Now for the Wordy Post

Merry Christmas, Happy New Year and Happy Valentine's day. Now that I've hit all the holidays that I missed posting, I can say that I have updated my post to the best of my abilities and pictures that I have taken in the last 2 months.

A hopefully short recap as to what we've been up to.

Christmas eve, Jason's parents came down to give Katelyn her gifts for Christmas. We went out for Chinese for lunch while Jason was on duty. That evening, we went to church for a short service. After we got back to Powell, we went over to a Christmas get together the new chief of police was having with his family, that he invited the other officers too. It was actually kind of fun talking to and meeting some new people and meeting the chief's family. We really like Roy and his wife Kelly. They are such warm and down to earth people.

Christmas Day was a quiet affair. This is the first Christmas since we've been married that we actually had Christmas morning at home, on our own. We didn't venture to Manitoba or Billings, Montana for Christmas since Jason worked had to work the holiday. It was a quiet, simple affair. We spent a bit of money on Katelyn and that was about it. Katelyn and I spent the morning watching White Christmas and then Daddy came home for a couple of hours so she could open presents. Christmas is pretty low key for the department. If it's quiet not many calls, they say to go home and spend some time with the family. Since the other officer on duty was at home early in the morning with his girls, Jason could come later on while he covered for the two of them. I think that evening we went to our friends, the LaFollette's and had a get together with them since we all didn't have gatherings to go to. We did a white elephant gift exchange that is always interesting to see what people received from others.

New year's again was quiet. I'm thinking we went somewhere but i can't remember. I know Jason had to work nights that night as well and I missed the ball dropping in New York. I rang in the New Year reading in bed.

The 3rd of January was a stressful day. Jason had left the 2nd to go the police academy in Douglas, WY 5hrs away. The 3rd was his first day and I had an ultrasound in the afternoon. That morning, they had to do a physical test to pass in order to stay for the academy. He missed it by 2 sit ups. There is a whole lot more to it than just 2 sit-ups as to why he couldn't stay, but regardless for this entry, I'm keeping it short. So he called me as I'm outside the door to the hospital to tell me he's coming home. This just ruined the rest of my day. I was trying not to cry during my appointment. At this point, we thought he was out of a job, because with other agencies, if you can't pass the academy, you are out of a job. But because Powell does all their in-house training first and there is another academy that he could attend in April, they took him back and he is still working. So now, he's working out, like he was before he left, to pass the test again in April. We really wanted him to make it now, since I'm due in May and the academy is 3 months long. So do the math, he is gone during the weeks when I'm due. He can come home on the weekends, but it is still a 5 hr drive one way should something happen. But God's plan is not always our plan or timing. Maybe he was supposed to be here for the things that would come to happen in the following weeks, or it was for his own protection driving in the winter. We don't know, but we're trusting God that it was for a reason and he will pass again. It actually took him 2 times to pass the written test to even get into the pd. 2 seems to have significance for him, so maybe 2nd times the charm to pass it.

So after getting over that news, Jason's schedule has been busy, while mine is not. I'm busy keeping a very busy Katelyn busy during the day. She has more energy than I know what to do with sometimes, and living in a 1000sq ft house doesn't leave us any extra room to run and play like a basement would. The weather hasn't been terribly cold and with little snow, what do you do? Plus, we battle with keeping our little jacket even zipped to our chest, so going outside is more battle than pleasure. We did make it out twice this week already, so we're on the upswing. I can't wait for nicer weather.

Working for the pd has been exciting to say the least. Just after the new year, they had a huge drug bust in town, which Jason was involved in. Then there was a drug store burglary which he was called into in the wee hours of the morning and they ended up solving not long after. Last week, he was called in again to a hostage situation at a local motel, that didn't end well for the man wielding a gun. You can read up on that at www.powelltribune.com. Needless to say, Jason has pulled in a lot of overtime hours. Plus, their schedules have changed from 3 different shifts to 2-12hr shifts. 2 weeks 6am-6pm and 2 weeks 6pm-6am a month. They work more hours and have more days off in a row, usually 3-4 days off at a time. So it's different, but these guys are tight knit group which is great to be apart of. Jason's invited a few of them over for supper when I've made enough and they're on night shift. It's just nice for them to get a break on those long shifts.

Well, enjoy all the other posts I posted today. There are quite a few, but now I'm up to date.

Jason's Best Buy

This is my most used appliance in the kitchen. I guess you could say that it is literally used because Jason picked it up at a garage sale last year for $5. It came with all the cups and toppers that come on the infomercial, minus the chopper blade. So, I had to get 2 new blades from ebay for $15. So for a total of $20, much cheaper than the $50 or $60 you have to pay in the store, I have used this machine everyday in the last month. Smoothies or "swoowies" are a breakfast staple now. Our recipe of choice is 1 banana, strawberries, 1/2 apple juice and water and maybe some ice or frozen berries. This yields enough for a good 6 oz cup full for K and a full cup for me. So we're getting our fruit in and we haven't been sick all winter. Of course we haven't gotten together with many sick kids either, but we're amping up our vitamin C and taking extra "bitamins" to stay healthy and so far, we have been. Daddy on the other hand did bring home a nasty cold for himself and I caught the stuffy nose, but K seemed to come through unscathed.

So now the joke around here, is that Jason finally bought a gift that I like and use. I'm a hard person to buy gifts for, so he's kind of stopped guessing what I want and knows just to buy me what I tell him I want, if I let him spend the money, because being cheap/frugal is also something he must come up against when buying gifts. Yes, I'm difficult.

Valentine's day treats

Going back through our home videos, I noticed that last year on Valentine's day, we baked Chocolate Brownie Pudding for all of us. This year, having been addicted to Pinterest, I thought a fun thing to do for this year was to make Rice Krispie Treats cut into hearts for the kids at church. As I was making them, I realized it had been a really long time since I had even made the cereal bars. I had a very eager little helper to help me. She was in charge of measuring the cereal, with some help of course, and counting out the marshmallows into the pot. She is so smart and has a memory of having marshmallows on the fire when we went camping last summer with friends. She just amazes me sometimes with what she remembers.

Minus one marshmallow.

The end result and yes her hands were clean, I think. :)

These were made on Valentine's day but we had made a batch last Saturday to bring to church on Sunday. She was so cute handing out her hearts to her friends in the nursery and to our neighbor friend, Sam. Sam also gave Katelyn a "balintine" gift, thanks to her mom Kim. She got a red frog that plays a song and his cheeks light up when you press his belly, along with some M&M's and twix bars she shared with mom and dad.

Wonder Pets

This is one of her favorite shows to watch on netflix and is asked for regularly. Maybe it's the animals, I don't know, but it is a favorite. The premise of the show is 3 little animals, a hamster, turtle and baby duck are pets in a school, who get phone calls from other baby animals that are in trouble. They jump out of their cages and build the flyboat that takes them to wherever the animal in distress calls from and they help bring the baby back to it's mother and out of trouble. They have a very catchy, stick in your head kind of theme song that they sing, and Katelyn sings right along with them.

"Wonder pets, wonder pets, we're on our way. To help a friend and save the day. We're not too big and we're not too tough but when we work together we've got the right stuff. Go Wonder Pets, Yay!

We definitely have a singer in her. She has to sing with every theme song from every show she sees, whether she knows it or not. She must hop off the couch and stand in front of the T.V and try and sing along. Once it's over, it back on to the couch to watch. It quite cute and she is very particular that I don't sing along, she can do it herself, and I let her. We also got her a new cd with kids singing praise songs and some older hymns, that we play every night and she has picked up on a lot of the words and sings along with them, raising her hands in praise in her bed. It helps that daddy demonstrated to her the raising hands, and sometimes I must also raise my hands in praise with her. Before we can say good night, we must sing "Jesus loves me", "He's got the whole world in His Hands" complete with custom verse of "mommy, daddy, katelyn, tucker and baby in his hands" and now "This little light of mine" complete with actions. Sometimes these songs are a good reminder for us adults as well, that God does have us all and the world in His very capable hands. We just have to trust.

Air Pop Popcorn

One night when daddy was working, Katelyn asked for popcorn. Since we didn't have any microwave popcorn, I broke out the air popper and kernals. This was a real treat for her since we never seem to use it. The kernals were old and I didn't know if they would work, but they did. She loved sitting on the counter watching the kernals pop and drop out of the chute into the bowl. Adding a little melted butter and salt, we were ready for a girls night movie and snacks. I forget which movie we watched, probably something from the library, which would be something along the lines of Curious George, Bob the builder or any other children's movie. She was very intent on it and her popcorn. Of course baby had to sit with us too. It has become her one thing to sleep with lately. She has not forgotten about this new popcorn technique. She'll sometimes ask for it and I should just give it to her as a healthy snack, but I just don't think about it when she asks.

22 weeks

This is me at 22 weeks pregnant, which happens to be 6 weeks ago. As of today I'm 28 weeks and not a whole lot bigger, but the last month I've definitely started feeling pregnant and have more of a belly and can no longer wear my regular jeans without the help of a bella band keeping everything closed. 28 week picture to come. It's sad but I haven't been very motivated to take pics of myself this time around. I don't know why, but the time just seems to fly by.

Daddy's Little Helper

Helping daddy to fix the drawer slide on one of her bed drawers.

She looks like she knows what she's doing.