December & January

Here it goes again! I'm playing my catch up game! Chris and I are still busy at school, so blogging is pretty much on the back burner, but I do like to make sure I keep my blog going somewhat so my England family can check out what we are doing.
Christmas was soooo much fun this year!! We kicked off the holiday season with a Thanksgiving dinner at Victoria's house. We had everyone there, who was in the USA, minus Elder Josh Wilsher. Not too long after that, we had a great McDowell Christmas party hosted by Diana and Justin (Chris's sister). My kids felt very spoiled!! Christmas Eve was our usual, a quiet night at home reading the nativity and eating a candle lit meal together. Christmas day was fabulous!! It was my most favorite Christmas ever, having three kids just made it all that much more fun and having 3 kids that are at the perfect age for enjoying it was just a blast!! (Sorry, the pics are all saved to discs and deleted.)
New Year's came and went without excitement. lol...Chris and I just felt exhausted and all I wanted to do was stay home. So, we rented a movie or two and watched movies with the kids.
Chris and I celebrated our 8th wedding anniversary on January 16th. That was an adventure! lol! The kids went to stay with their grandparents, something they always enjoy. Chris and I went to watch Avatar in 3D. I got SOOOO motion sick that I couldn't enjoy it. I'm not really sure what happened! lol...The next day we 'accidently' hiked 15 miles to a hot pot! I say 'accidently' because it was supposed to be a 2 mile thing, followed by a relaxing soak in the hot water. Instead, it was horribly exhausting and we walked 6 miles in the pitch darkness, with no end in sight! My ankle was hurt, but I just kept thinking, "If I sit down, I'll never get back up. Then I will literally just freeze to death in the snow." lol....so I kept pushing it, while I couldn't help but constantly think how greatful I was that was born in the century I was born in! lol!! I just couldn't bare the thought of the newspapers reading, "Couple Freeze to Death on Anniversary"......lol..... Anyway, we enjoyed our time together and we'll always have a great story to add to our anniversary stories.
We tend to have a lot of disasterous, yet hilarious anniversary stories. Like our fist year married when we saved all our money to go to the Chattanooga Choo Choo in TN. It was supposed to be "original", well, it was.....it hadn't been updated since the 1920s and the room came with two single beds. It was grotty and still smelt like a rotten train station, but we sure laugh about it now! Yes and this was the same trip that we had no money, so we had to split a piece of pizza, for our anniversary dinner. lol.......
Well, I had my finals week, at school. I scored myself all As and I'm proud to say I am a straight A student, as of now, anyway. Chris has done his finals, but is awaiting grading. I'm sure he did great!! My goal is now to CLEP out of a bunch of classes. So, I'm studying extra hard, in addition to my classes. CLEPing would save me about $6,000 and about 6 months of school, so it'd certainly be worth it. Just a tedious process.
Landon has started basketball and had his first game last week. He's enjoying it. Korbin is just about done potty training. He's doing soooooo well!! And I think we will be taking a winter trip to the zoo, as promised, soon. (I was aiming for Spring, but he has suprized us so!) Kayla is now starting to learn her dance for her Ballet recital in June. She really enjoys it, but is most looking forward to getting a piano and doing piano lessons, as is Landon, next school year.
And well, that about wraps it up! Life is moving pretty fast and furious lately! Not much else to do, but school, family, home, church....repeated over and over. Brain hasn't much else to think about right now, but that. Well, except Haiti. I've been pretty saddened for the Haitian people. They are truly in my prayers, especially the orphans.
Oh and while it is on my mind, Kayla has been with us for (almost) 6 months!!! Which means we can start working on the legal process of adoption. Well, I should rephrase that, we can start on the last part of the legal process. This is a legnthy process (I've never seen so much paperwork!!), but we are almost done. Just waiting for an adoption assistance app to be approved and processed. Then, signed and agreed apon. Then the paper work will move onto a lawyer, at which point we will have more paperwork to finalize the adoption and to change Kayla's name (Kayla Maylee McDowell). In the meantime, caseworkers are preparing post adoption homestudies and getting ready to present our case before a judge. A court date will then be set and we should be able to to 'attend' the court via live video from a UT court room. Awesome!! (Adoption will take place in OR, but we aren't required to be there.) We are still being told it *might* happen in March, but be prepared if it happens in May. (sometimes things 'come up')
So...phew....that's life right now. It's a busy life right now. :) And it's a good life.
(Sorry I don't have pictures this time. It's either this or nothing, just don't have time to upload today.)

Landon's Birthday

Landon turned 7 years old on December 5th. He had a huge party with a million little boys, or so it felt! Nana was AWESOME at helping me with all the games!! The kids had a great time. It was a "late night" party, like a sleepover, but they go home to sleep. The kids all wore their jammies. Landon then was given a birthday gift from us. It was a kitten!! He LOVES kittens. Sadly, he ended up being allergic to her and she had to find a new home today.

Performances

Landon and his first grade friends all put on a performance for Thanksgiving. They sang about Turkeys, colors, being thankful and Native Americans, to name a few. Landon was an indian. Nana came to watch him with mom and Korbin. We had fun and were proud of him for working so hard for this event.

Kayla had 3 seperate performances for choir. She sang at the Christmas Village in Ogden and in Eden and, also, at school. Unfortunetly I waited until the last performance to take a picture and my camera died!! She has practiced all school year, two times a week, before school. We are proud of her hard work and dedication, even thought it meant waking up so early!

The Last 4 Weeks or So....PART 1

Chris and I are both going to school full time at University of Phoenix. Chris is going into IT (information technology/computers) and will get his bachelor's degree in software engineering. I am going into elementary education to become a teacher. Chris isn't so thrilled to be doing it, but he's working hard. I, on the other hand, LOVE it!! We are half way through our first set of classes and we are both maintaining a straight A average. :)
Needless, to say, I am VERY busy going to school full time, being a mom full time and now with Chris going to school full time and working full time, it's like I'm a single mom. lol.....So, my blogging has been forgotten about. This post and the next post is a recap of the last month or so. (Note: We are at our halfway mark to finalizing Kayla's adoption!!!!! She's SOOOOO EXCITED to get baptised and get sealed to us.)

I like to take the kids to the hot pot in 12th street canyon, in Ogden. It's a naturally flowing hot pot, just right there in the canyon. Years ago, volunteers, created "pots" out it that you can sit in. Chris and I love to go alone in winter, while the snow is falling. The water is BURNING hot. The river runs right along side of the water and you can add buckets of cold water to get your desired temperature. This time I took Landon and Kayla with me. Korbin and I go while the kids are in school. It's nice. :)

All three kids just adore eachother. Landon and Kayla, especially, are best friends. They love to play with each other and hardly argue. I expected things to be more "contentious" than it has been. The kids just really do love each other.....that's just what siblings do. :)

Here's a cute picture of miss Kayla Maylee. She thought the changing leaves were pretty cool.

I LOVE this picture of Landon. He's such a cute little boy. I LOVE that blondie!

Landon started wrestling this year. He is apart of the Weberbilt team. They are all valley kids, who will eventually attend Weber High School. The valley kids have quite the reputation for being great wrestlers!! We have some state champs from the valley...well...from Liberty. People joke that it should be called "Liberty Wrestling" because most of the kids are Liberty kids. Apparently, it's a huge town event for Liberty!

Landon did a great job. He keeps saying that it is his thing, I think he's right. He must take after his dad. He participated in two wrestling meets. In his very first meet, ever, after a week of practice, he took 4th place. The following week he took 2nd place. He missed his last two meets due to being ill, but he had a great season! :) He LOVES his medals and has them hung prominently on his bedroom wall.

The Last 4 Weeks or So... PART 2

Here is part 2 of my "catch up".....

Landon played soccer again this year. I'm not sure he liked it so much this year, but he gave it a good shot! Last year he loved it, this year he said, "I think wrestling is 'my thing', mom.". His team is the Yellow Jackets. They are playing again next spring. (Notice Landon's bruised forehead? He fell on the concrete at school!)

Landon played defense. Here his is kicking the ball away from his team's goal. Go Landon!!

Kayla and Korbin played at the playground, while Landon had a FREEZING game of soccer!

Korbin at Landon's soccer game!

After the soccer game, I took the kids to Huntsville Park, as promised. It was freezing!! The kids were glad to go, though. Here's Korbin climbing up the playset!

Korbin and I took a walk in North Fork. He LOVES to kick the leaves...

...and fall over to play in them!

This Fall we took Libby and Thunder to the corrals in North Fork quite often. It's a perfect place for Chris to train Thunder. Kayla rides Libby around, while Chris trains. Kayla is really pretty incredible with the horses, you'd think she'd been riding her whole life. I can't handle watching her run, it scares me, but I know she does!! Chris will take her on a dirt road away from me and I can hear them!! Then Kayla comes back and tells me. :) (She wants to learn how to barrel race next summer.)

Landon likes to ride, too, but only for a few minutes. He likes to hop on the back of Kayla and let Kayla ride them around. Korbin likes to be lead around by mom. :)

The Monday before Halloween, we had a Family Home Evening and carved a family pumpkin. Each of us was assigned a face part like the eyes or the nose, etc. and we had to draw it without looking at anyone else's. Then, we brought all parts together and carved our "family pumpkin".

Our front door all decorated for Halloween.

Here's a buck on "our property". OK- it's not ours, but we want it. :) We found some land that we'd like to build on when we can. We are hoping it'll be around when we are ready. :) It should be because it's on a mountain. :) It's recreational property, but there are a handful of people that live their year-round. You are required to maintain your own dirt road and plow yourself out in winter, but the neighbors have a rotating schedule, so we only have do it once every 6 or 7 snow storms. :) Yes, we are adventurous!! We can't wait to get to "our property"......whenever, that may be.

Having a girl is more fun than I thought! And having Kayla is AWESOME!! She's such a "girly girl" that loves to wear fluffy dresses and skirts. She LOVES her purses and always wants her hair done. Her teachers always ask me how I manage to get her looking so cute each morning and I tell them it's because she just is so cute! :)

Having said that she is a girly girl, she LOVES to hunt with her daddy and can't wait until she can pheasant hunt, herself. She was very disappointed she didn't get to go elk hunting with dad and she is so excited to one day move to the mountains. :) She said she's looking forward to waking up early (as she gets older) and taking her horse, Libby, on mountain trail rides.