The Coombs Family

This year all my siblings came over for our Christmas party. We usually don't all get under one roof, so when we do, it's time to snap some pictures. It's so much fun to see my kids getting to know my brother Ryan and their new nephew Porter. Here is Uncle Ryan teaching my kids how to destroy our yard and play in the street. Good example! But hey, that's what uncles are for. Here we are at meal time.   Here's what happens when the grown-ups decide to play dress up by the tree.  Here's Roger's family. Angela and Porter sure do make him look good. This is a picture of a quilt that my mom had made for Rhoda. It's from my grandpa Dave's old jeans and handkerchiefs. We can totally recognize some of his jeans and we love it. I may have to borrow that.  And here's the whole family. Some of us are growing up and some of us are growing old.

Christmas was out of control this year. We are usually pretty low key, but that's hard to do with 7 kids in the house. My sisters family is staying with us (more about that later), and so Christmas morning was full of lots of laughter and screaming. We've never really done the whole Santa thing either. We are big believers in less is more for gifts for our kids. We like to spoil other peoples kids instead. Anyway, so Santa apparently buys things that are unreasonable and obnoxious. That's how the kids know it was really Santa, because what parent would honestly buy things that are loud, eat up batteries, and take up lots of space…. So yes, super adorable to see how happy they are. I get it. But then they only got one gift from us. Unless you count their new pajamas. But then they get stuff from their grandparents, great grandparents, aunts and uncles, and before you know it, there are 9 million gifts under the tree and we have enough recycling to fill the back o...

We got snow earlier than usual this year and we were so excited. We didn't manage to get out of school or work this year, but at least we got a nice weekend of freezing cold snow free entertainment. Last year Shelby wanted to play in the snow for hours until she was frozen solid. This year it was Calvin. He would not come inside and wanted people to throw snow right at him.   The snow was very dry and it was impossible to make a snowman. Calvin really wanted one, so Cale b made him a baby one that he proceeded to jump over 50X. You have to look pretty close to see the little guy. I don't think my kids know how big snowmen are usually supposed to be.   And of course, our annual gingerbread making night. We had over some of our good friends and there was a lot of candy, houses, sugar rushes, and building going on. It's so fun to see what everyone makes and how creative they get. Now I have to show off my friends kids creations. Each of their houses ...

Caleb and I are getting some house guests for almost two months and we needed to make some room. Our house is plenty big, but we need to use every square inch to fit my sisters family of 7. They sold their house and bought a fixer-upper (major job here people), and we are going to have them stay with us as they get a rental situation figured out until their new-old house is ready. We have a room downstairs with no closet or window, so it counts as an office and we use it for a playroom. This is now my sister and her husbands room, so Caleb built them a nice walk-in closet. There used to be a door that opened to storage under the house. The storage was just black plastic and I hated it. I stored all my Christmas decorations and kids clothes down here and it was so disorganized and nasty. We started with building the closet. Then went on to build storage for under the house. What used to be a pile of mess, is now an organized system that I love!! This is the room and the door that ...

This year Shelby wanted to be a mermaid and Calvin wanted to be a dozer. Shelby got her costume for her birthday present from her Granny, so that was easy. But how was Calvin going to be a dozer? Caleb found some cute pictures online and copied the idea and made him a costume. It was awesome because Calvin got to see it take shape, get painted, and finally wear it. Now he just plays with it. We went to EZ Orchards with Grandma Wendy. We had such beautiful weather this year in October. It was a perfect day to go. Calvin stole this tractor and rode it all over the place. Here he is making a run for it.  And of course our carvings for the year. Let's just say, Caleb does all the carving every year. I help do the guts, and the clean up, but I'm not the creative one. I use the stencils in the books.