Hookie Bobbin'

Jadon and Katie (yes, that's really her under the orange mask)

 We did some hookie bobbin' on Christmas but I forgot to take my camera with me.  We got some great snow last night so we spent a few more hours again today.  Unfortunately, Jaxon,Jake and Kyson didn't want to come out today so I didn't get any pictures of them.  They did have a great time on Christmas though.  The kids have so much fun going around the block on the sled behind the van.  I got to go a few times and it really is fun.  We picked a few neighbor kids today and gave them rides too.  We had a great time!

Kierra waiting to go

What a cute picture

She figured out that it was a lot easier to hold on when she was on her knees

Jadon has bad knees so he had a hard time doing it that way

Jadon after one of his wipe outs

This was Jadon's face when Daddy said we could go hookie bobbin'



Christmas Eve

Jaxon's favorite thing is to get the ice cream

We had a very fun filled Christmas Eve this year.  We stuck with our tradition of going out to dinner and to a movie.  We decided to go to chuck-a-rama this year.  The kids really love buffets because they can eat immediately and they can pick whatever they want and get their own food.

Kyson loved the orange slushie drinks

Jadon's favorite is the salad.  He says he likes salad without lettuce.

Jake had quite the spread.  Everytime somebody went and got something that looked good to him, he went and got it too.

Kierra and Katie sharing some dessert

All the kids in their tye die shirts.  This was our Christmas craft this year

 After dinner, we went to the dollar store to pick out candy for our movie.  Everyone was really full so nobody felt like getting anything.  We went to see "Rise of the Guardians".  Everyone really liked it.

 When we got home, our driveway was covered in snow so all the kids went out with Daddy to shovel.  It was so much fun to have a snowstorm on Christmas Eve.

 All the kids were excited to open the traditional "jammie" christmas eve presents. 

The kids in their new jammies!

I love the excitement of Christmas Eve.  We had such a good day together.  It was so fun to see the excitement all the kids had during the day.  It's cute to listen to them talking to each other after we put them to bed.  Today we can definately say that it's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

More Christmas activities

 On Saturday, Jadon had to work at one of his 3 jobs (talking about his jobs will be another post) so we decided to go visit him and all have pretzels.  It was very crowded at the mall that day and pretzel maker was pretty crowded too.  Dale entertained the kids by spinning a penny on the table while I ordered the pretzels.  We all enjoyed the yummy pretzels!

Jadon getting our cheese to dip the pretzels in

Katie and Kierra with the Pretzel bites

The boys

 That night Dale and I went out to dinner with my siblings, their spouses and my parents.  We have decided to do this instead of giving each other gifts.  I love it.  We went to a mexican restaurant and then went to my parents house for dessert.  We also played a fun little game where we each got a small present.

It's nice to be able to visit with just the adults once in a while

Christmas Activities

 I'm getting so excited for Christmas.  I love the last week when the kids are having parties at school, we start putting presents under the tree and we do fun Christmas activities.  This year I decided to do something I've never done before.  I used a code system for the kids presents.  I wanted them to have fun trying to figure out the code instead of figuring out how many presents each person had.

 Everyone, except Jaxon, has had fun trying to crack the code.  I didn't tell Dale about the code so I gave him the chance to figure it out.  He got it pretty fast.  Jadon was next but it took him a few days to get it.  Kyson is the only other kid who has figured it out but he had some help from his Dad.  Kierra is going crazy trying to crack the code.  She has all the present's codes written down in a notebook and she studies it at school.

 Here is a sample of one of the codes.  We are going to give the kids a clue on Sunday night if they don't get it all figured out by then.

 Last night we all went downtown to see the Christmas lights.  We decided to walk around City creek since we hadn't ever been there.  It was pretty cool and we all had a great time walking around.

The kids loved climbing on anything they could find!

 

Me and my girls

No better way to start the Christmas weekend

After we walked around for several hours, we went to McDonalds to get hot chocolate.  Some of the kids wanted ice cream but their machine was broken.  Here they are waiting for the hot chocolate.  We had a great night together.  I can't wait for the rest of the activities we have planned and then Christmas...Yay!

Katie's 1st dance recital

 Tonight was Katie's first dance recital.  She really didn't know what to expect so she wasn't super excited.  She did like getting her new dance costume on. 

 Once we got there and Katie saw all the little girls in their costumes, she got excited.  She loved it when Lisa sprayed gold glitter in hers and Kamryn's hair.

 I wasn't able to get any pictures of her during her dance because they all turned out blurry but we got it on video.  She was so cute!  Her face was in awe when she came out on the stage and saw all the people.  As soon as she spotted us, she started waving and smiling.  She was so cute through the whole dance and did a pretty good job.

After the dance was over, a lot of the girls received flowers from their dad's (notice Kamryn with hers in the background).  We thought Katie would like a barbie movie better than flowers so that's what we gave her.  She was really excited.  I'm so glad that I have a little girl in dance again.  I just hope she wants to continue dancing for a long time.

Meet Averie

 This week I started watching a little baby girl named Averie.  She is 3 months old so, with Noah at 7 months, it's kind of like having twins.  The first two days have been easier than I thought it would be.  Averie still sleeps a lot so that makes it easier.  I was able to take them both to the church to exercise and they both slept most of the time.  I hope they keep that up.  Besides the church, I haven't taken them anywhere where I have to get them out of the car.  I don't know if any place is worth that ordeal.

 Katie instantly fell in love with Averie but she still loves Noah.  Noah likes to crawl over to Averie and Katie is really good at making sure he doesn't get close enough to touch her.  She loves to spread Averie's blanket out on the floor and then cover her up with another blanket.

Here's my little tribe.  I'm sure that we will have good days and bad days but it will be fun to watch these little ones grow up and I'm glad that Katie will have the chance to be a big sister.

Kyson's 8th Birthday

Kyson turned 8 this week and we had an exciting week.  We celebrated Katie and Kyson's birthday on Wednesday by going to a trampoline place and then out to McDonald's for dinner.  Besides going to school, on his birthday, Kyson did nothing but play minecraft all day.  Jaxon got him the upgrade on the ipad as a present and all he wanted to do was play it.  Since I always let my kids do whatever they want (within reason) on their birthday, I let him play the video game all day.

The next day was his baptism.  He was excited, but nervous, to get baptized.  It was a very nice day.  There were only 3 kids who got baptized so it was short and quiet.  Dale gave him a wonderful blessing when he confirmed him.  After the baptism, we went to a church to have lunch with our families.  We also had a pinata for the kids.  They all liked that.  It was nice to be able to visit with our family while the kids ran around and played.

That night we took Kyson to the Roof to celebrate.  We wanted to continue the tradition, that we started with Jadon, of taking our child who just got baptized to a nice place to celebrate such an important event. 

Kyson had a good time.  He was very excited when they brought him a special hot chocolate.  He ate some new things.  He even tried a mushroom.  I wish I had a picture of his face because it was so funny.  He did not like it.  He was so full by the time that we got to dessert that he only had one piece of cake.  We had a good time together and it was quite an adventure.  When we got to our car to leave, the battery had died.  Dale had to track down someone who could help us.  Kyson, being the little worrier that he is, didn't like that part of the evening.  Luckily, we found someone to help us and made it home safely.  I am so happy with the decisions that Kyson has made.  He is a great kid who likes to do what is right.  He is a wonderful brother to Jake and takes good care of his best friend.  He has a lot of friends and everyone seems to like him.  He brings a great deal of joy to our family and I love him to pieces!  Happy Birthday Kyson!

Katie turns four!

 Yesterday was Katie's 4th birthday.  She has been very excited for her birthday.  She woke up at 6:45, which was way too early.  I tried to get her to go back to bed but she wouldn't.  She wanted to get ready for her party (which was going to be at 3:00)

 She was pretty grouchy all morning and whining a lot.  I decided I was going to take her on a ride to get her to fall asleep.  When I came out from getting ready, this is how I found her.  She had fallen asleep on the floor watching tv.  She ended up sleeping for a long time.  In fact, I had to wake her up for her party.
                                     
 She invited 6 of her little friends.  I had little games like duck, duck goose and pin the carrot nose on the snoman planned for them.  They played the games and had fun but all they really wanted to do was play with each other.  So that's what we did.  They played house downstairs then went outside and played together. 

 I asked Katie what she wanted for her birthday dinner and she picked chicken and fries, of coarse.

After dinner we opened presents then had a movie night.  We all watched the new barbie movie that Katie got for her birthday.  She loved it!  I think she had a pretty fun birthday and she is really excited that she is finally four.  I can't believe how fast the last 4 years have flown by.  It breaks my heart for her to be growing up and that's she's not a baby anymore.  I love spending my days with her.  She is my constant companion.  I have no idea what I am going to do when she goes to school.  At least I have almost two more years to enjoy her!

First snow of the season

 The first snowstorm of the season is always so much fun.  The kids were so excited to have snow on the ground.  They were excited when Lisa called and invited us to go sledding with them.  They got way more snow up on the east side than we did.

 Katie was so excited to go sledding and she's lucky enough to get carried up the hill most of the time.  She loved going down the hill and wanted to go over and over.

 Kierra and Katie had a great time burrying Jaxon in the snow!

 Kierra, Jared, Kyson and Kamryn all built a fort in the trees.

 Jadon loves to play football so he pushed for a football game after everyone was done sledding.

Before we went home, we went over to my Mom and Dad's and Dale got up on the roof to shake the heavy snow off of the trees.  He thought it was pretty cool that he could make it snow.  We had a great time and now I'm way excited for the holiday season!