Christmas 2013

Christmas time was so fun this year! Rick took his last final the week before Christmas and then we headed off to Utah to visit family!

We were so grateful to be able to go to Utah and see everyone and spend Christmas break there. Before we left we actually celebrated with a little mini "Christmas morning" with the kids and let them have some of their gifts so we didn't have to take them all to Utah.

Gifts from Rick and I to each other :)

Gifts for the kids. We feel so grateful to the Goodrich family for giving us all of these toys!!! Will Goodrich is in Rick's class and his wife, Tara, and I have become really good friends. She has 4 kids and was trying to get rid of toys that they don't use much anymore and she gave them all to us! Thank you! Kimbri and Garrett love them!

They gave us a jungle animal set,

a house set with a bunch of little people and a minivan,

a farm set,

and a fire station set! Wow, I can't believe how kind that was of them to give us all of that. Kimbri and Garrett LOVE it!

Here was the set up before they came out on our early "Christmas morning":

Christmas decorations:

We had already bought a trike for Kimbri off a yard sale site before the Goodrich's gave us all the toys so we gave that to her too. She loves it :)

And my friend Erin gave Kimbri this little baby car seat/baby carrier thing and Kimbri loves toting around her baby in it!

Trying on a stocking cap... we had to pack some hats, jackets, coats, etc. to take with us to Utah! This cute little stocking cap was almost too little for Garrett's extra large head!

Christmas cookies we made before heading off to Utah.

Filling up with gas on the drive to Utah, sound asleep. This is how we like it on 10 hour drives :) Rick is amazing and is really good at night driving, so it's nice to be able to drive when the kids are sleeping. I, on the other hand, am terrible at night driving.

I can't seem to find any other pictures from our Utah trip... weird. Pretty sure I took more than one picture while we were there, at least I hope so! I'll have to update later if I find more... but we had so much fun! Even if we don't have pictures to prove it. 

Kimbri with her Uncle Enoch

We arrived in Utah really early on the Saturday before Christmas. It was seriously a good thing we drove through the night because we were just under an hour away from Spanish Fork when a huge snow storm hit! So it was pretty slow moving the last little bit, but we were grateful to have been so close instead of driving the whole way in those snowy conditions! 

Well, I can't remember tons and tons of detailed info on what we did every second of our trip (since I'm really behind in writing on my blog... it's February people! Yes, I'm a little behind), but here is the run down on what we did while in Utah:

We spent Saturday morning in Spanish Fork, to say hi to my family and then that afternoon we headed over to Salem to the Stone family Christmas party. We spent Saturday night through Christmas morning at the Stones, going back and forth to various Christmas and family parties. Sunday we went to church with the Stone's. Monday we lounged around and relaxed and that evening we went up to Draper to my aunt Margaret's house for the Haycock family Christmas party. Tuesday we spent a couple hours that afternoon of Christmas Eve at the Haycock's and then headed over to the Stone's for the rest of the evening and to sleep. We woke up on Christmas day and had fun watching all the excitement of the kids opening presents, mostly the aunts and uncles of Kimbri and Garrett (Rick's siblings). We did give Kimbri and Garrett a couple of other things to have something to open on the actual Christmas day, like several books for Kimbri and sippy cups for Garrett.  After a while we packed up and headed over to the Haycock's and had another "Christmas morning" with them. The rest of the day was spent just how a vacation should be spent, relaxing and doing nothing, really. Just visiting and having fun. The second half of our vacation was kind of a blur seeing that I came down with what they called parainfluenza. Ugh. It was no fun at all. It stinks to be sick on vacation! But anyway, we ended up leaving I think Sunday morning and drove back down to sunny Arizona! 

That was pretty much our vacation in one rather large paragraph. Hopefully next year I'll be more on top of it and write about our Christmas vacation NOT at the end of February. Ha! Then maybe I could remember more details... oh well. Merry Christmas everyone!

"Do Hair"

The other day I found Kimbri in the bathroom like this:

She has gotten really good at going potty by herself, flushing the toilet, putting the lid down, then standing on the toilet to reach over to the sink to wash her hands. I usually go in to check on her to make sure she didn't do a #2 because she needs help wiping in that case. But this time I was occupied with Garrett at the moment and heard the water turn on so I assumed all was well and that she was just washing her hands. 

After the water stayed running for longer than it should I went in to check on her and she had somehow gotten the stopper to plug the sink and filled the sink all the way up! I got there just in time because much longer and it would have started spilling all over onto the floor! 

She looked up at me so innocently and said, "Do hair." Haha :) So I let her sit there for a little while so she could "do her hair". She would dip her head into the water and then comb it out, just like in the pictures. I know I mentioned a couple posts ago how Garrett was growing up so fast... well so is Kimbri! She is learning so much each day and is soooo independent! 

I love her with all my heart.

Mesa Temple Lights

For family night this past Monday we went to see the lights at the Mesa Temple! It actually was cold enough to have to bundle up the kids in long pants, shirts with coats on top! I for some reason only snapped a few pictures... maybe because my camera doesn't take very clear night pictures. But here they are:

We met up with a bunch of other medical school families that went to see the lights that night too! It was beautiful and made me excited to hopefully see the Salt Lake Temple lights when we go to Utah NEXT WEEK!! We are all so excited! 

The Phoenix Zoo

I think I mentioned in a previous post that we went to the Phoenix Zoo over Thanksgiving break. It was SO awesome! Rick took a final the day before Thanksgiving so he had absolutely NO studying that he had to do over the break. So we went to the Zoo together as a family! 

We decided to get a one year membership since it would have cost us $40 to go just for one day and the year membership was only $80. So we go 2 times and we've paid for it! Plus they let us put my name on the pass with "Guest" for the other adult. Since Rick won't always be able to come with us since he is so busy, this will allow for another adult to get in free when they come with us! For example, the kids and I went to the zoo once before with my friend, Erin, and her two girls. I got in on her "guest" pass as the second adult and kids under 3 are free! So it is pretty much way awesome to be able to do it that way. 

Anyway, moving on... if you have a pass you get access to the Zoo an hour early. So we got up and headed off to the zoo first thing in the morning and there was hardly anybody there! 

We saw the giraffes, lions, elephants, flamingos, etc. etc. etc... and Kimbri loved it!!! We all loved it. I especially loved it since we just got to hang out as a family at the zoo, going from animal to animal doing whatever we wanted, as a family. Yay! Here are some of the pictures I took:

The rhino. Kimbri did not want to be picked up
and was trying so hard to get down in this picture.

Rick especially loved the flamingos

This little guy was randomly on the path we were on. I tried to hard to see
if he had another leg tucked up somewhere and could not see one. I have
no idea what this is and thought is was interesting so I took a picture.

The elephants!

Garrett chillin' in the stroller eating crackers. I specifically
dressed him in his tiger outfit for the zoo :)

Santa

Last Saturday there was a community even called "Snow Days". Obviously it did not actually snow, seeing that we live in sunny Arizona, but they brought in fake snow. And it was totally legit. It really looked like snow. They sectioned off an area in a parking lot and let kids play in the snow. We didn't have any snow boots for Kimbri so we personally did not play in the snow but I'm sure we'll have plenty of opportunities to do that in Utah for Christmas!

But they did have plenty of other fun things to do! They had a free breakfast of almost anything you could imagine. All sorts of muffins, all kinds of donuts, drinks, fruit, etc. etc... Kneaders even had a table with tons of yummy things like pumpkin bread, cinnamon rolls, mint brownies, etc. The list could go on and on about food. Let's just say it was yummy and all of it was free! The kids looooved it. Especially Kimbri and the powdered donuts. Grandpa Haycock started that addiction! Haha!

Anyway, they also had free balloons, face painting, games, a bounce house (Kimbri loves those things!) and of course, Santa Claus! 

And Kimbri has improved! She didn't cry at all but she most definitely would not look up at Santa. Her head was down the whole time, but hey, that's improvement for sure since the last time! Garrett, well, he sat there like a champ. 

They even took pictures AND printed one off right then and there for you for free! The place at the mall won't let you take any photos with your own camera unless you pay a fee. So it was awesome that they did this for every family free of charge. Here is the photo:

And after they sat on Santa's lap, Santa gave Kimbri a frisbee. She still wasn't too sure about him... but it was a fun event to go to! 

Snuggle Time... Or Not!

This is how our bed looks so often in the mornings.... Kimbri wakes up and wants to get in bed with us. Then she asks for a sippy cup full of milk. Then Garrett wakes up and I bring him to bed with us because I'm never quite ready to crawl out of bed.

Yes, we have a bug pillowcase from one of my years at Girls Camp.

And then this happens:

Garrett just can't resist and his hands start flying into Kimbri's personal bubble space. And no, she isn't laughing in that picture, although it kind of looks like a half smile laugh sort of thing... no, no. She is very upset! 

So our snuggle time is very brief when all four of us are in our little bed because things get cramped really fast. But we're building memories, right?! :)

Steal of a Deal

I know this is super random but I love when I find a good deal! And this was a super good deal! We are totally stocked up on clothes for Garrett for probably all of next year! This lady posted on a yard sale site that she was getting rid of all her "gently used" boy summer clothes (sizes 18-24months). 

There were 60 items including shorts, t-shirts, onsies, button-up shirts, etc... all for $15! And they were in perfect condition. In fact, they all looked brand new! Since Garrett is already wearing 12 month old stuff now, the sizes will be perfect for next summer. So glad I found such a great deal! Wahoo!