Our Newest Member of the Family

On December 27th we welcomed the newest member to our family...no we're not talking about babies or pets....

Jessi and Danny got married!Because of the weather (cold, snow, sleet, wind) we took all of the temple pictures in the entryway (thank goodness). It's not the same as having pictures in front of the temple but there was no way that we were going to stand in the elements for pictures where we'd all end up looking miserable! Here's some shots of my handsome little boys. They were mesmerized by seeing Jessi in her fancy white dress.


Sam was not thrilled to be wearing a flower, can you tell? But doesn't he look like a stud!Andrew loved all of the attention that he got all night! For the reception we brought a portable DVD player and a couple of Little Einsteins DVD's and set Sam in the corner. One of my brother's commented that he thought that the building could've fallen down around him and, as long as he still had power, Sam wouldn't have noticed. It was a great distraction! The only time he left the corner was when he saw people dancing and he had to take part. Both of my boys love to dance, it was so cute! Here are some shots and video:

Sam and I were showing our skills! Sam dancing with his cousin Ela.
Andrew was a solo act, but he's got skills!

The wedding and reception were beautiful, fun and an all around success! I am so thrilled to have Jessi as a sister-in-law, I've been hoping for this for about the last five years!

Congratulations you guys, we love you!

The Big Day - Christmas 2008

Here's a quick look at our Christmas festivities. We went to my aunt's house Christmas Eve for more eating (it's seems like we've done a lot of that!), then to my parents', then finally back to our house. Below is when the boys opened their Christmas Eve PJ's, we went with a superhero theme this year which Sam was thrilled with. I even made Joe a shiny cape (sorry no pictures of that) so that he could "fly" around the house with the boys. Here's a shot of my PJ's, no superhero jammies for me, just awesome polka dots!

This was Christmas morning, Joe opened his first present which was a Wii remote. I suppose that I should have had him open the big box first, but oh well, he put it all together pretty fast...and was thrilled with the Wii (thanks Mom and Dad Lodge!)

This was just after Andrew opened what turned out to be one his favorite presents (also from G&G Lodge). He pulls it all over the house!

Santa left this great present for the boys in the basement. It provides endless entertainment and frustration (as Andrew takes apart all of the tracks that Sam puts together). Definately a hit, though! Andrew did his best to multi-task and enjoy as many of his new things at once as possible.We had my family over for a brunch after presents. It was quite a feast! Below, is Breanna (sister-in-law), Joe and my mom digging in. Bernie didn't get the yummy stuff, but he was perfectly content with his bottle! What a good baby, he just laid there and drank his bottle and let his mom and dad eat!
After breakfast Joe hooked up his new toy and we all tested it out. I'm not a huge video game fan, but I've had lots of fun with the Wii so far!

Jessi (almost sister-in-law) plays with her new phone. We had a wonderful Christmas. Although we didn't get to visit Joe's family this year, we were able to talk to them on the web cam and let them share in some of the boys' excitement on Christmas morning. We are so lucky to both come from such great families, if only we could get them to live in the same time zone so that we'd get to see everyone more often! I hope that all of you also had a great Christmas and made great memories that will last a lifetime.

Christmas Activities

It was a crazy couple of weeks leading up to Christmas so I just thought that I would post some pictures of some of the fun things that we got to do.

Here are the boys with their 2008 Christmas ornaments -

every year we have let Sam choose a new ornament and this is what they ended up with this year. Andrew's got broken when Sam pulled the tree over (that's a whole other story) but luckily I went back to the store and they still had some left so I was able to replace it.

Our Christmas tree which we got for a killer deal on "black Friday". It is pre-lit but we added a strand of blinking "twinkle" lights to make it more fun. The boys loved it! Andrew especially loved to lay with his head underneath and look up through the branches.

Sam is concentrating very hard on this art project. We painted some Christmas ornaments, the one shown below we kept for our tree and the others we sent to my grandparents. Of course, it's not Christmas unless you decorate sugar cookies so here are our creations. Sam, of course, had to have chocolate on them so his job was to place the M&M ornaments...

...and here is Andrew's contribution!

We also went carolling with my extended family which, despite the icy cold weather, was tons of fun. We practiced Christmas songs with Sam so that he could sing along and he had a blast! (Too bad I forgot the camera...)

Let it Snow!

All last week we heard all about the huge snow storm that was coming over the weekend...between Friday evening and Saturday we were supposed to get 4-6 inches in the valley. Well, we didn't get that much, but we got enough that the boys could go out and play! Even though it was freezing (we're talking single digits) and the boys were still recovering from colds, Joe had them out there right after breakfast on Saturday. They all had a great time!

Andrew was ready to go! Too bad that's the door to the garage...

Most of the pictures have Andrew's eyes closed or squinting because of the snowflakes that were falling, he wasn't quite sure how to handle that! Sam didn't seem to notice the falling snow or the painfully cold temperatures, he was just thrilled to have snow to play in. What a fun time (glad I was only out there long enough to take a few pictures, though!)

What Have I DONE?!?

After too many months of being told "what a pretty little girl I have", I finally got the courage to cut Andrew's hair! (Come on people, can't little boys have curls too!) But, I gave in and decided that it was time. It was seriously hard for me, though! I actually shed a few tears. Maybe I'm just having a hard time realizing how big my baby boy is getting!

He loved the clippers and was giggling and the whole time!

Here's the "after" shot, doesn't he look grown up! The problem with cutting his hair is that what is left is so blond and fine that he kind of looks bald again! Oh well, I'll get used to it. {Sigh} But I already miss the curls!

Crazy Ladies!

I spent my whole evening last night with lots of fun and crazy ladies. It started off with the Bridal Shower that I threw for my future sister-in-law, Jessi, and ended up at the midnight showing of Twilight with some great girlfriends. The shower was a huge success, lots of people, great food and some embarrassing moments for the bride-to-be (but not too embarrassing, we were nice!) You'd think that a shower with a bunch ladies my mom's age (and older) would be a little more tame, but that was not the case! The best moment was when my great-aunt (she's 71 but you'd never guess it) was looking at the "bottom half" of some very racy lingerie like she was trying to figure out what it was supposed to be and then held it up to her eye like an eye patch. The funny part was it looked more appropriately sized for that than for any other purpose! It was hilarious!

After that I met up with friends at the very end of what looked like had been a very fun Twilight party, too bad I missed it! We froze in line outside the theater for what seemed like forever before they finally opened the doors, I didn't think ahead enough to bring a warm coat! The movie was good, of course it could never live up to the books, but I would still recommend it. I'll probably go back and see it with Joe soon. The most fun part was being there with good friends and a theater full of crazy girls and women (and a few brave guys). Thanks for a fun experience ladies!

Flying Solo

I'm so glad that it's Wednesday, because that means that we are more than halfway through the week to Friday when Joe gets home. Yay! He was out of town last week on an audit and then found out Thursday night that he'd been assigned to a new out-of-town job while he was gone and that meant that he had to leave again Monday morning. Travelling is hard enough when it's one week at a time or two weeks if its scheduled and I can prepare myself, but being blindsided caught me off guard. But, we knew when he chose this career path that he'd have to travel. And, really, we've got it pretty good compared to newbies at other firms, so I shouldn't complain! But, I still hate to have him gone, it's the pits. The boys miss him so much and seem to take it out on me with their whineyness and crying. Luckily, I've got a great friend who is in the same boat as me the last two weeks (for her it's been three) so we've been keeping eachother sane. (You're a lifesaver, Abby!) It also reminds me of one of the reasons that we moved to Spokane...to be close to my parents, it's so nice to just be able to drop by for a dose of face-to-face adult conversation! Well, only two more days! Sorry for the whining, I just thought that it was better here than being even grumpier to my boys!

Halloween!!!

We had lots of fun for Halloween this year...especially since the festivities lasted all week long! Luckily, both of the boys loved their costumes so they were always glad to get dressed up! The first pictures are from our family party last Monday at my cousin's house, it was lots of fun and a good kick off for the week!
The Kids....And the big kids...

The last pictures were actually on Halloween, we went to my brother's house and had dinner then went trick or treating with them. It was fun to have the four cousins together!

Danny and Jessi (my brother and his fiance) were also there in the India-wear that he brought home from his mission.

I didn't actually wear this trick or treating, but Joe did!

We went to this awesome neighborhood that was a couple of miles from where they live on the South Hill and it was so cool! They were these amazing castle-looking homes that were all decorated and most of the people handing out candy had great costumes on. Such a fun experience, and Sam totally got into it!

After we parted ways with them, Sam (and Joe) hadn't had there fill of trick or treating yet, so we hit a neighborhood close to our house. After awhile, Sam was asking for a piggy back ride, so I said that if he was too tired to walk then we were definately done. He kept pushing for a few more houses, because he was having so much fun and just wasn't ready for it to be over. Pretty soon he gave in and sadly went home...with a monster bag full of candy! It was such a fun night for him!