"I Dis Wake Up"

I put Matthew down for a nap about 20 minutes ago. About 5 minutes ago, he came running out of his room and told me, "I dis wake up! I dis git out my bed!" I suppose the days of napping are pretty much gone as he learned how to climb out of his crib this morning. At least Emma waited another year to stop taking naps. On top of that I am enjoying morning sickness which of course is completely misnamed since I am sick all day and not just in the morning. Why do they call it morning sickness? Oh well, here we go with another phase of life. What an adventure!

Happy Birthday To My Favorite Husband

Yes he is my only husband, but indeed my favorite!

Daniel turned 35 yesterday. We had a pretty low-key birthday, cleaning the basement (Daniel's idea) and ending the day with pizza and cake. Here are some things that Daniel did this year that shows how wonderful he is.

Daniel worked very hard to get our back yard in this year. We did not finish, but he worked very hard to try to, especially helping me get 5 fruit trees planted for my birthday. It was great, and the kids loved being outside and helping him in the yard.

Daniel has spent more time at home this year. He has played more with our kids and they have loved it. Bugsy loves being with daddy, especially driving in his black truck.

Emma also loves being with daddy, especially when he dances with her. It is so darling to see them playing together.

As always, he has been so supportive of me. He helped with the float that I had to do earlier this year, and even dressed up like a ladybug for the parade.

He has also been so supportive with my new calling as relief society president. He is the most wonderful husband I could ever have hoped to marry.

We love our daddy/husband!

Happy Birthday!

Bugsy in 2009!

This is my year in review!

Me on my first birthday:

These are the things I learned how to do this year:

These are the things I learned that I like and do not like this year:
Actually I HATE haircuts and scream the entire time! Lucky mommy!

This is me at the end of this year:

What a fun year it has been!

Buggy's Birthday!

Here is another late post. Bugsy turned 2 years old on January 10th. He is growing so big. He LOVES TRACTORS! They are his favorite toy. He also loves cars and especially daddy's black truck. He likes to build "castles" with his blocks and he really loves watching videos. His current favorite video is "Frosty the Snowman," which mommy tolerates only because it's better than listening to him scream. He is very vocal. His vocabulary is quite large for his age and he let's you know when he is not pleased with something. His favorite thing to eat/drink is "choc-o-late miowk." (chocolate milk) He asks for it often and is often very upset that he cannot drink it all day. He is a very sweet little boy with quite a stubborn streak. His laugh is contagious and he is very sensitive to the feelings of others. His current favorite thing to say is "I'm a guy!" He has bugged Emma several times by insisting that she is a guy as well. We have finally helped him to understand that she is a girl and there is now peace over that subject in our home. What a sweet little boy we have been blessed with. We love you Bugsy!

Unfortunately, we were in Nashville, TN competing in a dance competition the weekend of his birthday. We ended up changing our tickets and arriving home at about noon on his birthday because we didn't want to miss it. Fortunately, Melissa is fabulous and had planned a little party for him at her house. She is fabulous, and we all had a great time. Thanks Dave and Melis, you guys are the best! Here are some pics.

Ringing in the New Year!

We had a fun time on New Year's Eve this year. We went over to Dave and Melissa's house and had Newfie New Year. Daniel served in Newfoundland on his mission. They are 3 1/2 hours ahead of us of. Thus we celebrate the new year at 8:30 PM and then put the kids to bed so they are not so tired. It works well for us, and we have a good time.

Melissa had purchased candy necklace kits that the kids put together. Matthew and Mieka were more interested in eating theirs than actually making a necklace, but at least they had fun. We tried skateboarding on the wii. Daniel was of course a pro, and I even did pretty well too. We also filled out papers for our goals for this year. Then we had a fortune cake that Melissa made. Each slice has a fortune that you pull out and read before you eat the cake. It was really cute.

At 8:30 exactly we brought in the new year with sound makers, poppers and of course the traditional banging on the pots and pans. Emma finally figured out how to make noise on the sound maker and was so excited. Matthew didn't get it, so he just made the noise with his voice while he held the noise maker up to his lips. It was really cute! And yes, he is wearing a princess type crown in the bottom left hand picture. He wanted to wear one.

We had a GREAT time! Happy New Year! (a little late)

Christmas Stuff!

Obviously I am still behind since it is January 13th and I am just getting to Christmas stuff. Oh well, better late than never.

This First Collage of Pictures was from Emma's Preschool Christmas program. It was on December 18th. She was so darling. She did so well on her dances, her songs and her karate performance (despite the fact that she doesn't like karate). She said her line slowly and loud enough for everyone to hear. She was wonderful. Unfortunately, I was having camera issues and missed her doing her line and the pictures and video did not turn out very good. Oh well, at least we got it. She was very excited to see Santa and did finally sit on his lap. She was shy, and so cute!

This next collage is from Christmas Eve. We started out at Steve and Jane's house. We had a delicious dinner and visited. Then just before we left, Tiago, Melissa and Emma sang "Rudolf the Red Nose Reindeer." It was really cute

After that we went to my parents house for our annual kids nativity play. Emma was an angel this year and Matthew was a wise man. Melissa had sent us a file for a backdrop that we printed at our print shop and it all turned out very cute. Then my dad read the Christmas story, we exchanged white elephants and sang some carols. It was a lot of fun, and the kids were worn out by the end.

The next collage is from Christmas day. Emma was so excited this year and woke up a little earlier than she usually does. Matthew didn't get it at first, but quickly caught on to Emma's enthusiasm. By the time he realized he was getting new toys, he started to get it as well. He got a lot of tractors this year and was so excited. Emma got a rocket from her favorite show "Little Einstiens." That was her favorite that day, but in the days that followed, she discovered that her tea sets from Grandpa and Grandma Sperry were her favorite. She had several tea parties with daddy and quickly renamed him "Jolly Good" because he was such a good daddy and really got into it by using a British accent and using words like jolly good. It was so cute and Bugsy got jealous and decided that tea party was one of his favorite things as well.

This last collage is from Christmas morning at my parents house. It is a tradition in my family to have a large family breakfast instead of a dinner. It went really well this year. We brought a couple of food warmers from the rental center and that made it so we could all eat at the same time. Dad, Jon, Seth and Karla prepared all the delicious food this year, which was very nice of them. Then we opened presents and visited. It was very enjoyable.

After going to my parents house, we went out to Steve and Jane's house again and went sledding. It was a nice day, not too cold with a lot of sunshine. We had fun!

It was a great Christmas season once again and I am sad that it is over. Oh well, on to another great year!

Catch Up 5! Thanksgiving, Live Nativity and Ginger Bread!

Here I am doing a another catch up post. I think this is the last one before Christmas which is good since Christmas was 3 days ago! The first pictures I have are from Thanksgiving this year. We went to my parents house this year and had a beautiful time. Dave and Melissa brought these cute little turkeys made out of cookies and candy and put one on every plate. They also brought the packing peanuts that you can lick and stick and let the kids make pictures out of them before dinner. Emma said she was thankful for books, so she made hers look like a book. Unfortunately I only have a couple of pictures, but here they are.

Then, on December 5th we went to the live nativity in Alpine with Dave & Melis and Jan & Jen. It was really cool. There is a family that has a couple of barns and they get a bunch of people to dress up and help out. The first barn has a bunch of animals like camels, sheep and donkeys as well as people pretending to be craftsmen from the time of Christ's birth. The second barn has a group of people in the loft that are singing hymns. You can hear them as you walk up to the barn. Then you go in the barn and they have a little manger scene set up with a man, woman and a baby all dressed up like Mary, Joseph and baby Jesus. It is a wonderful experience and I really enjoyed it. Emma seemed to enjoy it as well. Matthew of course was not interested in seeing the baby Jesus and wanted to go back and see the animals. He was freaking out a little, so Daniel took him out. It was really nice though, despite the cold.

Seeing the animals!

More animals. Bugsy was loving it!

Seeing the baby Jesus. Emma is on the left hand side of the top picture in the beige coat.

The last thing for this post is our annual ginger bread house making night. We actually did a night for the kids to make ginger bread houses a week before we did our house. Then on the 14th of December, we let the kids decorate cookies for a couple of minutes and then we did our own. It was a lot of fun and we didn't even stay up too late!

Here are pictures of the kids as well as one of the ginger bread house.