Carson the Cute-Nosed Reindeer

Not to be outdone by his older brother, here is our littlest reindeer, Carson. He doesn't like the red nose, though, just the antlers.

Winter Wonderland

Mother Nature has been sending a lot of snow our way. Here is the view out our back window Saturday morning (5 days before Christmas). Perhaps we'll have a white Christmas afterall. Just one of several tender mercies we have experienced lately... the snow makes this place seem more like home to me.

Brrrrr!!!

I could have sworn we left the cold of Star Valley behind, but this is what our thermometer is saying... It's cold outside!

Snow!!!

We had snow in our forecast Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and today. But it wasn't until today that we had enough snow to really see on the ground. Cooper has been wishing for snow and begging to wear his new snow boots, so today, out he went! He looks like a blue marshmallow in his snow clothes!

Cooper the Red-Nosed Reindeer

Cooper had a friend over to play the other day, and they found "rudolph." The nose used to blink, but I think it's been dropped too many times and doesn't work anymore.

So long, farewell...

We sold our Toyota Camry last night. Cooper has been telling everyone that we have a new car, but we can't drive it until we sell our old car to someone else. That's not entirely true, but the Camry gets such good gas mileage we had to take advantage of it while we still had it and while we only had to put 2 kids in the back seat- 3 car seats just don't fit back there!

Anyway- last night while the very nice couple was driving away with "our car," I didn't really anticipate Cooper to have a problem with it, because he's been so excited about our "new car." (I should have known better; afterall, he did have a complete melt-down when I sold our worn out kitchen table set before we moved from Wyoming- he started crying and yelling at the men as they carried it out the door: "No, that's my table, no, that's my daddy's chair, no, that's my favorite chair!") Well, as our car was driving away this was our conversation:

Cooper: "Why are they taking our car, mom."
Me: "Because they bought it, and now it's their car."
Cooper: "It's not their car, its our car. Why are they taking it?"
Me: "Because, sweetie, it's not our car anymore. They bought it. Now we get to drive our new car."
Cooper: "Oh, I want to drive our new car. But I want our old car, too!"

Sorry Cooper, we just can't have it all!

Pajama buddies

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving and really enjoyed visiting family and friends. We were also able to see a few friends from Star Valley; Randall had some work to do over there a few days before Thanksgiving, so we all went and made it one big trip.

Randall's mom gave the kids all an early Christmas present before we left: pajamas! All the grandkids had to put their pajamas on and show off. I wasn't able to get a good picture will all of the kids, but here's a few cute pics anyway.

"That's superb!"

So, this afternoon for lunch we were having soup- nothing special, and Cooper asked for some juice. I didn't have any if the refrigerator, so I mixed up some Tang for him. Cooper took one drink, looked at me, and said:
"Mmmm, that's su-perv (superb) mommy, thank you!"

I just had to chuckle, for several reasons:

Number 1: What a sweet little guy my Cooper can be. At 3 1/2 years old, he can be a sweet angel one minute, and a terrorizing, tantrum-throwing, screaming, crazy boy the next.

Number 2: Randall is always using big words and scientific explanations when he talks to Cooper. It makes me laugh, because I tend to dumb things down a bit too much at times. Cooper is quick to pick up on new things, words included. But this time, no one had said the word "superb" for quite sometime. Cooper just said it, and actually used the word correctly! It must be those "smart genes" kicking in...