Happy Birthday to Sierra!

Once we finished with Cheyenne's birthday celebration, it was time to start Sierra's. We have been celebrating Sierra turning 6 for two weeks now! She started celebrating on January 30 at Grandma Phyllis' house. We had another birthday party on January 31 at Grandma Debbie's house. Her "real" birthday is on February 2 (she's our little groundhog baby), so she had brownies at school, went out to eat Chinese food for dinner, and had another round of birthday brownies at home for dessert.

That little number 6 candle looks innocent enough but, let me tell you, it cause A LOT of trouble at Grandma Debbie's house. :)

Sierra has played with this art set EVERY DAY since she opened it. Aunt D.D. knows what this girl likes!

"Look! I got a DOLLAR!"

I think this was Sierra and Landon's first time to play "stick the tail on the donkey".
They thought it was really funny when Sierra missed her mark, not so much when it was THEIR turn. :) We had to explain to Landon that putting the tail in a silly spot was part of the fun. He didn't really buy it.

Poor Donkey!

We had Sierra's "friend" birthday party yesterday at the bowling alley. She had three little girls from school, her brother and sisters (of course), and Grandma Debbie bowling with her. It was fun!

I remembered to get a picture of Cheyenne bowling this time. Landon is supervising. He seems to think he is a professional bowler since he's been TWICE now. :)

And here's the birthday girl. It was fun to see the difference in her personality when her friends were around.

Daniel and Landon watching the action.

Dakota spent most of her time hiding and playing her DS. She came out to take her turn to bowl, but couldn't really risk being seen with a bunch of kindergarteners too much. :)

Grandma Debbie and Sierra checking out one of her birthday cards.

After all the trouble it caused, we just had to use the number 6 candle one more time!

Happy Birthday Miss Sierra! Hope you have a great time being 6!

So, we have officially passed Sierra's birthday for this year. Now we're moving on to Daniel's birthday. I'm ready for that one because he won't be able to use the "you're 32 and I'm only 31" thing anymore (yes, he IS that mean to me :)).

After that, the one I'm really not ready for this year. I can't believe that Dakota will be 12! That just sounds crazy!

I think next year's birthday season will be much different. Since we will be living much closer to our families, we won't have to have quite so many celebrations. The kids will be disappointed, I know, but I am kind of looking forward to it. :)

Happy Birthday Cheyenne (better late than never)!

I mentioned the other day that we have entered the Harmon family birthday season. So far this year, our family has already had 4 birthdays-mine, Cheyenne's, Grandma Debbie's, and Sierra's. We are having a birthday party for Sierra on Saturday and then we get a couple of week's off before we get to Daniel's birthday. Whew! I need it! I've already baked 6 pans of birthday brownies and one cake, plus 70some cookies for kids' Valentine's parties (oops, I mean "friendship" parties) today.

Have I mentioned that my kids' birthdays can last weeks? They usually take treats to school on the day of their birthday. Then, we take them out for dinner and have cake and ice cream at home. We also celebrate with our families in McAlester-usually once at each grandma's house-the weekend before or after their birthday. My kids are the king and queens of birthdays!

The past couple of years, we haven't really done birthday parties for their friends. It seems like kids just don't really go to birthday parties anymore. The last couple that we did, only two or three friends showed up. But, my sly little offspring ganged up on me this year and convinced me that they "needed" friend birthday parties since we are moving.

Cheyenne had a bowling birthday party. The kids had a blast! In fact, it was so much fun that Sierra has decided to have her party there too.


Somehow we didn't get a single picture of Cheyenne bowling. But here are some of the other kids-even a big kid. :)


Be looking for pictures from Sierra's birthday tomorrow. I've got one more batch of brownies and cookies to go!

Snow!!!! (LOTS of pictures-sorry, I just couldn't help myself)

We have had LOTS of snow this year! It has been deeper and lasted longer than I can remember ever before.

Snow around here usually doesn't amount to much and is usually gone by the next day. It's not usually good for snowball fights or building snowman-sometimes we can get some snow ice cream out of it. Last year, we got one snow that we were able to play in for a little while (not long because of the wind). The year before, the wind was blowing so hard that we couldn't go out at all and when the wind stopped, the snow melted before we could get out in it. Mostly, we get ice instead of snow.

This year, though, we have already had 2 BIG snowstorms and one that was pretty but didn't last long.

The first one was began on Christmas Eve. We had to cancel our Christmas Eve church service, dinner at Hunan's, and driving around looking at lights in our P.J.'s because of the ice and snow. We thought we were going to have to cancel our trip to visit our families in McAlester, too. But the sun came out on Christmas Day and we were able to make it-slowly. Daniel had to literally dig us out of our driveway!

Here are some of the pictures we took on the way to McAlester.

The snow from Christmas Eve lasted a long time! At first it was mostly ice, so we couldn't really play in it. It finally warmed up enough to soften it up and the kids were able to play it in for a while-wasn't too good for making snowmen though. These pictures are from January 2. I can't remember a time, ever, that snow has been on the ground that long! It was amazing!

We got another round January 28. It was forecast to be worse than the one on Christmas Eve. Daniel was gone to El Paso for the week. Since we were supposed to loose power,-leaving me with 4 kids, no heat, water, or electricity (TV or video games)-I loaded up the kids and took them to my mom's in McAlester. We ended up not losing power at our house, but better safe than sorry. Here are some of the pictures that Daniel got on the way back.

That's ICE on the trees. Very pretty, but not good news for the trees.

This is a pretty view even without the ice on the bridge. Love it!
Can you tell how hard the wind was blowing? Those icicles are crazy!

The girls had to go back to school on February 1. While they were gone, Landon and I were able to get out and build a little snowman. He had a blast!

The next day, the girls got in on the action after school. Sierra and Cheyenne built their own snowman. It was huge! They had to have Daniel come out and stack the middle and head on for them because they were so heavy.

We got another little snow this week on Monday. It didn't stay around though. It was mostly gone before the girls got out of school.

I love snow! It's so nice to sit by the window and watch the snow falling outside. I love the sound it makes when you walk on it (especially when it's just snow and no ice). But, I think I've had enough for one year. I'm ready for Spring!

gymnastics meet #2

Cheyenne and Sierra had their second gymnastics meet this past weekend. This time it was only the girls in levels 1, 2, 3, and 4 so it went much faster. It was fun to see the improvements they have made in the couple of months since the last meet. They each came home with one blue ribbon-Cheyenne for vault and Sierra for beam. Cheyenne also got two reds and one white. Sierra received one red and two whites. Here are some pictures from the day.

Sierra marching in with her group.

Sierra LOVES gymnastics! She gets so excited that she bounces up and down from the time we get there until the time we leave.
Cheyenne with her group during the opening introductions.
Sierra on the bars. She's gotten sooooo much better since the beginning of the year.
Look at that finish!!!

Here's Cheyenne on the beam.

She's still a little scared of it, but she's getting much better.

Sierra on the beam.

She got a blue ribbon on beam!

Cheyenne on the bars.

The coaches are allowed to give some support at this level.

I have videos of their floor routines and their vaults. My computer is not cooperating with me today and I am tired of trying to get them to load, so I will have to post them another time.

They have such a blast at gymnastics! I can't wait to see them at the next meet!

Update on Landon

It's been a while since I've had time to write a post (actually, it's more of an issue of having energy leftover at the end of the day). We have entered birthday season at the Harmon house and that has been keeping us pretty busy. My birthday is on January 3, then Cheyenne on January 13, my mom (grandma Debbie) on the 15th, Sierra on February 2. It's been fun, but I'm ready for a birthday break!

Landon is doing really well. He hasn't had another seizure (that we know of) other than the one on January 17. We were able to get him in to see the pediatrician on January 18. Dr. B checked him over and said that everything looked fine. She scheduled him to have an EEG on Friday, January 22 in Oklahoma City.

I won't go into all the details of the EEG, but I am sure that I NEVER want to have to do that again. It was not a fun process for any involved. Thankfully, though, the doctors were able to get the results they needed from the test so I guess it was worth it.

As of right now, they can't find anything that would have caused Landon to have a seizure. Apparently, it's common for someone to have one or two seizures in their lifetime and never know why. Dr. B said that he would have to have several (at least more than 2) more before they would consider treating him with any type of medication. Her instructions to us were to watch him like a hawk in the tub and to just let him be a little boy. So, that is what we are doing. I still get a little concerned when I don't hear him for a few minutes, but that really has more to do with me wondering what he's getting into than worry that something's wrong.

We are so thankful to know none of the things they were looking for on the EEG were found (brain tumor, brain bleeds, abnormal activity in the brain). Those were some scary thoughts to live with for the few days we had to wait. I know so many other moms and dads don't get the kind of good news we did.

I am so thankful that I am getting to spend my days with my boy enjoying things like this

(the first snowman that he built "by himself").
We're having a great time and can't wait until the girls can join us when school's out!

Don't know what he was thinking here, but I'm pretty sure it's trouble!