Carson Quote of the Day

Where did you get those Christmas jammies?

From Pinnochio, Santa's elk.

He was supposed to say: From Empey Ganomie, Santa's elf.

Then sometime last week we were eating lunch and Carson asked for a drink of water. I got distracted and forgot to get him a drink so he said,

Hey, resturant lady! Can we have our water now please?


Wasn't sure if I should laugh at him or smack him.

Carson's Artwork

School has been great for Carson. He's really learned a lot and so far, he's only complained once about going to school. I've been impressed with his progress. These are some of the pictures he's drawn recently. I know they're not really impressive, especially since he's almost 5 but if you knew how much Carson has despised drawing/writing/coloring, you'd realize that these are something to show-off!

His name...

A frog, this was the first one that you could actually tell was supposed to be something...

A cat...

A duck (they're learning about animals)...

He's gone from the frog to a duck in like 10 days. It's really good to see that he's trying and improving!

Eight Months Old

This little cutie has reached the eight month mark. She's still as sweet as ever! It seems that she's changed a lot in her short life. Not only has seen grown and reached lots of milestones, her personality is a lot different too. Gwen used to be quiet and shy and reserved but now she's a lot more giggly and spunky. She's into everything and she'll use anything or anyone to climb on so she can stand up. The little stinker is trying to teach herself how to walk and she'll stand up for a couple of seconds without any support. It's impossible to get her to stay still so that makes church interesting. Last week, for example, she had a massive blowout, the biggest Ry and I had ever experienced. Her brand new onesies was destroyed as well as her white tights (good thing she wearing tights though!). It was a disaster and she even got it on the bench! I just took her straight home and put her in the bath. Once she was clean again, we went back to church (it's so nice living one minute away from our church building!) with carpet cleaner to scrub the bench she violated. Our Sunday school class meets in the chapel and of course there had to be a guy sitting in the exact spot that she pooped on! I was dying but there was only 10 minutes left of class and I didn't want to make a scene so I decided to wait. But of course the elder's quorum was meeting in there too! So after seeing that the guy wasn't moving he had to be told. He took the news that he was sitting in crap really well! He was just worried that he got it on his suit but amazingly he didn't. But I told him that we would pay to have it dry cleaned and he said that he has four kids and has been through it before. So we got it cleaned up with no harm done. See what I mean by "interesting"?! 

  She so funny! Ever since she was a newborn she would stick her legs straight up in the air whenever she was lying down. Made for easier diaper changes. Sometimes I wonder if she's going to be a dancer or a gymnast. She has really good extension and she loves pointing her toes and stretching. She's really agile and strong and wow, she is really flexible, especially for a baby! Makes me wonder if she's going to be a Jocey-Junior. We'll see!

Gwen loves to take showers with Dad. She'll lie her head down on his shoulder and just relax. She loves to baste just like Ryan! She really enjoying baths too. Last night I had Reese and Gwen in the tub and they were so cute laughing hysterically at each other. It was pretty crazy with my two wild-childs but they had a blast!

Side note: Gwen also loves it when you run your fingers through her hair! She immediately relaxes. My boys didn't like it, they still don't, so I wonder if it might be a girl thing because I love to have my hair played with too. 

Another side note: She has two cute little teeth on the bottom!

Christmas Unwrapped

I guess the best place to start is Christmas Eve. It was the Crandall's year for Christmas so we headed over there to start the partying. We always have a smorgasbord of appetizers for dinner...

The family is getting big enough that we have to start setting up a kids table!

Carson's making his pirate face. Not quite sure what happens to him when I raise the camera to take a picture. Stroke maybe?

Reese is still growing into the table.

Then tradition demands a reenactment of the nativity.

 Reese was the angel this year and he was pretty much the cutest thing ever. Even though he looks like he's going to kill someone in this picture he really loved it! He still talks about how he was the angel.

Carson was being a punk because we made him turn off the Wii. That kid is a gamer!

 And Gwen doing her part... getting into trouble!

After the Nativity, we headed home to get ready for Santa to come. When we got home, Empey Ganomie had left us a box of jammies so the boy's put them on and rushed to bed. This was our first Christmas at home.

I thought they would wake up super early but they slept in and we had to wake them up so we would have enough time to open presents and get ready for church.

Gwen's first Christmas present.

The rest is on video but I had to get a picture of the boys in their Boise State jerseys. My mom sent them and the second they were pulled out of the box, the boys stripped off their pajamas and put them on. They were pretty excited!

 After everything was opened, we rushed to get ready for church. Luckily, it started at 10:30. We were all dressed in our cute Christmas church outfits so I wanted to get a picture but when we got home Carson was in a bad mood and wouldn't have any of it. So we'll try it another Sunday. 

We cleaned up the house a bit and then headed to the Crandalls where we had another gift exchange.

Emily and Kyle gave the boys BYU jerseys and once again, they stripped off their clothes to put them on. Reese's was so big it looked like a dress!

Grandma Mutti got some sweet feather hair extensions that she was pretty stoked about. :)

Then for dinner we had the traditional prime rib dinner.

It was a great Christmas and it was fun spending Christmas morning with just our little family but then having the opportunity to hang out with all the family too.

Alex and Alia came up the next day and spent the week with everyone. We got to go skiing a couple of times, we played some games, but mostly we spent time playing Just Dance 3. The little boys are awesome at it, especially Reese! I'll have to post a video later.

New Year's Eve came quick and we had a countdown for the little boys at 8:00. I don't think they really understood what was going on or what the big deal was but it was still fun for them. We spent the night at the Crandalls and in the morning we had to say goodbye to everyone who was leaving. Then we went home and went to church.

Reese Recited

Talking on a pretend cell phone;

Hi Mr. Dancen. No, sorry, I don't have any room for pirates.

Reese has such an imagination. He doesn't know a "Mr. Dancen," he must've made up the name. You should've heard the story he just told me... There was a guy named Dip, he was the daddy, and he went to pick up a cheetah named Peep, to go to the ice cream store to get ice cream. After they went to get ice cream, they went to go get money and candy. Bet you didn't know that a cheetah's favorite candy bar is the pink one. Then they went and had cheetah racers.  We can always tell where Reese has been because he leaves little trails behind. He's always lining things up and putting things in order. He likes symmetry. I'm going to start taking more pictures of his creations.

Holiday Lights Cruise

The best part was when Santa read off the names on the nice list. Luckily, Carson and Reese made the list! ;)

I'm already enjoying living close to a lake. Lots of fun things to do!

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving was so much fun! My family came up here so it was the first time I got to make dinner and play host. Everything went pretty smoothly and I have to admit that the food was great! We had turkey (obviously) that wasn't very pretty but tasted really good, maple roasted sweet potatoes with pecans, green beans with bacon, stuffing, mashed potatoes, and rolls with the fortune inside. The boys loved finding the "grateful fortunes" but it was kind of annoying after a while since you weren't sure if you were going to bite into one or not. But it was fun getting everything together and set up and looking pretty. I've never done it before and I think I could handle it once a year. :)

While the fam was in town we did a lot of shopping and some hot-tubbing and of course there was a lot of playing on Grandma' Ipad (or big GPS as Carson calls it).

Then we went to the Christmas parade (there was even a zebra!) and froze watching the fireworks.