My baby's not a baby anymore!

Sloan Christine Jackowich,

My Sloanie Bologna

Oh how you've grown!

soon you will be leaving me, your childhood and your home

Be there for you, yes, I will

Until the very end

And even after that

I'll always be your mommy, your friend!

I love you SO BIG!

Love,

   your mom

The girls' new green room!

We finished their room just before Sloan's 16th Birthday on December 7th, we're so happy to be almost done with this, only have a couple finishing touches left. The girls absolutely love it! Good work babe, you did a great job! :)

The green looks a little obnoxious in the pictures but it really does look great

They especially love the big mirror (in the pic, you can see lines or streaks but it's just the flash) to get ready in front of and they can actually see their clothes too. Only full length mirror in the house. They all sit in front of it and do makeovers too, very cute! I invited myself down there the other night to a slumber party, we all watched 50 first dates and I slept with Sloan in her new bed, they tried to kick me out but I wouldn't go...they loved it! (so did I)

We love because He first loved us. John 4:19

We were blessed with a magical Christmas this year, an amazing family, clean and cozy home decorated with ornaments and lights, incredible food, health, Christmas joy, cheer and love! Glory be to God and happy happy Birthday to our King and Savior, Jesus Christ! Woo Woo!

Christmas eve

Christmas eve

Christmas eve

Mom & Dad Sledge on Christmas eve, sure is a nice coat Mom! I think Dad was singing in this pic. :)

Linni adding her special touch to the mini pies on Christmas afternoon

Matt & Turk, enjoying themselves during Pito and Gammy's naptime

Pito ponging it up on Christmas eve

Sloan & O are growning up, they are so beautiful and all around good girls! As you can see, after presents Linni was nowhere to be found. She was downstairs having fun with her the new Wii game, Sing It. (which she'll have mastered in a week if she hasn't already)

Sloan leaving with her dad and O on Christmas, this is HER car that John & Kim got her for her 16th Birthday. She drove away on Christmas and it hit me that in a month she'll drive away by herself. Wow, I seriously can't believe how fast time flies! I love our kids so much, it's bitter-sweet seeing them grow up.

My husband's masterpiece picture, just adding the finishing touches to the table

Our mini pie display

We had a Merry Christmas with Papa too!

Jr out cold on Christmas night

Pito's idea to rock his Christmas tie with cozy pants. :)

Pito with his 2nd best buddy, Barkley

We had a beautiful Christmas, it was the first year we've had Christmas at our house. Turk, Jackie and Matt joined us on Christmas Eve afternoon and we had dinner before we went to church. We started what I hope to be a tradition of having Mexican food on Christmas eve, it was so delicious! Marcus made tortilla soup and Matt made bomb chicken enchilada's. Church was great and was so great to be there as a family! It was a perfect night, brought the ping pong table up into the dining room, which sounded like a good idea but I think we'll leave that out next year. It was fun though! The kids all played and Matt and Marcus had a pong dual too. I think Matt won in OT. :)

Marcus and I tried our mini pie recipe late that night and I had so much fun with him and the mini pies turned out so cute and yummy too. We saved the rest to have Linni help with. The kids and adults slept in, woke up at 8:15, Marcus' parents & brother came a few minutes later so it was perfect timing. We also put the beef brisket in the crock pot on low on Christmas eve so it was already done and smelling delicious Christmas morning. We opened presents and gammy and Pito took a nap in Sloan's new bed and everyone relaxed and watched sports, home alone and a little bit of the Christmas story, we did Birthday toasts for Jesus, which was so cute seeing Pito do, he sang Happy Birthday to Jesus too and we celebrated with a Christmas feast. Marcus made his first prime rib and it was mouth watering! Everything was beautiful and the dinner was just delicious! The girls couldn't be there to enjoy it but we'll have leftovers tonight and I think they'll be pleased, plenty of gammy's mac n cheese left too. I thought about hiding it so they wouldn't eat it all but my pants are already tighter today so I left it to be devoured by the wolves.

Fun was had by all!

Committed: This Love

Who could ask for anything more!

So many things to be thankful for...thank you to our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ for all of the blessings that He pours out each and every day!                                                           

Picture number two and he's already done

Everyone's happy, let the festivities begin

Smile pretty Grandma (looking great as usual, I can't believe

she's almost 77, she definitely doesn't look or act it)

Everyone working on the last minute finishing touches

Can you say BRRRRR!

It's been between 13 and 30 degrees the last few days in Olympia, that is cold for here...or anywhere I guess! This snow has kinda been a tease to the kids except for the fact that they didn't have school today because of it. Linni and Pito got all dressed up to go outside earlier and then realized, it was so cold...they couldn't last longer than 10 minutes without their hands going numb and the snow wasn't sticking because it was too cold. They even had frosty's hat, carrot, black checkers and red licorice ready and then couldn't roll the snow into a ball. Too funny! I have to admit, I love it too...so many memories of being little and playing in the snow, riding snowmobiles and the whole nine yards!

Sloan and O weren't interested in playing outside on Sunday and then went to their dad's so I'm sure they are misisng playing with their little brother and Linni now. :)

We are Family!

We had a great time in Wenatchee over the weekend, we got there on Thursday night and Jaime brought the twins and Sarena over to our hotel room and she stayed and visted for a while and then took the twins home to bed and left Sarena with us, we stayed up late and played a game called "headbands" that Rena got for her Birthday a couple weeks before. Soren flew in from MN, where he'd been training for his new job, he didn't get in to Wenatchee until midnight and went straight to Jaime's parent's house and met us the next morning for breakfast. On Friday after breakfast, we switched hotels to the new Marriott in Wenatchee, where we had a very swanky room and it was a super cool place! Jaime made reservations there for Friday so we could just hang out with the kids and take them swimming in their pool (since our other hotel didn't have an indoor pool) The twins even enjoyed swimming, Hudson and Moya are natural swimmers...they love the water. And of course, Sarena & Linni would've stayed in the water all day if we would've let them. We missed Sloan and Olivia while we were there but understood that Sloan couldn't miss school on Friday because she had tests and homework to make-up for being sick the Friday before and Olivia had a basketball tournament that she didn't want to miss. Soren made dinner on the bbq at the hotel, the steaks were delicious. We had the whole area, inside and out to ourselves so it was really nice! Soren & Jaime let us know a few weeks ago that they wanted to give us their 2000 Ford Focus so we transferred the title on Friday, we're sooooo appreciative! Soren will have a company truck in MN and they have their Expedition so they decided to give us their car, which was so generous of them...we still can't believe it!! Jaime cleaned it spotless too, I love her so much...she's the best sister in law and friend ever!! Soren took Marcus and I to a sports bar on Saturday night and we all sat at the same table and played some poker, he did really good and won money...plus he paid our bar/food bill. Marcus and I each lost our $40 that we started with but we sat there for several hours and it was a lot of fun. We had such a great time with everyone there, thanks guys...we will miss you so much!!

Can you tell, they're happy to be there? :)

MJ was hilarious with this game, Marcus was a chicken once and he kept making chicken sounds to help his dad figure out what he was supposed to be.

Moya Marie, not the clearest picture but still adorable

Hudson and Wyatt, 8 months old

Water babies

Jaime, Hudson and MJ

MJ and I on the patio area where Soren and Marcus cooked the steaks

The kids waiting patiently for their dinner

Soren doing his business, preparing the steaks

Linni with Sarena, Linni isn't sure if it's too cold or not

MJ with Huddy