Goals

My goal this year is to have no goals.
I will relax, have fun, and take it all in stride.
We started putting up our tree tonight. Just the tree. Decorations will come tomorrow.
One step at a time.

Concert time

Dex's new food is the wooden food diet. He gets to eat steak AND chicken-delicious!

"C'mon, Sawyer, can't you see I'm full already!"

In other news, it was Alaina's orchestra concert last night and she did a beautiful job. It's fun to hear her songs she has been practicing played with the full orchestra. She also looked so grown-up with her hair straightened for the event (: The pictures didn't turn out very well and I could not get her to look at me to take a good picture.

Sawyer was getting attacked by a little one year old who went back and forth from hitting him to hugging him-a little too tightly.

"Help me, mom!"

Thanksgiving pictures

I know, I know I am still on Thanksgiving time.....Before I start with all the Christmas photos and activities, I need to share our thanksgiving pictures with you (: All of these are taken at Jon's family gathering at the church. I didn't take any at my family get together-no real excuse, it just seemed like time flew by and it was over. Sorry, Mi familia, I'll do better at Christmas.....

The day consisted of...

Enjoying a delicious feast...

Running and being chased by all the kids wanting the ball....

Making the traditional gingerbread houses....

Mmmmm, sweet heaven.....

And shopping at the swap meet.

Alaina picked up a 1000 piece puzzle and her and I spent the weekend putting it together. I forgot how much I love puzzles! I wonder who will be getting another puzzle for Christmas (:

On Friday, I watched a friends little girl for awhile and she was so fun to have over-they were all buddies (:

On Friday Dex became really sick. My sister Danielle came to visit but couldn't stay long because I had to bring him to the vet. They think he has a stomach ulcer and is being treated for that. He is doing great now. He may have to be put on anxiety meds in the future. So much for adopting an "easy" dog (: At least he is a sweetheart and so well behaved. Here he is on his new bed feeling sick......):

I hope everyone else had a great Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving

LOVE
The Swanson Turkeys

"All I want for christmas...."

Is My Two Front Teeth!

I don't think he is happy about or anything, do you?

On another note, here a few pictures of the Holidazzle parade.
This is right when we arrived. It was around 30 degrees and not windy, so it was very nice.

The pictures I took came out very dark, but maybe if you blow them up you can see them better (:

My favorite was the live Nativity float. It had a real donkey and sheep on it. It was beautiful, but maybe you can tell that if you blow up the picture (:

Sawyer was fascinated with...

This. It was the highlight for all the kids and warmed us up, if only briefly.

This morning I overheard Alaina and Jonnie in the kitchen with Jon talking. This proves the difference between boys and girls, or 8 and 10 year olds, or just Alaina and Jonnie.....

Alaina: My dream last night was really scary.

Dad: Oh yeah? What was it about?

Alaina: You and mom were going on vacation to Duluth and you told us we couldn't come. Jonnie and I were crying and crying. You were going to leave us home alone. At the last second, we begged one more time and you said OK, we could come. (Maybe I should look into this....hmmm).

Jonnie: My dream was scary, too. There was a Yeti (a big white Bigfoot like creature that lives in the mountains) in our basement killing people and me and all my friends got our swords and went down there and attacked it. (Maybe I need to look into this, too).

Anyway, that made me laugh this morning at there different very "scary" dreams. Today I am home having a blast with Saywer. I have a lot of things for us to accomplish today.....I'll let you know if I get any of them done (:

Friday night dance party

Well it has been awhile since I posted any dancing pictures, so I thought I would share a few (: I know you missed them. We still turn up the music and dance and tonight it was 101 dalmations cd. Personal favs are Digga digga dog and Freak out (: As you can see Alaina sat this one out as she was mothering her pig.

Lord please give me the strength to live with these crazies.....

Have a great weekend everyone. Does anyone have any fun plans? Tomorrow we are headed to a free screening of Kung Fu Panda through community ed. and then we have the hollidazzle parade with cookie decorating, reindeer, hot chocolate, etc.. tomorrow evening. Should be fun! Plus, I can sleep in tomorrow-nothing better than that on a cold morning (:

Birthday Boy

Happy 36th Birthday, Jon!

Here Jonnie made dad a birthday banner and Alaina and him decorated his cake. We brought everything over to his mom's house and had a birthday party.

Just to let you know, Jon was working outside and his face is very dirty-if your questioning why he looks a little different (:

He had a lot of help blowing out his candles. No girlfriends this year....

Here is the key chain Alaina made him.

Jon made the comment that he wished he could be 19 again just for a little while (: I think he was feeling a bit older today.....just wait until he turns 40!

I had to throw this picture in, too. Can't you just picture him here as an adult working on cars (: