Here comes Santa Claus!

Here is the traditional picture with Santa. Jade is a very smiley kid, but we have a hard time getting her to smile for the camera.

Can I just say, though, this was one of the best Santa's we have seen. His beard was real and so was his tummy.

2 already!

So even though I am a little late I just wanted to post about Jade's 2nd birthday. I can't believe she turned 2 already. Time flies when you're having fun. We celebrated with family several times and she is loving all her new stuff. We are so glad Jade is in our lives and feel very blessed because of it.

Jade around 3 weeks old.

Jade now at 2!

Thanksgiving

Cody's school had a Thanksgiving celebration today and he got to dress up like a Native American. They some songs to sing for the parents so I put a video of that on here too!





We can't have a post without mentioning Jade too. She has started to take some steps on her own. Unfortunately we never seem to be able to time it right to get a video, so this is the best we have gotten so far.

Halloween (a little late)

As always we are late with our blog entry, but hopefully our cute kids make up for it. Anyway, we had a great Halloween celebration. It included a party at Jade's therapist's office, a party at Cody's school, carving our pumpkin, Trunk or Treat at church, and Trick or Treating around our neighborhood.

Davey Crockett

Our little Penguino

Scott made us this great breakfast on Halloween morning including: blood juice, "finger" sausage links, brains (green eggs), and pumpkin pancakes.

Trick or Treating at Grandma and Poppy's!

Trunk or Treat

Trick or Treating in our own neighborhood for the first time!

The LOOT

Mmmm...

Now on to Thanksgiving!

Finished Product

So it was supposed to be a simple project. I went to Home Depot to order new counter tops for our kitchen. I was informed that because of the age of our stove top that if I didn't replace it now and it broke later the new stove top would not fit in the same spot with the new counter tops. So I decided to buy a new stove top. However, the cost of a new stove top was the same as the cost of buying a new range and oven unit. So, why not? We went with the new complete oven. Also with the new counter tops it was a must to have all appliances in place that we wanted. When we bought the house there was no dishwasher and that is definitely on our "must have" list. So the dishwasher was also purchased. In order to make room for the new stove and dishwasher we would need a new sink too. Now the question was what to do with the space where the old oven was. We originally thought that we would just use some of the old cabinet doors that we were losing to make that space into cabinets, but in the end we thought it would be a better use of space to have more counter top space. In comes my Dad (Jack) to the rescue. He saved us a bundle by doing our remodel for us. And after two weeks of hard labor we have a finished product with only minor cosmetic things left to do. Thank you so much DAD!

BEFORE

AFTER

We really feel it turned out beautiful and are so happy with our "new kitchen".

Milestones

Okay, so I know I'm really late posting this, but better late than never. Cody started preschool about 2 weeks ago. So far he loves it and is making lots of new friends.

Jade had her own milestone too! We got this pediatric treadmill for her about a month ago. She was scared of it at first, but now loves it. So this is Jade walking, yay!

On the Move!

Look out world here she comes! Jade has gotten really good at crawling now and she can even go up the stairs. Our next home improvement project is safety proofing our house.

Typical Girl Room

So after months of hard work Jade's room is nearly completed. We moved her in over the weekend and she seems to love it ;). We painted it white on top and pink on bottom with a butterfly and flower border. We also had wall to wall carpet installed that is a very light pink color. Nothing like pink and butterflies for the "girl" room.

The border

This was one of my favorite parts of the house. The previous owner built a cedar closet in this room.

The Wait is OVER!!

Okay, so I know I promised pictures of the house a long time ago and haven't delivered. When we moved I somehow lost our memory card for our camera and have been procrastinating buying a new one in the hopes that I would find the old one. But finally last night I broke down and bought one (mostly because I found this fantastic deal and couldn't pass it up). So here are some of the rooms in our new house:

Living Room

Living Room again. Sorry it's so dark, I couldn't get the flash to work.

The office that is currently Jade's room until we finish hers.


Office again.

Master bedroom

Cody's Room

He picked out the border and the colors. Of course they are his favorites, green and animals.

Here is a close-up of what Cody's border looks like.

I will post some more pictures when those rooms are presentable ;).

Yellowstone Part 2

When we were on one of our walks we decided to take a girls picture. I think it turned out cute.

After just a girls picture Cody really wanted to take just a boys picture.

Jade is so cute in this pic that I couldn't leave it out.

After we camped in Yellowstone for a few days we were ready for hot showers and comfortable beds. Some family friends of mine (Becca) let us stay in there cabin that is just outside of West Yellowstone. Isn't it beautiful?

This is the best game ever, Ticket to Ride!

The cabin was on a lake so we were able to go canoeing too!

After the cabin we had a very pleasant and uneventful ride home. It was such a wonderful vacation and we are so happy that Scott's family could spend it with us.

Stay tuned for pictures of our new house. I promise they are coming it just took us some time to find our camera and our batteries.

Yellowstone

So after Scott's brother's wedding we headed out to Yellowstone for 4 days. About 2.5 hours into the drive up we got a flat tire (on my in-laws mini-van). Sounds simple enough, but the last time there was a flat tire a professional changed it and did something to the lug-nuts so we couldn't get them off. Anyway, 3 hours later, AAA, and a new tire we were back on the road again. We first stopped at Grand Teton National Park and hiked around Jenny Lake. It had been raining all morning, cleared up just in time for our hike and then started hailing when we were yards away from finishing our hike. Talk about luck.

Grand Teton
Jenny Lake

We left the Teton's during the storm and continued to Yellowstone. We camped right in the park at Grant Village. When we were setting up our tent we discovered that most of the sleeping bags had gotten wet in the trailer we were pulling. But after that one wet and cold night the weather cleared up, our sleeping bags dried out and everything was wonderful.

The first day we saw Old Faithful...

...and saw lots of these.

Mmm...s'mores.

Cody was so excited to see some wildlife.

We took a beautiful walk to see this...

"The Grand Canyon" of Yellowstone

More pictures to come of our Yellowstone trip!

The Wedding

So we just got back from our trip to Utah for Scott's brother's wedding. Thought I would post some pics that came out cute!

Cousins walking to the Temple.

All the cousins together.

What a cute family!

Stay tuned for pictures of our trip to Yellowstone National Park.