Christmas Service Party

This year, about a week before Christmas, we decided to have a little service party with our family. My brother, Jake, joined us for an afternoon of food, Christmas music, and doing service. We wanted to do something this year that the kids could really be a big part of. We decided to make children's snack sacks for the Provo Food Bank; an idea inspired by the kids' school. When families come in for help with food or shelter these little sacks are given to the children so they have something special. We colored pictures on brown paper sacks and filled them with a juice box, cheese and cracker pack, granola bar, fruit snacks, and some play-dough.

Then we exchaged or Christmas gifts with Jake since he won't be here for Christmas. His gift to the kids was a HUGE hit. I didn't get any pictures of them playing with it, but they love it.

We had all had fun, and got to help others at the same time. That's what you call a win-win situation.

Christmas Concert

Merry Christmas! As a Christmas treat you get to hear the boys perform at their school Christmas concert. The 2nd grade sang "All I Want for Christmas is My Two Front Teeth," and the 1st grade sang "Christmas Cookies." As usual, my children were quite the animated performers. ;) We hope you have a wonderful day! Merry Christmas!

Geese in Our Backyard

I guess the geese have been migrating, because they have been living behind our house for a couple of weeks. There are literally hundreds of them. It has been so fun to look outside and see them all and listen to them. The kids have really been enjoying it. Kenyon especially, as I'm sure you can imagine. He decided to go out to see if he could catch one.

I hate it when that happens.

Ward Christmas Party

We had the most fun ward Christmas party this year. It was a breakfast and everyone came in their jammies (well, almost everyone). There was a huge turnout and yummy food. We sang carols and the bishop gave a great little presentation on the symbols of Christmas. We even got to see Santa.

Doesn't Everyone Let Their Baby Eat a Whole Apple?

This baby loves his fruit. Especially apples he finds on the floor because the kids in this house don't think twice about dropping fruit on the floor and walking away.

Snow Shovels and Letters to Santa

Apparently snow shovels are good for more than just shoveling your sidewalk and driveway. They are also good for shoveling your backyard.


So you can make a big pile of snow. (With as much snow as they were shoveling, I'm not sure why their big snow pile is not so big.)



What's better than playing in the snow all day, coming in for hot cocoa, and finishing out the day by writing letters to Santa? We place our letters on our tree before bed and during the night the elves come and take them to Santa.

The elves must have been very busy this year, because it took 2 days for them to come. The anticipation was almost too much to take.

I have gotten very behind with my bloggin for this month. I can't imagine why. It's not like I am insanely busy at this time of year or anything. :) But I am trying to be good and get caught up, so check in often this week.

The Kids' Trees

The kids' trees have been up in their rooms for a while now, but they finally got to decorate them today. They were so excited.

Mara's pretty pink tree matches her room perfectly with a garland made with the scraps from her quilt.

I feel bad that Mara has the awesome pink tree and the boys have this stub. Oh well, next year will be their year to get a great tree, and at least they have one in the meantime. They still had a great time decorating it.

Thanksgiving Turkeys

Since we hosted Thanksgiving dinner this year, the kids made place cards for the kids tables. I cut out the pieces, but they put the turkeys together themselves. It was a fun Thanksgiving activity for the kids, and they looked so cute on the tables.

We had a great Thanksgiving! Hope you you did, too!

Little Monkey

While I was busy cleaning out the refrigerator the other day, I turned around to find this...

My crazy little monkey, who can't even walk yet, (aren't you supposed to walk before you climb?) had climbed into the frige and was pulling things out (note all the stuff laying on the floor). What a silly little boy.


He is already keeping me quite busy with the mischief he gets into on a daily basis. If this is what it is like before he can walk, I'm definately not looking forward to when he can walk. But I have to admit, it was pretty darn cute!

Snow? I Guess You Could Call It That.

It has snowed twice so far and neither one has been very much. The kids wanted to go play in it. Since there wasn't much I told them to just put on coats, gloves, and boots. But I guess they were a little excited to break out the full suits. They were a little over-dressed for the occasion if you ask me.

How fun is a green snow angle? Is it even really a snow angel?

They tried sledding and building a snowman. Neither worked of course.

After about 15 minutes or so Cruz said, "This snow isn't fun." They all came in shortly after that.

Hopefully we will get "fun" snow soon.

3 Days of Halloween

Our Halloween festivities began on Thursday. I took a fairy and baby spiderman to a party a a friend's house. We had such a great time. Thanks for being a great hostess, as usual, Mauri!

On Friday we took a fairy and a mouse to the school costume parade and saw a pirate and a vampire . Then I got to help with the vampire's class party. That pirate and vampire were so cute that I decided to bring them home with me.

But once they got home they started looking a lot more like 2 little boys than a vampire and pirate. We carved jack-o-lanterns, had dinner, and got ready for trunk-or-treat. Strange enough, that vamipre and pirate showed back up again just about the same time I couldn't find Cruz and Kenyon. Pretty soon the house was overrun. The fairy was back and I saw a little mouse scurrying around on the floor. I turned around to find a full-grown pirate. It scared me so bad that my hair turned black and stood up on end.

Since I couldn't find any of my family, I decided to take all the crazy things in my house along with me to the trunk-or-treat. I went to get in my van and found it covered in spiders and webs. Some one had taken our jack-o-lanterns out there, too.

We all had so much fun at the trunk-or-treat, and at the end we were told that we had the best costomes and they gave us a prize! Good thing I brought all these guys along with me and left my family at home.

When I woke up on Halloween morning my family was back. Good thing because I needed their help decorating the house for Halloween night, but as it stared to get dark all those crazy things started showing up again, and my family started disappearing again. But then the little fairy told me she didn't want to be a fairy anymore and before I knew what had happened, POOF, she turned into a witch! I didn't know fairies could do that. So this carzy group set off into the night to knock on doors and get candy. I left a bowl of candy at the door for any little ghouls that might come to our house. We had a very fun time. When we arrived home, we saw that some ghoul had taken our whole bowl of candy. Not just the candy, but the bowl, too! The pirate and vampire were pretty upset by the whole thing, and the little witch started to cry, "I don't want robbers on this earth!" she said.

We poured out the candy, and before long I looked around and all of my family was back again. What a crazy 3 days of Halloween this was!

Why I'm So Glad To Be A Mom

Tonight I was in the kitchen. Kenyon and Mara were at the table talking.

Kenyon - "Mara, remember at the old house when me and Cruz were being mean to you?"

Mara - "Yes." (Said with a very sad face.)

Kenyon - "Those were the very baddest days. But now you are my bestest buddy."

These are the moments that make motherhood worth it.

Fall Break Day 2

Our second day of Fall Break, Karl was off work. He had some big surprises for us. First he took us on our annual trip to Hee Haw Farms. We've been doing this for 8 years now.

The kids so much fun riding the tire horses...

And the big swing.

They went down the slides...

And jumped in the hay.

It was Koen's first time to measure himself at the pumpkin.




They got to go in the petting zoo to see and touch all kinds of animals, and as always they were excited to see Leroy the huge pig.



Kenyon and Cruz get to go on a pony ride, but the saddle came undone when Cruz was on it. Mara never got a turn. :(

They got to ride the animal train



And we all went on a hay ride.



They went in a haunted house, shot the corn cannon, and sooooo much more. We all had a great time!

That wasn't the end of the fun. After we had dinner, Karl took us to see "Where the Wild Things Are." We were all so excited to see it, and it was fun going to the movies because we hardly ever do that, but I don't recommend this movie. If you haven't taken your kids to see it yet, watch it before you take your kids. It was very depressing and dark. It was so depressing it made Kenyon and Mara cry. We definately should have seen something else.

But all in all, we had a very fun day, and a great Fall Break.

Fall Break Day 1

We had a super fun fall break. On the first day we did lots of fun Halloween stuff at home. We read Halloween books, played Halloween games, and we made shrunken heads out of apples. The kids carved their own faces with a melon baller, a can opener, and other similar tools. The kids had a blast with this. They got creative and decided to give them teeth (rice) and eyes (whole cloves) and bloody wounds (red food coloring).

We had so much fun, and here are the final relults:

Field Trip to the Zoo

Kenyon had a class field trip to the zoo last week. He came home with some fantastic stories.

When I asked him what his favorite part of the zoo was he said it was the "Ring-tailed Lemur." When I asked why, he said, "He broke out of his cage and climbed up on me and wanted to come home with me." I was cracking up, but he was sticking to his story. Finally he confessed that he was teasing me.

Then he told me that the wolf tried to eat him. I asked why he thought the wolf was trying to eat him and he said, "The wolf was chasing a bird and then he saw all of us and then he looked right at me." So I guess that constitutes trying to eat him.

He was cracking me up with his stories. I think he was having so much fun seeing all the animals that his imagination was getting carried away. Needless to say he had a blast at the zoo, and Karl and I had a good laugh from his stories.

What a funny kid with a great imagination!

6 Months Old

Koen is 6 months old now. I can't believe it! His stats after his check-up are 34th percentile on weight and 2nd percentile on his length, so we have another shorty on our hands. He is sitting, he scoots really well, and he is beginning to get the hang of crawling. He loves to eat, and especially enjoys the teething biscuits that he can eat by himself. He has 2 teeth, and in general is just growing up way too fast.

He is a super smiley little guy who pinches and head-butts way to much. He has every person in this family wrapped around his little finger and I think he knows it. He is such a joy. We are so very blessed to have him in our family. I love you, little man!

Mara's New Bling!

We took Mara to get her ears pierced yesterday. She was warned that it would hurt, and that she would probably cry. She was also told that even if she didn't want to, she would have to get the second ear pierced after the first one. She agreed and was VERY excited. Look how happy she is in the before picture.

Well, it hurt more than she thought it would, and she cried. She didn't wail or make a scene, she just hid her face and silently cried. We gave her a few minutes and then it was time for the second one. She was having no part of it. We encouraged, coaxed, bribed, and pleaded with her. Finally Karl and I just held her down. She was happy she had done it as soon as it was over. Here is the after. A great big smile with red, teary eyes.

She loves her new earrings!