Thanksgivings Past

When I was a novice Scrapbooker, I started a scrapbook for each Holiday. The idea behind it was that we would pull it out during each of the Holiday festivities and remember all the years past. Such a cute idea! Go me! I even scrapbooked every Holiday from our younger years to our first Holidays together- all the way to 2004.
This past week, I have been looking through my old Thanksgiving scrapbook. I realized that the transition period between these amazing scrapbooks I started and when I commenced blogging got jipped. SLACKER!
I decided that I needed to remedy that. I pulled out piles of pictures from each of the missing years. But then what???? Unpack scrapbooking supplies- ie. scissors, paper, stickers, glue? Oh heavens NO! Way too much work! LOL So I scanned in pictures and went to work in my scrapbooking program. I finished up 2005 to 2008. Then discovered I would be way sad if I just ended the Holiday Scrapbooks there. So, I pulled things off my blog and got all caught up (using my journaling from my blog as well)!!! I called around and found a copy place that would print them for me for a really good deal. And magically my Thanksgiving Scrapbook is complete! I'm so excited!!!!
To get you all caught up from 2005 to 2013, here are my Thanksgivings past! Enjoy! ;) [You can click on them to see them larger]

 2005:

2006:

2007:

2008:

2009:

2010:

2011:

2012:

2013:

Happy Thanksgiving! Love the memories!

Snow Day

The kids are out for the Thanksgiving break. Today it snowed ALOT! It was a perfect SNOW DAY! Justice made a Snow Chair (recliner style). LOL The girls helped Liberty for a bit to make a pretty cool Snowman!

P.S. It warmed up Thanksgiving Day (the next day). By Friday- the snow was completely gone. Crazy! But then it snowed again Saturday night. Silly, Montana!

Thrilling Third Grade Thanksgiving Play

Victoria's teacher, Mrs. Melanie Sharbano is amazing! She is so positive, loving and super fun! Every year, she does scrapbooks with the kids, sings them fun songs, teaches them positive sayings and puts on an amazing Thanksgiving Play. It's put on by only her class for the year. All the kids get parts, costumes and practice like crazy. They put it on for parents, family and several other classes.

They did an amazing job!!! Victoria first wanted to be Squanto because it was a big part. But she ended up doing lots of little things that were way impressive. My kids always blow me away with how hiddenly talented they are. She was amazing! We are way proud of her.
One of the moms played the harp as prelude music while everyone filed in. It was beautiful!

Mrs. Sharbano narrated the play sharing lots of fun facts about the first Thanksgiving story. They made it light-hearted by making a few jokes, throwing fake snow at each other, spraying each other with water and just being silly. There was some superb acting skills here, people!

They also sang lots of songs as they told the story. They used a few VeggieTale songs and some impressive patriotic songs. Lost of kids sang some solos and seriously sounded great!

Victoria did a fabulous job. She threw a bucket of glitter at the audience (it was supposed to be water). LOL She was a pilgrim that got dragged away by the Indians. She sang a solo for a verse in the song, America the Beautiful. It was so sweet. AND she recited the preamble to the Constitution (She had memorized the whole thing BY HEART) Wow! Who is this kid?! Great job, Sis. You were amazing!

We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

Glory's Turkey Feast

The 1st grade & Kindergarten classes had a Turkey Feast today. They spent the last couple days making bread, decorations, placemats, oreo turkeys, etc. Today, they put it all together to enjoy.

Happy Thanksgiving!

1st Official MT Pie Night

Technically, we had a pie night last year with the Lay Family. They invited us to enjoy some pie with them after all the Thanksgiving festivities. But this year was our 1st Official party throwing of our famous Seamons Pie Night here in Montana!! We had a fabulous time! Thanks to the Lays, the Coils, the Izatts, the Schoenfelds, and the Stovalls for joining us in our fun tradition. We are grateful for you in our lives!

Driver in Training

In Montana, the age for getting your drivers permit is 14. Believe it or not, (cuz I can't!!) within 4 1/2 months, we will have a 14 year old under our roof. So Brett did a little driving lesson this afternoon. Holy Moly! Heaven help us if this girl gets that much freedom! ;)

Beauty of this Yard

We are seriously in love with where we live! We are constantly amazed at the beauty that surrounds us. We love our house, the chance to have lots of people over, room to play, the mountain view, the sunrises and the sunsets and the wildlife. So gorgeous!!!

Our buck friend in the back yard:

Double Rainbows (We see them a lot in our front yard):

Fog Mountain off my back porch:

Snowy Mountain to the left of our backyard:

Sunrise shining on other clouds with deer in the left hand corner:

Sun peeking over the mountain:

Gorgeous colors from my front porch:

A Snowy Day (in December):

Happy Monday!

Back from our vacation, unpacked and cleaned up, kids all in school- this should be a day of relaxing and blogging BUT instead...
Two phone calls from the school nurse for 2 different kids for 2 different things. Including a day full of dealing with this....

Oh man! Happy Monday!

Scones, at Last!!!

We have tried several times to get together with the Genger and Weaver Families.
We met the Gengers through football this past season. {Noah, Jenny, Jake, Clara, Cici and James} Noah was one of Justice's coaches and their son, Jake was the quarterback. I also became friends with Jenny through Crossroads (my gym). We have become quite the Zumba buddies! My three younger kids got to participate in the Wilderness Escape hosted by their church group back in October. The Genger girls do ballet with the Fife family. [small world] The two older Genger kids go to school at Montana City with our kids as well. [just not in same classes] I also had talked to Jenny about the Mama Rave and she got a huge group of friends to come. They are this amazing family!!! We just adore all of them. We've talked several times about getting together but it hasn't ever worked until now.
The Weavers [Jonathan, Emily, Makenna, Clara, Tyler and Lyric} are our neighbors across the street. We have met them a couple of times by taking treats over. They were actualy the very first people to bring us a treat and welcome us to the neighborhood.  They weren't able to come to our Block Party we had back in September. So we have been meaning to have them over forever. Such a beautiful family!
It also turns out that Jenny & Emily know each other.
We are so excited it finally worked out to get us all together. We had a fabulous time! I'm so happy to keep meeting such amazing people here in Helena!

Fairmont Vacation

We spent a week at our Fairmont Time share. I finally posted details. See our fun- a few posts back....

Fairmont Vacation: Polar Plunge

The temps dropped so badly this week but it didn't stop us from completely enjoying our Hot Spring Swim Fun! We actually swam in -4 degree weather! We are CRAZY!!! The girls and I also enjoyed the steam room each day before we got dressed.

Brett and the kids even rolled in the snow before hoping back in the pool. Silly family!

One night, we took turns trying to get the biggest icicles in each others hair. Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

One of our favorite parts is the slide. During the winter season- it's only open in the evening but we had a blast. Because it was soooo cold- the steam made it nearly impossible to see anything once you made it up a couple flights of stairs. It was hilarious!

They actually cleaned the indoor pool at the beginning of the week (closed, drained and painted it) so we had to use the outdoor pool. However by the end of the week, it was back open. We had fun jumping, sitting in the hot tub, and of course, eating Tropical Sno! Our favorite!

Fun Family memories @ Fairmont!

Fairmont Vacation: Condo Fun

Soon  after we married, we got roped into one of those Timeshare presentations and ended up buying one. We paid way more than we should have but with joining the exchange program, we have definitely done some fun things and shared it with others. So not a total loss. However, after we moved here, we used our exchange to visit Fairmont Hot Springs. It's only a little over an hour from our home. After one visit, we were hooked. We even bought a week from them so we can go ever year. We hope to sell our other one and just enjoy time here instead.
We really like to visit when it's cold and possibly snowy. That way we take full advantage of the HOT Springs part of it. Our family loves it there!
Check out this shot of the resort one morning we were there. That's steam coming from the pool.

We bought a week with a two room condo. We enjoyed hanging out together- playing games, watching movies, making yummy food, popping popcorn, sipping hot cocoa, climbing trees and being together. We also LOVED swimming! But that's another post. ;)

The day we left- it snowed ALOT!!! We took advantage and played in it. Snow much fun!

Our whole family LOVES pretzels so we treated ourselves to some before we left. Poolside as well. Luv it!