Spaghetti Mess

This little girl loves her some spaghetti, but look at this! She is such a mess when she does get to have some! Notice her fork. Untouched. I believe with the starter bite I left on there when I gave her her plate. Someday she will use a fork. But for today, I will just take her picture and remember this time when she was small.

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Getting Ready for Sunday

Grant also got some new church clothes for Christmas including this snazzy new tie.

-He looks so grown up! Super wish James had been smiling, but I think I took this when we were rushing to get out of the door. I just couldn't resist!


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Christmas 2013

The second Christmas in our new home, did not disappoint. We had so much fun with the kids, and hopefully instilling in them some new holiday traditions. I love living closer to family. I really believe that kids need their grandparents. And not just any kids, but MY kids especially. In Casper, we could never venture out, and now that we are here, we go to St. George quite a bit. We just love it here.

Anyway, on to Christmas.

Big ticket items (the things they asked Santa for) included for Audrey:
Snow White dress

For Grant:
Donald Duck stuffed animal.

Grant has always been a fan of Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and all the friends, but these past few months have been all about Donald Duck. Donald Duck stories in our Disney Book, Donald Duck shirt, Donald Duck episodes of Mickey Mouse. I honestly don't know how it started. But I am not complaining. I love that he loves Donald Duck.
And Santa did not disappoint.

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Look at that smile! Look at how big he has grown! What a sweetheart. I love that his whole Christmas is made just by a Donald Duck stuffed animal. Can I save him forever?




And this little beauty! Adored her Snow White dress. If you will notice, she quickly peeled off her pajamas, and put it on.


And continued to wear it for most of the day. Santa also thought to give her a Strawberry Shortcake hat, which she also adored. This girl has many interests. She is so easy to get to like for things, if that makes sense. Princesses, Minnie, Strawberry Shortcake, Hello Kitty, she loves them all!




Snow White surprisingly got the shaft and Minnie won out in the end. Dress ups were a great thing for her this Christmas.


Oh the anticipation! I just love my little ones!


















This was a most fun Christmas! Grant actually got really excited this year, so I had two little ones super excited for Christmas.









Another Christmas tradition I hope that will be started is going down to St. George. Look out Grant's window! Sunshine! So happy we are back!




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Gingerbread House Fun

-This week at school, the Friday before Christmas vacation, the kids both got to make gingerbread houses. My kids are really not into too many sweets. Grant didn't want to eat his, and Audrey tried to eat some of hers, but she lost interest. They just are not huge in to sweets, but the candy they do like, they love! These houses started to fall apart soon after we got home, so I had to snap a pic. Grant also ended up being sick the next week, so I don't think he was feeling the whole gingerbread house thing. Audrey loves to pretend she is Mary, as in the mother of Jesus. She is so sweet.

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Christmas Decorating

I could not wait any longer. With Thanksgiving finished, (we had a great one, by the way), I just absolutely HAD to get the Christmas tree up. James had me talked in to December 1st, but I just couldn't wait that long. We had to get it up as soon as possible. So, sitting around the dinner table, James asked me what I wanted to do. With out hesitating, I said that I wanted to put up the tree. And James totally went along with it. We had so much fun this year. Our kids are ages three and five, and they are finally excited about Santa coming to our house. It was so fun to watch all the magic unfold this Christmas season.

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Audrey and Grant adored decorating our tree. I kept handing them ornaments, and they would be very careful about choosing which spot they got to on, even if another ornament was already there.


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Another fun thing the kids like to do is to set up the Book Fair. Back in September, Grant's school had a Book Fair, and, since it is for a good cause, we could go there and get some books. Grant just had to have Pete the Cat, and Audrey found a Minnie Mouse book she loves. Ever since then, they love to set out our books like they did at the book fair, and look at all the ones we have.

Too fun!

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Happy Birthday to James

November 7th, marked James' 35th birthday. We managed to stretch his birthday across the weekend, which I think makes it more fun!

He wanted a birthday dinner at Winger's with the kids. And the kids were fabulous. James is always trying to get our family to read scriptures better, so the kids and I gave him a Family Version of the Book of Mormon.

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He wanted a pumpkin cheesecake for his birthday cake, and the kids had fun with the 3 and the 5 that were on the cake.



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Playing School

One of the things the kids like to do when they get home from school is to play School. It is so funny the things they will do, and have me do!

Grant gets out a chair, and sometimes he will get a stool. He will say his name is Ms. Ross (which is his teacher's name), and will tell Audrey that her name is Ms. Gina (the kindergarten's aide's name.)

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He will show me something on the iPad, or in a book that I should know. He sings his calendar songs to me, and make me sit "Criss Cross, like a pretzel." I have to raise my hand to say anything.

And sometimes a few more members of the class will show up:







And we all have to listen attentively, or go to Time Out. I love these kids!


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Same trip, new day. We took the kids to Temple Square. I love it when they see it and identify it. We talk about it so much, it was fun to go and see it. We took a tour of the conference center and took a few pictures around it. We have taken the tour before, but the guy that did it this time, was so fascinating while talking about it, I learned lots of interesting things. Of course, we had to take a picture at the top of the Conference Center. The kids do okay during tours, but I think they were glad to be done.




I'm sure glad that our family is forever! :)


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Finally Hogle Zoo

We tried to do this trip a month ago, but it didn't quite work out. We finally made it so that we could go to Hogle Zoo on Labor Day weekend in September.
I loved going this time of year. We thought it would be so busy, but it really wasn't. The sun stayed behind some clouds, and it was actually really fun to be outdoors.

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This bear was super cute. It was really interacting with the crowd.










I like giraffes. They deserve lots of pictures. :) We liked this mama and baby giraffe. It makes me smile!












This tiger was pretty cool, too, but when it was all said and done, the kids would rather be doing this:












While I was still intrigued by these little guys:








Pretty scary. I was very grateful for the barrier between us. I don't know how I would do in that Everglades Park in Florida. I think they have crocodiles that just wander around...no thank you.




Touring the zoo took us all morning. It would be so much fun to go again, since every experience is different. We sat at these little tables and at some lunch. We brought that in, so Grant stuck to his diet the whole time we were there.







Another cute one of Audrey and Daddy.




Since we spent all morning at the zoo and we were so close to the This is the Place memorial, we packed up, and took the kids to those sights.







I think places like this are more fun for Mom and Dad then they are for the kids. Hopefully as they get older, they will be more fun to take to stuff. I don't think they were quite getting this, after our morning at the zoo. We will try again another day!




We also took them to the State Capital. It was open, and quite vast and pretty going inside. By this time, I think the kids were done, but I loved going inside that big building I used to look at while going to Aunt Melba's apartment. :)



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