Christmas Day, 2010

Checking out the stocking spoils. . .

Emmy's gift from Santa - an adorable doll-house.

Miles' gift from Santa - Night-Fury, from How to Train Your Dragon.

Jonas' gift from Santa - an archery set.

Another one of Miles' toys - a microscope set.

Emmy opening up her beloved princess-dolls.

Jonas opening up "minotaurs," a game he's really wanted for a while.

Ben is opening up a present from Jonas - some "coupons." Cute. And check out Lucy's expression. Pretty great.

Awwww.

Emmy playing with Snow White and Belle.

Lucy eating her present from Santa.

Jonas and Miles also got an electric race track. It's really cool.

Miles is definitely in to it!

So is Jonas. :)

Lucy - definitely the cutest gift around.

An Early Christmas Eve

By early I mean the kids waking up at 5:15am today. Ben told them to stay quiet and they did - well Emmy did some loud singing around 6:15ish, I think, but they did pretty good. Waiting until a little bit before 7 to come out of their rooms. I wonder what time they'll wake up on actual Christmas Day? Only a few more hours to find out. . .

Miles put his hat on Lucy and just thought it the cutest thing. It sure was. Miles took this picture.

We went up to the "forest" to play in some snow (thank goodness there was some - it was a close call!) and have a fire. So fun!

Fire-sticks! Smokey would not be proud.

Yes, indeed, there were some chestnuts roasting on an open fire. Ben liked them. I didn't really. Kind of. Kind of not. Ben thought at first they tasted like butternut squash, then potatoes, then hashbrowns. Weird.

Eating lunch in the snow.

Emmy really liked peeling the chestnuts. . .

But did not enjoy eating them!

Lucy all bundled up. Oh she is my Christmas Gift indeed.

Happy Christmas Eve!!

Miles' Theatrical Debut

Miles' 1st grade class put on the play "The Pied Piper of Hamelin." It was pretty adorable. It was a packed house in their little classroom and so it was a little hard to hear sometimes. But cute nonetheless just seeing the kids act something out. Miles was a "child." He had one line. He was totally nervous the afternoon before his performance. I think a nervous excitement. He wouldn't even play outside - which is a big sign something is off with Miles.

Anyways, for some reason we couldn't get a decent picture during the play. Our camera was doing horribly I guess. So this was the only good shot we got, which was after the performance:

Such a cute actor.

Ben is Old

Ben had a birthday yesterday and at first Miles, who thought Ben was turning 25, told his dad that "You're not old, not until you're in your middle 30s." Whoops, that officially makes Ben old seeing as he turned 35.

I told Diana (Ben's mom) that I don't know how she made his birthday special as a kid because his birthday is such bad timing. :) After Jonas' birthday and getting everything ready for Christmas, Ben's birthday just kind of comes along and happens. And I know that birthday celebrations aren't really for adults, but I still feel bad that his birthdays aren't spectacular. Because he is.

But because of this ridiculous weather we're having (waaaay to warm - like 50s. and waaaaaaaaaaaay too much wind - like wake-up and scare Miles wind.) Ben spent a few hours in the morning in the backyard. (I was at Miles' school helping out for a couple of hours.) Jonas and Emmy built a fort or something. Ben played in the compost. Not literally in. He organized his garage. Manly things like that.

But the big celebration of the day (of all his birthdays now) is decorating our gingerbread houses. We started the tradition of doing it on Ben's birthday a few years ago and it's great. It makes the day fun for the children, at least. :)

At first I helped Emmy with her house by placing the icing where she wanted me to and then she would place the candies. But then she decided she wanted to do it all on her own and she did awesome. I love this picture of her squirting out a great big pink blob. Love it.

And here's her finished product - she's so proud! I love how it turned out.

Jonas had a blast doing his house, too. The boys were all on their own. It's fun to see what they do. Jonas was pretty pleased with it!

And Miles with his house. We named it "Winter Wonderland." You can't see too well in the picture but he has white frosting ("snow") everywhere. Pretty darn awesome.

Here they all are. From picture L-R: Ben, Emily, Miles, Jonas, Emmy. I really love Ben's home.

And here is the old man with his kiddos. Such a handsome father with his adorable children. We all love Ben. A whole lot.

Lucy = 4 months

Lucy wins the "My favorite child of the week" contest this week. Even with her middle of the night (morning?) feedings! I know, I know - parents aren't supposed to have favorites. But it's been a whopper of a week with my other kids and so she deserves this.

Happy 4 months girl!

She's still just as cute and yummy as she was at 3 months. She still wakes up during the night/early-morning to feed. She still fusses (a lot!) during 5-6pm. She still does not roll-over. She is still madly adored by her siblings. She is still our Lucy Dee and we sure do love her.

Jonas' Birthday, Take 5

Ah-ha, finally! Jonas gets to celebrate his 5th birthday! (The shirt is my first attempt at freezer-paper stenciled shirts. Ben helped out with it, too.)

Bright and early: opening up one present in the morning.

Jonas - the boy of many silly and adorable faces. Enjoying breakfast (fun cereal!) and balloons.

Jammin' on his new guitar. Too bad the picture is blurry cuz he's so cute in it.

A little clearer and still cute.

Jonas and his birthday cake. I loved how the cake turned out - I think it looked better in "real life." But it was pretty awesome. Thanks to Ben and all his great help! Jonas loved it and "decorated" it with his pirate toys.

Going to bed in his new "tent." I don't think he lasted too long sleeping in it, though. But he does love it and is actually "napping" in it right now. :)

I hope it was a good day for Jonas. He got some other fun toys like: a bakugan, don't break the ice game, some toy dirt-bikes and riders, a mini (as in 2-inch) skateboard, target gift card, CARS puzzle book, clothes, a movie, and a castle lego set. Coooool.

To Jonas

Dear Jonas,

These letters are always so hard to start. I just don't know where to start. Looking back at the past year I think, "Not much has changed." I mean you are still Jonas: sweet, smart, goofy, daring, funny, and, yes, still whiny.

You still make me laugh and smile a lot. I love it. You like to be silly. But mostly your being silly is just you being you. A lot of times you don't do it on purpose. You say honest things that are just funny. Like the time you told me, "I heard the Holy Ghost once say, 'Tickle my toes.' " How can you beat a quote like that? You have gotten into tickling others: your siblings, as well as your parents. I think you like to make others laugh. You've also gotten into saying, "tricked ya!" You think it's pretty hilarious. Sometimes it is. Other times it's basically you being caught in a lie, tho you claim, "Tricked ya!" (By the way, I am not easily tricked.)

You have gotten smarter this past year as well. Originally you didn't seem to me to be the "academic-type." Not because you weren't smart. Just because you were interested in other things. But you have proved me wrong. You love our little school time and have become quite a good little reader. Just today you sounded out and read "s-p-r-i-n-k-l-e." You do really well with the 3 and 4-letter word books. You love to write and will spend quite a bit of time in your notebook writing words, notes, or simply just writing l-e-t-t-e-r-s. It's pretty neat. You're pretty neat.

You perfected the art of bike riding this year. You learned last year (when you were still 3!) to ride a bike with no training wheels, but you were still a little reckless then. Now you have much more control and you usually ride (on your bike or scooter) when we pick up Miles from school (if the weather is decent). We went to some BMX spot a couple of times this past summer and you adored it. I adored watching you. In fact, Miles - probably after watching how much fun you had! - finally learned to ride his bike at the BMX area. You did a soccer clinic this summer and had fun there. You always attended Miles' soccer practices and would kick the ball around with either your dad or Emmy.

We hiked the "Y" as a family this year - around the 4th of July. You did awesome. I think you did best out of all the kids as you hardly (if at all, really?) whined. Which, sorry to say, is really unlike you. Well maybe it's not totally unlike you. You are sweet and do try to be good. Whining is just your coping mechanism. Miles has his arm to "suck" on. Emmy has her "boo." You whine. Oh well. I think you'll grow out of it someday (could it be sooner than later?).

You invented a name for some bug that is common in our area. I don't know what the bug is but you named them "eenies." That is what our family now calls them. Miles will get excited and say, "Jonas there is your eenie bug!" It's pretty great.

The biggest change in your life (in our family's life really) was the great addition of Lucy Dee. You have been amazing with her. To say you love her is a great understatement. You adore her. You treasure her. You are enamored by her. You think she is the cutest, sweetest, and funnest little gal around. You always have to come up to her and kiss her. Always. Even at times when I'd rather you not - i.e., when she's nursing or has just fallen asleep. It's literally impossible for you to stay away from her for too long. To you, she's irresistible. You love to try and make her laugh. You love to flow your hair over her face (you love doing it; i'm not sure how much she loves it tho?). Frankly, you are 100% smitten by little Lucy.

Another gal that you are pretty smitten by is your Primary teacher. She is a beautiful and wonderful teacher and you recognize that very well. You are always so excited to see her. You always want to tell her about such-n-such or show her a picture your drew during sacrament meeting. You also really like the girls in your primary class (the boys, too, of course). Not a gushy-like, just a sweet-like.

You're just sweet Jonas. You say sweet things. You do sweet things. You want to be sweet. And that is a pretty sweet quality to have. Keep it up kiddo.

I love you,

mom

Little trip to Littleton

I am not very good at being a respecter of pictures. Thus you get a lot. So here it goes:

The boys (plus Grandpa Jim) traveled to the Denver Art Museum to see the King Tut exhibit. They got to take the train there and I know they loved that.

Just being in a big city was pretty exciting (what's not exciting about seeing a bunch of homeless men - including one who they weren't quite sure was still breathing. . .)

The boys are hard at work at their "Pharaoh collars."

There are the collars - super cool. Miles was a little disappointed that the exhibit didn't have mummies. He really got into mummies and King Tut from a National Geographic we got from the grandparents. In fact, one day a couple weeks ago Miles told me, "When I die I want to donate my body to science and become a mummy." Lovely.

Friday (I'm out of order since King Tut was on Saturday. . .) was like 65 degrees! So most of the day was spent outdoors. We went to the Littleton Historic Museum (as always) and enjoyed that too - well except the gusty wind. Here's cute Emmy struggling with a miniature wheelbarrow.

Much better for the wee little gal.

Miles just had to have a picture taken on the tractor. Pretty fun.

Oh my are they adorable?

Feeding the sheep (right next to the "Don't feed the animals" sign. We stopped after we saw the sign. And got a few pictures of course.)

Love this. Love them.

Here we are at the blacksmith's shop. He gave some great (and lengthy) lectures. He also turned out to be Ben's chemistry teacher from HS - Mr. Pittman, I think.

In the backyard at Grandma's and Grandpa's. Climbing trees is just so irresistible to boys.

Playing with some toys.

The beautiful grandma with her beautiful grandbaby.

And another beautiful woman: Great-Grandma Dee holding a thumb-sucking Lucy Dee. Precious.

And I didn't even think I got a lot of pictures - ha! But I did miss some highlights like Ben and I going out each evening after our kids were "in bed." The kids really weren't settled down and kept Grandma and Grandpa running for a little bit (thanks again!). (By the way - the last 3 nights the kids have hardly, if at all, made a peep at bedtime thanks to their not-going-down-so-great antics.) Ben and I enjoyed going to the Tattered Cover one nite (like Barnes and Noble), to Old Navy (got Lucy a little Christmas PJ shirt), and visiting with our great friends - Pete and Katie Sabey. Other highlights included the kids getting to watch "Prince of Egypt" on Sunday, making gingerbread cookie dough with Emmy then decorating them with everyone else, eating yummy dinners not made by me, Ben finding "The Little House cookbook" and making his first recipe from it - custard pie. Going on a run one morning WITH Ben. But we really mostly enjoy just being with "extra" family - it just makes life really good.