Livi's Birthday...We went to Dizzyland!!

My little baby girl turned 4 years old on November 17th! We had decided that for Olivia's birthday we would go to Disneyland for the first time with kiddies in tow. We left for California on Wednesday. After we checked into our hotel, we headed straight for Disneyland. It was so fun, especially with all the Christmas decor and lights. It seemed extra magical. Olivia's excitement was bubbling over. We stayed for the fireworks that first night and then headed back to the hotel to get some rest for tomorrow. My sister Lori and her fam came from Utah and we had some serious FUN! Here are some pictures to prove it.

Cinderella's castle. It was so pretty.

Olivia got a birthday pin with her name on it and how old she was. She said several times, "this is the best birthday ever!" She is only four, so I don't know how we are going to top this one next year....

Dumbo Wumbo (as Olivia called it) was her all time favorite ride.

Livi had extra fun with cousin Shelby.

Wow-check it out!

It's a Small World was decorated with tons of lights-had to snap a picture here.

Shelby and Olivia in the teacup. This is a ride that I can't go on without wanting to die, so I was thankful that Lori and Shelby were there to go with Livi. My mom always called it Dizzyland when we were little, I think it is very fitting, especially for the Teacups.

Snow White's wicked stepmother. Olivia was TOTALLY scared of her. We had to reassure her that it would be okay.

October Fun!

We have had lots of fun so far this month! We went to a Fall festival in Flagstaff a couple of weeks ago. The kids had fun doing all the activities, and we enjoyed the coolish weather and a little hint of Fall. They had a haystack maze and scavenger hunt and stuff like that. The best part of the day was when we stopped at the outlets in Anthem. A little shopping always makes me feel better.

Last night was the annual Trunk or Treat in our ward. It was very fun and we had yummy food to eat. The activities committee did a great job!

Here are my sweet kiddies in their Halloween costumes. They are Snow white and Grumpy-I know it's a garden nome costume peeps-use your imagination!!

Did you notice Olivia's haircut?? Well she pulled the "scissors aren't really for cutting paper-mom is just teasing about that" and so we had to cut it. I don't know how many times I have told Livvy that scissors are for cutting ONLY paper. Alas. My friend Danell cut it, and it is sooo cute. Thanks Danell!

Back at home...

After a very fun vacation we are back home. We have been home for almost 2 weeks now. I just might be the laziest blogger ever. I have been meaning to blog about our extended vacation for at least a week. I even thought about blogging in UT, but just didn't get around to it. It is nice to be back home of course, but we had lots of fun in UT, and ID.

The first fun thing we did was see our friends from Omaha! We drove up to Nate and Elise's house in Rupert, Idaho for a mini IDEP reunion. Jenn and Tyler came from Boise. They were headed to Butte, Montana where they are buying a practice. Amy and Josh even came from PA (They were in Idaho Falls visiting family)! It was fun to see how all the kids have grown up. Nate and Elise were great hosts and we all met in Rupert at their NEW house. We went to Nate's aunt and uncle's house for a BBQ and a little boating on the Snake river. They were also wonderful hosts, and we had a great time. Thanks Carla! It was super fun to see everyone and we ate some great food and had a nice visit. I didn't take many pictures.

Here are the girls. Jenn, Jolisa, Amy-Elise didn't ride since she is pregnant-This is one of the only pictures I took. No comments about my pasty white legs please. Elise, I am taking a picture of us the next time I come up! I was sad I didn't have one of us. Do you?

We said good-bye to Daddy that weekend. But we knew we would see him in just a couple of weeks. We didn't know it would be such a sad occasion. Jason's Grandma Meador died a few days before we got there. We were sad that we missed seeing her again. She was a wonderful person and we are glad she doesn't have to suffer anymore. We are so glad to have the knowledge of the gospel!

We also got to visit with Jason's family, since all the siblings came for the funeral. However, I failed to take a picture....

Back in Utah we did lots of fun stuff. We spent lots of time with Grandma Rey, admiring her flowers, and eating the dirt they were in. Mostly Liam enjoyed the dirt eating. Grandma's house is so fun and Grandma is especially tolerant....And of course, I had a great time with all my sisters!

Mom and the kids at her house.

We went to the Oquirrh Mountain Temple Open House with my sister's Julie's family. The temple was beautiful!

Liam had a very hard time with getting his picture taken. Here are me and Livvy. She was also none too happy about having her picture taken. Too bad you can't see the whole temple!?

Olivia and George especially had an good time. They are close to the same age. They played in the dirt, caught bugs, and argued over toys. Most of the time they got along.

We had all sorts of fun with the cousins and sisters! We went to the Hogle Zoo. (which is nothing exciting compared to the Omaha Zoo-highly disappointing). We ate at some of my favorite places. The Training Table...a Utah original was probably my fav. It is definitely somewhere you should visit if you are ever in the beehive state. I suggest the turkey bacon sandwhich.

We got to see Lori's new baby. Mirielle is about 4 months old. We were also there when Julie had her baby and got to see Reagan right after he was born. I have such a wonderful family and family in law!

It is nice to be back at home with my little family. We are getting back into the routine, and looking forward to cooler weather!

Pictures and table makeover

Jason and I have been trying to figure out what to do with our crappy looking table. It was looking pretty bad. It had a lot of places where the finish was coming off on top. It was eternally sticky in one place from something (yes I tried everything to clean it off), and generally looked bad. Jason had mentioned refinishing it, but thought it would probably be more work than it was worth. Note: we bought this table in Omaha after we moved into our house, it is three years old. It only looked nice for about 3 months and then the top of it just started looking bad. Anyway, to make a long story short, I actually had an IDEA. I am not a creative person at all, especially when it comes to decorating. However, one day I was thinking about the table and remembered one of my friends had a two-toned a table. It was black and a wood color, and it just hit me-paint the table top black and find a pretty fabric to reupholster the nasty dirty chairs. I was a little worried if it would look ok, but we figured if it was really bad, we would buy a new table. Anyway, here is a picture of the finished table. Nice job Jason. THANK YOU.

Liam is getting SO big. He is no longer my baby, but my little kid. It is very sad. I am finished nursing, and lately he looks so much older. I wish I could stop time for a little while! He is such a sweet thing. He throws his little arms around my neck, and I just melt. Heavenly Father knows how to make them! He LOVES peanut butter and honey. He loves to be tickled on his neck and back and he loves kisses. He giggles all the time. Here he is in his peanut butter glory. And he LOVES having his picture taken. He smiles EVERY time...a big cheesy smile.

We had a fun 4th of July, but I am a terrible picture taker and just got a couple silly ones of the kids. Not even all of Liam. They were already swimming by the time I thought, "I need to take a picture of them in their 4th of July clothes." OOPS. O and L had lots of fun swimming with the cousins too. Since then we have been trying to live through the triple digit heat, staying indoors, and swimming in the evening. We are taking our annual trip to Utah in about a week and are looking forward to cooler weather and seeing everyone!!!

June Happenings

We have had a busy month! We are enjoying the warm weather, and staying pretty cool. I don't know if it is because I have acclimated to Arizona or because it is a little cooler so far this summer, but I am happy to report that its been nice. I guess 100 degrees is my new 80. And, I got my hair cut and that has to help with at least 10 degrees. Olivia (who you know is a professional photographer when she is not making a mess or tormenting Liam) took my picture.

I tried to take one myself, but it looked ridiculous. Anyway, Sara-Lynn cut my hair last weekend when we went on a weekend road trip to California to visit and Jason installed some lights i and she cut my hair. Thanks Sara-Lynn! We were also able to visit Aaron and Nicole and their two boys. Aaron checked our eyes. Thank you Aaron!! So the drive was a little long with the two kids, but it was a fun trip and great to see everyone.

Olivia, Liam, and I are keeping busy. Olivia takes dance lessons, we swim in the pool and go to ward playgroup once a week. We also bought movie tickets for every Tuesday morning, but I didn't realize how hard it would be with Liam, so we only go if it is a good movie. They are old movies from last summer.

Olivia is such a sweet little thing and is very imaginative. She is always talking about and with her "friends" She makes up names for these friends and they always end with "ia", "Redia" is her favorite. She just changes around the first few letters to make a new name. She asks me to do things for her friends too. She is the sweetest. Here is a recent pic.

(Note: Her hair is usually in her face. I do it every day and about 5 minutes later it is messy. Do you think Bangs would solve this problem? Oh yeah, and Sara-Lynn cut Olivia's hair too. It looks great! She is no longer a rag-a-muffin.

Lately I have been feeling creative. It is a little strange for me. I have always wanted to be crafty, but I never really did it. I was simply gathering all the necessary supplies for being crafty and stuff, and not actually using them. Now I am actually using the stuff that I have acquired. I have sewed a few projects on my new sewing machine and am using the Cricut that I bought to scrapbook. Here is a crayon roll that I made for Olivia.

There is a blog, http://www.makeitandloveit.blogspot.com/ , which has lots of tutorials for things. I have made a couple of crayon rolls, and a cute little trash bag for the car. I can't believe all the tutorials on the Internet. It is so cool. There are TONS of websites that walk you through everything. How nice of people to share their knowledge so freely!! I love it. I also got the idea for a Framed dry erase board off this site. You know how white erase boards are so handy, but so ugly too? Instead of just using a dry erase board, you buy a frame and use fabric to make it pretty. Here is her example if you want to look

http://makeitandloveit.blogspot.com/2009/03/picture-frame-dry-erase-board.html

I decided it would be fun to have a dry erase board calendar.

Enough about the craft stuff back to the important things-kids.

Liam is walking and running all over the place now. We just went to his 12 month appointment at the beginning of the month. We were a little over due. He is doing great and in the 35th percentile for height and 16th percentile for weight. He is in the .6th percentile for head circumference. I know it doesn't look small, but it is. His doctor assured me this has nothing to do with intelligence-Anyway, he is a happy little guy most of the time, and very lovable, he wants to cuddle which is something Olivia never did. I LOVE it.

And he LOVES to have his picture taken. He always smiles big for the camera. Is this a little John Travolta? good thing he doesn't have any chest hair! Hehe

That was our June in a nutshell. My little sister has been bugging me to post some pics of the kids-I realized I haven't taken too many lately-so now I am on a quest. More kid pics later.

Greta-our new puppy...

Liam and Greta (8 weeks old) We brought her home and played with her in the front yard. The kids were ecstatic! Including Jason. He has been waiting for a long time to get a dog! His mean wife finally let him get one.

I know it is hard to believe, but I have found a moment to blog. I am actually awake past 10:00pm, and my husband is asleep-which is VERY rare. It is usually the other way around. My kiddies are also asleep of course and they are the little cuties that take all my attention it seems. I have felt very busy lately, so it has been hard to find a minute for an update. We got a puppy about 5 weeks ago. I have tried to post some pictures of her several times, but I have logged in to my blog and gotten side tracked-which is often the case. Anyway, she was so sweet and little. Now she is getting bigger. She is still pretty cute though. We named her Greta, since Jason didn't get to name Olivia Greta. Surprisingly, considering my fear of dogs, I am really getting used to her. I even like her and pet her and stuff.

Liam thinks it is super fun to get into Greta's kennel. I think it's nasty and pulled him out as

quickly as possible (after grabbing the camera of course ;)

Liam is such a big boy now and is walking all over the place. Olivia graduated from preschool and is having a fun time swimming in the pool on most days. She is starting to be able to swim pretty well now. It is so fun to watch them grow and learn!

Liam and Greta Olivia's preschool graduation

Home from Boston

Well, I have a lot to report since I have not blogged for at least a month-not because I didn't have anything to blog, but because the kids and I have been BUSY! We had a visit from my sister and mom the first couple of weeks in April and then I went to Boston with the kids for the last half of April. We got home from Boston last Wednesday. Jason went to Omaha for a Continuing Education thing and was able visit a few friends while he was there. I wish I could have gone too, we miss all of our Omaha peeps!

So here are some pictures from what we have been up to.

We went to the Childrens Museum while we were in Boston. The kids had lots of fun. William really liked the baby place. They were having a frog exhibit which was so cool. Some of the frogs were so wild looking. This one is called the Waxy-monkey frog. It looks like it is fake and it didn't move at all.

We also went to Rockport, which is a pretty coast town that, hence the name, has lots of rocks on the beach. The girls had fun splashing in the water and climbing all over the place.

Here are a few pics of when Mom, Michelle, George and Ruby were here. We sure had fun!

We had fun at the park too!

Liam turned 1 year old! I can't believe an entire year has already gone by. He is such a sweet little boy. I wanted a girl so badly when I was pregnant with him, but Heavenly Father must have known better. I am so excited to have this little boy in our family. He is so happy and fun to take care of.

He was totally into the cake, which I have to say was very tasty, thanks to the Oreo cookie crumb race track. It actually turned out how I had pictured it in my head-this has never happened before so I was happy with myself.

The cousins came over for the big day and William loved all his presents.

Well, that is about the last month in a nutshell! Life just keeps going and the kids keep growing. We feel "seriously so blessed" lately especially.

A question for anyone... I have been trying to put a slide show on my blog and am having issues. Does anyone use Picassa or Flickr?