Self Portrait

Have I mentioned that I love my kids. I love their creativity. This is a self portrait that Alex designed.

In case you are wondering. This is Alex punching himself in the face.

I know.

In Jayden news: He rode his tricycle all the way to the playground and back! He loves riding his bike now. Today he cried when we went to use the car to go to the grocery store. He wanted to ride his bike, snow and all.

Alex who has always been a little nervous riding his bike, due to recent crashes, peddled so fast he beat us home and gave mom a heart attack because he rode out of sight. This after having a safety discussion not an hour before. So we had a talk again. In which I found out that Alex needed to get home to use the bathroom.

Yummy In My Tummy

Jayden is finally at the age that he can understand our "No Thank You Bite Rule" With out us having to force feed him. (I'm kidding, I don't force feed him). Last week, after much coaxing he tried Barbeque Chicken. Then he proceeded to inhale his chicken asking for seconds and then thirds. This week it was Spaghetti. After one bite he started scarfing it down not even bothering to use utensils just the Plate-To-Mouth method. I eventually got him to use a spoon.
In his own words:
"This is Yummy In My Tummy" "This makes my tummy go Vrrrrooooop" (picture a toddler sticking out a cute little full tummy)

Then he and Alex compared full tummies. I love my kids.

Honey Do's

Stillman and I finally rearranged our pictures centered over the couch and added the shelves that Santa brought me. Our front-room looks complete now. all except for the rest of the paint.

We moved the sconces.

We hung and put to good use our Welcome Coat Hanger

Since it was Monday we had a fun Family Home Evening lesson about Temples and then hung our Temple picture and Sacred Grove picture.

We scooted the frames over and flipped them around a bit, Now I just need to fill the with the right pictures since now we are upside down and sideways in all of them.

True to his inner Engineer Stillman Calculated, drew and then Calculated them some more. The back of the paper is just as full of calculations.

Someone was suppose to Write "Rach take down the Christmas Lights and put in on the refriger......How long as that been there"

So we just put away the decoration and I figured before I changed my blog I better post the rest of the Christmas Pictures.... Brigitte also inspired me. for some more Christmas pictures go here.  So here are the kids visiting Santa. I don't know how many know that you can get free pictures with Santa if you bring your own camera. Make sure you stand exactly where they tell you or you WILL get put on the naughty list. Jayden and Brogan take their visit with Santa so serious. 

Here we are opening up our Jammies so that we all look nice in our pictures Christmas morning.

Jayden waste's no time in stripping off his clothes and trying on his jammies..

His "Just what he always wanted" Star Wars Lego Jammies

Stillman needed shorts more than Jammies. He usually where shorts anyway and his pajamas sit in a drawer.

We went to Grandma's and Grandpa's house for Christmas Eve and had a little program and Cookie exchange. We Sang the Nativity song while the kids acted out The Nativity, A few good natured adults filled in with some roles. The costumes were done by an amazing seamstress I know. Thank You Mom! They made their parents proud and brought a few tears I was told.

Our Wise Men. Alex liked pointing out which Wise Man he dressed up as on our Advent Calendar.

Cookies for Santa, The boys always test taste the cookies before giving them to Santa.

Scurrying off to bed, Alex was too fast for me. He was worried that Santa would think he stole a toy from Grandma that he accidentally took home with him. He worried all night, that Santa wouldn't know it was an accident.

The one and only picture I took on Christmas morning. We video recorded the rest. Which was good, because some of Alex gift brought tears to his eyes. No Really, he cried when he opened his pillow pet!

We stopped by Stillman's Grandparents house and gave them our presents and visited with the Aunts, uncles and cousins that came up from Utah before heading over to Michelle's family for Dinner.

"Yay! Thomas"

Opening his "Just what I always wanted" Lego toy

For some reason I can't type above this picture. But it is of the boys at our ward Christmas party.

Cancel Christmas!

We have an awesome Advent calendar the Grandma LaVerne made for us. Every year the kids want to put The Baby Jesus up first. I never let them. I make them wait until Christmas Eve to him up. They play with the pieces everyday and we lost the Baby. This happened last year too. I didn't find him until after Christmas last year.

So this year Alex Says :"We are going to have to cancel Christmas if we can't find him." He even told his aunt Brigitte that we might have to cancel Christmas.

He get's it! Thank you Primary Teachers and Dr Sues. Christmas isn't about packages or bows.

Luckily Christmas is saved I found him stuck behind one of the Camel's (Velcro) that was already on the nativity calendar. We have him now Velcro-ed behind his manger for safe keeping and he will be swapped on Christmas Eve.

A Few Christmas Pictures