Family Christmas Celebration #1

It's that time a year again!  We spent Saturday in Mora celebrating with Nate's immediate family.  We had a great time hanging out and keeping the kids entertained until Uncle Sam got off work.  Now that some of them can tell time the anticipation happens a lot earlier in the day.

Kaitlyn and Cousin Hailey being goofy!

Trying to get all 5 kids together for a picture.  Take One!

Take 2!  Someone doesn't want to participate.

Take 3! Let's try giving him a phone and hopes that he will look up when we call his name.  Nope!

Take 4!  Everyone is looking except Gavin!  This will have to do.

Close-up of pouting Gavin!

Minutes earlier... Auntie Mandi captured these photos of Gavin!

Look he can smile for the camera!

Kaitlyn's New Adventure

This fall Kaitlyn wanted to ride a BIG horse, so we got connected with MaryEllen and Roudy!  On most Saturdays Kaitlyn will spend an hour learning about horses and actually riding Roudy.  She has learned everything from grooming, different types of saddles, getting on and off a horse safetly, how to talk to a horse, and the list goes on and on.  Honestly I did not know much about horses, but now I do.  They are amazing animals and can give children the confidence they need.

A few weeks ago Kaitlyn and Nate went for her weekly riding lesson.  I had asked Nate to take some pictures since it had been awhile.  Well, he delivered and got a lot of cool pictures.

A couple of things...
1. I had never seen a horse in the winter... only in the summer.  Their fur (if that is what you call it) in the summer is smooth and silky... but in the winter it is thick and very teddy bear like.  They look so different.

2. During this lesson Kaitlyn rode bareback.  Here are a lots of pictures from her lesson!

Gingerbread House

Kaitlyn and I had ventured off to Michael's on Saturday!  They had a display of gingerbread kits on sales, so we decided to get one.  Sunday we put it together and started decorating it.  Here are some pics.

Gavin got to decorate one side and Kaitlyn got to decorate the other side!

Kaitlyn's side!

Gavin's side!

Close-up of Gavin's side.  He did pretty good.  We helped a little but he did the roof by himself!

Kaitlyn's side!  She did a great job adding all of her candy!

Monster Jam

We headed to the Metrodome for the last time on Saturday night.  We decided to take the kids to Monster Jam.  Gavin has really been into his Hot Wheels Monster Trucks and since they are tearing down the Metrodome soon we thought we should go.  We bought the tickets on Friday, so our seats weren't the best, but we had a blast.

Kaitlyn was a little nervous because we were really high up.  She got used to it pretty quickly and never said another word about being scared of heights. 

I had never been to a Monster Jam before so I honestly had no idea what to expect!  It was loud and exciting!

Kind of blurry, but we were happy we brought these.  Even though we were near the top... it was REALLY LOUD!

Gavin being silly!

Gavin loves to take pictures of himself!

Everyone knows that when you leave events like this... getting out of the venue and the parking lots is a nightmare!  We ended up staying to the end, but got to the stairs immediately after the show.  This allowed us to get ahead of the crowd.  Once we got to the main hallway... Gavin went on Nate's shoulders and I held onto Kaitlyn.  The kids loved being pushed out the door.  (My favorite part as well.)  Than we high tailed it  back to the car.  We were out of the parking lot just as I finished buckling Gavin into his car seat.  I was impressed with our speed and we were home in no time.

What I want to be when I grow up...

We went to Kaitlyn's school conferences last night.  Each student picked an occupation and wrote it on their iPads.  There were lots of nurses, vets, firefighters, and policeman, but there was only 1....

We are not sure where she learned about being a dolphin trainer, but I give her points for being creative.

Trick or Treat

Happy Halloween!  We headed to Waverly to do some trick or treating with our best friends the Eggiman's and some other friends.

Kaitlyn is one of the girls from Lalaloopsy and Gavin is a Fire Fighter!

Kaitlyn's superhero pose!

Gavin had 3 costumes to choose from this year.  He chose being a firefighter.  We used his rain jacket and I bought some reflective tape and put that around his pants and on his helmet.  I also taped a flashlight to his helmet to help with trick or treating in the dark.  He only wore his helmet for these pictures!

Gavin posing!

All the kiddo's ready to head out on the town!

Gavin and Ashlynn trick or treating!

At first Gavin wasn't too impressed until he realized that if he said "Trick or Treat" he would get candy.  After that he was all for going to houses with lights on.