Christmas Morning

Merry Christmas!

I absolutely loved Christmas this year, it was so fun having kids who are old enough for it to be magical. Grace was the best this year, she loved asking Santa for a guitar, she loved to drive around and see the lights. We have an advent calendar, it's Little People and tells the story of Jesus birth and each day she reminded me who's turn it was and eagerly moved the next piece. She was so excited whenever we saw Christmas tree's in stores. She was concerned Max didn't ask Santa for something and made sure we had something for all her aunts and cousins.

Max only opened one present early and it happened to be the present with socks in it, and he was a little pill with the tree for the first week. He loved seeing trees in the store and actually sat on Santa's lap without crying this year, a major plus! Grace kept saying she wanted a guitar so about mid December that's what he said he wanted too... but Christmas Eve he finally said he wanted a gun! (About 8pm Christmas Eve...) He still didn't get the idea behind most of Christmas, but he was pretty adorable ripping into his presents Christmas morning.

Santa did bring Grace the one thing she wanted, and she loved it! Her Grandpa Todd showed her how it worked and later in the day I asked her if I could show her something and she told me "Grandpa read me the constructions, I know how to do it." She is pretty good I must say! And she already has the rocker "Christmas morning" hair do going on. Grace also got a camera, a Belle dress, a giant chalk board, an outfit and some new pink boots. She got a Barbie and horse from Grandma Kate & Grandpa Guy and a puppy Pillow Pet & blanket from Grandpa Todd & Grandma Ruth, not to mention lots of fun presents from her aunts, uncles and cousins! Spoiled!

Max got his gun he asked for late Christmas Eve, good thing Santa plans ahead! He carries it everywhere, sleeps with it and begged to bring it to church on Sunday. He needs a little help holding it right, but I don't correct him, I think its cute when he holds it upside down and is so serious about shooting the TV... He reminds me of Ralphie Christmas night sleeping with his precious gun, it's pretty much the cutest thing ever.

Max also got a remote control Lighting McQueen, a Thomas the train set, a tool box and a bucket of soldiers, or as Max calls them "little mans", which he totes around constantly also...and if you ever find them lurking in your house after we've visited, you can bet they followed Max because I find them everywhere! Max got a giant talking dinosaur from Grandpa and Grandpa McBride and a Panda Pillow Pet and blanket from Grandpa and Grandma Tyler, and of course he got spoiled by his aunts and uncles too!

There are a few things I'm going to miss... and they aren't very Christmas spirited, but I'll admit I've loved getting Grace to mind, be kind and pick up her room by telling her Santa and his elves are watching and she might not get her guitar if she isn't good... And, I went and bought all new decorations for my tree last night and I can't wait to put them up next year! Hows that for wishing away a whole year? My ornaments were given to me when I was first married, and we've had them for 6 years now, so I'm ready for something different, but I wouldn't pay full price for them - but I got $50 bucks of ornaments for $17! They won't match any of my other decorations now, but I'm ready for a change!

Christmas Dance Show

Grace's dance class preformed the Nutcracker for their in Class Christmas Show. It was for parents only and it was the girl's first dance performance.

Grace says she likes dance class, but every week when I pick her up her teacher Miss Jenna says she doesn't pay attention, she talks non stop and has a hard time following directions...So, I wasn't sure what to be prepared for. BUT- Grace did really well! She wasn't the best in the class, but she pretty much did what the other girls did and there were a couple girls who couldn't stop crying and didn't dance at all.

I'm not exactly sure what this pose is, but I laugh so hard every time I see it!

There are 8 or 9 girls in her age group.

I was surprised how many costume changes they had for a 3 year old, but they were really cute.

After the girls were finished they exchanged a small gift, it was funny because they all wanted to open the gift they brought, they had no idea what exchange a gift with someone meant. The dance last about 8 minutes and Grace was smiling and dancing the whole time, success!

Zoo Lights

We took the kids to Zoo lights this year at Hogle Zoo. The lights were really cool, but you couldn't see hardly any animals. I thought we'd at least be able to see 1/2 of them- so I was disappointed. My two cents worth says it was a lot of money to see lights that we could have seen for free other places. The kids had fun, but they kept asking to see more animals. We even got a member discount and I still think we got robbed.The peacock and the alligator were our favorite.The kids chased this cat in the reptile house back and forth for a long time, they giggled and screamed- it was really cute. The reindeer brought Santa too, however the wait to see the big guy was 45 minutes, and the line started outside, I said lets just look at the reindeer...

It wasn't too cold and the lights were cool to look at, once ;)

Christmas Card Pics...

If I were smart and had a scanner I'd post our actual card - but I don't, so here's some of the pictures we had taken for our Christmas card... many thanks go to my sister for taking the pics, my mom for providing the studio (aka decorated living room) and my children for staying clean through church and an hour car ride!

My seriously handsome Max, who nearly always sports some sort of scratch, bump or bruise.
My smart, sassy and spirited daughter Grace who makes it a goal to complicate every photo!

Mike and I, 6 Christmas's and counting!

And a few of the family pictures - I think at least one of us is spastic in every one...but aren't we in life too?

Gingerbread Houses

Each year we look forward to decorating gingerbread houses with Mike's family - I'm going to be honest, I'm not the best at letting my little helpers help me, but I want to use it as a decoration.... Grace was a total ham the whole time, she made faces, danced, sang and decorated a little gingerbread man and tree, but mostly - she ate candy!

Cousins Tylor and Travis -

Sleepy daddy...

Daisy and Beth

My, I mean our finished house... I had to get to work so I didn't get any decorations on the windows.... oh well...

Tylor & Travis's and my house with Caitlin's in the background -

I'm so thankful for traditions and family to do them with!

Layton City Lights

I wish I knew how to take pictures in the dark.... Needless to say I don't.

Layton City fills their park with lighted animals and other fictional characters each year - they have Christmas music playing and you can drive around the park or walk through the grounds. It was nice not being too cold this year, and very little snow on the ground was a major plus!

I asked the kids what their favorite animal was and they both said dinosaur, but now Grace says the mermaid. Its so nice that there are free activities all around us to keep us busy during Christmas time ;).

Grace had to wear my scarf...which ended up caked in mud, of course... Good thing for washing machines!

Trick-or-Treating in the rain

Aren't these the cutest kids around? We had such a busy Halloween and it feels like we haven't stopped! I had to work so Mike picked me up at 4pm and then we ran to Hyrum. The kids got to Trick-or-Treat with their cousins for an hour, 1/2 of it in the rain and they didn't care at all!

Actually Max was content after he got a few pieces of candy and wanted to sit down and eat his suckers.

Then we went to my moms and had a bowl of chili. It's a tradition that I hope we will always do, what could be more warming than a hot bowl of chili after freezing your butt off?

Then we drove to Kaysville and Trick-or-Treated with Mikes family for about an hour, and then we finished off in Layton to a few people in the ward. The kids could have kept going and Grace was a girl after my own heart, "Just one more house mom!" "but we have to go there mom!"

We love that our families are close enough we can do fun things with them!

Max's 2nd surgery

A few weeks ago Max started screaming hysterically in the middle of the night. I knew right away he had an ear infection, and a trip to wee care confirmed it. The doctor said he could see the tube from May 2009 sitting in the canal, but it had fallen out of place and with Max's ear infection history he recommended taking him to an ENT to have new tubes placed in his ears. Then he checked his tonsils and said they were huge and red.

I made an appointment with a doctor a lady I work with took her kids too, and when I got there I was surprised - he was so old, and his exam room looked like something from the 60's or 70's. He started by saying he didn't take tonsils on a 2 year old because they were too hard to convince to drink and then he checked and said he'd get us in the next day. Max's tonsils were so big he wasn't sure how he was breathing.

It all happened so fast, and I was nervous- I wasn't nervous when he had his first surgery, but the doctor freaked me out. My sister said she was home within 2-3 hours with each of her kids so that's what we were hoping for- but Max didn't come out of surgery so good. He screamed and flailed around for 2 1/2 hours and we ended up being there for almost 9 hours. The doctor also told us that the left ear's hole from previous tube hadn't resealed itself and was too big to put in a new tube, but the hole was acting like a vent so he felt Max wouldn't have too much trouble and when he's older he'll need surgery to close off the hole.

The night we brought him home we had a meeting scheduled with the bishop, when I opened the door I was obviously exhausted- the bishop asked if I forgot he was coming and I said no, but be fast. Max didn't move from Mike's lap until after the prayer and then he perked up a little bit- He did pretty good overall all, mostly just wanting to be held. He didn't want Popsicles or ice cream but loved chicken noodle soup and mashed potato's.

I'm so glad to have it over with, and even more happy he's back to his cute, happy, mischievous self!

Halloween Costumes

I wanted to get a few good pictures of the kids in their Halloween costumes so we headed to the park one warm fall day. (Remember when we had warm, fall days?)

Grace was a dalmatian and Max was a lion.

I'm sure the Kaysville parks and rec department wanted to shoot me for letting my kids play in their recently raked leaves... but they sure did have fun!