A Little Bit of Christmas

This is how we spent the few days before christmas. The boys and I flew to Colorado early and this is what we did... Visited Santa at the BLM where my dad works

Spent a day visiting the train museum and enjoyed climbing ALL over the trains.

Andrew and my mom put together a ginger bread train. He wanted his to look JUST like the box. Friday night Bob flew in and we spent Sunday with his family decorating gingerbread houses.

Andrew got his own little one made of graham crackers. So FUN!! Thanks mom!

We even got to spend the day before Christmas Eve with my parents riding the light rail ALL over Denver. The boys thought it was SOOOO Fun! Well, Andrew did, Benjamin was done about 5 minutes into the 20 minute ride, oh well.

Then Christmas Eve morning while setting up the AMAZING dinner table with Bob's mom, we realized we needed one more childrens house...we HAD to make things even you know, so, Benjamin got to make one as well. He really enjoyed himself, i was amazed at how well he did. He especially liked to suck on the candy and THEN put it on the house, in turn coloring the icing whatever color the candy was. Check out that TABLE!!Yes, those are candy trains for name plates, 21 to be exact. Can you see all the cool ginger bread houses! What a FUN tradition!!
Just a ramdom cute picture of Benjamin. He found a book and decided the perfect place to read it was hanging out with Grammy in the kitchen while she did dishes.

We hada great Christmas and I will post more later. This is just the beginning!!

Finally!!

After MANY hours... (I started these LAST year)I finally finished the Christmas stockings. NOtice there are only 2. I haven't even started mine and Bob's...next year right!Can you tell they're excited for chocolate chip muffins... Andrew was wanting to be Mary, I showed him how he could be a shepherd instead.

Thanksgiving

So, I realized I missed Thanksgiving. We had a blast! We celebrated with our friends Kenna and Jayson. (Kenna and knew each other in High School) It was a lot of fun being able to spend it with friends. Kenna and Bob are pretty competitve, so we have a lot of fun playing games. This time, it was a Scene It for X Box rematch. Here's the out come..

Can you guess who won? I"m sure there will be another rematch again soon. Then of course we had to play a 'Bob' game, one that actually involves strategy, Can you guess how THAT turned out?

And to top it all off, we had great food, great fun, great friends, and A LOT of PIE. NINE!!! YUMMMY!!!

We had a great Thanksgiving. Thanks Kenna and Jayson for a wonderful day.

Celebrating Christmas

Last Saturday was the Puyallup Christmas parade and ward christmas party. Sorry, no pictures, we were running late to the parade and I left it in the car. Because we were late, our spots weren't that great, or so I thought. They had the parade participants coming in from three different directions, we were standing at the intersection these places. The boys LOVED it! We happened to be where the floats come out. Benjamin was in AWE of the colorful floats. And we could see all the cars driving onto the parade route. The boys thought it was pretty exciting. We wanted to stand at the beginning so that we could see Santa before heading over to the ward christmas party. But, the parade was running late and so we had to leave early, but guess where we parked! Right by where the Fire truck ws bringing in Sanra. I was SAVED! Andrew still got to see Santa. Then it was on to the ward christmas party. We had a very enjoyable time. And, instead of Santa, they had the three wisemen. According to the MC, in Mexico santa doesn't bring the presents, the 3 wisemen bring the gifts. The children got to sit and listen to the story of the wisemen and then meet them and recieve some treats. It was WONDERFUL! In fact, yesterday I was reading the story of the wisemen to Andrew, and he recognized the story! YEAH!!

Christmas Decorating

We actually put our tree up early this year. We're going to Colorado and so we turned our advent calendar into a countdown to Colorado calendar. Well, that led to ALL the christmas decorations going up. Andrew was really excited to decorate, he did a really good job too and was very proud of himself. He has actually since added candy canes. Benjamin wasn't too interested in the decorating. This is what he did,watched Thomas the Tank Engine and then The Polar Express. The boys love trains.Then,when all the decorating was done, it was time to be silly! At least Andrew thought so.

WHEW!! Decorating was hard work!

Some fun things

Here are a few fun things that have happened recently. It's a little long, but it's more for posterity sake then anything.
Benjamin is at the age where he LOVES to help. He's ALWAYS putting his empty wrappers in the trash,as well as pieces of his apples. And loves to put his empty cups and plates in the sink. Such a big helper! We do have to check every now and then to make sure things have gone in the right spot, he's been known to throw his plate in the trash and empty milk jugs in the sink but he's getting better. Yesterday Benjamin and Andrew were laying on my bed with me while I was trying to wake up. Benjamin crawled over Andrew and found an empty string cheese wrapper on Bob's side of the bed. He promptly crawled off the bed saying "trash, trash" headed out the door, down the stairs, into the kitchen and threw it away, then came back upstairs and climbed back on the bed. All in the dark!(it was REALLY early) I had to laugh. Such dedication!!
Today we found a mouse. Bob had seem something a week or so ago while we were watching tv. He said he saw something small and dark run across the living room. I thought he was imagining things, but we set out to look, couldn't find anything, so gave up. We thought maybe it was a cockroach, it was small and dark right. Yet I don't think big cockroaches can survive in Washington. Anyway, we forgot all about it...until this morning! Bob was getting ready to head out for work, all the lights were off except for the christmas lights, tv and computer, so it was still pretty dark. Andrew was sitting on the couch watching tv and I was sitting at the computer. Bob jumps! He sees it again!! I thought he was just seeing something again. Then he sees it AGAIN! A mouse and it ran right past me! I still didn't see it yet, but told him we'd look into getting traps when he gets home from work tonight. Just amusing him, we couldn't possibly have mice! Andrew was wondering what was going on.... a mouse in primary? (we had just been talking about primary) Poor Andrew was confused. Then, while I was standing on the stairs making my list (I had moved from the computer, remember, that was the last place Bob had seen it.) I SAW IT! A LITTLE BLACK MOUSE!!! I jumped so high!! Andrew said he saw it too, and that it didn't bother his christmas village, he seemed pretty happy about that.He also told me it was blue. He wasn't too concerned so I was trying to be calm. Then Bob saw it 2 more times and jumped both. It's a little unnerving having a mouse in your house. By this point, with all our jumping, Andrew has decided he doesn't like it and won't get off the couch! Bob had been planning on taking my car with the car seats, it gets better gas mileage and he had lots of driving to do. I looked at him and told him he'd better move the car seats so the boys and I could go and get traps. Yup, the urgency for traps increased significantly as soon as I saw one for myself. Andrew later told me he saw it run downstairs. We haven't ventured down yet. He thinks it left with daddy and we'll leave it at that. I'm still going to go get traps, humane ones though, NOT the snapping kind.

It's that time of year again and I'm sending out christmas cards. Please send me your home address. Either here, facebook, or email. Thanks!

Merry Christmas

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

What I'm Thankful for..a day late

Bob Andrew Benjamin my family Bob's family Bob's job our amazing home wood burning fireplaces friends healthy kiddos happy children music boys who love music DVR space heaters trains our wonderful ward
my Heavenly Father prayer the Holy Ghost templesa prophet talents gospel knowledge Knowing I am loved
Happy Thanksgiving (a little late)

Twilight

Yes, I went to the premiere. Some of the women in the ward got together to see it. I really wondered all week what in the world I was doing! I will admit it was more because we're new in the ward and I knew this would be a chance to get to know some people and socialize (we had a nice lasagna dinner after. Thanks Laura! Everything was DELICIOUS!!) I was a little embarrased to be there. I have NEVER heard SO many screaming girls! It was comical. I'm glad that several of the women I was with were feeling the same way. The conclusion I came up with....NOT a theater movie, especially with teenage girls (maybe because I wasn't like that when I was a teen, never understood.) It's more of a wait until it's on DVD and watch at home with hubby. I think we'll try that. Here's a picture I stole from Lauras blog. Thanks again Laura it was a great night of great food and great conversation. In the end, I'm glad I went and was able to get to know the ladies better.

Train Expo

Last weekend Andrew earned himselfa trip to the Great Train Expo. Both boys really enjoyed themselves. Here are a few pictures.

Uh OH

Let's hope we never have to use this. Yup, that's right, we're at the base of a volcano. Mt Rainier to be exact.

18 months!!!

Today Benjamin is 18 months old. I have been waiting for this day for a VERY long time. Why? Because now he gets to go to nursery and we actually get to attend our meetings!! Of course now they'll probably call me to nursery, they have 23 kids in there now with 3 leaders. CHAOS!! I took Benjamin in last week and I was exhausted by the time we got home.
To celebrate this special day we went to the library for story time and TRIED to take some pictures for christmas cards. Here is the result...

Benjamin wasn't too sure about the scarves, or the whole needing to sit and listen to a story idea. Andrew on the other hand...LOVED it! We went to the older story time jus before this one and they didn't have THIS much fun.

Worms

Today the boys experienced the joys of WORMS! Unfortunately I didn't have my camera.Andrew doesn't like to get dirty and he doesn't really like to feel different textures, or even TOUCH anything he's not sure of, so today when we were cleaning out the garage we found a worm that had crawled in during the rain last night. I totally ignored it, knowing it wouldn't entice Andrew at all, and because this is what I'm used to, didn't even think about pointing it out to Ben. Well, Dad pointed it out and Andrew actually got down and examined it. He wouldn't touch it, but he was curious. He then proceeded to ask what worms eat. We told him dirt. So, he decided that the worm needed to go home. She was sad and needed to go home. I told him that was ok and to just pick it up and carry it to the dirt. He proceeded to tell me that he couldn't because the worm was all gooey and that he needed a shovel. Dad showed him where his sand toys were and so off he went to get a shovel so that he could take the worm back to her home. By this point Ben was interested in what was going on and decided to come and investigate. His way of investigating, to touch. He LOVED it. Every time he would touch it, it would wiggle and Ben would laugh. All the time Andrew is trying to scoop it up. Andrew would just about get the worm and Ben would touch it and it would wiggle away. After many attempts and without having to touch it, Andrew succeeded. He moved the worm home. He then proceeded to find dirt for the worm to eat because she was hungry. He was VERY concerned forthe worm, wanting to make sure the worm was home and had enough to eat. Ben, just wanted to touch it and make it wiggle, and then stick his hands in his mouth. YUCK!!! We ran straight to the sink and ended the worm playing.
How different children can be. Yet be the BEST of friends.

P.S. Andrew doesn't like the tops of brocoli and Ben doesn'tlike the bottoms, their solution....Andrew gives the brocolli to Ben to eat all the tops, then takes them back and finishes them off. Works out quite well.

Fall Leaves

This is the beautiful fall scene in our backyard right now. Look at all those leaves!!! Some are as big as me head! I don't know if I've ever seen them so big! Have we been able to jump in them yet you ask? No, it has rained everyday since the leaves have fallen and so they are soaking wet. Andrew keeps asking if he can gather them up and jump in them. I really hope the rain goes away before the leaves.

A busy week

So far we are really happy here. Last tuesday we had the first assistant to the High Priests come by with one of the missionaries, then on Wed the missionaries stopped by again. And on Thurs day, the lady that lives across the street, who's LDS, stopped by to introduce herself and welcome us. Then the RS pres and one of her counselors came by. WOW!!! I have never had so many people come by! Then on Sat. was the ward party. We had a lot of fun and got to meet new people. So many people would come up and say hi and introduce themselves. It was AWESOME! Bob is here taking over the director position at Good Samaritan hospital and the old director also happens to be LDS and we're in the same ward. So, people knew we were coming. It was so great! By Sunday, more people knew who we were then we knew! How great! I was worried that, because we're only here temporarily, that we wouldn't have chance to make any friends. The Hill's ( the old director) have already done that for us. It's GREAT! Our prayers have been answered. We love our house, lots of room to spread out and as soon as it's all put together, I'll take pictures. But for now, here are some pictures from the halloween party and the pumpkin patch. enjoy!

Yesterday we went to a local pumpkin patch when Bob got off work and the boys had fun searching for the right pumpkin.

Trying to get them all to look was pointless.

Benjamin thought this was the coolest thing, we didn't even have to coax him, he walked right over and stuck his head in.

They had a barn full of fun activities for the kids and some baby animals.

Andrew enjoyed racing the ducks with the water pump

And of course, they even had pumpkin slingshots! They HAD to give it a try