The Santa Picture

This was the shot we got before Emery started screaming....

Thanks to The Chatterbox (my work) for a fun breakfast with Santa.

Davis also saw Santa at his preschool, so by the time our ward party rolled around and we wanted him to sit on Santa's lap again he was totally over it. His quote: 'I have to tell Santa again what I want? I already told him 2 times!!'. I thought that was pretty funny. He does have a point...

Gingerbread House Party

We had such a fun time decorating gingerbread houses with fun friends. Okay, to be honest, despite what you see in this picture, I got a little carried away and didn't really let anyone help me build our family house! Last year we made a house out of graham crackers and it was so ugly and I hated having it in my kitchen all of December, so I was determined to have a cute house this year. I had a great time, but maybe next year I should let the kids help? We'll see!

Davis putting the finishing touches on our awesome house...
I love these girls...Jenny, me and Jaimee (thanks to Jaimee for such a fun night). I am serving as a counselor to Jaimee in the primary presidency and I just love serving with her.

Not a great picture, but here we are with our finished product.

Family For Christmas

We were so lucky to have some family come visit us for Chistmas...it was the best present ever! Micah (my brother), Christie and Grant made the big drive from Dallas to come up and stay with us for an amazing Christmas. We had so much fun with them and we are so grateful that they would come. We are already counting down to the next time we get to see them again.

They arrived on the 22nd super late at night so we only had one day to show them around Louisville before everything closed for Christmas.


Oops, I meant to put this picture last since this is how we finished the day...enjoying a bedtime story with Steve. Davis made sure that Grant joined him for bedtime routines every night.

I think Churchill Downs was actually closed, but we had to do a drive by so they could say they have been there.

We had a lot of fun at the Louisville Slugger museum. It was actually the first time we have been there since we moved here. Steve was in Heaven! Anything to do with baseball and he is a happy guy. I think this picture of the Wrights is so cute...

Emery playing and getting ready to take off her headband. I keep fighting her to keep them on, but I think she is winning!

Davis working on his baseball skills...trust me, they need some work! He'll get it sometime, right?!

Steve and Davis watching Charlie Brown at the Christmas Charlie Brown exhibit (which was kind of lame, by the way, except for the adults that were in there writing letters to Santa. Weird.).

Little kids+kid size Louisville slugger bats=really bad idea!

No one got hurt this time, but they didn't get to hold them for very long. I mean really, what else is a kid going to do with a little bat besides hit another little kid?

Steve is so proud you would think he single handedly rooted the Giants to win the World Series this year. What can we say? They are his team!

Davis Turns 4!!!

I can't believe that this guy is 4 years old. It seems to have passed in a blink of an eye, although on the other hand, I can't remember life before him! Davis is the happiest little boy and I am truly grateful for every day with him. Everything is fun and exciting with him around! I am so lucky to be his mom.

I took him to the Dr. today for his 4 year check up and he weighs 43 pound (95%tile) and is about 43 inches tall (98%tile). Don't worry, he is keeping up his stats of being a big big boy!

I like to complain about having a birthday so close to Christmas, but we celebrated in style and I think he had a really great day. I had fun and I think he did too! Here is how we spent the day...

Star pancakes for breakfast...
I was working out when he woke up and he came running downstair yelling 'it's my birthday, it's my birthday!!'...he was super excited about the balloons, etc.

We met Dad for lunch at Chick-fil-a...

I am not really a cake decorator (this is something that I want to get better at), so I was pretty impressed with my dinosaur ( that was Davis' request) cake attempt. Not bad, huh?!

Getting ready to eat some yummy cake...

The birthday boy with his cousins that we are so lucky to live close to...

Davis and Josh kept feeding each other cake like they were at a wedding or something. It was really cute. I just love seeing these best buddies together. They love that their birthdays are so close together, too.

Watching Davis open his presents was seriously priceless. He was so excited. This picture sums it up...

The present he was most excited about was a Leapster. HE opened it and yelled 'video games'!!

We love our big 4 year old boy!

Snaggletooth

I just had to post a picture of Emery's snaggletooth. She has cut 4 teeth in the last month or so (all on top) but only one really shows yet when she smiles and she looks like a 'snaggletooth'. It seriously cracks me up. I can't wait till they are all grown in, but trust me, she is cute no matter what!

BYU vs. Utah 2010

I still get a little teary when I think about the big game this year (yes, the Y did get jipped big time), but we did have fun watching it and I have to say Steve was very polite to all of the BYU fans at our house for the game. I was impressed since he and I seem to get in a BYU vs. Utah argument about once a week. Wouldn't my life have been easier if I could have just found some wonderful BYU fan to marry? Maybe, but I'll take him anyday, Utahness and all (as long as he doesn't talk our kids into actually going to school there...that is where I draw the line).

We had our friends, the Bloods over along with the other Larsen's to watch the big game. Steve told our friend, Blaine that he couldn't come over unless he was wearing a red shirt, so this is what he showed up in:

Hilarious, I thought! Everyone in their family was dressed head to toe in BYU gear. I loved it! So, Steve had to improvise and I thought his shirt was pretty funny, too. I have to say it warmed my heart to see him in a BYU shirt, even if it was x'd out with Utah stuff. Take what I can get, I guess!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Oh, the holidays! I have to say that I am loving the Christmas season this year, mostly because Davis actually is understanding the concepts of celebrating and Santa and giving, etc. It makes it so much fun and so magical. I can't get enough.

I have felt a little behind and am still trying to get everything done to be ready for Christmas. Steve has been super busy at work and since he had a few days off around Thanksgiving I talked him into putting up some molding in our dining room which turned out to be a huge painting project for me! Our deal was if he did the molding, I would paint. For some reason that molding is so time consuming to paint plus I had to prime since we had a darker color in there, and try to take care of my kids in the midst of it. It just ended up taking me what seemed like a week and put me more behind in my Christmas preparations! BUT, I love love love how it turned out and actually like to be in that room now. It is lovely. All of this is besides the point....we really did have such a nice Thanksgiving and here are a couple of pictures of our fabulous day.

A bunch of cute crazy kids ready for some Thanksgiving dinner

Davis and his best buddies Max and Josh (bad picture, sorry!). We carpool with Max to preschool so we get to spend a lot of quality time with him in the car! Davis and Max's conversations seriously crack me up.

The guys doing what guys do best on Thanksgiving...watching football of course!

Our lovely hostess, Cynthia. We had an amazing meal!

I think my very favorite part of Thanksgiving was shopping on black Friday! Jen, Cynthia and I stayed up all night shopping (this was my first time doing some real black friday shopping) and we seriously had such a good time and got such great deals. We divided and conquered those stores-great parking spots, got seriously lucky with short lines and found everything we wanted. We only got in one small fight with a really mean lady in line behind us who obviously needed a huge dose of some Christmas spirit and also met a bunch of really fun nice people. It was a good time. I can't wait to do it again next year.