Jingles Fun

We are loving our elf guest! Here is what the kids have found him doing lately.

Having a tree lit tea party...

playing the piano...

making a powdered sugar snow angle

doing a little living room fishing

having a little snack...

underware and diapers on the tree... Hyrum laughed so hard at this one.

This one was awesome... he wrapped himself up as a present under the Christmas tree. Only the tip of his hat was out. The kids looked for almost an hour before finding him. What a crafty, smart elf. :) thank you very much!

Indoor Snowball Fight

Awhile back my sister-in-law Dulcie gave me an amazing idea, I decided to mooch off her brilliance and put that idea into action for FHE last week. Joe came home from work to a sign that read; "CAUTION, you are entering a battle zone. Here is your Ammo. Use it wisely." Attached to the note was a ziplock bag of mini marshmallows. Inside the kids and I were also armed with our own bags of "ammo" along with a gigantic bowl of extra's. Jace and Hyrum each took window duty and kept an eye out for Joe. Our plan was to hide then jump out and yell attack as soon as Dad entered. Of course Dad was too crafty to just walk in. While waiting on the stairs we heard a knock on the front door. I asked the boys if they were sure they had seen Dad. They assured me they had. Another knock, so we yelled for Dad to come in, with no response. Finally I sent Hyrum to open the door. Sure enough when the door opened Hyrum was showered with mini marshmallows. We had such a fun time pelting each other with ammo. In no time we were all covered in tiny white circles of marshmallow powder. Grace sat on the floor, (in a low traffic area of course) eating the treats that flew her way.

P.S Check out these two adorable hippo teeth. love them

Meet jingles

This year we decided to start a new family tradition... meet Jingles the elf. Jingles arrived on the first day of December with a note and some elf made ornaments for each of the kids. His note explains that he is here to keep an extra eye on the kids and each night when everyone is sleeping he reports back to Santa. Sometimes the night can be a little boring for Jingles though, and he often gets into mischief. The kids run downstairs every morning to see what our little friend has been up to. Here are a few of his doings so far.

This is how we found him on December 1st, sitting on top of a lego fort.

Here is Jingles adding a few decorations to the Christmas tree

reading a book

... helping himself to the chocolate chips

Of course Jingles knows right where we keep some chocolate kisses. He loves candy:)

Here he is climbing our Christmas countdown. We can't wait to see what Jingles does next, I'll keep you posted.

Next to Joe's office is a green house with one room filled with colorful birds, turtles and fish. Joe ran to the office for a few minutes on Saturday and took Hyrum with him. This time Hyrum got to hold one of the parrots. Joe said he must have loved Hyrum because it took almost twenty minutes to get him off Hyrum's shoulders and onto Joe's finger...( which he ended up biting several times)

We had the kids draw straws to see who got to put on the star. Rebekah was the lucky winner.

Grace woke up from a nap in the middle of our decorating festivities. She did her part playing with things on the floor and watching. She is still not crawling...but maybe the tree with all its dangling toys will be her motivation.

Christmas is coming the goose is getting fat...

I don't know about the rest of you but Thanksgiving weekend is more then just celebrating a beautiful holiday with food, family, and Thanks giving, its also about the start of the Christmas season. Growing up my family always went the Friday after Thanksgiving to the mountains to cut down our Christmas tree. The rest of that weekend was spent putting up decorations, and trimming the tree while listening to Carpenters Christmas music. I have gladly taken that tradition with me. True to form here we are decorating the Christmas tree.

Here are the kids enjoying some turkey. The weather was beautiful and only a little chilly. It reminded me of my years growing up in New Mexico, where Thanksgiving is still a great time to play a game of football outside in a jacket. Here are some of the older cousins eating outside in the backyard, seriously beautiful weather.

The kids did a few fun Thanksgiving activities, making candy turkeys and paper plate teepees.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING

This year we headed down to Utah for Thanksgiving at my oldest brother Matts house. We had a wonderful day full of food, football, and more food. The kids love to play with cousins and pretty much disappear every time they are with them.

Behold the goodness...just the memory is making me drool all over the keyboard

HALLOWEEN!

We had a great Halloween this year, carving pumpkins, putting together costumes and of course trick or treating. This year we had two ninjas, a black cat and a chubby pumpkin. Though the kids came home with a pretty decent amount of candy, I cannot help thinking I used to get so much more as a kid. Does anyone else think that? Maybe it's because my Dad, (a die hard trick or treater) always had us walk for hours, "how bout one more neighborhood guys" Thanks Dad, good memories:) Still we ended up with three healthy mounds of goodness. Joe and I being responsible parents made sure to sort through the candy and make sure it was all safe... and edible. We even double checked after the kids were in bed. :)

HYRUMS BIRTHDAY!

Yup, our little Hylo isn't so little anymore. The day before Halloween Hyrum turned 7. I cannot believe it. We had a fun birthday with spider and pumpkin cupcakes, pizza and of course presents. Check out his Captain America costume... his body language is near perfect.

TOUGH MUDDER!

A few weeks ago, Joe and I took the kids down to Utah for a little family trip to watch Joe run the Tough Mudder race. For anyone who is wondering what the heck that is, its a half marathon with about 30 obstacles thrown in. Most of them include, mud and water. We had such a fun time cheering on Dad and running from obstacle to obstacle. He did amazing and had a blast doing it. In fact it looked like so much fun I think we are going to do it together next summer... we love company... any takers? - some of the obstacles; crawling through mud, jumping in freezing cold water, crawling under electric wires (yup, for real), monkey bars, tunnels, climbing hay stacks, climbing up and out of muddy pits, balance beam, running with a log over your head... to name a few

More of the photos...

More pictures...