Family Pictures 2011

It was that time again. It feels like it flies by every time. We finally had family pictures taken. We had my awesome cousin Summer take them. She did an amazing job. Not only are the pictures beautiful, she has this talent with the kids. She gets them to smile, laugh, play and help MacKayla with her "princess legs". The link to her blog "Summer Image" is on the right. Here are just a few of my favorites...

Kindergarten Zoo Day!

One of my favorite things about being a stay at home mom is that I am readily available to help out with MacKayla's class. I've been able to go on all of her field trips or help out with any activities that need parents. I love that I get to be a part of these fun activities with her. I'll admit though, going to the zoo with a bunch of kindergartners did not sound exciting. I, however, was given the best girls to be with. Raegan is on the left, Angie is in the middle and of course, Kayla is on the right. Such fun girls!

My little mover!

Here's just a little update on my little guy...Joe Joe is my mover! He wants to be doing something at every moment of the day. The only time he sits still is when he's watching one of his superhero cartoons. He can watch one after the other for hours...if I let him.

Joe Joe is potty training. He sometimes just doesn't care to go in the potty though.  Thank goodness he can't stand the thought of pooping in his pants because I can't stand the thought of having to clean it up. However, he takes FOREVER when he has to poop. I felt bad for the poor guy and gave him a book.

As I mentioned before, Joe loves superheros. He loves Hulk, Ironman, Spiderman, Fantastic Four...you name it, he loves it. We found this cute little get-up at Dollar Tree and had to put it on him. He looks so ferocious!

My parents have these awesome rolling hills at the church across the street from their house. I remember rolling down these same hills as a kid. Our kids seem to love them as much as I did. I like it now because it wears him out. Go down the hill, walk up the stairs, go down the hill, walk up the stairs. After 50 or so times we go home and crash in bed. :)

Kayla is a natural pianist!

MacKayla has been taking piano for 3 months now and three weeks ago she played her first song with her hands together. It was a "proud mom" moment. She is such a natural pianist and is very talented. I'm so proud of her!!

JoeJoe turns "free"

Our little guys turned three on March 27th. He is such an energetic, carefree kid. He loves to play and have fun and doesn't care about the important things in life. He was so excited to turn "free". We had my family over to help us celebrate with him.

His cousins thought he was so slow at opening his presents, a few of the presents got the help of many hands. Joe got lots of cars, especially "Cars" cars. He was more excited about the "Cars" cars than he was about his new bike. Go figure.

He picked out his own cake. It was a close running between "Cars", Spiderman and Thomas the Train. As it turns out, it was hands down "Cars". Plus he got two more "Cars" out of it.

We love you JoeJoe!

Little Joe is HILARIOUS!

Little Joe has been having a very difficult time lately eating anything that is a fruit or a vegetable. So tonight Joe was helping little Joe say prayers and was telling him to say "Help me to eat my vegetables" and Little Joe says "Help Daddy to eat his vegetables". So to fix what this smart little guy was doing, Joe says "Help JoeJoe to eat his vegetables" and little Joe says "AMEN!" Yea...he knows exactly what he's doing.

Happy 6th Birthday Kayla!!

Happy Birthday to the sweetest six year old girl! MacKayla is one of the friendliest little girls I have ever met. She loves to make new friends wherever she goes and makes time daily to play with her friends. She loves to organize as much as her mom. Just the other day she organized her whole room, Joe's room and then asked me for something else to organize. It was wonderful! So for Kayla's birthday she decided to have her first "friends" birthday party. We went to Zurchers (which, BTW, I think is over-rated because they may have lots of themes but they're not as cheap you think they're going to be) and she went with the Hawaiian theme. Surprised? Yea, I was. I thought for sure she's go with Princess or Barbie. At any rate, it turned out so cute. I got these hawaiian flowers and put them on all the birthday hats with a gem. Then I made all the girls hawaiian flower hair clips with a gem in the middle. We had party bags, a pinata, games, cake & ice cream and of course, presents. I'm pretty sure Kayla loved it!

The pinata was hilarious and they couldn't break it. I took pictures of each girl and put it on a little slideshow. In the end, I was the one that ended up breaking it. Which was a relief because it was in the garage and it was freezing!!

Christmas Day 2010!!

I love Christmas Day! The only day I love more is Christmas Eve because it's the anticipation...the looking forward to the awaited day! So this year it only took 2 hours to wrap presents and that was with help from my sister. I cannot believe how much we had to wrap this year. It's all for the cause. :) I always have to take a picture of the set up of the presents before the kids come down on Christmas morning. There's just something about seeing it all! As it turns our, our living room is pretty small when it comes to Christmas morning.

Little Joe got his first tie for Christmas. He was so excited he put it on over his pajamas. The best part is his daddy got a matching tie. They're so cute!

My friends Vicki & Rebecca helped me (ok - they did it and I watched) make a skirt and shirt for Kayla for Christmas. It turned out so great and Kayla couldn't wait to put it on. She finished opening her presents in that outfit and now wears it 2-3 times a week. The kids also got new slippers for Christmas.

After the morning festivities at our own house we headed to my parents house for lunch and more "giving". It's always fun visiting with everyone and sharing in this exciting day. No matter what we give and get though we can never replace the true meaning of Christmas. What a blessing it is for us to know our Savior and have this day to celebrate his birth. Without Him our lives would be pointless and difficult.

Top Left - Mom, Amy, Thomas, Michelle, Derek

Top Right - Dad, Sara, Aunt Jane, Matt

Bottom Left - Mike, Mack, Marie, Joe, JoeJoe

Bottom Right - Thomas (front), Oliver, Kate, MacKayla

 

Oh how I love Christmas!

Breakfast with Santa!!

My family has a tradition of having Breakfast with Santa. From the time I was a little girl until it closed, we used to go to the Santa Breakfast at the Tiffin Room in the ZCMI Center. It was $4 a person, on Christmas Eve Morning and we loved it! We had a breakfast that was small enough that by 10am we were hungry again but we got to see Santa, sing all the Christmas songs with him, see some other kid-bob entertainment and then get a candy-cane from Santa. We looked forward to this every year, getting up at 6 am and being first in line to get in so we could have first picks on seating. Well, as we all know, the ZCMI Center no longer exists. So sad. My family had to find other Santa Breakfasts. Ironically they are few and far between. We seem to find a new one every year and none quite compare but we still have a good time. This year we went to the Santa Breakfast at the Davis Conference Center. It was really nice (as it should be at $18.99 per person)! There was a buffet, child's buffet, face paiting (or air-brush), candy counter, letter's to Santa, cookie decorating and of course your visit with Santa with a stuffed animal at the end. We might just give this one another go next year.


Gingerbread Houses!!

Every year my family makes gingerbread houses with graham crackers. Why graham crackers? Because it's easier and EVERYONE gets to make one. We had a plethora of candy! It's fun to see what designs everyone comes up with. My brother and his...fiance... (this is fairly recent so it's weird saying that) made an "In N Out Burger" Gingerbread House. Set up with hot-wheels cars through the drive-thru. The kids just love that they can make their own creation and put candy anywhere and everywhere.

Top left picture - Marc & Whitney
Top Right picture - MacKayla, Grace & Whitney
Bottom picture - Kate, Grace (back), Oliver, JoeJoe, MacKayla