Christmas

 

A Utah Jazz T-shirt and 2 tickets to a game to go along with it :)

 

Plate #1

 Plate #2

 

Sadly, I did not make our gingerbread from scratch this year like I have before. 

BUT IT WAS SO WORTH IT!  Took 10 minutes from start to finish and Mason loved it.

 Mason was excited to see the marble tower again!

 

 

 

A popcorn machine!  I'm so excited!  I've  used it several times already and it's the Best.

 

Merry Christmas!

Sweet Baby Kate is 1

Hard to believe . . .

 

 

 

 

Spaghetti & Red Velvet Cake for dinner

 

 Mason had been practicing singing "Happy Birthday" to Kate.  He's such a sweetie.  We were able to have the sister missionaries come eat dinner with us, so we had a few extra voices with us!  You can kind of tell Kate has NO idea what is going on, but she loved the cake.

 Kate's got a sweet tooth, haha.  Just like her mom.

 She got a new bike from Grandma--yay!

 Mason was more excited for Kate to have a new bike than anybody . . . now he has a friend to bike with! I will usually push Kate around on her bike and Mason will ride circles around  us.

 I forgot we had party hats and whistles until right before we went to bed, but we broke them out anyway :) Happy birthday, Kate!

Christmas card :)

Grandpa Harper

We have an old family video of my siblings and I doing this exact same thing as little kids--it was so fun to see Mason get to have a similar experience :)

THANKSGIVING

For Thanksgiving we got to go home and eat with our families--yay!  On Thanksgiving morning we baked and watched "Iron Will"--a tradition of David's mom.  While we were at the Yates, we visited Stephanie and Jared's new house and had a birthday party for me, Michelle, and Kate.  I got a coupon for a "Swedish" massage and a pedicure--I LOVE my in-laws! :) I got them all done in the same day and just felt completely pampered and treated well.  A great early birthday present.  We were also able to see some friends in Salt Lake, we went to see Lincoln (a Wonderful movie), and we went up to the U of U campus to see where David's mom works and eat some lunch.  We also did some shopping, patroned Leatherby's, and skyped with Becky and Nelson.

 

 A little early Christmas present for Mason, which he LOVED.

 It was so great to see Mason and Kate spend time with grandparents and cousins.  Addison and the kids played really well together for the most part and we can't wait to play together again soon!

We went to see the lights at Temple Square with Mason.  It was pretty cold, but HE LOVED IT.  He especially loved riding on the trax.

We went to the Harpers the week after Thanksgiving.  EVERYone was there, even if it was just for 2 days, that hasn't happened for a while so it was fun.  We played a questions game, which was hilarious, basketball at the church, the guys went shooting, and the girls had a spa evening.  We also had some good food, a gift exchange, a family picture was taken, and my family did a surprise early birthday party for me!  For years I have wanted to have a birthday party with all of my siblings at home, so that was a lot of fun.

 

 

 

 

 A definite highlight was meeting our brand-new neice, Ava Autumn Harper. 

Such a precious little girl!

My Dad has a traditional Christmas game, a big favorite with everyone, he hosts called "Let's Make a Deal." AKA clean-out-the-closet, haha.  We won $20, a remote control helicopter, and a hat (which Mason is modeling below)!

 

 

Now we are back home getting ready for Christmas :)

(three of the following pictures were taken by Mason)

 

Birthday!

 

 Mason learned how to use the camera, so he documented some of my birthday.  We had the Christmas tree up by then, but no ornaments.  We had glo-sticks, which were a hit with the kids.

This was one of my favorite gifts--a Nutcracker snow globe--David is taking me to the Nutcracker ballet some time this month as a birthday present. Yay!

 I picked up some pizza for an easy dinner and easy cleanup. I also picked up my favorite cake--carrot cake, and ate some of my favorite ice cream--Cold Stone cake batter batter batter (with cookie, cake, and brownie batter.  H-E-L-L-O)

We had just gotten back from a long travel day from Declo, ID to KC the previous day, so my kids gave me a great gift by sleeping in on my birthday and also letting me take a long nap that afternoon.  (Kate took a nap and I just gave Mason the ipad to play with . . . ) David gave me a great gift by cleaning the house and doing the laundry for me so I could just do some Christmas shopping on my birthday instead of doing the cleaning/laundry.  I am sooo grateful for my sweet little family--I love being a momma and a wifey :)

It was a fun day!  Thank you everyone for the happy birthday wishes and texts/calls/posts.  Love to you all--

Halloween!

Our ward had a trunk-or-treat on the Friday before Halloween. Mason went as a football player, Kate was a cheerleader, I was a fan, and David was a replacement ref.  But we only got pictures of the kids. :(

 

In our church building there were several stations with games.  Mason was a little perturbed by all the costumes but he appreciated the candy and prizes!  We did a cake-walk, a fishing game, got some witches brew, and did a donut-eating contest.  Mason just marched up and grabbed the donut to eat it.

 

On Tues, Oct 30 David didn't have to work so we made a Halloween-style dinner.  Monster apples, witch fingers, mummy dogs, blood and bones, apple brew, and dirt n' worms.  All ideas were from ourbestbites.com.  Love that website!

 After our spooky dinner, we carved pumpkins.

 I tried to carve Skellington Jack on the hill of Nightmare Before Christmas . . .

 On Halloween day we had a playgroup and I painted the kids' faces.  Mason as zombie and Kate as a kitty.  Halloween night we waited for David to come back from work to take the kids trick or treating, but Kate fell asleep so David just took Mason, who wore a Frankenstein mask.  We only got 3 trick or treaters!  What??  I bought $20 worth of candy.  What are we going to do with it all??

Left to right pumpkins: Mason's, Heather's, David's, and Kate's.

Hope you all enjoyed Halloween!  Can't wait until next year!