Bringing in The New Year

Rachel and Nathan came and stayed with us for a few days and were able to celebrate New Years with us.



We had a fun little party with the kids. We had party hats and blowers, danced around, and pulled the party poppers.


Then Dan and I went over to the Thatchers for a fun New Years fiesta! They went all out with the Mexican decorations, food, rockstar margharitas, and even fake stache's for the guys.





Then of course the wives had to try them on ;)


We passed the time by eating all the delicious food, and playing games (in which Tara had a few memorable moments) Once midnight came Dan and I decided we're too old to party much longer so we headed back home. Thanks for the awesome party Thatcher's, we're looking forward to next year!

Let it Snow

Kaitlyn absolutely LOVES the snow. Whenever it snows she begs and begs to go out and play in it. Whenever she gets the chances she will run and jump in even the smallest pile of snow. So I decided it was about time let her go outside and get soak up all the snow time she wanted. And boy did she have fun. She was singing, dancing, twirling, throwing snow in the air, and making snow angels.
Then she got cold.

Christmas Festivities

This was the first Christmas since Dan and I have been married that we did not travel to be with either of our families. And to be honest it was really nice to just stay home and enjoy the holiday with just us and our kids. (Don't worry we still love our families, but traveling at Christmas time with kids, presents, and such is just no fun)

On Christmas Eve we made and decorated sugar cookies for Santa.

Then we ate donuts and watched Rudolph


Followed by opening a Christmas Eve present. (I think they were pretty tired by this point)

After a good nights rest the girls were ready to see what Santa had brought.


Well Makenzie needed a little convincing to get down the stairs.


But as soon as she saw her very own stroller she was so excited. She of course didn't want to stop pushing it to open any other presents, but she decided that opening the other presents then loading them up in the stroller was pretty fun too.


Kaitlyn was just in Heaven with all of the new things. It was also so fun to see how exited she got when someone was opening the present that she picked out for them.

Although we always enjoys receiving gifts, we know that the best gift we received was long long before we were even born. It's easy to get caught up in the commercialism of Christmas but we're trying to teach our kids the true meaning of Christmas (the Little People Nativity set helps alot -Thanks mom) Here's to hoping that they remember that it's not about the presents but celebrating the birth and life of our Savior.