How you know your kids watch too much T.V.

As we're leaving Walmart parking lot

Kaitlyn: Mom, guess what I heard?

Mom: What?

Kaitlyn: Christmas costs less at Walmart!, Good thing we shop there.

Don't We Clean Up Nice?

It's been a busy couple of weeks for us. We've had tons of rain, but to my kids continued disappointment, no snow. I got to go into Kaitlyn's class and help her make gingerbread houses. Then we made some at home with Wendy, Annie and Katie, but my battery was dead, so no pics :( We've been getting boxes galore from granparents, and the kids are getting antsy for Christmas to come. We've tried hard to teach them the true meaning of Christmas, but alas, I'm not sure they are getting it. We'll keep trying though. Today was our Christmas program in church, so I bought Kaitlyn a new Christmas dress. I really wanted a green one to go with her red hair, and so I found one (not my favorite, but it does look nice with her hair.) I couldn't find anything I liked for Matt, so he just gets to wear his everyday church clothes. Don't they look great?

On a side note, here is finally a picture of my hair. I chopped off 8 inches. Sorry I didn't have the guts to go the full 10 Beth, next time I promise I'll donate it :)

Santa

In years past my kids have been terrified of Santa. They would always refuse to go and sit on his lap, so I didn't have high hopes for this year. But one day while we were at the mall, I decided to try it. And to my astonishment, they ran right up there, told him what they wanted (Kaitlyn a 3 Muskateers Barbie, and Matt a big Batman with Batman car) and took a great pick. They constantly amaze me. Happy Holidays!

Thanksgiving

We had a great Thanksgiving. Some wonderful people in our ward invited us over, Sabrina and Dustin Ward. The kids were totally excited. The Ward's daughter Kylie is in Matt's playgroup, so they already know each other. The kids favorite part about going over there was their dog, Milo, who got fed a better Thanksgiving dinner than anyone via my kids. Sorry Sabrina! We had a fabulous dinner. Sabrina cooked most of it. I contributed a veggie tray, turkey cupcakes and a banana cream pie. Sorry, no pics! It was a great day though. On Friday we took the kids to see Planet 51. They loved it, I fell alseep. But in defense of the movie, I had gotten up at 4:00 a.m. to do some Black Friday shopping. We then decorated our house. This year we added some net lights on the bush, lights around the window and the red and green bulbs in our house lights. The kids pooped at about 1/2 hour into it, but it took Aaron and I almost 2 1/2 hours to finish it.

On Saturday we went with Wendy and Gabe and the girls and bunch of Wendy's family to Thornton's Treeland to cut down our tree. IT was actually a dry day! The kids had a blast. Kaitlyn actually tripped over a stump and face planted in the mud. Here she is after the face plant, still smiling! Here is the tree Matt wanted to get. He aims high don't you think?

Here is the tree we actually picked. We were a little worried because it's the biggest we've ever gotten, and we were worried we'd have to move the couches out to actually fit it in our tiny living room, but we got it anyway. And for those of you that have never been to a tree farm, I wish I could describe the smell to you. To me, it is pure heaven.
They had a petting zoo at the tree farm. The kids stayed quite a while here. Then we got some hot chocolate.

Next came the hay ride. They had this fabulous kettle corn, as you can see Kaitlyn holding. We ruined everyone's dinner by eating two bags full!

And here is the final project. It just barely fit in the living room, although the love seat is pushed all the way to the front door and it still squishes that one side of the tree, but oh well. We love it. It smells sooooo good!

SYTYCD

For those of you that know me, you know that I'm a HUGE So You Think You Can Dance fan. I especially loved last season, when Jeanine won. So when I found out they were coming to Portland for their tour, I wanted to go. I was online to buy the tickets the second they went on sale. We went with our friends Mark and Karen Ray, and Gabe and Wendy Atkinson. It was amazing!! We had great seats, down on the floor, but in the first row of the bottom part, so we had a lot of leg room. We were also a little raised so we could see really well. They did almost all of my favorite dances. It was so great to see them so close, and to feel the music. The floor was literally pulsing with some of the music. It was an amazing night! We went to dinner at this fabulous Peruvian resturant, Nascas, owned by a lady in our ward. It was goooood food. Flash photography was technically banned, but everyone else was taking pics, so we did too. The only downfall of the whole night was that Phillip, one of my favorite dancers, was injured. So we didn't get to see him dance at all. :( The rest of the show was fabulous!

Here we are at the show, you can see all the foot room we had.

This is Melissa and Evan.

Here is the winner of last season and the runner-up, Jeanine and Brandon. This was my favorite group number.

Here is Phillip and Jeanine, once again, totally sad that Phillip didn't dance. Here is Kayla's solo. She wasn't my favorite, but she is a great dancer.

These last two pics are just for the Grandparents. Kaitlyn accessorized herself in a scarf yesterday and wanted me to take a picture. After the picture she informed me I had to send it to Grandma and Grandpa. Well, since Kaitlyn had a picture, Matt had to have one too, with Spiderman. He has a bit of a cold, that's why his nose is so red and raw. Silly kids!

Happy 30th!

Happy Birthday to my wonderful husband. We've been married 7.5 years and I love him as much today as I did when we were married, even more! He's such a wonderful husband, and most importantly a wonderful Dad! The kids were so excited for today. They helped wrap his presents ( a new golf club, spongebob golf balls, and a putting practice thing) and then helped make his breakfast (cinnamon rolls, eggs, and bacon). They were so excited because Daddy chose to go to Kidz Club for his b-day. For those of you that don't live here, Kidz Club is a big, three-story indoor jungle gym. The kids had a blast playing tag and hide-and-go-seek with Daddy, (who consequently needed a shower after the trip.) His chosen b-day dinner is crab legs and steak, so I'll get the chance to cook crab legs for the first time. The day will finish with his favorite, Boston Cream Pie, also baked with loving help from the kids. So Happy 30th Birthday Aaron!!!!

Happy Halloween

As most parents know, Halloween is a hard holiday for kids. From the second mine woke up they were asking to go trick-or-treating. They couldn't believe they had to wait all day to go! So we told them they could pick one fun thing to do, and they picked bowling. So we headed to Big Al's! It was actually quite fun. The kids had a blast. Kaitlyn quickly discovered that she could run up and throw the ball (only dropping it a couple of times) and Matt pushed his. They did pretty good, although it was blatanlty obvious that no one in our family is bowlers. The final scores were Kaitlyn: 65, Matt:65, Me:80 and Aaron:97. I will say that Aaron finally got a strike and broke 100 on the second game, but the rest of us didn't really improve.

After all day of waiting it was almost time to go. Gabe and Wendy and the girls came over and we had some pizza, then went trick-or-treating together. The kids were all so cute! Everytime Matt and Katie would run up to a door their little capes would fly out behind them. We went around all block and by the end of it, Matt was done. So he headed home with Daddy, and the rest of us went over to Gabe and Wendy's neighboorhood. We made it about four more houses, then Katie pooped out. The bigger girls were die-hards and we made it a few more blocks. By then Annie was pretty cold and tired, but alas, Kaitlyn could have gone all night. Crazy kids pumpkin was totally full and she kept trying to smash it down so she could go to more houses. All in all, a great Halloween!