Christmas Morning

It was a picture perfect Christmas-at least in my view. Chris and I were talking before bed and he actually complained about the cold (Arizona boy)!! I was in heaven with the Christmas Eve snow. It made everything beautiful and frosty. Perfect!!

Here are the children on my bed at 6:30. As you can see, everyone was wide awake except for Carter. Ten seems a little early to be losing the excitement of Christmas morning!

This year, our kids drew names so that they only bought for one sibling. This is the gift that Grant chose for Andrew.

Carter chose this dart board for Chris and was really excited when he found out there is a "trash talk" feature on it. What's better than playing darts with your dad and having some trash talk going on? (honestly, I don't totally get it, but I AM a girl).

Hailey got a "perfect pet": a cute dog that breathes while it sleeps. I honestly hope this is the only pet we will ever have. Cute little Alyssa always wants to be close to people and has learned to climb up on the chairs. I now call her the hurricane-she is creating constant destruction.

Alyssa opening her gift from Carter. It took awhile.

Hailey's choice for Grant. It was a beautiful thing to see them playing this together later in the morning. I love it when they are happy and having fun together. We had a wonderful time together.

Christmas Eve

Every year on Christmas Eve, we have our children act out the Nativity. For the past several years we've gotten together with our good friends, the Birds. The kids enjoy dressing up and the adults enjoy focusing on the true meaning of Christmas. We also invited the Menzel family and I hope that they weren't too overwhelmed by the craziness and noise (all of their children are older).

Hailey wanted to be Samuel the Lamanite this year (Samuel always gets marshmallow "stones" thrown at him and she wanted to eat them). Here she is preaching to the people.

Grant was the star and was on his tip toes several times trying to hold it up as high as possible.

Here is sweet Emma being Mary.

The entire cast (minus Kori the fabulous piano player and Chris the amazing narrator).

Thanksgiving

Chris took the boys out on Thanksgiving morning for a little football. Brave man considering he hates the cold.

Chris' parents were here to celebrate with us and Hailey got to experience a small dose of the traditional Stradling pie making marathon. She loved baking with Grandma.

Luckily, Chris' mom reminded me that I wanted a picture of them and I got all of the kids with their grandparents. We were so glad that they came!

Fun in the sun

Chris and I were able to go on a cruise with 4 of our dear friends right before Thanksgiving. We had such a marvelous time and it's hard to even imagine summing up the trip. Needless to say, we would do it again in a heartbeat!

The girls hamming it up in Honduras.

The boys checking out the female stingray.

While he's not a huge fan, Chris did a wonderful job with Neil Diamond's "America" for karaoke. He actually had the whole room singing and laughing-definitley a success.

Visiting the Mayan ruins in Tulum, Mexico. Super interesting and I loved seeing the huge iguanas lazing around in the sun.

We stopped at an island of Honduras and this was one of the few times it wasn't raining. We braved it for a bit, but then headed back to the ship for the hot tub and ice cream.

We had so much fun. Sitting here in the snow, it's hard to believe that we were ever there!

Out of character

Anyone who knows me even remotely well, knows that I despise running. It is amazing that I married Chris with his insane running ability. I enjoy exercising daily, but until this summer that NEVER included running. I started running and while I still don't enjoy it, I can endure it. My friend Amy convinced me to run the Hot Chocolate 5K in Chicago this Saturday and we actually had a lot of fun. Maybe I'll even do it again. :)

Juliann, me, Kori, and Amy. Juliann and Amy ran the 15K.

Halloween 2010

Another year with too much candy. Andrew decided to be Mario again which I loved since I didn't have to do anything.

Carter isn't big on dressing up so we came up with the idea of being Percy Jackson. Easy-Camp Half Blood t-shirt, jeans, sword...done. I would have done a little more, but for him it was perfect.

At Goodwill, Hailey found a pretty Cleopatra dress which I was quick to accept since it was inexpensive. Little did I know...she asked me all about Cleopatra and I looked her up online. Wow. How do you explain to a 6 year old about a woman who married both of her brothers, and slept with several other men only to kill herself in the end?? I left out a lot of details.

Alyssa surprised me by keeping her hat on the whole time.

Costume Confusion

Grant had a hard time committing to a costume, which worked out OK since we have several lying around the house. We bought the Woody costume which he wore to a party, but then chose Spider Man for school and trunk or treat. I thought that it was girls who always changed their minds...

She's 1!

I can't believe that it's already been a year, but Alyssa turned one this week. She is such a sweet child and we love having her in our family.

Peek-a-boo

All parents think that their child is the cutest thing that they've seen, which is great. Every child should be adored by their parents. Even so, I just have to say that I think that MY children are the cutest. Alyssa just learned to play peek-a-boo and hasn't totally figured out covering her eyes yet. I think she's adorable.

Conference Tents

Our Home Teacher had a great suggestion for conference. He taught us about the Nephites gathering to hear King Benjamin in their tents and suggested that we build tents for our kids to watch General Conference. GREAT IDEA! They each had their own tent where they took notes, ate popcorn, played quietly, and hopefully heard some of the messages. They didn't talk to each other, fight, or get wound up. Why didn't we do this before???

What's for dinner?

Alyssa was playing in my pot and pan cabinent very happily. I happened to look over to see her and saw that she had sat right on top of the pot. What a cutie.

The first day of school was wonderfully hot (there is no A/C in the elementary school), but the kids were still excited. We are excited for a new year!

Hailey is a big first grader. She came home saying, "I saw the kindergartners. They are ADORABLE! They're so little." :)

Andrew is in 3rd grade this year and is excited about the friends that he has in class.

Carter is in 5th grade and much more interested in sports than he is in school. Unfortunately, school comes fairly easy to him so he doesn't need to try very hard. I'm looking forward to middle school next year when he'll have to put a little more effort into it! :)

Hailey's birthday party

Hailey had her first birthday party this year. She wanted to have a cooking party, so we had a "make-your-own-pizza" party. The girls got to make their own place mats before they got started on their pizzas. They had a lot of fun playing with each other and I couldn't believe the difference between this girl party and the boys' parties that we've had in the past. The girls sat and talked and played with Hailey's new things rather than running and trying to beat each other up. What a fun time they had.

Thank goodness for my baby!

I made chicken enchiladas for dinner the other night, which is not my kids' favorite. Some of them tried to choke it down politely, but one of them (his name begins with an "A") said that he would rather eat trash. He was so emphatic that he ate NOTHING for dinner and went to bed hungry. I thought I would give some to Alyssa to see what her thoughts were. Thankfully, she felt my wounded pride and ate THREE helpings of it. What a sweet baby!

Colorado Trip

We just returned from our annual trip to Colorado. This year seemed especially great for several reasons. First of all, Chris was there for a lot of our 2 week stay. Usually, he has to head back to Chicago for work, but this year he was able to stay. I also found that the cousins all got along wonderfully which was FABULOUS. They would play for hours and we wouldn't even see them! Eventually they would emerge with smiles and ask for food. :) Here are a few of the highlights.

Unfortunately, this is one of the few pictures that I have of Carter. I was with the younger kids a lot and the older kids were with Chris going to baseball games, fishing, etc. But, I do have this shot of my dad getting retribution on Carter after he hit him with a water balloon. I'm glad that Carter finally realized that I wasn't kidding when I said that my dad shows no mercy.

Sammi (4), Alyssa, and Caity (9) hanging out at Garden of the Gods. We hiked around and then ate a late breakfast with my dad, grandfather, and uncles.

All of the cousins in Garden of the Gods.

All my kids with my grandfather.

We went to Santa's Workshop where the kids get to see Santa and ride a bunch of rides. Here is Alyssa's first (and only) ride of the day. She loved it. The other kids were in heaven going on all of the rides by themselves. What a great tradition.

Grant, Hailey, and Sammi with new pajamas. The older cousins had all gone to a Rockies game and we went shopping (can you tell that the moms chose the activity?). They all got new pajamas and had so much fun playing in them. They definitely did not wan to go to bed.

Playing in the pool on the deck. Sammi put soap on the slide to make sure that it was slippery enough. I saw Grant slip right out the other side several times. The boy going down is Paul (2) who is about the cutest kid EVER!

All of the cousins at Water World. So much fun! We can't wait to go back.

Tradition

We have decided to start a new family tradition-getting stitches right before we go to Colorado. Last year, Andrew started us off by falling off of a chain onto the sidewalk. He needed stitches in the back of his head the day before we left. This year, Grant volunteered by bashing his forehead on our fireplace 2 days before we left. What a trooper! He didn't cry at all. He laid there calmly while I tried not to throw up all over the place and didn't cry during the whole stitching procedure. It doesn't bother him at all, but I honestly get sick every time I have to change the band-aid!

Lauren's visit

My niece Lauren came out from Colorado to visit for a week. We had a lot of fun hanging out with her, although I don't know if she'll ever recover from the noise. We are now headed to Colorado for 2 weeks so that the fun can continue...

We had a huge rain storm and these 3 ran out to play badminton in it. They were soaked in about 20 seconds. How fun is it to be a kid?!

Alyssa playing in the water at Millennium Park in Chicago.

Hailey standing by the huge water fountains in Millennium Park.

At the Museum of Science and Industry.