Utah Trip (part 1)

Cor, Mayer and Jovin Christmas morning
We headed up to Utah for Christmas this year. We left Phoenix around 1pm on the 23rd. After being stuck at the Hoover Dam (again!) for about an hour and taking a dinner break in Vegas we finally made it to my families house around 1:30 am. It wasn't too bad driving with 3 kids. They napped and then fell asleep in their car seats around their usual bed time. Jovin did wake up and ask to go home. Apparently we built up how much fun it would be to drive to Utah. By 8:30pm Jovin wasn't buying it any more.
We spent Christmas Eve and Christmas morning with my family. The boys got to open one present on Christmas Eve which is as always pajamas. They all ended up with Superman pajamas. Cor and I got wii pajamas. They are pretty cool.
Cor and the boys Killpack Christmas
On Christmas morning Jovin was really excited to see all the presents and was happy that Santa had found him in Utah. We then went and visited family in the afternoon.
Christmas night we stayed with Cory's family and woke up and did breakfast and Christmas with them. It was fun and kind of nuts with all of the gift exchanges, but it was nice to have the whole family together. Jovin and Mayer really enjoyed playing with all their cousins which they kept calling their "new friends".

Abby and Mayer enjoying Cocoa Puffs for breakfast.

'Tis the Season

Here are some pictures from our Christmas.
Our Christmas tree. (Yes we have little kids hence the ribbon and ornaments only on the upper half of the tree.)
A very groggy Mayer but still wanting to open presents.
Jovin, Mayer and Ang opening presents.
This is what I got Cory for Christmas. It is a custom bobble head of himself. If any of you are The Office fans you'll understand. It is one of our favorite episodes and we quote the line "Yes, I'm the bobble head!" all the time. Especially now that he has an actual bobble head.
Jovin playing with his train set.

We hope that you all had a wonderful Christmas and we missed you all.

Holiday Cookies

I've really been looking forward to the Christmas season this year because Jovin is now old enough to understand (to and extent) what is going on with the birth of Jesus, giving presents, Christmas lights, and Santa Claus.
One of my favorite things I loved doing with my mom during the holiday season was making Christmas sugar cookies. We'd roll out the dough and cut out the shapes of snowmen, candy canes, and Christmas trees. Then we'd decorate them with frosting and sprinkles. That is a memory I wanted my boys to have during the Christmas season too.


So the other night I got ambitious and we made some dough and I taught Jovin how to roll the dough with a rolling pin and to use the flour so it won't stick to the table or rolling pin. He really enjoyed using the cookie cutters. And got carried way with the flour.


When I turned my back to put another batch in the oven Jovin was going to town with the dough. He was also really sneaky at eating the dough. Little stinker... :)
It was a lot of fun, for me at least, and I hope that it is a tradition that I can keep doing every year.

Christmas Decorations

Well last night we finally got out the Christmas decorations. We put the tree in an area where Jovin can't knock it over and also can't pull everything off of it. It was also the only place we could fit it in our living room without it taking up the open area for the boys to play.

Jovin was a little scared at first to put the ornaments on the tree.

Jovin did finally get the idea of what was going on so he then got excited to put the ornaments on. Mayer is just watching from a distance.

Jovin doing the ornament all by himself.

Mayer and Jovin in Mickey Santa hats being cute!

Movin' On Up...

Well Jovin is moving on up to "Big Boy" status. For Christmas we got a bunk bed for him. We got it at IKEA!! (And as we found out when they say assembly required they aren't kidding... it took Cory 4 hours to put together... but it was worth it.) Jovin really likes his new "Big Boy" bed. He has not had any huge problems with it except for the one night he somehow got his head stuck under the bottom rung on the latter and the bed. We have since fixed the problem. We don't have a picture of it either because it was 3am and that would just be cruel... :^)

We also came home from our Utah holiday trip with a new member to our little family. Quesi! (Cory's family cat.) The trip home was very interesting with Jovin and Quesi in the back seat. It made for an even longer ride home. Quesi does seem to like it here. We are still trying to teach Jovin to be soft with the kitty and to not pull his tail. Quesi likes to curl up with me on the couch and on our bed. (yes, that is my big tummy that Quesi is laying against in the picture below.) He is quite fun to have around the house.

HAPPY HOLIDAYS!

Well we had a wonderful holiday season and we hope you did too. We spent the past week in Utah for Christmas to visit with family and friends. We tried to visit with everyone we could, but if we missed you sorry. We came home New Years Eve. It was a fun trip and since I am tired and I don't want to get into all the details I'll just make comments along with some pictures to highlight the trip.

This picture is actually our Christmas in our new home before we left on the trip...


Here is Jovin's real first experience with snow... He really liked it...


Us at the top of the Joseph Smith Building in down town Salt Lake to look at the pretty lights


One of the many things I miss about Utah... Snow, trees, and sunsets behind actual mountains. :^)