Christmas Eve

I love having Christmas Eve at home now that we have a bigger family of our own. My poor mom had to work so my dad came and joined us. We always have fish, steak and alfredo for dinner. We decided to finally use my wedding china. I grew up always using china on special occasions like Thanksgiving and Christmas and loved it. (Actually when Jess and I got engaged I told him we needed to go register for a china set and he was like "Ya...OK!" He totally thought I was kidding.) So my china has been sitting in a cupboard for these past nine years. It was fun and nostalgic to use it. The kids did very well. Even with their goblets. Kameron had to use plastic- still don't trust him!

Isn't he so cute? Oh...Kameron too!

And of course we have to act out the nativity. Ellie of course plays the roll of Mary. Jess is always the donkey/camel. Kaden played everything else and Kameron just wreaked chaos where ever he went! But he sure is cute when he's doing it!

Kaden the shepherd.

Kaden the wiseman. Notice our camel is a little tired.

And then the kids open their pjs. Kaden finally realized this year that it's always pajamas. But they got to open an extra present this year....

inflatable beds! I thought this would be fun for them to sleep in on Christmas Eve. They actually turned out to be really handy. All the kids slept in Ellie's room. Even Kameron stayed in bed all night!

Christmas time is here

I decided to finally redo my tree this year. I was previously made up of mismatch ornaments and the ones the kids made from school. These ornaments have sentimental value but I wanted a nice tree for my front room. I've wanted to this for years. One more thing checked off my perpetual to do list!

Christmas isn't Christmas without sugar cookies. And not just any sugar cookies. They have to be Jesse's mom's recipe. They are amazing. And I don't even like sugar cookies. And of course the kids love to help!

Thanksgiving Bowling

We went bowling as a family the day before Thanksgiving. It's always good fun. Mom is always the loser. Even Ellie beats me. Kameron did his usual throw his fit on the floor. Doesn't matter if it's on the disgusting floor of the bowling alley.

Jesse is 31!

It's always hard for me to come up with good ideas for Jesse's birthday. He's kind of hard to shop for since all he really wants is computer stuff that he buys for himself anyway. So I was really excited this year when I got him tickets to the 2011 MAACO bowl in Las Vegas to see Boise State vs ASU. We went down with the Edwards. It was a very short trip. We were only gone for 40 hrs but loved every minute of it. Lots of driving, lots of laughs, lots of disagreements on the music we listened to. (Yes, Nick I am talking about your Five Finger Death Punch!) We went shopping on the strip when we got to Vegas, went to eat dinner and then went to the game. Of course Boise won in a blowout so we actually left in the third quarter because it was FrEeZiNg! We then woke up at 3am for the long drive home! Gotta love it! Happy Birthday Jess!

Since we left on Jesse's bday we celebrated with the kids at breakfast. Breakfast is Jesse's favorite meal anyway. I made him breakfast burritos and had his favorite orange juice. Pure Orange, of course. It's really the only orange juice worth drinking.

It was nice to get some last minute Christmas shopping done on the strip. I thought it would be semi nice weather. No- it was WiNdY and COLD.

The game had it all. Fireworks, fly by from jets. Pretty cool.

Kaden is 7!

I sent Kaden balloons at school for his birthday. When I went to go pick him up I sat there and waited... and waited. He was practically the last kid out of the building. I asked him if he liked his balloons and he got all quiet and said yes. Then he said "I don't like getting balloons at school because everyone touches them!" So I guess that's the last year I'll do that! Totally something Kaden would worry about!

And of course we made our usual trip to the Fun Zone for his bday! It isn't a birthday unless we visit the fun zone!

Here's a list of 7 things about Kaden:

1- He will only eat waffles, pancakes or french toast for breakfast.

2- He HATES reading but is a whiz at math.

3- He keeps his room very clean.

4- He packs the same thing for lunch every day of the year. Peanut butter sandwich, cheese stick, fruit snacks and water in his Batman water bottle.

5- He will do anything I ask him to do and he does it quickly. He is very obedient.

6- He doesn't like sports. They are too competitive and he is not aggressive at all. He goes to tumbling and he loves it and is very good at it. His teacher told him he does the best splits in the class!

7- He has a very tender heart. He tears up a lot just thinking about things that make him sad. For example, he got all teary eyed the other day when he thought about when Grandma Hiccup might die. He's a pretty sweet little guy!

Christmas 2011

Christmas morning!

I got Kameron this bear that plays peekaboo. He saw it on QVC and was playing peekaboo with it on TV. He was laughing pretty hard!

Ellie had been asking for a happy napper since the summer I think. She finally got one!

And Kaden finally got his dog! It's a shih tzu and he named her Fifi. He kept begging for one this summer and we were able to fight him off. Then he started asking again for Christmas and we caved. He's actually quite protective of her and will always take care of her when I need him to. When we went to Malad that day Jeramy was holding Fifi and she crawled up on his shoulder and fell asleep. Later Kaden told me not to let Jeramy hold his puppy anymore because he wasn't responsible enough- he just let her sit on his shoulder and she could have fallen off. We laughed at that one for a while. Let's just say Jeramy doesn't get a turn holding her anymore!

Halloween 2011

Jesse dressed up as a couch potato this year. I kept calling him my sweet potato. Isn't he cute? Once again I dressed up as Jen Wakley.

Instead of making the huge mess of carving our pumpkins this year I decided to paint them. It was so much easier and the kids loved it! We did our usual boys vs girls contest. They both turned out cute.

Kameron was a green dragon this year. He didn't mind his costume at all. At every door he would drop his candy in his bucket and then say "See ya!"

Ellie was a princess again this year. Rapunzel to be exact. Kaden was a hunter. He's pretty much been obsessed with hunting since he went with Jess. But I didn't mind because it was the easiest costume ever!

I thought this pic was funny! I think he just discovered his finger fits perfectly in his nose!