Merry Christmas!

We had a great Christmas this year! Clay and I were very excited for Addie to open all her presents but we were especially excited about the kitchen we got her. We knew she'd love it and we were right!

Christmas morning we started with her stocking and she was having trouble getting through everything because she just wanted to play with each thing she pulled out. We finally made it through just as Gaga, Grandpa & Grandma arrived. We then had Addie pull down the wrapping paper around her play kitchen and once she opened that, she just wanted to play with that! She didn't care about opening any presents even!

The kitchen was most of her Christmas but we were worried about her not having much to open so we ended up buying some smaller gifts to wrap up. We ended up taking those with us to our parents' houses where she finally opened them!

We had a busy day but it was still enjoyable. We are lucky enough to be able to spend some time with both of our families on Christmas. Addie loved all the attention and the presents! She was definitely spoiled! We're still trying to figure out where we're going to put everything!

Clay and I both had a good Christmas. We decided for our Christmas presents to each other, we'd get an iMac computer. I am looking forward to being able to play around on it a little more and hopefully do some fun things on it.

We hope you all had a good Christmas! We love you all! Happy New Year! We can't believe 2008 is just around the corner!

Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve is always a fun day for us. The anticipation of what's to come in the next 24 hours is always exciting. Every Christmas Eve as long as I can remember, we have gone to my grandparents' (Dad's side) house to have dinner, a program and presents. We look forward to it each year. I didn't get any pictures with my camera there this year but we played a fun gift exchange with everyone bringing their "favorite thing". There was quite a variety of gifts! Then we all got our gift from my grandparents (we got a GC to Cheesecake Factory and Addie got a Giraffe bank).

After we finished there, we quickly headed home to open one gift and get Addie to bed. Of course, in following with my family tradition, the gift is already set aside and everyone gets Christmas jammies! When Addie was opening hers, she kept saying, "I think it's shoes!"

Addie went to bed quickly after we finished opening the jammies so we could finish up what we needed to and get to bed. We were both excited about seeing her reaction to everything on Christmas morning! Here is what it looked like after everything was done....

More Christmas Traditions

Here are a couple more Christmas traditions that we hope to continue doing!

Making Cookies
Making cookies is something Clay did a lot when he was younger and something he really wanted to do with Addie. One night, when we were going to go do something else but Addie had a late nap, we decided to make cookies instead. Addie had fun but she really just wanted to play with the sprinkles. She lost interest pretty quickly but we hopefully as she gets older she'll participate more!




Gardner Village Lights/ Live Nativity
We had hoped to make it to Gardner Village when they were doing a Live Nativity. Last year, we got there too late and we didn't make it at all on the nights it was happening this year. We did make it over to Gardner Village late one night and didn't spend a lot of time there but it was still fun. We had dinner at the Neighborhood Bakery and Addie had a HUGE Jam sandwich! It was pretty cold so it worked out well that we didn't have much time.




Temple Square Lights
This year, we picked a very mild night to go downtown to see the lights. We went with our friends, The Pratt's, who have a little girl just a few months younger than Addie. We drove to The Gateway Mall and then rode Trax down to Temple Square. The girls thought it was fun to ride on the train. We walked around Temple Square and saw the lights then headed back to The Gateway for dinner at Rumbi Grill. It was a lot of fun and we hope to keep going each year!

Zundel Christmas Party

A couple weeks ago, we attended the annual Zundel Christmas Party (Clay's mom's family). This side of the family is getting so big that usually the only time we are all together is at this Christmas party. The Zundel sisters go to a lot of work to make it a huge success and this one of the best I've been to.

After a nice dinner, we had a special guest arrive. Most people would expect it to be Santa but not here! It was Shrek! Actually, it was Clay in a Shrek costume. :) We still aren't sure what he has to do with Christmas but most of the kids thought it was great. Addie wasn't a big fan, in fact, she started crying when he came too close. She told me she wanted to go home.

Once that excitement was over, we started the Zundel Pinewood Derby. Clay's brother has a track and a whole system for these so we had quite the Derby. Some of us made our own cars and others just borrowed some of his brothers. Clay made Addie an ELMO derby car with the help of his brother. It turned out great and Addie loved it. It was a lot of fun for everyone- especially the kids. Can't wait for next year!

Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!

We got a lot of snow a couple weekends ago and we finally got Addie some boots so she could go play in it! She loves to pick up the snow and throw it. Clay even made a snowman! Unfortunately, it fell down about 5 min. after we came inside! Good thing I got a picture!

Here are some pictures of our fun in the snow!

Christmas is coming...

Christmas seems to be coming so fast this year! We've been doing some fun things with Addie this year that we hope will start into some fun family Christmas traditions! We love this time of year, it's so magical and fun!

Gingerbread Houses

At the beginning of December, we got together with the Jones' and decorated Gingerbread Houses. We took the easy way out and purchased a kit with the gingerbread part already done. The Jones' were ambitious and did it out of graham crackers. They all turned out really cute and the kids LOVED eating the candy! We have ours on our kitchen counter and it smells so yummy!

Putting up the Christmas Tree

We put our Christmas tree up a couple weekends ago. Having the tree up makes it feel more like Christmas so I hope we can get it up earlier next year. It's so pretty and fun- I love having the lights in the house off and just the tree lights on. Addie loved decorating the tree. I'd give her an ornament, she'd say Thank You! and go hang it on the tree. Most of them ended up in the bottom corner but it's so cute. There will be no presents under our tree until Christmas Eve/Christmas Morning because Addie would just open them all!

Other Fun Things!
Addie loves to sing songs...so we've been teaching her a few Christmas songs. So far, she knows the majority of the words to Jingle Bells and Santa Claus is Coming to Town. It's so cute to hear her little voice singing! We'll have to try and get it on video so we can post it!

She made this cute little tree at playgroup a week ago! Such a fun idea and the kissables made perfect ornaments!

We're hoping to still fit in a few more things before Christmas arrives!

We hope you all are enjoying the Christmas season!

Ansel Addie & LuLu!

Addie has recently developed a fascination for taking pictures. Thank goodness for digital cameras! We wish we could find a really inexpensive one that we wouldn't have to worry about- but for now, we let her use our older digital camera with supervision.

She actually does a good job for the most part. Every once in awhile, she gets it where she wants and then moves before she actually takes the picture. She mostly takes pictures of things she likes but she also loves taking pictures of me and Clay. Here is a little collage of some of the recent pics she's taken:

At the end of November and first of December, we had a friend of Clay's from Brazil come to the U.S. for a visit. We didn't get to spend as much time with him as we thought we might but it was fun to see him. Addie loved him...she called him LuLu for short and talked his ear off in the back seat. She didn't care if he didn't understand what she was saying! Here are a few pics of Lulu and us! Luciano- come back again soon! Addie misses you!

Thanksgiving

I know Thanksgiving was a few weeks ago but I'm still trying to catch up with all that's been going on lately!

We started our Thanksgiving Day off very early with the Cottonwood Heights "Beat the Mayor" 5K Run. My entire family decided to participate. Some ran and some of us walked. I pushed Addie in the stroller and walked. We didn't end up going the entire route because it was freezing (about 20 deg F)and Addie wasn't particularly happy. It ended up being a lot of fun though!

We spent the afternoon at Gaga's house eating a yummy dinner, watching movies and playing games and then finished off the night watching "The Bee Movie" at the movie theater with my family. Addie did pretty good at the movie despite being completely exhausted! Luckily it was short! It was a very busy day but lots of fun!

I am so thankful for the my husband and daughter. They bring so much joy & purpose to my life! I love this time of year as it is a great reminder of all the blessings we receive and everything we have to be thankful for. I am so grateful for such wonderful friends and family!!! Thank you for your support and love! Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving!

Aren't Dads Fun?

Clay's brother and his family came into town to visit the week before Thanksgiving. We had fun spending time with them (although it's never enough). Addie especially loved playing with them this time. She thrives on older kids' attention!

The night they arrived, it was just the girl cousins over at Gaga's house. They played with the dolls, kitchen, barbies, treasures (old earrings, buttons and pins from Granny Goose) and then they broke out the markers. I had Addie take off her shirt so she wouldn't get marker all over it.




Gaga had some paintbrush type markers and Maddie had Aunt Livi paint things on their faces. Addie thought her purple heart was so cool.



After everyone had left, Addie wanted to draw a picture on Mommy. Of course, I said no and so Clay decided he'd be a nice Dad and let her paint his face. Addie painted hearts (or what she called hearts) all over his face!



The end result:


Aren't Dads Fun? Turns out the markers weren't really that washable---it took 2 showers to get it all off his face!

Funny Things

We all know that kids just have a way of saying & doing the funniest things. Many times we wonder where they come up with things and others we know exactly where they learned it!

I've been meaning to record some of the funny things Addie has said and done recently. Her vocabulary is continually expanding and I am constantly amazed at the things that come out of her mouth!

Here are just a few that I can remember right now....

Addie: Mom, you know what?
Me: What?
Addie: I'm fourteen.
Me: No, you're not fourteen, you're two.
Addie: Oh.
A few minutes later she comes running back in my room...
Addie: Mom, you know what?
Me: What?
Addie: I'm fourteen (with a big sheepish grin on her face).
Me: only chuckles can come out of my mouth at this point!

I am constantly hearing, "Mom, I have an idea."

The other night we stopped by my parents house to drop some things off. They were not home so I used the garage door keypad to get in. Addie just stayed in the car because we were just stopping by quick. It took me multiple times doing the code (it has major trouble in the cold weather) before I finally got it open. I took my stuff in and came back out and tried to use the keypad to shut it. After multiple failed attempts, I finally hit the button in the garage and ran out. When I got back out to the car, Addie looked at me and said, "Mom, it needs new batteries." I just laughed wondering how in the world she knew this!

One day we were at Target. She was sitting in the front part of the basket waiting to check out. All of a sudden she looks at me and says, "Mom, I need to tell you something" at the same time she's telling me this, she's using her 2nd finger to gesture for me to come closer. (We definitely know she got this from me- I'm always telling her to come over to me because I have to tell her something). She then said to me, "Mom, I need to tell those kids something" and leans towards them gesturing and saying, "Kids, come here, I need to tell you something". Silly girl.

Apparently, she thinks all letters are called Letter B's. Most of the time when she sees letters on something, she either says, Look! It's the Letter B's or she starts singing her ABC's. We took some of our alphabet magnets to my moms the other day and accidentally left them. This morning she came over to me and said, "Mom, where's my letter b's?" Guess we need to work on the letters a little more.

Tonight she came over to me and out of the blue said, "Oh no Mom! I almost forgot my boots upstairs!" I almost forgot? I don't think she even knows what that means!?

She has taken an interest in Winnie the Pooh recently. For some reason, she refers to Tigger as Cougar. No matter how many times I correct her- tigger is still called Cougar.

The other night we were at Target and she found those plastic candy canes that they fill with M&M's or Reeses Peanut Butter Cups. Next thing I know, I look down and she's got one in each hand and she's bent over walking up and down the aisle with them as canes. It was hilarious. I wish I had a camera.

Addie has entered the nose picking stage of life. She constantly has her finger up her nose picking at it. One night, a few hours after she'd gone to bed, I heard her yelling. I turned up the monitor and I hear her saying, "Dad! Come get my bug!" several times. I finally went up to check on her and she was laying there with a bug from her nose in between her fingers- waiting for us to come get it.

Alright. I've bored you enough for one night. Hopefully I can stay on top of these from now on and post them as they happen.