Who could ask for a better friend?

My good friend here in my neighborhood moved away in October. She was (is) so fabulous and so willing to help out. Tyse is the same age as her youngest and they are best friends, as well. When they lived here, our door (and theirs) would rotate constantly- either the boys running back and forth, her 11 year old daughter coming to play with Emitt and Ollie, or her older 2 daughters coming to babysit. We miss having them through the alley so much!
Anyway, she called last week to say she was coming to town! I was so excited to see her and hang out again. She knows that I have really not been feeling well, so when she got here she called to see if there was a day she could take my KIDS and let me rest! Seriously- on her vacation!?! I can't imagine a more selfless and kind human being (and lucky for me- I know a few more just like her!). I am so grateful for great friends that know just what I need and will help me wneh I need it, no matter what the sacrifice for themselves. I love you guys!

Like Mother Like Son

Yesterday morning, I was laying in bed watching the news when they started talking about Punxsutawney Phil and how he saw his shadow. What is my son's response? "YESSSSS! 6 MORE WEEKS OF WINTER!"- legitimately thrilled with the forecast! Just like me, winter is his FAVORITE season- he dreads the day when it stops snowing- but I am sure that when the time comes, waving his swimsuit in front of his face will convince him that the warmer weather is acceptable. I am so glad my son loves the winter! I get tired of everyone complaining about the winter and begging for it to warm up! So my sweet 6 year old son MADE my Groundhog's Day!

And finally to christmas day!

Our Christmas day was just fabulous! We were so excited to be in Denver! I think I was up first and actually had time to shower and what not until the first kid woke up- Ollie! I think this was the first time he has ever woken up before Emitt (and almost always Tyse), followed about 15 min. later by Emitt, and then we finally woke Tyse up at 8:30 and had to remind him that it was Christmas morning- then he was ready to go!

Ollie needed to look no further than his new Garbage truck. He was so excited and spent the rest of the day shoving wrapping paper into it. I think I finally threw away the last of the christmas wrap about 2 weeks ago- found it in his garbage truck. This kid LOVES garbage!

Emitt and Tyse both got leapfrog game systems, so we didn't see them for about a week after christmas. I have used more AA batteries since Christmas than I have used in years!We haven't yet gotten out our thank you cards, so thanks to all who sent gifts... and hopefully those will be in the mail soon!

The most popular of all gifts continues to be the bat cave. We use it multiple times every day and love it! Thanks, Santa!

Kent is excited for spring to come around so he can drop all his hard earned cash at the golf course with his new club... And congrats to Santa for getting it all the way to colorado undetected!

And since Kent doesn't start shopping until 3:00 on Christmas eve, he doesn't have time to feel the buyers remorse that usually sends most gifts from this house back to the store, so I make out like a bandit! As soon as I finally get our wireless signal working again, that itouch will be just fabulous! Thanks honey!

I think the boys would agree that the best gift of all was that I didn't make them get out of their pajamas at all that day! Well, Merry Christmas guys!

Christmas Eve

We were lucky enough to spend almost 3 weeks in colorado over christmas! HOORAY! We haven't been to Denver much at all for so long- it was nice to be back on the right side of the mountains!

Anyway, we spent a couple days with my sister and her family and then headed down to Kent's house on christmas eve. Grandpa Kirt and Grandma Anna had a great evening waiting for us! After a FABULOUS dinner (we LOVE french dip- even the boys inhale it!), we were treated to chocolate fondue! We don't fondue nearly enough... so it was a great treat!

We also started a couple new traditions this year, thanks to Kindergarten. Tyse was given some magic reindeer dust at school that you sprinkle on the snow outside and the reindeer find their way to you by seeing it. So after careful instruction, out the boys went to sprinkle. We also sprinkled some reindeer food on the sidewalk outside for extra lure.

Ollie sprinkling reindeer dust

Tyse and Emitt covering the walk with reindeer food

While we were outside, Emitt kept thinking he saw reindeer in the sky... of course. At one point, he even convinced Ollie and they were on a mission to convince us all... here is ollie pointing it out.After the yard was properly prepared, we came in and opened the traditional elf gifts and had the christmas eve picture taken. Notice that not all of our family was feeling all that jolly...

Then we read the christmas story, teamed up with some carols and it was off to bed for the little ones! We once again had an extrememly easy time getting them to go to bed! I thought they would be up for hours and coming in a lot- but they went right to bed- not to be heard from again until we WOKE THEM UP at 8:30 Christmas Morning!

Kent and I started a new tradition for ourselves- a late night trip to 7-11 for whatever was previously forgotten and for a great cup of convenience store hot chocolate with flavored creamer- one of my favorite things! Hopefully we will always have company on christmas eve so we can indulge in this little post bedtime tradition!

Our Christmas Tree

Just a quickie to document the tree we had this year. Of course we wanted to cut our tree again this year, but didn't get to the office early enough to gt a permit in our usual location. Dang those 8 minutes! So after a month long debate about what we were going to do- were we going to (heaven for bid) drive to a tree lot and BUY a tree? Well, that was what I thought we would succumb to, but Kent had other ideas in mind. He had a guy from work have his parents who live down by Nephi go and buy us permits so we could go cut way out by Delta. So we started out trying to leave early on Tyse's birthday- which just happened to be the coldest day of the year- on our adventure to find a new place to cut. We decided to follow a friend's recommendation as to what canyon to try out and by the time we got there the kids were ready for naps. But there is no time to nap when there is a christmas tree to be hunted on the coldest day of the year! So we bundled everyone up and headed out (this only took 45 minutes!). We should have known that we were doomed when Ollie was crying before we even left the car! Anyway, I hope to have suppressed the memory of this tree hunt by the time next year rolls around, so I am not going to go into the gory details- let's just say that we found a tree in record time, Tyse and I cut it down, Kent left half of it on the mountainside and wasn't willing to go back up to find the rest; Ollie, Emitt and I started down earlier than Tyse and Kent and we got totally lost to the point that all 3 of us were crying, and luckily Tyse kept telling dad to follow the crying, so they found us and got us safely back to the car! Here are the boys in the car after finally warming up...and here we are with the tree loaded by the sign documenting the place we will never cut again!I should have known this wasn't going to be a quickie!

Anyway, we did get the lights on and decorate and I think it was one of Kent's favorites- minus the issue with the lights. Half the time the top of the tree wouldn't light up at all! It would just blink on and off at will so we decided to just embrace the personality of the tree for another year! I will have to post a finished pic later- I think it is on Kent's camera.

We were really happy that it was still in good shape by the time we returned from CO and we were able to light it up a few more times before my mom took pity on and came to take it down.

Tyse turns 6!

Tyse has turned 6! we are so excited for him. He thinks things are great at 6, and who can blame him? I would LOVE to spend a while as a 6 year old again!

Anyway, about 2 weeks early he was sitting in church and I leaned over to see what he was doing and saw this...

His birthday wish list AND invite list for his party. The best thing about this list is on his wish side (written in red). The 7th item down says "RUG". I think it is a funny story. We are sitting in church and he leans over and says to me, "Mom, for my birthday, can I ask for something for you?" Of course I say yes, but I am really curious as to what he wants to get for HIS birthday for me. ANyway, he writes rug. I aks him about it and he says, "Mom, you really need new kitchen rugs." Apparently the wear on my rugs is enough to entice a completely self centered six year old (as all are) to aks for kitchen rugs for his birthday.

This was also the first year he wanted a boy only party. So for my friends with girls, don't feel slighted. Your daughters would have gone nuts at the bowling alley with 9 six-year-old boys!

Anyway, for the day we actually went to cut our christmas tree. That deserves its own post, so I will share that later, but after we got back we went to Red Robin for dinner, where we actually let him order dessert, and then opened presents.The highlights were...a bronco bobble head from my sister's family- which lasted all of 3 days before his leg was broken off, and...The bright blue cowboy boots! He had been asking for seriously over a year for some and so I took him boot shopping and he couldn't live without the bright blues. He calls them his BYU boots. Apparently all things in our house are byu. On a sidenote, when we asked Emitt tonight at family prayer what he was thankful for, he said, "The BYU guys." Boy, we have been effective in our brainwashing! Anyway, he wants to wear the boots every day, even with warm up pants and one leg tucked in. I am learning just to cringe and get over it!

A couple days later, we had his friend party. We took 9 boys bowling! I wasn't sure they would all really get it, but they had a great time and left some great divits in the lanes of the bowling alley!

I know this pic is really blurry, but I think it is hysterical and it sums up the entire bowling experience- 9 young boys trying their hardest to throw balls bigger than their heads down a lane- in the fastest way possible!

Here's our crew after the bowling- next stop home for pizza and cake!

Tyse was very specific about what cake he wanted- he has been asking for it since the day after his birthday last year!

Yes, that is a bag of cheetos with a candle taped to the top! That is exactly what he has been asking for for months! But he did think maybe someone else would want cake, so as a boy after his mother's heart, he wanted chocolate cake with chocolate frosting. I did my best, but cake decoration is usually Kent's domain!

We all survived and had a great time! Can't wait for #7!

Emitt's 3rd birthday

We had such a great time celebrating our little comedian! We let him open his presents in the morning. This is all you need to know about that... He LOVES his new cowboy hat and his bike! He asked for french toast for breakfast, so I obliged
We spent the day at Tyse's school fun run and then took the Englands with us to Kangaroo Zoo- a place Emitt had never been but asked for almost daily
Yup- I know this isn't Emitt, but for some reason I took pictures of everyone EXCEPT Emitt while we were there! Oops!

A few days later we had the big cowboy party with 21 little buckeroos! We made cowboy vests and bandanasWe practiced our sharp shootingWe had a horse race

And a gunny sack raceAnd of course, presents and a HUGE COWPIE CAKE

We had a great time!