Missing those curls

Out of curiosity I straightened Enna Bugs hair for the first time, in a long time today. Do you think she liked it?

And really, can you believe her hair is that long? I had NO idea!

Sienna love, I think you are a beauty either way, but I sure missed your curls today. You look much to old with straight hair, and I think you lost a little of your lovely spunk without them too!

Sunday with the ladies

We used to go to church at 1:30, making for very lazy Sunday mornings, and busy Sunday evenings. But now we go at 9:00.

This gives the ladies so much play time and today they took complete advantage of it. Saturday we purchased the new wii game, Just Dance. It's a total hit with the girls (and curiously enough, dad too). The second we walked in they changed their clothes (Notice Sienna's swimsuit cover up is her choice of "outfit for the day. She puts that thing on at least once a day, and it really deserves a post of it's own), and they were downstairs shaking their stuff. It's about the cutest thing in the world to watch and they are both pretty good at it.
If your wondering, this particular dance is to Kylie Manogue's, I just can't get you out of my head. And strangely enough, I can't get that song out of my head now. Go figure.

When they finally tired of dancing, they came upstairs to watch a movie. Travis and I decided to go downstairs and watch the football game, and we assumed all was well upstairs. (Remember what they say about Assuming?)

Um, this is what we found when we went to check on them.

Sienna made a "pillow house" using every single pillow in the house.

Scroll down, it gets worse.

Adyson made her house surrounded by pillows and with a good chunk of her Barbies as guests. She and Sienna were just sitting around chatting like best friends and watching their movie like they'd done nothing wrong.

Cute. So cute. And so messy.

Here is the face I got when I mentioned that at some point the mess has to be cleaned up.

Not happy.

The girls are at a stage right now where either they are fighting because A) Adyson doesn't want Sienna following her around or B) Sienna is just trying to make Adyson mad, but Sundays they are just best friends. They do everything together and I even caught them hugging tonight before bed. The highlight of the day was when I went to brush Sienna's teeth she told Adyson, "Go ahead and dance with your prince Ady, I'll be there as soon as I brush my teeth."

I just love their imaginations!

Happy Sunday to you all.

And Heather, I blogged this for you, so you better just get busy and update yours now. Chop chop.

{Sunbeam}

After 3 weeks of being inactive due to the sickness that took. forever. to. leave, we made it to church on Sunday, and Sienna had her first week as a Sunbeam.

I think she's quite cute. (Side note: One of my favorite things about Sienna is that when she smiles really big, or laughs really hard, her eyes all but disappear. Melts my heart.)And because of the sickness, this is the first time the ladies were able to wear there Christmas dresses to church, and cause there cute, it must be posted. (Side note: picnik will no longer let me edit pics and save them, making the ladies have some red eye problems. Anyone know why? I miss it so...)

{Heartbroken}

Why must you leave us Simon Cowell?

Why?

(And since I'm complaining, why are you coming back Kara Dioguardio, why?)

AI starts tonight, and while I'm not a bif fan of the lifelong auditions, I can't wait to have a long season of bonding with Mr. Cowell before he leaves us.

Next year's gonna be rough dawg, without him.

Will you still watch? Will you miss him too? And who should replace him?
(I think the English accent is a must, but he can have good hair and clothes that aren't 3 sizes to small.)

Sisters

Sweet little Sienna has been feeling pretty crappy this last week. She's had a terrible stomach ache, a little flu, an ear ache, and has had a really high fever. We've spent most of the week trying to comfort her, and babying her.

Yesterday I walked in on my sweet little ladies snuggling on the couch, Adyson rubbing Sienna's forehead and Seinna was draped right around her body just letting Adyson try to take care of her.

My heart melted.

I sure hope they always want to take care of each other like this.
I know they will fight.
Over boys.
And clothes.

But I really hope that when they are sick, or just in need of a friend, they will turn to each other.
I just adore these little girls of mine.

Christmas Part 2, plus a few extra celebrations!

Now I shall mourn.

Christmas is officially over.

Our trees are even down.

And although I'm totally ready for my house to feel less cluttered, I'm sure gonna miss the warm glow from my trees. Don't you love that?

Anywhoo...here's how it all went down.

Jody and Heather got here and within an hour the kids were already begging to get the party started! The gifts had been calling to them for much to long....

Adyson got the Moxi car she's been wanting for a while....do you think she likes it?

Sienna just LOVES opening gifts. She LOVES everything she gets.....and just wanted to keep opening all night long.

Brielle got a new princess dress, and you must agree she looks just adorable. This little girl has the whole entire family wrapped right around her finger!

Breje, Adyson, and Sienna sporting matching jammies. My little girls are quite proud of this, and Breje is kind enough to amuse them....

It's utter chaos at my moms house with 7 grand kids and grandparents who spoil each and every one of them rotten! (Not to mention their aunts and uncles spoil them a bit too). After they've torn into each gift, it looks like a small tornado has gone through the basement. We clean up, them dump out the garbage bags to look for the small piece that has been thrown out, then we clean up again....then spend a good hour assembling the gifts. The kids had an absolute blast and had so much fun playing with their toys the rest of the weekend. This has been an especially hard year for my parents with my Grandma passing away so quickly before Christmas, but still managed to go the extra mile for us and make sure our Christmas was special. Thanks ma and pa!

My brother Cody's Birthday is Dec. 30, and my nephew Trayson's b-day is Dec. 27th, so we got to fit in a little celebration for them on New Years Eve. Here we are at Texas Roadhouse eating their B-day dinner.

Cody wouldn't ride the saddle.

Party Pooper.

Tray did, reluctantly.

Here's Trav and I a few hours before the ball dropped. Let's all pray for my hair to grow longer with each picture you see of me. (a resolution).All seven of them. I think they are just so grand!Pops made it till 10 on NYE. Seriously, this picture was taken at 9:30. Pathetic? Yes.His cute little granddaughter Sienna made it much. much. later than him. Here she is at 10 and I don't see a sign of tired in her!

And Brielle managed to stay up right along with her. Watching these two together is priceless. They are becoming fast best friends and it is just so precious. They are quite pleased in this picture because Grandma gave them some marshmallows. (I wonder why they stayed up so late? Could it be because they had so much sugar at 10:00 at night?) Thanks Grandma....

Amy and Simon. I'm in love with this little boy and his blue eyes.
New years day we decided to take the kids sledding. It was a bit crazy because Heather's kids were here without snow clothes, and we had a total of 3 sleds for 7 kids. (Totally unprepared!) but we all had so much fun! The snow was falling soft beautiful flakes, and it wasn't too cold making it perfect for sledding, and watching.

Here's the ladies. This was their first time sledding, and just so you know, they are big fans. Huge.Breje' taking Adyson on her last ride.Sienna loved sledding, but she was just happy to be outside in the snow. This kid could live outside in the cold.
I love her. Really, a lot!

Adyson and Daddy. It was so much fun to watch Ads because it's just her nature to be nervous, but she got right on (with a little coaxing) and loved it! All in all it was a lovely weekend, chuck full of family, too much food, and lots of laughs (and coughs...). I am completely ready for a little schedule! Here's wishing you all a wonderful 2010!

So excited!

Our little family won an amazing photo session with the uber talented Brooke Snow!

To say I am excited is an understatement.
We feel very blessed, and very lucky!

Head here to see here photoblog.
She is honestly an amazing photographer, who is really going the extra mile for our family.

Thanks Brooke! We can't wait!

Christmas: Part 1.

Boo to Christmas being over. Boo to forever lasting cold, no more treats left on my doorstep, no more "Be good kids, Santa is watching."

I sure love Christmas, and can't believe that this years has come and gone already. We have yet to celebrate with my family because my sister wont be here till Wed...so we are holding onto that last piece of Christmas as long as we can!

This Christmas was sure different then most. We were all so emotionally, and physically worn out from everything that happened with my Grandma, and her funeral was just Dec. 22nd, making Christmas sneak right up on us. But by Christmas Eve, we all were ready for it, and couldn't wait to celebrate.

On Christmas Eve morning each year my ladies wake up to a gift from Mrs. Claus. This is my very favorite tradition! She usually brings them a cute shirt to wear that day and a little surprise. This year Adyson was so excited she couldn't sleep, and when she awoke to a new webkinz, and a cute little shirt she was beyond thrilled.

Sienna was pretty excited too, can you tell?Here's a self taken pic of Adyson and I, do we look excited or what?Each year Grandma Lorraine comes up with some fun games for us to play. This year Adyson won the second round of the house burning dice game, and she was beyond excited. It was a great start to the night for her!
We played the 7-11 treat game, where the huge twix bar got passed from person to person about 100 times. Who knew? (Trav ended up with it, if you were wondering.)

Then it was gift time! Here's Enna with a tea set from Tiff, which she adores. And the ladies with their new walkee talkee's from Grandma. These have been a huge hit.After the gifts Grandma took all the kids upstairs to surprise us with new jammies she made for each of them, and a darling pillow case. The kids came running down to model them, and then Grandpa read "The night before Christmas" while they snuggled down in their comfy pj's and pillows. It was pretty cute stuff.Tiff gave Adyson a hair stylist kit, complete with a smock, gloves, clips, color bowls, and even a brush...I LOVE this gift! Rheagen was a good sport to let Adyson practice on her. Christmas eve was lovely and wonderful. Thanks Kidmans for always making it such a fun night!


The ladies went right to sleep on Christmas eve, shockingly! And slept till about 7:30, but woke up ready to go! Here they are waiting to go downstairs. Don't mind the foggy camera, it had been in my car all night...

Adyson got everything she wanted and so much more. Her she is modeling the Taylor Swift CD. Santa accidentally got the Karaoke CD, so that was a bummer. Dumb Santa.

Sienna has been begging for this Strawberry Shortcake doll, that you do "make-up" on for months, and of course Santa delivered. Along with all the other things she added to her list whenever people would ask what Santa was gonna bring her. She is one. smart. cookie.

Oh, and Santa brought make-up. Sienna used most of hers in one sitting. Pretty?
I think the best part of Christmas this year has been watching these 2 play. We've let them keep their new things downstairs in the family room for the week and they've pretty much lived down there with there toys. There's been 0 fighting, and just lots of laughs. It's a Christmas miracle!

We are excited that we still have Christmas #2 coming in a few days. I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas filled with joy. And I wish you all a Happy New Year!

A blur.

The last week has gone by in a complete blur. In fact, as I uploaded my pictures to blog them, I couldn't believe that these pics are all only a week old. It feels like some of them happened a month ago...

I wrote in my last post that my dear Grandma had a stroke last Tuesday leaving us broken hearted, worried, and emotionally drained. Our family spent hours in the hospital, my mom never leaving her room. She passed away on Saturday morning around 2:30.
It seems a bit unreal, and life is sure gonna be strange without her. We all will miss her so much.

Along with doing our best to support my mom, and be there for Grams, this week was just chuck full of STUFF. We had so much going on, and I'm not really sure how we fit it all in.

Adyson had her Christmas recital at school on Thursday. It was delightful to watch! My little Adyson is one animated little girl! After the recital her teacher even commented on how much fun she was to watch.

Here she is sporting her lovely reindeer shirt. She was sooo excited.

She's look over at us and grin every few minutes. Proud as she can be. To add to the craziness, before my Grandma got sick my sister had planned on bringing her kids to my moms for a few days while she flew to Texas to pick up Jody and drive back to UT. (yeah!) So, my mom needed to be at the hospital, leaving me and Cody with 4 extra kids. (If you add them all up, you get 7.) 7 kids? 7, really? Cody and I aren't the most patient people, and it's a small miracle they all survived! We actually made quite a good team, taking turns having all of them sleepover, taking turns buying them lunch, and taking turns breaking up the little quarrells they get in.

Here are my 3 favorite pictures of the weekend. Cody decided Brielle needed a nap, so he put on Strawberry Shortcake for her. A few minutes later I walked in on this:

Cody, out cold.

Sienna, out cold. (In a princess dress, natch).

And Brielle, wide awake. It just cracked me up.

I'm either really ambitious, or just plain stupid, but I decided the kids needed to have a little Christmas fun while they were all together, so I mixed up the BIGGEST batch of sugar cookies known to man. (I didn't realize that my recipe was already doubled, so I doubled it. again. You do the math). They were all so cute decorating their cookies, that I thought it was totally worth it. Till I had to clean up the mess.....



Simon and Tray. I sure wish I would have got a pic of Simons cookies. They were loaded with sprinkles. I mean LOADED!

A fuzzy one of Brielle and Breje.

Kutter, Adyson, and Sienna.
Brielle, just a little sticky....
That night Travis and I had all the kids here to sleep. They went downstairs and watched a movie, then snuggled up and amazingly, went right to sleep. They were angels!
Seeing them all lined up wall to wall, snuggled in blankets, just reminded me so much of being little and having sleepovers with my cousins. I'm so happy that they will have those same memories when the get older, and just love the bond these cousins share.

Doing all of this, plus finishing up Christmas shopping, baking, and making time to go to one of our favorite family Christmas parties, pretty much did our family in.

And today we headed to Ogden for my Grandma's funeral. It was a beautiful tribute to my Grandma. There were tears over how much we would miss her, and yes, it is so hard to say goodbye, but it was just so lovely to hear stories of her and see how many people's lives she has touched. My Grandma was really an amazing woman full of spunk, and heart. We had so many dear friends, and extended family members there for her, and us today. And her whole entire family was gathered (no small feat, I can't remember the last time each and every one of us were all in the same room). I could feel her joy because of this all day long. I'm sure gonna miss her and wish we would have had a few more years together!

Now, even with all the loose ends I still need to tie up, the Christmas holiday will feel a bit more calm. I'm ready for a great night of sleep, and ready to dive into my favorite couple of days of the year! I wish you all a Very, Merry Christmas.