Temple Square

After we had our gingerbread houses done and our family picture we headed down to Trolley Square. My brothers family wanted to see the light at Temple Square and so we decided to just do our traditional night of seeing the lights early this year so they could be with us! We usually see the lights then do dinner but we switched it up this year and went to the Spaghetti Factory first! It was fun to have my whole family there minus Spencer who is on his mission! We enjoyed a yummy dinner. The food that night tasted so good to us! We enjoyed it and one another's company! We then left and headed to temple square. We thought parking in City Creek would be a great idea. Well we were wrong we spent half of our free hour trying to find a spot to park! It was a joke and quite a mess in that parking garage! We finally found and spot and were on our way! It was actually really a warm night which was nice, it is usually freezing! It was nice to go earlier as well since I can still zip my coat up! It was actually quite hilarious once we got to temple square because the other million people that live in Salt Lake thought it would be a nice night to go as well. It was hard to enjoy and see the lights because we were just trying to make it down the sidewalk. Poor Andrew was a trooper trying to push our double stroller around but it was nice to not have the kids get lost in the sea of people or stepped on. We only lasted about an hour and then headed to Deseret Book and to see the fountains and candy windows! Although it was really crowded we are glad my brother's family was able to be with us!

The one and only picture we were able to get while there, that is the Assembly Hall in the background!

As we were leaving to get in our car we spotted this Ferrari parked next to us. I don't know who was crazy enough to take their really expensive car into that mess of a parking garage that night but they were brave! The kids thought it was so cool!

Gingerbread Houses

It has been tradition in my family to make gingerbread houses the weekend after Thanksgiving for as long as I can remember! We haven't been able to do it for probably 4 or 5 years since we weren't living here. This was a first for all the grand kids and so my mom really wanted to make it happen! We got together Saturday morning and had a big breakfast of pancakes, bacon, and eggs and then got to work on our houses. My mom made all the houses a few weeks earlier and just froze the pieces. She made the two girls their own houses to decorate and they were in heaven! It was fun to watch them use their imaginations and creativity and see what they did! I put ours together and then by that time Andrew was finally off work and came and helped me decorate it!

Poor Tyler was not feeling well that day and fell asleep in the chair like this!

Quick Family Picture

My mom wanted to do a quick little family picture while my brother and his family were in town, we literally had a 20 minute window to do it the Saturday after Thanksgiving! Since we had such little time we just took our camera set up the tripod and let the self timer do the work! Getting so many little kids to stay still was a challenge with only my Grandma on the other side of the camera!

After we took our picture the kids stayed out and played for a few minutes since it was so nice outside! They pushed and pulled each other up and down the street and loved every second of it!

Happy Thanksgiving

We had such a great Thanksgiving this year! It is great to be back in Utah and close to family again to enjoy it. We had a great morning we made muffins and ate them while we watched the parade. For Thanksgiving Dinner we headed to my Uncle and Aunt's house. My mom's family was together this year, we had about 35-40 people! We were still missing a few but enjoyed those who were able to make it! We had such a yummy dinner and so many different choices to eat, we were all stuffed! We had pie later that night and my Grandma spoiled a lot of people and made their favorites! We had about 14 pies and 7 or 8 different kinds! I was so full that night I had a hard time getting to sleep!

I love this of Easton, he won't smile like this for a normal picture so that is why this one got put up!

Starting to put some of the spread out!

The tables were all set so  nicely and were beautiful!

With this many little ones running around, plus a few more that weren't in the picture, it was quite noisy sometimes, luckily they stayed in the basement a lot of the time!

The girls got to sit up to the counter!

The boys got their own little table!

Ella's Birthday Part 2

Sunday the 17th was Ella's 4th birthday! She was so excited and told me a few days before she wanted balloons and streamers on her door again like last year. I tried to get balloons the night before but the store was out of helium so I bagged that idea and Andrew blew some up for me to throw on her floor! She was excited to wake up to just what she requested! We let her open up one gift before church. It was church clothes and some stickers for sacrament meeting. She was in desperate need of something new to wear to church, I'm usually better at having stuff a season ahead but just haven't been this year! She was excited to be sung to in primary and loved every second of it! She did mention a couple times in the day she didn't really care for her birthday to be on Sunday, I think she really wanted to go to Chick-Fil-A for lunch!

After church we went to my parents house for dinner. I had asked Ella earlier in the week what she wanted for her birthday dinner and she said Pancakes. She loves her pancakes! I told her what was on the menu a few days before and one of those being sausage. She wasn't very happy about that and said but mom I really want bacon, luckily I had a bacon in the freezer! She loves her bacon as much as her pancakes! We had pancakes, bacon, sausage, eggs, hash browns, fruit, and some juice! She loved it all! After we ate we opened presents and had cake. She got some great gifts!

Our gift to her was the 7 princess barbie set from Target. Thanks to all the coupons and phone apps I got it for a steal, like 65% off, it was a huge blessing! She is in love with them all and we have taken them everywhere the last two weeks!

She wanted a princess cake again so Andrew went to work on it! He was up until 3 the night before working on the castle! He is a perfectionist and spent a lot of time on it! Ella was so excited when she saw it!

Ella's Birthday Part 1

Two Saturdays ago we were able to celebrate Ella's birthday with Andrew's family! It was the night before her birthday and she was pretty excited! We had some Pizza and drinks and then played some games while we waited for his last sister to come so we could do cake and presents. It was fun to just sit and chat and play games. Ella was in heaven she loves games. They all played memory with her and it was her first time and she absolutely loves it. Once Deb came we did presents and then had cake. They certainly know how to spoil Ella and know exactly what she loves!

It is interesting about a month before both my kids birthdays I felt that they really did seem a year older it is crazy how much they change in a years time.

Easton lasted about 10 minutes, he doesn't quite have the attention span for games yet!

She loved her new dress up!

Movies and books always a hit with Ella!

We certainly love our Ella and cannot believe she is 4. She is such a peacemaker in our home and is very sweet with Easton. She is especially excited for her little sister to come and I know she will be a big help to me!