Yes, I realize that most of you were under the impression that our entire family entered the witness protection program a year and a half ago.  And yes, I realize that nobody reads this blog, but, here we are, nevertheless, giving the blogosphere another attempt.  And while we were not forced to change our identities, we did have an eventful year and for those of you interested, here is a very abbreviated update . . . the rest of you have our permission to give us a 10 second scan and get back to Christmas with your families.

Shortly after our last post the kids and I moved to Idaho just in time for the school year to start while Brent stayed behind in Salt Lake to finish his last semester of real classes at the U. This involved ALOT of driving back and forth for Brent and we were really glad when the semester was over.  After that Brent joined us in Idaho to finish up his thesis project working for the City of Idaho Falls doing some analysis in preparation for some massive changes to downtown.  All this time we were living with Ashley's parents and applying for HUNDREDS of jobs and wondering where we were going to end up when Brent graduated.

In May Brent graduated from the U with a Masters in City and Metropolitan Planning.  He did great and we are really proud of him!

The other big event of the spring was the addition of a new family member - nope not a new baby for us - just Shepherd (Shep) the golden retriever puppy who BTW potty-trained faster than any of our human children.
And clocking in at a solid 90 lbs now he looks like this most of the time.

You wouldn't know that he isn't even a year yet since he has the energy level of most geriatric dogs of 14 or 15, but he is great with the kids and lets them climb/lay all over  him and his favorite thing is to drop them off at school where he gets lots of loves from all the kids.

The summer included a trip to Minnesota to visit family and several trips to Yellowstone, since we were so close, and a trip to the state fair.

Lots and Lots of Buffalo

Siri loves hot pots

kids with their cousins in minnesota

yellowstone

kaise caught a big one

stopping for lunch on the gallatin river

the lake Brent's parents live on

Kaise and Siri at the fair with their faces painted

at the fair with the biggest cow on earth  - maybe

Brent is now managing the Construction Department of a restoration company here in IF and the very best part of this year was buying our house the day before Thanksgiving.  We have been settling in the last month and getting ready for Christmas.  Unfortunately we have been too busy unpacking to take pictures of the house yet so you have to make due with the realtor listing pic.

our new pad

The boys both contributed to Christmas by simultaneously losing all their front teeth and singing "All I Want for Christmas is my Two Front Teeth" all month.

Kaise has been working hard at her riding and is now up to a good solid canter and getting ready for jumps.

Brigham turned eight this month and is loving cub scouts and is getting ready to be baptized in January and have his first pine wood derby.

Owen is loving Kindergarten and trying hard (or not so hard) to get along with his little sister.

Siri is three and making up for all her earlier lack of talking.  She also is truly obsessed with Diet Coke (please leave all parenting/nutrition/crazy comments below).

That is us in a nutshell. We are very grateful for all that we have been blessed with this year and we hope you are all having a wonderful Christmas season.