Santa Clause is Coming to Town

We took the boys to go see Santa Clause and they were so good waiting in line even though they were very excited. So cute!

Happy Birthday Dan!

I don't know why I am so bad about documenting mine and Dan's birthdays but here it is , late but still important :) Dan turned 30 this year, woo-hoo! We had a party/advent with Dan's family, I made a yummy marzipan cake and Dan received Zelda Skyward Sword which he has informed me that he is totally addicted to it. I also planned a little over-night skiing trip at Wolf Mountain. Unfortunately the weather has not cooperated and we had little snow to ski on. But we went to stay in the hotel anyway and had a great time just being together and doing a little Christmas shopping. Happy Birthday Dan, I love you :)




We ordered room services because neither of us have ever done that before. We got a greek omelet which was all very good except for the 17 pieces of garlic cloves in it!

It's Christmas Time!!!!

It's starting to feel very Christmas-y at our house and we are sooooo excited!


Dan and Christian pulling out the decorations


A very poor picture of our beautiful Christmas tree, Miriam helped us pick up a new tree, and ornaments at the end of last season so it's so funny to have everything new this year.


Christmas came early from my parents for me and Dan, a new set of Tri-ply Calphlon pots and pans- can we say spoiled! I think I am in love :)



Christian is officially obsessed with Mannheim Steamroller and listens to it constantly, I need to catch some of his dances to it, but for now here is a segment of Kling Glochen



And Frosty the Snowman by Evan

Creativity

I love love love love LOVE that my kids have such creative imaginations...except for at dinner time ;) And Evan is a true little brother and loves to do and does everything Christian does, so he is developing quite the imagination. Here he is being a giraffe!

Happy Halloween!

We had a great Halloween this year. We had a ward trunk or treat and then we went trick or treating on Halloween with our friends Heidi and Devin and their kids and my brother Davy and his wife Lara. Some how I failed in my picture taking this Halloween but thanks to Heidi and Devin who were trying to get one decent picture of Holly (which sadly, they didn't) we have some pics of our trick or treating.

Evan as a pirate


Christian and Tyson, and this is the best pic I have of Christian, he was to busy running from house to house to hold still. But he is Optimus Prime, and Tyson is Link


Me and Dan were stick figures


Our pumpkins this year


Christian insisted on taking a pic of me and Dan, not to bad right?


The boys and their pumpkins


Neither of the boys wanted to stick their hands in the pumpkin and scoop our the guts, I guess they aren't quite old enough to think that is totally awesome yet so I had to do the dirty work while Dan carved the pumpkins, he is so much better at that then me.


Christian with his preschool class on Halloween, and if you look close enough you will find 2 sets of twin boys!!! Bless Miss Cathy's sanity!

Evan channeling Darth Vader

For the record... we have not let the boys watch any star wars yet, so this is straight from Evan's imagination :)

Eyebrows

Dan had to go to Florida for 9 DAYS for work, and on the day he was set to come home I was trying to get a nap in for all of us since we were going to stay up late when Dan got home. Christian doesn't nap any more but I thought I would get him to lay down with me. And while we were curled up in my bed my eyes were closed and I heard him say "Mom, watch this!" He then very carefully wiggled his eyebrows. I laughed and asked him "Have you been practicing that buddy?" And he smiled and nodded. He's so cute. :) So here are the boys wiggling their eye brows.

Fire Station

We braved going to the fire station today. They were having a little Safety Festival and it was crowded, but fun.
We watched them create this huge fire, and at first it was so sudden and hot all the kids screamed and started to run away until the fire fighter stared to put the fire out. When all was said and done and we were walking away from the demonstration Christian shouts "That was totally Awesome!"


They also let the kids have a turn with the fire hose which they thought was totally awesome!



They demonstrated how the jaws of life work and took the top of a car off in front of us.


And of course they gave out fire fighter hats, popcorn, and cotton candy. It was a fun way to spend the afternoon :)

Dealing with Fears

Evan has this funny fear, it's not a every day fear, but it keeps bubbling up. He tells me "Mommy! Fire Alarm SCARY!!!!" This morning I caught him shooting the fire alarm until he proclaimed it dead, I then had to take him downstairs so he could shoot and kill that one as well. What a funny kid.

CTR

Well our Christian boy is getting all grown up, he is 4 1/2 and we love him. But he still is naughty at times and the whole time out thing is not so much working any more for him or us. We decided to take a different, more positive stance. It all came about when our next door neighbor let Christian ride her bike with training wheels. It was love at first ride! After that Christian was not interested in riding his trike, he would ask permission if he could go over an ride her bike instead. He followed every instruction and was so obedient. One day he rode that bike for an hour and a half! Of course I was thinking well we are going to have to get this boy a bike for his birthday. But Dan felt like instead of being a gift it should be something he earned, so he doesn't feel like just because he has a birthday he gets anything and everything he wants. We came up with the idea of creating a CTR chart. Christian needed to earn 10 stars for 2 weeks for a total of 140 stars. He earned his stars by choosing the right which could include, listening and obeying, sharing, doing what he's told the first time, making his bed, eating his dinner, etc. We took this kid to Walmart and showed him all the bikes he could choose from, he tried all of them but kept gravitating to the bright green jeep bike. He rode it for a good 20 minutes int he store. We then said, okay say good bye to your bike. The kid was thoroughly motivated! And the next two weeks really were magical. He really did do great, sure he had his moments of naughtiness and when those happened we would take a star off the chart and put it in time out, and he had to earn it back. Then we would talk about why we choose the right and how it makes us happy and when we don't choose the right it makes us sad. Seriously the best thing ever, I think we may do another chart because it worked so well and we were all a lot more happy! I'm proud of the kid, he earned that bike :)


Of course the day we went to go get the bike after he earned it was pouring rain, so we let him ride it around the house to it cleared up.


Christian with his completed chart, all 140 stars!


Us at Walmart when we initially picked out the bike


Finally the rain stopped, it was freezing but he had to go out!

Home Depot

Did you know that The Home Depot does a kids craft day every month? Well they do and the best part is it is all FREE, well because they are hoping if they got the parents to the parking lot for the free stuff they just might wander in and buy something as well :) Well we went, we got orange aprons and made a cool orange car, and they had an ambulance, fire engine, and medical helicopter there. While we were there time was up, and it was time for the helicopter to take off, and it was so cool to see it go. We almost all fell over because of the powerful wind the baby stirs up. The kids were in heaven!

Some Spoiling

While browsing the toy section at Walmart, Dave and Lara couldn't help themselves, they HAD to get these capes and masks for the kiddos. I don't know what do you think, do they like them? :)

Rough Housing with Katie

When Katie comes over the boys always have a good time. Usually it goes like this. Ding Dong -"Katie is here!!!" then she comes in and puts her stuff down says hi to me and then they are off to the races teasing each other, rolling around wrestling, chasing each other and they all have a great time and are totally worn out by the time she leaves. We love our Aunt Katie.

This kid loves to color!

Please don't forget to note the iron man glove and green boots :)

First Day of School

Christian started his second year of preschool with Miss Cathy. About the middle of July he would say "Mom, I bet Miss Cathy is missing me!" He has loved all the summer fun, but he really does love school and his teacher. After I picked him up from preschool he got mad at me because I guess some of the mom's stayed and took pictures of the kids in the classroom where we just took first day school pics at our house. I told him I was sorry I didn't take pictures of him at school and we could do it next class time. And he just said "no mom, just remember for next year." Ha ha this is a good kid.

He wanted to do a silly face first


And after much coaxing a normal Christian smile. I cannot believe how fast he is growing up!!!

Sweet Pretzel Muffins

A favorite snack of mine and Christian's lately has been cheese and pretzels. While having this yummy snack Christian got an idea to make "Sweet Pretzels Muffins!" He said to me "All you have to do is get a plate and put some pretzels on it and pour water on it, stick in the fridge so they will get nice and cold and sweet!" He was so excited I could dampen his creative spirit even though it sounded disgusting. So he made the pretzels and he and Evan thought they were the best thing ever. They ate the entire plate and made some more... this time Christian was saving them for dinner. At dinner time he insisted that me and Dan try some of these delightful creations. Trying to be good parents we took a small piece and ate it. Soggy, slightly salt, mushy cold pretzel, um, yeah- it really was disgusting. All through dinner Christian wanted to discuss his new creation until Dan said "Hey buddy lets talk about something else now" because after tasting this little nugget of mushiness, discussing it made us both feel nauseous and our appetites were quickly slipping away. But Evan happily volunteered to help Christian eat the rest. The next day he made ANOTHER batch and saved them for Dan until he got home from work, then Dan told him even though he had tried them he didn't really care for them, and since then Christian has decided he does not like sweet pretzel muffins. This kid kills me :)



I mean come on, even though they were gross look how proud he was at what he came up with. So cute.

One more thing...

While I am posting things I don't want to forget, here is a conversation Dan had with Christian one night before prayers.

Christian: "I wish Jesus could live here"
Dan: "Why?"
Christian: "So Evan can get over his allergies."

What a sweet tender boy I have- love all three of my boys oh so very much.

Play Mates

My boys are so fun to watch playing these days. They are really good buddies and play well together most of the time. I have a few random things about each of them I wanted to write down before I forgot or they stopped doing them.
Christian: "20 hundred" This is the main phrase of Christian he uses it like "Mommy as soon as Evan is done having his turn with that I get it for 20 hundred minutes, okay?" or when he is saying his prayers he will pray "And please bless that Ashlynn and Haley will come over for 20 hundred days." or if I tell him that it's time to go in 10 minutes he will say "how about 20 hundred more minutes" Christian's turning into a little boy, he loves all thins super hero. And he is smart and catches on fast. He is sweet and will tell us all the time that he loves us and gives us kisses and hugs. And he loves to learn and can't wait for preschool to start back up again. Sometimes, when he sneezes or farts he will say "Mom I excused me!" or if he sneezes a lot "Mom I blessed you a lot!"
Evan: He is the ultimate little brother. He loves to do whatever Christian is doing- this is a good thing and a bad thing. It does well when Christian is leading them through some elaborate imaginary adventure, it does not well when we are trying to get them to eat their food because the second Christian gets up from his chair, so does Evan. Evan LOVES to read! He will sit and read with me for easily 30 minutes, which has been good to because Christian will sit with us. It's fun to go to the library and get new books every week or so with them. Evan loves his blankie and all animals. He loves to color and play with play dough. He also has quite the imagination and I will find him playing by himself quietly all the time. Sometimes he will point his finger at you and make a firing sound and say "I Iron Man" in the manliest voice he can. If you ask him a question he will most likely answer like this "mmmhmmm" or "yup" with an emphasis on the "p."
Love my boys :)