For all those who come to this happy place, Welcome!

Children sleeping, snow is softly falling. Dreams are calling like bells in the distance. We were dreamers not so long ago, but one by one we all had to grow up. When it seems the magic's slipped away... we find it all again on Christmas day Believe in what your heart is saying. Hear the melody that's playing. There's no time to waste. There's so much to celebrate. Believe in what you feel inside, and give your dreams the wings to fly. You have everything you need, if you just believe. Trains move quickly to their journey's end. Destinations are where we begin again. Ships go sailing far across the sea, trusting starlight to get where they need to be. When it seems that we have lost our way, we find ourselves again on Christmas day. The best time of the year, when everyone comes home. With all this Christmas cheer, it's hard to be alone. Putting up the Christmas tree with friends who come around. It's so much fun when Christmas Comes to Town. Presents for th...

This is a REMINDER about the benefit garage sell in behalf Joseph Runyan (Abby & Todd's son) who has autism. It is going to be Friday the 14 th & Saturday the 15 th . It's being held at the Neilson's house (Joseph's grandma - across the street from Mesa High). Last night my sewing group hosted a "Sew for Joseph" Night . We made aprons for adults & kids in fall and Christmas fabrics. Thank you to all those ladies donating their time & talents for this cause. Aprons make great Christmas gifts! Thank you as well to everyone who has made a donations or dropped stuff by. I have received numerous phone calls & donations from our neighbors & friends. Abby says, "THANK YOU so much it really means so much to me and my family. It's going to be a great sale with lots of great stuff ( things from Decor Unique too) so don't forget to come and check it out." We will have a table set up with all the aprons on it. Also, if you ...

This year Jason's cousin (Jeremy) called him up with info on permits to cut down your own tree. Jason was ecstatic and jumped at the idea of getting together to go cut down trees. He has been wanting to do this the past 8 Christmases that we've been married... but something always came up. Well, this was our year and our kids had reached perfect age. So Saturday Jeremy & Jen came over early to make a day trip of it. I made my infamous pumpkin pancakes with apple cider syrup, bacon, & eggs. It was a scrumptious breakfast and we set off... This is Paige all fresh faced and ready to go - isn't she so cute! She is wearing double layers (thanks to a dad that thinks ahead). We originally had decided to drive out to Springerville , AZ (for those of you that are geographically challenged - that equals a 4 hour drive heading East)... But reconsidered that Payson is a lot closer and the permit office was open on weekends. So we were good. After stopping in Payson we learn ...

One of the best things about my birthday is sharing it with my mom. I was born on her birthday 32 years ago today. Can you believe it, 32 years old - you too will get lovely little fine lines when you hit 30- ish . Oh how time flies when your having a life. Anyway, I've been tagged a few times to share interesting pointless facts about myself... so here goes. Curl up in your favorite sweats with your bowl of homemade popcarn , because this might take awhile. My mom was 24 years old back in November of 1975 - having her 4 th child (brave woman)... Here is a little known fact about her. Molly (my beautiful momma) only wanted 4 children so I was in the clear (thank goodness), how she ended up with ten was pure divine intervention and a very "healthy" relationship (oh the stories I could tell, but this is neither the time nor the place - I will save it for another time). Anyway, it was the day before Thanksgiving, a Wednesday to be exact. (Side note: I never understood the ...

Jason turned the big 31 today. Now for an entire week he can not call me "old lady" - "elderly" or anything in that nature. We are exactly the same age for 7 days and you better believe I will enjoy every last one of them... and also that it starts the countdown till my big day. Do I love birthdays you ask? of course, it's the one day my inbox is full of emails (not just forwards) and my phone rings with more then just solicitors at the other end. Usually is it the people I love most in this world wishing me well. I love birthdays - just because you get remembered. This is an extreme closeup of how siblings play. James was trying to bite Paige so she smacked him or something to the effect that his already loose tooth (from a different incident all together) was pushed forward to the point of no return. We rushed him to the dentist and within a minute the dentist had yanked it out. Now our son " Gappy " will have a hole in his mouth until about 6 yea...

I know many of us will be heading out for the holidays & blogging traffic will get really slow. Here is a great laugh for you to think over those long hours where your moaning from too much turkey but still shoveling in the pie. Good times brought to you by the Buchanan's... Photo and video editing at www.OneTrueMedia.com

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We left on Tuesday and came home on Sunday. It was 6 days of blissful fun in our favorite place. The only thing missing was Jason. We REALLY missed him. I know he was going with with drawls by the volume of calls I got daily asking which ride we'd gone on, what we'd eaten, etc. Luckily Jason's parents went with us, because I was not cut out to be a single mom. Anyway, below are a few pictures of our fun times from this past week . The ride out there was great. Jason's mom has a new Nissan Pathfinder so we had lots of room to stretch out with a third row seat & god bless the person who invented DVD players for cars. That saved us. The kids had no idea we were traveling - only when it was time to pop in the next movie. The decorations are amazing. I have been for Christmas but never gone during the Halloween season. Disney does not do anything half-way. I took a lot of pictures just of shops & decor - I love it! Everything was so festive and fun . The giant Mi...