Christmas 2013

This was the first year we've done new Christmas outfits. We were all ready on time and even had time to snap a picture. Then I went out in the 20 degree weather to start the car and the battery was dead. Thank goodness Emily lives down the street and we piled 8 kids in the back of her 5 passenger van and made it to church! David was in charge of planning the Christmas Sacrament meeting program so we sat down and wrote it together and picked out which hymns we would sing as a congregation. Nothing quite like sitting down and reading scriptures and quotes specifically about Mary and Joseph and the birth of our Savior. I loved it.

2013 was an adjustment getting the kids ready alone and sitting alone in Sacrament with David up front. 1pm church made my life easier on Sunday mornings and hopefully 9am church and a nursing baby will be kind to me in 2014! I love these kids!

Christmas Eve!!

We had Ben and Emily over and ate the traditional appetizers for dinner and the kids performed the Nativity. Mallie was a wiseman this year... thus the crown.

 Ashton and Hannah were Mary and Joseph this year. They were darling with baby Ellie.

Lucy was a shepherd and wandered around aimlessly holding her cow.

Here is almost the whole crew at the end. They ended with singing "Bright Stars Gleaming" and it was perfect.

Then the Ashton tradition of playing Christmas bingo with the money tree!

Next up were Christmas jammies!

 And here is the castle I stayed up till midnight finishing on the 23rd. Hannah and Mallie LOVE it so it was worth it. But mark my words no more homemade presents next year. That was exhausting!

I snapped 3 pictures on Christmas afternoon and put my phone away and just enjoyed watching the kids play. This pretty much summed up Christmas day. Lucy ate an obscene amount of junk food and emptied out everyone else's stockings while we weren't paying attention. The girls played in the castle all day. And Ashton played with his new Imaginext castle forever.

The house was happy and messy and so were the kids the whole day!!

Merry Christmas!!

December Wrap Up

December went by in a happy blur. There are a few pictures I have to blog.

First up we went to see Santa at the on post library. Mallie and Ashton were just 3 days out from their tonsils and were troopers. Mallie still had no desire to sit on Santa's lap.

Then we had our ward party that same night, "O Holy Night". This was the best Christmas Party I've ever been to. The kids were all supposed to dress as angels and the adults as shepherds. We had money to spend on food and it really felt like Bethlehem eating on blankets.

 Someone in our ward caught this picture of David with Mallie walking out of the chapel. She was tired and not feeling too great but I love David dressed up as a shepherd and Mallie hanging on tight.

 This was part of the amazing Nativity and the kids "The Heavenly Hosts" stole the show. The whole room quieted down to listen to them sing and it was an awe inspiring moment to see the kids sing about the Savior's birth.

Next up Emily and I threw a going away Luau for our friends the Lopez Family. Kori is so dearly loved and she is one of those people you just feel grateful to have crossed paths with. We had it at the community center and gave the 20+ kids 10 beach balls in a big open room and they were happy for hours! Here are all the women.

 Here's a picture of Kori, Lili and I. I took the girls over to say goodbye on their last day of packing up. Lili their 14 year old has been our babysitter from the first month we lived here. I had her in YW for almost 2 years and she is awesome. The girls still look for her every week at church and we are all still missing them. I'm convinced we're going to meet up somewhere somehow when they are back on the mainland.

 This year we did our Christmas mailbox again. Every few days an activity or new book pops up in the mailbox. David loves the tradition of sleeping under the tree last year we tried and the kids were too excited to do it. So this year I had the idea to bring a little Bethlehem to the living room and we built a fort and talked about the Shepherds seeing the star. The kids loved that they were sleeping in a "stable" facing the star on top of the Christmas tree. I told David I can't believe I had an original creative Christmas thought too make a new spiritual tradition that didn't come from pinterest. They lasted the whole night and can't wait to build their stable next year.

At David's clinic they had a decorating contest. David and his assistants went all out (and won obviously) so we went to visit. It was a slow day during Christmas break and women in scrubs from all over the building came over to see the kids. Hannah was mortified by all the attention as they snapped pictures of us.

December 2013 was my favorite yet. Next up Christmas!!

Snow Days and Tonsils

We got 6 inches of snow and 2.5 days off of school the first week of December.

The kids played for hours!!

David is always a stud and pulls the kids around on the sled first thing in the morning as soon as he finds out he doesn't have to go into work. I tried to keep Lucy inside but eventually I caved and let her out and she was so happy!

And then on Dec 9th Ashton and Mallie went into have their tonsils and adenoids out. They both snored like beasts and we were pretty sure it was causing Mallie some sleep apnea since she is always tired and falling asleep in the car even after 12 hours of sleep at night.

We wanted to document Ashton's huge tonsils for him.

Pre-op at 6:30am.

They loved getting to ride on the bed together down to the OR.

I love great nurses. Mallie was still barely waking up when they rolled her out and the nurse put down the guard rail and said, "You can hop in bed with her." She just cuddled right up on me and didn't even cry. She was so so good.

Ashton on the other hand was an emotional mess. I was holding Mallie when he came out and he couldn't see me on the other side of the room. So David was with him talking to him and he was pretty groggy and saying he was in pain. A few minutes later David and I switched kids and I walked over to his bed and as soon as he saw me he burst into tears. It's such his personality to try and hold it together and be strong in front of Dad and then when Mom comes around then he's safe to lose it.

Thank goodness for tablets. I marvel at the ease we have now of keeping kids occupied. Don't get me wrong I'd gladly live in the 50s where kids could run wild through neighborhoods and we didn't have to worry so much about safety in person and online and I definitely could do without car seats. But I AM so grateful for how much easier life is for me in moments like this!

We're now almost 2 weeks out from tonsil surgery and the kids have done really well. I don't know why we thought they would automatically know what their throats could and couldn't handle but we were wrong. Mallie walked right in from the hospital and tried to grab some pretzels from the pantry. We had to keep serious tabs on them as they are chip (and all things crunchy) junkies. But a few boxes of popsicles, lots of pancakes and lots of water got us through. Hurray for no better sleep and army medical care!

End of November

First up right before Thanksgiving. This guy turned 6!

Ashton is definitely the oldest child. We made him pay for half of his own birthday present. He wanted this lego castle so badly and we just don't do $75 on a birthday gift no matter how great it is. He was more than happy to pull out his piggy bank and make it happen.

 We're going to try and only do friend birthday parties on the 5,10,15 mark. So Ashton picked his favorite dinner and we had cake. The cake that was overcooked and then frozen. David had a Thanksgiving lunch at work and asked me to make brownies. So I made brownies... and after they were in the pan I tasted the batter only to realize it was cake mix. So I put the cake in the oven and got out the brownie mix. Then I put the brownies in the oven.... and then I left for an activity at the Church and forgot to tell David that I left things in the oven. Can we say, pregnant? So he was upstairs getting the kids ready for bed and couldn't hear the oven timer go off. I came home to overdone cake and brownies. Being awesomely frugal we cut out the center stuck it in the freezer, pulled it out and frosted it two days later for Ashton's birthday. And you know what? The kids ate it all and they didn't care!

Ashton at 6 thinks he's all grown up. He's super helpful around the house and loves his sisters. Legos are his thing now and his Dad is still his best friend. David plays Stratego with him at least a few times a week and I'm his regular checkers partner. He's the best oldest kid ever!

 

Thanksgiving came and we did our annual grateful tree. This year the kids were awesome at coming up with their own stuff. Ashton's best one was "I'm grateful to be me" and I even put on there "chocolate" more than once.

We hosted David's family again for Thanksgiving. As always we had a blast. Chanelle (David's little sister) makes all the nieces and nephews pillows when they're born. They're the only ones our kids will sleep with and are well loved. Well, Lucy finally got her own and she loves it!

I don't have any other pictures of Thanksgiving but this one of Lucy and the giant bucket of cheeseballs David's parents brought up. This girl is clever. She scouts for all her own food and because she is so darn cute and usually in the right place at the right time we let her do whatever she wants. She probably ate her weight in cheese balls over the week.

 

That's a wrap on November!! 2013 is coming to a close far too quickly!

 

Kansas City

Kansas City was one of the last two things on my Fort Leonard Wood bucket list. So we decided to take advantage of the 4 day weekend over Veteran's Day and go back with Ben and Emily. When we went to years ago the temple was just about to be dedicated and we really wanted to go do a session. So the Friday before we left I mentioned it to my Mom at the end of our 30 minute conversation. 10 minutes later I get a call from my Dad saying, "I want to come!" So we all met up on Thursday night while my parents watched kids so we could do a session. Then on Friday we headed to the Great Wolf Lodge!

Hannah going down the kiddie slide.

 Mom and Ellie

Dad and Lucy

We decided the Great Wolf Lodge was fun but not 3 days worth of fun especially with such young kids so we checked out early. Then we took the kids to parks, stores and out to eat for the extra day in Kansas City and they thought it was the greatest vacation ever.

I'm an independent kind of girl and pride myself on living far from most of my family and completely embracing it. But as soon as I spent a couple of hours with my parents it made me miss them so much more. We turned on FaceTime and went to their hotel room every night after the kids were asleep. I was so glad to see them and the kids were too!

On Sunday we headed to Liberty Jail and Independence to see the LDS church historical sites. I love this one of the kids looking up at Christ.

We have an almost identical picture from two years ago with two less kids at Liberty Jail. I love this place. There is nothing better than traveling with family with the exact same number of kids you have so you feel completely normal and everyone has a buddy.

Here is the picture I took of Hannah as one of the Stripling Warriors right before THIS happened...

She was standing on the leather ottoman in front of an exhibit fell off and smashed her face right up against the side of the wall. She had a black then yellow eye for almost 10 whole days. Hannah floors me. She cries over her feelings being hurt for hours. She cried over this gash that could have used stitches for 10 minutes. She'll have a scar on her cheek forever and I wanted to document for her where it happened.

We had a great time in Kansas City and are thinking of putting it on our short list of possible places to go when we move this summer. We won't know till February but it's always fun to think about the possibilities.

Halloween 2013

I saw the cutest pregnant mummy on pinterest with eyes poking out of her belly. Well, it was a total fail. By the time we got to the church all my wrappings were falling off, I had lost one of the eyes and I was blistering hot in a crowded gym. My face was totally that red because it was HOT!! David looked really good though and his mostly stayed up so it was a win!

Then actual Halloween came and it was freezing and raining. I was so glad that their costumes this year could be layered upon without taking away from what they were supposed to be.

 Wolverine

Purple Flower - for those of you who know Hannah know how appropriate this is. She is obsessed with picking flowers. It was even her part (that she wrote herself) in the Primary Program this year. "Jesus loves me because he created beautiful flowers and I love to pick them!"

Butterfly

Ladybug (that snuck a sucker) and Daddy. 

And at the end of the photo shoot we caught this gem. Ashton had pulled over all the girls on the couch and Lucy just stood their crying.

You know how Mom's take their kids candy away so they don't make themselves sick by eating too much? Well, I'll freely admit I have made myself sick on THEIR candy several nights this week while David and I have watched movies. I used to be excited to be pregnant through the holidays... now I'm wondering if overindulgence on sweets just might be the end of me. I told David if I end up testing positive for Gestation Diabetes before Thanksgiving and Christmas (even though I never have before) I would have a full on melt down and then sink into a deep depression from having to live out my worst nightmare over the holiday season. Cross your fingers for me!

Pumpkin Patch

This is our 3rd year in a row at Happy Hollow Pumpkin Patch. We tried not to get too nostalgic thinking about how much better it has gotten since our first year here in Missouri. We love Happy Hollows Pumpkin Patch in the middle of nowhere!!

 It's a frightening and enlightening moment when you start to trust your oldest to take your youngest on little rides.

Lucy started walking at 14 months exactly. It felt like forever. We're thrilled we can take her places without a stroller!

Last year I was wearing a 2 month old Lucy in a backpack and next year we'll have an 8 month old at Halloween. Can't wait!!