Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!

Merry Christmas everyone! Here are some pictures from Christmas in VA. Enjoy!!

Crystal & her basket!

Lambournes

Dowdys

Lambournes

Adam's gift to me!

Lynnea playing with Grandpa's Christmas train.

Lynnea's "Baby's first Christmas" ornament.

Adam says he feels like a man now.

Yay for Cheerios!

Robo-Rod

These are Rods' new contraptions on his arms. They help him do lots of stuff that he can't do otherwise. He even did a little driving! They look pretty cool. He's constantly telling me improvements they should have, like an l.e.d. light on the end of his bar, or pellet guns on them. You know, just practical stuff. My sister suggested they should be remote controlled so I could make him wash dishes, or do whatever.

We got a little dressed up and went to Rod's work party Saturday night. It was so nice- we wouldn't have been able to go if mom hadn't come out!! She helped us so much this week! I think we wore her out- so everyone make sure she rests (at least after the big dinner this weekend) and give her foot rubs and massages!!

Thanksgiving pics

These are some photos from our Thanksgiving here. My family (except my oldest sister and her family) came to our house for Thanksgiving. It was really nice, not only for all the help with the kids but it was a real booster for myself and Rod.

Here's our "Princess Party" picture. We popped popcorn and watched a Barbie movie! (Caitlin's idea of a perfect evening)

Grandma C. helping Caitlin spell her name (she's getting pretty good!)

Just a cute messy-hair Lizzie picture

These headresses were my sister Kate's idea. We chose an Indian name (note Lizzie's "laughing bear" on hers) and on the feathers wrote things we're grateful for. Then we wore them and read them as we ate our Thanksgiving meal! Rod's name was "Broken Arm", obviously...

Also, note Lizzie's plethora of animals and babies in her arms. This is her 24 hours a day. She has a HUGE entourage of stuffed animals, babies, and blankets that need to accompany her around the house. The number keeps growing, too. She can't carry them all so now it takes several trips of her filling her arms and going back and forth to move them from room to room.

Here's some food for thought. We recently got Rod's medical bills in the mail. Well, they weren't bills, they were statements on what our insurance has paid for (which has been 100%, thank goodness). So I thought I'd demonstrate how important good medical insurance is!

Rod's week in the hospital, including 2 surgeries: $97,812.12
Rod's outpatient surgery on his wrist (this was in in the morning, out at night, no hospital stay): $75,696.31
Our 3-hour stint at the ER after a doctor appt, to make sure he didn't have blood clots in his legs: $1,486.00

Keep in mind this doesn't include the ambulance ride (which was about $800, also paid for by insurance), or the custom-made prostetics Rod's gotten for his arm (there were 2), or the many doctor appointments, X-rays, etc., he's received at his almost-weekly doctor appointments, or his physical therapy that he goes to 4 times a week. Wow. The bills detail how much everything was. $1200 per night in the hospital. Plate in wrist: $1,049.00. Incredible. Good medical insurance is essential!! And to think we were grumbling about our measly $10 copay every doctor or physical therapist visit!!!

Thanksgiving Fun

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!!

Although we missed all of our family, we had an enjoyable Thanksgiving holiday. Scott actually took Friday off of work, so that was really nice! We had the Hagmans over on Thursday for turkey (Scott's good friend from high school). Unfortunately, in all the fun, I completely forgot to take any pictures. :-(

But here are some pictures from Friday -- we relaxed a little and then went and cut down our Christmas tree. Although freezing cold, it was a beautiful sunny day! The kids all had fun, although Nathan was a little (or rather, a lot, disappointed we couldn't decorate the tree the same day -- he says that's the only fun part.

I actually knitted those scarves & hats when I was pregnant with Talia!

Grumpy faces and playing with the dogs (Talia LOVED the dogs!)
Everyone took turns helping to cut down the tree.

Here's a picture of our Thanksgiving decorations. I just had to buy the girl scarecrow with the pigtails, and then of course, we needed one to represent our boy. It was just decorations, but I really enjoyed coming home and being greeted by our scarecrows! As you can see, by the time I took a picture, we were already putting up our Christmas decorations -- that was one of Saturday's activities.

Here's the other one .... We finally took the plunge & got a new van. This one seats eight & turns off the passenger-seat airbag if you have a child sitting there, so now I can take 1-2 friends with us -- great for carpooling which I haven't been able to do since having Talia.

We hope all of you had a good Thanksgiving!! Sorry you had to go back to work on Friday, Tiff. We sure miss all you guys!

Franken-arms

Today we had another doctor's appointment. They always unwrap his arms and change his dressings, and today they also took out some staples. But I came prepared with a camera...his scars are going to be a little bit scary. Warning: not for queasy stomachs!!!

Update

Rod's home (for a few days) and Dad's here too. Here's a few pictures..

Halloween in Oregon

We're so sorry to hear about Rod's accident & hope he's doing okay. I've been meaning to get our Halloween pictures posted...




Having fun at
the Pumpkin Patch

Carving Pumpkins -- Talia was interested in what everyone was doing, but she did NOT like sticking her hand inside the pumpkins!! The extra child in the pictures is Eve, our neighbor and practically-adopted daughter. (Did you notice those Scott's whiskers?)

Costumes -- Here's some pictures from our Halloween celebrations. We went to the ward party on Saturday night, and then trick-or-treating around the neighborhood on Halloween. The picture with me is the only time Talia kept her antennaes on for even 30 seconds, and, yes, the beard on Scott's costume is real. (He got asked quite a few times.)

Taking Talia trick-or-treating is

NOT on the list of most fun things to do -- she got quite upset that people were putting candy in her bag instead of her mouth. She very quickly had a lollipop in her mouth, one in her hand, and a piece of candy in the other hand. (At least then she couldn't scream at people when they took more than 5 seconds to give her a candy!)

Afterwards, I gave the kids one day to eat all the candy they wanted (yes, Kaylee got a sick tummy) and then we threw out the rest, so the house is finally candy-free. Next year I won't be so prepared by buying candy three weeks beforehand -- I'm sure I put on a few extra pounds as a result!

Rod's mishap...

I took this picture at the hospital today. They had to cut off his camelback but at least we found some use for it...

Also, a side note: I posted some pictures from Halloween on the Crowley blog, I usually post stuff to both, but I'm tired! So if you want to see them go to http://thecrowleycrew.blogspot.com/

Happy Birthday, Carrie!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY CARRIE!!

I hope you are having a great day!

Arlington National Cemetery

I uploaded the pictures from my camara last night and remembered that I wanted to post some pictures from Grandpa's funeral service at Arlington since most of you weren't able to be there. It was a really nice ceremony. There was the horse-drawn caisson and the 21 gun salute and everything. At the end, the officers folded the flag you see draped over the coffin and presented it to Grandma.

Unfortunately, my camara battery died as soon as the services started, so I don't have many pictures. I had to keep turning my camara back on and quickly snapping a picture before it died again. Sorry there aren't more pictures, especially pictures of the family.

This picture is of the officers folding the flag. They folded the flag completely without ever looking at it.

Here is the 21-Gun Salute. I got scared for a second because they fired their guns directly at us! I knew they were blanks but it is still scary when there are 7 guns pointed at you!!

And this is just a general picture of one portion of the cemetery. It was amazing to see so many tombstones all in a row. Adam and I stayed after and took a tour and learned that the lines of the tombstones represent soldiers standing at attention in uniform alignment.

We are finally on!

Okay, Tiffany showed me how to blog - dad's not here, so it may be awhile before we get him on. But we're all okay! We had a wonderful time at the temple Wednesday, Oct 24, when Sheree got sealed to Robert Willey (who died a year ago) 24 Oct is their actual wedding anniversary and the anniversary of his confirmation for his baptism three years ago. Sheree felt his presence there and Mom Lambourne felt the presence of Dad Lambourne, also. It was a very nice day. We had a great Halloween birthday for Crystal. She thanks all the family for her presents - especially, purses, galore, and coloring books.... Mom Lambourne & I made Halloween Placemats and used them on Crystal's Birthday and at our spooky Halloween, Dinner in a Pumpkin, dinner with the new missionaries in our area. Dad took pictures and maybe we'll get them developed and be able to show you these cute placemats. At our dinner we had pumpkin cookies and ghost merangue cookies as well as the meat mixture cooked in the pumpkin, with a jack-o-lantern face. We bought terriyaki chicken on a stick and pretended it was bats on a stick with our spooky dinner... Adam says they really had bat on a stick in Africa, but he never ate it. MOM

Pictures

I took some pictures of Lynnea this weekend, and I have to say I'm pretty proud of myself. I think I got some good ones! It definitely makes me want to learn more about photography and keep trying.