Quarterly faves . .

 ok . . . so as i look back on some of our pictures and my posts, i'm realizing that i put a lot of pics in slideshows and stuff that i can't print out in a blog book . . so a lot of pictures are getting missed!  so in an effort to make sure that i miss as little as possible, i'm going to go through 2 or 3 months at a time and find a few of my faves that i want to make sure didn't get missed.  which means that there will most assuredly be some that get put on a couple times, but better than getting missed entirely!  and hopefully i won't miss any of our faves!

aiden and loretta at thanksgiving . . so cute!!!

these of grandma ruby and sadie are my FAVORITE!!!:)  we loooove you grandma ruby!!

sadie and olivia . . they're only 3 weeks apart!  and i can already tell . . they're going to BEST FRIENDS FOREVER!!!

aiden, sadie , kennedy . . these little menaces (liv included!) are going to be TROUBLE!!!!  Lol, i can tell already!!!!;)

i just love this adorable baby! . . i could never get enough of her cute pictures!  we love our sadie lady!

ah, best daddy eveeeer!!!!!

notice i have glasses in the above pic . . but not in the bottom pic . . Lol!!!  she's the WORST!!!  she's sooo fast and will snatch my glasses right off my face before i even realize she's thinking about it . . little turkey!!

ok, let it be known that i tried my dangdest to get cute christmas pictures of these two . . it never goes as planned!!!  a couple turned out pretty cute but it was mostly just a disaster Lol!!!  thus is life with kids i guess!!!;)

still so cute even if someone's headband gets ripped off and it all turns into horsing around . . Lol!!!;)

i'm sure you can guess what's about to happen in this series of pictures.  samson looks worried . . rightfully so because that looks like a perfect, pristine snowdrift just dying to have a weenie dog chucked into it . . . Lol!!!  poor sammy!!!

he really had to put it in 4-wheel drive to get out of that, he looks pretty bottomed out!;)

poor weenie!

aiden was so excited for his keyboard, his face was just so cute!  he was playing music and dancing, it was ADORABLE!!!  best reaction ever!!

Christmas Day

and we thought the drive was going to be the craziest part of our christmas day! once we got to blackfoot the real party started! our day was scheduled so that we could spend approximately 3 hours at each house. let the house hopping begin! our first stop was to my mom's where zac and manami made breakfast burrito's (yummy!) and then we opened presents. aiden and sadie got spoiled and had a wonderful time! especially aiden, who loved to help sadie open her presents. i don't know what he liked the most, his new spider man scooter or the football kicker he got from grandma geri! my favorite was the converse shoes he got from aunt kylee so they can match now.

next stop was to grandma susan's. by this time, aiden had gotten the hang of the whole opening presents thing, and was running around tearing into presents before we even knew who they were for! he had so much fun, and was spoiled again. the only part that was lacking was that we missed the james family who celebrated christmas in north carolina. wish you guys could have been there! my favorite part was that i actually got a picture of uncle nick . . . . smiling!

last stop was to grandpa dick and grandma helen's house where we had dinner and got to see the hawkes family, who came all the way from sedro woolley, washington for christmas! it was wonderful to see them. i think this might have been sadie's favorite because she got a horse from her grandparents that laughs and shakes, she thought it was so funny! they must have noticed that aiden was quite fond of it too, because a couple days after we got home to logan a laughing shaking cow mysteriously showed up in the mail . . . . thanks gr. dick, thanks gr. helen!

merry christmas! if you can make it!

our christmas was really was really fun this year . . . once we got there! i will have to start from the beginning . . . christmas morning at 6:00 am when we left our house. the drive from logan to blackfoot, which usually takes about an hour and 45 minutes, took 3 hours. i think our speed maxed out at about 40 mph on the freeway, and we were grateful for those moments. the rest of the time was more like 20 mph or busting drifts in 4 wd! the roads, including the freeway, were drifted over most of the way, super slick, and the visibility was about 0%, especially for the first half of the drive, which we braved in the dark. thank heavens for reflectors! there was a cop car in the gutter, another car in the gutter, and here's the kicker . . . A SNOW PLOW!!! how does a snow plow run off the road and end up in the gutter!? if somebody had asked me before the moment that i saw it, i would have said it was not possible. any other cars that were on the road were pulled over and not driving. only us idiots! but thankfully, we made it safe and sound. thanks to trav's exquisite driving skills. a rest stop off the side of the freeway. a semi and another car were stuck on the off ramp because it was all drifted over! this one i got by sticking my camera out the window into the snow. again, on the freeway. crazy!

can you believe this was on the freeway?!

then once we got there, we couldn't make it out to my family's house in pingree because the roads were so drifted! so we didn't even get to see them for christmas! it was sad!

check this action out, we have 2 brothers with plows on their trucks, and they tried to plow a trail out to my dad and grandparents houses so everyone could go out for xmas, they got within a mile and then had to turn around and go back because they couldn't make it any further! they broke the tire chains and were stuck for a couple hours. it was really bad! obviously!

we're goin' to see ol' saint nick!

we took the kids to see santa this week. it was pretty fun. aiden made us laugh really hard, he sat on santa's knee and this is how it went:
santa: what do you want santa to bring you for christmas this year?
aiden: oh, just a candy cane or something.
santa: (laughing) oh, okay . . . well here's a candy cane for you. what else would you like?
aiden: just a candy cane i guess.
and that was it! the kid doesn't want anything but a candy cane! okay then . . . if that's all he wants!
sadie was cute, she liked santa. she didn't mind that an unfamiliar dude with a great big fluffy white thing in her face was holding her! she just wanted to grab his beard off!
look at the happy baby! she's always sticking her bottom teeth out and grinning like this, she looks like such a cheese ball when she does it too.

Aiden's Christmas Tree

this was so funny! i got this little christmas tree out and told aiden it was his very own, but that i needed to go downstairs to find its decorations. we put it up in his room and put the lights on, then i went to find its decorations. i came back upstairs to break the bad news, that i couldn't find them, and he says "it's ok mom, i already decorated it!" so i went with him back into his room, and this is what i found! his christmas tree masterpiece!

Tis the Season!

i love this time of year! aiden and i put the tree up and decorated it, he had a lot of fun and was my big helper. he really liked the lights and now wants them on ALL THE TIME!!! night and day they shine. . . i try to sneak them off, and then i notice that they magically have been turned back on within minutes. i'm very afraid of our power bill this next month!

what?? it's not fake i swear . . . . just a little bald around the neck . . Lol!!!

"the little glass balls are my favorite!"

look! the not fake christmas tree branches!

taaah daaah! finished!  i love this little boy and all his antics, he's so expressive and i love all his adorable expressions!

notice samson's sunglasses . . Lol!!!