Boonsage & Kabuski: What will the New Year Bring?

December has been a little rough on me. (I swear I didn't pray for patience or anything.) On the first day of December I was trying to put some more bedding in the chicken's new abode. On my way back to put it away in the shed, I fell through down into our root cellar.

It was an odd experiance for me, one minute I was throwing the pine shavings in the shed, and the next I was standing directly below where I was. We don't use the cellar yet because the ladder is unsafe. So there I was stuck in a hole. As luck would have it, I had my cell phone so I called the house and had the kids bring me a flashlight. It was around 4 pm and quite dark in the cellar.

The pictures are not very good, but technically I was a damsel in distress so don't ask for better quality pics. It's hard to see, but that is a sledge hammer right over my head. It is held in place by a pitch fork that had become wedged as the flooring gave way. Needless to say I was in a precarious situation, made more so by the ever increasing "help" of my children. I finally convinced them that they would be the most helpful if they stood away from the doorway.
I called Daniel to the rescue and began throwing out the various pieces of wood and miscellany that fell with me. Luckily He didn't take too long. I was only down there about and hour, which is good. Daniel cleared the debris and dropped me a ladder. Only upon exiting my hovel did I experience any pain. I was black and blue for most of the month. (I still have some lingering bruises.) So I went inside and made dinner. Cuz that's what you do right? I sat on the couch surrounded by ice for a while and chalked it up to a freak accident.
A few days latter I was making dinner and ran to the bathroom, when I came out, the fire alarm was going off and the house was full of black smoke. There is still some smudges on the ceiling. I aired out the house with the help of the kids and addressed the damage. Yuck! Dinner went fine though. I may have to replace my turnabout and a pan....
Anyhoo, then Devon decided to crack his head open. We needed a hospital trip at least one more time! He was jumping on the boxes of Christmas decorations, (yes, I just got rid of my Halloween decor, Priorities) The box slipped out from under him and down he went on the hearth. Daniel and I packed everyone up and off to the emergency room we went. It was a rather quiet day there so he was seen to rather quickly. He was a champ and only cried when they put the staples in. After a Popsicle he was right as rain. Here's another poor pic, he is hard to get sitting still. Those shiny parts on the right are his staples.

It hasn't been all bad though, I got to celebrate my birthday with the Relief Society. We had a RS Christmas evening on my birthday so I brought a cake. It was a fun evening. Everyone sang to me. There are two other ladies with the same birthday, but they couldn't attend. Later we celebrated Devon's birthday. We are all odds now. Emily is our odd one out. She has an odd year, the rest of us are evens. Grandma Bartholomew made the boys pillowcases, they love them.

Devon chose his cake out of 4 different choices, and then helped me make it. He chose to have the heart shaped pan. I frosted it in his favorite color.

More smoke...
I got a Groupon for a tree experience. We got lost in Oregon following our GPS. I was having a ball, but Daniel didn't like it I'm afraid. It was raining buckets and very slick out. We went over a lovely bridge.

And then wound up and up and up a mountain to this little tree farm. It was ever so cute. We searched about a bit for the perfect tree and Lizzy picked a wreath and we all had cocoa.

I had to remove my glasses, it was raining so hard I couldn't see with them on. Just then Devon made a break for it. I was stumbling around searching for a glimpse of orange. He had found their dog and was chasing it. So I was chasing him. I invoked the help of another family and soon caught him. Here the kids are decorating.