Nate Funny Comment

Nate was preparing to teach a FHE lesson on Samuel the Lamanite. He asked me, "Mom, did Samuel have a gun?"

Chaz

Obviously I have posted much this year, but this is for you Liz :). And next year, I hope to do better!

Chaz now weighs in at about 20 pounds. He went from my smallest baby (almost 2 pounds smaller than Nate) to as big as Nate was at Chaz's age! He sure is a cutie and we love him to pieces. He is a people person. He will stare and smile at anyone who will look at him and he LOVES his fingers. He usually is sucking on his thumb or a couple fingers or the entire fist and sometimes he tries for both hands at the same time. Sucking is probably incorrect though. I believe it is more of a chewing, chomping motion. He also LOVES his index finger. He is always pointing it and raising it up in front of his face. Then he makes funny "talking" sounds. We think he is trying to tell us some great proclamation of his. One day, he may be involved in a career that involves a lot of debating. Here are some recent pictures of him. He loved the pool in Hawaii and splashed away! I can't wait to see you in January Liz!

Christmas Eve

For Christmas Eve, we always read the Christmas story and the boys usually act it out using puppets.  This year I had some costumes I had borrowed to use for my sharing time, but the boys didn't get to be in it so they were very excited to dress up for ours.  They started as shepherds with McKay being an angel.  Then we took an intermission as they changed into their wise men costumes.  It was very special and so sweet to see how excited about they were.  Even McKay loved it!  

After the story, it was time for the traditional Christmas Eve presents.  Pajamas!

We got home pretty late because Kip needed Dad's help with something and by the time he finished, it was storming pretty badly.  When we got home around 11:30, we realized we had caught Santa in the act!  Our stockings were partially filled and there was stuff scattered all over the floor!  The boys quickly left a note asking him to please return and hurried to bed.  They were relieved the next morning to find that Santa did indeed find to come return and finish the job!

Disneyland at Christmastime!

This year we got to take a trip to Disneyland at Christmastime!  We love it.  (Of course, we always love Disneyland.)  Christmastime is especially magical.  They have everything so festive and fun!  This is us waiting for the parade.  I love the parades, and the rest of the family humored me.

The California letters between the parks were candy cane striped with several big character statues.

This is in Bugs Land.  

The castle this year was so beautiful.  Last time we were here at Christmas, it wasn't quite this amazing. They do really neat fireworks too, but we don't usually stay in one place long enough to actually watch the show.  This time, we happened to be in line and get on the rocket ride just as the firework show was going.  It was perfect!  Front row seats, up in the sky!

Disneyland is such a fun place for us!  We will be sad when our season passes are up, but will look forward to when the next child turns 2 and we start a Disneyland year again!

Festival of Trees

This year we made our traditional visit to the Festival of Trees.  We usually take my mom and this year my brother joined us.  We had a great time as usual.  It is a fundraiser for the local primary children's hospital.  The trees are decorated and then sold to raise money for the hospital.  This year my mom decided to purchase a tree so we bought this cute Thomas tree.  The boys absolutely loved it!  Maybe next year we will have to add a princess tree to the family room for the one granddaughter!

McKay is Growing Up!

I have noticed lately that McKay is acting much more grown up, especially in the sentences he uses.  When you are reading to him and ask him a question that he doesn't know the answer to, he will say "I don't know what that is," instead of just "ma don know".  Today I was just standing in the kitchen when all of a sudden he ran from across the room, gave me a big hug, and said, "Glad to see you!"  It was so cute.  I hadn't even gone anywhere!

Of course, with growing up, comes the realization of being afraid.  It has happened with each of our kids.  They are perfectly fine sleeping in the dark with the door shut, until about age 2 and 1/2.  Then all of a sudden they are afraid.  A couple nights ago, I told McKay goodnight and started to shut his door and he started crying, "Don't shut door, don't shut door!"  I turned the light back on and went to talk to him.  He said he was scared and when I asked what he was scared of he said, "Tiger."  I thought he had become afraid of the tiger in his favorite movie Kung Fu Panda.  I kissed him and left the door open and he slept fine.  The next night Mike was putting him to bed and started to shut the door and the same thing happened.  This time when we asked what he was scared of he said, "Tiger" and pointed to the wall next to his bed.  It was then that I realized what was scaring him.  Our toilet is behind the wall next to his bed.  He thought the toilet flushing was a tiger in the wall!  It made me so sad to think that our nightly toilet flushing was causing him so much fear!  We decided to show him that the noise was the toilet, so Mike went into the bathroom and I told McKay how funny it was when the toilet was flushed.  He laughed when he heard it flush and said, "funny toilet!", then insisted on the door being open (don't think that will change now.)  Once they know fear, it seems to stay.  

Tonight at dinner, Mike chuckled about something and asked McKay if he knew what was funny.  McKay got down and headed for the bathroom and said, "Toilet funny!"  then flushed.  He is so entertaining and fun.  What a sunshine he is!  Now if we could just get him to use the toilet!

Decorating our Tree

One of my favorite things about Christmas is putting up the decorations.  The  boys start out excited, but then get bored.  They love to do the tree, but I always make us wait until everything else is finished and cleaned up.  Then it is time to do the tree!  For me it is the final touch and I love to be able to turn on the lights and enjoy!

Fun movie night!

When we returned home from Idaho, we were greeted with a wonderful surprise.  A movie night all set up and ready to go.  There were tickets, individual bowls of popcorn, blankets, candy.  Everything you need for a family movie night, all prepared by dad!  He is so thoughtful and fun.  It was a super fun surprise!

Trip to Idaho

When the boys went off track, I decided to take off!  The boys and I loaded up and went to Idaho to visit their cousins Justin and Max!  We had a great time.  The boys played and played and enjoyed all of the projects Aunt Janae had planned for them.  They have so much fun together.  It was nice for them to have unlimited cousin time!  (And I enjoyed the sister-in-law time as well!)

Our First Snowman of the Year!

The boys were very excited to wake up to a snow storm.  As soon as Nate got home from school, it was time to build a snowman!  They had a lot of fun playing in the snow.  McKay loved the snow.  Anytime there is snow on the ground he calls it "snowman".  He also loved to wear all off his snow gear.  Doesn't matter where we are going or how cold it is, he wants his boots, hat, and gloves!

Halloween

For Halloween this year, we had a variety of characters.  T.J. wore his award winning Obi Wan Kenobi costume, Nate used his Indiana Jones hat that he worked so hard to buy at disneyland, and McKay was obsessed with Buzz Lightyear so that costume got another year of use!

Birthday and Halloween Dinner with Nanna

Nanna invited us over for a delicious dinner and apple picking.  The boys love going to Nanna's and especially enjoy picking the fruit from Nanna's trees.  We were also surprised with pumpkin carving and birthday cookies for Mike! It was a wonderful evening.  Thanks Nanna!

Nate lost a tooth!

Nate had a loose tooth for a very long time.  We kept telling him to wiggle it around to help it come out.  He would do that by pushing it forward with his tongue.  Eventually, the back of the tooth had come out but it was still connected in the front on one corner.  It was hanging sideways in front of his other tooth.   I wish I had taken a picture of it like that.  It almost looked like he had already lost it, cause you could hardly see it!  Nate was so excited and so proud when it finally came out!  (And so were we!)

T.J.'s Baptism

On September 27th, T.J. was baptized.  It was a very special experience.  I still can't believe we have a child old enough to be baptized.  He is such a handsome boy.  My dad took this picture and I love it.  He looks so grown up and ready to be baptized.  He was baptized in the Stake Center next to the new Draper temple.  I will post more pictures later.  They are on my mom's camera.  We had so many family and friends come and share the day with us.  We really appreciate everyone's support.  As we were sending out invitations, I realized how fortunate we are to have so many friends and family close.  We missed those who are too far to come and look forward to the next time we can visit with them.  The gospel is such a wonderful blessing and provides such guidance and peace for us.  I am proud of T.J.'s decision to be baptized and hope that he can always remember how he felt on this special day.  

Late Night with Lego's

We wanted to do something special for his 8th birthday.  He debated on going to a Bee's game but I told him he would have to limit the number of friends he invited.  He decided instead to have a late night party.  It turned out to be tons of fun!  We started with the Lego party and had a creating contest and tower building contest.  We then had pizza and built their own lego racer cars.  Mike built a 4 lane race track that we used to race the cars to see whose was the fastest.  After the race we had cake and presents and then moved on to our movie portion of the night.  We popped popcorn and watched "Ernest goes to Camp".  The boys loved it and had so much fun.  It was a wild and crazy night, but considering the number of boys in the house, it went extremely well!  I am glad that T.J. has made so many friends here.  We are so blessed to live in a great neighborhood.

T.J. turned 8!

This is old news but I am going backwards trying to catch up on important events for us.  On September 12th, our oldest boy turned 8 years old!  I still can't believe it.  He is so grown up and such a wonderful boy.  T.J. is the best brother you could ask for.  He loves to be with his brothers and is thoughtful and considerate of them.  He is so smart and is starting to teach me many things.  He has the memory of his dad.  He can remember the smallest facts from anything that he reads.  T.J. has always been extremely cautious in his decisions and has a great desire to be obedient.  I hope these are qualities he will continue to have as he grows older.  We have sure been blessed to have him as our son. 

 T.J. LOVES lego's.  He has aquired this from his Dad.  It is funny how our interests are so similar to our parents and grandparents.  We had a very fun Lego party.  I had to get more creative and design our own decorations and cake, but I think it all turned out great!

The family party is always a fun evening with dinner and time with grandparents, great-grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins.  We love having everyone together.

Being a lego party, everyone knew T.J. loved lego's and he received quite a collection that night!

T.J.'s birthday is two days after my grandpa's.  We always have fun celebrating with Grandpa-pa, but this year was extra special.  Grandpa-pa turned 80 and T.J. turned 8!  Grandpa-pa is such a fun grandpa.  He loves to tease the kids and the kids love to tease him back.  T.J.'s night was so much fun and a great way to celebrate this special birthday.

August Disneyland Trip with Grandpa and Grandma Fox

When the boys went off track in August, I talked my Dad into driving us to California so that we could go to Disneyland and he could play golf (never to hard to convince him to golf).  We were excited when he decided to stay with us and go to Disneyland for 2 of the 3 days.  We had tons of fun.  My parents even bought a season pass and are going to go back with us in December!

My mom enjoys it so much now that we have discovered rides that she can go on with the boys.  Buzz lightyear and Winnie the Pooh are two of our favorites and ones that Grandma could join us.  Since Mike wasn't there, my Dad took T.J. on a lot of the big rides.  They loved Thunder Mountain, Indiana Jones, and Splash Mountain.  We all really enjoyed the trip and the boys loved going on the rides with their Grandparents.  They fought over who got to pick a ride to go on with Grandpa. 

This is the rice krispie treat I got for McKay.  He was so excited when I pulled it out of the bag and wouldn't let anyone help him eat it!

This picture is of the boys waiting for the parade.  You can tell that they are all related to Mike.  You can frequently catch Mike in his squat and he seems to have passed it on to his boys. 

We don't make a trip to Disneyland without multiple rides on the Casey Jr. train.  It has always been a favorite and still is.  Even thought T.J. has grown into the big boy rides, he never complains about going on Casey Jr.!

I don't think I have ever seen McKay laugh harder than he was laughing at Donald Duck's mailbox.  We had to turn the knob over and over and over again.  Each time he just laughed harder and harder.

We love Disneyland and can't wait to go for Christmas!  We especially loved having Grandma and Grandpa with us!