Christmas Eve & Christmas Day

Christmas 2010 was AWESOME!   We mostly stayed home and hung out as a family. We had a good time watching movies, playing games, and sleeping in.

Christmas Eve brought new jammies

 

 Santa ate almost all the cookies

And he brought presents

 

New socks are always on the list

Alexis was thrilled to get stuff for her zhu zhu pets

Julee was excited to get the long awaited for Ipod Touch

Rick was super surprised to unwrap an iPad. Can you tell?

Merry Christmas Everyone!

Christmas Traditions

As usual, this holiday season was filled with some of our favorite traditions:

We made gingerbread houses

Saw the lights in Washington Park

 

Hung out with friends

 

Made and frosted Christmas cookies

And ate a chocolate yule log

We can't wait to do it all again next year!

Grandmama and Grandpa Bear Came to Visit

Grandmama and Grandpa Bear came to visit us around Halloween.  We had so much fun with them and were sad to see them go home to Arizona.  Here are a few highlights of all we did while they were here (and since my mom is now a famous radio personality (see here) I'm sure she won't mind all the pictures of her in here):

Admired lots of pretty colors not seen in desert lands

 Ate a lot of stuff that was really bad for us

 

 Acted silly at Yankee Candle Factory

 Rick and my turn

 Even Grandma and Grandpa got in on the fun

 Saw that Grandma had her first indoor snowstorm

 Pretended to like each other because Santa was watching

 Made new friends

  Chilled out at a hotel in Massachusetts (seriously, can't take my 

parents anywhere - they just act like they're at home)

 Took advantage of the hotel swimming pool

 Hogged the hotel TV to watch NCIS

 Took a Halloween train ride

 Actually had a lot of fun on said train ride

 Hung out with witches

 And train conductors

 

Played Legos and lots of other games

But mostly, we just enjoyed each others company

We can't wait for them to come visit again!

Happy Birthday Lekkis!!

Today Alexis turns 10!!

Here are ten things you may or may not know about Alexis:

1. She is in the TAG program at school

2. She loves all animals - even the gross ones like mice and snakes

3. She loves pink

4. She makes friends very easily and gets along with almost everybody

5. You never know which end of the bed you will find her head when you wake her up in the morning

6. She is quite the artist - she especially likes to design clothing

7. Just last week she chugged lemon juice for 5 bucks

8. She is willing to try anything once (this is not good for the parents)

9. She is learning how to play the trombone

10. She still walks on her toes no matter how many times we tell her God gave her heels to walk on

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ALEXIS!!

Pumpkin Face Lift

Pumpkin carving took on a whole new meaning this year. I think the fact that we are always joking around that Julee is the only kid we know that has had a plastic surgeon since birth did not work in this poor pumpkin's favor...

The O.R. is prepped and ready to go.  Note the neatly lined up surgical instruments.

 

Dr Alexis is ready to begin

 

A pose for the medical journals

 

 Assistant surgeon Julee steps in to assist

 

 The insides are exposed with a clean incision

 

 Time to clean out the insides

 

 Even a surgeon gets a little bit of a weak stomach sometimes

(I LOVE this picture!)

 

 Not looking so good for the pumpkin at this point

 

 The lines are drawn and incision marks are made

 Pumpkin comes through surgery with flying colors - everything went as planned.

 

Kind of makes you wonder what happens while I'm away that doesn't get photographed huh?

Apple Picking

.While I was in Florida, Rick and the girls went apple picking with the Elders Quorum. As usual, Alexis was excited to go and Julee was less than thrilled especially when I told her she had to go. I think she was pleasantly surprised at how much fun she had climbing around in the trees.  Both girls picked a bunch of apples and each came home with a pumpkin to carve.  I was bummed that I missed the activity, but appreciate the modern technology of cell phone cameras and text messaging that allowed me to kind of sort of be there.

Julee, Alexis, and ward friends

Alexis goes straight to the top

Julee's attempt at giving her mother a heart attack

Rick gets in on the fun

Peek-a-boo

I'm not sure any apple picking was actually going on here

Julee at the pumpkin patch

Alexis at the pumpkin patch

(later on you'll see the monstrous 15-lb pumpkin she picked out)

This is one of my favorite pictures of the day - running through the apple orchard