Fun with extended family at Christmas time!

We had a very fun family Christmas party in Cameron and Connie's beautiful new home in Mountain Green, Utah! Their home is beautiful. The kids especially loved the room in their basement that had a trampoline and a basketball court! We were blessed to have so many there, but missed the families who couldn't come. Connie had a fun party planned. We enjoyed great food, excellent company, and fun games!

Heath, Roger, and Jill excited to end up with a prize at the end of a game. Heath fought hard for those Reeses, as did many other kids!
Danica, Tyler, Jarom, and Collin enjoying one of the games!
Nathan, Porter, Danica, Tyler
Papa with 7 of the 13 boy cousins under 9!
We had the Kester family for Christmas this year. We gave them all four of the Home Alone movies, a popcorn popper, and dress-up clothes for the boys. Abram and Porter are dressed in some of the costumes in this picture. The Kesters had our family too. Amber and Ashlee each got a crock pot, Danica made beautiful watches for Emily and Brittany, she made me nice greeting cards, Mike got a book he's excited to read, and Tyler got a fun Batman cave and figures that he's enjoying.
On Christmas day we did our traditional sleep over with the Jones family. We all look forward to this fun time! We usually sleep at Nanny and Papa's, but with them on their mission in Boston, we went to Amy's home this year. We had a nice dinner, did a small talent show, the children performed the Nativity with Sydney as the director (Amber proudly noticed some of the similarities from when she directed), and then the kids opened the cousin exchange gifts. We also really enjoyed talking to Nanny, Papa, Jon, and Lissa on the skype cam. Lauryn, Sydney, Brittany, Emma - cousins and great friends!
Jack and Tyler each got a fun book from Matt and Jayne!
Ashlee and Melissa always enjoy their time together!
Jack was the only boy in the Nativity this year, the other boys played the Wii. What a good sport you are Jack! After the Nativity we all played games and then went to bed late! The next morning we enjoyed waffles together and more game playing!

Christmas morning

We went to the family room first to open stockings, then we ate breakfast, we then headed to the living room to see what Santa brought, and then we went to the basement family room to open family presents. It was fun. (We had a tree in the living room that Santa visited, but we had a tiny real tree in the basement where we put the presents we had for each other.)

All the kids were so excited to open a gift that showed a picture of the Carnival Paradise cruise ship and an itinerary for our cruise that leaves on January 18th. Everyone was especially excited when they found out that the Chris Jones family and the Leiseths are coming with us!
Emily, Brittany and Tyler playing Rockband; a gift from Santa to our family. We also have spent a lot of time playing Wii fit that we got from Nana Jody. What a fun Christmas. Tyler said, "We are the luckiest kids in the world!"

Santa Clause is coming to town!

The kids made a welcome Santa sign and Tyler put out cookies and milk for Santa and some carrots for his reindeer! We are all excited for Christmas!

Happy 18th Birthday, Ashlee!

Hawaii 2004

Alpine Days parade
Spelunking
Ashlee and Lydia "kissing" Mt Timpanogus

Doing a handstand after climbing to the top of Box Elder.

Ashlee had a bunch of friends over for her birthday. Amber made a beautiful cake. The next day we had Chris and Melanie and their kids over to celebrate Ashlee's and Emily's birthdays and to help finish the cake.

Happy 18th birthday to our sweet Ashlee!! What a wonderful 18 years! We love you!! Ashlee loves gymnastics, friends, interior design, venturing, and is a joy to be around!

Some funny things Ashlee has said or done:

• 6 months- Amber had an earlier bed time. Ashlee crawled into the room and found her. She giggled and wanted to play. After that we had to barricade the hallway with chairs.
• 9 month - Would walk up to daddy when he got home from work, would hold up her arms, stomp her feet and say, "eh, eh, eh. . ." until he would pick her up.
• 10 months- I left the kitchen, with her on the floor, for less than one minute, when I came back she was sitting in her high chair. After that, she started climbing on everything.
• 11 month- 4th word (after mama, dada, and no) was tickle. She walked up to Amber, touched her tummy and said, "tickle, tickle. . ."
• 20 months- started climbing out of her crib. Bedtime became difficult for about 2 weeks and then she stayed in bed again. Amber never even thought about getting out of bed. She slept in a bed from 18 months on and never got out after we put her to bed. After Ashlee would climb out of bed she would run out of the room and Amber would follow. I then understood why some people hated bed time!!
• Ashlee has always been polite and never demanded anything. Even at 2 1/2 she would ask politely. If I was doing the dishes, reading. . . she would say, "Mommy when your done doing the dishes (or what ever I was doing), will you get me a drink. . ." I have never heard another kid ask for things like that!
• 2- started making up her own jokes. Even before she was a year she liked to make people laugh by doing silly things. Her first joke she made up at 25 months was, "Knock, knock", Whose there, "Frog", Frog who, "Frog Ashee"! She laughed and laughed and this has become a classic family joke!
• 3 1/2 - When I was pregnant with Emily, Ashlee would pretend to be "praygnent" by putting a doll under her shirt. She was a little worried my baby would fall out when I changed my clothes, like hers would. She said, "Mommy will the baby not fall out when you change your clothes, because it's not showing (under my skin)?" She didn't think it would, but she wanted to make sure.

Halloween

Last week we had a sickness going around our family that we think was the Swine Flu. Everyone got over it within four days, except me. I was sick for about 10 days! I ended up with a secondary infection that turned bacterial. Brittany and Mike only got cold symptoms. They might have had something else or the Swine Flu does on occasion give only cold symptoms. Everyone else got headaches, a really sore throat, fever, aches, chills. . . Amber, Ashlee, and Emily had very slight fevers. Tyler and I had 102-103 degree fevers. Tyler and Ashlee were the last ones to get it and they were sick on Halloween. Tyler was so sad to miss his school Halloween party on Friday. Amber told him that she would plan a carnival for him here. He was very excited. Monday night for Family Home Evening, Amber planned a short lesson and then a Halloween Carnival. She didn't tell anyone and so it was a surprise! Everyone got in costumes and we had a costume parade, played bingo, pin the nose on the pumpkin, and a cake walk. The cake walk prize was an ice cream sundae and the end of the party! It was a lot of fun.

Emily (80's girl), Tyler (BYU football player), Brittany (candy kiss)

We had great weather for Halloween. Tyler went trick or treating for a short time because he was feeling better and his fever was almost gone. We made sure he washed his hands before going and he wasn't with any other kids. We wouldn't have let him go somewhere still being sick where he could infect others, but it was just Mike and Tyler. They didn't go to doors when other kids were around.
Brittany's pumpkin, a bat

Tyler's pumpkin, a spider

Emily's pumpkin, a bat and a moon on a cloudy night.

Amber's pumpkin, Harry, Ron, and Hermione

Mikes, pumpkin, me! It was a lot better in person.

Ashlee was still quite sick when we decorated pumpkins and so she didn't do one and I helped Tyler. Every one's well and healthy now and we are thankful.

Happy 14th birthday, Emily!

Happy Birthday, Emily. We are so blessed to have Emily in our family! She is beautiful, talented, thoughtful and a good friend to all. Emily loves ice cream, dancing, being with her family, babies, photography, making movies, and she plays the piano beautifully! She also just joined the Venturing group with Ashlee. We love you, Em. Thanks for coming to our family! We love you!

Some funny things Emily has done or said:

Emily loved to pretend to talk on the phone when she was little. She had four play phones and would sometimes talk on them, but she always wanted the real phone. She would have pretend conversations on them all day. (She pronounced phone, own) A sample conversation, "Hello. . . uh huh. . . My daddy's no home. My mommy's home. . . me read books. . ."

Emily was very much a daddy's girl. If dad was home she insisted that he change her diaper, get her in and out of her car seat, push the stroller . . .

At 2 1/2 she already had an eye for nice cars. We were heading to our car after church when she pointed to it and said, "That no my car" Then she pointed to a brand new, green, sports utility vehicle and said, "That my car"!

At 3 she still couldn't pronounce her Ls. She pronounced her name emoey. One day she said, "I know how to spell my name, M-O-E". She figured that out because if you just say all the letters, that's how she said her name. One of her nicknames after that became, Moe.

At 4, Emily was trying to do a perfectly straight front roll, she kept going side ways, and was getting frustrated. I told her that if she would practice she would be able to do it. She ran to the piano and played on it for a few minutes. She tried her roll again and still went sideways. She said, "I practiced and I still can't do it!" (Both Amber and Ashlee took piano lessons and I would ask them to practice. Emily had only heard the work practice used with the piano!)

Ashlee's senior Pictures

I am going to have a professional photographer take Ashlee's senior pictures in the spring, but I decided to take Ashlee out yesturday to get some pictures. She didn't have any taken at school this year and I want a current one for her frame.