Christmas 2010

I love Christmas morning. I love being home with the boys, the jammies, the excitement, the yummy breakfast. Love it. The past 2 years we have invited Nani and Papa over for Christmas morning to watch the boys open gifts. This year they went a little crazy with the gifts and the boys got ponies (stuffed ones) that they can ride. It was fun to watch their excitement.

We had breakfast, opened gifts and spent the rest of the day watching them play with them. Perfect day.

Alex saw this cat piano in a catalog weeks before Christmas and when you asked what he wanted he kept this same answer. I found it at Target and the rest is history. I love the smile on Jared's face as he watches him open the ONE thing he wanted.

as is usually the case, he has hardly played with that :)

Eli's face in this picture is priceless

here is Eli reading the Bible pop-up books that I got from a lady at church at the Mom2Mom sale for $1

there are 4 of them and they are a HUGE hit

total investment $4

isn't that hysterical

Christmas evening we went to my sister Molly's house and had dessert and we had a great time.

This year we led up to Christmas by telling the boys that Jesus' Birthday was coming, was tomorrow, etc. So when I mentioned it to Eli on Christmas day he said "where is his cake?" (the boy will always find an angle for baked goods, not sure where he got that from) :) I said we would have dessert at Aunt Molly's.

When she got the pies out I mentioned that if they had a candle we could celebrate Jesus' Birthday. Uncle Jack found a princess candle and we sang Happy Birthday to Jesus. It was a sweet moment that I will not forget.

When I told Eli we were going to sing Happy Birthday to Jesus he said "Where is he?" and when we lit the candle Bella said "I will blow out the candles because Jesus doesn't know how".

I often in my life think of what must amuse Jesus as he delights in his children and I have to think that gave him a good chuckle!

Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve is always with Jared's side of the family

we attempted family pictures also

It was worth a try....

ahh, the upside to teenagers...they will actually stand still and look at the camera ;)

precious

Aunt Linda, the sweet soul who let us all invade her home :)

and last but not least

the belle of the ball :)

I cannot say enough about how fun it was to dress her in her red velvet dress and bloomers not to mention the hat with the bow. Hmmm, all the girly-ness. LOVE it!

Cookies 2010

I believe I have mentioned in years past that I am the worlds worst cookie decorator. THE WORST! I swore I would never again attempt sugar cookies however.....I have made an ammendment to that rule. I will now make sugar cookies when I have assistants. :) Amanda and Andrew, Nani and Papa all came over and helped decorate the tree and we made cookies.

I don't have pics of the finished product but they were pretty and delicious. It was my first time "baking" (refrigerated cookie dough) in my new kitchen. It was an adventure and all went well once I remembered how to use the oven. I definitely think this will have to be a yearly tradition.

I was feeling cocky due to the pretty cookies and attempted them again for the boys Cubby Christmas party. They did NOT look the same. I am definitely the problem. :) I am o.k. with that.

Heavenly Peace

My quiet house called to me this morning. I am spoiled in the mornings. My kids sleep until 8 or later. Jared leaves early and I am always struck with the decision to get up and enjoy a quiet house (something only a crazed Mom can appreciate) or roll over and enjoy a bit more sleep. When I have a newborn I almost always choose the latter. Addie will be 6 months on the 11th so I have been getting up a bit more and now that we are settled in our new home I am thoroughly enjoying my quiet mornings. I am in the kitchen looking out my sliding glass doors and enjoying the beauty of the snow. I would make it even more picturesque by turning on the fireplace but I didn't remember to ask Jared to open the flu flute flue and I choose not to attempt to doing anything fire related,, that I am not completely confident with, in our new home. (You're welcome, honey.)

I have lots of holiday pictures to share and lots to re-tell but that will all wait while I enjoy my quiet morning. We had a nice Christmas and I look forward to enjoying some time with Jared in the next few days. I will be back with pictures soon.

Merry Christmas (a bit late) and Happy New Year to all!

Snow Day

(Written Monday) Jared has a snow day today. We got a good amount of snow yesterday and the high today is 18. Jared actually has to go into work despite his "day off". Part of the reason is because he needs to take care of the snow at the school and then he plans to grade papers.

Below is the reason Jared rarely grades papers at home. This was his attempt last night. :)

My children do really wear pants sometimes. Eli hates too however and leaves them in the bathroom after almost every potty trip. Some days despite the cold I give up the fight. This was one of those days I guess. :)

We move this week. I cannot believe it. So much to be done.

Lots on my mind today

First of all I have things on my mind because I actually have TIME TO THINK. The boys "rest" time has turned into lengthy naps for the past 2 days!! It is making me thankful for these dreary, dark, cold days. (Talk to me in February and I will be singing a different tune.) It is also making me want to curl up in this warm cozy house and rock some bunny slippers like Miss Addie did this morning. I actually put them on to warm her cute little feet but she enjoyed looking at them which was a bonus.

For some reason today I am thinking about last Christmas. Jared and I thought we kept things really simple as far as gifts for the boys go. We started with the wooden train sets from Nani and Papa and that is as far as we got. When we even suggested that they open something else they cried. I love that. Well, I didn't love it when I wanted them to open gifts because I had this pre-conceived notion of what the day should be but once I chilled out I loved it. I love that as little boys they were saying, "this is enough". I hope this year we will succeed at keeping it simple.

The below picture was an outtake from pictures I took of Addie for our Christmas card. Yay, Christmas card-DONE!

The boys wanted in on the action. This is just such a classic sibling photo.

Had Girl's Night last night and had a lot of fun. We could not all be more different but we have such a blast when we are together and I literally spit out coffee laughing at these girls.

We may still close next week. AHHHHHH! I am excited because we are in such limbo. It is kind of a crazy time to be moving. We haven't put up a tree and the boys keep asking when we are going to. I think we are going to borrow a fake one this week and let them throw a few ornaments on it temporarily. We will see.

We had our home inspection today and we rocked it. Jared maintains our home so nicely. I am proud of him. We had 3 things on the list that are tiny. One for instance is label the circuit box (I think that is what it is called.) When we moved in we had a two page list of things to do just to give you an idea of what we were expecting. We are thrilled.

Anyways, life is crazy as usual and these are my thoughts for the day. Umm, I guess I should get packing! :)

Our THREE Kids!

Saturday night at church they sang a song that Jared and I had at our wedding. And after teasing him about whether or not he remembered the song I said "can you believe how much our lives have changed since we stood here for our wedding?"

Well these pictures are a testament to how much things have changed.

Alex, Eli and Addie

They have definitely changed our lives and although sometimes we'd like to have a break from these three they have only enriched our lives and marriage and for that I am feeling very thankful today.

9 lbs. 10 oz.

Preemie WHAAAAAAT? Yep our little 2 pounder is almost 10 lbs. granted she is almost 5 months old (on the 11th) but she's growing.

She is starting to smile a lot and laugh out loud. Needless to say we have had many a conversation and right now me and the boys chanting "Go Addie, Go Addie, Go Go
Go Addie" seems to be her favorite.

I am currenlty drooling over hairbows and beanies on etsy. Have I mentioned how ridiculously fun it is to dress a girl! AHHH. Love it.

Jared thinks this bow is a tad on the large side so I am looking for a compromise. :)

A Reminder for those in the Trenches

I needed to be reminded of this today. "The days (of parenting) are long, but the years pass quickly." I added "Be a good otward" (actually it says "steward" but now that I am looking at it I needed to re-write it. :)

When I was in the hospital and the boys would come visit, they had fans. The nurses LOVED them. Most of the nurses were about 10-15 yrs older than Jared and I and would tell us how much we need to love this time because they are going to grow up REALLY fast. Most of them were dealing with teenagers and planning graduation parties and adding a teen to their car insurance (warning: start saving now b/c this is apparently pretty expensive) or sending them off to college. They were kind of sad about how quickly the years had passed and wished that their sons still ran up to them and gave them giant bear hugs like mine did each visit. This has really stuck with me.

Right now the boys are a real challenge. Nap times are obsolete although we do have rest/quiet time it is not the same as getting a quiet break without trips to the potty and lots of questions that require my attention. Tantrums are back with a vengence and oh yeah, I have a soon to be 5 month old. Although, she seems to be the easy one she still needs to be fed and taken care of. :) My days are loooooooooooooooooooong but it won't be long before:

they won't BEG to go to Nani's with us to decorate the tree

(all of the ornaments were in one spot but we managed to only break one)

They won't always crawl into Daddy's lap and ask for a book to be read.

They won't always ask for you to color with them

They won't always stare in wonder at the first snowflakes of the season and want to go outside and catch them (only to want to come in 2 minutes later b/c they are cold).

They are never going to have their first laugh out loud moment like Addie girl had last night. So cute.

Their boo-boos won't always be healed by a kiss from Mom and Dad.

They won't always think that the coolest thing to do on the weekend is to build trains with Daddy or watch a movie with their parents.

I know these moments will be replaced with first dates and diplomas, etc., etc., and that will be exciting but it is ALL going to fly by too quickly and this is what sometimes gets me through a rough day, or week as the case may be.

So to my sweet children, you are driving me crazy but I am determined to love you through it and soak up every ounce of these, long but fleeting, days.

a "few" pics of addie

Addie is doing wonderfully and staying healthy despite the rest of the family's various colds and breathing issues. Thank you God. She didn't pass her hearing screen for the 3rd time but she does still have fluid. We will go back to the specialist on Jan. 11th and if she still has the fluid she'll have surgery to get rid of the fluid and then we can get a definite answer regarding her hearing. So we wait. That seems to be the theme in our lives right now. Wait.