We may not have it all together, but together we have it all.

Hey ya'all ! Yes we are still alive and kicking here at the Hoogland house. We have been busy, and have been super anxious for spring to come. Some exciting things have been happening. First in January, I was able to go to my nephew's dance competition in Lehi ! I loved it, except my kids were wild and I couldn't enjoy it as much as I wanted to. I loved watching him dance and cheering him on. Mom and dad brought him down along with M'Lynn and two of Jake's friends. I love this pic of Maddy combing my dad's hair. Sometime in January me and Ry went on a date to the circus. We had a blast! Rylan even got to ride a elephant! His face the whole time was in complete excitement. He thought it was funny when I hid my eyes when the daredevil guy was running blindfolded on top of this huge spinning metal ring. He is such a silly goose, here he is with a pretend mustache , he wanted to be like his Papa Doug! In February we had a visit from Anna. She was able to get the ...

Here are some classic videos that I took this Christmas. This one has a story behind it. Grandpa and Grandma's new house has a fancy new gas fireplace and with the help of Anna pushing the button on the thermostat, my dad convinced Rylan that he could do magic. He told Rylan that he went to magic school as a young boy and could often make fires pop up in the fireplace. He showed Rylan that to turn it on you have to twirl your arms in a circle and then point to the fireplace. Rylan really wanted to try it and what do you know HE DID IT! It was so funny, when his older cousins came over Rylan told them..."hey guys, did you know that Grandpa went to magic school?" This is how Grandpa taught him to turn it off: Scott got me a fancy new video camera that I can upload onto my computer and make movies with, it records in HD so I have to upload them through YouTube first since they are such big files. Here is a video of Maddy playing her mini piano, which she loves. She had to ...

Wow did we have an eventful Christmas or what? Beware this is a HUGE POST! It all began with me and the kids getting ready to go to my parents home, I was literally putting the last of our things in the car when I came inside and Maddy was screaming and Rylan was shouting..."mom, Madelyn is bleeding all over!" I found her and she had a gash on her forehead and the blood had trickled down her face and it looked much worse than it really was so my first inital reaction was complete horror! I think I screamed pretty loud (sorry neighbors). Rylan told me that she was running in our hallway and fell and hit her head on the heat intake vent, right on the sharp corner. I cleaned her up and wasn't sure if she needed stitches, so I called our clinic on Hill Air Force Base and talked to a nurse. I was able to stop the bleeding and she wasn't exhibiting signs of a concussion so I slapped a band-aid on it and we headed to Rexburg. When we got there she had bled through the band-a...

For the past couple months Madelyn has expressed when she needs, or is going poo poo, by pointing at her diaper and saying, "poopies." So the other day when she did this I looked in her diaper and there wasn't anything in there yet, I hurried and put her on the toliet, and she did it! For the past three days she has done it twice, but she gets pretty bored up there on that toliet seat. After dinner last night she was telling us she had "poopies" so I hurried and sat her on the toliet, but I think she honestly just had some gas...which hello she is related to Scott soo, could be true! Well Scott thought it was so funny that I was reading to her that he took a picture, thanks Scott. Hope this is a start to something great! Keep it up sweet Maddy!

Last Saturday was our ward Christmas party...what a fun night! Rylan had a blast with his church friends until he was running and somehow ran into a chair and he ear was bleeding! Ouch! It didn't look that bad then but when he woke up the next morning his ear was purple! Anyway he really loved talking to Santa and when I asked him if he thought it was the "real" Santa, he said, "No, probably not, but he was a GOOD Santa, plus he even knew my NAME! how the heck did he do that?" Rylan has written his letter to Santa and we are going to take it to Macy's whenever it stops snowing! Maddy did not have a pleasant experience, I tried to put her on santa's lap and she screamed "no, no, noooooo!" Maybe next year.

Our Thanksgiving holiday started with Rylan's Thanksgiving program. Isn't he cute! Scott was able to go help with his class and their feast. He was in charge of a game, and dishing up the plates for all of the kindergartners. Then we headed up to Grangeville to spend time with the Hooglands. This is Grammy and Papa's (although Papa won't claim her) dog Scamp. She was adopted from an old neighbor and Rylan just loves her. Rylan also loves Sprinkles and Nugget. Papa built this feeding area to put hay in and it is perfect for Rylan to get right up to the horses while they are eating, and not get kicked. When Scott and I went to Colorado we brought Rylan back a slingshot, and Grammy and Papa's house is perfect for a slingshot, there are rocks to shoot, and little critters running around to aim at...however Rylan was told that if he shot an animal he would have to eat it. He aimed at trees instead. Thanks for the FUN!

With Scott gone and the leaves piling up in our yard, I decided that Rylan needed some constructive work to do. I sent him outside with a rake and said get to work! He soon got distracted and decided that balancing the rake on his hand and using it as a guitar was more fun! Madelyn is getting bigger (slowly) and smarter (too smart) every day. She can say about 15 words, and communicating with her is getting easier. She loves shoes (what a girl) I always catch her stepping into my misplaced shoes, here Rylan was helping her. Now here is what I have been up to lately, now that these gifts have been given I can post pictures. I made these two baby girl quilts for some friends. I was really pleased with how they turned out.