O Christmas Tree

We finally got our Christmas tree up, and we are officially in the holiday spirit. We went and picked out our new ornaments for the year with the kids (a fun tradition that we started a few years ago and each year the kids get to pick a new ornament to put on the tree). Here are our 2008 picks:
Shawn-The Flinstones
Jenn-The Grinch (no similarities, I just thought he was cute)
Ethan-Harry Potter
Cole-Iron Man
Liv-Fairy( I realize that it looks like the Grinch is trying to look up the fairy's skirt, but I promise he is looking under the Christmas tree).

Black Friday

I can't believe I even attempted to go shopping on Black Friday. We sat on the freeway overpass for 15 minutes.

(Here are Ethan and Cole with my Dad and brother, Matt)

But, I think the kids has fun. Even though the fake snow falling at the mall (it was actually bubbles) was a little sad. I want real snow-atleast just for a minute, that comes with it's own snowblower!

Just a cute pics of my mom and Cole.

Eating breakfast with Liv

Is is bad that I let my 19 month-old daughter eat her Coco Puffs on the table??  

I am sure this isn't approved by the American Academy of Pediatrics-so Shawn 

and Randy stop looking, but it is the only way she will eat.

The Big 30!

Happy Birthday to the most wonderful husband in the world. Each day I continue to be inspired by your hard work and dedication to me, the kids, the gospel, your job, and so many other things. You are such a great leader in our home and the kids admire and look up to you so much, as do I. Thanks for all you do to make us happy! WE LOVE YOU!

Head Above the Water!

A few years ago Ethan took a swim class with his cousin, Brandon. There was this little girl in their class who would not keep her head above the water-she just wanted to swim. It used to scare me to death and I was sure she was going to drown because her head was under the water most of the time and the teachers kept having to pull her up. Well, Ethan and Cole are currently taking a swim class and Cole has turned into that crazy little girl. He is out of control! He won't sit on the step with the rest of the class and just keeps jumping off the steps. He won't keep his head above the water no matter where he is. If he is sitting on the top step he still leans over and sticks his head under. I have to stand right next to him on the side just to make sure he doesn't drown. Both the teacher and myself have tried to talk to him, but he just laughs! If we survive one more week of this swim class I will be a happy girl! Here is the one picture I could get of his head out of the water. Meanwhile, the other five kids in his class are crying because they don't want to get in the water.

On the other hand, Ethan is doing great! Here is a picture of him meeting with his class. (notice the cute kid next to him in the speedo, I think I just might have to get one for my boys-isn't that cute!)

Farm Kids

Despite the fact that I didn't grew up in the country on a farm like my parents, I like to think that I am not totally a city girl. There is still a little country in me, and every chance I get to go up to my grandparents always reminds me of how much fun it can be. While up in Utah this past week my kids got to spend some time on the farm. They could easily be entertained here for hours, if not days. Here are a few pictures.

I knew they started driving young on the farm, but I didn't realize they meant this young....

Halloween and a quick trip to Utah

This past week we made a quick trip to Utah. My grandpa died last Friday, which wasn't totally unexpected as his health had been very poor the past few weeks. So, we made a quick trip to Utah for the funeral. It was a little crazy with Shawn's schedule. Shawn drove with me and the kids up to Utah, then he flew home that night, then he work for 36 hours straight and caught another flight back to Utah, just in time to drive back to Las Vegas on Saturday. It was a beautiful funeral and I couldn't believe how many people were there. My grandpa was one popular man! Cole almost climbed ontop of the casket while all the grandkids were up singing, but other than that the day went very smoothly. This is a picture of my grandpa five years ago at Ethan's blessing (as you can see Ethan was not a happy baby this day).

While we were home we were able to go trick or treating with cousin's. We had a nice Jedi clan (and one very nice Anakin Skywalker). Liv got to be Yoda for Halloween this year. I know that isn't very girly, but I figured we already had the Star Wars theme going and she really didn't care. There will be plenty of Halloween's for girls costumes.

The Jedi' Clan

My cute little Yoda!

This is Maycee, my niece, with my sis Jam

Here is little Maycee

This is my mom with Liv. Liv quickly became sick of the Yoda ears.

Oh, and can't forget Shawn and Kev!

time to carve pumpkins...

This was our FHE activity tonight. Livy's pumpkin didn't survive the night, but Ethan and Cole's are still holding strong.

Fall Festival

For the past few days Ethan has been talking about the Fall Festival. It is a little Halloween Carnival that his school does every year. Tonight was the night and it sure lived up to all it's hype. We had such a fun time! The kids dressed up and went trunk-or-treating. There were so many different games we got to play, like miniature golf, fish pond, throw pies in faces, cake walk, karate chop (Ethan seriously broke a board with his foot), glow sticks, crazy balloon lady, face painting, lots of food, etc. etc. I really had way too many pictures, so here are just a few!

By the end of the night Liv was done. She just sat in her stroller and polished off a bag of chips!

The face painting lady was a little crazy. She tried to make Cole a mean Anakin (Shawn will be so disappointed I think I spelled that wrong), and for some reason Obi-Wan has a bat on his face. Next, is our cute little lady bug!

Pumpkin Patch

I bet you didn't even think the Las Vegas could grow pumpkins in this miserable heat. Well, a cute family in our ward grew over 60 pumpkins this year and made a fun Pumpkin Patch for the kids.

Nature Scavenger Hunt

Today for Cole's preschool we went on a little nature scavenger hunt. Last time the kids painted wood treasure boxes and today they got to fill them up with fun things they found at the park. Here is Cole with his nature box.

Family Picture

This is what happens when we attempt a family picture. Really, I don't abuse my kids just torture them a little with pictures.

Loyalty

Cole is such a loyal brother.

No matter how many times Ethan picks on him, punches him, or makes fun of him Cole remains his number one fan. Ethan and his friends like to chase and tackle each other at school. Sometimes in the morning I will take Cole and Liv to play before school starts. Cole usually remains playing calmly by my side. That is until someone tackles Ethan. Cole will dash over and jump on the kid who is playing with Ethan and start hitting him. Obviously, I run over and explain to Cole that they are just playing (as you can tell because Ethan is laughing), but I can hardly turn my back for a second when it happens again.

This is also happening in the mornings when I drive carpool. We ride with a neighbor friend and lately she has been kind of teasing Ethan (a.k.a. Flirting). She'll punch him in the arm, throw her backpack on his face, take his toys, all in good fun. Ethan enjoys it and reciprocates, but if Cole's is there he jumps out of his seat and starts yelling. I have had to pull over twice this week to stop Cole from beating someone up. It really makes me so mad, but then I think about it and he is doing it totally to protect his brother. He thinks Ethan is getting hurt or that people are teasing him and he jumps in to the rescue. If that doesn't show brotherly love I don't know what does. So, all you future bullies, watch out because Ethan has a body guard named Cole!

Random Update

This last week has been fun, getting excited for all the halloween festivities. We made candy Haunted Houses for FHE on Monday. Can you believe they are still standing and most of the candy is still attached?

I sprained my ankle last week. I wish I could say that I was climbing a mountain, running a triathalon, or fighting a bear, but I was just climbing down off the playground. I laid around for most of the weekend with a big swollen ankle. Shawn wrapped it up and kept me loaded with pain killer. He has been making fun of me all week long-he doesn't believe that I just fell at the park. The wierd thing was as soon as it happened I jumped up and then fell back down. I started to black out and see stars. Then came the nausea. I was afraid that if I moved I would either pass out of throw-up, neither of which I wanted to do. About the same time this happened Cole found me and said that he had to go to the bathroom. Great timing! The bathroom happened NOT to be very close, so I told him to go behind me in the bushes (I'll regret that later). A few seconds later some friends said, "Jenn, Cole is peeing in the bushes." They could tell from my I-don't-care response that something was wrong. Anyway, my friends helped drive me home so I wouldn't crash. My ankle is now fine, just swollen and black and blue, but mostly I just lost a little pride!

The weekend was nice listening to Conference and relaxing. Shawn had to work, but what's new there? It seems about every six months I need a reminder of what I need to be focusing on so the Conference timing is perfect.

Ethan came home from school on Monday playing kissing tag. When I asked him where he learned how to play that he said, "the girls at school." Seriously, he is only in Kindergarten. I at least waited until 2nd grade before playing kissing tag. Today while walking through the parking lot there was a really cool old Yellow Jeep. Ethan ran right up to the Jeep and said, "Cool." I thought to myself, Shawn would be proud. He has moved up from the junky RV as his dream car to a jeep. (for those of you who don't know Shawn, he drove a jeep all through High School).

Cole continues to enjoy his little preschool. I taught last month and my friend Cassey is teaching now. He gets so excited that he gets to go to school like Ethan. Here is a picture of the preschool kids.

Liv continues to be precious and punky, sweet and sassy, hysterical and horrible and we love her more each day.

Liv's Bath

I don't usually take pictures of my kids in the bathtub, Shawn calls it baby porn, but I happen to have my camera tonight while Liv was taking a bath. I just thought this shot turned out so cute.