Christmas

Here we go, lots of pictures of Christmas morning.

The kids' new princess tent. This is Emma in defiance mode after we said "smile!" Of course we found out later she had a high fever. Poor kid has been sick all week.

Opening presents

Bert's new hat


We had cute matching pajamas for the girls but Kaylie managed to have a blowout in them the night before.


Bert's pride and joy, he made an apple pie which was delish! I think I'll have some of the leftovers for lunch.

Paint projects

The nice thing about having a school teacher/painter husband is that he gets two weeks off for Christmas and can work on projects like this:

Finally, Emma has her cute little girl room.

First Snow

Well, a snowstorm the day before Thanksgiving canceled our vacation plans and dumped a ton of snow. So we bundled up the girls to go out and play

"I can't move my arms!" Name that movie. My 15 month old is lost inside her 12 month snow suit.


Dad and the girls

And back after only 10 minutes. It was only about 15 degrees outside!


Kaylie was not very happy with the whole experience. I don't think she can walk in those pants.

Happy Halloween!

We had two days of some Halloween fun this year.

On Friday, Emma went to preschool as a Utah cheerleader and had a great little class party with lots of treats.

Saturday night we had a ward trunk or treat and Halloween party, Emma loved her fairy princess costume.

Kaylie went as a "buzzy bee" as Emma called it. She would not sit still for pictures, this is the best I got.

And my two girls.


Daddy usually goes all out, this year was no exception. For some reason this picture makes him look kinda creepy. The kids at the party loved him, although it took a while for Emma to warm up. And of course Kaylie managed to get into a chocolate bar.

I just had to include this one. She had a hard time with so many people in crazy costumes packed into the church house. This was the look most people got while she was trick-or-treating.

And Bert's favorite moment, the first time he made chili and he won second place in the chili cook-off!

Halloween fun

We took advantage of a break in the rain on Saturday and went to the pumpkin patch. The girls loved it. Well, Kaylie loved it as long as she could climb on a tractor and was not happy when I strapped her into the stroller to go looking for pumpkins, it was nap time. So we didn't stay too long.

And Emma sporting her new winter coat we bought that day. It seriously went from 70 degree days to 40 degrees in about 2 days. I'm not sure I'm ready for this.

And tonight we carved pumpkins. It's all Emma has talked about for days. I told her to smile and got this face instead. I think she's competing with the pumpkin for the scary face award.

Random

We got a new car seat for Emma and Kaylie got her old one. They had quite a bit of fun with the box of course and Kaylie crawled right in to her new seat and sat right down to watch a movie.


And Dad reading bedtime stories to the kids Sunday night.

1st Day of School

Emma's first day of preschool was today. We've been talking about it for awhile and she was pretty excited. Last week they had an open house to come see the preschool and meet their teachers. Ms. Tonya is Emma's teacher and she gave her a picture to take home, color, and bring back her first day of class.

Of course it rained last night and was quite humid this morning resulting in Emma's complete fro of a hairdo. Nothing I did would tame it. Oh well, at least she doesn't care. Drop off was a piece of cake. At first she asked if I could come inside and play with her. No, I told her, Kaylie and I have to go home. Well, she said, will you come back to pick me up? I laughed and said yes and she trotted straight in without looking back.

I had originally thought that preschoolers don't need a backpack. Apparently they do. All the little classmates had one and Emma brought home her art project in a plastic bag the teacher gave her. So after Emma talked about backpacks all afternoon and how she was supposed to hang them up in her classroom, we went out to buy one. Only took two stores to find one that wasn't an advertisement for Nickelodeon.

It is practically twice her size, but she is after all the size of a 2 year old. She loved it so much she insisted on leaving it on while laying on the couch to watch a movie.

Kaylie couldn't have been happier to have the house to herself. This is from a couple weeks ago. Showing off her teeth and big toe. What a cutie!


A couple other things Emma has been up to. I must multi-task a little too often. She made herself a play dinner then sat down with it to work on her play laptop.

And her first attempt at writing her name, with zero prompting from me. I was actually inside while she was out playing with chalk. Not bad!

Kaylie's 1st Birthday!

My little half pint turned one! And I mean half pint. I know 9 month olds bigger than she is. Tiny as she is, she is full of energy and smiles, gets into everything, already has 5 teeth going on 6, and is on the verge of walking.

Well here she is even tinier one year ago.

And her birthday party we had last weekend

One of the many toys she got

And of course the cake. I love how even with the booster seat her head is barely at the level of the table.

She liked the first few bites

And started feeling a little sugared out after a few more

You can't see too well but there was cake everywhere

We had a lot of fun! Happy Birthday Kaylie!

Camping

We finally did it. We took the girls camping.

Of course I did not bring a camera so there is nothing to show. We spent Wednesday afternoon at Bear Lake and got a great campsite at the top of Logan canyon. And we had a surprisingly good time! I've been putting it off all summer because I thought taking Kaylie would be a nightmare. The girl can't sit still, puts everything in her mouth, and until two months ago never slept more than 4 hours at a time. She was actually a little angel! We set up the pack and play next to the campfire, loaded it with toys and she couldn't be happier. Probably because Emma could not get in to steal her toys, or sit on her, or drag her around by the ankles, etc. She even slept better than the rest of us, only waking up when Emma made plenty of noise going to bed, and again when Emma woke up at 5 am with a stuffy nose, needing to go potty and quite upset about the fact she was awake. It took 20 minutes of watching Snow White on a portable DVD player in the car to get her to go back to sleep.

Other than her 5 am wake up, Emma was pretty good as well. She was great at staying away from the fire, loved looking at the flowers, squirrels and trees. And even found a boulder that someone painted yellow with a smiley face. It was kinda creepy looking if you ask me, but Emma loved it and called it her "funny rock."

So it was a success, although having to watch and take care of two kids made it a little more stressful than I'm used to. We just might do it again next year. Although if anyone wants to take my kids for a weekend so I can go by myself just let me know!

Painting Projects

In between paint jobs this summer, Bert's been working on our house.

Kids' bathroom - I think it's now Emma's favorite room

I think these pictures kind of make it look weird. It's a blue color wash over a white background.

And Kaylie's room, during the project..

and all finished!


Next up is Emma's room. She's requested purple, I think we'll do something a little more blue. After that I have to figure out what to do with our pea green bedroom.

Places I find my kids

Yes she climbed up there by herself



At least the dishwasher was clean




This is the bathroom cabinet, under the sink. I think Emma is in there again right now.


And this morning. They're eating a second breakfast and this is probably the one activity that they've done this week without fighting!

What was I thinking...

...leaving her alone with markers.


At least she didn't color on the furniture.