Merry Christmas

We drove to Denver for Thanksgiving. The ride there was great, but coming home there was tons of snow! But we made it. Grandpa Whiting gave Lincoln some deer horns that he uses as a hat rack. We love them.
We enjoyed visiting with everyone and had yummy food.

We love this smile on Dallin's face. It has been so fun decorating for Christmas and looking at lights and making treats (not that I don't make treats all the time anyway) but now I feel like "oh it's for Christmas". The kids are doing the usual sorting presents into their piles and saying, "hey, Lincoln has more than me!" in a grumpy voice. Then I remind them of all that we do have and how blessed we are!

Always something fun

Is this a common thing for kids to pull all the toilet paper off of the roll? I know my other 3 have.

The girls put on a "blueberry & strawberry" ballerina show for us.The boys had fun watching.

Throughout this year I have been putting together a family photobook. I love it. There is a great page with all the pictures of Anna sleeping. I don't even plan these--they just happen so I have to take a picture.

Todd and I at the Springs Preserve.

Dressing up

Every year for Halloween we pull out our wigs, Todd wears his polyester pants and I wear my pink ones (sorry there's no full body shot for this pic) I love these different hair styles I get to try. We had our Ward party last night. It was fun. Dallin wouldn't stop crying for almost the first hour. It was crazy. Maybe he was scared of us, I don't know.This one is before we had any kids in our BYU basement apartment.

School Fall Festival!!! The kids each got a goldfish. They are still alive. We put them in a punch bowl on our kitchen table. Kaylee named hers Goldie (I wonder how many other fish from the Fall Festival got named Goldie?)

Kaylee and I enjoyed our Beauty and the Beast play.

Happy 32nd Birthday Todd. We love you lots! Thanks for being a super daddy and husband.

Visiting the farm

There's a little farm down the road with some fun animals at it. We love when Dallin squats. Anna wore a bunch of brown eye shadow that day.

This one's for you honey!! I love you. You are definitely blogworthy.

Birthday party weekend

Kaylee just turned 7. We're going to a Beauty and the Beast play together next week. She looks very cute in her new shirt- the long sleeves were perfect for how cold it has been! She's having lots of fun with her new webkinz on the computer.
In the evening we watched Princess Diaries 2. It was so fun. Anna fell asleep early though while I was finishing my sweet pinata.I made a spider pinata (just put paper mache over a balloon)! Todd thought I should buy one at the store. No way--growing up my family always made our own for the 4th of July. It was unique! My cool brother Jeff and his totally cool and cute wife Nichole came for the weekend. We carved pumpkins. The kids totally love playing with them. Anna wanted Jeff to do everything for her. I loved having someone to play games with- Bohnanza and Pirates Cove. We made some good memories.

Dallin's getting to be a big boy now.

Happy 5th birthday Lincoln

For Lincoln's Bday we went to the new park by the Butterfly park and had pizza.
Todd had fun shopping for Lincoln at Bass Pro Shop and got him a cool suction dart gun. Lincoln totally LOVES it.

Balloonapalooza

So have all you in Las Vegas heard about Balloonapalooza? We thought we'd check it out this year. Lamo. It's free to get in, just 5$ for parking, and we parked across the street for free so that was sweet. I'm not into spending 4$ dollars for a carnival ride so we walked around a little, and I guess maybe because it was windy that's why I didn't see any hot air balloons-- anyway we took them to the 99 cent store instead and it was fun. Then had rootbeer floats at home (except I really thought we had rootbeer but didn't so we just had ice cream). Anna is just fun to take pictures of.

Quote from Lincoln "I like tripping Dallin"

Quote of the day from Kaylee: "When can we get a maid for my room?"Anna falls asleep on the couch alot. She was all sweaty, and there's a bead of sweat hanging off her nose.

Love those big brown eyes

The kids love to get a hold of the camera and I'll find surprise pictures from them.

Anna loves her preschool class. She wanted to bring a lunch with her just like Kaylee does.
Lincoln also really likes preschool. Almost as much as playing Sorry with mommy, baseball with daddy, and watching tv.
It's exciting for me to see how Kaylee is reading and learning. She has an elective class called Young Scientists.

My trip to CT and school's here

Kaylee looks so grown up in this picture. She's loving 1st grade.I went to visit my sister Wendy, her husband Adrian and their new baby Scarlett in Conneticut. Mom, Dad, Amy and Kevin came too. We went to the beach, to tour a mansion in Newport, RI and on an adventure in New York. The baby blessing on Sunday was wonderful. We totally got lost in Central Park. We were so tired and had to keep asking people how to get back to 73rd E where we parked. Dad asked a guy who was digging for food in the dumpster which we thought was funny. We didn't bring Dallin's stroller so we were carrying him alot. He was good though and finally fell asleep. Kaylee thought it was amazing that I was in the same place as Giselle in Enchanted.
This is how I find Anna most afternoons.

31

So I turned 31 and got my hair highlighted. It's fun. I'm so thankful for my family.

Today Cafe Rio opens about 8 minutes from our house. I told the kids if they're good today we can go, but you know even if they're little stinkers we'll still go.

Dallin is so adorable to watch walk

More fun Yakima stuff

Dallin took his first steps in yakima, and now at almost 15 months he's finally walking!

At grandma's house Anna told me there was a fly upstairs so she got the fly swatter down by herself, went back upstairs and then came down with a fly on it. Wow!
We enjoyed a day at the Yakima Family Fun Center miniature golfing.
Anna turned 3. Todd got her these fake earings that lasted long enough for a picture.