Welcome 2017!

 

Happy New Year!!  As it always does, the holidays flew by!!  We had a great few weeks celebrating Christmas and the New Year with family and friends.  We had a wonderful Christmas, and it was so nice that our celebrations were spread out so that we only had one family celebration at a time.  It was so nice not to have to rush around place to place and actually get to spend some quality time with our families.  We celebrated our 2nd annual "Krusemas" the week before Christmas at our house.  It was special because it was Rylee and Kenny's first Krusemas, and the night ended with an engagement when Ray's cousin proposed to his girlfriend.  The kids finally got to meet their new cousin, and Kenley and Charlie were both very excited to hold him. 

We celebrated Christmas Eve at our house with some of my mom's family, and a few of my cousins and their children.  We got to meet my cousin Carri's daughter, Tarryn, who is just 2 weeks younger than Rylee, so again, we were celebrating another first Christmas! It was a nice night, and all the kids had a great time playing together.  On Christmas morning we opened up presents with the kids, and then we headed over to my mom's to see my dad's side of the family.  We ate way too much food, and the day ended with a game of CLR that I won about $40 in!

We celebrated New Year's with the Roses, and we were trying to remember if this was the 7th or 8th New Year we had spent together.  We know we have been doing it since at least Kenley's first New Year when she was only about 3 weeks old.  It was a lot of fun, and considering there were 9 kids all under the age of 6, it was surprising that the adults got some time to relax and have a good time too. 

We're back to having a routine again, now that the holidays are over, which is both good and bad. I am not working this semester because my class did not have a high enough enrollment, so it got cancelled at the last minute.  I'm hoping to get back on the schedule in the fall. The only thing I was a little disappointed about was the extra money, but other than that I've still been keeping busy.  Kenley is taking gymnastics and ballet, and Charlie is doing a t-ball class, so most days between taking Charlie to and from school and both of them to their activities I'm driving back and forth a lot.  I am also finally able to work out at the gym again now that Rylee can go in the childcare, so I've been going 4-5 days a week.  I also made it a personal goal to cook real meals at least 2 times a week.  So far that has been going good, and nobody has gotten food poisoning!  I'm also going to try to volunteer at Kenley's school a few times during the semester.

The kids are doing great!  Kenley is becoming an excellent reader, and she is really motivated in school.  It is so cool to see her reading and writing, and she is improving by the day.  Charlie has been a lot better these last two weeks, and I'm hoping maybe he's getting over his rough patch.  He has been so excited to start his first t-ball class, and he seems to really enjoy it.  Rylee is 6 months already, and she is rolling around and scooting everywhere.  She loves eating baby food and being in her jumpy seat.  This winter is actually flying by!  According to the groundhog we still have several weeks before spring, but so far we have been so lucky that it hasn't been freezing cold, and we haven't had much snow at all.  Usually around this time I start getting the winter blues, but so far I'm surviving winter without too much complaining!! It also may have something to do with the fact that we just decided to plan a family Spring Break trip that is not too far away!