Halloween

Are you completely shocked that I'm actually posting on here? I guess that's what happens when you are up at 3 am holding a teething baby and you are tired of playing Temple Run. Instead of catching upon the last 5 months right now, how about some Halloween pix?

Family vacation

In the beginning of May, we took a little family vacation to Phoenix. We had decided we wanted to do one, but we had the hardest time deciding where we wanted to go. Every time we ran into what I called the "vacation escalation" cycle. It went something like this: Let's just go somewhere close, maybe St. George. But if we're taking vacation time, we should make it worthwhile, so let's go a bit farther, how about Phoenix. Well, if we are going to drive for 11 hours, let's just drive 12 hours and go to San Diego. But, if we're driving all the way to San Diego, we better go to Sea World, and the zoo, and maybe Legoland, or even Disneyland. But if we're going to spend that much on a vacation, we should use it to go see our family in Florida. But we can't afford to go to Florida right now. Let's just do something close then, what about St. George? And so we literally decided where we were going about 36 hours before we got in the car. Phoenix finally won out mostly because of the hotel. We stayed at this resort and ended up having so much fun. Even the drive was pretty fun. I know I brag on him a lot, but I just have to mention that during the 22+ total hours we were in the car, Keleni cried for maybe 1 hour total. During our trip we swam a ton, went to the children's museum, went shopping, and went to a train park. It was the first real family vacation where we haven't been visiting relatives and we really had a wonderful time.

Catch up- March

Annie turned three in March. She had been telling me for weeks that she wanted a minnie mouse cake and then two days before her birthday switched it to a swiper the Fox cake. Not Dora, just Swiper. Three is a great age for birthdays, and she was super super excited about every present she got. Annie is such a special girl. Everyday she makes Paul and I laugh with something she has said or done. My brother Travis put it this way, Annie has a song playing in her head that only she can hear and it makes her happy. I love being her mom and getting to share in this song sometimes. The pictures below are not in any kind of order. Some are from Annie's birthday and others are just cute pictures from March

The trouble with technology

I have been a terrible blogger lately. But I have a very legitimate excuse. For Christmas Paul gave me an iPhone. So now, I never really look at the computer I just check everything on my phone, but this means that I am never on the computer to do a blog post. However, I just downloaded the blogger app to my phone, so problem solved! We've been up to a lot of the same old same old lately: playgroups, preschool, gymnastics class, trying to maintain my sanity while keeping the house clean and entertaining three children. I'm pretty sure I will never master that last one. But here are some pictures of cute and crazy children. I think the only picture that needs some explanation is this first one. We were driving in the car and Annie decided to pretend that her granola bar was a camera, she got a little bit sad about the results.

End of November, December, and into January

We had a really great Christmas and actually all of December this year. For the first time ever we had Christmas at our house. Paul had a week and a half off work and it was so nice to just hang out and be together. I got really lazy having a husband home all the time to help with laundry, dishes, and parenting so it took me a while to get back into my regular routine after he went back to work. And let's be honest, my regular routine isn't even that impressive, so the first part of January was a little rough at our house. But I finally felt the pull of the new year and all those resolutions that had been bouncing around in my head. So, I finally jumped back on the treadmill yesterday and I'm on my second week of a push up/sit up regimen. The kitchen is actually clean at this moment and the majority of the laundry is washed and dried (even if it is sitting in baskets waiting to be folded). And here I am finally blogging about what has been going on for the last two months!

Thanksgiving at Jenni and Rob's house

Gingerbread house

Christmas card pictures, both unsuccessful

and slightly more successful
Christmas Eve:
new jammies

letter for Santa
Christmas day:
Stockings

the only present she actually asked for, Yoshi
as Grandma says, every boy needs hotwheels.
New Years Eve