Christmas 2013

We got up after 7:00 on Christmas morning.  Ty was very excited to go see if Santa brought him the Legos that he'd requested. 

We took turns opening presents.  Nick got into it as the morning went on.  He liked playing with the paper. 

Santa brought all the kids LEGO sets. 

Nick got a Duplos lego set, a basketball hoop and some clothes.  

Santa brought Ty the LEGO Grand Prix set he wanted (racecar with a semi truck).  He also get two other lego sets, KNEX, a car with door that open up (not out), clothes, sketch pad, water bottle, etc.

Santa brought Jack a cargo plane LEGO set.  He also got basketball shoes, KNEX, clothes, sketch pad, watch and another lego set.

Kate got a LEGO creator treehouse set.  She got the animal earrings that she wanted, a scarf made by her cousin Brooklyn, a duffle bag, hat loom set and yarn, clothes and a sketch pad.

We spent the rest of the morning in jammies eating cinnamon rolls and putting together Lego sets.

 

In the afternoon Dave took the kids ice skating at the ice rink while I made dinner.

They went back in the evening and went ice skating again.

Jack and Kate got rubber bands with crochet hooks in their stockings.  I taught Kate how to make bracelets with them and she showed Jack. 

Christmas Eve 2013

Our neighborhood on Christmas Eve has a tradition of setting out farolitos (luminaries) along the sidewalks and driveways.  A few of our neighbors were out of town, so we set farolitos in front of their houses too.

 

We spent quite a while setting out over 100 paper bags filled with sand and lighting the candles inside one by one.

 

The kids helped fill and set out the bags, but it was getting dark and cold when we started lighting them.  They watched a show and entertained Nick (with pretzels) while Dave and I lit the candles. 

 We were going to have orange chicken for dinner, but didn't have time to make them.  Instead we had pancakes and sausage.  Then we went for a walk around the neighborhood and checked out the farolitos.

Then we read the Christmas story in the scriptures, had baths and opened jammies.

 

We left Santa some cookies and then the kids headed to bed.

A Hair Post

Nick has some crazy hair going on.

And Kate got her hair cut, so it was not crazy. 

Johnson Baptism

Our friends, Sylvie, Heidi & Lily Johnson were baptized last night!

We've been friends with the Johnson family for a long time.  I met Sylvie five and a half years ago when Kate started preschool at Barranca.  Nina was in the other preschool class and Sylvie introduced herself when we were outside waiting to pick the kids up.  I mentioned to her that we were moving that weekend and ended up moving to the Johnson's street Canyon Glen.

We started carpooling to preschool (along with the Nye's).  Kate and Nina were in the same kindergarten class.  In first grade they walked to and from school together and had many playdates.  In second grade, we bought our house on North Mesa and I started teaching Nina piano lessons, so Kate and Nina could see each other each week.  They moved to Germany for several months and we kept in touch via email. 

We've had many dinners with the Johnson's, playdates, carpooling, etc.  They came with us to ward Christmas dinners.  Kate invited Nina to come with us to church and she's been coming for several years.  I spoke in church this past Easter and whole Johnson family came to sacrament meeting.

A couple of months ago, my friend, Sylvie started to come to church too along with her kids.  Her daughter, Lily, a freshman in high school, has been attending early morning seminary this school year.  They started taking the discussions with the missionaries.  In November they decided to get baptized!

Sylvie's parents (Oma and Opa) and her sister, Nikki, were here visiting for Christmas.  It was neat that they were able to come to the baptism.  They are very sweet and welcome us into their family.  Scot, Nina's dad, is very supportive.  Jack and Ty were glad that Jonah was there.  Jonah is 16 and plays basketball, chases and wrestles with Jack and Ty.  The boys love running around with Heidi too. 

 The baptism was held in the chapel and was filled with people.  Kate said the opening prayer.  Dave baptized them (and will confirm them in church today).  I gave the talk on the Holy Ghost.   It was a wonderful feeling to see these three beautiful "sisters" in their white clothes getting baptized.  Such joy! 

Here's Kate along with her closest friends: Sophi, Ada, Annika and Nina.

Nick at One Year Old

Nick's first year of life has flown by so fast!

Here's a little about One-Year-Old Nick:


Nicknames:

• Nicker-backer
• Snickerdoodle or Nickerdoodle

Loves:

• Blanket
• Binkie
• Biting pretzels and apple slices
• Mommy milk
• Pooping in his sleep
• Splashing in the bathtub
• Playing with the kids
• Climbing onto the dishwasher door
• Throwing things off of edges
• Remotes, phones, computers, tablets, etc.
• Loud noises:  vacuums, air compressors, blow dryer, etc.

Dislikes:

• Car seat forward facing
• Most healthy food (he pulls it out of his mouth and drops it on the floor
• Sleeping all night

Can:

• stand up from sitting down without holding onto anything
• crawl
• throw a ball
• wave and clap
• crawl up stairs (even though we don't have any in our house)

Has:

• four top teeth
• two bottom teeth
• has had one haircut and is ready for another
• weight: 19 lbs 8 oz.
• length: 30.5 inches

Words:

• go 
• bye (sounds like "bah")
• dada
• mama

 Helping Dad work

 Nick has a funny crawl on the hard floors.  He crawls normally on carpet.

 Nick fell asleep playing with his crib music toy one day.  Loves his blanket and binkie.

 Yum!  A pretzel.

 He got to eat a cookie.

 Loves the unload the dishwasher (and the fridge too).

 Post nap picture.  Nick didn't sit up in his crib until he was over 11 months old. 

 Putting his binkie back in.

Love this little buddy!  

Nick is One!

Nick had a busy birthday!

He woke up and opened his present before the kids went to school.

 He liked the balloons.

 The kids all helped Nick play with his presents throughout the day.

Nick spent his day taking two naps, pooping three times (unusual for him), had two baths, and played outside a little while.  I raked the needles and leaves into a little pile and Nick crawled over onto it and sat down and tasted some leaves. 

 After we all got home in the evening after basketball and swim practice, we had cake. 

He liked having us sing to him.

  Nick poked at his end of the cake and ate a bit of frosting. 

 A little milk to wash down the chocolate.

Happy birthday little guy!

Kate Caroling

Kate went caroling downtown Los Alamos with the Activity Day girls.  They had their picture taken by a reporter and were in the local newspaper, LA Monitor, a week later.

Christmas Tree Cutting 2013

Dave's co-worker, Donatella, and her husband, Paolo, and daughter, Anna, came Christmas tree cutting with us.  They are Italian and wanted to experience cutting down their own Christmas tree.

We knew the roads would be bad, so we borrowed their other 4wd vehicle and left early in the morning for our cutting spot, west of Santa Fe.

We found trees fairly quickly, since we needed to head back to Santa Fe before the roads thawed.  We had a lot of rain this fall and the roads were torn up by people four wheeling on them. 

Our tree..

 

 

 Jack and Anna

 Nick took a little nap in the backpack while we walked around.

  The kids had fun playing with Anna

Ready to four wheel back to the paved roads.  We couldn't have made it in our van.  By 10:00 the roads were sloppy and muddy. 

Donatello and Paolo have been very sweet to us.  Last year right before Nick was born, they had us over for dinner at their home in Santa Fe.  They made homemade pasta and sauce, pork in a cream sauce, bread and salami (Jack's favorite) and Italian carrot cake.  It was delicious!  They gave us a really nice Bugaboo Bee stroller ($600 new) and after Thanksgiving we came home with a new car seat for Nick.