Christmas in Coeur d' Alene

We missed seeing all you guys in Portland but we managed to have an enjoyable Christmas at home! On Christmas Eve we all sat down to our traditional clam-chowder-in-bread-bowls dinner!

After opening our "Santa" gifts we took out the scriptures and read Luke 2. Even Kya loved hearing the real story of Christmas!

Riley was so cute in her festive jammies!!

Christmas morning we opened our stockings, had breakfast and got ready for church! I actually really enjoyed having Christmas on a Sunday. It really put all of us in the right spirit!

The mess was great but it just proves that we had a memorable and Merry Christmas! We missed you all and love you very much and we hope you had a Merry Christmas too!!

More Teeth!!

Here's some recent pics. More teeth...more drool. :)

Isn't she cuuute!

Fa-la-la-la-la!!! It's a Caroling Party!

So, I dressed up the house, got ambitious and decided to host our first ever, soon to be annual Christmas Caroling Party on Dec. 22, 2011.  (Found later that I probably should have made the date a little earlier-- we might have had a few more people turn out.)  I made Aunt Michelle's spiced cider, got a little stressed and wound up, but finally people arrived and I got my caroling fix!  It turned out to be a blast--something that I hope will grow and become a much cherished tradition.  We visited eight homes within our ward and neighborhood and hopefully spread some cheer in the true spirit of Christmas.  Thank you Jaime, by the way, for being our photographer and documenting fun times.:)
On this night, not only did we get to know neighbors and friends from the ward a little bit better, we were also able to lend our voices to a beautiful and talented group of singers and bring some Christmas cheer to those who appreciate it most.   One of my favorite stops was the Starr family pictured below.


Grandma Porter was so sweet-- didn't want to let us go.:)

Babbling Brook!

So, didn't think I'd be writing a post with this title for another year or so, but we have a very clever baby here people!  Lately, I've noticed that Brook would start doing this funny talking squawk shortly after a feeding.  I knew she wasn't hungry or tired yet, so I investigated her diaper.  She was poopy-- AND telling me all about it!  It's amazing!  Brooklynn squawks whenever she's dirty and kicks happily as soon as you change her.  What a smart baby! ( and mom's feeling pretty smart too!)

Riley and Kya

We had a fun time with Riley and Kya this morning! I don't know why but Riley just finds her hilarious! Enjoy the giggles!!

Braden went PEE!!!!!! and.... POOO!!!!!

So tonight I was finishing up my dinner, after the boys had eaten theirs of course, and I heard the bathroom door shut.  Jakey still has no real sense of modesty, so whenever I hear that door shut I know something is up.  I went to investigate and found Jakey using the bathroom... and Braden.  Bray was naked from the waist down-- not sure how he managed to get his diaper off-- and sitting on part of the baby bathtub!  He was so excited about going potty, we quickly ran upstairs, got the kid potty out of the storage closet, and.... ta-da!!  A potty full of pee and three little terds!  Woo hoo!!  Unfortunately, he wanted to show everyone and slopped some of it out of the potty as he carried it to the family room--what can ya do!:)  It was pretty adorable. 
 We'll see what happens!

Shadow

So, last week Jayson decided to bring home a new friend...

His name is Shadow (the first name he responded to when our friends found him - it's fitting - he follows us all around the house). Some friends of ours took him in as a stray and had him for about a month. Still unclaimed, they were about to take him to a shelter when Jayson heard about him and called me one day to announce that Shadow was going to come visit us for the night. That night turned into the weekend and now we've had Shadow for a week and have decided to make him part of our family!! He is an Anatolian Shepherd/German Shepherd/maybe some Lab mix, about a year old, neutered, already well trained, and extremely well behaved! He's cool with kids, other dogs, he knows lots of commands - even some nonverbal ones - and only barks once if someone comes to the door - otherwise he's quiet, easy going, and sweet! The kids love him and Jayson is over the moon for this dog! He's ALWAYS wanted a dog - at first I was saying NO, but Shadow is too perfect not to take him in. He's a sweetie and we're excited to get to know him more!!

All Dressed Up for Christmas

I'm speaking of the house, actually! 

This is the FIRST year I've had a real house to decorate, so I've been going just a little bit crazy with Christmas GLEE!  :)  Of course, it also helps that my friend Jaime has been so kind to lend me some of her Christmas spirit along with a few extra trees, lights, and ribbon she didn't use this year.  So... 2 large trees (mommy's pretty tree and our family's memory tree), 3 little trees(music trees covered with real jingle bell ornaments), garland, vases, stockings, a mantle, and lots of lights later...here's the results of my latest love affair with Christmas. 

You may notice a "theme" of pinecones everywhere. I've just been loving pinecones lately-- winter's flowers.:) And, I am proud to say, all of the pinecones except those in the artificial garland were hand-picked by none other than myself and the boys! We had a ton of fun scouring the outdoors for sweet smelling juniper, red berries, and hunting for the most beautful pinecones! Everything on the mantle is actually REAL, not artificial garland. And, I am also proud to say, I HEART CRAIGSLIST!-- candles and beautiful pine&pinecone garlands for a steal!

Mommy's tree-- all pinecones, metal ornaments, and red, gold, and silver balls. ahhhh.. it's pretttttyyy.

The jingle bell trees--next to the piano of course!

Our memory tree-- little frames with photos of Christmases past, "first" ornaments, kid creations, lots of colors
--it brings me back.

I should also introduce Jasper, our family's elf and North Pole representative.  The boys love finding him every morning and showing off their good-ness for him.:)  Here he is talking with Woo-woo and Doody-- I imagine they are enthralled with his stories of the North Pole!

Christmas Traditions

This will be the first Christmas season that I am not away at work all day. And while this is a family tradition I would really like to keep, there is another tradition that I would also like to keep - and that is the annual visit with Santa and Grandma DeAnna. Every year since DeAnna has watched our kids, she has faithfully taken them to the mall to visit Santa. So on Wednesday, we all met at the mall together. I must admit, these are the cutest kids in the world! Thanks Grandma!

Believe it or not - Brycen was TOTALLY into it!

They really are best friends!

The other family tradition that we have started with our kids has been the addition of a little elf to our family at Christmas Time. His name is Tinsel, and he adopted our family last year. He has special magic from Santa so we cannot touch him, but we can talk to him. He watches over us and then flies back to Santa every night to give his report if we have been naughty or nice.

Ava and Brycen get SO excited to see him every morning and discover his new hiding place in the house. While Tinsel is fun, he is also funny! He gets himself into all kinds of mischief! On this morning, we caught him sitting on the fish tank with a fishing pole!

Christmas traditions are the BEST!

Ready For Christmas!

Our usual routine is to go out about 5 days before Christmas and try to find a decent Christmas tree among the already picked-through left-overs at the lot. But this year we were diligent, got out early and found a great tree!! We were so excited to take Riley out and I must say she looked smashing in her over-stuffed snow suit!Now with our garland up and our stockings hung with care, we can enjoy our decorations for more than a week! Matt even put lights up on the house!! Needless to say, we are quite proud of ourselves.

Riley's First Tooth!!

Lately, Riley has been chewing on her fingers and drooling like crazy! Now we know why...
Oh, how we celebrate life's little achievements!

Warm and Sunny Breezes

Hello from Cancun! This is from our Selvatica jungle canopy zip line tour. It was a blast! Not totally first class but quite a bit of fun and the people were really wonderful.




They had about six different kinds of bridges you could go on across the canopy. It was really a lot easier than it looked.

This is Mom's first time taking a zip line down into a Cenote. She's really getting brave!
We got up to about 45 MPH with these little 4 wheelers. I think we actually caught air a couple of times. What a hoot!

Mom at the mangrove at Xel Ha. This is a great place to go snorkeling all day and just relax and enjoy all the tropical fish and sites to see.
A lion fish at 100 hundred feet swimming around a giant mushroom coral. It was amazing how warm the water was - 82 degrees and how much light there was that far down.
I got to swim with a big school of about 6 Bull Shark. They were humungous! About 7 or 8 feet and kept circling us. What a thrill!
I couldn't help smiling. What an adventure! This was taken at 100 feet. We just drifted with the current along a reef wall. Hardly had to even swim. I want to go do this AGAIN! Wow!!





This is the temple at Chichen Itza. We found out that if you clap your hands right where we are standing the echo comes back as a loud high bird chirp. Doesn't sound anything like your echo at all. We had a guide tell us all about it this time and it was really worth it to hear more about their culture, games, and customs. What an amazing place!

Some photos!

Riley's getting such a fun personality and I caught one of her silly faces!

Definitely a Daddy's girl!