The final Countdown!!!!!!!!

I can't believe that it is already Feb. Where has the time gone? A couple months ago Scott booked a trip for the family to go to California, and while there, we plan to visit Disney Land. With all the stuff that comes with November, December, and January, the trip was somewhere in the back of my mind......way back. Scott has been telling me, "we need to research stuff for our trip". I figured I'd get to it as the time got closer. I woke up this morning and turned my calendar over to Feb. One more month til we board that plane! Wahoo!!!!! Now the super fast planning begins. I have never been myself, so any great advise would be greatly appreciated. If anyone has any great ideas of what to do with a 6 yr old boy, 4 yr old girl, and 2 yr old girl. I think that we might only do one day at the park because they are so young. We will see though. We are way excited.

Star Wars Party

Caden has been wanting to watch Star Wars for a long time now. All his friends at school play Star Wars so he comes home and asks me all sorts of questions I can't answer, such as, who has what color light saber and such. Last week we decided that because he would be tuning 6 we would all watch together. To celebrate the occasion, we had a little Star Wars party. Daddy surprised the kids by getting all of us a light saber (he is so cool. He always comes up with such great ideas). We all had a saber war (before putting Hannah to bed) then popped popcorn and watched the movie. Hannah was so cute. We almost put her to bed earlier, but thought she would enjoy participating in the fight, boy were we right.

Why didn't I think of that?!?

Sarah, being the super busy little girl that she is, has a VERY hard time doing anything that requires her to be still. as you can imagine, laying in bed till asleep does not come very easy for her. Countless times we hear all the reasons she "can't sleep". There are many, and they can get pretty creative. Our best bet is to put her in bed dead tired or asleep. Lucky for us though, she has an equally creative brother. One night, as Scott and I were watching a movie, we heard all sorts of noise and commotion coming from upstairs. Scott went up there to check it out. To his surprise, Sarah was sound asleep. He went into Caden's room and Caden explained to him that he had just jumped out of bed to get something.

The next morning Sarah ran into our room with a little note, Hannah also had one and on our alarm clock was a little note that read,

"I luv yoo mom ad Dad, frum Caden and Monstr"

We had all been given similar notes while we slept. Sarah was so excited and Caden went on to explain to her that only if she stayed in bed would the "Tickle Monster" visit her. This went on for several nights. One night the monster even brought Sarah an invitation to a party she could attend if she stayed in bed. The next day Caden and Sarah played monster games led by Caden. He made tons of little paper monsters that he hid all over the house and hey hunted for them. Caden even had to draw a picture of "Tickle Monster" for Sarah because she was so curious as to how he looked.

I am so grateful for such a creative boy, and most especially for the tender relationship that Sarah and Caden share.

What a great Daddy you will someday be Caden.

For Caden's birthday, I gathered up a bunch of cute pics of him over the last six years and hung them up in the dining room. I intended to do the same on my blog, but got too lazy. It is hard looking through 600 files. Luckily, Dawn took pictures of the collages I had hung up, so hope you can see some of the fun pictures. Thanks Dawn.

It may look a bit blurry, but click on the collage and you can see the pictures better.

Six years gone by......

It was not too long ago that I brought this little 6lb 12oz little bundle home with me........

...who could believe that 6 years has gone by!!!

Happy Birthday Caden

Moving out!!!!

Isn't she a bit young to want her independence so young? What is a mom to do?

Sarah got a sleeping bag for Christmas she insisted on trying out. I saw no harm in that. I took it into her room and tried setting it out. "No", she said. "I want to sleep in the play room".

She chose what she thought was the perfect spot, the coffee table, and together we set up camp. A night of sleeping in the play room would be fun for her I thought........but one night has turned into weeks! Apparently, the independence gained from MOVING OUT of her room with Hannah is worth the discomforts of sleeping on a coffee table.

Even more days pass. Sarah still doesn't seem to be bothered by her "bed", but finds walking all the way into "Hannah's room" to get dressed a great inconvenience.

She sweet talks Daddy into moving her dresser into the playroom.

P.S. Sarah, Hannah misses you. She calls for you every morning!

The dreaded call!!!!
It took til my third kid before we experienced the dreaded, accidental,911 call. I've heard many stories, and thought, "oh, that won't happen here". But leave it up to my mischievous, yet completely adorable, little Hannah to break our good luck.
I was checking my email and Hannah got the phone and started playing with it (you know, the kind of thing your kids do when you don't pay full attention to them). Even in my preoccupied state, I could hear the pressing of buttons, but of course, I chose to ignore it. I was just about done. Then I heard ringing out. she had called someone, and put it on speaker phone!! I quickly hung up, but not soon enough to hear "9-1....." My finger was already pushing the button and they were gone. Could that have been 9-1-1? Of course it was. Does anyone else ever answer the phone by first saying 9? Maybe I should have stayed on the phone and explained! A few minutes later the phone rang. Caller ID confirmed my fears. I answer. Voice on the other end , "9-1-1 emergency, we got a call, is everything okay there"?
We'll have to keep phones higher and out of reach.
It could have been worse. At least I wasn't in the shower and greeted by firemen who had to break down the door!

What a great Daddy!

Scott and Caden got season passes at the end of the season last year. We almost didn't think that we would get any snow this year, but it finally came and the boys have been taking full advantage.

As soon as Caden got home from School, he reminded me that Daddy was going to take him skiing and asked if his stuff was packed. Seeing that he was so excited, I called Scott. He wasn't very busy so he came home early and away they went. It totally made his day!

After all our company left last week, rather than cleaning my house, I took up a new hobby, playing with Caden's really cool toy he got from uncle Adrian!!! Quite addicting. Caden and I had competitions to see who could knock down the most cups.

THE TARGETS!!!

Thanks Hannah for retrieving bullets for me. That really helped my speed, as I was up against a very experienced competitor!

As of yesterday, my house returned to somewhat decent conditions. Thank you so much Caden, Sarah, and Hannah for letting Mommy play and veg for a couple of days. Oh, and Thank you so much to Uncle Adrian and Aunt Wendy for the awesome toy!

Fun family time pictures

These are just some of my fav shots taken during our big family picture day. Just click on collage to view pictures larger.

Family reunion

Here are some pictures we took while we were all together over Christmas. This is the first time we have all been together for about 5 years.

Snow Days!!!!!!

We had a lot of Snow over the Christmas break! I can't remember when it last snowed as much as it did this year. Scott had to constantly shovel the drive way and Caden had so much fun helping him. They built a huge fort and a snowman.

I am so proud of Caden and his kind and caring heart. The day that we got the most snow, we all went out to help Daddy. Caden told me that he wanted to shovel someones driveway. I figured I'd just let him help with the neighbors because Daddy always shovels hers. But that wouldn't do for Caden. He and Sarah went off on their own to a neighbor I have not yet taken the time to meet.She was shoveling all by herself and apparently Caden and Sarah asked if they could help. I decided to go down there and introduce myself. Caden was talking away as he shoveled. It was good to finally meet one of my neighbors after living here for about 6 months. I am grateful that Heavenly Father sends us such wonderful children to teach us some of the greatest lessons in life.

Christmas Day

We had a wonderful day! To avoid posting a million pictures as I so often do, I made a collage with some of my favorites. We had a super fun relaxing morning. The kids loved all their new toys. Daddy took the kids out in the snow to play with their new sled, Dawn, Daniel, and Grandma and Grandpa Smith came over for dinner (very fun), and we attempted to get pictures of the kids. Hannah thought it would be more fun to dance around on the fire place.

One of my favorite things heard that day, and so telling of this day in age when technology is everything came from my observant little Caden.

Sarah received a camera from Santa. She later opened up a present from us that was one of those little vtech laptops.

Caden got so excited and yelled out, " now Sarah can download her pictures onto her laptop and start her own blog".

p.s. to view pics, just click on the collage.

Christmas eve traditions

Normally, we put out the cookies for Santa on Christmas eve, but we made cookies on Monday for FHE and my cute little kids wanted to put them out right away. I, of course, let them, sure that Santa wouldn't mind a stale cookie from two adorable children. I DID make them wait to put out the milk despite their (mostly I mean Caden) begging! I think Caden asked every day, "is it time to put the milk out"?

I love traditions. I think it is what makes celebrations so special. It is especially fun when you have cute kids to create them with. Caden is especially fond of traditions in our family. Here is how we traditionally spend our Christmas eve. This is a time when we try to do things with just our kids.

We always make fun cookies. The kids are very involved in the process. Here is Sarah cutting up the cherries for the chocolate cookies.

Here are the yummy results before we deliver them t the neighbors.

In the past we have also gone to Grandmas house during the day to have shrimp stuff, but since Grandma was gone, I made a shrimp Fettuccine dinner. Caden loves shrimp so he was excited.


Hannah tried out the shrimp and didn't think it was too bad.

Caden couldn't get enough! He didn't like the noodles, but he wanted us to keep the shrimp coming.



Sarah, on the other hand, didn't want anything to do with the shrimp. She sweet talked Daddy into spoon feeding her the noodles, and she thought that was quite funny.

We always have fun snacks, watch a movie and play games together in the evening. Sarah decided that we needed root beer floats for that! ( a tradition our family uses for ANY event. We love root beer floats).

We cuddled up on the couch and watched Joy to the World with our Root beer floats and muddy buddies.

Then the kids always get to open up one gift, which is always a game, and we play game together til bed time. This year they got marble works which was a big hit! It was so fun to see them play. Even Hannah really got into it.


We had the most wonderful day and I am so grateful that I had my cute family to share it with.

Holiday activities

A few days before Christmas we took the kids to see Santa. Sarah kept talking about how last year she cried, but this year was going to be so different. She held Caden's hand so tight as they waited for their turn.

Caden sat on Santa's lap. Sarah didn't cry, but she told Santa what she wanted from a safe 5 feet away.

Hannah Kept yelling, "Santa, Santa", Trying to get his attention while she waited for her turn. When that time finally came, she wondered why we were trying to put her on his lap. she just wanted to give him the toy we brought to donate, and collect the candy cane of course!

Any time Hannah was asked what she wanted from Santa she would respond with, "candy". Now if you ask her what Santa brought her, she will tell you candy. Of all the things in her stocking, the one candy item was her favorite!

When we got back from seeing Santa The Valko's were at our house so Keoni got to join in on making gingerbread houses with us. It was a lot of fun.