December Fun

We love Christmas time so much!  There are so many fun things to do.  It is so fun to have activities to do every night.  One of our favorites was Christmas dancing, but I didn't get a picture of that.  We have treats and an activity most nights and I love it, but sometimes the girls get a bit out of control and start to demand a lot and it starts to stress me out a bit.  But we do love doing stuff.  I really want them to have great memories of Christmas.

 The girls got a special afternoon with Grandma.  She came up and spent the afternoon with them and made cookies and some ornaments and played games with her.  They loved it.  I loved it because I got to go and get my Christmas shopping mostly done.  It was really nice!

 Our ward has a breakfast for the kids and an adult dinner.  Both were great.  It was nice to get away with Kevin and have a nice dinner with some friends.  The three wise men came to the breakfast and then we got to go and get dressed up and take our picture with them. Although this was just two of them.  Russ wasn't really liking the headdress I had on and he was sad.

 It wouldn't be Christmas without frosting some sugar cookies.  I always make a lot because they are Kevy's favorite. And the girls love doing their own.

 Nellie always seems to make silly faces.

 The girls were having fun raking our leaves.  Our fall comes more in late November and December so there were lots to rake up.  It is nice still being able to go and play outside without freezing to death.

 Russ found this little golf cart and spent a good half hour dragging it around.  He loved it so much and has seemed to develop a love for golf.  He found one of the clubs and drags that with him all over the house all the time.  it is really cute and makes Kevy hopeful.

 Nellie was in her school performance of The Polar Express.  It was so cute.  She sang her heart out with the songs and she had one of the main reading parts too.  She did such an amazing job.  I was SO proud of her!

 Janie had her preschool performance and looked so pretty!  She was a cute little elf and did such a great job singing the songs.  The funny part was when Santa came and tried to shake all of the kids hands.  All the other kids were soo excited but when he came to Janie she refused and had the funniest look on her face like "uh no thanks, you kind of freak me out."  Afterward it took quite a bit of coaxing to get her to sit on Santa's lap. She only did it because Nellie wanted to get the candy cane and coloring book and made Jane go with her.

 She was like "hurry and take this picture so I can get down!"

 This year we saw this Gingerbread Train Kit and I decided it was a good change of pace.  I am glad I did because it was WAY easier to put together than the houses and much easier to frost too!  I hope they sell them again next year!

 The girls even got their own train piece to decorate too. We always love decorating stuff for Christmas!

Russ has become quite the climber and he wanted to join in on the train making. Such a silly monkey!

Decorations and Fires

This year since we went to Discovery Kingdom the day after Thanksgiving, we waited until the next day to decorate, which is one of the girls very favorite things to do.  Well that day Kevin planned on going and getting firewood for us.  We have a fireplace in this house and we LOVE having fires!  Well Nellie has turned out to be Kevin's little fire buddy.  It is really cute because if she thinks the fire is not up to par then she makes sure that Kevin knows and is taking care of it.  In fact one day they were upstairs watching a show and Kevin and I were down by the fire, and we heard a little voice from upstairs say "the fire isn't looking good.  You need to put more wood on the fire."     Nellie decided that she would rather go with Kevin and get firewood then to stay and decorate the house.  That is how much she loves fires. It was really cute to see her go with Kevin and be his buddy.  Russy is a bit of a fire guy himself. He loves the fires and we really have to keep our eye on that wild man.

 janie and Lizzy satyed and helped me decorate, in fact they did most of it themselves.  They had probably the most fun doing the village and Jane had to cram every single figurine onto it. We did however leave the tree for when Nellie and Kevin were back.

 Russ had a good time just relaxing and watching for the most part.  It is a bit crazy but he leaves the tree alone for the most part,  which is insane seeing how busy he is and how into everything he is.  But hey I will take it!

Look at these cute little people of mine!  They are such good, sweet kids!  Even if I feel on most days like I am going a bit crazy!

Thanksgiving and Holiday in the Park

We had a great Thanksgiving this year.  The food was great and it was really good to see Uncle Kimball who was visiting from London.  This is the only picture I got that day, Russ wasn't very happy about being pinned down.  Typical lately, he is SO busy and will not sit still for even a minute.

 The day after Thanksgiving, we decided to do something different than usual.  We have season passes for Discovery Kingdom, and they were doing a Season Pass holder appreciation day, so we decided to go down and have a fun day.  It was really fun too!

 This is what happens after one small candy cane.  He is so stinking cute!

 They had free cookies and hot chocolate for the season pass holders, so it was fun to go and have that, the cookies were really good but the hot cocoa was NOT!  The girls were not impressed.  I guess I have gotten them to used to having Stephens hot chocolate made with milk.  They said it tasted like brown hot water.  I love the way Janie is looking at her Dad in this picture!  So cute.

 There were lots of different things to do than usual, so that was really fun for the kids.  The park was really decorated for Christmas and the girls loved all the decor.

 I took Russ for his first ride on the carousel.  At first he wasn't very excited until it started moving and then he thought it was cool for a bit and then he was done and just wanted off.

 There were some Christmas Dancers who did a little show, that the girls really liked.  Lizzy turned to me during the performance and said "Isn't this so fun mom!"  I love her enthusiasm for everything.

 There even was a sledding hill with real snow, but the lines were way too long so the girls were okay with going and playing in the snow area.  It has been a few years since they have seen snow and they have sort of forgotten what it was like, so they were thrilled.  I am thrilled that they don't know what it is like.  I love not living in a snowy place.  Although there is a lot of snow pretty close by, we just need to take them to see it this winter.

Russy and Dad enjoying their popcorn.  Russ is really starting to get attached to Kevin,  it is really cute.

 This is Russ seeing the lights on the trees.  He was enthralled!  He couldn't stops saying "ooo, ooo"  over and over.  He still does it every time he sees even our lights on our tree.

We had a lot of fun going and if we stay here, we might have to make it a family tradition!  It sure beat trying to go Christmas shopping in all the crazy stores!

All About Lizzy-8 years

This is one of my favorite pictures of Lizzy.  She was so happy and proud to turn eight and get baptized.  I don't think I understood all about it the way that she did when I turned eight and was baptized.  She has set such a good example to me with her enthusiasm about the gospel.  She loves going to church so much.  And not just for the social aspect.  She loves to learn about Jesus and the gospel.  I love it!
Lizzy is such a special girl.  I knew from the first time I laid eyes on her that she was going to touch a lot of people with her light.  She is just so full of life and light.  It just radiates from her.
I was so very blessed to have her as my firstborn.  She is like my little sidekick and helper.  I can always count on her to help me with whatever I need.  A lot of the time she does more than her fair share of cleaning and picking up because she does such a good job and her sisters lack in that department.  She does get pretty bossy sometimes and I have to let her know that it isn't her job to discipline her siblings.
Lizzy is getting so grown up.  She has really gotten into music this last year. Every time we get in the car she tells me either to change the station or that she really likes this song and then she starts singing.  Its funny because if I want to listen to a song that I like that she doesn't she just acts like, :gosh mom I can't believe that you like this song!"  Her favorite artist is Taylor Swift and she gets so excited when she hears one of her songs on the radio.
I know I have mentioned it before, but Lizzy really has gotten into Harry Potter lately.  It is one of her favorite things and she wants a Harry Potter party and she wants Harry Potter stuff for Christmas. I think it is so funny that she loves it so much.
Another surprising thing about Lizzy is how much she loves basketball.  She asked for a basketball for her birthday and she takes it to school all the time and plays.  She told me that she played against some older boys and beat them. It doesn't surprise me,  Lizzy is the kind of kid that can do anything. She has a tremendous amount of self confidence and I really love that about her.  I never did, and I love that she doesn't struggle with poor feelings of self esteem.
Lizzy's favorite food is Hawaiian Haystack.  She gets so excited when I make it, but she is also the very best eater and eats everything and likes it.  She always knows how to make me feel good.  She always tells me "Mom it was AMAZING!"  So so sweet!
Lizzy really has developed a love for reading, which I love too.  She and I have started reading together, which was something I loved to do with my mom, so I am so glad that she likes to have me read chapter books to her.  The other girls are too young still to listen, but Lizzy and I have fun doing it.
I can't believe my Lizzy is 8!  I am so glad I was blessed with her sweet spirit to take care of.  I feel so lucky!  What an amazing girl she is and she brightens up our home so much!

Kevy and His Little Buddy

Contrary to what a lot of people might think, we are excited to be having another little girl.  She is the child that was sent to our family so of course we want and love her!  But with that said, how grateful I am that we had our little man!  I am so glad that Kevy will get to have a boy to do all the things that you really can't do with girls, like go to Priesthood session together and Father's and Sons and all that kind of stuff that girls can't do. 

 I love this picture of my two handsome men!

Kevy had to fix the sink one day and Russ was so interested in what he was doing.  I love it!  I hope that they can always share things together and do things together!  They sure do love each other now.  Russ loves when Daddy gets home and he loves to be with him whenever he is doing stuff.

Lizzy's Baptism Day

What a special day it was to celebrate Lizzy's baptism!  She was so very excited to get baptized!  It was a neat experience for Kevin to get to baptize his little girl too! We are so very proud that Lizzy wanted to take the next step and make that commitment.  She has been wanting it for a really long time, anytime any of her friends or cousins would get baptized she would get sad because she wanted to too.  

 Lizzy got scriptures for us for her baptism and she loved them so much.   She picked blue like her Daddy's scriptures.  It was cute because after she got them she spent a whole bunch of time just reading them.  She also asked us if we could start reading regular scriptures now rather than the scripture stories that we had been reading together as a family.  It is fun to have her and Nellie be able to participate in the reading.  Janie does too, she repeats it.

  She really did love them a lot.  In fact the other day she asked if she could take them to school and share them when she was the star student and they have to share something that is very special to them.  It makes me so happy that her scriptures are so special to her!

  I forgot to get a picture at the church, big surprise, so I made the girls stay in their dresses until Russ woke up from his nap to get a picture together.

We were glad that we could have some family come,  Grandma and Grandpa and Great Grandma Smith and Aunt Judy came to celebrate with us, along with some friends from our old ward. We had a nice meal afterwards, I made Lasagna because that is what Lizzy asked for.  It was a very special day!

Halloween

Halloween was fun this year.  Fun but busy.  I am glad I didn't think about making costumes this year.  Too much work! The Saturday before our ward was having their trunk or treat.  We took the kids even though our old ward was having it the same night and it was tempting to go over there, but we know that we need to get to know the people in our new ward.  It was fine but still hard because we don't know too many people still.  

 This was really the only good picture of Russell in his costume that I got.  We borrowed a golfer costume from my brother, and he looked so dang cute in it.  He didn't want to keep the hat on though.  I need to get him used to wearing hats.

 Russy the golfer, Lizzy as Hermoine, per her new obsession,  Janie was Rapunzel per her obsession and Nellie was a cowgirl.

 The night of Halloween I realized that we hadn't carved pumpkins, again!  What is my deal? This is at least the second year in a row that I have done this.  So we went to the grocery store and picked a few up, but the carving tools were lost in the move and so we had to do it with knives, which I do not recommend.  It is so much harder!  Janie had fun getting the guts out and  drawing on the outside.  Then I carved it for her.

 Nellie did the same, although she did a little bit of the carving  and she drew the pattern on the outside for me to do.

Lizzy was awesome and carved the whole thing herself.  It was nice because carving four pumpkins, making dinner and getting everyone ready to trick or treat was a lot of work!  

I was pretty exhausted that night. Luckily Kevy decided to stay home and clean up the mess I left, (What a great guy! ) while I took the kids out. We went with Lizzy's little friend from school and her mom, but they invited other people too and Lizzy felt left out.  Not to mention they were running from house to house and Janie was having a hard time keeping up with the big girls.  Next time maybe we will go by ourselves.

 Janie's wig was a disaster by the end of the night, but she looked really cute in it.  I tired really hard to get Janie to be Little Bo Peep because I have the cutest costume I made that both the other girls wore, but it was not what she wanted.  And I ultimately decided to let her have what she wanted,  I didn't want to force anything on her.  She really loved being Rapunzel.

 Nellie looks like she is in pain here.  She isnt though, just doing her silly smile.

Lizzy kept changing poses as I would take the pictures  But I only posted this one.  We did her hair in a bunch of little braids the night before so it would be kookily like Hermoine's is, and it looked so cute for school, but by nighttime it just looked sad.  We had a fun Halloween and look forward to next year.  Maybe I can get Jane to wear the Little Bo Peep and Anne can be the little sheep.  That would be cute!