New Years Eve

We spent New Years Eve with our friends the Lennox's.  We had our traditional chocolate fondue and lots of good snacks at their house.  We played a game with all the kids and then put on a movie for the kids while the adults played Settlers of Catan. At 9:00 we headed outside to ring in the New Year. I had brought over some party hats and horns and Tara broke out their pots and spoons.  Lydia and Jared were both pretty tired so we went back inside and packed up our stuff to go home. Jared had a small cold Monday and Tuesday and Lydia picked it up yesterday so she was pretty sad and tired by then. She held herself together pretty well considering.  We never did get around to drinking our Martinelli's and will have to do that with our dinner tonight.  We got Jared and Lydia to bed right around 10:00 and they fell right to sleep. Mark and I stayed up a little later but not quite to midnight.

 Poor Lydia

2014 was a pretty fun year for our little family.  We were able to visit so much family and experience so many new things.  We are looking forward to seeing what Virginia is like the rest of the year but these first 5 months have been really great. Yesterday afternoon we met with a loan officer to get pre approved to buy a house in 2015!  It's going to be a great year!

UVA Men's Basketball

Let's Go Hoos!

A few weeks ago I got an email from UVA's Cavman's crew saying that tickets for a men's basketball game would be on sale for 10 dollars.  It was a Tuesday night game starting at 6:00 instead of 7:30 and it was during Mark's time off from school so we decided to go.  Jared and Lydia had a great time. I can't think of anything we have done that is similar to this.  I think they were surprised at how large a room they were going into and how many people were there. UVA was really slow the first half but picked up the pace and the second half was really fun.  They ended up winning and maintaining their perfect record (so far).  Sadly conference games start next week so that record is probably about to be broken but fun for them to have a strong start to their season. Lydia had a great time clapping and cheering for the team. I asked Jared if he thought he would ever want to play basketball and he said yes and that he was going to go to UVA. We shall see. Lydia got a little stir crazy about 5 minutes into the second half so she and I went on a few laps around the empty halls of the arena.  It helped her be able to make it to the end of the game.  I know Jared would love to go to another game Lydia probably would too. They both seem to be fighting a little cold so hopefully they will get a good nights sleep and we can party it up with friends tomorrow for New Years, can't believe another year is finishing!

Christmas!

Lydia took off the last link! It's Christmas!

 I think Jared sort of forgot about it in his excitement to check out his stocking. 

We had a fun Christmas together. One of the added perks of having Jared and Lydia open a toy on Christmas Eve is that it gives them something new to play with in the morning so they are not up super early wanting to go downstairs.  Our kids are always up early but yesterday we didn't hear them until 7:30.  They came into our room and we sang some Christmas Carols and watched the Nativity video from LDS bible videos. We then headed downstairs to open stockings. I feel like our stockings were the best ones we have had yet.  After stockings we had Lydia go find her scavenger hunt present.  The first clues for each kid were in their stockings. She got her clues right away and when she found her present, a set of Tinkerbell and her friends fairies she said," I knew this is what I wanted!" Cute girl.  Then Jared went on his scavenger hunt.  We made him read his clues so I don't think it was as fun for him because it took longer but he figured it out.  After we started I thought that we (well really I am the one who wanted him to do read them) should have waited one more year and he would have liked it more but in the end he was thrilled with his present.  It was in our dryer and he was thrilled to receive Captain Hook's Jolly Roger (from Jake and the Neverland Pirates) 

After stockings and the scavenger hunt we ate breakfast. Jared and Lydia played happily while we baked our orange rolls and heated up some hot chocolate. I love orange rolls. While I was visiting with my siblings at home my Mom was asking what each of us did Christmas morning and Susanna, Davin and I all still eat the same orange rolls we always had growing up in Yuba City. Katie and Derek might too I am not sure. It is such a yummy and easy Christmas breakfast!

Then it was time for presents. We originally panned on having Jared pass out the presents and then we would take turns opening them but once Jared found his second pirate ship he just wanted to play with it, he didn't even want to open more presents. We kept interrupting him. He really loves pirates and his Christmas presents reflected that pretty well.  Mark's bother Steve sent them scooters and Lydia finally got her castle.  Every time she would open a present she would say "It's my castle!"  Silly girl it was actually the last gift she opened.  My Mom sent her a cute outfit that for whatever reason she absolutely loved!  As soon as she pulled it out of the box she started putting on the pants right over her pajamas. She was so excited. It was hilarious.  After she got them on and I put the coat on her she ran into the kitchen to get her chapstick and play phone. I guess she needed accessories to complete the look.

 He still had quite a few presents to open but this is all he wanted to do.  Later that night he even commented to me how he just wanted to play with his ships and we made him open his presents. So rude of us!

After we finished opening the presents we played some more then went out front to try out the new scooters. It was a really nice day so after naps we went over to Riverview Park to ride bikes. Lydia and Jared are both really good now so when we go Mark and I go in exercise clothes and just jog along with them. (Its a paved path) It's pretty great.

 Jared was so surprised that I let him go ride in his pajamas. 

We came home and got ready to eat dinner.  Mark was going to grill some Tri- tip. I had already made the rolls while they were sleeping and we had some funeral potatoes. Mark went to turn on the grill and found out we had no propane. It was almost a Christmas dinner catastrophe.  We called one neighbor to see if we could just use their grill but they did not have a propane grill so we started looking up gas stations. Fortunately we found a gas station that was open and sold propane. While Mark was picking up the propane I had Jared and Lydia take their bath so we would be ready for bed after dinner.

While we were waiting for the tri tip to cook Jared kept asking if he could just go to bed. We told him that as soon as we ate he could.  He had very little energy. He had not taken a nap that afternoon, just played with his toys. We figured that and eating a small lunch and riding his bike so much just made him super tired.  He ate some dinner and then happily went to bed. Then at like 10:30 he started crying.  I went to go check on him and he said he was scared he was going to throw up. I took him into the bathroom and told him I would be back with a throw up bowl.  He drank some water, and laid down then right after I laid back down he threw up.  Poor kid.  We had him sleep in our room so he didn't wake up Lydia and he did not get a great nights sleep. He didn't throw up again but has no appetite and is super lethargic.  He doesn't want to play or anything just lay round. I hope he feels better soon.

We did have a Merry Christmas and are looking forward to 2015.  Some of our big plans for next year include:  buying a house (we met with a realtor Friday before I flew out to CA), moving into a house, Jared starting kindergarten, (!!!) me starting a small 2 day a week preschool for older 3 yr olds, (Lydia's age basically) and making it to the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in NYC.  Should be a fun year!

Christmas Eve

We spent Christmas Eve day doing a few fun fun learning times and made one quick stop at the store. 

Since I had been gone Mark had been doing Lydia's hair.  When we were getting ready this morning I asked her is she wanted me or Daddy to do her hair and she chose Mark. I was happy she did because I think Dad's doing a little girls hair is so sweet and I wanted to see it. 

We spent Christmas Eve with our friends the Lennox's. We were planning on going caroling with them and some other families in the ward but it was kind of rainy and they were going in an open trailer so we decided to skip it.  I was so tired all day since I had gotten in so late the night before.  We had a delicious dinner and then watched Joy To The World and read the Nativity.  Tara and Tom have some older girls so they drew pictures of scenes from the nativity so as Tom read it he would stop and have someone pick the picture that went with that part of the story. It was a fun way to get the kids involved.  We enjoyed visiting and then came home.

We got Jared and Lydia ready for bed and read Twas the Night Before Christmas.  We then put our last ornament on our Christ Tree (http://25daysofchrist.com) and did a gift exchange between Jared and Lydia. Mark had come up with this idea and it was very sweet. We had taken them each shopping earlier in the month and had them pick out a gift.  They were super excited. It was funny because they didn't remember what they had gotten each other so it was a surprise for them too.  Earlier in the day Lydia kept saying "I didn't get brother a gift..." but she did.

Each ornament had to do with a part of Christ's teachings/life and had scriptures and video clips and quotes to use to discuss them.  It was hard this year because we started late (because we had to paint them) but it worked out.

Then we put Jared and Lydia to bed and Lydia stayed up till at least 10:00, crazy girl. We filled stockings and went to bed.

2014 Best Christmas Lights Award

 This is the house we wanted to give it to.  Sadly they were not home. We looked in the windows (in a non creepy way) and the inside of their house looked beautiful too!

So we gave it to this house. 

We never know what kind of reaction we will get when we plan on handing out this award.  This year was sort of a downer.  We picked this house and when we walked up to it we saw them backing out of their car. So instead of walking up to the house and giving it we gave it to them through the car window.  This would have been fine but as we handed it over (to the wife who was very appreciative) asked who we were with we said "no one it was just our family" and she thanked us (very nicely) and said her husband who put up the lights was in the shower.  She said he had won several times in the past and would be happy to get this one when he didn't even do as many as he normally did. It just really didn't go how we expected it to (much like our Christmas caroling).  The point of the award is to give to someone who just likes lights and put them up for fun not someone who has like experience competing!  Oh well.  Their lights were pretty and we did enjoy driving around seeing the lights. We will see what happens next year.  She was very kind about it and was happy to get it and said her kids would enjoy the candy.  Jared and Lydia loved seeing the lights, drinking their hot chocolate and having their blankets with them outside of the house. We drove all over town trying to find the right house. We just couldn't find one in other neighborhoods. I need to remember that it goes better when we focus on one area not all over the place and to just pick one before it gets too late.  It appears that candles in every window is a much bigger deal than lots of lights.  Most houses had a candle in each window which we saw a little of in Colorado but nowhere near as much as here. We may jump on that band wagon when we have a house here. It was also really common to have matching wreaths on every window too it was pretty and fun to see something different.