Austin's 1st Birthday

On October 23rd Austin turned 1! I can't believe we have had him in our lives for only a year. It seems like he's been with us forever but yet it seems like only yesterday we brought him home from the hospital. Isn't he the cutest ever...but if you look closely you will see a little bit (well maybe A LOT) or mischief in his eyes. He gets into so much trouble for a 1 year old.

When he woke up

His birthday cake. I made it and it took a long time. I tend to get in over my head sometimes.

This was his to eat by himself!

Opening presents!

Let's eat cake!!!

I want more!!!

That was good!

When he eats cake there is no body part untouched!

After his bath and riding on his 4-wheeler!

His first taste of cake...HILARIOUS!!

Funny Austin

This is a funny video of when Curt gave Austin a taste of some sour candy and his reaction to it. It cracks us up every time we watch it! He's so cute!!!

4-Wheeling Trip

On October 2nd Curt and I and a bunch of our friends including Curt's Dad, Steve, went on a 4-wheeling trip to Avon and up to Inspiration Point. As you can see it had already snowed and in this little crevice there was still snow on the ground. It was very pretty to go through...but very muddy!

This is me!

Our friends who got VERY MUDDY! They would have competitions of whoever got the muddiest would win! I think it was a toss up.

The view from Inspiration Point.

Curt and I.

All of our group at the Point.

My handsome husband!

Kaylee's Baptism

This was a very special day for Kaylee and our family. This is the day that she decided to become a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. This made us very happy because she made this choice. She was very excited because most of her friends had been baptised and Shelby was already baptised. She was a little nervous. When we got her dress she said she felt like a princess, which I told her that she was since she is a daughter of our Heavenly Father.

Kaylee's 8th Birthday

So this year was the year Kaylee turned the all-important 8 years old. She was so excited. She got to have a party with her friends and she decided to have a Hawaiian Luau. We gave the girls leis and they got to make their own bracelets. Then we played all kinds of games including LIMBO!!! Her friend Aubrianne was amazingly limber and won every time we played it. Then we had Pineapple Upside-Down Cake with ice cream and Hawaiian Punch.

Grandma Nye was going to be out of town for her birthday so she made a date with Kaylee and took her to Build-A-Bear to pick a new stuffed animal. Kaylee had a blast as you can see!

The day of Kaylee's birthday she had a soccer game so we gave her our presents before her game. She was very excited with everything she got.

For every girl in my family when they turned 8 my Grandma Bodily made a Barbie wedding dress for them. Before my Grandma passed away I got a dress for each of my girls. So this was a very special present for her.

Curt also got Kaylee her very own special chair that was just for her. She was very happy with it and the other kids wanted one, too.

Kaylee Tumbling

So during the summer Kaylee took tumbling. Here are a few pics of her working her magic!

Christmas Eve 2010

So on Christmas Eve we always get together with Curt's side of the family and do our certain traditions with each other. First we have dinner which is usually pizza or something easy since the next day usually includes a big lunch or dinner. Then we do white elephants. This is Curt's dad giving us, for the first time, the background of why it's called a white elephant. I guess it came from back in like India or somewhere that they used elephants that a white elephant was considered royal (or something like that). So if someone gave you a white elephant it was of no use to you because you couldn't make it work for you. So it cost you more to keep the white elephant because you had to feed it and take care of it but it could give nothing back to you in the way of earning you money or working for you. So that's where the term "white elephant" came from. I thought that was interesting. I never knew that before nor did I ever think about where the term came from.

Another tradition is to do the Nativity. Curt's mom has all the costumes for the kids to dress up in and Grandpa usually reads the Christmas Story from Luke and the kids come marching in when it's their turn. Shelby was Mary, Kaylee was the angel, Carson was a wise man and Austin was the donkey but he refused to wear the hat that has a donkey on it. So that's as good as it got for him.

After that came Carson's favorite part...opening up the traditional PJs from Grandma and Grandpa. His were Buzz Lightyear ones.

Of course Shelby's favorite part of her pajamas was the shirt which says, "All that matters is me," and she'll admit that that's true.

Kaylee liked hers because they were pink and girlie, just like her!

Unfortunately, Grandma had already given me Austin's unbeknownst to her so he didn't have a present to open but he was unaware of that fact since he's only 2 and really didn't know what was going on. But when we got home that night we put him in his PJs from Grandma and just like everyone else he was able to open his presents the next morning in his Christmas PJs.