Merry Merry Christmas to YOU!

We are thrilled to announce...

We couldn't be more excited!!

Christmas fun

Jeff's parents had left their Christmas gifts for us at our house and we patiently waited to open them until a little closer to the actual holiday. We didn't want to haul it all to CA, though, so the Sat. before we left we had a mini-Christmas. :) Jeff was done with school (BYU, not work) so he was actually home on a Sat. morning. It was awesome!

The kids were SO excited to get to open gifts early and even more thrilled with what was inside:

 We had fun playing games together all afternoon.

We went out for dinner and then went to see Santa at the Riverwoods. 

If you live in UT, and have never seen the Riverwoods mall at Christmas, we highly recommend going. He is the nicest Santa and it's fun to actually go 'inside' a little cottage.  And to top it all off, the lights are AMAZING!! It was so much fun and the kids LOVED finally telling Santa what they had been hoping for. :)

It was so cute, the entire drive home the boys kept saying what a great family day it was.  They were beyond thrilled to have Daddy with us ALL DAY LONG!!  

Christmas Celebration in UT

Since most of us would be in CA for Christmas, we had an early celebration with Chelsea & the kiddos!  

We had a delicious brunch at Shawn & Abby's, the kids played, exchanged gifts, and had a great time. 

We don't see Chels near enough, the boys were so sad to say goodbye to their cousins!  

Uncle Shawn is always a hit, the kids sure love wrestling:

Sweet Tanneah, she wasn't too pleased with my camera flash:

Aydrien, Tave, West, & Syanne reading to open gifts:

Ryder & Jeff

Chelsea & Tanneah:

Reverie:

The kids were all so thrilled with their new toys! Gift giving success:

Shawn & Abby

My beautiful sisters:  

(we missed you Shar!!)

What a great way to kick off the holiday season!!  

I sure love family. It is such a blessing to live by siblings.

I want to make sure to soak up as much time as I can with them before they move on to another place!!  

We definitely miss those who are already gone and the ones we haven't gotten to live by yet. 

In my perfect world, we will ALL live close enough to visit each other often, help out when needed, and share in all the fun memories of family. :)  Someday.

November moments

I love just the  normal, everyday shots i capture when the kids are just being cute or goofy. No poses, no big outing, just life. Someday I will be on top of things enough to post them as they come, but for now, here are November's everyday moments:

This boy is seriously THE.CUTEST. ever. I cannot get over how much we absolutely adore him, ALL of us.  

Where would we be without our Ryder-guy? 

He is such a good sleeper and loves to be on his tummy. He moves like crazy in his sleep (just like West) and is never where I put him:

Our Tave-man is LOVING preschool. Seriously, I cannot say that enough. He has SO MUCH fun with his friends and is thrilled when it's a preschool day.  Here are the kiddos eating their yummy treats from M's birthday:

My friend, Amanda, is awesome at posting every time she has preschool at her house. Me, not so great. But here is a letter I was proud of...I came up with the idea late the night before I had to teach when i realized I had to do a letter, the kids really liked it:

And our cute Thanksgiving pilgrims. I LOVE that Tave is so in to coloring now. He is so thorough and likes to use lots of colors of the rainbow:

A sweet moment.  We did a library trip and Weston was 'reading' the books to Tave:

After 3.5 years of wishing we had a light in the living room, Jeff made it happen. I am so IN LOVE with our ceiling light. I don't know how I lived in the darkness before!! Thanks, babe!!!!

It was Jeff's sleep in day and I couldn't find Tave anywhere. I finally looked in to see him sleeping by dad. 

I love moments like this:

Oh my adorable Ryder! He is growing much faster than I would like!!  

His new favorite thing is to climb in this chair with a book and just flip through the pages:

Ice Cream Cones - a rare treat!!  The boys have been earning ice cream when they stay in their beds ALL NIGHT.  (we have issues with them climbing in our bed when we're asleep, then Jeff and I wake up after not having slept so great, only to realize there are 4, FOUR, of us in the bed, ahhh!!)

Ryder thoroughly enjoyed his ice cream cone!!  

This is his new face when I pull out the camera, he is saying 'CHEESE':

Love these boys.

ps West is not in as many pics because he has decided he doesn't like them again. We'll see when he decided to show up. :)

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

The boys and I couldn't wait to put up the Christmas tree! 

the Monday after Thanksgiving we made sure to have everything ready. 

We started a new tradition, the boys get to open their Christmas pjs the night we set up the tree, which makes it even more special. Then they have them to wear the entire season. :)  

This year was especially fun, the boys were so excited to see the ornaments they had received each year from us (and grandparents). They wanted to hear when they got it and why.
They also made sure to put the ornaments exactly where they wanted them. 

Ryder was fascinated with the whole thing:

Jeff helped each of the boys put the star on top:

The only thing we made sure to tell them was that the ornaments had to go on the top half of the tree. (the bells were saved for the bottom in case Ryder gets to them!)

I love how the kids would clump the ornaments all together, so cute:

Our finished product:

The stockings were hung:

Our three adorable boys in their pjs:

I wonder what West was doing to get both his bro's attention! ;)

What a perfect night!