Christmas 2018

We had a nice quiet Christmas at home this year.  The Keeffer's got together on Sunday for a Christmas dinner, and a nice nativity put on completely by the kids.  The Brandley's are not getting together until the 30th to celebrate Christmas.  It is a nice change to just be home with our little family for the holiday.  On Christmas Eve morning we had a knock on our bedroom door.  It was Avery and Mary.  They had made us breakfast in bed!

Louis had a job interview that morning and was gone for most of the morning. (possibly more on that later) 

We watched a Christmas movie and built Christmas creations out of Legos while we waited for him to get back.

The rest of the day was spent playing games and relaxing together.  That night we had our annual $5 Christmas Eve dinner.  The kids call it whatever we want dinner.  What we do is we give each person $5 and they get to go into the store and pick whatever they want for dinner!  

We always get the craziest variety of foods, but the kids love it!

After dinner we opened our Christmas Eve jammies and took a bath before watching a 

Christmas movie together and heading to bed.

The kids slept in longer that I expected them too on Christmas morning, the older three were up around 7:30.  Wyatt is our kid that sleeps in (bless him) so we ended up gathering in our bed and watching a movie while we waited for Wyatt to wake up.  I can't even count how many times the kids asked if we could wake up Wyatt yet.  Finally at 9, we went in and woke him up and headed downstairs to open our stockings.

Santa always bring each of us a little box of cereal for breakfast, so after the stockings were opened we ate our cereal and read the story of the birth of Christ.  The kids were definitely getting antsy to open the presents under the tree!  It is so fun to see twinkle of excitement in their eyes as they each get their turn to open a present.  The rest of the day was spent playing with their presents, eating too many treats, playing games, and relaxing while listening to Christmas music.  It was a sweet Christmas and we are very grateful to my parents who are letting us stay in their house while they are on their mission and that we have had such a wonderful place to celebrate.

Let's Get This Going Again!

I have been so awful about keeping up with this blog.  I believe I said this before, but I had previously used this spot to journal for my family and I now mostly use Instagram.  However, you can't go as in depth on Instagram, so it is really nice to have this space where I can really share the goings on of my family.  My friend Kristy, who is so wonderful at documenting her life and her family's life, shared a quote with me that really encouraged me to start up again. 
"What could you do better for your children and your children's children than to record the story of your life, your triumphs over adversity, your recovery after a fall, your progress when all seemed black, your rejoicing when you had finally achieved?  Some of what you write may be humdrum dates and places, but there will also be rich passages that will be quoted by your posterity.
"Get a notebook, . . .a journal that will last through all time, and maybe the angels may quote from it for eternity.  Begin today and write in it your goings and comings, your deepest thoughts, your achievements and your failures, your associations and your triumphs, your impressions and your testimonies.  Remember, the Savior chastised those who failed to record important events."
-Spencer W. Kimball
I'm not even going to try to catch up on what I missed this year, and am just going to start up on the most recent happenings of our family.  The most recent exciting thing from our family is Avery's baptism!  Avery was so exciting for this day to come and was counting down the days leading up to it.  The morning of the baptism I had mostly everything done for the events of the day.  We just had to get everyone ready and out the door.  Thankfully, some of Louis' family came up early to help get the kids ready and out the door.  I was able to go to the church early with Louis and Avery to help her get into her suit while Louis' family helped get the kids ready and to church.  It was fun because I was able to see Louis and Avery practice in the hall for the baptism!

It was sweet seeing more and more family file into the chapel to support Avery on her special day.  Avery, Mary, Maya, Mikaela, Jill, and Elizabeth were able to sing "When I am Baptized" as part of the program and did a great job.  The baptism itself went well, Avery only had to be dunked once and she came out of the water saying she was cold!  She also felt good and warm inside.  I helped get her changed and into the room for the confirmation.  There were probably twice as many kids as there were adults so it was a bit noisy during the confirmation, and I couldn't really hear the blessing even though I was right there up front, but the spirit was there and it was wonderful. 
Avery had the sweetest smile on her face the whole day and it was a great day for her and our whole family.     

Kami and Nana made this baptism girl cake for Avery!

Ethan's Birthday Pictures & Interview

8 is Great

Avery is turning 8 this year, which in the LDS church means she gets to be baptized a member of the church.  She is very excited for this big event later this year.  At the beginning of the year Louis and I sat down with Avery to talk about her baptism and what it means and what she can do to prepare for it.  One of those things was to start reading The Book of Mormon on her own each day.  By "on her own" I mean her and I reading it together so I can help her read some of the harder words and explain to her what we're reading.  It has been a special time to come together each night and read from this book.  She's been so good to remind me every night that we need to read. 
I am looking forward to seeing this beautiful girl (inside and out) grow into a beautiful young women.

Birthday Boy

Our Ethan Buddy Boy is three years old!  This last year has been a trying, but fun year with Ethan.  He's still as sweet as ever, but this year brought tantrums and communication problems.  Ethan was a bit behind on his speech, but is starting to catch up now.  In the last month his speech has exploded and it has been so much fun!  I love watching all that he has been learning lately.
Right now Ethan loves superheros, puzzles, PJ Masks, Aunt Kami, and macaroni and cheese.  He loves being silly and running around being chased. 
On Ethan's actual birthday he woke up and we had a donut cake for breakfast!  I'm pretty sure he ate three donuts!  We played Candy land with him for the first time and played Just Dance Disney that night.  On Saturday we did our family celebration with Louis.  We had macaroni and cheese with hot dogs and had a big cupcake for dessert!  He got to open his presents after dinner and ended up liking the tissue paper from the bags the best. 
Ethan is a cutie and so sweet!  I love reading him books each night and I love his cuddles.  He's usually the first kid up in the mornings, but it means we get one on one time together.  Ethan has the cutest giggle and the sweetest smile.  We are so thankful he is a part of our family.

Evanston

Louis started his new job 4 months ago now.  Since starting his job we looked at several houses trying to find one that is right for us.  The housing market is quite frustrating for a buyer right now.  We had several houses that we made appointments to see and they would be under contract before we even got in to see them.  This went on for over a month before we decided to take my parents up on their offer to have us live in their house while they are on their mission.  Their home is in Evanston Wyoming, which surprisingly enough is a half house closer to Louis' work than Logan was!  So slowly, but surely we're making our way to West Jordan!  Our plan is to be here until the summer when we will aggressively look for a home!  I will be able to be more involved in looking for a house as well when Avery is not in school and I don't have to be home during the week for that. 

We have been in my parent's house for just over two weeks now and things are going well.  The day we moved in we got 18 inches of snow, but haven't had any since that day.  Most of the snow is even melted in the front yard.  I don't mind the lack of snow at all!  Avery started school three days after we moved in and has made several new friends.  She gets to ride the bus which she loves and I love that I don't have to live in the car and interrupt naps anymore!  We have gone to our new ward and everything went well, a few people in the ward have already been very sweet to me and our kids and I appreciate it a lot.  It's been different not having family close by, but we're adjusting.  We appreciate my parents letting us stay in their home and look forward to getting our own home in the summer!

Christmas 2017

Oh how I love Christmas!  It's such a magical and fun holiday.  It was especially fun seeing Ethan and Wyatt be able to get into the fun as well.  This Christmas season we were able to get together with family to make gingerbread houses which ended up being a lot of fun, we went to the Willard lights for the first time, and of course we played in the snow!

  

For Christmas this year we spent Christmas Eve and Christmas morning at home.  Christmas Eve started out with going to church and that night we went through the story of the birth of Christ before opening up out jammies and watching a movie.  This year we watch How the Grinch Stole Christmas.

I was awful this year and procrastinated wrapping presents until Christmas Eve so that is how Louis and I spent the evening!  Hopefully I'll be better this year!  Christmas morning came and we enjoyed opening stockings and our presents.  That afternoon we headed to Ogden to be with Louis' family, while we were there Wyatt started really walking!  He's now walking all over the place and it has been so cute watching his wiggly walk.  It was a nice simple Christmas and wonderful to be around family.

Surprise Trip

This has seemed like the year of travel!  When really I didn't travel that much, but it was a lot for me.  We went to visit my Grandpa twice, Louis and I went on our big trip to England, and then early in December I went to North Carolina for a sister's trip.  A few weeks before my trip to North Carolina I got a text from my sister Jessica asking that if the flight was covered if I could swing coming out for a sister's weekend.  Um.  Yeah!  We quickly figured out babysitting for the couple of days we would need it while I would be gone and Louis would be at work and I packed my bags and headed out with Megan on a red eye flight! 
We enjoyed a weekend of pedicures, movies, food, and being together.  It was a good weekend getting away from my normal responsibilities.