Advent

This Christmas season I accomplished all that I wanted to. It was a Christmas that left no regrets, no "I wish I would have done or had time for that" and plenty of family memories that I'll cherish forever!! We had a good mix of fun, learning and serving others.

Our advent calendar that contained activities to be completed. Not all of the things we did are represented in these photos. And, my nice camera has completely stopped working. I've been using K's camera...boo. Sorry for the terrible photos.

We started off with a night away in Boise for some Christmas shopping. We treated it as "celebrating Jeff's 33rd birthday." We had a lot of fun. The kids especially loved spending a decent amount of time in the pool. Love this shot of Sullivan flying from one bed to another. DISCLAIMER...London had accident on the drive to Boise (we left promptly after they got out of school) and I only packed her 1 outfit. So we HAD to go buy the kids a new outfit (when buying for one, we usually end up buying for all). All of these photos were taken on different days but the kids seemed to wear these new outfits A LOT!! My apologies!

The BEST breakfast.



We started the Elf on a Shelf tradition. Our Elf is named Buddy, original hu ;) Buddy was quite naughty most of the time. Here he painted Sullivan's nose while he was asleep.


Window markers for Christmas decor...what a mess!!



We read all the snowmen books we own followed by making our own puffy paint snowmen.



I think we own EVERY Christmas movie. Practically every night was a movie night at our home!

We made a long paper chain.

Today we wrote Grandma and Grandpa letters and made them these cute little foam Snowmen.

Today we did a photo scavenger hunt. If they completed they'd get a prize (the cheap medal).

Most things were found around the house...

For the items that we didn't have around the house they just drew pictures.

Then they just resorted to looking up items on google and taking a picture of it, pretty smart if you ask me...well lazy, but smart!


We've heard a lot about this place that has a ton of Christmas lights so we took the kids to see it. Wow! It was incredible! So many lights, so many people and even a camel to feed carrots too, those pictures didn't turn out though.


The ward Christmas party.
K was an angel, London was a star and my cute little sunbeam class were donkeys.


After the presentation, a group of toddlers gathered round Jesus.




Sullivan asked Santa for a "motor-Physch-Err." It was way cute. Santa happened to be really impressed that he wanted one.

Assembled this nativity set using toilet paper rolls, can't get a more "$FREE$" activity than that!

Built a foam gingerbread house.

We made snowflakes out of craft sticks to decorate our house with. Leave it to my creative London to create a doll with the left over craft sticks.


Tavaci concert. Buddy was completely right when he said "The best way to spread Christmas cheer is singing loud for all to hear." I love watching my girls perform in the Christmas Tavaci concert. They are adorable. And, it was so nice to have Jeff's parents, sister, sis-in-law and her kids come to watch as well.


We read Christmas books galore.

I was trying to avoid making real gingerbread houses this year, but they weren't very satisfied with the foam gingerbread house that we made so I broke down and did the real thing for an activity.




K's school Christmas concert


London's school Christmas concert.


We spent a few days assembling and delivering goodie plates, teacher gifts and rootbeer reindeer similar to these. Wow...every year our list gets bigger. We definitely didn't give out as many as I would have liked though.



For the last 7 days of our advent we took each individual piece of the nativity and studied them and talked about them. Then we did an activity according to that person. For example, we talked about Mary and how her heart was so pure and faithful and we made these heart ornaments afterwards.

When we talked about Joseph, we learned that he was such a faithful servant and was the one that was not in the spotlight as much, but still a major part in the birth of Jesus. We went and did some secret service after this. And, we ended with the baby Jesus. We basically did everything that was suggested in this book...(definitely worthy of your purchase!).

This last week before Christmas spent studying each individual person/animal/angel that played a part in the Christmas story definitely made for a great experience with my children. I got the opportunity to share with them my testimony which usually ended with me getting teary eyed. I hope they know how much the Savior means to me.

Christmas Eve, Christmas Day

Santa pancakes for breakfast.

All children go through this phase and it is a phase that has made Jeff create the rule "NO MARKERS in the house." It doesn't matter though, no matter what, a marker will be found and drawing on furniture and walls happens to be an activity all 3 of my kids have participated in. Sullivan happened to find a marker and drew EVERYWHERE right before Grandma and Grandpa were to arrive.

Decorating sugar cookies for Santa. Obviously more ended up in Sullivan's stomach than on his cookies.



While waiting for Grandma and Grandpa to arrive, we had a dunk contest in Sullivan's room. He was being such a ham.

After we ate dinner er, a bunch of appetizers for dinner with Grandma and Grandpa, we played Minute to Win It, Christmas style. Basically everything they did here









The reading of Luke 2, combined threats to the kids that we wouldn't do the gift exchange if they didn't behave...luckily they were angels!

We exchanged little gifts with each other that night. My Dad had my name and tried to pull a gag gift on me, unfortunately I lost my sense of humor and thought that it was an awesome and thoughtful gift...I'm too nice sometimes. Then he pulled out my real gift and gave it to me. So, if you want to be funny and get a laugh, do it to someone else because chances are I won't get it and the joke will be on you ;) Sorry I'm so lame Dad!

We ended the evening by watching Sullivan's favorite movie, The Polar Express. He ended up falling asleep during the first 20 minutes though.

Bright and early on Christmas morning (5 am), wearing their PJ's that they opened on Christmas Eve.

Sullivan got a train table. He did the same thing as he did the year before...he played with the table and didn't care much about the other presents under the tree. He loved everything, but the train table kept his attention for quite a long time.

London's new doll. I think she gets a new one every year. I wonder when her love of dolls will be a thing of the past??

Jeff LOVES his new Ipad 2. He makes Christmas shopping so easy for me!

Kamryn modeling her new scarf, thanks Ash!!

What does a guy get a girl who has everything she has ever wanted and couldn't even think of anything to ask for Christmas??? Oh yeah!! My man knows me well! I can't wait to put my new Soda Stream to use.

Off to church, there is no better place to be on Christmas day! I kinda wish Christmas fell on a Sunday every year.

Tavaci Concert

The girls had another successful Tavaci concert last night. Kamryn has been in Tavaci now for 4 years, ever since it started here. And, London has been in Tavaci for 3 1/2 years now. They both love it and I love it!! The following pictures were taken by a friend, we had terrible seats and I had a terrible camera!

Kamryn sang Tiny Little Baby in a quartet. She sounded amazing!!


London (far right on top) really got into all of her songs this year! She was fun to watch.


And one final picture, my favorite song of the evening...the munk song contained no singing, just a recorded version of We Wish You a Merry Christmas with which they held up signs with the words written on them. I think I laughed through the whole song.

3rd B-day

Sullivan turned 3 years old recently. He's like a little man now, growing up so much.

Sullivan has grown leaps and bounds with his communicating. He is still working on pronunciation, but it is so cute that I almost find myself using the following words in place of the correct words...

Ah La= Ice cream
Rawry= Sorry
Oten= Open
Wee Ooo= Any ambulance, firetruck or police car
Chalk-it-milk= Chocolate Milk
Nute Naks= Fruit Snacks
Nanny= Kammi
Nun Nun= London

He recognizes when he does wrong and corrects himself all the time, it is quite cute. He's put himself in time out for hitting. And, goes through out the day saying "I no say poopy pants, I no say What the."

We encourage him to be polite by saying "Say it nicely." Now he says "nicely" in place of please and thank you..."I want Nute naks nicely."

He's extremely independent too. I swear I hear "me do it" or "by myself," at least a dozen times a day.

His sense of direction is amazing for a 3 year old, or maybe we just live in a small enough town. We play games in the car together, he tells me when a stop sign/light is coming and when I should stop and when I can go. Tells me when to turn, where Daddy's office is, where the church is etc.,. He goes to his cousins house 3x a week in the morning so that I can go work out and we play another game called "Is this Bear Bear's (nickname he calls his cousin Sarah)house?" And then we both say "No" and then he keeps asking at each house we pass until we come to Bear Bear's house and we both say "Yes." Sounds silly, but I'll cherish this game because it is ours!!!

His most favorite food has probably got to be popcorn, he asks for it nightly. I think he just likes throwing it on the ground and making me vacuum daily.

He will be a sunbeam in the new year!! CRAZY!!

He has a tinge of shyness to him, especially when meeting new people.

He does NOT like change. A new coat, new shoes, rearranging his room and not letting him watch TV at his regular time have all caused tantrums. He is a creature of habit and when things are slightly different than what he is used to, he definitely lets me know.

With the above statement said, potty training has been extremely difficult!! But, we are almost there now.

Poor kid has asthma. I've been in denial about it and I doubted that the doctor was right, but the same symptoms keep happening. This last attack was so bad his little heart was pounding so fast that it scared me and I was on the verge of rushing him to the ER. It was a long night for me monitoring him and checking his stats to make sure he was getting enough O2 and that his heart rate didn't rise to high while sneaking in some of his albuterol treatments. By the morning, he was back to normal. Are asthma attacks like this (lasts 8 hrs or so, runs a fever, heart beats fast, sucking in air/breathing hard)? I've never been around this before. The doc thinks it might be something in the air that is causing him to have these attacks, but I can't figure out what it might be. If anything, I think that when he's running a lot and physically active that I can hear him wheeze a bit. But, nothing that would cause these asthma attacks.

He is the most kind hearted kid and such a gentleman!! Whenever Jeff is on a business trip Sullivan takes on the "man of the house" very seriously. He mimics Jeff by trying to use the fly swatter to kill flies, waters the tree, sits on the lawn mower, sleeps on Jeff's side of the bed (my fault) etc.,. This isn't something that he's told to do, he just does it...so cute.

So, one day while Jeff was on a business trip, I took Sullivan to the bank with me to deposit a check. It was raining pretty hard outside. I was holding his hand as we were fast walking into the bank when I said "Lets hurry, mama is cold." Sullivan replied "Mama want my B" which is his blanket that he has at home. I looked down at my sweet boy who happened to let go of my hand as I said "Aww, you are such a sweet boy" and noticed he was unzipping his jacket and took it off and gave it to me. My heart melted. Of course I threw it over my shoulders so that he could see that I was grateful for his sweet gesture and I let him know how much it helped keep me warm... when really his kindness warmed my soul through and through already.

The next story...

We were all sitting down to a family dinner. I usually don't place drinks out because the kids have a drink setting on the counter most days that they just grab and bring with them. Jeff and I were deep in a discussion about...hmm, don't remember. Then we hear London ask for a drink, but I don't think it registered or we were too lazy to do anything about it. She can climb on the counter and grab a glass and get a drink herself pretty easily, though she's the only one of my kids who doesn't like to do things herself. I think we tell her she can do it or something. I see her go over and try to hop on the counter, grab a stool to climb up etc.,. For some reason, she can't grab a glass. Then we hear a chair being scooted across the hard wood floor, from the table by Sullivan. Jeff immediately tells Sullivan "What are you doing, go put it back." This is a common occurrence in our house, he's pretty independent and gets what he wants, therefore we ALWAYS have to put these chairs back and tell him that he needs to ask for things before he goes to get them. Then his sweet little voice responded with a "I help Nun Nun, get Nun Nun a glass." My sweet little boy saw a need and went right ahead and did it himself.

Now for the birthday festivities...

First thing in the morning he got to open his gifts...

He was so busy playing with his new toys that he didn't eat any of his birthday pancakes. An hour or so after breakfast, he went searching for some food on his own.

Testing out his new boat in the bathtub. Every time Sullivan saw this boat on a commercial he'd say "I want that," "Buy me that," or "For my birthday," so Jeff and I got it for him despite the package saying for 8 years or older. Luckily he has a couple of great sisters that are willing to help him put it together and take it apart.
(Picture was here)
He's very much into planes, trains and automobiles.



Buzz defeating Zurg

Sullivan and his cousin have birthdays during the same week in November, so we did a combined birthday get together. Malorie made this cute treasure chest cake and we provided the ice cream (can't mess that up!) They each got to blow out their half of the candles.