The Greed Fest

Henry boy on his new ride on scoot scoot. 

Santa brought Benny a bike, just like he asked for! 

A Nintendo DS...yep, Grandpa Benny wins Christmas this year! 

 Henry playing with his fun new toy from Grandma Becky

Sylvia with her new guitar from Santa.

Merry Christmas!

Christmas Eve

Ben singing "Tick Tock", one of his kindergarten program gems.  Cousin Ryder is singing along. 

Sylvia singing "Jingle Bells" - it was beautiful! 

Grandpa Goodrich playing a Christmas carol by heart. 

Ryder and Henry playing smash the cellophane.

Ben's Christmas Program

Ben is playing Jingle Bells here with some of his classmates. 

Ben had the longest speaking parts because he is the 

only child in the class who is a proficient reader. 

Ben REALLY got into the Christmas songs. 

My favorite was I Want A Hippopotamus For Christmas. 

A little family picture opportunity.  

Sylvia stayed home sick from school, so she got to come and watch Ben's program.

* Side note--

I asked Ben the other day if he had a girlfriend.  He gave me an exasperated look, and said, "yes."  This surprised me, so I asked him what her name was.  He told me, "Marissa.  She has yellow hair."  I asked him if he has kissed her, and he said, "No, because Marissa doesn't like kisses."  But he has hugged her!  This conversation was hilarious.  If you're wondering which one is Marissa, she is on the front row in the third picture, wearing a white shirt and denim skirt.  Too cute!

Instagram Christmas Pics

Christmas Fun!

If you don't follow me on Instagram, you should.  Although, honestly I post most of my Instagram pics to Facebook, so whatever.  We have captured some fun Christmas pics via the iPad camera (because it's quick, and it's handy), and these are just a few:

Henry's candy cane face

Henry at the Christmas tree

Ben with our awesome gingerbread house

My cute Christmas tree skirt

The cuties eating cuties watching Christmas Oranges

Sylvia with the coolest thing EVER--

the Lego Advent Calendar from Grandpa Benny

Oh, Christmas, how I love you.  I didn't think Christmas could become more magical, and then I had children.  They have made the Christmas season even more meaningful for me.  I love these kiddos!

Sylvia's Christmas Recital

 Sylvia, the organist!

Ben and Tom doing who knows what.

This Fall, Sylvia has been learning about the organ at her piano class.  It has been a lot of fun having her tell us all about the organ, with comments such as, "Mom, did you know that you play the organ with your FEET?  Seriously, I'm not joking with you."  She has been having a lot of fun.  Her lessons have been at our church, so she's had lots of hands on experience playing the organ, and getting to know all about it. Yesterday was her Christmas recital, and every kid played a Christmas song on the organ.  Sylvia performed Bring A Torch, Jeanette Isabella.  So pretty!  She did a lovely job.

SAAANNNTTAA!!! I know him!

We visited my favorite Santa at Evan's Gatehouse in Orem last Saturday. We tried putting Henry on Santa's lap--needless to say, that didn't go well.  He cried, as we expected, but he also arched his back and squirmed which made it impossible for Santa to hold him at all.  Oh well!  The kids received candy canes, and told Santa what they really wanted for Christmas (Ben had a much longer list than Sylvia), and Henry stayed a safe distance away in Dad's arms.  Fun was had by (almost) all!

Henry Is One Year Old!

Henry doesn't trust Grandpa Bill at all.

The three crazy kiddos :)

Henry loved his cupcake!

Henry had a birthday yesterday, we celebrated with cupcakes!  We went up to Grandma Susan's house to enjoy our cupcakes and ice cream, and I made everyone wear party hats.  We bought Henry a Fisher Price Chatter Telephone for his special day.  So far, he really likes it!

What Henry's Up To At One Year:

• He is a screaming machine.  Henry will scream when he's happy, excited, sad or scared.  Sometimes its hard to tell what emotion he's trying to convey.  He screams all the time!
• Still eating baby food, but we're adding in sippy cups of milk, and lots of other big people food.  Henry especially likes noodles.
• He's still not sleeping as well as I'd like, but I'm more comfortable letting him cry for a few minutes when he wakes at night.  Usually, the kid cries for only a few minutes, and then he'll go back to sleep. Baby steps, right?
• Henry's new favorite activity is opening drawers.  I came in the other day to my bedroom, and he had emptied one of Nate's dresser drawers all over the floor.  This means a lot of extra clean up for Mom!
• We've discovered he really likes Sesame Street - especially Elmo.  This buys me precious time to take a shower :)
• Still a little baldie in the front, and he's getting more and more handsome every day.  Seriously, this is one cute kid.

So Sweet.

A little note from Sylvia's friend, Sophie.

I love that Sylvia is a social butterfly.  She has a lot of great, sweet qualities that I would look for in a friend.  I am not surprised at all at how many little friends she has--she really is one of the nicest and happiest kids that I have ever known.  Boys and girls alike flock to her, and I find it fascinating!  Now, sometimes I have noticed that Sylvia can be a little too nice, and she ends up being a door mat.  That is something I have to keep an eye on, because her feelings can get hurt by kids who are a little blunt, or who have very dominant personalities.  But overall, Sylvia is a child who excels at making and keeping friends.  I love that about her.  Not only does she occasionally bring home notes like this, but she also brings home pictures that her friends have drawn for her, and sometimes they even give her little gifts like necklaces and bracelets.  So so so cute.

Henry is 11 Months Old!

Rawr.

What Henry's Up To At 11 Months:

• Henry is no longer interested in crawling.  He is a fast walking nightmare!  He looks adorable running around, though.  He has taken to walking a lot quicker than my other two.  His coordination is also improving by leaps and bounds every day.  If he falls down, he crawls to the nearest piece of furniture, or a wall, pulls himself back up and steadies himself, and then he's off again.  Amazing. 
• He's still letting me spoon feed him, but he needs a minor distraction to get the entire meal finished.  Thank heavens for matchbox cars and measuring spoons.
• He slept all night last night (hooray!).  Sleeping through the night is still not a regular thing, but we are crossing our fingers that all night sleeping happens soon.
• Is now liking being read to, which is great!  Henry also loves to play "This Little Piggy" with his cute little toesies.  And he still loves to play patty cake and peek a boo.
• Absolutely loves to play with his siblings.  And they just accept him and incorporate him into their play.  It's perfect.

Halloween Cuteness

The kids wore cute costumes.  We carved pumpkins, ate yummy food, went trick or treating, and we visited some great grandparents.  In short, Halloween was fun this year!

The Halloween Parade

Hi Mom!

It is always fun to visit the kiddos at school, especially on fun holidays like Halloween.  As you can see, Sylvia is a red devil, and Ben is Spiderman.  Ben has a really cool mask that goes with his costume, but there aren't any masks allowed at school.  So, mom improvised and broke out the face paint.  Note:  I am definitely not a professional face painter...

Anyway, the kids looked adorable today, and as a bonus, we all got to watch the 5th and 6th graders perform the Thriller dance.  Very fun!

What We Do When Dad's Off Hunting

We eat some yummy In-N-Out Burger

We collect stick "swords" at Bridal Veil Falls

We go on the carousel at Provo Beach Resort

We eat ice cream and Dole whips.  Yum!

We play in the pirate ship

We slide!

My Little Walker

At the park, exploring all by himself!

It's been a lot of fun watching Henry learn to walk these last few weeks.  Henry took his first steps on October 5th, just two days after turning 10 months old.  He is definitely my youngest walker--Sylvia walked at 12 months, and Ben at almost 13 months.  Henry has plans, that's for sure.  He has a lot to do, and definitely a lot of stuff to get into!  Watching him toddle around is pretty much the cutest thing ever.

Bridal Veil Falls

Bridal Veil Falls, up Provo Canyon, is beautiful in October. It was cool, breezy, and full of fall color.  I also didn't mean to match my kids in gray sweatshirts.  It just happened that way!

Halloween Books

One thing I love about holidays is books!  Children's books are just too much fun, and my kids love it when I read to them.  We just got out the Halloween books to enjoy for these next few weeks.  These are some of our favorites!

Pumpkin Pumpkin, by Jeanne Titherington

Happy Halloween, Little Critter!, by Mercer Mayer

The Berenstain Bears Go On A Ghost Walk, by Stan and Jan Berenstain

Franklin's Halloween, by Paulette Bougeois

The Little Old Lady Who Wasn't Afraid Of Anything, by Linda Williams

Two Little Witches, by Harriet Ziefert

Scary Scary Halloween, by Eve Bunting

Very Scary Jack 'O Lantern by Joanne Barkan

There are lots of other great Halloween books (one that comes to mind that we don't have is Bone Soup, so cute!).  I love buying maybe one or two new holiday books each season to add to our holiday themed collections.  Having special books that you only read at a certain time each year makes them really special.   I really enjoy making holidays special for the kiddos.

The Pumpkin Patch

Time for family night at Jaker's Pumpkin Patch!

 Ben at the mouth of the hay maze

Sylvia and Henry hangin' out 

Is it really that hard for everyone to look at the camera at the same time?  

Seriously, this is the best picture of the 3 munchkins that I could get. 

Sylvia liked the "warty" pumpkins 

Henry is just trying to process what a pumpkin is, exactly. 

Jaker's has a corn pit for the kids to enjoy.  

Ben's idea of fun is to throw corn at all the other kids. 

Cannonball!!!!