Merry Christmas!

We had a very nice Christmas! Savannah told all of the kids "don't even think about presents" when they woke up. But the girls rummaged through quite a few gifts before church. I was amazed at how quickly we managed to get ready! We had a wonderful Sacrament Meeting with some amazing music! The kids were quite anxious to open things afterwards.

Savannah's favorite gift was her American Doll.

Melanie says she loves her purse with accessories.

(And yes, the girls put their pajamas back on, so they could feel like they just got out of bed...definitely Savannah's ideas)
Spencer was happy with the toy cars that Savannah picked out for him...forget the Batcave that Santa brought!

And Owen loved everything! Especially his new chair and books. He was also quite fond of the Batcave box...just his size!

My favorite part was getting to Skype with my sister, Stacy, who is serving a mission in Rexburg, Idaho.

Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!

Veteran's Day

Since Savannah didn't have school on Veteran's Day, we thought that we'd try to have a little fun. We took a little trip to the dairy farm that's just around the corner. We had a lot of fun, but man did it get hot pretty quickly! And I thought that it was November. I guess that that doesn't really mean too much here in the valley. We invited both sides of the family to tag along with us and got a small turn out from each. Here's a shot of all of the kids up in one of the tractors. Melanie liked climbing around on some of the tires that they had set up. Of course, Spencer loved that too, mostly because we let him out of the stroller. Here is all of us waiting to go on a little hayride, which is also a tour of the dairy. We were lucky to get both Grandmas to come with us! Here is my mom and the girls, once we finally got on the hayride. We enjoyed seeing all of the cows and learning lots about them. They have about 1000 cows at the dairy. Did you know that each cow gets 4 showers a day? They are given 2 showers before each milking, and they are milked twice a day. The thought may have crossed my mind that those cows were usually cleaner than my kids, but then again, we get a good whiff of them every once in a while over at our house, and they don't smell too clean then. We even got to see 2 little calves that had been born that day. Pretty amazing. The kids all loved feeding and petting some of the other animals. The girls really wanted to pet one of the sheep, but it was much more shy and so we had to settle for the goats. Melanie's favorite was petting the bunny. It just sat so still and let everyone touch it. That's definitely Melanie's kind of animal. To finish up Savannah got her face painted, a unicorn. And of course, we all got free milk. We had fun, despite the heat and the crowd. And hopefully we can go back to the farm some time when Daddy can come too.

Happy Halloween!

We had a nice Halloween! To get into the holiday spirit we went over to Jon's parents' for some pumpkin carving! Melanie had no problem gutting her pumpkin. I thought that it was funny that she didn't mind getting her hands all slimy! Savannah didn't mind the slimy hands either. Jon was good enough to carve both of the girls' pumpkins. Melanie wanted the exact same face as Savannah's pumpkin, so that worked out pretty easy for him. And the pumpkins turned out pretty cute too. We even got to have yummy pumpkin waffles that night! Thanks Auntie! They were really good! We also decided to make a few Halloween goodies. Here are our Tombstone brownies with Nutter Butter ghosts. The girls had fun helping for about 2 minutes and then Jon and I were left to finish them. I think that they turned out cute though. The anticipated night of Trick-or-Treating finally arrived and the girls didn't want to be what they originally planned. So here is my cute little Superman. It was about the only costume that I could come up with that didn't require Spencer to wear something on his head; he absolutely hates that. Savannah was a butterfly again, which she was 2 years ago. And Melanie decided on the Indian costume, which Savannah wore 3 years ago. Melanie insisted that she was the Indian Princess from the Peter Man movie; so there's our cute little Princess Tiger Lily. Jon and I also pulled some costumes together. I found almost all of the needed clothing at Goodwill, so I guess that it was meant to be. Jon went as Handy Manny and I was Kelly the Hardware Store owner. Of course, no one could tell who I was without Jon and even then it was still difficult. Oh well, we still had lots of fun and the kids got mounds of candy.Happy Halloween!

Happy Father's Day

We had a very nice and mostly relaxing Father's Day. Savannah wanted to make breakfast for Daddy, but I knew that it would be impossible with 8 o'clock church. I decided to make some really easy Pilsbury Cinnabon Cinnamon Rolls instead. That certainly made Jon's morning. Here's the kids right after church posing for a Father's Day shot. Unfortunately, Spencer was not very cooperative at church and that made for a slightly tired and cranky Daddy. But I had Savannah secretly wrap some gifts for Dad. She then went and hid them behind the couch, but then she couldn't wait for him to open them. So she went and told him where they were. Jon was very happy to open 2 candy bars and a new ladle. The ladle made him laugh because he broke ours last week during an attempt to sword fight with it. Savannah also made a card for Daddy, with a picture of her inside. After the kids had naps we headed over to Jon's parent's house for dinner. We had a nice simple meal of cold cuts, fruit with dip, and lots of salads...pasta, potato, and pistacchio. There was also a manly edible arrange made by my sister-in-law. After dinner we surprised our Daddy with his real Father's Day gift...a new 42" LCD TV. Savannah had told him that we were keeping a surprise for him at Grandma's house, but he really was surprised with what the gift turned out to be. I think he was half expecting to open the box and there be something else inside. But he REALLY liked it, which didn't surprise me at all...it's what he's wanted for a long time. We ended the evening with some wonderful home-made cheesecake with strawberries. Yummy yummy! We also went and visited my Dad for a little bit. We had attempted to make an iron-on t-shirt for him with a picture of the kids, but the picture didn't come out as great as we hoped. He was still a good sport though and said that it just looked like he had already washed it a few times. When we made it home, Jon insisted on hanging the TV up Sunday night so that the kids wouldn't ruin it. As you can see, they put it to work right away! Babe, I love you...even with all of your silly quirks! I hope you had a great Father's Day.

Easter

We had to wake the kids up extra early on Easter, so they would have time to look at their Easter baskets and still get ready for 8 o'clock church. I think it's so funny to see how they're actually sleeping. I don't know how Melanie even manages to stay in the bed. Savannah was very excited to get up, because she knew it was Easter. She was so thrilled with her basket. She especially loved that the Easter Bunny brought her a little pig that she had seen at the store and Mom didn't buy for her, despite her major fit. Melanie just wanted to keep sleeping. She finally got up after she heard Savannah being so excited. She was pretty thrilled about her basket too. Spencer didn't get left out either. He was very happy to find a bucket of beach toys in his crib, even though he looks totally sleepy-stupid in this picture. Here are the girls in their matching Easter dresses, along with their new stuffed animals. We managed to get one shot of all 3 kids in their Easter best, but Spencer wouldn't hold still for any more than one. I love his little pin-stripped outfit with the pink bow tie!We all got naps and then we colored a few eggs. I got an egg spinner at WalMart, and I love how the eggs turn out all multi-colored! And it's so easy! Then we went over to Jon's parent's house for dinner and an egg hunt. This was the girls 3rd egg hunt, but the first one that I had a camera at. The loved looking for the eggs. Melanie needed a little help, but she was so cute whenever she found one! Can you spot the egg here? It took Savannah quite some time to find this one, even when she was told where to look. She was quite proud of herself for finding it. The kids had so much fun that we emptied the eggs of all the candy and then hid them again. They had just as much fun looking for them the 2nd time, even though they were disappointed that the eggs were empty. The kids were pretty tired by the end of the day. The girls were very excited to get to wear their new nightgowns to bed! And they were being such good friends with each other, that they decided to both sleep in Savannah's bed. They're cute here, but I'm sure that they would have been on top of each other if left like that for too long. Hope you had a great Easter too!