Hawaii - Day 1

Mom is turning 60 this year and she said that instead of a big party she wanted to do something with just the family.  So we decided to go big for her 60th and booked a trip to Hawaii!  We've been looking forward to it for months and now it's finally here!!! We left our kids with our wonderful friends Melissa and Jordan and boarded the plane to Kauai.  Oh man we can't wait to get there!

Airplane pictures are always the best.  Dad, mom, Hayley, Josh and I flew together and Justin, Steph, Britt and Chad flew together and we all met up in Lihue.  We were so excited to finally be there after our long flight.

We rented a Jeep Grand Cherokee for the week and stopped at Costco when we got there to fill our car with food and supplies for the week.  We ended up driving up to Princeville where our condo was with piles of boogie boards and other things on our laps.  

We made a quick lunch stop on the way and mom chose this little taco place called Tiki Tacos.  It was a good little place and mom vowed we would be back before our trip was over.  

 We got up to our timeshare condo on the north side of the island and checked in.  It was a nice place with 2 big pools and hot tubs.  They gave each of us a lei when we checked in and we felt very Hawaiian.  We had a few hours before the others got in so we played games and got our rooms all set up.  By the time they got there around 11:00 pm we were all exhausted and went to bed.  It was a long day of traveling but we were so excited to be in Hawaii!

6 months

Oh how we love our Beck!  Josh and I are getting ready to take a trip and I snagged this picture the night before we left just so I could see this sweet smiley face whenever I need to! I love this toothy grin of his - those two little teeth are just new to his smile and I love it. 

6 month stats:

Weight: 18.61 lbs - 63%

Height: 28.15 inches - 91%

Head: 18.5 inches - 99%

Rhen's picture of the family

Rhen loves to draw and color.  She draws the best pictures of the family.  This was the latest one she did and I love it!  She is such a sweet girl this Rhen!

Dishwasher

Rease and Rhen have started unloading the dishwasher for me as one of their jobs and rotate weeks of doing it.  Rhen has her own unique way of unloading.  She opens all the drawers and cupboards before she starts so she can put everything away easily.  She's such a funny girl!  I don't care how she does it - I'm just happy they are my helpers!

Josh's work party

This year for the True North Logic yearly party they did a casino night.  It was at a hotel downtown and they had a bunch of dress-ups to put on for a picture.  We got decked out for our picture!  We had dinner and then played casino games the rest of the night.  Whatever we won we could put toward raffle tickets for a bunch of cool prizes.  We didn't win any prizes but we had a fun time!  

Rease's Goals

Rease made goals for the new year in school.

Sitting up

Beck has officially learned how to sit. What a guy - can't believe he is getting so big!  Now comes one of my favorite stages - sitting and playing with toys but not able to crawl yet!

Staples

Today Rhen had a little accident and we ended up at the instacare.  She was standing up on the edge of the couch and slipped off and hit her head on the baseboard of the wall.  Rhen's pretty accident-prone so I didn't think much of it when she fell and started to cry.  It wasn't until I saw all the blood that was coming from the back of her head that I realized she had a pretty good gash.  We headed off to the instacare and they took really good care of her.  She was a trooper and didn't hardly flinch when they numbed her and put 4 staples in her head.  Crazy girl!

Instacare

The same day that we were at the instacare for Rhen, we took a trip back for Mr. Liev.  He hasn't had an ear infection since he got his tubes out, but today he has been really warm and complaining about his ears.  Sure enough it was just what we thought.  He is super great about getting his ears checked now though and was so cute laying there waiting for his turn.  Hopefully a quick round of antibiotics and this will be the end of it!

Skiing

One of Rease's Christmas presents this year was a skiing pass to Park City.  She was so excited to be able to go with her dad again.  The two of them headed up right after the new year and had a fun day together.  Josh said it took her a couple runs to get comfortable again but then she was great.  He told her that if she could go down the bunny hill without falling then they could go up to a bigger lift.  She did it and they continued up the mountain.  She is doing great and loves being with her dad!  This is the first of many ski days this winter!

Rhen's calendar

Rhen made this adorable calendar for 2015.  I love all the cute handprint pictures on each of the months!

Rease's Calendar

Rease's calendar made at school for the new year!

Josh's Birthday

Josh turned 36 this year!  What?!?  We're old.  

Anyway, we had a fun day with the annual panini party.  It's always a fun day to get together and celebrate our dad and husband.  We love him so much!  These girls are the best and love their dad to pieces.

 Josh got a helmet for skiing this year.  He was pretty excited about it!

 And Rease wrote him this sweet little note.  Love her!

Happy Birthday my dear sweet man!  I wouldn't be me without you by my side.  Thanks for being my best friend and always making me laugh!

Stuck

Liev loves to climb.  It's just that today he didn't know how to get down once he was up.  Poor kid.  I only left him up there long enough to get this picture then I helped him down!

Snow Day

Christmas day we got a few inches of new snow on the ground.  The kids were so excited!  The next day they got all bundled in their snow clothes and headed outside to play.  I didn't think Keen would last too long in the cold but he actually made it longer than I thought.  Long enough to take a trip down the slide at least.  Rease Rhen and Liev stayed out and played for a while though and had a blast in the new snow!

Christmas 2014

Christmas is already here!  We love Christmas at our house and the kids have been waiting for this day all year!  The kids have loves having the elves on the shelf at our house.  The first thing they do every morning is try and find out where they are and if there was a note left for them.  Both the girls have been really curious about them and have written notes back and forth all Christmas season.  It has been so fun!

 When Christmas Day finally arrived Rease had a plan for the day.

 We hosted this year and had a fun group.  Josh's parents, my parents, Garrett, Andy and a friend of Josh's from work and her daughter.  We had a yummy dinner of French Dip sandwiches (Josh's family's tradition) and lots of desserts!  Then we went caroling around the neighborhood.  It was a perfect Christmas Eve night with a light snow falling.  It was beautiful!

After all the Christmas Eve traditions, the kids were ready for bed and ready for Santa to come!

On Christmas Eve all the kids sleep together in the same room.  I think they actually did get a little sleep!

Lined up Christmas morning at the top of the stairs!

Santa did make it to our house this year!  

This year we tried to have one person open a present at a time so everyone could watch.  It actually turned out good and was super fun to see the reactions of each of the kids with every gift.  

This was Rease's Christmas list to Santa.  Turns out he read her letter!  She got Pokemon cards and also got a ski pass to Park City to ski with her dad!

We had such a fun, happy Christmas this year!  Most of all we loved being with family and friends to celebrate the birth of our Savior.  It was a day to remember!

Cousins

This is a favorite spot at Grammie's house for the cousins to gather.  There's a little tv in the toy room and at the end of a long day, the kids love to watch movies together and squeeze onto this little couch (and the window seal.)  Such a fun time for all these kids to grow up together!

Just underwear

My Liev would wear nothing but underwear all day every day if I let him.  When it's naptime he takes everything off except his underwear and when I put the blanket over him he says, "That feels nice!"  Such a funny kid.  Anyway, this is a perfect example of what I'm talking about.  Obviously not a good day to go without clothes, but why not?  At least he put his boots on to go outside!  He was so excited to play in the snow that he didn't care that he didn't have anything else on.  

Rice Cereal

Beck's 4 months old and you know what that means!  Rice cereal baby!  He's not sure what to think, then excited, then back to not sure what to think.  Me either buddy - it doesn't look that good!  Don't worry.  There's much better stuff to come!

Great Grandma Losee

My sweet grandma Losee had a stroke this week and has been in the hospital.  She hasn't been doing well so I wanted to take my kids down to see her.  We loaded up in the van after school and headed down to Delta.  The kids all drew a picture for her and were excited to be able to give them to her at the hospital.  Grandma has been so healthy and has always had tons of energy to do whatever she wanted to do so it was so unordinary to see her down and in bed.  The boys were pretty concerned about her and all the tubes that she was hooked up to.  But we had a special, sweet time while visiting her.  The kids all sang songs to her and each had a moment to give her a hug and kiss.  We sure love our great grandma Losee and are so glad to have had time to see her.  We hope she gets well soon!