A New Day

Today was kind of a sad day for me. I have been doing daycare now since November 2008. During that time I had a cute little boy named Truman full-time. He is 5 months older than Darek, so it worked out really well having the two little boys together. It seems like they grew up together when I think about how little each one of them was when I started watching Truman. Anyway, today was my last day with Truman. I knew it was coming. His mom (Emily) notified me that they were going to get him into a daycare/preschool at the beginning of the year. But it seems like the time went by too fast.

We "celebrated" the day by eating lunch at McDonalds and playing in the playplace. After exhuasting ourselves there, we headed down to Sandy to the Living Planet Aquarium. The place was totally packed, but the last time I had been there was when it was down at the Gateway. It had been really small and there wasn't much to see. This was much better! We walked all around and saw the new Sea Horse exhibit. We watched as they fed the Sting Rays. Darek and Truman were totally mesmerized with the fish. In fact, Darek tried as hard as he could to jump in with the Rays to "take a bath" as he put it. We were all more than ready to head home and relax. After his nap, Emily came to pick him up. It was sad saying goodbye, but at least we'll still get to see him a lot. Emily just took my place in the nursery at church. Truman and Darek will still be in nursery together, so this was definitely not goodbye. But we will miss seeing him everyday and seeing that cute little smile. Love ya Truman!!

With saying goodbye to Truman, I decided that I would need to go out and find a job. As I mentioned a while ago, I had been offered a job at a local bakery. Well the timing didn't really work out, so I declined the job. Well I talked to the bakery again and they had another job available. I am going into the bakery tomorrow to work out my new hours and what exactly I'll be doing in my position. I am very excited and a little nervous. It's always scary starting a new job and wondering if it's something you'll enjoy. I'm really hoping I'll love this job. I should be starting next week, so we will see how it goes!

Nerf War II

Before Nerf War III starts, I wanted to do a quick blog about Nerf War II. This past Saturday we scheduled the church for our Nerf War. We did one last year during the holidays and had so much fun. So we decided that it needs to be an annual (or more often) occurrence. There isn't much to tell as far as the war went. We had 6 people for this one... Me, Ryan, Alex, Beth, Chad and my Dad. We split into teams and had a blast. After a few rounds with the Nerf guns, we decided to try some hand to hand combat with Nerf swords. I think we had more fun with the swords than we did with the guns! And it was an insane workout! Our video coverage didn't end up working out so well, but we did get some pictures of our fun time! Tomorrow will be Nerf War III and we can't wait to see how that one turns out!

So excited for tomorrow!

A Very Happy Christmas

It's hard to believe another year is coming to an end. It's always amazes me how quickly each year goes. But Christmas is always something we look forward to and wait anxiously for. This year was no exception.

Alex seems to enjoy each year more and more. At almost 7 years old, he has so much energy and it radiates through our home. I enjoy watching him as Christmas comes closer and closer. He has so much fun trying to figure out what we got him and what Santa is bringing him. He loves being off of school and spending time with family. I think that is one of my favorite parts as well. I love when he is out of school and we get that extra time together as a family.

Darek still has no idea what is going on. He knows who Santa is, but really does not like him at all. But I think that by seeing the lights, Christmas tree and feeling that excitement from his brother has given him those clues that it's a special time of year.

Christmas Eve and morning were really wonderful. Darek went to bed at 8:00 and Alex stayed up until about 9:30. I was figuring that Alex would probably be up for quite a while, but when I went to check on him around 10:00, he was fast asleep. After the boys went to bed, we (along with Santa, of course) got everything ready for Christmas morning. I also figured that we would probably only get to sleep in until 5:00 or so if we were lucky. I was pleasantly surprised to have Alex come in and wake us up at 8:00. Very happy about getting a full night's sleep!!! We let Alex see what Santa brought him (2 Zero Gravity Laser cars) before going in to get Darek up. Santa had already set up Darek's present for him, so when Darek came out, he ran right over and jumped into his new ball pit. I wasn't sure that we would be able to get him out of it to finish opening presents, but somehow we managed.

We brought all our presents upstairs to open them with my parents and my brother in law and sister Chad and Beth. It always feels like we only take a matter of minutes to open all the presents, but before I knew it, it was almost noon. We were able to do a video chat with my brother Aaron and his family. It was fun seeing my nephews and neice, even with them being across the country.

After cleaning up all the presents and having a very late breakfast, we took the boys over to Ryan's parents home. We arrived around the same time as his sister and her family. We all opened the wonderful presents that they got for us. Each of the boys (including our nephews) got some kind of weapon, so they went outside with Grandpa to have a mini-war. We had a wonderful time with them.

The rest of the day was spent relaxing and playing. We all had a wonderful Christmas. I am so grateful to have such an amazing little family. We all enjoy each other so much. I'm grateful Ryan was able to have this whole week off of work so that he could experience and enjoy this time too. Sadly, he will go back to work Wednesday night, so there will be a few things he won't get to do around New Years. But this week will be full of fun. My older sister Hayley and her family got here yesterday and we have some really fun plans in store. Hopefully I will get to the blogging sooner rather than later.

Merry Christmas everyone. I truly hope this has been a wonderful holiday for you and your family.

NO NIPPLES!!

I had to write this down before I forgot about it. I was getting the boys ready for a bath. Alex was already sitting in the bathtub. I put Darek in the tub as Alex made an observation. "Mom, Darek doesn't have nipples like I do." I giggled a little and said, "Yes sweetie, he does have nipples." "No, not like the ones I do." I pointed to Darek's nipples and said, "These are just like the ones you have." Alex looked at me like I was dumb and pointed to his face where his DIMPLES are and said, "No Mom, these nipples." I just laughed out loud and corrected the word. He blushed and laughed a little when I told him the right word.
I just love little moments like this!

Halloween

I never blogged about Halloween, so I figure I ought to get to that before Thanksgiving rolls around. We went down to Hurricane/St. George for Halloween this year and had a blast! We went directly over to my sisters (Bethany) house in Hurricane for a How To Host A Murder party. It was such a fun evening. It was fun watching everyone get very into their parts and we all just laughed and laughed. The next day was Halloween. We started the morning with carving pumpkins. We did pretty basic faces this year since I was not in the mood to be creative. :) We met my other sister (Hayley) and her family at a cute place to eat called Pirate Island Pizza. It was a really neat little place and we found out they are building a couple up here, which made us pretty happy. After we all ate, our husbands took the kids back to Beth's house while the girls went shopping. (Don't feel bad for the guys... they went back to play games.) We had so much fun shopping and made me miss the old days when we used to shop together all the time. Before we knew it, it was time to get back to get the kids ready to go out trick-or-treating. We got lots of pictures of all the kids dressed up and while they were out. Ryan and Chad were gracious enough to stay behind for any trick-or-treaters that came by. But really they just sword fought out on the lawn. :) The next day was pretty relaxed and we left in the early afternoon to go back home. It was a great trip and we're thinking of making this a tradition.

Alex (Snake Eyes) and Tyson (Darth Vader)

My cute little Snake Eyes

This one creeps me out a little.

Darth Vader coming in for the kill

My cute little Woody. I couldn't resist this costume!

My little nephew Brayden.

All the cute cousins having a blast together!

Hayley with Anna

I got some of the funniest faces from Brayden.

Love this picture of Anna

Once Darek got one piece of candy, he didn't want to move on until he ate it. :)

Back at Beth's house, Darek found the stash!

Alex was so excited to join in the sword fight when he got back. I love this picture!