Merry Christmas!

Before all of the craziness starts, I wanted to make sure to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas!

Our house is full of excitment as our countdown comes to an end and our celebrating Christ's birth and santa's arrival begins!

Baby Coop is ready to help with presents.

He has already opened one and TJ didnt think that was quite fair!

Belt Family - Christmas 2008

Belt Family - Christmas 2009

What a difference a year can make! We were watching last year's Christmas video last night and we were amazed to see how little Andi and TJ were but found it hilarious that it was just miniture versions of what we see every day. Their personalities were the same, they are just a little stronger now! :)

Time flies...

when you're having fun, or so they say! This past year we have definitely had lots of fun AND stayed busy! I can't believe it has been 3 weeks since I last blogged. Last night we were looking through some old photos and we couldn't believe how much Andi and TJ had grown up or Cooper either for that matter!

This week is the start of my "vacation" kind of. I am done writing until Jan (at least I think!) so I finally made time to sit at the computer to update my blog instead of my latest article :)

So here are some random pictures that I found for you to enjoy for being so patient!

Our little dorks! There is not a day, well really hour probably that Andi and TJ are not dressing up. This is pretty calm really but it shows a new infatuation that has started at my house- headbands!

Again-"headband heroes" Most of these pictures (like this one) the kids wanted me to take, that's why they are actually smiling!

She's a rock star!

and she loves her "mermaid lipstick" or loved until TJ snuck into her room while she was sleeping and use the rest of it on his own face!

Cooper is enjoying baby food and we are still trying to find something that will stay down! He likes most everything except cereal and peas and it doesn't help that Andi told him "that's okay Cooper, if you don't like it just spit it out!" Really? Who told you that?!

He likes sitting up but that seems to add to the constant puking and really it isn't very safe at our house yet. lol

Andi and Cooper just hanging out.

Andi and TJ were a BIG help (haha) wrapping our presents but I didn't think I would have to worry about this guy! I forgot what its like to have a roller/scooter on your hands!

Santa! We made a visit to see Santa at Bass Pro. Andi was okay, Cooper was okay, TJ was not okay hence his daddy in the picture!

Before Travis left last week for KS we tried taking a picture for the Christmas card. Of course there is never a perfect time for everyone; Cooper was tired and ready for bed but we tried anyways. The big kids were surprisingly fantastic but if Cooper isn't in the mood he really isn't in the mood!

Actually, this card really sums up our daily routine over and over and over!

TJ trying to love on Cooper, Cooper not too happy about it and trying to move or get away and little mamma Andi trying to calm everyone down!

Shortly after this photo Cooper got to go to bed and we came back to find this...

TJ patiently waiting in the baby poser for a photo shoot...

and then Miss Andi ready to smile as well!

The good thing about taking your own photos, is that you get to try, try again. Only since Travis was gone and I was ready to send out my Christmas cards I got to try by myself! It went better than expected. Andi and TJ would smile and even laugh but then TJ would do his dorky fake laugh and it would scare Cooper and he would cry. After 10 or so minutes of this..we finally settled on this one...

Merry Christmas from the Belts!

Christmas Time!

We decided to put up our tree the weekend after TJ's party. We had most of our Christmas decorations put up the day after Thanksgiving but we knew the tree would take up a lot of room and wanted to wait so there were not extra cedar needles all over the place!

Andi, TJ and Travis set out to get the tree (on a cold Friday a little before the sun went down). They found a nice huge tree fairly quickly but arrived home without one because TJ and Andi were whining because it was cold (come on at least 30 something! lol) and they couldn't walk anyways with all of their winter gear on (think Christmas story :) )

When they got home, I threw out the idea of an artificial tree for the first time as I was trying to remember where we put the "Christmas tree blanket" and other blankets to cover some furniture as we would have to get it from the front door to the living room. I did not have much argument and even though I still miss the smell of cedar and the idea of having a real tree, we set out Saturday morning to find the "perfect" artificial tree in Quincy.

our new tree... It was definitely less painful as we decorated for the kids and it seems to be lots sturdier than our trees in the past, which is definitely a good thing so we have no corner to put (protect) our tree in this year and it is open from 3 sides!

TJ's excitement after hanging his first ornament on. This kids LOVES Christmas and we hear lots of girly shrieks from him when we see Christmas trees, lights, presents etc. :)

He is quite the decorator as you can tell from his ornament arranging.

He took time to hang each one on the same limb at the exact spot. We had lots of hooks over top one another. You should have seen the tinsel- even better!

The finished product- officially ready for Christmas. The kids loved decorating and helping wrap presents. It did take longer but it was worth it!

They did so well with ours we couldn't wait to help decorate Grandma Mari's and this past weekend we went and helped along with Kyle and Stephanie.
Stephanie was brave enough to climb and use the ladder.

TJ decorating.

Andi really liked decorating with Grandma Mari, she loved all of her ornaments!

Even Kyle "Tom" helped. That through TJ for a loop "Kyle Tom? No Kyle not papa Tom!"

umm Stephanie what are you doing?! LOL :)

And as always there was a little mischief.

Cooper loves bouncing especially when Andi and TJ aren't helping!

TJ wearing a "new" hat and trying to be cool like Andi.

TJ's Birthday

TJ turned the big 2 on December 3rd and had a fantastic birthday party and was spoiled way in a good way! We decided to video tape most of the activities and our "professional photographer" kept busy with all of the babies instead of snapping lots of pics! LOL!

TJ loves Elmo and Truman so he was super excited to see all of his Elmo stuff for his party. He was also excited to wear his Truman shirt for the big MU vs KU game that we watched with friends at our house after the party.

Hmm..whats in here? He was super excited with all the presents and quickly opened each and every one of them!

He was very excited to see all of the gifts especially when most of them turned out to be Elmo or Truman related!

The best of both worlds- an Elmo cake and a Mizzou football cake!

enjoying some cookie cake

TJ's 2nd Birthday "party" Andi was worried that we wouldn't get to "celebrate" TJ's actual birthday and couldn't believe that we were going to be the only ones there! What a nut! Even if we were the only ones there we certainly enjoyed our hot dogs and cookie cake per TJ's request!

He loves singing Happy Birthday and being sung to!

blowing out the candles...

new camo underwear!

and a new bike!

Gotta love our TJ! What would we do without him?!

N.A.I.L.E.

Finally at 12:30 on Saturday morning we were ready to leave Shelby County to head to Louisville. We had done all the important things on our checklist including 1) killing a monster buck and 2) doing chores for mom and dad and yes in that order! The navigation system said 7 hours and 7 minutes and we really did pretty good. The excitement of the big deer and that fact that we were getting to go to Louisville didn’t wear off until later that night and then a yummy meal at Red Lobster at 10pm KY time helped.

Even though it was a long ride and late night we were excited to see Kyle show at the North American International Livestock Exposition the "world's largest all breed purebred livestock exposition" can you tell I got that from their website? (That was for all of you blog stalkers that didnt know the background! lol) Truly it was a huge show and Southdown was the biggest breed there. Andi was excited to see Jayleigh and Dusty again and we were all happy to hang out with MaMa Mari, PaPa Harold, PaPa Tom, "Barb", Gina, Kale and Kyle and the rest of our "sheep family" from MO!!

Andi and her girls!

Andi picking apples.

TJ loved playing in the corn.

He also loved playing with the chickens. LOL For some reason TJ wanted all of the chickens on the tables and he kept busy moving them 2 by 2 from their pen to the table. It was pretty hilarious because every time TJ would go back for more chickens the guy in charge would swoop in and get the 2 off the table and take them back to their pen. I let this go on for awhile because I really didn't see the harm in moving the chickens because they could move every thing else. Finally I went to get TJ and the man told me "You are going to have to talk to him, he cant be moving those chickens out of their pens." What the heck? The poor guy was stressing out about it though so we tried to get TJ to play with something else before we got kicked out of the play area! :)

TJ fixing PaPa Tom's hair.

Kyle and Cassidy showing Jayleigh

Jayleigh did very well and got 7th in her class.

Kyle and Dusty

Dusty was Andi's leadline ewe and the lamb she showed all by herself at Bethel. She also did really well and placed 7th in her class!

The trip was lots of fun and we were super glad that we got the chance to go and that everyone made it home safely! I think we ended up getting home around 2:30 thanks to my wonderful husband!

Hunting Season!

I knew that deer season would be interesting this year especially since we have 5-11 deer in our front or back yard every night but I just figured that would just make it longer! :)

Travis finally got to go bow hunting the week before firearm season and was fortunate (or skilled) enough to get a great buck! That was on Wednesday morning.

Everyone was super excited to get their picture taken!

Andi and TJ checking it out...

TJ and Travis, both still excited!

I was super happy because that meant the next couple days that he had planned on hunting he could help me! Friday I went shopping with a group of girls from Leonard. We met around 7:30 and got home around 7:30pm that night. It was tons of fun and I got almost all of my Christmas shopping done in one day! And an even happier babysitter because he had already gotten the biggest buck he ever had and had already delivered him to the taxidermist!

Late Friday night I asked Travis if he killed a big buck Saturday morning did that mean we could go to Louisville to watch Kyle show. He just laughed and smiled and I did too because the bow buck was the first deer since he was 15 that he had gotten mounted. I was not counting on it! A little after 7:30am the next morning I got a text message that said "I got him!" I immediately got the kids up and ready to take pictures again with their dad.

The whole gang again with an even better buck- still excited!

After oohhing and ahhhing about the deer for a few minutes Travis said "well, I guess that means we are going to Louisville!" He did not have to tell me twice and I even let him go "uptown" for a few hours to show off the biggest deer he had ever gotten-for real this time!