Christmas Eve with Grandma and Grandpa

We spent a wonderful morning with Grandma Teri and Grandpa Stu. We got to have a yummy breakfast of pancakes, sausage and eggs. Here is a picture of Mason, Grandma, Cody, Grandpa and our new dog Sweetie.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

We Got a PUPPY!!!!!

Please meet our newest member "Sweetie" She is a purebred beagle. She is 9 weeks old and she is adorable. Mason picked her out as his first dog. He has been looking for a puppy since June. I think she will be so much fun and the boys just love. What a perfect Christmas Gift

Mason had zero Cavities!!!

Another trip to the dentist has resulted in no cavaties. I am so proud of Mason. He is now the proud owner of a $100.

Our Snow has Arrived! Yeah!

Uncle Sean is so STRONG

 

An Interview with Mason

We got to see more family and Play with Sydney

On Thanksgiving we went to see Grandma Sandy, Grandpa Mike, Great Grandma Francis, Great Grandpa Audrey, Aunt Krisha and Uncle Rich, Aunt Kayla and Uncle Ross and of course the boys cutest little cousin Sydney. She is almost 2 and just adorable. She loves Mason and Cody and spent the whole time "helping" them crash over there block towers.

Happy Thanksgiving 2009

Our family got together on Monday to celebrate Thanksgiving and Fletcher's birthday all in one. The food was delicious, the company excellent and the kids were hilarious. Linda, Heather, Todd, Mason, Cody, Fletcher, Sean, Ashlynd, Tyler and Marlin were all there to enjoy the yummy dinner. We had pumpkin pie and German chocolate cake for dessert.

Mason Creates Another Great Video

Mason wrote a Poem for school.

ABC on Me
By Mason Saulsbury

A is for Adam. My most athletic friend. We play outside a lot. I like him. He’s a softie though.

B is for Baseball. I always try to practice it. I go outside to practice with dad. I got hit in the eye by grandpa once though.

C is for Cody, my little brother. I love him. Though sometimes he’s annoying.

D is for Drums. I got some for my birthday. I love playing them. I got all kinds of them.

E is for English. I speak it. I do not say swear words. I don’t like to swear.

F is for Fletcher, my uncle. He is so much fun! I love him. (Plus he plays my games.)

G is for Grandma and Grandpa. I have a lot of them. Grandma Terry has a lot of animals. I like to pet them.

H is for Humor. I have a lot of it. I tell jokes and make comic strips. I am a cartoonist.

I is for Islands. My grandpa Stu took me to one. It was so much fun! I collected a lot of shells.

J is for July. I don’t really celebrate the “Fourth of July”…but it’s fun to look at the colors. It’s hard to sleep though.

K is for Kindergarten. I use to go to Kindergarten, but that was a while ago. My teacher was Mrs. Rich. I loved to write.

L is for Lasey. She’s our dog. She’s lazy. She likes to catch snowballs.

M is for Mason. That’s my name! I like to make games. I also make comics.

N is for Nana. She’s my grandma (Out of 5)

O is for oyster. I found one once. It was shiny. I kept it.

P is for Poster. I won a poster contest once. Or at least I was a runner upper. Mine said “Reading is a door to a magical world and much more….”

Q is for quilt. One of my grandmas has some. It had a stripy pattern on it. I can’t remember which grandma has quilts

R is for run. I like to run. But I don’t like running the track OR staying IN! I can outrun my brother.

S is for spoon. I like spoons.
PRIVATE—I jump around the house with them. Don’t tell *Blush*

T is for team. I want to be on a baseball team but I can’t. So I’m practicing. I want to be a pitcher.

U is for UFO. Don’t like UFOs. I don’t like aliens either. I think there creepy.

V is for video games. I play them a lot. I even make them. I don’t like bloody games though.

W is for woman. Half of my family is women. I don’t mind though I like the fact that my family mostly consists of boys.

X is for X-ray a picture of bones

Y is for yawn. I yawn all the time. I don’t yawn when I’m tired. When I yawn, Mom thinks I’m tired.

Z is for Zoo. I went to the zoo last summer. I like the zoo… Some stupid kid hit me though….

And that ends my ABC! Hooray!

Mason's and Cody's school Pictures 2009

Don't you just love school pictures? Cody is in the 2nd grade this year and Mason (on the right) is in the 3rd grade this year. I think they look so much alike in these photos. What would childhood be like if you didn't have the "fake smile" school pictures?

Cody Rocks some Moves

A Great Day with Friends

Our Happy Halloween

My Make up for Halloween

The Kids Make Christmas Cards

Cody and Mason got into the swing of things by helping make Christmas Cards. I think they did an awesome job. Cody created the one on the left and Mason created the one on the right. They each used stamps, markers, glue and paper cutters.

We created some Halloween Decorations

Cody and I decided to make some things for Halloween. Cody pulled out his favorite crafting book and we made candle holders (mine is the star and Cody's is the skull) and we made a large skeleton. Both turned out great.

Things are on FIRE

Todd got the first fire of the season started in the garage and I think this will all be our favorite spot. Warm cozy fire, good book.. .sounds like a great time to me.

Great Grandpa Gene grew these Awesome Pumpkins

Today Grandma Teri dropped off these awesome pumpkins that Great Grandpa Gene grew for the boys. They are huge. Mason and Cody are sure happy about it. I can't wait to see what they make out of them for Halloween. Thank you so much Grandpa

Mask Making at Our Local Library

Cody is on the left and is a monster and Mason is on the right as Charlie Brown. We went to our local Deming Library and got to do this great event for free. They told a wonderful story and had all the supplies to create your own masks.

Our eggs grew faces. What fun we are having collecting them. This is the work of Todd. Cute aren't they?

Cody has zero cavities and is now a $100 richer.

Today Cody and I went to the dentist for a check up and he had no cavities. Yeah! He has been much better with brushing his teeth since the last visit. He and his brother both had to have a bit of work done after the last check ups and so I promised them both if they did a much better job of taking care of their teeth and had no cavities I would pay them a $100.
I am so proud of Cody and he is so happy to get money to spend on a new video game. I am even prouder of Cody because he decided to share his money with his brother. Mason is trying to purchase a RPG game maker and was $20 short. He has been trying to figure out ways to come up with the money and today after school Cody said he would just give it to him so he could get the game. Moments like this are when I realize I am raising caring, compassionate, thoughtful children. Cody did not have to share but he wanted to because he knew it would make Mason so happy. It makes my heart all warm and fuzzy.

Harvest Festival of Fun

Mason and Cody got to spend the day with Grandma Teri and Grandpa Stu at the harvest festival.

"We ate caramel apple on a stick and we made zucchini race cars and we got to jump in a giant air pumpkin. We got to see machines that shoot pumpkins and the Gordinator shot a 1000 ft." as told by Cody

Mason turns 9

We had a great time celebrating Mason's 9th Birthday Party. We were going to go swimming and ended up going Bowling. The boys had a blast and did great bowling.

The chickens layed some eggs

I was so thrilled to see that they had finally layed some eggs. It really is right on time, the 20th week mark, but it was still a thrill to find one. So far we have had three eggs in two days. We are not sure yet who is laying, but I have a guess. I made them a better laying area today so we shall see if this works. One book I read said put a curtain up for their privacy, so I did that for one nest and I left the other one open. We shall see which one has the egg.

We Took a Road Trip to Riverside, WA

Yummy Chocolate Butterscotch Cookies

I decided to make some cookies for the boys when they come home from school and when I went to go grab the ingredients I didn't have everything to make regular chocolate chips cookies so I created a new recipe with what was in the cupboard. I wrote it all down in case it tasted really good and oh my, are they yummy.

I am not sure if there are going to be any left for Mason and Cody when they get off the bus

Butterscotch Chocolate Chip Cookies

2 ¼ cups all purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
½ tsp cinnamon
½ cup (1stick) margarine
½ cup creamy peanut butter
¾ cup granulated sugar
¾ cups packed brown sugar
3 small eggs or 2 Large
1 cup Toll House mini chocolate chips
1 cup Toll House butterscotch chips
½ cup Toll House Chunk Morsels

Preheat over to 375 degrees
Combine first 4 dry ingredients in a smaller bowl. Beat butter, peanut butter, sugar and brown sugar in mixer bowl until creamy. Add eggs until beaten well. Gradually add dry flour ingredients until well mixed. Stir in chocolate chips, butterscotch chips and Chunk morsels. Drop rounded tablespoons on ungreased cookie sheet. Bake around 9 to 11 until lightly golden brown. Cool on baking sheet until next round of cookies are almost done. Then make sure you pour a great big glass of milk and sit down to eat some warm yummy cookies.

First Day of School

Mason and Cody started the 2nd and 3rd Grade today. they were excited but a little concerned. I put them on the bus and then met them at school so I could walk them to class. I do believe I am more excited that school started then they are. Hopefully they will come home with lots of stories and smiles about their first day. Mason has got a male teacher, which is a first and Cody got the same teacher Mason had last year.

My newest Video of our group Motorcycle Ride to Winthrop, WA

From Blueberry pie and Ashlynd809

This is Ashlynd my granddaughter and we had her visit us last night and she loves having her picture taken. Heather and I had a lot of fun with her. Heather loves to do her hair and she says she likes to look like a girl.

We also made blueberry jam and blueberry pie. The pie was real easy and very good. The jam was more time consuming and 6 hardened up and 6 are a little runny. We processed them at the same time. I guess we will just have blueberry syrup. We really enjoyed the blackberry syrup.

Our Chickens

The Finished Chicken Coop!

We finally got the last few things done on the chicken coop and I think they are living in the lap of luxury (for chickens that is). We ended up with four hens and one rooster. Hopefully some day soon we will actually get eggs. We decided to have chickens for the purpose of farm fresh eggs. I let them out everyday for free range time and Nana takes care of the feeding and watering. Cody will be in charge of egg collecting as soon as it arrives.

The Kids Got to Go to the ZOO

Grandma Sandy and Grandpa Mike took Mason and Cody to the Woodland Park Zoo. They had so much fun. The were joined by their Aunt Krisha, Uncle Rich and Cousin Sydney. Mason's favorite part was the drums in the African Exhibit and Cody said he just loved the whole thing. He had so much fun hanging out with his little cousin.

We got to go on an great Motorcycle Ride to Wintrop, WA

Todd and I, along with 7 other people got to take a beautiful ride over HWY 20 to Winthrop, WA. It is the longest ride to date that I have done on my motorcycle. It was so much fun and what beautiful scenery. Here is all the bikes at one of the stops we had to stretch our legs. It was a total of seven bikes and 9 riders.

Blackberries..From the bush to jam, syrup and PIE!!

Todd and I got inspired to pick blackberries so we could have blackberry pie. It is one of our favorites and Mom makes a mean pie. We then decided maybe we should pick enough to make jam since we have the supplies and that is exactly what we did. After about an hour of picking with some help from the kids we ended up with enough blackberries to make 10 jars of jam, one blackberry pie and two jars of blackberry syrup. We had so much fun making everything and can't wait to have pancakes with our freshly made syrup. So far the canning is going well for us. I think next its going to be applesauce because everyone we know has apple trees.

The pie turned out delicious and mom found the recipe here at http://www.grouprecipes.com/28126/blackberry-pie.html . We had it warm with vanilla ice cream last night and today it has set and is nice and firm. Usually we end up with runny pie so it is great that it stayed together.

The Pickled Beans are DELICIOUS

We popped open a jar of the pickled beans last night and they were yummy. They were crisp and flavorful. I am so glad they turned out because we have a lot of jars of them. I think they will be fabulous as a salad with corn and peppers. It feels so good to can our own food. I know the pickled beans are just the beginning. We used the recipe I found here http://www.pickyourown.org/greenbeans_pickled.htm and the only thing we did different was use 1/2 apple cider vinegar and 1/2 white vinegar. This inspires me to try all different kinds of things and I am going to have so much fun making labels.

Family BBQ at Jim and Darlenes

Everyone got together at Jim and Darlene's to say good bye and Good Luck to Joe, Michelle and Natalie. They are moving to the east coast. We had a wonderful time seeing everyone and Jim and Darlene put out an awesome spread. They had BBQ Ribs, Salmon, Hot Dogs, Salads, Corn and yummy fruit. I let Mason and Cody have the camera so I got lots of great pictures of everyone. I love the different angles that the kids get when they take pictures. They also get much better smiles then I do. Natalie was a sweet heart and made great glitter pictures for everyone.

BEANS! I canned beans for the first time

Our wonderful friend dropped off 3 big buckets of beans, actually it was two buckets and a bag, but alot all the same. So mom and I found a great recipe for pickled beans and got all of the ingredients this morning. I am not sure if I even like pickled beans but it seem like a good idea to give it a try. We ended up with 6 large cans and 6 medium cans of beans. It was a lot of fun. The longest part was waiting for the dishwasher to finish sanitizing the jars. I was surprised at the amount of vinegar it took but thankfully we had two big jugs. We have to wait a couple of days before we can try them and I just can't wait. Next we are going to do blackberry jam. YUMMY!

I am so excited about all of this because we are working very hard at become a greener and more self sufficient family. It just feels like this is a step in the right direction.,

What an incredible Fort to have!

Here is a picture of this awesome fort my brothers built in the woods by the river. They used all kinds of trees and wood that was lying around to create this incredible structure. It is so beautiful and blends so well with its environment. They said they were very inspired by Robinhood so they might be creating more platforms on top of it. It is so sturdy and they just weaved the branches in and out of each other. I just love it.

Gardening

Gardening is fun but I can not seem to get those beautiful vegetables that other people have. My friend brings me the most beautiful vegetables. They are big and green and delicious. I want a garden like that. I keep adding things to my dirt and composting but it is only helping a little. At times I get discouraged and go to buy instead.I want to be able to feed the family cheaper but it is not working out that way. Heather bought me a caner and now I need to find some vegetables to can. I have tomatoes but not enough to can.

My chickens are doing great but no eggs yet. I keep looking for the eggs and talking to the hens, but to no avail yet. We ended up with another rooster. Out of 14 chickens I am down to 4 hens, all the rest were roosters.

Transformers Rock Cody's World

Cody loves his transformers. He is so amazing with them. He opens a box and just goes to town transforming them. I think that most of them are really hard to maneuver but he seems to instantly know how to do it. Its just amazing. He got a ton of new ones for his birthday and he just keeps playing with them. He creates whole scenes and can imagine for hours. He makes me so happy that he plays with them by himself and seems to really enjoy it.