Charlotte's 1st Birthday!

Charlotte turned one on the 20th of December! I cannot believe how quickly her first year went by. And because our year was so unorthodox, it seemed to go by even faster.

Her birthday fell on the Sunday before Christmas, so we all went to church and then came home to party! These are the girls right after church in their Christmas dresses.

I decided on a winter theme and the colors were aqua and red. I made her an outfit with the leftover fabric from my Patty Young pattern testing. It just happened to match! Sophie made her the matching bracelet.

Her cupcakes were red velvet cake with aqua icing. I printed out the circles and attached them to lollipop sticks.

The usual suspects minus Papa and the person behind the lens (me!). Charlotte was actually napping while we ate a dinner of all appetizers (it was a hit!). So she was nice and rested for everything, it was so mellow.

Sophie & Scout


Charlotte loved the concept of being allowed to rip through paper and find something new.

She was anxious to put on her new shoes from Grandma & Grandpa Roberts.

Oooo, so cute!

Here Gage, try this on!

Her favorite gift, a monkey from Matt & Jenny.

I made her birthday banner with my Cricut. So easy and cheap!

Then I just took a piece of 12 x 12 paper and rolled it up to make a hat. Added some trim and whalla!


Her cake wasn't quite as planned, but it worked. It was also red velvet with snowflake sparkles.

She was fascinated by her number one sparkler candle.

Have at it baby!

Getting a birthday phone call from Grandma and Grandpa Roberts.

Happy Birthday Charlotte!!

Christmastime

Charlotte is loving Christmas! I'm so glad since this is the time of year of her birth. She is obsessed with Christmas trees. A few times a day she guides us to the tree and we ask her where things are (santa, apples, berries, birds, nutcracker, etc.) and she shows us. She can say "lights", "tree", "ho, ho, ho", "bird", "ball", and others. It's really fun to hear her vocabulary expanding and I love that it's Christmas-y!
We really have to watch her because she might just pull that whole tree down one of these days!

Maggie and the gingerbread house she made at school.


Snow Day!! It hardly ever snows in St. George so we were so excited to wake up to this! It was amazingly cozy.


The first thing the girls wanted to do was build a snowman. Granted there was barely enough snow to throw a snowball, but they were determined.

I think it turned out pretty darn cute. Of course he was nothing but a pile of sticks and a carrot by the afternoon, but so worth it!

Albuquerque Turkeys

We spent Thanksgiving in Albuquerque with some of Chris's family and it was a total party! Well at least on Thanksgiving it was. This is Grandma's Dance Party and the kids just loved it. It's the perfect thing to do after a delicious Thanksgiving meal:).

Chris's mom had just championed through weeks of chemotherapy for which she had gotten a wig. The kids all had fun trying it on. Sophie looks so much older!

And Charlotte finally looks like a girl. She was confused at why we all were laughing at her.


Kellie's friend Rachel, Kellie, Jordon and his cute son Quinn, and KC.


The next day we headed to the White Sands in southern New Mexico. It was an amazing sight! Miles of pure white sand. We played in it like it was snow but without the freezing part.


Maggie loved getting buried.


I had the kids write their names in the sand and pose. Moment in time kind of thing.



The best part was the sledding! Everyone took turned climbing up and sliding down. Even Charlotte loved it.


Charlotte's was fascinated by the sand and would climb up and then skooch down it like she goes down the stairs. I think she was enjoying her freedom.


Eliza and Kellie (I love this picture!)

Our heroine, Momma Jan and her hero, Papa Ron.

Jubilee of Trees!

The Jubilee of Trees is an annual tradition in St. George that I haven't been to since high school! In fact my friend Kris and I actually decorated one of the trees way back when. So my mom, the girls and I headed out and had a really fun time.

Sophie's school was commissioned to decorate a tree and the 4th graders got to make ornaments for it. The theme was Peace, Love and Groovyness. Sophie made one of the little records from a CD.

The Jubilee was raising money for a life flight helicopter for the local hospital. They had the helicopter there and the girls got to go inside and check it out.

The girls in front of a Twilight themed tree. They matched it, so they wanted a picture.

The mini trees display. Hmm....maybe I could do another one next year.

Halloween!

Twas the day before Halloween....

Charlotte, our little rascal in her Halloween outfit. I made similar ones for the other two girls, but didn't get a pic. She loves to race up and down the stairs. She climbs to the top and then yells at us until we come to find her. She also loves to roll a ball down the stairs and then we throw it back up again and again and again.

Sophie and Maggie had a costume parade at their school. They get dressed up and march around by class in the play field while parents take tons of pictures.

Maggie and her friend, Pearl on the march.

This is Sophie's fellow witch and best friend at school, Zoe. Yes, they are the same age.

After school Sam had an overnight Scout campout at Zion's. It was going to be a bit cold, so we got him all ready to go, thermals and all. It's his first overnight without Dad and we were a little nervous. But knew it was important for him.

Okay, so I am a holiday freak. I LOVE them! And yes my expectations usually outweigh the reality. This Halloween was no exception:).

This is how we found Sophie on Halloween morning. She had an incredibly high fever and was achy all over. She stayed in bed all day (so you know she really was sick). Sam came back from his campout grumpy having nearly frozen to death and didn't want anything to do with Halloween. We had to make soup for the ward's Trunk or Treat and though we got the soup there on time, we had missed the actual Trunk or Treat. But I finally got everyone going and I even made Sophie get out of bed and get dressed (I know I'm a horrible mother, but I knew she'd regret it the next day if she didn't).

So, here they are!

Charlotte was our little monkey with her banana, Sam (totally his idea).

The girls were Elphaba and Galinda, the witches from Wicked. Sophie was supposed to have green face paint but because she wasn't feeling well, we opted out. Maggie was supposed to have her hair all curled up, but we realized that the curling iron was in storage and my mom didn't have one. I got $.99 bags from Target and then printed the Wicked logo onto iron-on paper and ironed it onto the bag.

Charlotte is an escape artist and also loves to eat dirt. So we really have to keep an eye on her.

We finally hit the road to go trick or treating! We ended up out in Santa Clara so the kids could go with Scout and Gage. They were a cat and a Whoopee Cushion. It's a lot more work to go trick or treating in Utah than it was in California because the houses are further apart. The kids were missing 12 Picket Lane for sure.

Matt was a Wiggle, his band had a gig later on and they were all Wiggles. Jen was a jailbird.

Charlotte was loving trick or treating. I guess giving babies Smarties is the thing here, everyone was giving them to her.

We had a good time but it started to get cold, so we got everybody home. The best part, sorting the candy! The kids got a lot less this year than usual. But that's not a bad thing.

Sam and his pumpkin, Keroro.

Maggie and her pumpkin, a puppy.

So a not so great morning turned into a fun night and another Halloween is gone!