My Baby is 10!

This year we celebrated Mariah's birthday a little differently. Since we are going to Utah in a few weeks she decided she would rather celebrate with her cousins. It is the first year in a long time that she has not had a party with her friends so it was strange. Anyway, we went to Disney On Ice the day before her birthday and she took her friend Brooke with us. It was a fun show and Gabriella actually held still for the first time her life as she watched. Of course that lasted about 15 minutes, but those 15 were awesome!
On her actual birthday we had a family party at home. Joshua was SO hyper all day anticipating the whole thing! I thought I was going to have to toss him in the snow to get him to chill 0ut a bit, but we survived and I was glad he was so excited for her. He said the prayer for dinner that night and among other things he asked that Mariah's birthday would be beautiful, pretty, and lovely and just a little bit wiggly. I guess we had told him more than a few times to stop bouncing off the walls all day. Needless to say we had a hard time not laughing as he finished praying. Samantha made the birthday poster for her that is on the wall. Mariah is lucky to have siblings that are so happy about her birthday.

Mariah is a beautiful girl, who we love so much. She is an amazing big sister who loves protects her siblings. They all trust her and go to her when they need help or in Joshua's case if I tell him no about something he just says he will ask Mariah to get it for him. She is also a fabulous student and I couldn't be more proud of her. We are so lucky to have had this little girl with us for 10 years! I cannot believe how fast the time has gone, but I am excited to see what the next 10 years has in store for her! Hopefully it will not go as quickly as the first 10 and of course I am sure we will just sail through the teen years without a glitch:) Happy Birthday Buggy! We love you!!!!!

Thanks for the cute pj's aunt Christy!

After our family celebration Mariah gave each of us a ring with a cute letter rolled up in it. She is so thoughtful!

There is nothing like Christmas morning!!!

Mariah has been asking for a desk for the longest time and we are so glad Santa brought one for her. I don't think we would have lasted another year listening to her begging. She is a delight and love her enthusiasm!

Samantha got the annoying toy of the year. The baby that cries and makes all kinds of cooing sounds! It is actually not that bad because Samantha manages to keep her pretty happy, although we do get shushed a lot in order to keep the baby asleep. She is a good little mommy!
Gabriella loved to play with pretty much everything else except her own gifts. Here she is proudly wearing Daddy's new snow boots. Daddy said she had better not play with anything other than her new kitchen because we happen to know it took Santa almost 4 hours to assemble! Luckily once the obstacle course full of boxes, packaging, wrapping paper and toys were removed from the room she was able to spend plenty of time cooking at her new kitchen. I am sure Santa was happy about that!
Tough boy Joshua was very surprised by his new 4 wheeler. I am a little nervous because he had recently looked at pictures on our friends blog of the husband doing all kinds of crazy stunts on his ATV. I hope Joshua isn't too sad when his barely reaches 4-5 miles an hour. I just have to make sure there are no hills around that he can turn into jumps. (thanks a lot Dale!) I am ready for that yet! After all the gifts were open, Joshua kept asking me if I was sure there were not any other gifts hiding somewhere. He wanted me to make sure I got all the packages out of the closet. I think he needs a reality check and to get a little less greedy. But, if there is any time in life that you can get away with being a little greedy it would be a 4 year old at Christmas! We will keep working on him...
We hope you all had a wonderful, magical Christmas! The New Year is right around the corner and we can't wait to see what it brings!

And, just think, only 362 more days until it is Christmas again:)

Christmas Eve 2008

There is just something about snuggly new pajamas on excited kids that just screams Christmas Eve to me! We had such a sweet, calm Christmas Eve. We came home from sledding, ate cinnamon toast and hot chocolate, and gathered in the living room for the nativity story. This year we took the advice of President Eyring and even though we don't have enough family members for all the parts we made due. The kids loved finding random bathrobes and crowns for the play. I think Gabriella and I were more princess than wise men in our pink and purple sparkly crowns, but Joshua was a the perfect Shepherd watching over his little sheep tucked into his robe pocket. Mariah was a very caring Mary, and Samantha was our angel holding her star high to guide us all. Kris was the narrator as well as Joseph and we all enjoyed the Christmas story one last time for this season. We sang a few carols and enjoyed the lights of our tree.

The kids exchanged gifts with each other. They had picked out the gifts themselves and I loved watching the face of the giver as he or she anticipated what reaction the receiver of their gift would have. It was so special. Kris and I gave the kids pjs and bathrobes and the kids pretty much stripped down right there and got in their cozy things. The kids got all settled down in Joshua's room and actually went to sleep pretty easily. Sledding did it's job!

I hate to see Christmas come to an end, but it was a wonderful night and I was excited for the kids the next day!

Snowman Challenge

A couple of weeks ago we challenged our fellow bloggers to a snowman building challenge. Well, so far the Haymore family is the only ones to successfully complete the challenge. Others (MindyMindy) tried, but had snowball forming failures. Perfect snow is a necessity. Keep trying! The Haymore's are now the ones to beat. They did have a little extra muscle power thanks to a few extra family members, but none the less they are the new winner. So, get building and knock them out of first spot!

Sledding on Christmas Eve

These posts might be a little out of order, but at least they are here. On Christmas Eve when most people are rushing about to get to family parties or dinners we were at home thinking of a way to have some fun, get out of the house, and most importantly--wear out the kids. So we headed out sledding. We heard of a great hill not too far away and grabbed our disks and went. It was a great hill, just right for the kids to be able to climb, but long enough to make the climb worth your while. It was not too cold so we were all happy!


The only bad part of the night was that Kris had the great idea to push me really hard down the hill and spin me at the same time. Off I went, spinning a billion times before I finally bailed and tipped myself over. I get motion sickness really easily so why either one of us thought this was a good idea is beyond me! I was ill for a couple of hours afterwards, I will not be spinning down any hills in the future!

Our plan was successful, we had fun, got out of the house, and got a little Christmas energy out of the kids!

Graham crackers, candy, and frosting...

Kris and I had plans to go out on a date tonight, but we got so much snow today it made leaving the house nearly impossible and very undesirable. So, what was supposed to be a night out turned into a night in. The kids have been waiting very patiently for a chance to make gingerbread houses and tonight proved to be a great opportunity.

Joshua was in a bit of a hurry for his to dry so he hooked up his trusty little fan to speed things along. It was actually great idea. For such a rough and tumble little boy he was very careful and precise with his building skills.
Mariah wished we could have made bigger ones, but maybe next year...
Samantha's little house was a bit stubborn and didn't really want to stay upright, but in the end she made a darling little cottage.
I don't know what to say about Gabriella during the whole process. First, she pulled the empty egg carton off the counter that still had the shells and yolks from the eggs I was using to make the frosting and dumped the yolks all down her shirt--yuck! Second, she climbed on the table and tried to dance on every one's house. I finally resorted to putting her in her high chair, and giving candy as she grunted and pointed to the one she wanted. She knows how to enjoy a party. Seriously, I think I am the worst mom ever. And yes, she did eventually throw up a bunch of the candy she ate:) Fun times...

Now that is a Snowman!!!

If you are going to go to all the trouble of building a snowman you might as well do it big! The kids and Kris had so much fun tonight building a huge snowman. Gabriella and I enjoyed the scene from the living room window. It is too bad there wasn't a lot of snow so he is a little dirty.

Here is our challenge to each of you:

Build a snowman bigger and better than ours and post it on your blog. Then leave a link to your blog on our comments so we can see what you came up with. Be creative, have fun and feel free to pass on the challenge to any one else you think would like to join in on the fun. We even gave you a few hints on how to put the body parts together if you are short on muscle power:) Happy building...