Christmas Day

Christmas with kids is a blast. It was so fun to watch their little eyes light up and teach them what Christmas is really about.

Here are our stockings. Do you like the newest addition (Mia's stocking)?

The morning started bright and early when Mia woke up hungry. Little Austin is such a light sleeper he woke up not too long after and walked into the living room to find his train table. And that was it for him. He did not want to leave it all day. It was all we could do to get him to open another present, then he would go right back to his train.


Mady girl got a new balance bike and an easel (she is such a little artist). She was ecstatic.


But she was also ecstatic about the M&M's in her stocking. Hmm... maybe next year we will just shop at the dollar store and she will be JUST as excited.

Ryan and I bought a new dining room table for each other, which makes me more excited to move into our house!

Ryan's favorite Christmas present was these beautiful books:

He knew I was working on them, but I printed them off and surprised him. They are a collection of pictures and stories/blog posts (once the blog started) from when we first started dating until 2009. They turned out amazing and they will be so fun to look at over the years. I can't wait to finish catching up!

This poor little girly woke up with a cough and runny nose. Doesn't she look sad?


Her favorite present was this chewy giraffe from Grandma. She would pull it right up to her little mouth and suck away. She is growing right up...

Overall a wonderful day with family. I hope you had a magical Christmas, too!

On the eve of Christmas...

The week before Christmas my parents took a little vacation down to St. George, hoping to golf, relax, swim, shop, read, watch movies and rest. Of course the weather was terrible for them, but they still had a great time.

Meanwhile, us little elves were busy back here in Provo. We had been plotting with my mom for awhile to redo their entertainment center, which was a built-in cabinet with an old small TV. So Ryan ripped out the old cabinet, which we donated to Habitat for Humanity (they picked the huge thing up for free!) and we had a new beautiful cabinet put in that was the perfect fit for my dad's new plasma TV. All of this was a big surprise for my dad.

So Christmas Eve they came home to find this:



My dad, who doesn't get surprised very often, was so surprised. He just kept saying "Dixie. Dixie. Dixie" over and over. And then "I only got you a book for Christmas!" It was so cute. My mom was just beaming.


And here is the finished product. It looks amazing and is already a really fun place to watch movies and hang.



Christmas Eve we had a birthday party for these three adorable boys:

Don't you love their matching t-shirts? Made by the incredibly talented Aunt Tara (mother to Sam, birthday boy who turned 1).

It was a really fun night filled with opening presents (here are all the kids helping uncle Lincoln open his many boxes of Reese's Puffs), breakfast for dinner, pajamas, and cupcakes. Ausy loved it.

Here are the kids in their matching PJ pants. Their's turned out super cute. Mine? Not so much. They fit me weird. But Ryan's are super cosy...so I'm glad I did something right. Maybe next year I can make them all right.


The girls playing games on someone's laptop

Eating some delicious waffles

Then on to the Christmas celebrations. We opened cousin gifts to each other and Mady jumped off furniture.


And Mia passed out on her daddy, which was thoroughly adorable.Then off to bed to await the arrival of Santa.

cavity

This story is a little out of order because I couldn't get the pictures to load. Better late then never.

Last Sunday Mady started complaining that her mouth hurt. For you mom's out there, you know just how hard it is to pinpoint exactly what is hurting when your child complains and they are too little to explain in detail. After some tears and some guessing we realized it hurt just when she was chewing and especially when it was sugary. I guessed it was a cavity.

Monday morning I called my dentist and he said to bring her in. She has been to the dentist once before and they let her sit in the chair, count her teeth, and gave her a toothbrush. So she remembers it being a pleasant experience.

This time around was a little different. At first, she loved sitting in the big chair and was excited for them to count her teeth. Then they tried to take an xray of the side that was hurting. She could not keep the little guard-thing in her mouth without gagging and I think she may have bit the dental assistant girl. So in the dentist came to see if he could see any cavities. Lo and behold, on her back molar there was a little one.

Mady was still doing good up until now. No crying. But then they started to fill the cavity and she went crazy. They had to lock her mouth open and have me hold her arms down, another hold her head still, an assistant and the dentist working away. Luckily it took less than a minute to fill. Afterward, Mady just complained that her mouth felt funny from the numbness, but the dentist was really nice and gave her a hug and talked to her. I think there are no hard feelings (I've been talking about the dentist since to try and boost it as a positive thing). And she got a balloon out of the adventure, which is probably the biggest thing she remembers from the trip.


This whole time Austin was sitting in a chair in the corner watching the whole procedure. I'm a little nervous for his first trip to the dentist - he may have some latent negative feelings towards him.

Birthday Boy

Today was a BIG day for our Ausy boy, turning 2!

We had a fun day, playing out in the snow - turns out he isn't a big fan... he looked just like Ralphie's little brother in "The Christmas Story" in his snow suit and couldn't really walk or function. So we didn't last long, but it was fun.

We opened a few presents (we are saving some for when Grandma and Grandpa get back from St. George).

This little girl has been all smiles lately.



And we had these cupcakes instead of the traditional cake. They were yummy. Austin loved blowing out his candles so much we did it a few times.


And one more of the drooler, sporting her new ultra-cool leggings.

Happy birthday, little man. We love you!

A trip to SLC

Last night, Ryan and I went on a REAL date. What is this thing called a "real date", you say? Well you start off with some wonderful babysitters and then you dress up, hold hands, talk and reminisce, eat dinner...you get the idea.

Ryan surprised me with tickets to the Jon Schmidt concert, which we haven't been to for years. His parents came with and it was their first Jon Schmidt experience.

The concert involved amazing piano, cello solos, red wigs, flips, playing the piano upside down, a break-dancer, a lot of family participation from his kids, his dad playing the harmonica and telling Obama jokes. Sound irreverent and silly? It was. But there were also some beautiful moments with beautiful Christmas arrangements, something I love.

It was a perfect night...until we hit the freeway which was CLOSED and traffic was awful. We finally made it home after a long drive that made me grumpy, picked up our sleeping babes and put them to bed.

It was fun.

Today was an eventful Sunday. I played the piano for our ward Christmas program and also for the Young Women Christmas presentation. Instead of braving Sacrament meeting with all 3 grumpy, tired kids Ryan opted to stay home. They have been so grumpy and awful today. Can I blame them? No. Late nights and not enough sleep have a tendency to create monsters.

And can you believe it is CHRISTMAS THIS WEEK? I still have a few things to get ready (what was I thinking making pjs for the whole family??). Better get on that.

work. it. out.

I've been working out religiously now for 12 weeks. At first I was running until my foot started hurting so badly I could barely walk. So I started P90X, which has been so great for me. I can do it at home, when I have an hour, while my kids are playing.

I lost 5 pounds...and plateaued, which is awful when I still have at least 15 to go. I still feel like it is giving me results: toning muscles, helping me get in shape - just not dropping pounds. I decided working out in front of the TV is just not enough cardio for me and so I have started running again. This means waking up WAY too early in the morning and going to the track (I'm sorry, but I'm scared to run outside in the dark. Have you heard about all the attacks on the river trail?). Hopefully this will jumpstart some weight loss for me.

To those of you who take off your baby-weight effortlessly: I hope you realize how good you have it. And I hate you.



Funny things the kids have been saying:

Austin has been doing this thing lately where he puts his hands up and moves them up and down and says "Roar! The monster truck!" It is hilarious. No idea where he got it.

Another funny thing? He has started calling me "Mamacita." It is the best when he yells at me "MAMACITA!!!"

Today watching TV Mady turned to me and said "Mom, I need to eat some carrots so I can see better."

And watching a football game, she asked about the newscaster "Why doesn't he talk like a real guy?"

Construction Update 4.0 and beyond?

It's been a while. The abstract: Framing's done. Rough-ins just finished up. The house is insulated and the Drywall starts tomorrow. Stucco guys are doing their thing tomorrow as well.

The full pictorial:

Finishing up the framing

Shingling the roof

Installing housewrap (Tyvek). Not really required by code, but helps stop solar-driven water (i.e. keeps the walls dry = good)

Finished wrapping the house, getting the windows in

One of my favorite parts, having the back timbers installed.

I didn't really take any pictures of the inside during all this. Nothing really too exciting to see during rough-ins (HVAC, Plumbing, Electrical, gas line, phone/tv/internet, fireplace installed, central vacuum) I guess you can see a small plumbing stack in this picture . . . (yeah, that's a broken window in the background. Mistakes were made.)

Insulation just finished up today

Scaffolding set up for the stucco/stone

So drywallers are starting tomorrow and should be a little more than a week. We're looking for a good tile guy so if you know one let me know.

busy little bees

This week was a busy one. I felt like I was running around trying to get everything done, only to end up tired with more on my list than I had to begin with.

I DID get some Christmas shopping done, made Mia's Christmas stocking, give Austin a haircut, make a delicious salad for our R.S. Christmas dinner that was so so yummy and started on Christmas cards. Yahoo!

We also went to the BYU Faculty Christmas party. Along with the rest of Provo - it was PACKED! And I'm sorry, but I was not about to stand in line for a picture with Santa only to have all 3 kids screaming once we got there. So no picture with Santa this year. Mady did get to make a snowman necklace, go fishing for a prize and view Cosmo from afar, which was close enough for her.

Some pictures of these two best friends:


And Mia. Compared to our other two kids, she has quite the fussy temperament. She likes things just so. And she is still waking up in the night, which is normal for most kids...but I'm not used to it (both Austin and Mady were sleeping through the night by 2 months old). But she is adorable. And smily. And she likes to talk to you while you change her diaper.

These two monkeys were being awfully quiet for awhile so I went searching for them and found them snuggled under their blankets on the couch reading "I Spy" which is Austin's FAVORITE thing to do. It was adorable.