Time Flies

Oh, how time flies when you don't look at your blog for three months. We have had such a fun three months that it is a pitty that I didn't blog more. I will try to make up for lost time. First of all, my parents came home from their mission. This means major family reunion for their homecoming! It was A LOT of family in a little bit of time, but totally worth it. I love to see how my kids react with their cousins and I love that the kids are old enough to play without having to be supervised every minute! I also love that Thomas is under constant supervision and I don'thave to worry about losing him. :) We went to a local rec center and went swimming with everyone and a good time was had by all! It really was a highlight of the year to be around family and enjoy their company.

Halloween was next. Matt and I

decided to dress up this year. Super fancy costumes are a must at our house...well maybe not super fancy, but fun none the less. We didn't have to explain our costumes to anyone.

The girls were cute, as always, Annalie as Raggedy Ann and Malorie as a Disco Devil. They had fun running around with their friends for the night!

In November we moved into a new home a couple of miles from my parents house. It is in a great neighborhood and has a great backyard! I am looking forward to next spring/summer when we can utilize it to it's full potential.

Thanksgiving was spent at home with Matt's family. It was fun to have a "smaller" (as there were 10 people which is small to me, not so small to their family) Thanksgiving. I would share pictures but I forgot to get the camera out!

Finally, Christmas came and went. We spent time with all of our family and enjoyed every minute of it! We went to a ward party where Santa showed up!

The kids got to sit on his lap and tell them what they wanted.

Annalie wanted a cell phone (yeah, right)










Malorie wanted some Barbie stuff (which she got).









Thomas wanted....his mom.




We are so grateful for the many blessings that we saw in 2010 and we are looking forward to a great 2011. There are many more adventures to be had, many more friends to meet and many more blog entries (hopefully) to be posted.

Future Missionary

Here is Thomas in his first suit. He is so dang cute!

Mom, I am already five!

My how time flies when you have such fun kids! Malorie turned FIVE! The night before her birthday Annalie asked what time Malorie was born. She happened to be born at 3:30 in the morning. So when we awoke on her birthday, Malorie proudly announced that she was already five! She is such a blessing to our family. She is so smart and funny. She also likes to test the boundaries...which can be funny, and sometimes it is not.

For her birthday, Aunt Sarah took her to the Butterfly Pavilion. Malorie walked around the grounds with her arm up in hopes that a butterfly would land on her finger. Ironically, the butterfly picked Sarah's shoulder to land on. :)

Here little butterfly,


Here little butterfly,


Trying to get the butterfly off of Sarah's shoulder.


Holding Rosie, the tarantula.

We sure love our Malorie! Happy fifth birthday!

Because I want to remember....

Malorie has been hilarious lately. Here are a few things that I don't want to forget:

• Driving along the other day she was talking (which she does a lot) when I heard her say, "Mom, that would be awe-some! (with the high pitched singing to go along with the word 'awesome')".
• Tonight at dinner Annalie asked what had happened to Matt's hands. He said, "I think they are just calloused from lifting weights. I don't know." To which Malorie replied, "That is unacceptable."
  
• After dinner Matt was eating some cookies and milk. As he put a cookie in his mouth Malorie walked by and said, "So, are you going to eat that last cookie?" Matt almost had milk coming out of his nose!

It is amazing what she picks up from listening to us. I know that there are more...I just can't remember them all!

Superstar Dad

A guy that Matt met at the gym wanted to launch a TV show honoring real heroes. Luckily he knew Matt and was able to treat him to the "sizzle real" that they put together to try and sell the show.


Matt with Cody Collins of Lonestar and Mike Timlin.


The whole gang on an air boat.

Matt got to meet Mike Timlin (Former Boston Red Sox pitcher) and go to Florida with him where he met the lead singer of Lonestar. He also got to go to a Rockies game and do all the behind the scenes stuff with him like meeting the players and going to batting practice.

batting practice!

It was an AWESOME experience for our whole family. They spent a couple of days at our house interviewing Matt and Me and some of Matt's friends from the Marine Corp. We felt like superstars and we now know some of the behind the scenes tricks of all of the reality shows. :)

Mike Timlin getting interviewed in our front yard.


The girls enjoying the benefits of knowing a superstar!

We don't know if the show will get picked up. We do know a whole bunch of guys that deserve the same kind of treatment that Matt got. Ooh-rah. :)

Florida 2010!

In May we we fortunate enough to travel to Ft. Lauderdale, FL to visit with Matt's grandma for a week. We were very much looking forward to a nice break from the crazy Colorado weather that we have been having this spring and just enjoy the heat and humidity of Florida. Here are some of the adventures that we embarked on while we were there.

Matt and Thomas with Grandma Lucy

We went to a place called Lion Country where you got to drive your car through an animal park. The animals were not in cages (except for the lions....which I think I am okay with) so they would just wander around your car. When you finished with the drive through the park there was a small amusement park that we went to and enjoyed some of the rides.

Zebra Crossing

Some of the animals at Lion Country

We also got to feed a giraffe! Very cool!

We also went to the everglades and went on an airboat ride. We all had earplugs as the airboat is quiet loud. Malorie also had to wear a life vest because she was younger than six. Partway through the ride Malorie put up her arms as if she were riding on a rollar coaster. Thinking that she was really enjoying this and having fun I leaned forward to snap a picture. This was the result. It has to be one of my favorite pictures of her just because of the lack of emotion.

After the airboat ride they had a reptile zoo of sorts where Annalie got to hold a baby alligator. I was quite proud of her as I thought that she would have not wanted anything to do with reptiles.

Matt went deep sea fishing one morning and thoroughly enjoyed it. He caught two fish that were delicious. I am surprised at how much meat you can get from one fish. We probably could have fed ten more people on just those two fish!

Matt and his catch.

The girls waiting for dad's boat to come in.

While Matt was fishing I went swimming with the kids. Thomas slept in the stroller while the girls and I swam. We took advantage of the swimming pool on more than one occasion and really enjoyed the warm water! Grandma Lucy lives near where the Goodyear Blimp takes off so when we were swimming the blimp would fly over and it was kind of cool.

Finally, we enjoyed the beach. After living in California for a few years where the water is never really comfortable, it was a nice change to be able to run into the ocean and have the water be warm. The girls loved jumping the the waves and Thomas enjoyed sitting in the shade of the umbrella.

Annalie running to catch up with Matt and Malorie.

Thomas enjoying the view of the ocean.

It was a very relaxing trip. We really enjoyed our visit with Grandma Lucy and look forward to doing it again!

One Singular Sensation

Thomas is ONE! It is hard to believe that our little guy has been with us for one full year! We are so lucky! Some of my favorite things about Thomas' are:

• He loves to smile and laugh!
• He loves to snuggle with mom.
• He can give a high five.
• He can say, "uh-oh" when he drops something.
• He loves playing with any type of ball...he has a pretty good arm too!
• He is the best little one year old someone could ask for!

We love our little Thomas!

As time goes by

April flew by for us! We had some fun adventures and some fun time with the family which made it go by so quickly! To start the month we had both Matt's family and my family here for Easter. It was a beautiful day which was awesome as the kids could play outside and the adults could actually hear each other talk! :) We had an Easter egg hunt in the yard (we are still missing 3 eggs -- Matt found one last Saturday!) and we were able to enjoy each others company! It was a great way to celebrate a wonderful holiday.




Malorie, Thomas and I went over to Utah to stay with my nieces and nephews for a week while their parents went to Mexico! The drive over was so pretty. It had snowed earlier in the week and the mountains were so beautiful with snow on them and the blue sky behind them. I didn't even think to bring the camera charger so the only pictures I got (besides the mountains) were of Thomas playing with the dogs. We really did have a fun time with the cousins even if we didn't get any pictures of them. :)


If you look closely in this next picture you can see a parachute. This was taken from my sister's back yard. It was very pretty while we were there.


We also got to go to the zoo with some other cousins where the girls measured how far they could jump compared to some of the animals.


Thomas has found a new love for basketballs...or any ball for that matter. Whenever the door to our back hall was open he would crawl as fast as he could to get in there. One day he made it and this is what he found! It was like he found mecca!


April was a great month for us and it went by far too quickly! In May we look forward to Matt finishing this semester of school, going to Florida to visit Grandma Lucy and a lot more sunshine!

Laughter is the best medicine...

Whoever said that laughter is the best medicine knew my kids. I cannot tell you how many times my girls have made me feel better by just saying something so funny...and they don't even know it.

Today at the grocery store Malorie and I were looking for some bread when an announcement came over the loud speaker saying, "Adam come to the customer service. Adam." Not missing a beat Malorie started singing, "Adam was a prophet, first one that we know!" Thank goodness for primary.

Then tonight as we were watching the NCAA Women's final Annalie was reading the screen. "Standford versus UConn. Cool! Our car is playing!" --get it? Yukon...UConn! Ha, ha, ha! What fun girls we have!

She's like the wind

On March 13th I ran my first 5k. My family has put up a challenge to run this year. Some of them have a goal of a half-marathon and others (namely me) have given myself the challenge of a 10k. Growing up playing basketball (or any sport for that matter) running was always a punishment. If I had a quarter for every suicide I ran I would be pretty well off. There was always a time to beat in order to get playing time. As a result I HATED running. Now, I say I hated it because after running just to run, I have found it not so horrible. Matt and I went up to Ft. Collins and met up with two of my sisters and we ran the 5k. And I won! Not really, but I really liked it. I will be running my 10k in May and I am looking forward to accomplishing that goal.

By the way, this is our reenactment of the race. Boy, we look good! :)

The literal meaning

The girls had a "snowball fight" today after church. This consisted of the girls taking turns throwing globs of snow at each other. When they came in Annalie exclaimed, "I can't feel my toes!" To which Malorie responded, "You feel like you don't have any toes?"

I can only imagine the visual that Malorie had in her head.

Bouncing Baby Boy

Here is some video of our bouncing baby boy. He loves his 'Johnny Jump Up!'

Getting so big!

Thomas is getting so big! He has had so many accomplishments in the past few weeks that I will try and get them all on here! He has started doing a real crawl. None of this low crawl stuff anymore. He has also started pulling himself up on things. He usually gets up to his knees pretty easy but he has even started getting himself up on his feet!!! He is also feeding himself. He likes the baby food, but he thinks that being able to feed himself is pretty cool! Here are some pictures of him approaching his obstacle (the pillow), attacking it, and conquering it. And yes, he has to do it all with his mouth wide open. He is so fun to have around!

Head, shoulders, teeth and hair?

This week they had a crazy hair day at school. Annalie wanted to go big...so big we went! We used two Styrofoam cups to create this masterpiece. I must say, it was a BIG hit.

Thomas got his first two teeth! The only time I can get him to open his mouth wide enough to see the teeth is when he is eating. I apologize for the "see-food".

He has also started pulling himself up on things. His favorite jungle gym is Mom, but he is branching out and I even caught him trying to figure out how to pull himself up on the couch! I guess we will have to baby proof the house to the next level!