Well, I made it.  I actually took a picture of my family (myself included), every month in 2011.  Sometimes, my heart was not in it, but other times I loved every minute of it.  Most months, we took a special adventure for our family picture.  But my favorite picture of us is probably the one of us above, and the one of us in my bed cuddling on a typical weekend morning.  Coincidentally, both were taken with my iPhone.  Which just goes to show that it is about the image, not the equipment.

2011 was a good year.  One of transitions, but at the end of the year, we only had good things to celebrate.  What more can you ask?  We are happy, healthy, and together.

This poor blog has become so neglected.  It is not intentional, but this time of year is so busy.  Wes and I have been taking Financial Peace University, and I have been taking every freelance job that I can to help with our snowball.   FPU has definitely been the best thing that Wes and I have ever done.  It is a commitment, and not always easy, but we know that it will be so worth it in the end.

October was a great month.  We enjoyed the fall weather and spent a lot of time outside.  My best friend in the world and her husband came for a visit, along with my Nonnie. I love having people stay with us.  It makes living so far away much more tolerable.  I love having an audience to cook for, and making things that I know that they love and appreciate.

William got his first straight A report card.  I am so proud of him, it may come as a surprise to you, but I have never gotten straight A’s in my life.  He is getting so big and funny.  He is heading into that really dorky phase and it is endearing.  He was in a school play a few weeks ago, and I saw a side of him that I have never seen.  He started off shy, but a song or two in, he was dancing, and shaking his little booty all over the place.  Not shy that evening.

Ava is really into cutting out paper people and leaving them all over the house for us to find.  Her artwork tells me so much about her.  She reminds so me so much of myself at her age.  All I wanted to do was read and color.  I still do, if I am being honest with you.  She still loves school, and is so happy for Monday.

Clay is a mess in the best possible way.  He is rough and tumble, sweet and mean, but really funny.  He keeps us on our toes, that is for sure.  He is getting so big.  I realized the other day, that we have gone from having babies to having kids.  We were on our way somewhere, and we all just hopped into the car and went.  No pre-planning, packing, we just went.  We got into the car and headed out.  In some ways, it is incredibly freeing.

Halloween was insane.  I have never had so many kids come to my door in such a short amount of time.  400 kids, 25 bags of candy, less than an hour.  I am really not into Halloween at all.  I am not at all creative when it comes to making costumes, or even coming up with ideas.  But the kids love it, so I do participate.  People here on base get really into it.  They decorate their houses like it is Christmas.  I am just not into scary, I like cute Halloween.

Off to bed, but Happy November.

Better late than never.  I really had good intentions, I swear.  In fact, I actually did my hair and left the house with my camera a few times, with the intentions of taking our monthly shot.  But it never felt right.  This exercise is not to force a family shot, but to celebrate my family.  This morning, we were all piled into our bed cuddling, and it did feel right.  I grabbed my camera from the kitchen and put it on the dresser.  This is the shot that I was after.

September went by in a flash.  Seriously, I am not sure where it went.  Kansas is so gorgeous right now.  All of the leaves on the trees are golden and red.  The air is beginning to crisp, and it looks like a nursery threw up mums and pumpkins on my street.  People really go to town decorating for Halloween around here.  I cannot even imagine what Christmas is going to look like.  Halloween is not my holiday.  I like cute Halloween, but not scary, and I really do not do much for it.  I decorate a little for fall, but I really see Halloween as the thing standing in my way of Thanksgiving.  Thanksgiving is the holiday that I look forward to all year.  I love everything about it.  No pressure, no presents, just good friends and family, and a huge meal.

The kids are wonderful.  They are doing so well in school.  Ava in particular loves school.  I work in her classroom on Tuesdays and it is so fun to see her in her element.  She seems so big and sassy at home, but once you put her in a room of kids her own age, she looks so little.  William is having a much better year this year.  He is more responsible and seems to really like being at school.  The homework here is much more manageable and I think that it makes a huge difference.  They have a really long school day, and I am grateful that there are less fights once he gets home.  Clay is no longer a baby.  No more diapers, and finally, no more pacifier.  I was scared to death to take it away from him, but it sort of happened organically.  We lost a bunch and were down to 2.  The dog chewed on one, and Clay threw it away.  One night, he lost it and was sad, we did the middle of the night-half asleep-pappy search and we could not find it anywhere.  He whined for about 2 minutes, and that was the end of it.  Sometimes, I forget that they will be able to do things on their own, when they are ready.  I really wanted to take it away earlier, but I am thankful that I did not push the issue.  I know that if I didn’t wait until he was ready, it would have been drama filled and harder for all of us.

As for me, September was pretty good.  I can’t really tell you what I did, but it seems like it was good.  I have been working a lot, and love what I do.  I am ready to make some changes though.  I need to push myself more.  Maybe change my look a bit.  I am ready to move to the next step.  Stay tuned.

We are finally starting to find our groove.  The kids are back in school, and have been for almost a month already.  They love their new school, new teachers, and new friends.  I do too.  The school here is beyond what I expected, and I am really and truly impressed with it.  They are happy, and come home from school happy, which is all that I could ever hope for.  Clay loves his new school too.  He is doing well, and getting used to being a big kid.

I am feeling so much better.  It is amazing how meeting one good friend can change your outlook.  I really do like Kansas, it is beautiful here, and I like the pace.  Admittedly, I miss having a Target (or even a grocery store) right down the street, but I can live with that.  The weather has cooled finally, and it is beginning to show signs of fall.  We went apple picking yesterday and it was the most gorgeous day.  The apple pickings were slim, I guess this years apple crop has been affected by weather and hail, but I still got enough to make an apple crisp.  I love apple picking more than anything, I have a feeling that we will be exploring all of the orchards around here.

We finally sold our house.  I loved that house.  I am sad that it is longer ours, but thrilled that a nice family is going to live in it.  I am also glad that the strain of having two residences is coming to an end.  The whole process of selling our house took a year, and I will not lie, it was stressful.  It feels freeing to be done with it.

This picture was taken over the weekend at the Kansas City Zoo.  We had a great time there, and it is one of the nicer zoos that I have ever been to.  Getting a picture of all of us every month is no easy task.  Here are a few outtakes to show you what I mean.

P.S.  My keeper image was edited using RadLab.  I was one of the lucky beta testers, and have been playing with it for a few months.  It is one of the coolest products around.