Christmas Memories.....

Last Christmas I didn't take a single picture, and this year well....I didn't do much better. I got a few pictures, but nothing to write home about. Things just get busy and I forget to pull out the old camera. This doesn't mean it wasn't special or that we didn't create memories...we certainly did! I will mention a few of my personal highlights:

*My Dad graciously took Matt, my Sister, my brother-in-law and I out for a very fancy (children free) dinner the night we arrived in Portland. We have made it a yearly tradition to go out to the same restaurant he used to take my Mom for their anniversary. We had a great time laughing and sharing! This year my Sister and I even got our hair done for the occasion (what a treat)!!! Thanks Dad!

*On Christmas morning we all gathered at my Dad's house and had a yummy breakfast together, followed by opening gifts. Ten kids plus five adults made it cozy, warm, and memorable! My kids love and look up to their Opa, Auntie & Uncle, and special cousins. We are truly blessed and thank Jesus for allowing us to all be together this Christmas.

*My Sister and I spent quality time together chatting at Starbucks, then shopping the day after Christmas (in our new matching slipper shoes...I might add). This is one of our favorite things to do together!

There is more to share, but I will stop and present a few pictures...

Asha and her special cousin Christmas morning (in their new matching dresses from Opa).

Everyone around Opa's Christmas tree eagerly awaiting to open presents.

Aaahhh....the men got matching sweaters (from me). Too cute, guys!

The girls and I stayed a few extra days to celebrate my Mom's birthday (she would have been 69 on December 28th). We went up to her grave site and had time to remember her, pray, and share tears. We then took the train home. We had a blast playing cards most of the way (our favorites - Uno and War).

Now to the New Year!

Happy 4th Birthday Jeffrey!

Yesterday my baby turned 4 years old. I just can't believe it! Wasn't it just yesterday I was carrying him around in a little front carrier all day or feeding him cheerios in his high chair? Gulp. I wish I could stop time, so that I could enjoy his every little growth a little bit more. Being that he is our last child...it's a bit hard to watch him grow up so quickly.

Jeffrey is our fun and easy - going boy. He loves to play with his cars, build with his blocks or Lego's, and now strum on his new guitar. He is content to sit and snuggle on our lap or tag along with Luke and his adventures. We are so thankful to God for his life!!!

For his birthday we took him out for dinner at a Mexican restaurant. He loves beans!! =) Then we came home and had chocolate cake. We loved celebrating him and making it "his" day!

All the kids were very "available" to help Jeffrey open his gifts.

Jeffrey playing his new guitar. He is a natural. We got him this because he loves music and played on Matt's guitar a lot (until he broke most of the strings).

Asha loving on her little brother.

Jeffrey got some ice cream and sombrero at the Mexican restaurant to celebrate his birthday.

Happy Birthday our sweet boy!!! We love you!

We love our city!!!

One of our favorite things to do as a family is to adventure downtown...especially around Christmas time. In fact, every year we have gone downtown a few weeks before Christmas to go on the monorail and Christmas carousel. One of my personal highlights this year was seeing all the musically talented people out on the street corners. In one place there was a group of Dickens Carolers and then on the other side was a group drummers. It was fun to stop and listen to each of them. Here are some pictures for all to enjoy!

Asha on her blue stallion!

Asha, Lana and Luke. Jeffrey didn't want to go on the carousel this year. =(

The kids on the monorail looking up at the Space Needle.

This picture cracks me up! We took the bus downtown so we wouldn't have to deal with parking. Here the kids are on the bus pretending to talk on their "fake" cell phones. Do they fit into the city, or what??

Me and my sweet boy (who is almost 4!!! Guess what my next blog post will be??) on the bus home.

Buzz Day

All three of the gentlemen in our family got a buzz yesterday. For Jeffrey it was the biggest change, as we hadn't cut his hair for almost two years. It had gotten very long! It was sad to see the cute curls fall to the floor, but it is so much easier to maintain. I thought it would be fun to post a few pictures (though I don't have any of Matt).

Jeffrey before.....

Jeffrey and Luke after the buzz....

Muscle Man!!! Man, I wish I was that defined!

Oh....one more photo of sweet Lana with her rosy cheeks. No, she didn't get a buzz. =)

More fun with the family.....

The fun continued after Thanksgiving! My Sister and her family stayed with us for two nights. On Black Friday my Sister, her daughter Marissa, and I hit the sales at 4:30am. It is a tradition of ours no matter how tired we are. This year my sister got about 45 minutes of sleep and I about 2 hours. We are crazy, but it is a fun bonding experience. Coffee is always a MUST!

Also, my Dad, Sister and I took eight of our kids to the Space Needle. We found a coupon for all the kids to go up to the top for FREE (BTW -if you are interested I have several more of these coupons). It was so fun!!! Here are some pictures from our time at the top!

We had perfect weather...a few clouds but mostly clear! Beautiful!

At the top they had a free kids' cookie decorating table. Even Santa was up there in a space ship.
Good job Tyler!

Luke checking things out!

Opa with Asha & Lana.

Seattle is the most beautiful city!


Sweet Marissa!

Cousin fun!

Thanksgiving 2009

We have many things to be thankful for this year! For one, after many sicknesses for my sister's family and ours we were able to all be together for Thanksgiving (and my Dad too). My highlight was going around the table and listening to what each person was thankful for. I'm so thankful for our family! The kids are so fun to watch as they interact and play together (all ten of them)! My Sister has teenagers now...and that makes it even more entertaining and exciting! Really! Only one thing would have made it better, and that would have been to have my Mom back with us. We always miss her, especially on holidays when we are all together and her lack of presence is so obvious.

I posted some pictures of our Thanksgiving dinner.

Marissa, Kristol, Opa, and Asha.

Ernst, Luke, Matt, Trevor, and Malaya.

Asha, Annalise, Lana, Aubrey, Tyler, and Ernst.

The fun craft we did with the kids to make the name cards for the table. So fun!

Happy Thanksgiving All!!

Our Two Boys.....

These are our two boys. So different, yet both full of silliness and sweetness. True pals...most days. For example, this morning Luke woke up before Jeffrey, and went on and on about how bored he was. Asking when oh when was Jeffrey going to wake up. As soon as he did the boredom blues quickly went away. I love how Luke calls Jeffrey "bud". "Hey bud, come with me", we hear Luke say often. Jeffrey quickly follows after his big brother without question! Though, if Luke does something Jeffrey doesn't like the whole world quickly hears about it. Quiet in our house? Nope...very seldom! I'm thankful for our boys! What precious gifts!

(Check out Luke's Mohawk. He had been asking for this for a long time. It isn't a"full" Mohawk...but he was satisfied.)

Buds!

Cats & Halloween

I have been itching to get a pet the last few months! Halloween day we decided to head to the Seattle Humane Society to look into adopting a cat. My first choice would be to get a dog, but I'm not sure we are ready for all that entails. So...after spending close to three hours at the humane society we all fell in love with a sweet little cat named Rose. She was two years old, and seemed very friendly and loving. She eagerly came up to almost every person that came into the little room that she was kept, and let all of us hold her without any fuss. We all felt pretty good about adopting Rose, but the only thing holding us back was some possible allergies. Luke and I were both getting stuffy noses, but we didn't think it was too bad. Until, Matt was getting ready to sign the papers to adopt Rose and I took the boys to the car, it was then I noticed Luke rubbing his eye. As I took a closer look one of his eyes was swelling up, and almost swollen shut. Yikes! I quickly had a conference call with Matt, and we decided we better not go through with the adoption. Looks like having a cat will be out of the question. More waiting...maybe a doggy down the road. We pray Rose will find another kind family to care for her!

So, after that crazy adventure the kids got into their Halloween costumes. We enjoyed visiting some of our neighbors and getting lots of candy (which I'm still not sure what I will do with yet). Below are some pictures of what the kids dressed as.

Lana was a Spanish Princess. We found this authentic Mexican dress at Value Village. Luke was "Muscle Man" (as he called himself). You can really see Luke's eye in this picture. It took all day for the swelling to go down from the cats!

Didn't get a great picture of Jeffrey this year, but here is our lion detective (his new favorite hat).

Luke again as "Muscle Man"!

Asha was a Jazz Dancer. She took Jazz lessons last year, so this was the costume from her performance. Sparkle girl!

I love the Fall.....

I really do love this time of the year! The leaves are so beautiful in our area! I love to just drive around and look at the different trees. My kids probably get sick of me saying, "WOW, kids look at that tree!" I'd like to say I get this from my Mom (she had a great appreciation for Fall).

This Fall one of our favorite things to do after we are done with school each day is to go to our local skate board park. The kids get a little exercise and I get some fresh air! We literally go almost everyday (except maybe if it is too rainy). Last week I finally took some pictures of the fun we have.

Jeffrey on his scooter. He gets right in there with the "big" boys!

Luke is fast...with jumps and fancy twists with his scooter. I wish I had his energy!

Lana and Asha enjoy roller skating. They are very cute to watch!

Here is the street right near the park. One of my favorite views!

New School Year

The school year is up and running! We had a bit of a bumpy start - we all got the stomach flu which circled through every member of our family. Not fun! Being sick sure makes you appreciate the healthy days!

We are beginning our 2nd year of homeschooling. Wow! Sure goes fast! Luke and Lana have been enjoying their math a lot this year. It has been fun to see them get excited about it, and even ask to do it on "non" school times. Asha has been really into sewing this year. Unfortunately, she has a mother who can hardly sew a button, so she has had to mostly self learn. She is excited though because she is taking a Home Economics class at our co-op where they will do some sewing. Jeffrey continues to love cars, cars and cars! Did I mention he loves cars? He has a box of cars that he carts around the house - though most of the time they are kept safely in his bed.

This year I am doing something new, which has been a bit of a stretch for me. I decided to teach a preschool class with Jeffrey and other 3 year old kids at the co-op we are involved in. Today was our second class, and I have to say I really love this age (for the most part)! Today we made alligator puppets to help them learn the letter "A". Jeffrey isn't too excited about "preschool", but at least he has a cool teacher. Ha ha!!

Below are a few pictures I took recently that I wanted to share because they make me smile and giggle whenever I look at them.

One afternoon Matt took care of Jeffrey while I took the three other kids to one of their co-ops. When we got home we found this in Jeffrey bed. They were out! Nose to nose! Jeffrey loves his Daddy!!

"Ho Ho Ho...Merry Christmas!" Bubble baths are a special treat at our house, and full of laughter!

Potty Training.....Again!

We are trying to potty train Jeffrey this week. It has mostly been unsuccessful, but we slowly keep trying. Even as I type this he is outside playing without a care in the world (in a very wet pair of pants). "It's okay Mom....we'll change it later." Jeffrey says. Still we keep plugging on...hoping and praying that soon we will see an end to diapers here at the Hudson home!! Below are a few cute pictures that I know he'll love when he is 13. Hee Hee!

It can't be that stinky...nothing is in there yet!

"Elmo has to go potty train." Jeffrey

Mt. Baker Trip

Some friends of ours offered us the use of their cabin near Mt. Baker for a few days, and we just couldn't turn them down! What a great break for us as the reality of school starting is right around the corner! We enjoyed swimming, hiking, and lots of rock throwing (Luke learned to skip rocks and that was all he wanted to do). The day we did some hiking near Mt. Baker it was an amazingly gorgeous day! Below are some pictures of our hike! The pictures don't begin to capture how beautiful it was up there!

One of the many crystal clear lakes that the boys learned to skip rocks on. We spent most of the hike doing this!


Asha and Lana having some "sister time" and enjoying the view.

Mt. Baker in the back ground. We tried really hard to get a good family picture, but Jeffrey just wasn't in the mood. Too many things to explore and look at, I guess. =)


Luke on top of the world!