Ornament Exchange

For those of you who don't already know, every year for the past 9 years now, my mom has an Ornaments Exchange party with my sisters, Grandma and some times cousins.  A long time ago a few ladies in my ward started this.  It got so big and changed so many times that my mom stopped going and decided to do it with her girls instead.  We were all excited because for many years we have all helped her make her decorations for the Sisters in our ward.  So 9 years ago we had our first one as a family.  I have gotten so many cute and fun ornaments over the years.  My sisters and mom always make such cute things.  Some of my favorites over the years have been.....

• Gold beaded glass ball that Jocie made

 

• Jingle bell, jingle bell, jingle bell, rock that Rebecca made

 

• Blue snowflake chime Emily made

 

• Personalized wreath Mom made for each of us

 

• Hand made snowman that Deloris our cousin made

 

• Painted Santa spoon Mariann made

 

• Beaded Star TaNiesha made

 

• Bird house Lea made

 

• Glass heart painted on the inside that I made

This year was no different, a lot of cute and fun ornaments that I will cherish forever!  

• Grandma Watkins made a decoration with a Glass Basket, bird and trimmings in it

 

• Mom made many different ornaments but we got to choose 3, these ornaments were from a wreath she made many years ago

 

• Lea made a cute Sparkly Christmas tree decoration

 

• Rebecca made a One Horse Soap and Sleigh

 

• MariAnn made a cute crocheted Snowman glove

 

• I made Snowflakes, which Tanner made for me last year in his 2nd grade class

 

• Emily made a hanging decoration that says Joy

Thank you everyone for the fun memories and priceless decorations/ornaments that I get each year!

9 Years Old

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

Tanner celebrated his 9th birthday on Saturday.  This year we decided to throw a birthday party for him, since we have managed to get away with it in years past with just a family/cousin party!  He wanted to do a Pokemon theme... shocking it wasn't a Transformer theme.  So we tried our best.  We gave each of the kids 2 Pokemon cards and they were thrilled.  We also played "Pin The Tail On Pikachu" (ohh I so wanted to type "Pekah-chu").  Darin did a good job drawing it on a paper and I colored it in.  10 of the 14 kids we invited showed up and they had a blast.  We sent them on a scavenger hunt and fed them pizza.  Tanner was so happy to share his birthday with some of his friends.

We can't believe we have a 9 year old!  Time flies by too quickly.  On Saturday Tanner came in to wake us up.  I told him to quit growing that he has to stay 8 years old forever.  He said he couldn't do that because next year he was gonna be 2 digits and he has to get to 2 digits!  So cute :)  We have enjoyed having him in our family.  He is so sweet, thoughtful such a good kid!  We love you, Tanner!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

And You Thought She Couldn't Get Any Prettier...

BEFORE:

AFTER:

Still a beautiful little girl!!!

Silly Pekah - Part 2!

I guess I am just gonna have to have a running blog on this title, because Pekah keeps doing funny things. Those who have a dog or cat know that they usually like to find the "sun spot" in your house.  Pekah is no exception.  As the day goes on I usually know where she is depending on what time it is and where the sun is!  She has a sun spot in most of the rooms in our house that she frequents most every day.  Her favorite spot is in the kitchen.  Every morning I wake up and pull open the blinds and she sits/lays in front of the sliding glass door for hours with the sun on her back, especially since I am typically around where she can see me.  Well, the past few mornings for some reason I am not opening them up fast enough.  If Pekah could talk, I'm sure this is what she would be saying...

 Maybe if I just stand here long enough mom will notice.....

 Um........ Hello........ ?

FINE THEN.  Since mom won't open them, I guess I will do it myself..

   Finally! Thank you mom, that's more like it!

Spencer the Slow-Growing Boy

We had Spencer's 15-month checkup the other day.  I always hate it when they give our babies shots but thankfully Spencer only cries for a few minutes until I can pick him up and snuggle him. The doctor commented on how he sure doesn't like to grow very fast, but still is growing so he is not concerned!

Spencer is....
32 inches Tall (77.6 percentile... up 1 inch since his 12 month visit)
and
21.21 lbs (9.3 percentile... up 1% since his 12 month visit!)

He sure is a joy to have around.  He is finally starting to walk, but only for a few steps until he realizes that crawling is much faster.  He is very curious about how everything works and usually he can figure stuff out.  He is pushing our chairs from our tables over to our island so he can get the stuff up on the counter.  He loves to play with balls.  He loves Elmo and Barney.  He also loves his older brother and sister, but can hold his ground if they try to push him around too much.

He is still allergic to milk - though we're still hoping he'll out grow of that.  We have found that a little bit of butter and a little cheese usually will not bother him.   I did finally shave his head and I have to admit I miss his hair, but I know it will grow back.  We sure love this little boy!

I'm so Domestic! Huh, Bec?

At the beginning of the year Darin and I (OK - really me) decided that we (I) would like a garden.  We feel in love with fresh home made salsa, plus I really wanted to make my moms canned salsa (BEST SALSA EVER!).  So we planted tomatoes, jalapeno, banana, anaheim and bell peppers.  We also planted zucchini, banana squash, pumpkins, strawberries and watermelon (which the last two didn't turn out as well).


So the last two Saturdays I have been canning with the peppers and tomatoes that our garden produced.  I canned Sweet Pickled Banana Peppers (with Anaheim peppers in them), Spicy Banana Peppers (with Anaheim peppers also), Jalapenos and my mom's salsa.  All have turned out SOOOOO nummies:

I am kind of sad to see my garden die in a month or so but I can't wait for the pumpkins to be ready to carve and the banana squash to eat.  Hopefully next year I can get the watermelon and strawberries to work, but we are excited to do this again.  Savannah says she will only eat corn that we grow, so we will be trying corn next year.

Thanks to my parents for teaching me how to garden and how to take care of one, and thanks to Auntie Bella and Auntie Susan for helping us get one started.

Savannah's First Day of Kindergarten

We are really excited for Savannah to be in school.  She has been looking forward to this day since Tanner started going to "the big school".  Last week when Tanner went back to school Savannah was a little upset because she wanted to start then as well, but they held kindergarten off for another week.  Every day Savannah would ask if she got to go to school yet.  Finally when the day came it was every few hours..... "is it time," "when do I get to go,"  "can we go yet", etc.

Savannah got accepted into the Dual Language class, which means she will be learning Spanish as well.  We are really excited for this.  For the first hour, her teacher speaks only in Spanish.  It has only been a few days but Savannah is already saying some words like arriba (up) and abajo (down).   By the end of the school year she should know how to:

     Count from 1 to 30 (Thanks to Dora the Explorer she already knows how to count to 8). 
     Basic Shapes
     Months and Days
     Colors
     Positions (up, down, left, right, in, out)

As she moves through the grades they are thinking by 2nd or 3rd grade they will be speaking only Spanish through 90% of the school day.  We are going to need lots of help from our Spanish speaking family and friends (mostly on how to properly pronounce words).  I dropped out of Spanish in high school (I didn't get it like I got Chinese) and Darin took a few years but really can't remember much, mostly because he says his teacher called roll the whole time.

Back to her first day.  We got ready and then I walked and she rode her bike to school.  Once we got there we entered the class room and Mrs. Arroyo was speaking only in Spanish.   Telling the kids what to do by pointing.  A lot of the moms commented on how they are so scared for their kids to get this, but I think they will all do just fine.  Savannah was instructed to hang up her backpack and to find her name tag then get a picture to color.  Mrs. Arroyo pointed to the line that said me llamo, spoke the same words out loud and then pointed to Savannah's name tag on her shirt.  Savannah went to a seat and sat down, wrote her name on the paper and started coloring!  Then she looked up at me and said,  "When you gonna leave, mom? I can do this. I love you but go," to which I replied not until I get a big kindergartner hug and kiss goodbye! 

Just like with Tanner I got a little teary-eyed but I didn't bawl like I always thought I would.  I got home and put Spencer to sleep.  As I was holding him I looked down at him and said, "You're next," which he shook his head to as if he understood what I was saying.  

This is going to be a fun year for Savannah.  Tanner started 3rd grade last week and so far is having a lot of fun too. 

This next picture I took before we left to make sure I had enough battery life.  I didn't realize what I was taking a picture of, but Pekah  is wishing she could go with us to school! 

Cousin Sleepover

So a while back Tanner and Garrett came up with a plan (probably mostly Tanner) to get MariAnn and I to let them sleep over at each others houses.  MariAnn and I thought it was a good idea so MariAnn took the first round here.  On Thursday Garrett and Bethany came to sleep over and Jaxon came to play while MariAnn and Dave cleaned their rental house for new tenants.

We went to a nearby park and had a blast there.

And my favorite picture with all of them in it.....

When we got home they played the wii and watched a movie.  It was a lot of fun for all of them and I hope to be able to do it again.  Maybe be daring enough and have all the cousins like Aunt Bec did!