I seem to remember (and document) the big events in our lives - birthdays, holidays, job changes... But what I want to remember is the little things - the way David and I hold hands, the way Karsten looks with his hands behind his head without a care in the world, Skyla's giggle, and Sierra's ability to block the world when she's reading. So here's to what I want to remember the most... the little moments of our lives that equal a much bigger picture.
She loves it! Especially sledding where she thinks it's a personal invitation to race! We, however, are in constant fear that she's going to be trampled by a moose (she's been charg
ed by only one so far...), eaten by a bear (there's a black bear in the neighborhood), or lured away by all the amazing smells in the trees and forests and get lost.
But so far she's fine. And she really loves her new companion. I mean REALLY loves. Bordering on obsession.
Here's our special family vegetarian (and sugar-free) dinner the night before Thanksgiving. A possible new tradition? We actually eat vegetarian quite a bit, but it was a nice focus before gorging on meat the next day. :) Karsten has become an anti-vegetarian. Today when he saw the turkey and ham he started chanting "Meat! Meat! Meat!" This accompanied with him grabbing big packs of steaks at the grocery store begging for me to buy them tells me we're not meeting some of his carnivore needs. 
of 5 and for my growing up family of 5 and for my big family of 29 (soon to be 32!) and that includes great grandma.
Our House
Girls' room
The funny thing is I started this post over a month ago! I guess we weren't quite settled. And notice no pictures of the kitchen. I'm a little bitter about the old school (and not in a good way) kitchen. Especially remembering our toil and labor remodeling our kitchen in CA. But this is just a rental which has turned out to be a wonderful thing. We have a problem, we call someone else and it's fixed immediately. I may get used to this!
dentist I had a cavity. Well, I could hide from the dentist no more as there are eight dentists and one endodentist in our new ward. So we went. And while my kids had ZERO cavities, I had to have a root canal. The terror! So I was sent to the endodentist from my ward. I asked them to just put me out but they wouldn't. And the special gas cost $100! So it was just me in my proper frame of mind and my ipod to deal with this awful situation. Well, my mouth was numb and dentist came in ready to roll so I hurried and turned on my music. It wasn't loud enough so I quickly tried to turn it up, however when I touched it, it changed my playlist. And it was changed to James Taylor who I do not even like. The drilling had started so I couldn't look at my ipod to change it back. Trying to be positive I thought maybe this would be good since I don't know his songs and I can really focus on listening to the words to take my mind off the horrible drilling that was presently happening. So I focused on those songs with everything I had. And my breathing as I was terrified. About 1/2 hour into this drilling, I realized that I wasn't listening to James Taylor's songs, I was listening to one song. Over and over. And it had taken me a half hour to figure that out. Fire and Rain. Over and over. For an hour. Fire and Rain. 
Maybe you didn't notice my car now that it has ALASKA plates!
ress like but I think she just wanted to wear glasses, because apparantly all old-fashioned teachers wore glasses. Luckily I found this beautiful costume on sale at Target and thus she happily becamse a 1774 Colonial girl - just like her American Girl doll. She looked so beautiful!
time than Halloween, right? I can NEVER seem to get good pictures at Halloween. Here are some of the key pictures I missed:
Checking out the stash as soon as we got home - so much joy at their hard earned candy!
