Monster Truck Rally!

So Travis won ticket on the radio to the monster truck show last weekend. We were so excited! We had been wanting to try and get tickets to it for the boys because they love them so much right now. It was nice to not have to pay. We also got pit passes, which meant that we got to take the boys to see the trucks up close. We had so much fun!

Christmas

I know, I little late! O well! We had a fantastic time! Christmas eve went to my mom's house and had dinner and acted out the nativity and sang Christmas songs. The adults dressed up this year, it was pretty fun! When we got home that night someone had left some gifts for the boys on the porch. It was very kind and very appreciated. We put them under the tree. Christmas morning we got up around 8:00 and went down to open presents. The boys got to open their stockings first. They were so excited with the treats that were in them that they hardly noticed the presents under the tree. When they did they were even more excited. They got books from the anonymous santa. They are just what we needed for Jonah for school! The boys also got some goggles for when they go 4 wheeling, light sabers, a pillow, more books from us and some games for the family. Jonah got a transformer and Simon got a few little monster trucks. Luke got a little Tigger and and a big fire truck to push around. I gave Travis the last 4 quarters that he needed for his collection and the conference talks on CD. I got a pair of comfy pants. It was fabulous! We played for a while with our new things then got ready to go to my moms for breakfast. They always make the best breakfasts and it is a long standing tradition in our family. After breakfast we open presents with my family. My sister made each of my boys quilts. They are so fun and the boys love them! They got scooters and monster trucks from my parents. I know, completely spoiled. I am too though. My mom is making me curtains for the basement. They are beautiful! They also gave us new sheet for our bed!
Later that night we went to Travis parents for dinner. We did a nativity again with the kids and sang more Christmas songs. All of his family was there, even the ones from out of state! It was really nice. We opened gifts and got a lot of neat things. We got family pictures that my sister in law had taken. We got the rest of the navity that my other sister in law has been working on for quite a few years now. We got a book and a butter crock, which I am very excited about. My mother in law gave us her history that she has so far. It was a wonderful night! We went home tired, but excited for the rest of the weekend to come. No, Christmas was not over for us yet!

So Saturday we went back up to Travis' parents house. We were invited to come up and play in the snow and then Grandma and Grandpa were going to give the kids their presents. We made snow men and had a "contest". It was fun! The snow was not very wet and so it didn't pack very well. They were all spraying it with water and dumping buckets of water on it to try to get it to work. It finally did and here are the results.

They all took first place in their own catagory!

After we warmed up we had lunch and then we gathered together for more presents. Travis' parents gave all of their children a book called "The Message". They told us that it was very meaningful to them. They feel that it is a book that needs to be read by many. They asked us to read it and then to write our names in it and give it to someone else and ask them to do the same. We are reading it now and it is very good! They then gave the gradkids their gifts. They gave them all books that they put alot of thought into for each specific grandchild. After they were all opened we sat and read them. Everybody traded books when we were done with their own. It was very fun and relaxing!

Boys

I have been listening to my boys play today and they have said some pretty funny stuff. I just thought I would share.
Jonah to Simon: "Be quite man, you're blowing my bubber" (instead of cover)

Again, Jonah to Simon as they were playing star wars with empty wrapping paper tubes.
"No Simon, I just cut off your arm. That means that you have to put your arm in your shirt and hold your light saber with your other hand."

They have also been playing Santa Clause and pretending to bring presents and put under the tree.
Too funny!

Starving Luke

So, my little Luke who the doctors say is under weight, never stops eating! Lately it has been so funny because he recognizes the words breakfast, lunch, dinner, snack and food very well. I will ask the boys what they want for lunch and Luke will respond "MEEEEE". He doesn't know what we are having and he doesn't care he just wants some. He also is always going around eating off of everybody else's plates if they leave their food. My poor nephew Jakob has had his dessert eaten for him the last two Sunday's because he has left it at the table for a half a second. The poor kid just never gets enough to eat!

Happy Birthday Simon!

Well, today is Simon's birthday! He is 4. Time goes by so quickly! It seems just yesterday that we found out that we were going to get him. We were so excited and the the 3 months of waiting for him to be born started. That time went very slowly. It seems more slowly then the last 4 years have.

The funny thing is that he refuses to believe that today is his birthday. I kind of don't blame him. We have been celebrating his birthday all weekend, so I can see how he is confused. We decided to wait and give him his present from us today, so that he would feel like we did something on his actual birthday, but he really doesn't care. I think he will when we give him his gift, but right now he doesn't. We had a great weekend. On Saturday we meet Simon's birthmom Jessica at the Mayan resteraunt and had lunch with her.

Then we all went to Chucky Cheeses to let the boys play. We took them to the mall after that to let the boys see Santa, but the lines were way to long so we ended up just getting ice cream and visiting more. Simon had so much fun with Jessica. She gave him some playdough and some matchbox cars. He has not stopped playing with them for days.

On Sunday we had a family birthday party for him. I made him a monster truck cake. It was fun to make! I named it the Slim Monster. That is what we call Simon alot of the time, because he is always picking his nose. It is decorated with "slim" or lime green frosting. He loved it!

He has grown up to be a very fun boy. He makes us laugh every day with his cute smile and laugh. Of course that is between his very frequent fits that he throws. He is just 4 after all. He has a few choice words that he likes to use (which I will not mention) that have frequently gotten him into trouble and he is definitely the "Drama Queen" of the family. But we still love him! His favorite things right now are cars, monster trucks, forts, tractors, anything with wheels or anything that he can build. He loves tools and we often find him with a screw driver and several wall plates from off the light switches. Here are some pictures of him over the years! We love you Simon!

Just one more!

Just one more post, I promise. I just wanted to share this about my boys. We got a whole bunch of boxes of food storage delivered to our house a few weeks ago. It was Travis' grandma's that we got because she passed away. It was sitting in our front room for a few days because we didn't quite know what to do with it yet. The boys figured out really quickly what to do with it however. Make a space ship out of it naturally!

They stacked up the boxes and cans and played in it for two days straight. It was so fun listening to their little minds work and hear what they had to say about space. It was fun to watch their imaginations at work. After they were done with the space ship, they decided to take a few of the boxes and make glidders out of the boxes. This kept them busy for at least two more days.

Happy Birthday to me!

Ok so, my birthday was Dec. 1st but I haven't posted about it yet, so I thought I would. It was a fabulous day, a fabulous week actually. Probably the best birthday that I have had in a while. On Monday we hadn't planned on really celebrating, (we were going to wait til the weekend) but Travis stopped at the store and got something to make for dinner and some "presents" for me. We had decided that I wasn't going to get anything for my birthday this year, because money is tight and I really wanted to go out to dinner instead. Anyway, Travis cooked dinner while I relaxed. He also helped the boys make some wrapping paper and wrap my presents. I was in the other room and after the presents were wrapped Jonah and Simon kept bringing them down and showing them to me and saying, "This is not a present, it is just something we worked on." and "We cannot tell you what is in here, but it is good!". It was pretty fun to see them so excited.
We had dinner, complete with fancy glasses and sparkling cider, and then the boys each gave me a gift. The first was a package of chocolate licorice. The next two were Hot Tamalies and Jr. Mints. Then Travis pulled out a Red Box movie for us to watch. It was Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2. I have been wanting to see that, so I was very excited. It was nice to know that even though we wern't planning to do anything special that night, that Travis still thought about me and wanted to make it special for me anyway. He did a great job!
The rest of the week was fun. We went to the Desert Star Playhouse for Travis work party on Thursday. That was alot of fun! Then on Saturday, I went to lunch with my girl friends. We went to the Olive Garden as usual and then did some Christmas. This is a Tradition that we do every December for two of our birthdays. I very much look forward to it! Travis meet me in Lehi and then he took me to the Cheesecake Factory for dinner. We meet some friends there and it was alot of fun. After that Travis took me to Sears. He had a gift card there that he got as a gift and decided to get me a present after all. A new pair of very much need pants!
On Sunday I got spoiled all over again. We had a family party for me and I got many of the things that were on my birthday list from my wonderful family. I also got my favorite birthday cake. Peppermint hot fudge sunday cake! Fabulous!

Christmas Decor

Well, so far these are the only Christmas decorations up in our home.

We have purposefully done this. (Actually that is not true. The boys somehow found this in the storage room today and pulled it out by themselves. Otherwise I wouldn't have them out. Thank goodness nothing got broke. I decided that if they went to the effort to find them, then I should have them out.) Usually our house is all Christmasy the weekend after Thanksgiving, but this year we just don't want to have to deal with it for to long. Considering that this is the normal state of our house these days...

(because I have three little boys that get into EVERYTHING! and I am very busy just trying to keep up with things) I just don't want to have anymore things up that I have to be constantly vigilant about. It is just not something that I can handle right now. We will probably just get out one of the Christmas trees a couple days before Christmas. I know sad huh?
But instead of getting more stuff out, we have decided to take the time to go through things and re-organize. We have been working really hard to get closets cleaned out and things moved to different places. We have had so many things without places since we moved here because our basement was not done. Now that it is, we are moving things around. It has gone well so far, but we have a lot to do still. I cannot wait until it is all done!

Thankful

With Thanksgiving upon us I have been thinking a lot about my blessings. I have so many to be thankful for. This year has not been an easy one financially for anybody and we have not been excluded from that, but the Lord has looked out for us and blessed us tremendously! We have had many people bring us clothes. I have not had to buy any clothes for the boys. We have also had people give us money for my schooling which has been so helpful. We seem to always have food in the house even though we haven't done much shopping. One of the most amazing things is that I have had a gift placed upon me that I have never before had quite like this. It is that I am able to look into the pantry and see the food we do have and make a meal out of things that I never thought possible. I have never been good at that and I have been very good at it the last few months. The food was also not only eatable, but it tasted good! We have also had many opportunities that have come to us that have allowed us to make some money here and there and come up with the money that we need. The Lord has certainly been looking our way and we are so grateful for that! We are grateful to all the people that the Lord has directed our way to help us as well!

We have been blessed with health and strength to accomplish the tasks that we have taken on. We have been blessed with learning and our home has been touched with the spirit more often.

Happy Thanksgiving!

One of my favorite Christmas songs

I cannot find it to add to my playlist so I thought I would just post it. Enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kGrhzCgy_bg