Showing posts with label holidays. Show all posts
Showing posts with label holidays. Show all posts

Thursday, December 11, 2014

Thanksgiving Recap

We had the most fun Thanksgiving this year with my whole family at a cabin we rented near Big Lake. It was probably the best Thanksgiving I've had personally in over five years, it was really special. Our family has been going through a lot with my grandparents going through the worsening stages of dementia and Alzheimers and it's put more of a strain on things than I really realized. Our family (my dad and mom, her siblings and my older sister mainly) had been caring for them personally since they moved into Anchorage from their homestead in Talkeetna in 2009 and after a lot of very hard changes, heartache and worsening health on my grandparents part we made the decision for them to be moved into the Pioneer Home here in Anchorage, specifically into the dementia ward where they receive round the clock care.

Understandably it hasn't been easy on a few different levels, but it has gone very smoothly considering and I'm very thankful for that. Thanksgiving was the first big holiday since their big move, and my parents and sisters and I decided to get out of town and spend the long weekend all together as a family (minus my little sister who couldn't make it home from college). We rented a really nice cabin on Beaver Lake (near Big Lake) bought a bunch of food and holed ourselves up to spend the holiday together.

We had bonfires, saunas, and hobbit-watching marathons and it was just the perfect way to spend Thanksgiving break. We all agreed that getting away together as a family needs to happen more often and I can't wait for our next chance to do just that.

just before loading everything in truck...I felt like we were moving haha

Sunday, November 2, 2014

Halloween 2014


Halloween two-thousand-and-fourteen. I just want to keep saying (typing?) it, mostly because it rhymes and I like things that rhyme. We had a fun Halloween 'season' this year, complete with decorations and costumes planned ahead of time. What wasn't planned ahead of time was how sick poor Riggs would be on Halloween, but we still ended up having a pretty good day. It helped that we celebrated all week long.

We started with a Halloween celebration at Library Group on Tuesday. Riggs shocked me and happily wore his mask and tail, which for the record, I didn't make. I purchased them from Opposite of Far, which also carries lots of other amazing animal masks. Anyway, he wore them proudly during all the book reading, craft making, and snack eating. He chose not to wear them the second I tried to take some pictures of him and Raina out on the lawn in the sunshine. Of course. I managed to get one before he ripped it off and threw it on the ground. It wasn't meant to be anyway, because the sun was so bright that poor little red riding hood couldn't even open her eyes. 


Then Wednesday we had a little Halloween Party at Nancy's house. We planned it so that the kids would have a fun place to wear their costumes. Only problem? None of them would wear them, haha. The only ones who wore costumes were the babies who were too young to protest. We still had a great time and ate lots of yummy fall treats.

Riggs loved little Gyffy and barely left his side the whole time.
He also got in a rage over Nancy's son Griffin trying to 'wake
Gyffy up' by moving one of the nine pillows Riggs had stacked
on top of him while 'putting him to sleep' on the couch. toddler problems...
Thursday and Friday were pretty much a blur. Riggs woke up Thursday with a fever which quickly climbed up to 103.8 and hovered there for way too long. I was so sad about how bad my little guy felt, and wished I could have done something to make him feel normal again. Halloween morning he was still feverish and miserable but after a long nap he seemed to be on the mend, other than a racking cough. I dressed them up so Steve could see their cute little costumes and to take some 'official' Halloween pictures, then we came inside to snuggle. No trick-or-treating (or 'tricker treating', as I saw on quite a few IG posts, haha) for us this year, and not a single trick-or-treater came to our door either.


Despite Riggs being sick we had a pretty fun year. I think next year he will be old enough to go trick-or-treating with Steve, although our neighborhood is so rural and spread out that I'm not sure how many people would actually be ready with candy. Last year we went to town to the Halloween Carnival put on in the Fire-station, and that was fun (and for those of you who clicked back to see my post, how cute was Riggs as a hobbit?!). I was also thinking it would be fun to go to Anchorage and let Riggs trick-or-treat with his big cousins, I know he would love that!

I also plan on brainstorming months ahead of time for what matching costumes I can come up with for the kids. I thought it was so fun to have their costumes coordinate, and I know there's only so much time I have to do so before they don't want to match.

I hope everyone had a lovely and safe Halloween weekend filled with fun and lots of your kids' halloween candy. I leave you with this adorable picture of a cute little baby bat we found on our doorstep back on Halloween 2012...

Wednesday, April 30, 2014

Mother's Day gift ideas 2014

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8

Spring holidays are some of my favorite as I get older and more fully understand the reasons behind the celebrations. Now that Easter is over, I've turned my attention to Mother's Day and couldn't be more excited to celebrate the amazing mom's I'm blessed to have in my life. My own mother will be gone on Mother's Day (maybe for the first time ever?) and so I'm a little sad about that. But we will have our family Mother's Day celebration a little late once she's back (with our little sister in tow - freshly graduated and everything!). 

I rounded up this list of gift ideas and would love to read any other gift lists you might have posted on your own blogs, so be sure to comment and leave a link if you're so inclined!

Sunday, April 20, 2014

Happy Easter!



There in the ground his body lay,
Light of the world by darkness slain:
Then bursting forth in glorious day
Up from the grave he rose again!
And as he stands in victory
Sin's curse has lost it's grip on me,
For I am his and he is mine -
Bought with the precious blood of Christ
from In Christ Alone by Stuart Townend & Richard Getty

Happy Easter! I hope everyone has a wonderful day with friends and family celebrating the life we have through Jesus' resurrection. I can't believe how grownup my Riggy looks today in his Easter best, such a big change from last year.