Thanksgiving Shelley Side

This year we spent Thanksgiving last Saturday because most of my family works during the real Thanksgiving. It was a perfect meal. My mom slaved all day baking pies and cooking all the food. Thank you mom for the yummy meal!

On Sunday we went up on the Kiabab to get Christmas trees! It was FREEZING! We didn't leave til 1:00 ish..got up there around 2:00 and we left at 5:00. We found 3 way awesome trees so fast. We had fried chicken, and HOT HOT HOT chocolate, and lots of snacks. We built a awesome fire and went sledding. All the kids had so much fun! However it was blizzard cold. Snow was hitting you so hard, and the wind was blowing so fast. No one complained hardly at all, which made it made it funner. We were in the middle of a thick group of trees, so it wasn't as bad where we were at, but when we went tree hunting, it was hard to see. We were so lucky to find 3 good trees so fast. We got down the mountain, and we headed back to Cedar City.

It was a Happy Thanksgiving for the Shelley family this year! :-) We have so many things to be grateful for this year. I think recognizing all the good that has happened to you makes the holidays more enjoyable and special. Happy Thanksgiving to everyone!

No pants...

As stated once before, Dawson prefers no clothes ALL the time. :-) He gets that from his daddy who comes home and just takes off all his clothes. J.D. says its just more comfortable that way. So all my fresh sunshine coming in from the windows is closed off because J.D. wants to be more comfortable.... BUT that's another story.

No Pants #1: Dawson loves to help me with the laundry, more so because he gets a pop every time we go to the laundry mat. It was late last night we went to go fold and pick up the laundry. Dawson is running around and next thing I know he has his pants around his ankles! I said, "Dawson pull up your pants." (I was laughing though) He replied, "No pants mom." and he laughed. He kept running around with his pants around his ankles until he totally biffed it-face first! I just laughed and said "that's what you get!" He just laughed with me and continued running around with his pants around his ankles.

No Pants #2: Right now, this instant as I'm typing, Dawson has taken his pants off... taken his diaper off.. and is grinning ohhh so mischievously. So, just his cool sweatshirt and his cute bum hanging out. He is also dancing to the "Word World" song. LOL!

No Pants #3: I have some boots that are SOOOO soft on the inside. Dawson just loves them! So...without pants he wanted to wear the boots. It was so funny! He could hardly walk because the boots went clear up to his bum. But he managed and was determined to wear those boots.
Need I say more?

Happy Halloween!

I love Halloween! It truly is my favorite holiday. I have never missed a year of not dressing up. This year Dawson and I were devils, while J.D. was a REALLY UGLY hobo. Dawson really didn't do much trick or treating.
He doesn't look very happy here b/c he just woke up..but he was happy after he saw that everyone was dressing up.
...really ugly!

We went to Great Grandma Stevens' first to show off our lovely costumes. She gave us extra candy for looking so good. :-)

We were going to hit up some more houses, but it was time for the carnival. On our way out we ran into 'lucas' (which was parker dressed as lucas). If you don't know Lucas or Parker-they are J.D.'s brothers...Lucas is the oldest, and Parker the youngest.. Lucas looks like this..
We went to the carnival at the church and ate sloppy joes and played LOTS of games. J.D. won me and his Grandpa Stevens cakes for our birthdays. We left there and went back to Great Grandma Stevens' to eat our cake.

Here is Dawson and his cousin Destry. She was a fairy- and the CUTEST one at that!

Randomness

My little man can't hardly stand to not be in the same room as me. I was organizing his closet one day and I turned around to find Dawson putting the boxes I needed to 'better' use.
This is the outfit he chose for another day! He's so cute! He was so excited to have pockets on his shirt!

Dawson isn't really potty training right now..but we have taught him how it all works. Some days he wants to go, and MOST days he doesn't care. I'm not going to worry about potty training him- when he's ready I figure he can do it. BUT he feels the need to potty train his stuffed animals. lol! He will put them on the seat, and say, "Pussssssshhhhhhhhh..." Then he flushes, and tries to wash their hands.

Dawson is such a goof ball! Everyday I get a kick out of the conversations we have, and how smart he is. Yesterday for example, may not seem as funny as it did to me. He's too quick for me.

We had to go get his car seat out of the car that J.D. had at school. So I just buckled Dawson in the middle buckle of the truck and we were off. Dawson decided he didn't need/want to sit down when he can get out so easily...

Me: Dawson please sit down. I don't want you to get hurt.
Dawson: No sit down!
Me: Dawson if you don't sit down I will have to put you in time out when we get home. Please sit down.
Dawson: No sit down mom!
Me more sternly: DAWSON- sit down!
Then I tapped on my brakes a bit to have him see that he needs to sit down or he'll get hurt. (probably not smart of me, but it happened...) after he grabbed something and got stable again...
Dawson: GEEZ! GOSH! Stop it mom.
Me: (laughing inside seeing that it just made me look stupid and not him) Dawson, please just sit down.
Dawson: No sit down. no time out.
Me: (YELLING STERNLY) DAWSON SIT DOWN PLEASE!!!
Dawson: (with his finger to his mouth) ssshhh! No sit down.

By this time we were at the school, and I was trying so hard not to laugh! That's what we do to him if he's yelling at us. We say, sshhh please use your soft voice. He did the same thing back to me when I yelled. haha! I felt so dumb! He's such a smarty pants!

Deer Hunt

Here we are at the annual Stevens Traditional Deer Hunt. It was a little rainy this year, but I actually thought it was kinda of nice. We roasted smores, ate TONS of food, and just relaxed. All of the cousins had so much playing together.

I had fun taking some pictures of Dawson! Dawson loves his cowboy hats. He actually knows that his parents don't get him real cowboy hats yet, so he INSISTS on a real cowboy hat. We are lucky that Dawson has Grandpa's that are real cowboys. This hat is one of his Grandpa Stevens old hats-it's been worn down like a 'real' cowboy hat. :-)

My little man found himself a fort

He is too cute when he's sad! lol!

CHEESE!

Aren't leaves so interesting? They are more interesting when you see your child pondering about it..What is this? Look at how it crinkles? What a cool shape? Why is it outside? I've never seen something like this?

Dawson took this picture- I say he did a pretty good job for a 2 year old. He loves taking pictures.

When you get a pic like this I can't help but brag about how stinkin' cute they are!

Here's all of the cousins!

We had a blast no matter the weather. I wish we could have stayed longer, but I'll take what I can get right? :-)

Back from the Hunt

Well, like I mentioned earlier ..I definitely would rather have J.D. home than not home-even if it means more cleaning up to do. lol! Dawson was so excited for J.D. to come home. He would let go of him ALL night. He goes to J.D. for almost everything. It's just fun to have my own family all home.

They didn't get a elk...I don't even think they shot at anything. I do know they ate really well, and slept really well. I have officially cleaned everything, washed ALL the clothes from his adventures, and managed to cook a meal. We have yet to watch our netflix..but we will get there. It's a lot of catching up to do. I am extremely tired from the weekend, and finally feel a little better. I could use more sleep-seems like I'm the only one who lost sleep this whole time. But, this too shall pass once I get a little more sleep. haha!

PS-Just for the record...I'm am so glad they didn't get anything. I hate putting money into elk meat, or jerky especially since I hate it. I like it any time I save money. So ..yes, I pray they don't get anything. :-)

Bitter Sweet

Well, J.D. has left me to go on the spike elk hunt. This is a HUGE deal in my family. My brother and his kids fly in from Missouri every year to come. All the boys go on this same hunt, and have been doing it since I was born because I can't remember not ever having it. They used to allow the girls to come up for one of the days. I'm sure they still would, but we are all so busy and have a different lifestyle than we did 10 years ago. Even so, we are still not allowed to stay the night, it's a boys only ordeal.

Anyways, it's been really calm around here without J.D. I have found myself without anything to do. Dawson has cried every day since he's left. It is the hardest thing for me to see Dawson cry and want his daddy. Nights are little scary b/c I don't have someone here to protect us except neighbors (who were out of town). And I'm a worrier, so I thing of all the things that could go wrong and analyze a plan for each one...it'd be a lot easier if J.D. were just here. This is the bitter part of the whole thing.

The sweet part is the fact that my house actually stays clean...ALL DAY! I am so calm, and less stressed because my house is always clean. Even Dawson has been happier because I don't spend so much time cleaning up and can play with him more. I have everything to make all of my dinner meals! I don't have random things gone. J.D. just grabs what he can and makes something of his own out of it instead of what I make. The milk has lasted forever!! I hate going grocery shopping so I try to do a once a month big shopping day and then sometimes I have to go get small things because J.D. has eaten them, or the milk is gone. AND the gas in the car..well it's still full and has been since the day J.D. left. I know he has to go to school-I'm talking besides school.

Needless to say, it's a bitter sweet couple of days while J.D. is gone. :-) Even with the sweet part of him being gone, I would rather have him here because worrying takes a bigger toll on my life and sleep. I'm pretty sure my life line on my palm gets shorter every year because of all the worrying I do. lol! However, I will NOT admit any of this to J.D. in fear that he will know he is actually right and I'm wrong.. :-)