Zoie's Poor Tooth!

For those of you who have been lucky(?) enough to live by us for the last year and a half or so... you know that Zoie fell in Paris and literally cracked about 1/3 of her front tooth off. (The poor girl also has a kind of webbed tooth on the bottom- two of her teeth are fused together and look like one big old mutant tooth).

Well, it's been bothering her recently, so I brought her into the Dentist last week a couple of times.

It was a nightmare getting her to cooperate with x-rays etc. (When we first went in, the Dr. put her in the X-ray chair and handed her a little white rectangle, and asked her to "bite down on this". I shot him a look like, "you have obviously NEVER been around a two year old before", and Zoie promptly stuck the x-ray card down her shirt.

Anyway, they finally sealed it, but couldn't tell us why it was bothering her.

A couple days ago, I noticed that there was a little white pearl looking blob in her gum above that tooth... So I brought her in AGAIN!

The dentist took one look at that thing and said- "this has got to come out!"

The TOOTH, that is!

So, yesterday we had the pleasure of assisting Zoie- a TWO year old, in getting multiple injections into an already inflamed and engorged gum, and then getting her tooth manually removed- while she was awake. It wasn't easy, they finally had to strap her down to one of those little papoose boards. :(

What a nightmare for all involved. The poor girl, she just kept looking at us like, "why are you doing this to me!"

Got to get a picture of her new smile... she looks like even more of a Hockey player than before!

In case you missed it...

A hilarious video of Zoie...

Mitt... taking the high road

How can you not just love this man???

My favorite tree this year...

I decorated my favorite little tree this year. I can't bear to take the decorations off... it's going to look naked!

Bye, Bye Tree!

Well, here we are on the way to the recycling drop-off to deposit our "real" Christmas tree. We had to get rid of it somehow since they don't pick up trees in our village- so Steve chopped it up into bits, and we transported it this way... I don't think anyone was permanently scarred by the trip.

Zoie's bandaid...

No... there's nothing wrong with her. Ike needed a bandaid, so she wanted one too. The problem is (besides the fact that it's embarrassing 'cause everyone keeps asking, "what happened", and I have to say "absolutely nothing!") that she stuck it right on her eyebrow, so I don't want to rip it off!

In case you're wondering... she's eating a Nature Valley Sweet & Salty granola bar (the peanut butter one)- a family favorite!!!

This isn't your Grandma's Santa!

The French were surprisingly festive for Christmas. Does anyone know what's up with the Santa's hanging all over the place? Usually climbing on a ladder into a window- but they're all over the place.

Here was Izzie as a French "Santa" in a really cool walled in French market town (read: GREAT shopping!) called Saint Malo.

Family Favorite: Mont Saint Michel

This is a real place!!! We went on our Christmas trip to Normandy. I was driving with Emily & Julia (and a couple of kids), when we saw Mont Saint Michel across the horizon. It looked really surreal. The cool thing is that the closer we got- the cooler it got. The "town" is just as amazing as it looks. This is for sure one of our all-time favorites!Here are the kids with Julia on one of the "streets" of St. Michel.This is Zoie on the city wall (don't look at her poor little cold hands- the girl will NOT keep gloves on!):Here's that same picture from a distance!This is a cool picture taken from up in the town, with the surroundings in the background. Do Mimi & Nicki look cold here? The wind was biting!

Not exactly a traditional Beach Trip!

But we did go to the Beaches of Normandy for Christmas this year... It was such a blast to go with Emily, Ben & Nicki and Jesse & Julia! This is the place we rented:
Here's Aerie by the fire. There was NO heating- just a fire that we kept blazing and little plug in radiators! It was a full-on experience just keeping warm!We like to rent houses when we travel for a lot of reasons. But this one worked out great. The kids loved the playground outside- with animals everywhere! Zoie WAS having fun here!

New Year's Resolutions...

So this is what's posted on our refrigerator right now. Our goals for 2008!

Pretty standard!

1. After scraping toothpaste off of the wall in the kid's bathroom upstairs the other night while they were brushing their teeth, I decided that I REALLY need to make sure and do a deep clean up there once a week- so we're going to focus on the upstairs on Saturdays before we do anything else.

2. In 2007, we were really good about our family scripture study and morning prayers because we have a regular morning routine- on school days! However, we found that we drop the ball consistently on the weekends and holidays- but we aren't going to miss them this year!

3. Since it is so expensive to go out to eat here, we don't do it much... (our tiny village has a pub with GREAT food- but with the WEAK dollar, and £7 lunches ($14 for you yanks!)- we don't go much!) HOWEVER, there is a Burger King and Taco Bell and a Pizza joint on base- where you pay in the dollar. Anyway- we need to cut down on fast food. It's just YUCKY!


4. Speaks for itself. We want to travel etc. while we are here- but also want to keep involved- serve, etc. in our community.

Sorry, we're all thinking caucus here!

I'm trying to think of something else to write about right now- but we're all anticipating the Iowa caucus tonite!

I'll add some more interesting tidbits about OUR lives tomorrow!

Any Iowans out there... go caucus for Mitt!

(Izzie and Aerie at a Mitt Fundraiser in California this summer!)

I know you are all know this stuff... but just in case, the caucus is tomorrow. Here's a link explaining: how to Get involved in the Iowa Caucus!

Happy New Year!

(Ireland- October 2007)
Hmmm... can you tell what one of my New Year's Resolutions is? I'm gonna get with the rest of the modern world, and keep a family blog!