Ice Skating FHE

I'm featuring Parker here because it was his first time going ice skating! I was a little concerned because he tends to be a little more shy about doing new things than Samantha is, but he did great! He used the walker along with the help of Jeremy, but by the end, he was doing it all by himself, with only the help of the walker. And, no crying! Samantha had a little harder time. She didn't use the walker, so she fell a lot and got a little discouraged. BUT, she never cried or got too upset. I was pretty proud of her. Overall, they had a great time! Collin and I took pictures and video and ate Yo Go's while Jer had the kids on the ice. Jeremy did take Collin out on the ice once, with ice skates on and everything! Collin held on as best he could to the walker, but he didn't last very long. Maybe next year...

Christmas...So Far

It's been a while since I've blogged and realized I have nothing about Christmas on here! We've done quite a bit so far this Christmas. We try to get in as much as we can. Of course, we started off with putting up our decorations. We decided to do two trees this year- one in the playroom/sun room and one in the living room.

We also kicked off December with Jeremy shaving!!! Hallelujah!!! He decided to sport a mustache for the month of November, so on December 1st he finally shaved. Thank goodness! Not a big fan of the mustache...

Also, Samantha sang in our Stake Children's Choir for our Stake's Nativity Creche. It was really beautiful and the kids sang great.

We visited Snowflake Lane in Bellevue. We try to do that every year. The kids love to dance and play music with the drummers and characters that visit, like Rudolph!

We took the kids to get Santa pictures, thanks to Jeremy's work. Usually, I don't do this only because I tried it with Samantha when she was a baby and she screamed and I've never done it again! Samantha absolutely hated it and I've steered clear of Santa pics ever since because I've always seemed to have a baby that I assume will probably cry. Lame, but true. BUT, this year Jeremy's work provided Santa pics free of charge! They did Santa pics a couple years ago as well, but again, Samantha wouldn't get close to him!!! We ended up getting a picture of Parker by himself with Santa. Anyways, we thought we'd try it out and we actually got a really good picture! I was pleased. I probably won't go get Santa pictures again, unless it's free, because I'm also cheap!

Here's the kids before we left to see Santa...Their Santa picture is, obviously, the cute one at the top :)

We went to Clam Lights a few nights ago. It was fairly nice that night so we thought we'd take advantage of the break in the rain.

I'll post more after next week's activities! Jeremy has the week off and we plan on going ice skating, and taking a trip to Seattle. Fun, Fun! I hope everyone is having a wonderful Christmas!!!

A Very Happy Thanksgiving

This Thanksgiving was much like the ones before...football, food, and family! The only difference was the snow. Yes, we had snow on Thanksgiving! We loved it. We got a nice new dusting of it on Thanksgiving morning and it was so pretty, but so cold. Poor Jeremy, along with many others, got to play football in it. I wanted to go watch, but really didn't want my kids to freeze. After a fun game of football for Jeremy we headed over to my in-laws house for some games and pre-Thansgiving snacks, which we always eat way too much of and spoil our appetites for the real deal. I guess that's what Thanksgiving is all about! The kids played dress-up and put on some very funny shows for us. The adults cooked, played some games, and hung out until dinner. I always love Thanksgiving. It's a time to sit back and reflect and be thankful for all you have. I am very blessed and have so much in my life. I'm thankful for the wonderful, loving family that I can spend my Thanksgiving with and for the foundation I have because of the gospel. After a great Thanksgiving Day we did crazy things like go out at midnight to shop at Old Navy and wake up again at 4:00a.m. to shop at electronic stores and Target. Silly us! Thanks to my amazing mother-in-law, Jeremy and I had an early morning date of shopping, eating a yummy McDonald's breakfast, and just being together. Thank you! I wasn't very good at taking pictures this year. Here's the few that I got!

Some fresh snow for Thanksgiving

The Turkey Bowl!

The girls showing us their "special things",which was part of one of their "shows" they performed for us.

Parker and Rohne having some boy time together...

Playing a friendly game of Settlers. Poor Collin...this was the only picture I got of him.

The kids coloring in the midst of all our snacks. Our little Princess Samantha

Parker showing off his goofy personality!

Jess, Aaron, Rohne, and Parker being silly together.

Snow!

We got our first snowfall of the season! It came as a shock to me because the weatherman totally downplayed it and I thought we'd get nothing or just a trace of it. But, it came alright! We got a good 6 inches, which isn't much for some people but here in Seattle it's a ton. It started snowing on monday during school, so by the time kids were leaving there was quite a bit on the ground. Buses were out until 7 p.m.! Luckily, Sam doesn't take a bus, but those poor kids who do...Anyways, I wasn't prepared, so my poor kids wore rain boots and snow clothes that were too small. They survived, but I did feel bad. Temperatures dropped to the teens, which is rare. It hung around for a few days so school was cancelled tuesday and wednesday, so we had a nice, long Thanksgiving break. Jeremy worked from home those days so we had fun playing in the snow with him. We went sledding a few times and drank lots of hot chocolate and apple cider. It was soooo cold, but so nice to get all warmed up again. I guess this is the start of a cold, snowy winter (or so they say!). I guess I should be better prepared next time so my kids can enjoy it a little more without freezing!

Snow Day #2