Today My Baby Turned ONE!

About a month ago my little Caleb started walking. I was heartbroken. I am not ready to not have a baby at my house. I am such a baby person! I'd have a million if they stayed babies! Now he is one. And walking, and trying to talk, and crawling up the stairs, and tackling his brother, and really needs a haircut. I'm not ready! But ready or not...here he comes! He has been such a joy in our home. We absolutely adore him. Brooke especially, she still wants to hold him all of the time. She carries him all over the place even though he only weighs 10 pounds less than her. She's trying to keep him little too. Not Brielle, she has been walking around refering to him as "one year old boy" all day instead of Caleb. "One year old boy, come here!" "Hey mom! One year old is going upstairs!" etc. She's rubbing it in! How rude! Anyway, he went to his well baby checkup this morning and he weighs 21 lbs (50%) and is in the 90% for his height. He got his shots so I gave him Tylenol and fed him and he slept from 12:00 until 4:30. What a great kid! And that was after sleeping in until 9:30 this morning. I kindof missed the kid! He slept all day. Grandpa and Suzanne came over for pizza (I redeemed myself), presents and cake. It was a good day, and I'm so glad I have my Caleb, even if he does grow up! We love you Caleb!

My four adorable kids!

Christmas 2009!

Unlike Christmas Eve Christmas Day went flawlessly! We had such a great day. Here is a picture of Christmas morning before the kids got to it. So magical. Well, minus the ugly window well in the background. This is our "real" tree. It is the "boy" tree. The girl tree is upstairs, and artificial, and has colored lights. We like doing Christmas downstairs because there is way more room and the tree smells awesome! Anyway...peaceful...until

the kids get up!

Here is grandpa and Suzanne...just happy to be up so dang early!

and Jacob would've never left his train table if Brooke hadn't kept making him open more presents. He loves that thing!

Caleb...loved the 7 dollar bath toy the best. Figures!

The happy couple...

And the other happy couple. Notice our awesome fire in the background. Our real fireplace is upstairs. The first time we turned on this fire Brooke walked up to the tv and asked Chuck, "where does the heat come out?" Cute kids.

Chuck and the kids playing Legos. What a good dad!

We had such a great Christmas. Kids make Christmas so dang fun! After presents and breakfast Charles' parents came. We had a big turkey dinner, and had a great evening hanging out with them. The kids were so excited to show them their toys. They stayed over, and in the morning we all went to Provo to return all of Chuck's Christmas presents. I was shocked at how NOT busy the stores were. We didn't wait in one return line!

On Sunday we had another family dinner at my dads. It was fun to see Blake and Mary Ann before their journey to Minnesota (Blake headed out yesterday!) And Anne and Brok, Nolan and Erica and two of Suzanne's kids and their families were there. It was fun to hang out and visit. Then Monday we went out to the cabin to spend the afternoon. Not enough snowmobiling, but we had a good time. We'll have to go when we can stay longer!

Last night I started taking down the Christmas decorations. I was taking the lights off of the downstairs tree and Jacob asked what I was doing. I told him and he was heartbroken. He said to me, "But I LOVE Christmas!" Then he walked over the Charles and in the saddest, most heartbroken voice he said,"Mom's taking Christmas!" I felt bad. Then this morning he asked about his train table and I realized he thought I was going to take it too! Poor kid. I am sad it's over too. It flew by way to quickly again this year, just as it always does!

Christmas Eve 2009

Our Christmas Eve was full of ups and downs. I worked the 22nd and 23rd, so the majority of my Christmas Eve was spent cleaning and making food...which I actually enjoyed. Until my vacuum blew up. It finally just gave up the ghost after 8 and a half years (thank goodness.) However I didn't even get half of my house vacuumed. I hate that! Anyway...I picked up some pizzas from Papa Murphys for dinner. Nolan and Erica were there, and my dad and Suzanne were planning on coming over, so I turned the oven on. It started preheating, and all of a sudden I saw a flash in the corner of my eye. There was a sparkler...yes, it looked just like a sparkler...on my bottom heating element. So I watched it for a minute. Then I called Chuck over and we watched the sparkler make its way down my heating element totally burning it up. It was gone. No oven. No oven...no pizza...no Christmas morning rolls...no Christmas turkey...all thoughts that were running through my head. So I did what anyone would do. Used my connections. I called my neighbor/cousin/friend and he hooked me up on Christmas Eve with a new heating element...what an awesome guy! Thanks Doug!!! However, in the mean time, I asked my other friend/neighbor if I could stick my pizzas in her oven. I know, I know, you aren't supposed to cook two at time. I know. But I was desperate! She was gone...I got distracted with the fixing of the oven. I FRIED the pizzas in someone elses house! I was mortified. Her house reeked of stinky burnt pizza. I sat over there and tried to air it out for 45 minutes. Didn't help. I used a half a can of febreze. Didn't help. I am SO SO SOOOO sorry Camille!

Anyway, with no pizza, no oven, the horrifying thought of Camille walking into her house, and a dirty floor we preceded to have a wonderful Christmas Eve. We acted out the nativity...

And we exchanged Christmas Eve presents...

Notice the matching pjs...

How could you not?!

And we had a great time together as a family. We watched Christmas cartoons, read The Night Before Christmas, set out cookies for Santa, and laid out our stockings. Then we put the kids to bed. Brielle laid wide awake until at least midnight. That girl stuggles to sleep on a normal night... Nolan and Erica stayed with us that night, it was nice to have some help after the kids were in bed!

Christmas At The Balchs!

The weekend before Christmas we headed for St. George for the Balch family Christmas Party. We had a great weekend. We shopped, we ate...a lot, the boys golfed. On Saturday we went to dinner, and walked around the St. George temple to look at the lights and hear the nativity. Then we went back to the house for presents!

All of the kids got books...

And Jacob was lucky enough to have grandma read his to everyone...

Then it was PJ's all around. Gotta love new Christmas pjs!

The girls got fancy black boots, which they love...

And TOYS!!!! Jake was pretty excited about his RC Truck!

And Caleb was lovin' on his Elmo...

Thanks for a great time Grandma and Grandpa! We love you!!

And...this is Caleb on the way home. Now that is a kid who needs a major haircut...any volunteers!?

Gingerbread Houses!

Brooke made this adorable gingerbread house at school. The roof was broken off and most of the candy was eaten by the time I got around to taking a picture, but it was cute!

Then for FHE we made the gingerbread house that Grandma gave us. Is it just me or do they put WAY too much candy in those things? It would take us all night to put all that candy on! As you can see by the color of Jacob's teeth, we ate a lot of it!

Santa...Again!

You take every chance you can get don't you!?

American Girl Doll

American Girl Doll
Train Table

And...iPod Touch

Santa came to our ward party so we jumped on the opportunity to tell him what we wanted again. And...it worked!

The Big Snow Storm

We finally had a great snowstorm...the snow kept the kids occupied for days. Brooke kept asking Jacob to come make snow queens with her. I finally figured out that snow queens are actually snow angels.

On the 12th I went to Anne's graduation from USU (congrats Anne!) and left Chuck home with the four kids. It snowed all day. The first time I called him to make sure they were all still alive he was in Park City Christmas shopping with them. The second time he was outside building a snowman with them. Don't I have the BEST husband ever! He didn't take any pictures though (and the next day the neighbor kid knocked the head off of their snowman). Charles had Caleb in his stoller all bundled up while he was snowblowing, and then he started on the snowman. He heard Caleb crying and looked over at his stoller. No Caleb. He had slithered out of his stoller and crawled halfway down the driveway. They had a good day in the snow.

'Tis The Season!

We came home from Thanksgiving only to be bombarded with Christmas...which I LOVE! Tuesday night for Enrichment we made watch bands. I made mine for myself. I know, I'm a horrible person. Wednesday night was my work party at the Dock of the Bay. I'm oblivious and didn't realize all of Heber has mutual on Wednesday nights so there were no babysitters to be found. My dad and Suzanne came over and watched my kids all night. Thanks guys, my kids had a blast! Thursday they came over for dinner, which was also fun. Friday night we had Chuck's work party. Then Saturday was the Zion's Bank kid Christmas party. We went to a theatre in Pleasant Grove to watch UP and see Santa...and we got tons of treats and toys....

This is Brielle. She was so excited to see Santa, but when he started talking to her she sat there looking scared to death. She could hardly respond. It was kinda funny.

Brooke was pretty much the same. They both told Santa they wanted American Girl dolls.

Not Jacob, he wasn't scared at all. He told Santa he wanted a train table. But Santa thought he said Training Table.

Then there was Caleb. He looked...

Then he looked closer...

Then he decided it must be okay.
And I think he asked for an iPod Touch.

Saturday night was also the big Carlile Christmas party, which is always so fun. But after leaving my kids 3 nights this week, I just couldn't bring myself to leave them again. They were exhausted anyway from a long day of partying and Christmas shopping. They also missed 2 b-day parties, and I missed a baby shower...all Saturday. Sadly, I don't think we have anything planned for the next two weeks. Somehow it all fell this week. But it was a fun week!

Thanksgiving Weekend

We had the nicest, most relaxing Thanksgiving weekend ever! So much fun! We headed for sunny St. George on Wednesday afternoon (I didn't realize there was no school on Wednesday until Tuesday or we would've been gone Tuesday afternoon!) Thanksgiving morning we cooked and relaxed while the boys golfed. Then we had the most spectacular Thanksgiving dinner. Yum. And Charles' entire family was there. It was fun to have everyone together. After dinner all the kids went "swimming" in the hot tub...and then came in for homemade ice cream (which was also sooo good!) Here are some of our shivering wet kiddos chowing down...

The cousins left on Thursday night, which left my kids wondering what in the world to do with themselves. They played Magnetix (or Mane-ga-nets),
the played baseball in the house with Grandma,

and they swam almost as much as Charles golfed (every day.) He only played 9 holes though, so he could shop with me, nice...huh?! We did a ton of shopping and got a huge head start on Christmas. Awesome weekend...thanks Balchs!

This is Caleb on the way home. The instant you put socks on that kid they are pulled off and stuffed in his mouth. Love it. Can't tell you how many times I've glanced at him and he's crawling around with a dirty sock hanging out of his mouth. Cute...