Christmas Festivites

It was another super christmas season this year. We didn't do as many activites as we sometimes do, but I know my limitations right now and I just couldn't over do it. I still felt like we had a good time and we tried to do Christmassy things every night.I am always itching to get the Christmas decorations up every year and it is so hard to wait until after thanksgiving, but I always do. The funny thing is how excited I am to get them up and then the day after Christmas I am just as excited to get the dang things down. It's one of those funny things in life I guess.

 

Annie was actually really good and hardly touched the ornaments after we put them on the tree, which really surprised me! But she did have fun helping us decorate.

 

We had a great time going to the Roseville Christmas tree lighting this year. Last year we went and it was so darn cold that we didn't really stay. This year was such a perfect night, we stayed for quite a while and had a really good time.

We didn't quite make it in time for the actually tree lighting but that's ok. We still got a picture by the tree, even if it wasn't a great one, we were all in it at least.

There was cookie decorating and Anne really enjoyed the eating part of it.

 

The girls got to write some letters to Santa.

and the girls got to make fun little hats. Russ wasn't interested in the hat making so he and Kevy went over and checked out the SWAT truck that was there.

I actually took about ten pictures of these little rascals thinking that surely one of them would turn out but it was a no-go. This was the best I could find.

One of the families in our ward put together a little family home evening going and seeing some lights together. One great thing about living where it is warmer is that we can do stuff like this without being totally miserable. We walked around this fun decorated neighborhood and then hung out with all the families after and had cookies. It was a lot of fun!

From this picture it doesn't really look like Anne and Jane had much fun, but they actually really did! Annie LOVED the lights this year so much, it was really the cutest thing ever. Every single time she would see lights she would say "woah!!" Over and over. I seriously could not get enough of it.

 

This picture is not that great but it was the cutest thing. One of our favorite things to do during the Christmas season is to do dancing at night. The kids really love it and it is a tradition that I have from my childhood that I love sharing now with my children. They decided to make a train and Annie was the leader. It really was so dang cute. I really love seeing my little kids together.

I had some serious helpers making sugar cookies. We had a lot of fun though. It really makes everything harder and longer but also so much better when I do things with my little kiddos.

The kids had fun with the decorating of the cookies for Santa. It's a fun tradition that we started that we will defintely have to continue.

 

I wish I had a better picture of this little monkey. She is such a dolly, but that's what happens when you take pictures with a crappy phone.

We had such a great time this year celebrating the season together. It really seems to get more and more fun every year. I love being a mom!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

McKay and Kelsey's Wedding

It was so fun to take a trip to Utah with the kids to see family. Ok maybe the trip itself with my crazies isn't the most fun, but actually I shouldn't complain they do so well traveling that long of a distance. We always seem to make great time because we only stop twice. This may seem harsh with such young children, but if we stopped more it would take forever. Everytime we do stop ends up being a half hour minimum.

It was great to go though to celebrate McKay and Kelsey getting married. They are so great together it makes me so happy when I see people find eachother that are meant to be together like them. Especially because I know how amazing a great marriage can be and I want that for everyone!

The wedding was so beautiful and it was fun to get to take the kids to temple square. It was a bit cold for us California wimps, but it could have been much worse I'm sure! We got a lot of fun pictures at the temple because we were standing around waiting for a while, but of course I didn't get very many more pictures on the trip.

Me and my love. I sure love this guy so much!

I love this one of my two guys!

Janie wanted one with her daddy too!!

 

I love these pictures of the girls with their Price buddies who are their age, so cute!

The happy couple with all the grandkids that came. Annie wasn't there because we figured it would be a nightmare if she didn't get a nap.

A picture of the sisters, which was fun to get. Crazy that I am the tallest!

Love these kids so much!!!

Annie was kind of a stinker and really out of control at the reception. I was kind of wishing that I had just left her with Kevin's sister Kelli the whole time because she was so wild and wouldn't stay with us at our table. She kept going up onto the little stage and messing around by the piano. It was a long evening of wrestling little ones, because Russ wasn't much better.

We still had a great time being with family and spending time together. I love being part of a big family even with all the drama and I am glad that my kids will have the same experience as me. Big families are the best!

 

 

Halloween

This year I really wasn't interested in spending the money to buy new costumes for all the kids, it gets so expensive!! So I knew we had all these costumes that would fit the kids and I thought it was perfect that all the girls were insects! Russy wanted to be Spider-Man, and my sister Chanelle was nice enough to send him an old costume of her boys for Russ to wear. The day of Halloween ended up being really rainy so we decided the buzz light year costume would be better and Russ was really excited about that. Luckily though it stopped raining for the time that we went trick or treating. It really couldn't have been more perfect

Annie was our little ladybug. She even kept the antennae on the whole time!

Janie was a butterfly

Russy was such a cute Buzz!

Lizzy was also a butterfly, we were given an old dance costume that just fit Lizzy perfectly. It couldn't have turned out better!

Nellie was a bumblebee.

The kids and Kevy made some pretty cute pumpkins! It was a great Halloween! It couldn't have been any better!

 

 

All About Lizzy-10 years

It is so hard to believe that my Lizzy is in double digits. This last year she has grown up so much! She has always been such a good helper to me, but she has increased that 10 fold lately. She is getting so good at being a big sister and helping with the little ones, even if she does get a little bossy at times. That is her job as the older sister right? She has gotten so good with Anne especially and Annie has started to just love her and wants to go to her all the time. She is going to be the best helper with Clara.

Lizzy is now in the fourth grade and doing just as good as usual in school. It is fun to see her learning things and telling me about them. It is so fun to have a little buddy to talk to about things. One thing about Lizzy is that she really doesn't have the whole attitude thing like a lot of girls start getting at this age. She is always so willing to help and be happy and try to do what is right. If she ever does start to get an attitude, I just let her know that she is doing that and she will start apologizing about it.

Lizzy has always been the very best eater. One of her favorite foods is salads and she actually likes to pack them in her lunch quite regularly. She actually has very adult tastes and likes pretty much everything that little kids doesn't usually like. She will tell me that whatever food I made for dinner is so great and her fourth favorite, or something like that. She enjoys helping me in the kitchen and is really starting to get good at helping there.

One of the most speical things about Lizzy is that she has the very best attitude. When something disappointing happens she does so well with being ok with it. I think sometimes even better than I do. We forgot to sign up in time for her to do the school play and so she didn't get to be in it. She was amazing and just said, "That's okay Mom!" I was seriously so blown away. She is such a good example to me!

This past school year she has started taking sewing lessons from her Grandma and I love how much she looks forward to it. She is a natural too, I am truly amazed at how well she is sewing so early on.

Lizzy is just such an amazing girl. She is my little right hand. I know that Heavenly Father sent her to me because he knew how much I would need her. I am so grateful to have her as my daughter!!

 

Lizzy is Ten!!

I can't believe that my big girl turned ten! Time flies! It was a year for her to have a friend party but she was wanting to have smores for her party for the treat and I was happy about that because I hate making cake for a bunch of kids. So many of them are like "I don't like cake!" It irritates me. So I made her her birthday cake on her birthday for our family party. She wanted a chocolate cake with purple frosting and yellow flowers. I haven't made many flowers so I thought I would try and teach myself how to make roses, but that was a definite no go! It is so hard! It will take me lots of practice to figure those out. So I just made some easy little yellow flowers that I thought turned out pretty good.

 

 

This year from us Lizzy wanted to make a teddy bear at Build-a-Bear workshop because she has never made one before, which I think is so cute. I am so glad she isn't growing up too fast. She also wanted clothes which is fun too, I love shopping for clothes.

She got a really cute outfit from Grandma and Grandpa that she just loves.

I had put the cake in a very nice glass cake dish that i thought was safe on the counter because the lid is so heavy. I should have known better! The next day while i was busy getting stuff done Annie and I am guessing Russy helped get the lid off, becuase I went in the kitchen and this is what I found. I didn't get a picture right ways becuase I was really mad so I don't have one of them covered in cake and frosting. The little stinkers! They seriously get into everything!!!