Make a Smilebox scrapbook

Music to my ears!

Today was our annual Christmas meeting at church and once again, it was amazing (well, at least what I was able to listen to while I wasn't fighting off Jack and Olivia!)!  It was a meeting FULL of beautiful Christmas music and good stories.  It actually made me think about joining the choir and then reality set in and I realized that they probably wouldn't even want me in the choir! I can't get enough of Christmas music, it's too bad we only get to listen to it for such a short time each year.  There is just something about the Christmas meeting that really puts life into perspective.  I especially love celebrating the real meaning of Christmas as it sometimes gets forgotten in this crazy, busy, time of year.  May we all remember the birth of our Savior. May we all remember our blessings not only during Christmas time, but throughout the year.

"I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst" (John 6:35) 

I wanted a family picture taken in the kids' Christmas outfits

and this is the best one we could get!  Not too bad for propping the camera

on the couch and using the timer.  Obviously Jack wasn't too thrilled!

Here's KJ's famous 'cheesy' smile

This is all I could get out of Jack!

Olivia's pretty 'hair-do' didn't last long!  But she's still pretty darn cute!

Happy 2nd Birthday Princess Olivia!

Olivia Michelle Howard 2 days old.

Olivia turned 2 today!

Our little blond haired princess turned 2 years old today!  I can't believe how fast the time flies, I know how often you hear that, but it is so true.  It seems as if I was just getting ready for her arrival into this world, it is hard to believe that she has already reached her 'terrific two's'!

Even though she is small, she has taught us many things in her short 2 years: 

She has taught us that;

• Girls are completely different than boys
  
• Shopping for little girls can be a very dangerous thing
  
• Stubbornness runs in our family, it doesn't matter how cute and innocent you are
• Little girls can melt a daddy's heart
• Girls are born with the ability to be caretakers, especially for their dolls!
• Girls are not always delicate
• Long blond hair gets the attention of all strangers
• Girls can hold their own in a fight with their older brothers
• Life passes by way too quickly, I'd pay all the money in the world, if I could, to keep her this age right now forever.... Although each new age is just as much fun as the last!
• Girls are not immune to breaks and falls or bumps and bruises
• Nothing is sweeter than watching her sleep with her 'gigi' (blanket) and her baby doll
• It's way more fun playing dress-up with her than the boys
• When she pouts her bottom lip, it can literally break your heart
• When a girl has 2 older brothers, she'll always be protected whether she wants it or not
• 'Drama queen' moments happen very early on in a girls life
• Girls are born to love the color pink.  She'd pick a pink crayon over a blue crayon any day 
• The love for shoes and purses starts very young
• When the princess of the house is not happy, no one is happy!
• Girls are born with curves
• The 'terrible two's' starts way before two...or maybe it's just the female attitude?
• It's so hard to say no to her when she bats her big blue eyes
• "I wuv you" can pretty much get her anything she wants
• I wish I could change the 'dating' age to at least 25
• I want her innocence to last as long as possible
• Rolls on a little girl in a swimsuit are so kissably cute, (wish it were the same as an adult!)
• Girls love to help out in the kitchen
• Girls light up when their daddy walks into the room
• Little girls need their daddy's
• Pig-tails only look cute on little girls
• Painting my daughter's toenails and doing her hair brings me lots of joy
  
• She makes our home a happier place

Sweet little Olivia, I hope that one day when you have children of your own, you will finally understand the overwhelming amount of love that we feel for you.  It is immeasurable but somehow it continues to grow and we love you more and more everyday.  All of our lives are better for having you in it.  Happy Birthday!

We had her party at Kiddoz on Saturday!

Merry-go-round with some of her friends

We had 24 kids including ours there, all to celebrate Olivia's Birthday!

By the end of the night, she was so tired.  These are some of the gifts from her friends.

Her real birthday morning!  We had breakfast in bed,  got to stay home instead of taking the boys to their schools because it was a snow day, YAY!  We played games, made popcorn for movies and then went out to pizza for dinner.  It was a great day.

Opening presents from our family!  She got spoiled, but she deserved it!  Love you little girl!

First snow angels of the year!

We finally got our first 'real' snowfall of the year!  It makes me realize how much I love living in a place that has all four seasons, the kids find so much joy in it!  Although, I could do without such long winters, it is so beautiful to look out your window to a blanket of white!  It seems to make everything seem so peaceful and quiet.  Something I don't get enough of these days!  Here are some pictures of our first 'play day' out in the snow.  We didn't take the camera sledding with us, but I did take some pictures of the kids playing in our backyard.  This snowfall makes it feel a little bit more like the Christmas season. 

 

Snow Angels!

"Mom, I love this"

"Mom, help, I can't see!"

"Mom, I want the doll to play in the snow with me!"

Thanks Tomlinson Family!

Well, we had our White Elephant Christmas party tonight and once again, it was a success!  I always laugh so hard, where do people come up with their crazy ideas!?  My cheeks actually hurt by the end.  We came home with boxes of Tag body spray, relish from Amish Country, Fish Oil Vitamins and an Osborne doll. ??  We drew the 'clean' gifts!  Somehow some of the gifts from last year appeared again, it was just as funny this year as last.  Thanks to the Snows for having the party again this year.  Thanks for all the laughs! Oh, and we got home and the kids were happy as clams with the babysitter watching a movie with popcorn!  A fun night out with Dan!  I didn't take my camera with me so there are no pictures, I'll be sure to bring it next year!

Christmas Family Night!

Every Monday night Dan and I try to have a Family Night where we spend time with our family doing something extra fun.  We really try to make it different than any other night of the week.  Tonight was extra fun for us and the kids.  Any time candy is involved means fun for the little ones!  It's a good thing they have a dentist for a father, 'cause they love their sweets!  We started the night picking out our favorite Christmas music to listen to while we made our 'yearly' Gingerbread house.  (I cheated and bought a kit from Costco this year)  KJ looks forward to this every year.  This year was fun because all the kids wanted to pitch in and help make it "pretty"! (in Olivia's words)

Getting started....

look how excited they are!

She was so cute and extra careful to make it 'pretty'!

The whole family pitching in.

Olivia kept kissing her "pretty" house, it was so sweet!

The finished product, they did pretty good huh?!

Another tradition in our family is that every night in December we do our Christmas Calendar countdown where the kids get to pick a treat out of the pocket.  Tonight the kids drew the pocket with a tag for a Christmas book.  Russell's Christmas Magic.

So before bed, Dan read the book to the kids, they loved it.  But they love a book anytime, especially when Dad reads it to them!

I LOVE December!!

Big Thank you to Blink Photography for capturing some great moments! You girls are the best!

Make a Smilebox postcard

check out their website: www.lifebetweenblinks.com

They do amazing things, even with my children who HATE pictures (especially at nap time)! Thanks girls!

Happy Turkey Day! (well in our case, happy ham day)

We always seem to be extra grateful for the blessings we receive at this time of year.  This is my favorite part about the holiday season, it brings out the best in everyone.  Dan and I continue to count our family as our greatest blessing.  We are amazed with the love we have for our kiddo's.  We can't imagine life without them.  This is the first Thanksgiving that we have stayed home and the first Thanksgiving that I cooked everything by myself.  It was actually surprisingly fun!   Dan wanted ham instead of Turkey this year, which was fine by me, the whole Turkey was too intimidating for me.  We ate dinner, had some laughs, shared what we were thankful for (my nana's tradition), and then we were off for a long weekend trip to Portland.  We thought it would be fun to spend Black Friday in a bigger city that actually has toy stores!  KJ's also been wanting to go to the OMSI museum for quite a while now, and I wanted to swing by a cute Christmas Store on our way home.  So we packed up Thursday night, found a hotel downtown, ate a late night snack at the only open restaurant in town on Thanksgiving night (Denny's, yuck..) and fell asleep.  A few hours later we woke up to Olivia.... she caught a stomach bug.  We were hoping it was just from the trip over so we got her cleaned up, had clean sheets delivered, and fell fast asleep again, only to wake up to KJ running to the toilet because he had the same stomach bug.  Turns out those few hours we had of sleep were all we got for the night!  Luckily Jack had it last week, so he was immune!  The next day we checked out late, missed the Black Friday shopping and then it hit me fast.  I just wanted to go to bed so we found another hotel over by the Portland Temple.  Dan took the kids out, they got to see Mrs. Clause and hit a couple of stores while I slept.  The next day we all felt great, but very tired, so we bagged all our other plans and came home early.  Bummer!  I guess life continues to be unpredictable, but that's what makes it so interesting right?!  We are especially grateful today (now that we are all feeling better) for our health!  Hope you all had a memorable Turkey Day as well.

   

KJ, thankful for Thomas Kemper!   ~     This is the turkey hat he made!

    

Jack trying to ignore my obsessive picture taking!  ~  Olivia's Aunt Bert face!                 

     

Okay, there's the smile I'm thankful for! ~  Couldn't keep their fingers out of the chocolate pie!

 

Sweet Dreams little ones!  At least for a few hours! What's cuter than watching your kids sleep?

Polar Express

Thanks to a wonderful friend who organized the whole amazing trip, our family along with 4 other families that we love, were all lucky enough to start this Holiday Season with a Ride on the Polar Express.  We all met in Hood River, OR at 3:30, had really good pizza by the train station, had a very yummy 'polar express' cake made by the Cake Lady, opened cute little Katie's birthday presents and then were off to board the train.  My kids have been looking forward to this adventure for months now.  We love the movie and book in our house.  KJ even watches the movie in the dead of summer!  And well, Jack is completely OBSESSED with trains, so it was really cute to watch how excited he was to see the train pull up to the station!  We loaded the old train, found our seats, and were off for a holiday adventure.  We started the ride with some cookies and hot chocolate.  The conductor came around and punched the kids tickets, like the movie.  We sang Christmas carols with Santa's elves, and then the best part of the night happened....we made it to the North Pole!  There was a little town all lit up with lights and we saw Mr. and Mrs. Claus and their elves waving to us.  We stopped for a minute and then were off again, but to the kids' surprise, Santa had boarded the train to take turns with each of the children and ask them what they wanted for Christmas.  I thought Olivia would be scared of him because both our other kids were, but she loved him, wasn't even phased!  Santa gave each child a silver bell, which KJ was excited about, Jack threw his, and Olivia kept trying to eat hers??!  Anyway, we got Santa's autograph on our Polar Express book.  We had a really memorable night!  It was a great way to start off the Holiday Season and get me in the mood for holiday music!  Be prepared, I took a LOT of pictures and I have a hard time choosing my favorites!

  A special Thank-You to Matthew and Tasha for doing this for all of us.  

Merry Christmas Everyone!

Happy 2nd Birthday Katie!

Jack watched that train so closely, he was in heaven!

                                 

Olivia with Santa, asking for a doll house!

KJ with Santa, asking for a Wall-E robot!

Jack with Santa, asking for trains!

Can you hear the bell?