these two....

After many (MANY) weeks of my children being sick. I feel as though I need to remember the things I love about them since all they are capable off right now is crying and whining. It's a good thing we are on the tail end of this crap (hopefully)

SAM

*He is always good to give you a big smile, as long as the attention is on him!
*The past two nights he has slept extremely well. Only woke up once each night!
*He is so cute how he crawls (army crawls) around to get to what he wants.
*He is definitely a determined little boy and won't quit at something until he succeeds.
*He is so curious, I love to watch him. He looks at everything around him. You can almost see his brain at work!
*He loves Carly. He is always watching her (and taking mental notes) He follows her around in his walker. He loves is, but she hates it!
*He laughs so hard when you tickle him.
*When I go to get him after he has been asleep he always smiles and gets way excited!
*His big blue eyes!
*He loves bath time. He'll splash his hand in the water, he'll get his face wet and freak out and then he'll do it all over again!
*Whenever I am holding him, he'll constantly try to grab my face. He loves my hair and will sometimes grab around my neck and slobber me all on my cheek. A baby's kiss is the best kind of kiss!

CARLY

*whenever she is Hungry she says to me "I hungry Babe."
*When Swiper the Fox shows up on Dora the Explorer she says "I scared" and hides her face.
*She is such a good little mommy to her dolls. She always makes sure they are covered with a blanket and she tells them not to be scared.
*Whenever Sam is sleeping shes says (in a really quiet voice) "shhhh...Sam sweeping, be very very quiet."
*When she gives you a hug she has to pat your back.
*She sleeps through the night!
* When she wakes up from her nap she yells "Danette!" ( i know, I shouldn't encourage that, but it's cute!)
*After her nap she always says "I had good nap mommy"
*When we are doing something that she thinks is dangerous she says "Careful sweetheart!"
*In the car recently she will tell us to either slow down or go faster.
* I catch her playing out scenes from Dora the Explorer.
*When Chad leaves for work she yells to him as he is walking out the door. "love you, see you later."
*She'll pretend that she goes to work and she walk away from us and say "Bye-bye, see you later, I'll be back."
*She's good to clean up all her toys. I think that is her OCD kicking in.
*When she does something on accident she says "oops, sorry. Didn't mean to."
She definitly keeps me laughing!

F-O-U-R

That's right. Four years of marriage TODAY! I'm so glad that I married my best friend!

Top left- A year after we started dating. yes, we look like geeks!

Top Right- On our honeymoon in Sedona, AZ

Bottom Left- This was taken on our trip while moving to Texas

Bottom Right- Obviously on a rollercoaster our first year of marriage.

Happenings

Here's a couple things of what we've been up to....

First (even though he won't be seeing this) I wanted to wish my little Brother a happy birthday! He's 21 (which is hard for me to believe, aren't I 21?) He is serving a mission in Georgia and will be home the end of April. We are so proud of the great job he is doing there and we can't wait to see him!

That's right. It's a Possum as big as our cat, in our driveway. We think it lives in the bushes in front of our house.

A rare moment where Carly was actually playing nice with Sam.

Playing with Daddy's feet.

Playing with Daddy's toy helicopter. It's hard to see it in the pictures but the kids (and Daddy) love it!

8 Months old!

I love the total look of concentration in the lower right picture. He wanted to get the leaves so bad!
Sam turned 8 months old yesterday! I can't believe it, he'll be crawling and walking before I know it! With Carly it felt like she was a baby for an eternity, but with Sam it has gone by way too fast! He is such a fun little guy. He loves to smile and now he's getting into exploring everything around him. You can practically see his brain working when he finds something new! He doesn't quite crawl yet but he can turn in circles on the floor and roll so he gets where he needs to go. He loves to cruise around in his walker. I love how all of our downstairs is tile or wood, it makes it really fun for him because he can go everywhere!!

Happy Birthday!

We hope you have a good one!

Baby Hungry?

More like Kitten hungry.

(This was taken back in 2005, our first "children")

Hello 2009

Here's a little of what we've been up to since the new year. A lot of nothing. We've just been hanging around the house, relaxing, enjoying life. Other than small bouts of sickness that we seem to be passing to each other, we are all doing pretty great! I never really used to make resolutions but ever since I had Carly I began making resolutions. (don't know why I started then) Anyway...my resolutions for this year are pretty simple but hopefully they will make a difference in my life. The reason for blogging about them is hopefully it will motivate me to keep them since I'm sharing it with everyone.
*spend more time playing and enjoying being with my children. I get caught up in stupid things and I forget that the most important job in my life is to raise my children. One of the perks of raising children is you get to play with them. They are both at such fun stages right now that I need to take advantage of that and enjoy being a mom.
* stick to our budget and my cleaning routine. This was a resolution last year and I'm proud to say that I did pretty well with both of them (except for the cleaning part when I was prego and right after Sam was born)
*Spend more time outside. For so long we were in an apartment or in a rental house that had a crappy backyard I forget that we have a perfect yard at our house. The weather is so nice here about 90% of the time that I need to spend more time outside. Plus, the kids love it!
* read more. Chad probably thinks I already read to much but I enjoy it and I feel like I don't do enough of it.
Well...there you have it. Like I said, they are simple but hopefully they will make a difference in my life this coming year.

On a side note, Carly is about 85% potty trained. She has only had a couple of accidents. We still put pull-ups on her when we go out (we tell her they are panties) Last night at Applebees she stayed dry and went potty twice while we were there. She even woke up dry this morning and went potty! I am so excited. Hopefully within a couple weeks she'll be 100% potty trained!


Here's a little video of Sam and Skipper. Sam LOVES to watch skipper. I am glad we have a dog that is so good with kids!

America's Funniest Home Videos

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z_LHlSPNdj0

We saw this on America's funniest home vidoes and thought it was hilarious!

I love these two!

For any of you who know my children, you know how rare it is for them to be still, I made sure to capture it with a picture!

Videos

Once again I can't get videos to upload on this so here are the URL's.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e7R5glp_mso - This was Christmas day and my In-Law's house. They had a ton of good food and had dancing in their barn!. It was great!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Msh--VfUIiA -This was part of our Nativity scene. It was pretty funny!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v2oJUcMdDdU - I love this one!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bXBGafu9UVo - This was Christmas morning (obviously)

Christmas Fun!

Christmas Eve

We read the Christmas story from the bible and had the kids do a Nativity scene. Carly and Adam were Mary and Joseph. (Chad was the donkey)

Jesus Supper

It's a tradition in Daniel and Alycia's family to have a Jesus Supper on Christmas eve. They make foods that Jesus would have eaten and they eat on the floor by candlelight. It was pretty yummy.

Christmas Morning

Uncle Bobby and Sam

Carly loved Uncle Ron and Cheri's bird. Yes, she tried to poke at the eyes.

Uncle Frank pushing the kids on the swing. They loved it!

Sam was pooped by the end of the day!

Videos will be coming soon.

week in review

Sunday: Took family picture, relaxed.

(Sam loves Skipper)

Saturday: We had a Christmas party at our house. Only in Texas can you swim in December without freezing your butt off. (except today it dropped to 45 degrees, i know boo-hoo) We heated the pool to around 94 degrees. So, it was practically a hot tub you could swim around in. Very nice! Some of the pictures aren't that great because the pool was steaming so much!

The kids enjoying a Christmas movie while the adults chatted and played games.

Friday: Made Christmas cookies and Caramel (actually the caramel was on Saturday) Carly had more fun licking the dough than helping me make them! I had to make the traditional Chocolate Chews (cookies) and homemade Caramel that my mom always made. Brings back good memories that I want to make with my children.

Monday: Chad surprised me with an early Christmas present. Ever since we moved to Texas (3 years ago. Wow) We have always wanted a fish tank. Chad and I have had one ever since we dated. I took them while he left on his mission (they all died off one by one.) When we got married we replenished the tank and those same fish (3 of them) are now living with my sister. Anyway...our dream finally came true when Chad's uncle was getting rid of his tank. Let me just say thank you to Uncle Ron.

sleep

Last night I went to bed around 10:45ish and didn't open my eyes until 6:00 this morning. That hasn't happened in 7 months! No babies crying, no headache, no snoring from my husband. Just a long night of blissful slumber! I am in a VERY good mood today!

For all of you crazy Twilight fans :)

Go here.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

Here's what we've been up to...

First of all...my baby turned 7 months old on the 12th! Can you believe it?!? He is definitely showing signs of growing up. He rolls over all the time now, he can almost sit up by himself. He loves to grab EVERYTHING that is put in front of him. He loves to watch and laugh at Carly and Carly loves the attention. He has a MAJOR temper. I didn't realize babies could have such bad tempers. Don't be deceived by his sparkling blue eyes, when this kid gets mad he wants to let the whole neighborhood know! Lets just say I am not looking forward to his terrible two's!
Christmas Craft

I've decided to make it a tradition to have the kids paint/make their own ornament. This year was the first year since Carly is old enough now to actually get the idea of painting. It may look tacky having all these homemade ornaments on our tree but it will definitely be worth the memories! Carly had so much fun painting and decorating her ornament. She loves painting so much that it didn't stop when the ornament was all finished. :)

Oh Christmas Tree

We finally decided to go out and get a Christmas tree. We kept debating on whether or not to get one this year because a.)we were too lazy b.)we didn't want to spend the money and c.) we didn't want to try and keep Carly away from the tree every second of the day. But we broke down and picked one up on Saturday. Carly liked helping hang the ornaments and the "jingle bells" (which is her new favorite song by the way) Sam loves to just stare at the lights.

Gingerbread House
Tonight was the night we made a gingerbread house. I bought the kit on Friday but haven't had the time to do it until tonight. Carly thought she was in heaven! I was letting her play with Candy. She had more fun eating the candy and breaking the candy canes then she did decorating. The picture below is not staged by the way. She actually took a bite of the house? I seriously have never seen her so excited about something!

One of those days...

Have you ever woke up in the morning and found that Patience is nowhere to be found?

I have.

Thanksgiving fun!

There are a lot of pictures in this post so have fun! We spent Thanksgiving in Utah this year. We decided to drive rather than fly because of price differences and I have to say wasn't that bad! Our kids did extremely well and there were no major meltdowns which is always a plus! It took us about 23 hours one way so there was a lot of time spent in the car but with the help from Dora the explorer, Elmo and lots of books we made it!
We ate Thanksgiving dinner at my Mom's parents house this year! It bring back so many memories eating at their house! We came up with a good way to keep off those extra pounds after shoving our faces full of food! Everyone seemed to get in on the action! I have to give props to my mom who is freakishly strong! Way to go racquetball!

Sam was well loved! He got plenty of hugs and kisses while he was there! As you can tell, he loves the camera!

More pictures from our Thanksgiving feast! Carly slept through most of it but woke up in time to try some turkey and potatoes.

While we were in SLC I thought we'd get Carly's hair cut! She needed one desperately! My cousin Leslie manages Cookie Cutters. It is a really cute place for kids to get haircuts. Carly loved it and did pretty well at holding still! Thanks Leslie for the cute haircut!

We celebrated birthdays while we were there. Chad's birthday fell on Thanksgiving this year which is kind of fun! I surprised him with some fishing lures that he wanted. I guess you know were getting old when things like that can excite you! We enjoyed some birthday ice cream with family.

We had so much fun! It was sad to come home. I love visiting my family, especially around the Holidays. We got home last night around 10:00 (a little later than plan due to some Thanksgiving traffic) It was nice to be at home and sleep in our own bed! Now.......on to Christmas!

videos

For some reason I can't get my videos from You Tube onto my blog and I don't feel like trying to download them again onto something different so here are the URLs just in case your interested in watching some cute kids :)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lvgW2k659wc Carly and Sam
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QZPkcULsqS0 Carly reading a book
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lJEQwfO6KSk Carly singing in the car
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R28laGelvvw Carly and her Pumpkin

Half A Year!

Our little Sambo is 6 months old today! Man, time sure flies! He is such a fun little guy (when he is happy) He is very easy to get a smile from, he loves to give you kisses and hugs! He loves to pull my hair and suck on his fists. He has found his voice and loves to use it by screaming like a girl, to the point where I think my ears will explode. He eats like a horse, I didn't know a little baby could eat so much, but it seems like he is constantly wanting food. I'm sure it'll be no time at all before he is scooting himself around and getting himself into trouble!