Free Range Family

So last year I did Christmas through the years, and I thought that this year I would do something different. Here is Sant over the years with my family! :D As you can see, Santa has never changed. We love our mall Santa! He has been "in the family" since Natalie and I were children! We love him! He has several different Santa outfits (so if you see him multiple times in the year, the kids don't think Santa has only one stinky Santa outfit lmao). I mean, each picture he has a new shirt on! He has also perfected his Santa voice, and is super kind to the children. Alan loves Santa, tells him that they are best friends every chance he gets! :) Even if there were other Santa's to visit in town, which there aren't in this small town, we wouldn't go! I love this Santa so much, he is such a wonderful guy! *2010* *2011* *2012* *2013* *2014* We love our Santa!  Here's to many more years of him keeping the Christmas magic alive for childre...

This weekend was a weekend for my sisters lol. Saturday was the annual Griz and Cat game (an important Montana rivalry, if you haven't ever heard of it). Since both my sister and her hubby go to University of Montana, we are totally supportive of the Griz! So we had to wear our maroon AND totally harassed anyone that I saw in Navy Blue lol! I mean, I had to! Its a Montana tradition! And of course, the wonderful Grizzlies won!  That same night, was Aunt April's first formal dance of the year, Twirp. I remember when they called it Sadie Hawkins, but apparently they think that "Twirp" is a much more attractive name for a semi-formal where the girls ask the boys. In that case, we should rename Prom "Dork" in my opinion. But I digress… Aunt April had asked me to come take pictures for her, since Aunt Natalie (the only other person in our family with any photography skills) was still in Missoula. So Anna and I made a little trip to the Yellowstone Country ...

This weekend was quite the crazy one for us. We had two sets of family members surprise us by coming into town, one from Lon's family and one from mine! Uncle Cameron came into town from Seattle and the Glover family came into town from Missoula! It was pretty awesome! We also had Colton's birthday party (but that's for another post)… And we went to the NEW Scheel's! The kids had a blast their and I didn't spend a dime! Yes! :D I failed to get one good picture of Uncle Cameron and the kids, but they had a blast with him over the weekend. We are kinda poor right now lol, so we just stayed at home and watched the new Spiderman and Captain America with Uncle Cameron. And Alan showed him all of his Legos. Anna started saying his name while he was here too! That must've been very cool for Uncle Cameron! :) Ah they loved every minute that he was there! Thanks for coming to visit Uncle Cam! We love you bunches! Have a safe trip back to Washington! Posing with a ...

We have been so busy this week preparing for that boy's birthday party on Friday, that I have yet to even post about his first day of school! Wow! So we are in need of some MAJOR catching up!  This past weekend, Aunt Natalie and her family came into town to host their wedding reception in Billings. They stayed the whole weekend and we even went to one of Aunt April's first football games as a varsity cheerleader. We had a wonderful time! Benton even started walking while he was here! We all were able to see a major milestone for him! I was so happy! Auntie loves you so much BB! Gotta love my weird siblings and I. Trying so hard to take a family photo at Aunt Natalie and Uncle Jake's reception, it took probably five times to get a nice picture! And Uncle Jake's thumb is even in it! Lol, we are so crazy! We also celebrated Alan's birthday early because Aunt Natalie and Uncle Jake wouldn't be able to come back next weekend. They took us to Chu...

The Montana Fair was in town this past week; Lon and I went once to the Train concert, the kids and I went three times. Rather then post four separate posts, I figured that I would combine all four times into one massive fair post. It shall be full of photos too, you have been warned. :P We had quite a great run there this year, and apparently so did the rest of the county lol. Almost everyone was there! We ran into so many people we knew! Even some from out of town lol! Gotta love the state fair for that reason! Train was a pretty good concert, except it seemed like the lead singer, Mister Patrick Monahan, was drunk off his gourd. And that's me being nice. Everyone else I have mentioned this too disagrees with me, saying it was such an amazing concert. But I was quite upset when he messed up several sets of lyrics from several of my favorite songs. One was a Zeppelin song that I think even Alan knows the words to but if he didn't know all the lyrics to the song, he should ha...

Next week is a wild week for me. Actually, if you really want to get technical, starting Saturday is just craziness for us… probably not slowing done at all until school starts up in September. Gah! Benton is still in town with us, Natalie has surgery tomorrow and will be heading to town Sunday most likely. Saturday Lon and I have the Train concert to go to, Sunday we will be headed to the fair with Aunt Natalie and Benton. Monday I start Cheer and Dance Camp, Tuesday and Thursday I have my gymnastics class showcases. So crazy! I may not post that much next week because of how busy we are, but stay tuned because I will do my best! As for our vacation, let's catch up on the last two days! Day Four: Enjoying Flathead Lake We were all exhausted from the big celebrations last night, so Sunday we had a calm day. We woke up late, had a breakfast of steak and eggs, and cleaned up camp some. Lon and I decided that we would be leaving that night for Butte, due to the car's problems...

I don't have too much to say about this day, except for it was one of the best days of my life. I do, however, have a bunch of photos to show everyone all the love and beauty that made this day so special. I love my sister more then words can explain, I love my nephew to pieces and I love my new brother-in-law. I am so very happy for them to begin this journey of marriage, it will definitely be a wild ride for them! But they both have a great love for wild rides and dirt bikes, so that is right up their alley. Love you Aunt Natalie, Uncle Jake and Benton! Day Three: Natalie and Jake's Wedding Day My sister and her husband were married at Mission Mountain Resort, just a shot away from Flathead Lake. It was a cute, small little resort ran by a elderly couple. There were so many different trails leading off everywhere, we went on several throughout the whole day but I don't think we ever covered half of the many trails! The resort was snuggled up into the Mission Moun...