I got nothin.....

I'm sitting here trying to come up with some great excuses reasons as to why I haven't been bloggin.  And, yeah....I got nothin'.  What I do have is several things to post about so we'll just start there and just focus on putting one foot in front of another. 

This is going to be a collection of pictures & things for me to tell/show you.  Sit back, maybe grab a bite to eat & enjoy : )

Carmen started swimming lessons.  It is tradition that when a Peterson turns 3 they start the swim program at  our local Y.  I keep them in lessons until they start kindergarten.  By that time said child is able to swim on their own and enjoy the recreational side of the sport.  So here we are at the start:

 



Believe it or not, I have not gone sledding since I was a kid.  I have played out in the snow plenty of times, made several snowmen.  But no sledding since I was 10 (?) or close to that age.  I can distinctly remember that time of sledding.  My sisters & I walked down to Eversmeyer Park on Orange St. and we spent hours sliding down the big hill.  Quite honestly since then I've just been too lazy to bundle up, drag the stuff out to the park and sled.  Yep, 25+ years of laziness right here.  And it's not that I don't WANT to or haven't THOUGHT about it.  I have.  Plenty of times.  Most of my kids have done it, it's just with other people...while their mom sat at home sipping hot cocoa or something.  Ok, in my defense I'm sure some times I had a good excuse.  Like having a large soon to deliver a baby body or a newborn who couldn't possibility be out in the cold weather.  Yeah, those two excuses alone covers a good portion of my adult life.

So I finally did it.  Bundled us all up, dragged the stuff out to the park & we had a BLAST!!!!  It helped that I met up with a friend.  I had also bought John a snowboard for Christmas and wanted to give him the chance to use it.  It was good snow.  It was also VERY windy which made it less than "perfect" conditions.  But we braved the elements for an hour or so and made some good memories.

I called this my redneck sled.  It didn't work quite like I  imagined, but we had fun trying.



I joined in on the fun too.


John was a good big brother & showed Andrew how to handle the board.


John participated in a ice fishing derby.  It was held on a busy day for our family so Jim & I were not able to take him our self.  A wonderful man from our church was willing to take kids out even if the parents couldn't.  John had a great time.  He caught 3 fish and won the award for catching the longest fish.  Not bad for a first time ice fisher (or really much fishing at all.  he's gone a few times, but not really a lot).
My best friend Mandy had her second baby.  She wasn't scheduled for her c-section until Jan. 31.  Due to some complications she delivered 2 weeks earlier than that.  Mom & baby are fine.  I was able to go over that day and spend some time at the hospital and see this precious baby girl.  Can I just say....how nice it is to be on this end of the spectrum.  I've gone through this with my sisters, but as far a friends, she is the only one that I ever have and likely ever will be close enough to share in the deep intimacy of this special part of life.  This means even more since she struggled through over 10 years of infertility and in the mean time fertile myrtle here popped out 6 kids.  So yeah...how nice to be on this end of the situation.


The same day I went to go over for the birth of Lexie (pictured above) my parents watched Carmen for me.  Due to school the other kids were left behind and many of my friends pitched in to cover for me while I was gone.  It was nice for Carmen, the youngest of 12 grandchildren, to get some 1 on 1 time with the grandparents.  She is particularly fond of her paw-paw as you can see here.


Super Bowl?  Eh, who cares?  For any Bears fan the game that mattered more was the big play off game between the Bears & the Packers.  Yeah, yeah, we know.....the Bears lost.  Go ahead Packer fans, rub it in.  Well, someone had to lose and we will still hold our heads high as Bears fans.  We had a great time by having some friends over for that big game. 




I think I could start a whole new blog on the antics of Carmen alone.  She is somethin' else!  Can't help but love her even more.  So here are a few Carmen moments:

Taking Barney potty.  Aka:stalling on going to bed.  She is a master at this (stalling).  This was a moment of pick and chose your battles.  So Barney going potty was not worth the fight.  Carmen happily crawled into bed once Barney had performed his big boy duties.

This was one of the few spots that I thought Carmen could not reach/crawl/climb up to.  Well, I guess not anymore.  She busted herself though cause while most of the time she can climb back down, in this spot she is stuck.  So she had to call me for help.  I know I should have scolded her, perhaps lectured on how that is not a good idea & very unsafe.  But she does these things and when I find her she is so stinkin' cute.  Look at that smile.

Ok, big pat on my back for getting this done.  It only took me 3 days to finish it all.  Take what you can get people and come back for some more.