My Snow Men

We have gotten so much snow lately and Ethan has just been dying to get out there and play in it. Every time we go out to get in the car or when we return home he runs out of the garage and immediately goes straight to the snow. The other day I decided to get him all decked out in his snow gear and let him play in it till his heart's content. I even walked him down the street to where Cassidy and a friend were sledding. Cass took him on the sled with her and he LOVED it. He just kept saying "more, more". He had the time of his life!!


He wants to be like his dad and brothers and shovel the snow!


Every time Ethan would stick his hands down in the snow the snow would stick to his mittens and he would come up with these huge snowballs. He thought it was so funny!

I think the snowsuit added about 20 pounds!

Ethan discovered the fun of eating the snow!


I have mentioned before how helpful my twins are around the house. They love to help and do a great job at it. They are anxiously awaiting the day when they are old enough to mow the lawn, but for now shoveling the snow will have to do. One day it was snowing really hard and they wanted to go out and shovel. I kept telling them to wait till the snow let up a bit. Finally after about an hour of them begging to go shovel I gave in. How can you say no to that? The other day Cassidy and Spencer got home from school and Kaden wasn't with them. They told me that he had stayed outside to shovel. I opened the door and there he was shoveling with his backpack on. He hadn't even bothered to take it off! They have been loving all the snow and I have been loving all the help!

Our Christmas Wrap-Up

We have been so busy the last few weeks with all our fun Christmas activities that I have fallen behind on my blogging. In an effort to get caught up before next Christmas, I will hit on a couple of our highlights from the holidays. Warning: LOTS of pictures!!
The kids were off of school for over two weeks and Andy had the same amount of time off of work. I had all these ideas of fun things we would do as a family to fill the time, but we only got around to one of them!!
We had a fun family party up in Morgan(where Andy is from and where his parents still live). We do this every year with his mom's side of the family. We have a great meal, play Christmas bingo, play Christmas carols on kazoos, and everyone opens a present.

The whole fam

Ethan got an Elmo Live toy. He was not so sure about it when it was talking and moving. He had fun watching it move and trying to copy what it did.

Getting used to elmo and being brave enough to touch it!

The kids and their loot!



We went back to Andy's parents house after the party. The boys were anxious to play their new gameboy games and wasted no time doing so. Their cousin Lily wanted to see too so she crawled over to Spencer and laid on him like this while he played. I thought this was so funny!


Andy's parents and brother came down to spend Christmas Eve with us. I fixed a ham dinner and we ate too much! We were so full we could barely eat dessert! We read the story of Christ's birth in the Bible, watched a short 5 minute DVD depicting the birth of Jesus called the Nativity. We watch it every year, it is one of my favorites! Then it was time for the kids to open their traditional Christmas Eve present of pajamas.




The kids in their new pajama's.

They always have to do a silly face picture!

We ended Christmas Eve with a story by the tree. We tried to do this every night while the tree was up. The kids would take turns picking a Christmas book and we would snuggle under the tree for a bit while we read.


We spent Christmas morning at home. Santa brought the kids a Wii and they were SUPER EXCITED!!! We have had so much fun playing games together. We spent the rest of Christmas Day with Andy's family. We had a wonderful holiday season and love all the time we got to spend with our families!





Reading some of his new books with Grandpa John. Ethan would look at books all day if he could!

Having a Christmas snack with his cousin Avery


I had to add this picture because I thought it was too cute! On one of our MANY trips up north Kaden was listening to his IPOD. Ethan loves music and wanted to listen too. Kaden was sweet enough to share one of his ear buds. Ethan just zoned out and listened for quite a while!

We got Elfed!

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Worth the Wait

Last weekend we decided to venture to the mall and see Santa. The past two years when we have gone we have really lucked out. There was hardly anyone in line and we got to see Santa really quick. We knew it was too good to be true and to happen a third year in a row, and we were right!! When we got to the mall the line didn't look horribly long but it moved so slow. We debated whether or not to stick it out, but are glad we chose to bear the 90 minute wait! We thought for sure Ethan would not be happy to see Santa and would probably cry for him. We were totally wrong. He sat on Cassidy's lap and did great! He kept staring at Santa, couldn't quite figure him out. The promise of a candy cane may have helped a little! Watching the excitement on the kids faces made it really worth the wait!!

Christmas Concerts

With this time of year comes lots of performances, concerts, recitals, etc. Cassidy had two performances this past week, both of which really added to our Christmas spirit.
Her first performance was the school choir concert. Cassidy was so excited to be able to join the choir this year. It is only for fourth, fifth, and sixth graders. She has always loved to sing so it was a great opportunity for her. She has been very dedicated, getting up early twice a week, so that she can make it to choir on time--they meet an hour before school starts. They sang seven songs, and they all sounded great! One of the songs was in Latin and one in Hebrew--I was impressed!!

The fam before we left for the concert

For some reason Ethan kept smiling AFTER I would take the picture. So I hurried and took this one right after while he was smiling so big!

Andy's parents drove over an hour just for the concert! I love having such supportive grandparents!

Cassidy is on the front row right in the middle

Cassidy and her friend Tatumn after their concert!


The second performance we were able to attend was really really neat. Cassidy's piano teacher chose only 8 of her students(out of almost 60), to have a small, spiritual, Christmas recital. I have to admit that I was not too excited to have to go. Her piano recitals tend to drag on and on and you really only want to hear your child(rude, but true). I was pleasantly surprised by this particular recital. Her teacher had all the students pick some beautiful Christmas music, it was such a special night. Cassidy has started playing out of the LDS hymn book and the LDS primary hymn book, so she chose to play "Picture a Christmas", and "He Sent His Son". If you aren't familiar with those songs, "He Sent His Son" is a very very difficult piece. To make things even harder her teacher wanted her to accompany someone singing. Cassidy asked her friend Madison to do that. They practiced so hard and it really paid off. They did a wonderful job--it brought tears to my eyes!

They both looked so beautiful in their Christmas dresses!


Cassidy's teacher had her and Madison close the evening by singing a duet of Silent Night, then the audience joined in on the last verse. She definitely doesn't have stage fright like her mom!

Thanks to my wonderful friend Trish who watched all my boys plus her kids(6 kids total)so we could enjoy this great evening with Cassidy.

Tis the Season!

I absolutely love the Christmas season! One of my favorite things about this time of year is all the extra time we get to spend with family! We kicked off the holiday season on Saturday with a family party. Most of my family will not be in town this year for Christmas so we decided to celebrate a little early. We have actually had this family party for a couple years now. It is always fun to be with everyone and this year was no exception! A big thank you to my brother Chris and his wife Julie for hosting, they always do a great job. We had a great dinner, a fun talent show, and even more fun doing a white elephant gift exchange. Laura started the talent show idea a couple years ago and it is such a success! I always pawn the talent portion off onto my kids. This year Cassidy played the piano. She always does a great job and amazes everyone at how well she can play! Kaden decided to read a Christmas story to everyone and did a wonderful job. His nerves got to him right before it was his turn so I promised to sit with him and luckily that helped. Since Spencer is our resident comedian we though it would be appropriate for him to tell Christmas jokes. He did a great job up there, no nerves at all, and even stumped us on most of the answers! It is such a fun tradition that we have started. Here are some pics from our fun-filled night:
Sorry to those of you(Dad, Laura & Jon, Kevin's fam) whose pictures aren't shown. My camera was being weird and some of them came out so dark you couldn't see anything.

Our wonderful holiday meal!

All the kids were putting this tinsel on their heads, so of course Ethan had to be in on the action too!

Cassidy playing fabulously!

My niece Elly narrating the hilarious skit that my brother wrote!

Julie playing, she did an outstanding job!

My cute little nieces, Sophie and Liza, singing Away in a Manger!

My little comedian, he will do anything for a laugh!

The white elephant gift exchange, my favorite!

My brother Chris modeling the awesome 1970's sweater he got!!


We did miss Katie's family and David's family(who live out of state), and of course we missed Mom! It was weird not to have her there but we were definitely thinking of her!