He is the Gift

I love Christmas. I love everything about it actually, I love the
feeling of happiness I have and see in others. I love the look of
excitement and joy on my children's faces when they see Santa or open a
present. I love the smells, the songs, I just love everything. Something
else I love is remembering what Christmas is really about which is the
birth of our Savior Jesus Christ. Without him and what he's done for me
and each of you our lives here would be kind of pointless. Without him
and his sacrifice how would I be able to repent of my sins and return to
live in his presence with my Heavenly Father? I'm so grateful for the
birth of Jesus Christ and all that it means. I hope that we can all find
time during this busy Christmas season to stop and remember why we
really celebrate in the first place.

Spring Break 2014

Last week was Spring Break here in our area and I knew we had to do some fun stuff if we were going to make it threw the week in once piece. Monday was our stay home day to get everything done around the house that we could and Tuesday was our errand day. The real fun started Wednesday when we had a play-date with some good friends, Savannah's old preschool teacher to be exact and her two sweet kids. We had a blast and the girls didn't want to leave! On Thursday the weather was a bit colder so we headed over to the movies with our good friend Marianne and the girls got to see Frozen. To say they were excited was an understatement and all three girls did a great job.

 

The next day we went to the zoo which as always my girls loved and we managed to be there again when they were feeding the bear. Abby was decided the zoo was a perfect place for her to take a nap and after looking at all the animals the girls had fun running around like crazy people playing chase.

  Friday also happened to be Pie Day!!! I love pie day because I love pie and its the perfect opportunity to eat some. This year we invited our friends Fred and Marianne to join us in celebrating and it was a blast. Jacob even surprised me and made the apple pie for me because he didn't want to run errands for me.

 

His pie turned out great and we were all impressed with his made baking skills and he was pretty proud of himself too. After we were all full from pie we had a movie night with Savannah and Olivia and let them stay up way past their bed time. It was a blast, we blew up the air mattress, had blankets, popcorn, and watched Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2. It was a cute movie and the girls had a blast. Poor Olivia fell asleep within the first half hour but Savannah surprised us and made it threw the whole movie.

 

Overall spring break was a blast and we all had so much fun doing fun things and being together as a family.

Valentines Day 2014

I really do love holidays! I just think they're so fun because you can either make a big deal out of them or not. This year I'll say I've made a big deal out of Valentines day. I started out the month giving Jacob a small present each day leading up to Valentines Day, I got the idea from this site and it was a big hit. Each day Jacob looked forward to seeing what he got and when he'd get his little gift. I also made the girls these Valentines, I got the idea for Olivia's bug Valentines from this site and Savannah's glow bracelet ones from here. What I loved the most was each girl picked out the ones they wanted to make and they really were perfect for each of them. We also made some fun teacher gifts and I got the idea from this site, we made them Valentines day smore mix and all their teachers seemed to enjoy it.

Last night I also got the girls surprise ready, I started the tradition last year of heart attacking the girls bedroom door. Savannah and Olivia were so excited to see their bedroom door covered in hearts and each girl wanted me to read what I had written to them. The girls and I will also be heart attacking Jacob's car again this year and we each came up with different things to write on his hearts. I think I might even have the girls decorate the driveway with sidewalk chalk for when Jacob gets home.

Its been a fun day of playing Valentines day bingo, making hearts, and just having fun as a family. Hope you're having a fun day too cause I know we are.

Resolutions

I read somewhere that 70% of people don't keep their New Years resolutions. They said it was mostly because people have so many other things going on in their lives that they can't/don't incorporate their resolutions into their lives. Its a bit discouraging actually because I've made some goals for myself and I really want to keep them so hopefully I'm one of the 30% that will actually keep their goals. My big unspecific goal is to be more proactive, I feel like since I've had Abigail I've been doing good at meeting my family's basic needs but I've been letting other things slide that are important to me. For example having a clean house, folding the laundry, and actually getting myself ready in the morning. Even little things like making my bed and putting the dishes in the dishwasher after each meal. So that's my big not super specific goal, to start reincorporating those daily tasks that I've been neglecting. Two specific goals I've made are first to be more healthy by being more aware of what I'm eating and by exercising. These last 5 years my body has been threw the ringer having children. With both Savannah and Abigail I gained 50 pounds and with Olivia I was good and only gained 30. Its taken quite a toll on my body to gain and then try to lose so much weight. I know it comes with the territory when you have children and I'm so proud that I've had 3 successful pregnancies. I know that I will never have the same body that I did before I had the girls but I can improve my health and be in better shape then I am now. My third goal is one I'm actually pretty excited about because its one I've been wanting to do for some time. I found this link on Pinterest for reading the entire standard works in one year. That's the Old and New Testament, Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants, and the Pearl of Great Price. On average you're reading about 7/8 pages a day and I can't wait to accomplish this goal!
So there you have it blogger world my 3 New Years resolutions. We'll see how well I do at actually completing them and I'll keep you posted threw out the year too. Have you set any goals? If you have good luck in meeting them.  What is it they say? It takes 21 days to turn something into a habit?

Christmas 2013

I really enjoyed Christmas this year as did the rest of my little family. We carried on the tradition of a advent calender. I made this one last year and inside each envelope is a scripture about Christ and telling of his birth.

This year we also put up a Christmas tree in the girls bedroom, saying they loved it is an understatement. It was one of the main highlights of Christmas for them, they're going to be devastated when I take it down next week.

I had our tree up the day before Thanksgiving but it took me forever to finally decorate it. I decided to make a popcorn and cranberry garland for the tree and I loved it.

We had some colder weather every once and awhile so the girls could occasionally wear some of their winter gear. I love this hat of Savannah's, I wish I had one.

The girls brought home some awesome holiday crafts this year too. Savannah made this adorable card one day. When she realized one of the eyes was missing she said it was a Pirate Santa.

This ornament Olivia made was by far my favorite! I mean come on its hilarious and totally fantastic!

At church the Sunday before Christmas the primary put of a nativity during sharing time and Savannah's class were the angles, she just thought it was great.

Christmas Eve was such a great day! Jacob ended up having it off and we spent the day relaxing and baking, and just spending time together. Abby had so tummy time.

The girls and I made sugar cookies for Santa like we do every year.

Jacob got Abby down for a nap and followed her example by taking one himself.

I made homemade marshmallows using this recipe and I was really happy with how they turned out. We were suppose to put them in our homemade hot chocolate that I made which did not turn out the way I expected.

That night before the girls went to bed Jacob read the girls The Night Before Christmas which is something we do every Christmas as well. Jacob's dad would read this to his kids on Christmas Eve as well.

The girls were beyond thrilled and excited when they woke up Christmas morning and they loved all their gifts. Savannah is sporting her new shirt, skirt, fairy wings,and guns she got for Christmas.

The big present the girls got this year was a Barbie house from my parents, they've been playing with it everyday since they got it which is awesome.

Later that afternoon we had some good friends of ours come over for Christmas dinner where we ate tons of food. I actually ate all day long from all the snacks we had laying around like artichoke dip, cheese and crackers and these amazing little smokies, and muddy buddies to the amazing dinner I made. Yes I'm bragging about the dinner I made. This year we had turkey, rolls, mashed potatoes, corn, brussels sprouts, stuffing, this jello salad, Jacob's killer beans, and this amazing cranberry orange relish from Trader Joes. For dessert we had rolo cookies, the sugar cookies we had made earlier, and homemade apple pie. I know tons of food people and it was all amazing! By the end of the night I was exhausted from all the baking and all the fun we'd had. It ended up being a great Christmas spent with some of my most favorite people.

It's Beginning to Feel a Lot Like Christmas

I love this time of year! I feel like since the girls are in school we've been a bit too busy to do all the fun Christmas things I'd like but we still find time for some of them. Abby has been keeping us busy and wearing herself out too since she started rolling over about a month ago. She's almost mastered rolling back onto her back from her stomach too. Its crazy that she's already 4 1/2 months, time is going by way too fast.  Back to Christmas fun though, A good friend of ours went with me and the girls to see the annual gingerbread house display they have in Prescott. It was so fun and the girls had a blast, after looking at everything we then got to decorate gingerbread cookies. Now I'm actually not a fan of gingerbread but these were AMAZING!!! The girls had so much fun decorating and about halfway into it Santa came. The look on Savannah's face was priceless, her jaw literally dropped and she was speechless. When she could finally talk again it was almost in a whisper and she informed me that Santa was there and she really wanted to talk to him.

Abby was fantastic and slept pretty much the whole time. I was smart and brought the stroller so I could just put her car seat in it and push her and Olivia around.

A few days later we woke up to this beautiful sight, this is my kind of snow people. It was just enough to make the view from the front of our house look beautiful and by the afternoon it had all pretty much melted. I loved it, the girls were of course a bit disappointed that it hadn't snowed a bit more.

Thanksgiving 2013

We once again headed down to Jacob's brothers for Thanksgiving this year.It was so fun as always! What can be better then great food, great company, and beautiful weather.

I love that these guys all get along and have so much fun together. I think that's been one of my favorite things about living here, That we and the girls have been able to get to know my brother in law and his family better. They're 5 kids are adorable and so much fun and my brother in law and his wife are fantastic. Spending time with them has and is a blast, it was a great way to celebrate Thanksgiving.

Halloween 2013

Halloween was so much fun this year! The girls were beyond excited and had such a blast dressing up. Savannah went as Cinderella, Olivia was Snow White, and Abigail was a pea in a pod. Olivia wore the same costume from last year but I got Savannah and Abigail's costumes at Good Will. I'm pretty sure I'm going to do this every year from now on. Both their costumes cost me about $10 and were in great condition, plus why should I spend a fortune on costumes that they wear for 1 night?! We started the day off by getting the girls dressed up for school, their school asked that the students not wear their Halloween costumes but instead had Odd Outfit Day. Both the girls had so much fun getting their outfits ready and though it was just so silly.

After school we rushed home and changed into their Halloween costumes and headed over to Tim's Toyota Center where a bunch of local vendors were handing out candy. Our good friend came with us to help me with the girls. Afterwards we came home and had dinner before heading over to our church building for their annual Trunk or Treat. In case you don't know what that is, you just go trick or treating in the parking lot and people decorate their trunks and hand out candy. I took the girls around once and then we started handing out candy at our car. The girls loved handing out candy and wishing everyone a Happy Halloween. We also had a fun surprise and Jacob showed up! He left school early so he could be with us and we were all thrilled!

Pumpkin Patch 2013

We had so much fun at the pumpkin patch this year! I really do seem to enjoy holidays more now that I have kids and especially since they're old enough to get really excited about them. We drove down the rode to the same pumpkin patch we went to this year and once again had a great time. The girls loved the wagon ride into the patch and they thoroughly enjoyed all the rides that got to go on. The admission to the patch went up considerably this year which I found to be ridiculous so this may be our last year going there if the prices don't go down next year.

They had a pumpkin catapult contest which the girls had no interest in at all and we quickly gave up trying to watch.

We opted for the hay ride instead which was a huge success. The owner of the farm took us around and then let each child have a turn driving the tractor and also stopped in the patch so we could take pictures. He was so nice and we all loved it.

Next we  had fun on the bounce houses and the girls of course rode the kiddie train. We went threw the easy section of the corn maze and Savannah was our navigator. She did a great job and got us out safe and sound without getting us lost.

We really did have a blast and it was such a fun way to get all set for Halloween the next weekend.

4th of July 2013

I really do love the 4th of July! I love having an extra reminder to really reflect and think about what an amazing country we live in, how lucky we are to have the freedoms we do and to not take them for granted. We had a fairly low key 4th which was fine by me because its been so hot and I feel huge and tired a lot of the time. Jacob had the day off work so we dropped Olivia off in the morning and took Savannah to her last day of swim lessons. She was beyond excited that Jacob came and this was a fun day for her too because they did a quick practice of the things they learned and then they got certificates, otter pops, and they got to go down the big slide! We also decided to sign Savannah up for another session of swim lessons and this time Olivia and I signed up for a mommy and me class too. We start Monday and both girls are super excited. After Savannah's lessons we headed home and watched shows and hung out in the house where it was nice and cool. We went to our good friends the Johnson's for a bbq and it was so good! We visited and the girls played until it was time for fireworks. We headed over to the church where we had a perfect view of the fireworks, we were a bit further away then I would have liked and the girls weren't as interested as they were last year. It was a great show though and we all had a good time.

Then today Prescott held their annual 4th of July parade, its the second largest in the state and they weren't lying. It started at 9 and went till 12! We left at 11 because both the girls were done and Jacob and I were so hot! It was actually perfect because we missed all the traffic and we got lunch before a huge rain storm came through, I love monsoon season. We didn't tell the girls we were going to the parade till we got their and the smile on Savanna's face was priceless! Both the girls love going to things like this which I love because I always love going to parades and fairs. Jacob is less thrilled but he's a very good sport and will come along with us. Their were quite a few fire departments that came to the parade to remember the 19 firefighters that just died last week in a fire about an hour from Prescott. It was so sweet to see all the tributes that were being made to them and their families. The girls LOVED all the horses and all the candy and other fun stuff people were handing out.

(Getting ready for the parade to start.)

(Doesn't Jacob look so excited?! LOL!)

(Olivia kept hugging Jacob and rubbing his back, so tender.)

Thank you Prescott for putting on such a great parade and helping us feel such pride for our amazing country. See you again next year.