Same blog, new address – I have been spoiled having endless amounts of storage for videos and pictures and being able to easily organize all my pictures into albums, but now that it is $48 per year, I started looking at other options. A friend told me that I could transfer my entire blog over to wordpress, so I did! It took me about 30 seconds. I might fix it up to make it cute later. Please take note because I don’t know how much longer this will be here.

TheKoehlers.wordpress.com

So proud of this kid:

Oh my:

Conference crepes:

Dancing:

Allison has decided she wants to be the mvp of every soccer game:



Kisses for Coco:

This is what I woke up to a few days ago. Benjamin got himself some crackers and water and got his couch potato on.

So, my phone ran out of memory last week, so I decided move it all over to my big hard drive. Holy cow! over 500 pictures and videos. It is going to take me a while to go through it all. Here are the first two that came off:

I am too lazy for captions… I think they are pretty self-explanatory.

On our way to DISNEYLAND!

What would we do without our Seat Pets?

A few days before the trip, I read some articles about how to use the “FastPass” system, so we didn’t have to wait in any lines. Every two hours exactly, I would grab a fast pass for the next ride, so we pretty much never waited in a line longer than 10 minutes. There was no line at all at some rides like Splash Mountain, so we rode them over and over again without getting off. We did all of the main rides by about 2pm, so after that, we just walked around, ate, took some pictures, ate some more…. Oh my goodness, we ate a lot of food on that trip!!! Anyway, here are a few pictures:

One of my favorite things from the trip:

The dog bed:

This is why little girls should never wear makeup:

Brody hanging out in the lobby with his friends while Allison is in Ballet:

We had a lot of birthday parties lately:

Swimming:

Bikes:

Metal Detector:

My little desert rats:

Everyone loves it when Daddy cooks because it usually involves something fried:

Every day is park day:

Trampoline is still in the living room:

Christmas day (these picture in backwards chronological order and I don’t feel like fixing them)

This was my view from 8pm-11pm Christmas Eve. I need to stop procrastinating the wrapping:

Christmas Eve: “Polar Express”, Cookies, opening one gift – of course, they decided to open the one from Grandma Binder:

I LOVE this time of year! Busy, but good-busy. Christmas jammies, pancakes shaped like snowmen, Christmas activities at the school, Christmas programs at church, the kids finally getting to the age where they really understand what Christmas is about…. LOVE IT!
Last week, I was called to be the Primary Secretary, which is actually a pretty cool job, because I help out with EVERYTHING, but I am not IN CHARGE of anything – ya know? But…. since they called me right before the end of the year, that means that I need to do the the year-end primary things… new primary rosters, new baptism calendars (I plan the baptisms), update sub list, new door signs, new teaching calendars, new teaching manuals, figure out some new classes(we have a big primary, so we are splitting some classes into two), new birthday charts, theme charts…. I can go on…. but, the biggest project I will have is making updating all binders for all the teachers and making new ones for the new teachers. Once, I get everything updated, printed, and binders put together, I will deliver the binders to the 14 teachers during the week so they are ready for the first sunday in 2014. (I don’t have to do any of that until after Christmas though – thank goodness….. Luckily, I have a great primary presidency!!! We were already good friends before, so now that we are all in primary together, it is going to be fun.

Oh yeah. And, I got jury duty summons. Asked my attorney (Leighton) if he could get me out of it, and he said, “no”.

Update, so today was my first day as primary secretary. I had all my ducks in a row when I walked in the primary room – birthday treats, conducting agenda, door signs, rolls, baptism packets… Leighton was playing the piano for primary that day, so I had a great view – I was all ready to go… About 15 minutes later, the nursery teacher came in and said “Benjamin just threw up EVERYWHERE!”. So, I got him, took him to the bathroom, washed him up, took off his pants, and brought him back into Primary with me. About 5 minutes later, he threw up. All. Over. Me.
Leighton abandoned his post at the piano to come and help me. It was bad. It was so bad.
As we were walking in the hallway covered in vomit, the old primary secretary walked by, and immediately said, “Don’t worry about this, Kristen, I will take care of primary. You go home.” I love that woman. Anyway, we ended grabbing all the kids and going home. So, we just spent the day watching Christmas movies and doing dishes from our big Christmas dinner from last night (see pictures below).

I love matching Christmas Jammies.

Brody forgot his lunch – again.

The kids like playing behind the couch. Sometimes, they take food in there and have picnics. Weirdos.

Allison, being Allison. Benjamin, being a potato.

Making new crayons out of the broken ones:

Christmas Puzzles, Christmas cookies, Benjamin selfies, other random stuff, and some pictures from San Jose trip for some reason:

Thanksgiving – Yum

My view from the sofa during food coma – uuuuugghhh:

Before Thanksgiving, the kids helped out in the kitchen. Benjamin was the official taste-tester:

Allison helped with pretty much everything:

Here is Leighton walking in after taking the third part of the CPA exam. He looks pretty confident:

She cleans up pretty good:

Benjamin LOOOOVES to sit down with the kids in the evening and pretend he is doing homework:

A few of the Christmas Decorations:

Brody had a project over the Thanksgiving weekend. He worked hard and I am so proud of him:

Brody and Allison had some friends over to hang out for the day. The boys made fortune tellers:

The girls made this awesome fort:



Playing outside in the beautiful weather:

More random pictures:
Brody reading The Hobbit surrounded by food:

Allison lost her front tooth:

Grandpa Binder playing Monopoly with the kids:

At the show:

Kids being cute:

Playing with friends:

My other brown-eyed beauty:

I drive by this tree about 6 times a day on my way to and from school. One tree has green, yellow, orange, red. So pretty:

Allison yanking on her loose tooth on the way to school:

Homework time:

After dropping Brody off at school, I come home to this quite often – the forgotten lunch on the table:

Morning activities include making rocket ships out of boxes:

Me, hanging out at my mom’s house:

Allison caught of pigeon at the park:

Allison looking gangsta on the way to play basketball / Benjamin photobombing:

Making smashed potatoes:

making stuff:

Friday nights, we all watch Legend of Korra:

Lazy Saturday mornings:

Benjamin figured out how to use a pencil… on my scriptures and the desk:

Found some sharpie on the wall and on Benjamin’s lips – This is his GUILTY face:

Flying kites with the neighbors:

Three Shirtless Koehler Men:

My nephew’s baptism:

Picnic at the Kindergarten playground:

Totally random pictures:


Typical weekday night – homework and dinner:

I make my 11-vegetable minestrone a lot during the cold months – Allison helps make it and eat it:

School pictures:

Allison glued to her chess game:

We had a great weekend with some family in town. I made prime rib, we saw La Reve… but mostly we just stayed at home and enjoyed each others company. I am so lucky to have such great in-laws!!!

This table was waiting ALL DAY for dinner:

I tried to do something fancy with Allison’s hair… This looks NOTHING like what it was supposed to… but I still liked it:

Getting ready for Trick-or-treating:

Benjamin is very suspicious of the carwash:

This beautiful pumpkin gave us seeds to feed us for days:

Fall Festival – Brody won a fish:






Benjamin, the TORNADO!

The family’s new favorite food – green posole. Leighton asks me to make it a few times a month. When Benjamin smells it, he climbs up and says “want some”

And, the puppy:

Now that the weather is nice, the kids have been spending most of their time in the backyard:

Benjamin NEVER watches TV – NEVER. We have tried baby einstein, elmo… but for some reason, when I put in in his chair with a bowl of blueberries, he will actually sit and watch for 5-10 minutes. It is awesome for me!!

This little guy is always getting stuff from the pantry:

Some shoe drama on the first day of school. Apparently, her mother bought school shoes that were too small… She was quite upset.

Brody wanted me to take this picture of him to look like the bird was on his hand:

I went with my niece to look at homecoming dresses. Benjamin’s first time to a mall. He loved it!

Tinker toys:

Quick trip to the lake before the government shut down:

On our way to school:

Coco loves Ben and Ben loves Coco:

Football games to watch my niece:

Ready for some sunflowers:

I made some new bench cushions using mattress memory foam and a thick plushy blanket:


More pictures: