A few candids...

A self portrait of me and my big girls!
So totally maddie!
Quinn's beauty shop stylings while Faith took a bath!

Coloring Fun

Faith's new favorite thing to do with the girls is coloring. She loves to do anything the big girls do. Some nights when I am making dinner, coloring is just the right thing to keep them busy until Daddy comes home. That hour between five and six o'clock is so hard...ask any stay at home mom! Since I have a camera now I thought they just looked so cute coloring together - I had to get a shot!

Game Night

At the beginning of the month, we were supposed to go visit downtown Holland for some festive fun. They were having their Christmas open house with the stores offering hot cider and snacks, Santa walking the streets, carolers singing songs and thousands of Christmas lights adorning the trees. Well, weather didn't agree with our plans and with Faith still a little under the weather herself, we decided to stay in. Nana Nita and Papa Al came over for Lasagna and then we played Don't Wake Up Daddy - the kids love it because the goal is to not wake up Daddy as you are sneaking past Him on your way to the refrigerator for a midnight snack...Daddy is sleeping in bed...there are spaces you have to land on and if you are not safe, you have to press the button next to Daddy a certain number of times. You never know when you press it whether Daddy will wake up...when he does it startles you because he pops up in his bed. It's a riot and even Faith loves to hit the button to see if he'll wake up! The last picture - no one was really aware Quinn was taking, but it shows us getting ready...the Daddy is on Faith's high chair.

Thanksgiving 2007

It was our turn to go to Columbus for Thanksgiving this year and so we invited our good friends the Valentas to come along. We made it in about 1:30 in the morning on Thanksgiving day...the trip went well, but getting in so late...we didn't really get settled down until about 3 am. It made for an interesting next day and a half as our sleepiness caught up with us and the kiddos too. We had all the family over to mom's for a huge feast...it was so fun to be able to see everyone and give big hugs to Kelli (who was weeks away from delivering Jackson)...she looked so good! I took a few pics of the day...I'm not sure if Quinn took some with his camera...I'll have to get those later. We spent the next few days just relaxing...Carissa and I got to do a little shopping at one of my favorite stores - The Olde Farmstead. Soon it was time to go...a lot of us were struggling with sickness too, me included, so we didn't get to do any karaoke :( and we only played one game because we were always too tired to stay up after the kids went to bed...but all in all we had fun. Hope you enjoy some of the pics...

Nana's Big Helper...

Maddie couldn't wait to get to Columbus to help Nana stuff that bird...she was fascinated when we told her where the stuffing goes. Nana is always good about letting the kids help in the kitchen, even when it could be messy...her motto is "That's what you do at Nana's" They like to help cut vegetables for salad, etc...in this case it was fresh mushrooms for the stuffing. Then Maddie helped mix it all up...thus the gooey hands!

The finished bird...

Tabitha basting with an orange juice mixture
Uncle Roy always gets picked to carve...that's cause he's a professional!

Thanksgiving...

Beautiful table mom!
Deacon...what a sweetheart!
Carissa, Terry and Deacon
I don't think this is in focus very well, but the only picture I got of everyone eating...and Uncle Roy's eyes are closed again!

More Turkey Day Photos

Matthew and Tab can't be serious for one photo - those goofs...here they are with Terry and Carissa...
Carissa made a beautiful apple pie and Tabitha made our traditional pumpkin pies from an old family recipe...they were awesome!
Here are four of the cutest girls on the planet...all coloring together and sitting so nicely (I think this was a day or two after Thanksgiving)
Ainsley got to ride back home with us and watch video with the girls...they had a blast...

My dear Elves.... I love you all!!

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Wow!

Has it really been almost a month since I've last blogged? Well, hopefully I've made up for it (after 2 hours of blogging myself silly tonight) with the following posts! Fifteen posts in all, with lots and lots of pictures and some BIG NEWS somewhere in between. You'll have to keep on reading to find out! I am a little neurotic in that I had to put them all in order beginning with most recent and then counting backwards over the last month, so be sure to see what happened last month too including Grace's birthday and field trip! Time is flying here at the Dennings and in two short weeks we'll be in Columbus celebrating Thanksgiving - unbelievable. God has been so good to us even though life has been very busy lately. But isn't it always? Love to all and hope you have a good week!

My Morning Cartoon Gang!

This is what it looks like on a typical weekday morning about 15 minutes after all the girls awake. They are snuggled in a row on the couch with juicy in hand watching some morning cartoons before breakfast and then off to school. Now that I have a camera handy (read the post below) I had to snap a pic...aren't they precious? And the nice thing is, is that they really do love each other so much!

Sam's new camera

My darling hubby brought me home a great surprise this week in the form of a new digital camera...I have needed one and wanted one for a long time. It's a Canon Powershot A560 - perfect size to keep handy in my purse and to help capture those little moments in the day I have missed out on for the last year and a half of not having one! I know I'll definitely blog a lot more because it will be so easy for me now! So here are some test shots , just having fun around the house. Maddie took the one of me all by herself...I finally had to say yes because she kept begging to take my picture (at least it was a decent one). The one of Faith just cracks me up... I was too close, but it's a funny picture. And Maddie came up the stairs dressed like that and with her guitar before I went out with my girlfriends for dinner on Thursday night, so I had to get a pic!

A New Nephew!

With the craziness of our Halloween schedule, also came the news that we were Aunt and Uncle to a new nephew. Harmony gave birth to a beautiful and healthy baby boy on the morning of the 31st...Peyton Anderson Charles. What a cutie! I haven't had the chance to see him yet, but the rest of the gang has and here are some pics...

Proud Daddy!
Cousin Maddie holding Peyton.
Cousin Grace practicing for our new brother!

Halloween 2007

Here's one of the first of quite a few posts about Halloween at the Denning household. It was a busy week for us because of a slew of other commitments, but we still found time to do the traditional pumpkin carving and trick or treating. The first pic is of Grace and Madison, or should I say Jasmine and Tinkerbell right before trick or treating. They were excited to have such nice costumes this year, thanks to Nana Heidi and Aunt Cindy! Faith wanted nothing to do with her costume when it actually came time to go out in search of candy. We thought she would be so cute knocking on doors and saying "tick ow tweat", but when it came time to put on the kitty costume, her exact words were..."All done, bye-bye kitty!" Ha Ha! You see, I had put her in that costume first thing that morning because we had an appointment somewhere and then we were off to Maddie's class party, so I just thought she would be such a cutie as we drove around town, but then she ended up wearing it all day except for nap and then it was kitty no more!!! So, the pic below is how she ended up going out...perfectly content to sit in the stroller and go for a nice walk while her sisters raced up and down driveway after driveway in search of the ultimate stash!