Happy New Year!

Well I don't think I've ever gone this long between posts, but I've been busy editing wedding pictures and entertaining kids.... so here's a catch up, in no particular order...
Caroline decided she wanted to be an artist. First she went with the more natural approach. We weren't big fans of that one, so Bri hooked her up with some acrylic paints and she decided she wanted to paint live forms. Needless to say, her art went a little unappreciated that day.



New Year's Eve, Bri and I have decided, is way too overrated! We decided to just hang home with the kiddos. We ate dinner and then for dessert thought we might start a new tradition of banana splits. Well, if you're like Elizabeth, you don't like ice cream (odd, I know) and you don't want bananas either, so you have a whip cream split. The recipe is whip cream, carmel syrup, chocolate syrup and sprinkles. She didn't eat much. None of the kids had bananas, so that tradition might not stick. After that, we did some little fireworks and put them to bed. They didn't stay, so we let them stay up. I thought it'd be fun to make some music videos, but Bri was a poop on that one, so me and the girls did videos. Might have to work on that one for next year. Then we let them watch movies until 12:00. Elizabeth made it to about 11:30 and Caroline was 11:50. I tried to get them to wake up so they could bang some pots outside, but they didn't budge. Bri and I flipped on the tv, had a quick kiss and finished our board game. Just another night for us, just a little later.




Christmas Eve we went to my parents house and hung out and then after dinner, headed back home to try out another tradition. I got this one from my friend. It was to make home made pizza. Well, I counted Boboli as homemade since I didn't have enough time to make the dough. The kids had fun making their own, Cooper thought just eating the sauce was cool enough I guess. Then we opened pj's that Bri's Mom made and sent the kids to bed. They came out to let us know they heard the bells from the sleigh on the roof. I kept telling them they better go to sleep so Santa could come in. I think I said it with a little too much excitement 'cause Caroline jumped out of bed and said, " I want to sleep in your bed. I don't want Santa to come into my house." Well, we calmed her fears and then she was all excited again. Christmas was fabulous too. We woke up and did the whole presents thing. Caroline was the most excited. She was so thrilled that Santa came to our home. When we first moved in, Elizabeth asked us how Santa was going to come in because we didn't have a fireplace. I didn't even realize that we didn't have one until that point. Well, watching The Santa Clause with Tim Allen showed her how a fireplace just magically appears if you don't have one. We spent the morning opening presents and visiting with Brian's family on webcam. We were all pretty happy with our surprises that morning. We were blessed to get all that we did from eachother and from family. Then we packed up and headed to my parents for the traditional brunch which is fabulous! My Mom does such a great job on all the food. I look forward to it each Christmas. We ended up sleeping over because of the snow storm and stayed up until about 1:00 playing games. Jill and Paul got stuck there too, so that was fun.





We had a fancy night with Brian's work party at the Joseph Smith Memorial Building. It was a nice dinner and of course he was "talked into" performing a little song for the group. It was well liked as expected. He's a great performer, and doesn't he look hot in his suit!



Isabelle now has her 2 bottom teeth in. They were a little rough in their journey, but we all made it! She also had her left eye's tear duct open up, so we're glad about that. She's a smiley baby and we're having a lot of fun with her in our family.


Earlier in December we made the trek to Salt Lake to see the lights. We took the front runner and trax and I don't think we'll do that again. Quite the long night, but the kids were great and had fun seeing the lights. We stopped for a minute to catch a few snowflakes on our tongues.


Elizabeth loves playing in the snow. She was out there for a little bit by herself and then she came in and walked straight to the fridge and tried to put her snowball in there. She wanted to save it for later. It was so funny.