More December Festivities

I can't believe Christmas is in 4 days!!!  We haven't had too many extracurricular things going on this December, but we have tried to do a few festive things.

Last weekend we had our Ward Christmas Party in the morning, and then that night, Jeremy and I went to his work party at his boss's house.  It was nice to meet some of the people he's been talking about and of course it's always nice to have a night out!

This week we made some Christmas goodies and then took them around to our neighbors.  We have some really sweet neighbors (all of them at least our parents' ages or older), and they are always happy to see the kids.  We don't know them super well, so I think they were pleasantly surprised we would bring them something. :)

 Licking the beaters from the snowball cookie dough.  No, Anna didn't have one - I have no idea what she's putting in her mouth!

Then last night we drove around our neighborhood and looked at Christmas lights.  It was so fun!  We were amazed by how many of the houses were super decked out.  We didn't have to go far to see some impressive displays.  After we drove around for 20 minutes or so, we came home and watched Rudolph.  It was the kids' first time seeing it, and our first time in a long time.  It seemed so old!  Haha, but it was fun.  Then after the kids went to bed, Jeremy and I finishes wrapping a few presents while watching "It's a Wonderful Life" on NBC.  It's such a good one!

Anna before we went out last night, she was giving Jeremy the cutest snuggles!

 She opens her mouth like this all the time...

 Hehe, and she does this super cheesy grin all the time now too.  I love it!  It makes me laugh every time.

Boys ready to drive around and see the lights!

Anna also had her 9-mo. checkup last week, so I found the boys playing "doctor" later that night:

Okay, no idea why that is loading sideways.  Sorry.  Oh, and in case you're wondering, Anna still tops the charts on height and weight (20lbs 15oz & 29.5 in.).  AND she has now taken a step twice.  Ahh!

So anyway, the kids are very excited for Christmas.  I had them do some jobs around the house to earn some money so they could get each other some Christmas presents, and they've also been working on some homemade art and cards for loved ones too.  I've been trying to really stress the giving part of Christmas, since the excitement of getting presents doesn't really need any extra emphasis for kids to be excited about it!  It's been nice to see them get into it though.  They helped me wrap presents for people and they wrapped each other's gifts too.  Eli keeps telling me "We can't fit any more presents under the tree!  It's full!"  We've also had a lot of family night lessons about what Christmas is really about, so I hope that's sinking in.

Eli emptying the silverware - he did such a good job, it's becoming a regular job for him. :)

We have our church Christmas program tomorrow that we're all participating in (except Connor and Anna), and we're last-minute putting together a caroling thing with the missionaries for Monday night, and then it's vacation time!  So if I don't blog again before Christmas, I hope you all have a very Merry Christmas!  Love you all!

[Faux] Gingerbread Houses

We decided to decorate gingerbread houses this year.  We did it at my parents' house 2 years ago (thanks to my sister Amy!) and even though Eli was only 2, he really liked it.  I knew he and Connor would love it and we all had a great time being creative.  I went the lazy route and just used graham crackers, but do I feel bad about that?  Not at all. :)  And thanks to Winco's bulk bins we were able to get a large variety of candy without breaking the bank.  It was hard for me to buy all that candy!  But I sucked it up and did it.  As it turns out, the kids ate way more of the pretzels than they did of the candy (by choice) as we were making them.  Happy day.

Here are our masterpieces:

 I helped Connor do his and he just told me where to put the "glue" as they called it, and then he went to town.  I was pretty impressed!  He really liked the jelly beans, can you tell? :)

 And Eli's...I think he added a few more things after I took these pictures.

 Can you guess Eli's favorite color?

 And Jeremy's...he was helping Eli and only finished half of his, but he was okay with that.

 And mine.

 And the whole village...

We had a fun time!  I think we'll definitely do it again next year.

Just a little Elf fun...

(I don't know why they all start playing immediately, just pause them to play one at a time)

And some hip-hop, yo:

Those are some mad dance skillz.

And one last one for the whole family. This is way too much fun...

Enjoy your day!

6 Months and 9 Months

We have officially been in Portland for 6 months.  Crazy!  We moved in 6 months ago today.  It's weird to think we are halfway through our time here.  In another 6 months we will be packing up and heading somewhere else!  But I try not to think about that...

We actually got a little dusting of snow here yesterday.  Apparently a lot of places are experiencing this "major" cold front and our parents in California may even actually get snow today.  Eli was really excited and kept asking when we could go out and make a snowman.  Uh...sorry buddy, there's not that much snow.

Anna is also over 9 months old now!  She's been out longer than she was in.  Here is what she's up to right now:

• She has figured out how to pull the plug protectors out of all the outlets and she goes around taking them out and putting them in her mouth.  The other day I came into the living room to see the boys pretty much wrestling her to get one out of her mouth - they were trying to "protect" her.  Awesome.
• She has figured out how to open drawers and cupboards and now loves taking everything out in the kitchen.
• She also has successfully taken off about half of the bows on our presents under the tree and she gazes at the lights with intense fascination.
• Her favorite spot to hang out is under the kitchen table - she's like a puppy waiting for someone to drop something (it doesn't take long).  
• Anna has been cruising around the furniture for a long time and recently started letting go and standing for a few seconds at a time!  We're afraid she may be walking by Christmas. 
• She smiles with her tongue out constantly.
• She sort of waves sometimes now.  She'll at least hold her hand out when you wave to her.  It's very cute.
• She loves to eat everything - food and non-food.
• She loves her brothers and loves to play with them.  She gets so sad when they go in their room and close the door to play legos.  She sits in the hallway and hits the door and cries. :(

She really is a happy baby and we all love her so much!  She is wearing me out a little bit lately with everything she's into, but she is also getting to be so much fun.  Her little personality is coming out and it's fun to see.  I can't believe she'll be one in less than 3 months!

And here are a few more pictures from Jeremy's phone taken over Thanksgiving...

 Beautiful sunrise as we left Portland Wednesday morning

 Mmmm....pie....

 Grandpa time.

 Grant and Anna.

Thanksgiving! And adventures upon returning home...

We went to my sister Amy's house for Thanksgiving and it was wonderful!  We spent Thanksgiving with them 4 years ago (when Eli was just a baby!) and it was delicious and this year lived up to our memories and expectations. :)

We arrived Wednesday afternoon and were there until Saturday morning.  I felt like I hardly even saw the boys, especially Eli, the whole time we were there.  They were in cousin heaven.  Amy has 6 kids ranging from ages 4 months to 12 yrs, so there were lots of people to help entertain them.  Besides the fact that we were exhausted from staying up too late combined with babies sleeping terribly, we had a really nice time.

Here are some pics:

Thanksgiving breakfast - Russell, Connor, Sydney, and Eli

 Grant with his newest baby sister Elise.  She is a cutie!!

 The kids anxiously awaiting the feast!

 My parents came from California too, so that was nice to see them again!

Jeremy resting after the big meal:

Mmm, pie.  Here's one of SIX pies that were made (2 pumpkin, pecan, apple, berry, and lemon cream).  I know Jeremy got more pictures on his phone, so I'll have to get those later...

On Friday afternoon, Jeremy had some dental work done.  When he was a kid, his older brother Jared shot his tooth out with a BB gun (thanks Jared!) and so he has had an implant in for a long time.  Well, a couple months ago, he bit into a bagel at work and his [fake] tooth fell out.  He knew he would need to get a new one eventually, and we were glad it happened now instead of when we were in school with no dental insurance!  He went to our dentist here and he was able to cement it back in, but he knew he'd need to get it taken care of.

Luckily our wonderful brother-in-law Rob is a dentist who also does implants (ours here doesn't), and so we got the family hook-up and Rob started the process of putting in a new implant.  So he pulled out Jeremy's fake tooth and all that remained of his original tooth, then he drilled in a titanium post I believe.  That has to heal for 4-6 months before he can finish it and attach the post and the new fake tooth, so in the meantime Jeremy gets to wear a "flipper", which is basically a retainer without the metal and with a tooth.  Fun stuff!  It's quite the process, but it will be nice when it's all done.  Thank you Rob!

Then on Saturday, we drove home.  Unfortunately Eli and Connor started getting sick before we left, and then Anna had it while we were there, and I started getting it on Saturday, and poor Jeremy had a bad headache from his tooth ordeal.  So we really all just wanted to be in bed all day, but we made it home in good time and got everyone to bed early, including ourselves.

Then Sunday night around 9pm, the fire alarm went off in the house.  We walked over to the hallway where we heard it and we smelled smoke.  Not good.  Of course we started to panic, especially when we felt the ceiling, which was very warm.  Yikes!  So we ran around the house, trying to find what was burning, making sure the kids were okay, and then Jeremy ran over to our neighbor's house to borrow their ladder so he could get up into our attic, but we still couldn't figure it out!  Finally, we realized something was wrong with the furnace and our heater wasn't working.  We tried to reset it, but when it switched back on the smoke came back, the ceiling heated up again, and the fire alarms went off again.  Our landlord was out of town, so we just shut off the furnace and bundled up for the night.  Then Anna was up coughing at 1am, then two of the smoke detectors were chirping (dying) at 3am, and Jeremy left for a business trip around 5 am this morning, so we'll just say it was a rough night!  Luckily, our landlord sent a guy over today and he was able to fix the furnace.  Hooray!  That is a relief.

So the plans for the rest of the week include staying alive, not burning the house down, getting lots of rest, and laying low until Jeremy gets home.  Sounds good to me!

And the rest of November...

I'll get back into the blogging groove, but for now, here is a quick recap of the rest of our month, mostly through pictures.  I posted twice today, so keep scrolling for the other.

We toured Bob's Red Mill with some friends (and got to meet Bob! He's in the red vest)

 Made a fire in our fireplace!

And roasted a couple marshmallows:

 Bathtime is super fun, especially in the sink!

 Eli is getting quite good and his reading!

And a little taste of our Christmas set-up!

Happy Christmas, er, I mean, Thanksgiving everyone!

Cousin Fun

We got to spend the day with Jeremy's little brother Jonathan and his beautiful family on Saturday.  It was so much fun!  We usually only see them when we're with the whole Nowland clan, so it was nice to have some time with just them.  Their kids are the cutest and it was fun to play with them.  Boston just turned two and Kamryn is just 12 days younger than Anna!

They helped us finish up a project we were working on and other than that we did a lot of playing and eating.  Good times. :)

And sorry the pictures aren't the greatest.  It's really hard to capture decent photos of 5 busy kids ages 4 and under.

 These two played with this thing most of the day.

 Meet Kamryn - cutest giant dimples just like her Mama and tons of hair!

 Meet Boston - aka Uncle Jonathan's mini-me:

 Cute! Connor was really looking forward to Uncle Jon coming and doing his "soccer tricks" like he always does.  "Uncle Jonafan can kick a soccer ball wif his head!  And on his back!"  Very exciting stuff. :)

 Hugs before they left:

Thanks for coming to see us, guys!

Life

Hello.

I don't have anything terrible exciting to share, but it's been awhile, so here are some random thoughts.

• Jeremy was out of town most of last week and it was rough.  The kids and I did a lot (probably too much) and had some fun, but it was hard.  I thought about my sisters whose husbands travel a lot and other wives whose husbands are in the military, but that didn't really make it any easier - it just made me feel bad about feeling like it was hard. Haha. Anyone have any tips for getting through?  He has another trip coming up...

• Speaking of making it through things, I feel like the work week should be 4 days. :)  It gets to be Thursday night and I am ready to pop some popcorn, turn on a movie and veg out (who's with me?).  Obviously I need to toughen up here, people.

• Funny quote from today - Eli: "Mommy, Anna's trying to get in the toilet!" (he was trying to go the bathroom); I come in and she's sitting on the floor: "Did she get up? Did she put her hands in the toilet?" Eli: "No....I handled it....bravely."  Haha, you should have seen the look on his face too.  So proud.

• So I decided to break all my normal rules about not putting Christmas stuff up until after Thanksgiving and the boys and I pulled out the decorations yesterday and turned on the Christmas music. :)  Thanksgiving is really late this year, okay? AND we're going to be in Idaho next week and then we decided to go down to California earlier and be there for Christmas, so we would have only had 3 short weeks to enjoy it all, so I decided November 20th was late enough.  It's not all up, but it's getting there.

• Connor threw his pacifiers in the trash on Saturday and there has been much drama since.  We've been telling him for months he'd have to get rid of them eventually, and I mentioned it again randomly, so he went and threw them away on his own.  Oh boy.  Every nap and night there have been tears mourning the loss of his beloved pacifiers, but it's about time they are gone (he'll be 3 in 4 months!).  Tonight, however, was the first time he hasn't mentioned them.  Hopefully we're turning a corner.

• Christmas gets more and more special each year with the kids getting older.  We don't have a big tree yet, but we set up our little 4 ft one and turned off all the lights in the house tonight and watched the lit-up tree and sang a couple Christmas songs (Away in a Manger & Silent Night).  Eli was really happy and said he felt good and we talked about the special spirit we feel at Christmas time.  It was tender.

So...life is good and life is hard.  Three kids feels like I'm drowning some of the time, but it's good to record these sweet and funny moments so I can re-read them and focus on the good that is happening.  So thank you, blog, and thank you, family and friends, for the outlet.  You're all wonderful!

And now I'm going to go eat some popcorn...

October Wrap-Up

I'm going to lump the rest of the month into this post, so here we go!

First off, I know everyone with kids despises Daylight Savings Time changes, and I get that - my boys woke up at 5 am this morning - but the stars aligned with Anna and she slept 10 hours!!  And I slept 7!!!  That hasn't happened in at least 8 months, but more like 1.5 years.  It was amazing.  I've been letting her cry it out this week because she finally got the last of 4 teeth that were all coming in at the same time on the top and she has been sleeping terribly, so I knew it was time.  And it worked!  I hope it sticks.

But boy, she is sure adorable. :)  She is now 8 months old and she has 8 teeth.  She is definitely an over-achiever.

 We find her in all sorts of placed these days, happy as a clam.

 Another one of our ginormous apples next to a normal-sized one.

 Here are a few pictures from a few weeks ago at our neighborhood park.  I love this place!  Jeremy and I were doing really good for a little while and we were taking turns running/walking in the evenings.  We were both so out of shape, but I finally was able to run 1.4 miles (big accomplishment for me, probably seems really small to some of you!) and Jeremy did 2.  We've been bad this week though because it's been really cold, and now with it getting dark earlier, we're pretty much done.  I'm not dedicated enough to go when it's cold and dark!  Hopefully we can start up again in the Spring.  The loop here at the park is exactly a mile, so we would come here to do it.

 There were a few river otters in the lake!

 These boys have been a little wild lately. They are often wrestling and occasionally I catch them giggling on one of their beds together. :)

 Anna is always happy to get up!

 Connor is getting pretty good at drawing faces!  I always know which ones are his because of the long nose.

 And Anna discovered the piano this week!  She's so cute. And yes, that is Connor running around in his underwear in the background.  It's a party around here, I tell you.  The boys like to pretend they're Mowgli (from Jungle Book) and they run around in their underwear.

And that's a wrap!  I can't believe it's November already.  I'm excited though.  Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday and we're looking forward to starting some of our own traditions this holiday season since the kids are getting a little older and we'll be home for Christmas for the first time.  We feel very blessed these days.  It's a good life!