Christmas Dresses

Every year I love to buy the girls matching Christmas dresses. I'm not sure how much longer they will put up with this, but I'm going to push it as much as possible. I try to be sensitive to their needs. Bella's need to be non-girlie, and not too cute, Monique's need to be fluffy, and pretty like a princess, and Olivia's need to be just like her sisters. (That's the easy one!) Each girl was thrilled with the dresses this year, and were very pleased to wear them. Oh, and we were even on time to Church with all the hair a "makeup" we had to do. I even changed my clothes three times before settling for my outfit (thank goodness no pictures) and we still made it with two minutes to spare. Hurray Dottie! (Well, and Kirk if you want to include him in the Hurray giving.)


Bella did NOT want a ribbon in her hair, but I did some fancy talkin' and she finally agreed to a little bit of ribbon. (But you can't see it in this picture!)


Monique was quite cooperative this morning, because she wanted to be really pretty. It's always fun for a princess to get a new pretty dress...and the skirt was nice and fluffy. I had to really explain why I was putting a green ribbon in her hair. She knows, when you wear red, you use red ribbon (it's all about color coordination.) but she finally relented when I explained the whole Christmas colors thing.


This is one of MANY pictures taken. She is quite the ham in front of the camera, but forgets to smile. This is kind of a happy, drooly mouth, look. It doesn't matter, because she's always cute!


Yup, this is her "forgetting to smile" pose. Kirk kept asking me why we had to take all the pictures before church, and I kept trying to explain that by the time we come home from Church, the girls are too cranky to take beautiful pictures. Besides, you never know what will happen at Church. Well, as if just to prove my point for me, by the end of Sacrament Meeting, Olivia had gone into the bathroom with Monique, and put her skirt in the toilet! It's a good thing I'm such a smart Mommy, and didn't listen to Crazy Daddy!

I love you beautiful girls....

SANTA TIME!

Santa came to our Ward party a couple of weeks ago. It was really nice, because they had someone in our Ward take pictures of each child with Santa. It's a good thing, because I was in charge of other things, and didn't even see the girls with him this year. Apparently, Olivia wanted nothing to do with Santa, and Bella decided she was too old to sit on Santa's lap. Good thing another mother MADE her go see Santa, otherwise, I would have no picture of Bella. Thanks to the other "mean" mom for taking care of my needs during my absence! Oh, and thanks to Kirk for just being mean, and handing Olivia over screams and all. What good memories we'll have! (I'm sure it was very entertaining for all the other mothers in the room)


Olivia does NOT like men with facial hair. (We have this really cute man in our ward who just wants to be her friend, but as long as he has a goatee, she will NEVER let him come close to her. She starts screaming and runs the other way.) This is too bad, because who has more facial hair than Santa?? Maybe if he shaved, he wouldn't scare so many children. I think Monique is annoyed that Olivia is ruining her perfect picture with Santa.


Well, at least it's a semi-smile. I guess I can't ask for much more. Maybe I should remind her to be very nice to this big guy, because he controls some of her presents! Hmmmmm-for her sake, I hope he wasn't too offended, or she might get the big, black rock this year.

HO HO HO
MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL
AND TO ALL A GOOD NIGHT!

Thanks Santa!

BELLA'S BAPTISM

Because her birthday was on a Saturday this year, Bella was able to be baptized on her birthday. What a lucky girl. I'm sure she will always remember what a special day it was. After the birthday festivities in the morning, we had much too much to do to finish getting ready for the baptism. (Mainly because I'm a space head!) We don't have Stake baptisms, so it is all on us to make it happen. ( I don't know why I say us, when I really mean me....but I'm trying to be polite!) The baptism was at 3:00 pm, so I was hoping Olivia would get a nap, but alas, it was not to be. She was very cranky by the time we arrived at the Stake Center. Luckily, I have great friends who provided all the refreshments, and having my family around really helped with all the little details. Kirk performed the baptism and conformation, Michael gave a talk on baptism, Grandpa spoke about the Holy Ghost, Grandma and Jean sang a beautiful song, and because I am the Primary President, I was able to be the first to welcome her as new member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. It was a really special, emotional experience for me. Oh, and Monique said the closing prayer.
(She did a great job too!)

Kirk was nervous and spoke really fast, and suddenly she was already coming out of the water. When she came up the stairs to me, she said, "he did it so fast, my eyes were still open!"

It was wonderful to see Bella make such a good choice, and it also made me feel really old. I didn't realize I was old enough to have a child getting baptized. Where does the time go?
I need a pause button, just for a minute so I can catch up.

After the baptism, we all went to Country Buffet (Bella's favorite restaurant) for a birthday dinner. We had quite the crew of people, and I felt bad for our table clearer lady! We were a mess. By the time we came back home, we were all very tired and ready for bed.

Thanks Grandpa, Jean, Michael, Seth, Jessica, Corbin, and Grandma Smith for traveling here to be with us on Bella's special day. And thanks to all our friends who helped and supported us.
You guys are awesome.

Oh, and a BIG thank you to the Bishop for making the water nice and warm!

Try not to look too excited guys.


Izabella & Monique


Izabella & her best friend Samantha


Kirk, Izabella & the Bishop


Bella did not want me to take so many pictures. So, this is what you get.


Thanks for the beautiful cake Chas. I know Izabella will always remember it.


Olivia throwing a tantrum because we won't let her have any more cake.




AAAAAHHHHH....What a cute family!

IT'S GREAT TO BE EIGHT!

FINALLY! Izabella finally had her eighth birthday. She thought she would die before it came. According to her, life begins at eight. She gets to be baptized, go to activity days, and now she's not the only 7-year old in her CTR 8 class.
It's been a long wait, but I think she feels it was worth it.

Because this is such a special birthday, many people came to be with her, and give her too many gifts. The party started the night before when she slept over at the hotel with Grandpa, Dad and Monique. When she came home in the morning, I made her wait outside until Kirk came home with Jean & Michael. (they stayed at my wonderful friends' home) Good thing it wasn't too cold!


Izabella's face as she saw her new bike




She was so happy we it wasn't PINK! (we looked all over and finally found a blue one.)




Grandma Smith gave her a set of her very own BLUE scriptures Thanks Grandma!



Jean, Michael & Seth gave her a "Cheetah" shirt (which she put on right away) and $10.00.
HURRAY! More money to go shopping with!



Grandpa, Grandma & David gave her a Nintendo DS and a really fun game with Sorry, Battleship, Connect Four, and Trouble. Even the adults liked that gift!



After the busy day, we decided to wait until the next day for cake. So, we had a nice dinner and her favorite cake. She doesn't really like frosting, so she always picks a cake with whip cream instead of frosting. Mommy is so smart, I started with 7 candles on the cake. Luckily, Michael came in and reminded me of how old my daughter really is, and I fixed it before Izabella could see what I dumb dumb I am!


I love this little girl, and I'm so proud of her. She is such a good helper, and loves her little sisters like crazy. She's creative, active, and ready for anything.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BELLA!

Pre-School Nutcracker

Monique's preschool went on a field trip to see the Nutcracker. Kirk, being the good sport he is, took the day off to attend the ballet with her. He said she danced in her seat the whole time, and was really excited to see all the ballerina's. Kirk's favorite part was when part of one of the backdrops fell. (typical) Good thing this was a dress rehearsal they had invited the preschools to. Monique loved it, and couldn't stop talking about ballerinas.



She had to be pretty to see the ballerina's



Sarah & Monique
Sarah's mom said she kept asking when it would be over!

CRAZY FUN!

For Thanksgiving we went with our friends to a couple of cabins in the mountains. It was so, so fun with all 22 of us. We had 8 adults and 14 kids running around. It was FANTASTIC! We arrived Wednesday night and stayed up way to late playing board games. I learned I love the game Blockus. If you've never played it, it's totally fun....like Tetris fun (for all you Tetris fans out there!) That night, Olivia needed to poop in the middle of the night, but took ALL NIGHT to do it. After staying up with my friends until almost 1:00 am, Olivia woke at 2:00 am, and didn't go back to sleep until 6:45 am after she FINALLY pooped. Everyone was awake at 7:30 am and it was time to start the turkey. Needless to say, I was very, very tired.

On Thanksgiving day, the weather was pretty mild. A little on the cold side, but no snow. The boys headed to town to shop (I know, all these grown men wanting to go shop together. It was scary!) They came home with water, paper towels, and other provisions we had either forgotten, or didn't have enough. It was a very boring assortment of things. I was quite disappointed that they didn't come back with something more exciting...like a present for me! The girls worked on turkey, rolls, and all the other meal items. It was very interesting to cook without some basic items like a whisk! We weren't sure exactly what the cabins would have, but we assumed all the utensils needed would be there. NOPE! I was making gravy with the whisk from Chas' mixer. It was quite interesting.

The kids loved the fact all the grown-ups were busy, because they were able to play in the hot tub for a while. It was like their own personal swimming pool. They had tons of fun, and were mad when it was time to get out.



Sarah didn't want to go in the hot tub, she was too cold.




We had a YUMMY Thanksgiving dinner, and stuffed ourselves thoroughly. Of course, we had way too much food, but every bite was worth the pain endured later.


MMMMMMMMMMMMMMM......TURKEY!

Thursday night, I tried to play games, but I was too tired and cranky to enjoy it much. I was a little on the snippy side, so I finally left to go get some sleep. I'm sorry I was so cranky people!

Friday morning we crawled out of our beds way too early because the children think they need to be up with the sun...and sure enough...the ground was covered with snow! The kids ate breakfast, and were out to go sledding and enjoy the snow for as long as possible. We found out Olivia is a snow bunny, and loved every minute of it. I'll have to post those pictures later, because we had a few technical difficulties and I need to gather pictures from the other families.

Friday was a great lazy day of playing in snow, reading, going for walks, or whatever we felt like. By the way, I did not take a nap...I was reading my book! We stayed up late playing card games and I even won a couple of times. I think Kirk even won a hand or two. (Which is good for him, because he doesn't like card games)






Saturday morning, it was time to leave. My children were all having meltdowns, and needed naps, but overall the clean-up and pack-up was pretty smooth. We had a crying, screaming, "I need to go potty!" drive home, but that couldn't dampen the wonderful time we had with our friends. I'm so grateful for such great friends, and look forward to many more adventures with
them!

THANKSGIVING AFTERMATH!

(Feeling a little bloated?...Me too!)

*

YOU BETTER WATCH OUT,

I THINK I'M GONNA CRY

THE FOOD HAS TAKEN OVER,

AND I ATE WAY TOO MUCH PIE

NOW JUST LOOK WHAT HAS HAPPENED....TO ME!

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HOPE YOUR THANKSGIVING WAS AS FATTENING AS MINE!!