Merry Christmas!

Avery funnies

About a week and a half ago we were at Wal-Mart doing some shopping. One of the aisles was particularly crowded so Andy went to get what wee needed and the boys and I waited at the end of the aisle. After a few seconds Avery, very seriously proceeded to point at every man that walked by and ask very loudly "Is that my daddy?"...over and over and over again.
I tried distracting him by talking about something else, but he wouldn't give up asking. I've honestly never been embarrassed by anything he's said before. And I've never been more relieved to see Andy walking towards the cart before either!
Kids...


And just this evening Avery was drinking some juice, after drinking half his glass he handed it to me and said "I don't like this juice!"
Seriously, it took him that long to realize it?!

We love Avery and all the funny things he does. I can't believe he's 2 1/2. Time has gone so fast!

babies in the family

We make 'em cute, and sometimes chubby too! :)

Rachel, and Keenan (3 months)

Jack (5 months)

Joshua, and Jonah (3 months)

Mini Christmas update

Why does blogging during busy times seem so overwhelming!?

So, this will me short.

Christmas was good, people got sick, the food was good, yesterday was in the 60's and today is iced/snowed, we're having a ton of fun running around like chicken's with our heads cut off trying to see all the family, and now our van works. Good enough? :)

Here are some pictures.

Road trip/arrival




Christmas Eve




Christmas Morning


Andy and Josh trying out Andy's new Wii Star Wars game, complete with Wii light sabers! :)

End of Semester/Trip to MO/AnniversaryETC

So, vacation time has finally come for us. I finished my last final on Thursday, and Kizzie finally finished her big Christmas enrichment activity, which meant that we were free to leave! Yippy.

We left Friday morning at about 3:00 AM and drove straight through to Missouri. With stops (those dang kids always want clean diapers, food, and the like... time wasters!) we coasted in to Hamilton, MO in about 17 hours. It was a long day, but went really well. We beat much of this bad weather (trust, me, I didn't leave at 3:00 AM for fun or because I have otherwise been oversleeping over the course of the semester), and the boys we pretty pleasant until just before we arrived (thanks to Jon's car dvd player we borrowed, and my IPOD). That helped time go pretty well. The car survived well, except for the fact that the thing that shoots the wiper fluid seems to be either frozen or broken.

Since we've been here in MO, our luck hasn't been quite so good. On Saturday, as Kizzie was driving to her parents' house, the van was overheating. When we arrived we found that it was pretty much bone dry of antifreeze, so we gave it a drink. On Sunday, on the way to church, we heard a loud pop followed by smoke gushing from under the hood. Luckily we had some blankets in our van (because it was something like 2 degrees with -10 wind chill - in other words, it was cold!), and were able to snuggle up until my brother Steve came to rescue us. It turns out that a radiator hose pretty well exploded. With the assistance of Kizzie's brother (I must emphasize yet again that I have no practical skills), the hose was replaced, and our lovely van is back in action.

Sunday was our 4th anniversary (congratulations to us), so we left the boys with family and went out to dinner on Monday night. We drove our newly repaired van to Chillicothe to go to Applebees. Unfortunately for us, our heat did not work (did I mention how ridiculously cold it is?) on the 25 minute drive. We got to the restaraunt and ordered our food, including our favorite (the appetizer sampler). We waited and waited... no appetizer sampler. Finally, a waitress came and brought us our main dishes. We reminded her of our appetizer and she said she'd take care of it. We began eating our food to discover that it was luke-warm at best. The Manager came out to bring us our appetizer a little while later and told us that it would be no charge, and asked how the rest of our food was. We told her that it was cold and she said that there would be no charge for the whole meal. Woohoo! With what we would have paid for tip (the waitress did nothing... as evidenced by our lack of appetizer... and water... etc...) and everything, that saved us about $40! That a rare warm spot in a very cold weekend.

Anyway... this is only the beginning. I'm sure there was be more tails of car repair... and coldness in the near future.
Merry Christmas everyone!
Andy

Santa

Last night we took the took the boys to see Santa at the mall. I was a bit nervous that Avery would freak a little bit (like last year), since he seems to be afraid of everything. Not joking, more about that later. When we went to Andy's school Christmas party Avery refused to even be on the same side of the room as Santa, so this was at least a step in the right direction.

Jack wasn't scared, but he certainly wasn't terribly interested in Santa, I think he was looking more at the Christmas decor all around. Avery didn't want to sit on Santa's lap, but at least he didn't cry. And I'm so glad they let us take our own pictures every year. 14.99 for one 5x7...yeah right!We walked around for a bit, got some Sub Zero ice cream (yum!) and then decided to let Avery ride one of those cars they always have at malls. My kids happiness is worth at least 2 quarters!
What kid doesn't beg their parents for a ride every time they see one, right?

Not ours that's for sure. As soon as it turned on he freaked out. He was so scared of the moving car he was shaking!! And then he talked about not wanting to ride the car, all the way home. When he saw the pictures a few minutes ago he started talking about it again. He tends to obsess about things.
He's pretty much afraid of everything. How did that happen?! He still talks about a mask his cousin Caleb put on a few months ago and is nervous to go near the scene of "the crime" still.
We sure hope he grows out of this "phase" soon.

Last night was fun though, and the scene at the little car just adds to the excitement of going out with a 2 1/2 year old!

A Sunday evening at our house

Our evening was nice. We hung out and watched Mr. Krueger's Christmas, the boys "played" with each other (interpretation: Avery moved Jack around, which usually makes him laugh; Avery played while Jack watched), and Avery sat still for longer than 10 minutes!
We love the weekend! It's Monday's that are a real bummer!

Thank goodness we are leaving town a the end of the week and getting a nice long break from work (for Andy, and maybe me if I'm lucky some days! :) ) and get to spend lots of time with family back home for a couple weeks! We're praying for good weather!

Avery is so done having pictures taken...but Jack looks SO cute! Too bad I couldn't get the Avery of the previous picture and Jack of the next picture to happen at the same time! how cute would that have been!?

Sneaky

Remember the post about our Christmas Candy Making weekend? Well Avery discovered that we keep it all in the fridge. He can open the fridge. Not a good combination. He has eaten more candy by way of thievery in the last 2 weeks than is good for him!

I have been keeping a close eye on him, so he doesn't actually snitch them while I'm near, but as soon as I go upstairs for a minute, answer the phone, open the front door, or anything that takes less than 30 seconds he's got his mouth full of some yummy chocolate treat. Ah, the joys of a 2 1/2 year old...

(yes, these pictures are from 2 different days...I am not exaggerating about his craziness...!)

Avery's Thankful list

This morning Avery and I were reading some old Friend magazines. One of them had a little Matt & Mandy (the children who haven't aged in 10 years, at least!) cartoon strip about being Thankful. So we read it and then I asked Avery what he is thankful for, after being met with a blank stare I told him something like
"being thankful for something means we're happy when something happens or when we have something."
Then I asked him again what he was Thankful for and this is what he said -

"Jack! I'm thankful for President Monson. I'm thankful for my Daddy."

Then he was distracted by a rubber band he flung into the tree yesterday. He was so overjoyed with thankfulness for his long lost rubber band he left to play with it.

But seriously, this was one of the best "mom moments" I've ever had. I'm so thankful for Avery, and how fun he is. I have so much fun helping him learn things, and this one was so much more rewarding than teaching him letters! He probably wont remember it in 5 minutes, but I sure will!

Sweet boys

I just think they're so sweet. They love playing together, or rather Avery loves playing with Jack (i.e. moving his arms around, trying to carry him across the room, bouncing toys off his head, etc), and Jack loves to watch whatever Avery is doing. It's fun to see them interact with each other.

Christmas lights

A few days ago we drove up to Salt Lake to visit with my Great Uncle Jack (Baby Jack is named after him), it was a nice visit even though Avery was crazy. There were so many things he wanted to play with, that were most definitely not toys! So we only stayed for about an hour, but we had a good time visiting.

After we left his house we headed over to Temple Square to show the boys the lights. We went last year too, so there's really not much new to see, but Avery likes it and it's fun to walk around and see the pretty lights.
And this year was much nicer outside, I remember it being really cold walking around last year.
Jack pretty much slept through the whole thing, but he sure looked cute.

Half way through our walk we stopped at the Nauvoo Cafe in the Joseph Smith Memorial building for a cup of cocoa and a cinnamon roll, both were tasty, and helped us warm up a bit for the rest of our walk.

Something that bugs me...

Holiday cards...Happy Holidays...Holiday parties...blah!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!! Seriously folks. It's Christmas. Just say it.

Falalala Lifetime

So, I love Christmas time a lot. There is so much fun stuff to do with the family, not to mention all of the delightful food and treats (see previous two posts by Kizzie). However, one thing I loathe about this time of year is the bevy of horrible movies! No channel seems worse in this area than the woman-centered Lifetime Network (with this year's holiday tagline "Falalala Lifetime"). Last year I was disgusted by such movies as "A New Dad For Christmas", "A New Mom For Christmas","A Grandpa For Christmas," "A New Sister For Christmas", or "A New Adopted Turkish Son for Christmas." Ok... I made that last one up... but there were seriously a ton of "A New........ For Christmas" type movies. They make me want to vomit.
Obviously, this problem is easily solved by simply avoiding the Lifetime Network. In reality... not so easy with a wife who seems addicted to these movies. More than once in the last couple days have I caught her not only watching these movies, but setting future movies to record on our DVR. I can understand her being bored, flipping through the channels, and being sucked in by one of these ever so cleverly titled movies. However, going out of her way to find and record such things? That's premeditated pain for her loving husband! I think that she may even find the movies, mentally rate the amount of anguish they would cause me, then make her final selections.
Do they even make man Christmas movies? How about "A Jack Bauer Christmas" or "Chuck Norris Slays Santa" (clever huh? - Networks... I have lots of ideas, give me a call). If nothing else, such movies might provide a nice change of pace from all of the sappy, vomitous, and otherwise repulsive selections. Until things improve, I suppose that I'll just endure it the best that I can, and hope that Kizzie has mercy on me. Keep your fingers crossed for me!

mmmmm....

Andy and I made candy this weekend. Yum!

We dipped pretzels in chocolate, made Snicker's Fudge, English Toffee, and Cookie Dough Truffles.




The "helpers", staying quiet and happy was the best way for them to help!
He was reaching for candy...



Look at those lashes!! I know I'm jealous!

Homemade Christmas

I've been trying to make more gifts this year for Christmas. So after seeing a friends felt food that she made I decided I had to try it. I found felt on sale this week so I started these earlier this week and sewed the last stitch on the last cookie about 15 minutes ago.
I think they turned out great, especially since I'd never done it before, I had to learn 3 stitches and didn't use any patterns.

The only problem will be not giving them to him early!!! I'm SO bad at keeping gifts secret, Andy's last birthday I think I actually talked him into opening his presents from me a couple days early. I can't stand it!
Anyway...here's what I made. Breakfast (bacon, eggs, pancakes), lunch (sandwich makings, bread, cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, lunch meat and chips), and cookies.

Turkey Day '08

The pilgrims and the Indians

had a pow-wow a long time ago.

The pilgrims and the Indians
felt like having a party and so.
The pilgrims and the Indians
cooked a turkey and Indian corn.
Sat down and ate together,
and that is how Thanksgiving was born.

This thanksgiving was our first year to make a turkey, and have dinner at our house. The group wasn't big, it was just our little family and our friends, Jordan and Amelia and their boys, but we had good food and fun hanging out.We had stuffing, mashed potatoes (not from a box, impressed?), gravy, jello, cranberry sauce jello stuff, green bean casserole, 2 kinds of yams and rolls. And the turkey of course. Pretty much writing this makes me hungry. Good thing there are leftovers.

I felt so grown up hosting Thanksgiving at our house! We even set up folding tables in the living room, just like at home. It was a lot of fun.

After we ate and got the downstairs spiffed up a bit (Thanks to Andy and Jordan for cleaning up dinner!) we let the little boys play up stairs in Avery's room...and this is what we found. But, they were having fun, so we cleaned it up later.




Later in the evening we went over to Jordan and Amelia's and had the pie portion of our feast. I love pie. There was apple pie, some chocolate chip pie, coconut cream pie, chocolate cream and razzle berry pie (Thank you Marie Calender for some of those!). I felt at least 10 pounds heavier by the time I went to bed last night!!

Here's a short list of things I'm thankful for....
Andy and the boys
Our house
Running vehicles
Good medical insurance
Doctors who know what they're doing
phones, email, blogs, anything that helps me
keep in touch with family and friends that live far away
footed jammies, they look so cute on my baby
D.I., who doesn't love it?!
Friends who like the same things we do
bed time
falling gas prices
Boys who sleep through the night
peppermint ice cream
we get to go home for Christmas!
Andy, again. He's pretty great to me!

And this is what we're doing this weekend....we love Christmas!