hey goofball

so my mom is technologically sound- bigtime. she could fix a computer that was thrown thru a brick wall and make it run perfectly again.. ok, ok, so maybe that is exagerating just a bit, but you get the point. anyhow, my mom is on facebook as am I - but I joined it originally when it was only for college kids and I needed to make "friends" in my classes who would give me notes and the like... ok. back to the story. she is on facebook and has an album called grandbabies 2008 and has some hilarious pictures of my neice Ila, and I stole them to share with all of you!

Now as you are looking at these pictures, you have to know Ila.. she is the funniest, silliest little girl ever created on God's great earth. She saw my mom the other day and said "hey goofball" and then made a funny face. she dances all the time, calls every baby Case and calls my mom Karen more often than Gramma. She loves animals, horses and dogs and chickens of course.. a girl after my own heart!

And this evening, Case was being rather silly himself, he used to be pretty camera shy and now he loves to make faces into the camera!

This picture below, I caught Case playing with this outfit from his Nana - he always pulls it out of his bottom drawer and drags it around his room with him... must be his favorite one!

Last but not least, you can kinda see Case's 2 bottom teeth if you look real close!

oh how he has changed

This evening I was looking through Cases' pictures, from when he was in the NICU at TMC to now, and wow, its like he is a different baby!

Just a few months ago, Case HATED peas and tonite he wouldn't fill up, so, what did I do.. I opened a can of peas.. and what do ya know? he ate them up like candy!! That just goes to tell you never to give up on the peas!

Rosemary, Case's nanny, whom everyone calls NiNi - why I don't know - gave us the funniest present for Christmas, and I needed to share it with you all because its hilarious! Here is our little guy, dressed up like Santa!

He will be 1 in just a few months! wow, this year has flown by!!

chores in december in duncan

you know its cold outside when you come in from doing chores and you change your son's dirty diaper and when you wipe his hind end with a wipe, it burns your fingers.

thats all I have to say.

snow!

its been snowing here since about 4:00.. and its still snowing!!!

Laundry baskets have many uses

I was folding laundry this morning and Case grabbed my laundry basket and started playing with it. Sooner than he knew, he was inside the laundry basket, since it was on top of him. It was pretty hilarious watching him try to get out of it!

discovery of the basket....

oh wow, it moves....

I could still escape...

darn! Im stuck!

what now?

Busy day today...

Case and I had a busy day today, this morning we went into my classroom to meet a few of my students for public speaking practice - I must be a stinkin dedicated teacher to come in on my winter break and help some students with their speaking abilities!

Once that was done, we went to Safford and got my oil changed. In the meantime Case played in the kids area of the lobby with a ford f250 toy truck and gooseneck horse trailer. I took pictures with my phone and sent them to my mom and mil, but I can't figure out how to get them on here. He is a pretty hilariously friendly kid. There was a little boy, about 7 years old that came and was watching Case attack these toys - Case started laughing which in turn scared the boy I guess because he ran back to his mom screaming " I don't know what I did to make him laugh". I thought this was pretty funny.

Finally we went to Walmart and bought some lights for our ginourmous christmas tree (had to get 3 boxes of the 18 foot rope lights which I learned this evening aren't actually supposed to go on a tree, but on a house) but anyhow Eric and I hung them this evening on our tree and I have some great pictures for you all to see -

While Eric and I were finishing the lights, I remembered that Rosemary, Cases' nanny had gotten him some super cute john deere ornaments and I had to take a picture and show you what cute ornaments are made now - back in my day I don't remember anything this cool.

And finally, I have decided to not buy toys because Case is perfectly content playing with empty water bottles. I think that toys are a ploy to make billions of dollars. Case would rather play with ornaments, water bottle and my spoons and spatulas.

the little helper

Case has been quite the little helper today, he has helped dad drive, helped mom decorate the tree and played with the shatterproof ornaments too! Just some pictures for you all to see -

Oh Christmas Tree, Oh Christmas Tree

This afternoon, we went up MuleCreek - the town just to the northeast of us and really a beautiful place. We went to Martinez Ranch and started searching for trees. we saw lovely spruces and alot of junipers that Udell swore would make great trees, but Eric just wouldn't settle until he found "the one". Well the one sure was "the one" - it was up an incredibly steep hillside that of course I had to get out and hike with Eric and we didn't exactly dress for a hike today - both of us had cowboy boots on which are less than ideal for climbing steep hills.

However, the tree was perfect. Beautiful all around and very full of course.

Eric has been pretty excited to cut down trees and wood for our woodstove lately because he recently got a new stihl chainsaw, and quite honestly I think that stihl should look to him for a model for their commercials... don't you think so? Wouldn't you buy a chainsaw from them if you saw the picture above?

Anyhow, the tree is great. It is quite tall, its amazing how small a tree looks out in the open, but once you get it into the house, I was quite thankful we have a 2 story house because the tree is about 9 feet tall! I will post a pic when it is finished being decorated too!

The McSpadden men!

Eric's grandparents, Patsy and Udell came up yesterday and we have been enjoying their stay so far. As soon as they arrived yesterday, we went down to the ranch down the road and gathered pecans. Then when we came home, Case and his grampa Udell played with a towle and GG or Gramma Patsy got down on Case's level by crawling around on the floor with him.

Today we are going to cut a Christmas tree, yes, a little late, but better late than never! At least it will be super fresh on Christmas! Look for more pictures to come....

Oh and mom, I am keeping this updated with lots of pictures just for you!

here is our bathroom....

so for you moms (mom and Pam) that have been waiting so paitently to see my beautiful bathroom (well, the tile portion at least..) feast your eyes! Oh and my bathtub, it is wonderful, I took a bath in it the other night and loved it!

confusing

I am pretty tech savvy, however this blog stuff has got me baffled.

9 months and standing

Case is in his 9th month of life and has already discovered so many things!

• says the words "DaDa" and "Yea"




• can hold his own bottle (finally)




• has 1 tooth and is working on the 2nd




• loves to eat everything, especially if he can feed himself!




• crawls all over the place.. seriously, this boy can move!




• started standing up like a monkey, looks pretty funny from behind




• this morning at 6:45 amish, stood up all by himself, holding the crib!

things to be thankful for:

As the year ends, there are things of which I am incredibly thankful for, and I feel I should list them below:

1. God - without him, I would be a lost soul. literally.
2. A husband that somehow puts up with my sillyness and stubborness ALL the time
3. a baby that was born so early, but is doing SOOO well now!
4. wonderful parents
5. wonderful inlaws "mil and fil"
6. currently I am thankful that my career was a smart choice - teachers will ALWAYS be needed!
7. great family
8. fabulous friends
9. the life that I live
10. farm fresh eggs
11. home grown beef
12. the ability to be where I am today, owning a home, land and lots of animals
13. humility
14. humbling adventures
15. home made ice cream
16. turqouise
17. cowboy boots
18. flip flops
19. dutch oven peach cobbler
20. the fact that i get to wear jeans everyday to work is by far a wonderful thing!!!

Ok, some of these are givens, but some I truly would not be able to survive without.

Yes, we now have a blog!

Eric finally caved and said I could make a family blog. love it!