Thanksgiving, and the Day After

This was such a wonderful Thanksgiving that we were able to share with our new friends here in Missouri.  Such neat families, thank you for having us over!  The company was great, the food was amazing, and the babies were loud and in to everything, which means this Thanksgiving was a success!  Here are a few photos of the event:

Triplets and the twins loving some
Thanksgiving goodness!

The plate just got in the way!

The kids dining hall

Emily made an activity for the kids,
balloon turkeys + Nerf guns=Perfect combination

My job, at least I did something, right?

The day after Thanksgiving.  I am a firm believer that there should be NO Christmas decorations before Thanksgiving.  Emily doesn't like it, but she puts up with it.  Every year she tries to do it, and it comes right back down.  I don't even like to hear Christmas music before the day after Thanksgiving.  This year I was some what hypocritical (I can admit it) and I listened to the Pentatonix version of Little Drummer Boy (awesome by the way, you should check it out on YouTube) the day before Thanksgiving, then once I realized what I was doing (after the song was over), I immediately shut it off and went and asked for forgiveness from Emily for being so hypocritical!  Anyway, today, the day after Thanksgiving means that it is OK to put up Christmas stuff, and turn on the music with no guilt, I will even post some pictures:

We had to put the tree up a little bit so the babies can't get to it.

The finished product! 

Huge thank you to the Taskers for this
addition to our decorations, it is my favorite!

I hope that everyone had a splendid Thanksgiving, and everyone of you gave thanks for what you have, just before you went out to risk your life for what you want at whatever Black Friday store you went to!  Here are a couple of random photos (oh, the one of Bennett with the waffle mark on his head, he fell over in his pack-n-play and we are pretty sure that he smacked his forehead on the wall with the mesh of the pack-n-play being the only cushioning!):

Waffle Head!

Taya, up close and personal

Anderson

Right before my school's Winter Formal Dinner and Dance

Cooper's note to the triplets

Oh, one more thing, Bennett is taking a few steps, here's the video to prove it, he just turned 11 months yesterday!  Growing up WAY too fast:

Country Living

With the craziness that is our lives, it is very difficult to find time to sit down and take time to write and post pictures.  I truly wish that I could do this at least once a week, but with my school trying to make up 2 months of school work, life has been a bit nuts!  In the month and a half I've been in school I have taken and finished: Embryology/Histology, Immunology, Pathology, Molecular Cell Biology, Pharmacology, Anatomy, and there's another one or two in there.  Needless to say, everyday so far has been like the day before finals, because it basically has been.  For instance, we start a class on Monday, we have our mid-term on Thursday and our Final the following Monday.  We have been in lecture for an average of probably 6-7 hours a day, plus reviews on Saturday and Sundays.  Ok, feel sorry for me.

Off my soapbox.  This little adventure has been so full of ups and downs.  We love the area, Emily misses Target (actually any store that doesn't involve Wal-Mart), we literally live in the middle of nowhere (look at the pictures) but we love it!

You know you're a redneck when:

Your dishwasher is not a machine or a dog, but a wandering baby...

Luckily he doesn't complain about his job!

You might be a redneck if:

When you come home from a day's work, you have random hunters in your front yard

 You might be a redneck if:

You have a paper airplane graveyard in your house.
(PS--If anyone out there needs any paper airplane parts, we got ya covered)

OK, random pictures from the last month.

Halloween

Cooper got an award for his pumpkin at my school's pumpkin carving contest

Biker Babies and a female baby monkey

Randomness:

CHEEKS!!!

Family Frisbee 

Cooper lost a tooth!

The boys and their tubby time

The Babies like FOOD! (Just look at their smiles)

They even steal it from the pantry

Anderson will take it from anyone, even if he has it in front of him!

What a month!

Wow.  Where do I start?  We have now been in Kirksville for over a month, I have been in school officially for 3 weeks, 2 weeks of actual classes, Cooper had his birthday, BBQ's, get-togethers, kids new school, I haven't seen Emily a whole lot, I see the kids even less, how do I even have time to write?  Let me explain.

Sunrise over the corn

Sunset over the other corn

I will start with the boring stuff--dental school.  What a ride!  I don't know how else to say it.  On Friday (Oct 18) we had just finished our 2nd week of lectures and our teacher told us some numbers.  65, 42, 5.  65 hours worth of sitting in a classroom listening to lectures, 42 lectures to be exact, of those 42 exams we took 5 tests (well, the fifth was actually this morning).  So, my daily schedule has been the following: wake up at 6, at school at 7, study till 9, class till 12, lunch till 1, class till 3-4, study till 6, family time/dinner 6-8, study 8-10:30, then finally sleep.  Then Saturday and even Sunday were filled with study time.  I have had to do this as we are getting 5.5 times the amount of information that our sister school in AZ (ASDOH) is getting in a day, in other words what we were being taught in a day, they would have a week to learn it.  We had a test every third day.  We just finished 5.1 credit hours in 2 weeks.  If we are to keep this pace, that would put us at 40.8 credit hours this first semester.  INSANE!  In other words, this is going to be my life for a while. I remember that one of the doctors I worked with would tell me how they had 26 credit hours one semester, if only I could have it that way!  We just finished our intro to Embryology/Histology, Immunology, Microbiology, and Pathology classes.  Tomorrow we start Molecular Cell Biology.  Who's jealous?

WHITE COAT CEREMONY:

"Jacob Hutchings, UVSC, Construction Management"

Now, I'm an official Student Dentist

Proud Spouse!

Me, Jake, Braden, and Kolby

Anyway, on to more fun subjects.  We LOVE it here!  This has been such an awesome place.  The kids school is great, and they're making friends, Emily is really adjusting to the "country life" (something I thought was impossible), as hard as school is I am loving it.  The babies are growing like weeds.  Life is good.

Caught Red-handed

Triplets + Twins (1 week younger than triplets) = lots of babies

How pretty is that?

Bennett has actually taken a step and will stand for up to about 45 seconds with no assistance and he's getting his 4 upper teeth.  Anderson is crawling like a normal human baby now, no more frog crawling, and he has gotten his 2 bottom teeth, and is pulling himself up.  Taya is getting really proficient at crawling, she is waving bye-bye and smiling up a storm.

Anderson

Bennett

Taya

Cooper just turned 7!  I can't believe how fast time goes.

Minion Party

Emily drove down to Columbia, MO (1.5 hours away) with the babies just so she could go to Sam's Club where she stayed for a whopping 30 minutes and came right back home because the babies were not having it, she did say that life was so much more fast paced, and she almost missed the pace of Kirksville.  How about that? She's a country girl!

Here's some pictures, Country Living:

Snuggle Buddies, Cooper and Luke

Anderson and Taya