although she can't say her colors she recognizes many.

Another funny story; Mia rarely wears pajamas, but we took matching pajamas for the girls up north since the weather was going to be cold. Once we returned home, I loaned the pair she had worn to my sister, for Jane. I then washed Olivia's pair and went to put them away. Mia recognized these pajamas as hers and kept pulling them out of Olivia's drawer and was trying to put them on. It was quite cute, but she was so upset she didn't have her pajamas to wear anymore. She can put clothes on and off herself and loves to do this as well. She is now picking out her clothes in the morning.

She is full of mischief! We've begun potty training, which in Mia terms means she gets to strip naked and remove her diaper every 2 minutes. She will usually sit on the potty right after removing her diaper, but then proceeds to run buck naked from you throughout the house laughing. She loves this game she has created. As you can tell she is quite good at manipulating mommy and daddy.

Always on the go, and never slowing down is our Mia. She eats like a horse, but with all her activity it's burnt off in no time. She weighs in around 19 pounds, which is less than Olivia weighed at her age, but Mia is a smidge taller at this point. She listens to us, but chooses to ignore us and make a game out of it. Or if she is told no from people other than mommy, she often just cries as if you physically assaulted her. Once she gets her way, the tears cease.

She is definitely a daddy's girl, which just melts Andy's heart. She wants mommy at night, but other than that daddy is preferred. Now when she gets hurt or in trouble she immediately cries, "Daddy!" She also pretends to call him on the phone all the time and says, "Hi Daddy, bye daddy!" Sometimes Nana is also talked to on the phone.

The picture above is when she got into a glass candle jar and got the black soot all over her face and hands. She was so proud of herself.

Mia is truly happy most of the time. She gets into everything she's not supposed to, and while we are busying putting something up, or fixing what she has just destroyed, she's off conquering he next feat. I've decided a padded room with nothing in it, is all that might help me keep my sanity. Exhausting is a great word to describe her, but I love my little ball of energy. Andy and I both feel like we are finally getting our paybacks that we gave our parents.

Wilderness Warriors

Mia and Olivia sitting on the newly chopped down tree.

Halloween weekend we headed up north to Alpena for the weekend. We needed to close up our camper for the winter. Granted it was a bit chilly during the morning, but warmed up to surprisingly glorious afternoons. Andy did some cleaning up of little trees and other large ones that had gotten damaged in the terrible wind storm a couple weeks prior. The girls and I had fun exploring some of our trails and going off of the beaten path. Both Mia and Olivia loved watching Andy chop down a large tree with his chainsaw from afar. It was a nice and relaxing weekend for me and the girls, but Andy would probably say differently. He also tried to burn some small piles of brush, but immediately realized he shouldn't have. After running back and forth to his fire and the camper for water, he got the tractor and dumped a few buckets of dirt on the fire to put it out. His adrenalin was going and he's not used to running. Add cutting down trees, weed whacking, and the long drive and he was one tuckered out guy. While Andy was busy playing firefighter, I had taken the girls into town to visit my Aunt Julie and Uncle Pat and saw my cousin Brad. When we returned, Mia and I planted tulip bulbs and dug a few holes for some trees I ordered. We plan on planting them when we're up over Thanksgiving. My Uncle Jere was kind enough to put us up for the weekend so we didn't have to freeze in our camper. He is always so welcoming and we enjoy ourselves at his home immensely. We look forward to heading up to stay with him again at Thanksgiving. We drove home on Halloween day so we could get home for trick-or-treating.

Olivia striking a pose in the tall grass.

My crew taking a break for a photo on daddy's newly chopped tree.

My girls...I can't help but love them!