Happy 5 years

We have had 3 anniversaries with kids and have been able to spend one without Kelsey. Better luck next year right? I guess its our fault for getting married during Christmas break when all of the babysitters are out of town.

Although we had to have Kelsey, December 29th was one of the funnest days of the break. We started the day by exercising at the RB and then Ethan took us all to breakfast at Shirley's where we had some of the best cinnamon rolls of all time. AND the cinnamon rolls were as big as my face! It was AWESOME!

We spent the afternoon bowling at the WILK and oh my goodness. Talk about family fun.

Kelsey did pretty good, but got a little bored. She loved to push the balls down the ramp but even that only lasted a few times. She also LOVED to play with the fan where you dry your fingers. I don't like this picture at all, but you can see Kelsey in the back sticking her face in the fan. It was hilarious.

She also found other ways to entertain herself. She did her best.

While we were there we ran into the Salmons and Shellee was nice enough to take a picture for us.

We woke up to a pretty good snow storm and it lasted for hours. We were going to go bowling first thing but decided that it would be more ideal if we played in the snow and I am so glad we did. This was probably my favorite thing that we did all break. They only word I can think of to describe the whole morning would be happiness. It was just so happy to be out there as a family running around and laughing at everything. Nothing could go wrong. It was just one of those moments in life where you stop and realize how lucky you really are. Its also a moment that makes you wonder why all moments can't be like this one, but you at least have this moment. It was so much fun.

Kelsey LOVED the snow! Her coat didn't let her put her arms down and her gloves were too big so she was the cutest sight ever. Watching her try to run and keep up with Ethan was hilarious. She would trip and fall so many times and just laugh and laugh. It was equally as funny to watch her try to pick up the snow and throw it at us. Since her thumbs weren't in the gloves it was just kind of sad attempts that led to more falling but luckily we got it all on film.

Kelsey wasn't the only one that loved the snow. Although Ethan played different than her, he found ways to make his snow experience magical too.

When she would fall she would just sit there until we came and helped her up. She wasn't being lazy. She literally had no other option.

 Its long but PLEASE watch from 41 seconds on!! This is my favorite video ever.

And oh my goodness!! This girl loves her snow pants. She thought they were the coolest thing since sliced bread. She wore them for days after. When did my baby grow up?!

After playing in the snow we introduced Kelsey to Top Ramen and hot cocoa and let her watch Cinderella. I think its the best anniversary she has had yet!

Although I tease, spending 5 years with Ethan has been my greatest blessing in life. He is a wonderful man, a great husband, and such a happy father. He makes everyone around him better. I know no one that works and plays as hard as Ethan. He is optimistic, positive, and loves life. Situations don't get him down even if they try. He just chooses to be the bigger man and improve from everything that is thrown his way. I love him more every year and am so grateful that I get to learn so much from him. We have grown a lot as a couple and I look forward to these next years. I just don't fear the future because I know with Ethan by my side I can do anything. We will figure it out together and for that I am eternally grateful.

Side note: In the last five years we have had 7 moves, 2.5 cars, 1.5 kids, 2.5 degrees, and so many BYU home games that I didn't bother counting. Love you Ethan!

Christmas 2014

We were fortunate enough to spend Christmas and Christmas Eve this year with the Wings up in Bountiful. Because it was so close for us, we decided to stay in Provo until the evening of the 23rd and then stayed until the 27th. Nothing too crazy or out of the ordinary happened, but it was such a wonderful holiday.

We all were together, minus the AWings, on Christmas Eve for a beautiful dinner and most of us ended up spending the night at Robert and Dianas. The highlight of the evening was probably singing Christmas carols, or opening crackers. I love that the Wings introduced me to crackers. They are so much fun! I love them. The prizes this year were pretty swank too. We all had to act and told a joke but the best joke teller was probably Holden. "My clue is book. My word is To Kill A Mockingbird" and then he sat down. The best actor was definitely Emily with her impression of Fiddler on the Roof. Good times had by all.  I wish the AWings could have been there too, but we all got some pretty great laughs from cracker opening.

This fruit dish was too gorgeous to not take a picture.

I have officially decided that ham is so much better than turkey. Like so muc

h better

And by some miracle we woke up Christmas morning to snow on the ground. The whole week had been in the 40s and even 50s and then a storm rolled in. It was beautiful.

Ethan's family wakes up very happy. I do not. Ethan was nice enough to prepare me for Christmas morning by waking me up about 30 minutes before Kelsey woke up. He came in our room and said "I know you probably want to keep sleeping, but I thought you'd want to wake up so you can get ready to be around people." It sounds really sharp, but I thought it was one of the sweetest things he has ever done. And yes, his family wakes up every happy. I could learn a thing or two from all of them.

 Kelsey sleeps amazingly well at the Wings house and at 8 am we were all getting really excited and tired of waiting for her, so Ethan and I woke her up.

It took her a minute to realize what we were saying but then when she saw what Santa had brought, she was sold. It was so exciting. I thought Christmas was fun as a kid, but its so much more fun as a parent.

After we looked at Santa stuff, the Mannings came over and we all took turns opening gifts. This is minus the AWings and Robert and Diana, but there's the whole crew.

Everyone was so kind and generous to Kelsey. She had so much fun opening presents and wanted to play with everything immediately. She got a little overwhelmed and tired of waiting so we had to take a break from her gifts. She literally said " No more presents please." I felt really bad because I wanted people to know how touched we were, but she was just so tired and wanted to play. We need to remember that for next year. She was also super cute because she kept wanting to thank Santa Claus. It really concerned her that she couldn't give him a hug.

Kelsey helped Ethan and I wrap our presents and she was so excited to give them to us

On the evening of the 25th, the Smiths and Mannings had to leave, but the Wings got into town. We had a wonderful Christmas day dinner and then went to bed. Everyone was so exhausted. The next morning I got to go day after shopping with Andy and Annie and they helped restrain me from buying too much stuff. It was super fun though to be with Andy and Annie.  We had a whole day with Andy and Annie and decided to do our sibling gift exchange then. We had munchies, Andy and Ethan tackled each other in the snow and we played a game in which I got a little snippy and felt really bad, but the game was fun.

 Holden made everyone gifts. I got a BYU hand warmer, the baby got a soft rattle, and Ethan got a really cool car. Maybe the best gifts of the year right there.

During the gift exchange, Diana prepared a plate of chocolates for everyone and passed them around for all of us to enjoy. A few were taken and then the plate was put on the table. About half way through the gift exchange, I thought I would check on Harper and Kelsey (since we all got distracted and forgot to take notice) and I looked up to find Kelsey grabbing the last chocolate from the plate. The girls ate EVERY SINGLE CHOCOLATE OFF THE PLATE!!! No one actually knows how many they ended up taking but it was at least 6 a piece. They ran away from the table laughing hysterically.  About an hour later, we were all opening some gifts and playing games when Reo was like "where are the girls?" Good question. We were all upstairs and again no one had seen them for about 20 minutes. We heard gleeful screaming coming from Diana's room, headed in there only to find the bathroom completely flooded!! The girls had turned on the tub, would get in the tub "swim around"  jump out and run to look at themselves in the mirror. They were soaked and so was everything else. Both girls spent some time in time-out.
The next day Diana was talking to Kelsey about being naughty and eating the chocolates. Diana asked Kels how many she ate and Kelsey was like "3. 5. um I don't know. I being sneaky. Shhh!!" That little stinker! She is hilarious and she and Harper together are one dynamic duo.
I don't really have a favorite Christmas but 2014 was up there with the rest of them. We had great food, got some snow, played lots of games, finished a puzzle, sang songs, and were all together. I am so grateful to be apart of two really wonderful families who want to be together over the holidays. 

Christmas Eve

Not actually Christmas Eve, but every year around Christmas time Ethan and I try to have a fancy dinner. There is no set menu or anything like that, but we try really hard to pick foods we either haven't tried or have never made.This allows us to always fit in a fancy Ethan Wing dinner no matter what we end up doing for the actual holidays.

This year we decided to spend our evening with the Johnsons so on December 22nd we spent a lot of the day cooking and getting ready for our fancy dinner.

The menu isn't THAT fancy, its just all new to us so it makes it fun.
This year it was twice baked potatoes, a new type of pork, an apple berry salad, and pretzel jello salad. Everyone's favorite was the drink. It was a lime sherbert cherry slush thing. Delicious!

I am so glad the Johnsons could come over. They were so cute and got all dressed up for it too. Even little Edwin had suspenders on! He was adorable.

 

Ethan's really into taking candids which is totally cool, but he decided to take candids while Elisa was away from the table. It totally felt like Ralph and I were having a dinner together. It was so awkward that it got pretty funny. Then we saw this picture and that just summed up all the funniness of the situation. 

 

After dinner we had a Christmas program where we read from the scriptures and the kids got to put the characters in the barn. Once they figured out that it played music, all was lost. They just kept pushing the button and dancing. We tried right?

But look how happy they are together! Kelsey has a few very close friends, but she and Ralphie just have that special bond. We always joke that they will get married, but I would totally be okay with it. We love Ralphie so much. Its going to be really hard to move away from him.

The night was wrapped up with a few hours of games and Little Mermaid for the kids. Man I'm going to miss the Johnsons.

Babysitting

A few weeks before Christmas, Kelsey and I were feeling really caught up on all that we had to do and then we got super bored. I literally sat down and cried one day because I was so bored.  Pathetic, but true. Being  pregnant probably didn't  help, but it still. Its was also  hard because lately I feel like my only hobbies are exercising which I can't really do right now and picture stuff which I couldn't really do when Ethan needed the computer. Regardless its pathetic and it happened.
I said a prayer and my prayers were thankfully answered. The week of finals I had two opportunities to help some very dear friends. On Tuesday I had a friend who needed a babysitter all day while her bother was in the hospital so we got to hang out with baby Alice all day. Talk about perfect baby! She literally made no sound at all. She slept, she ate, she played, and didn't cry once. We had her from 8-6 and it was wonderful.

On Thursday we got to watch Ivy and Calvin Hames while Jench and AJ went to a wedding. I was so excited because I have only met Ivy once and I have never met Calvin. Again perfect children. Kelsey and Ivy just played the whole time, and as long as we kept Calvin standing he was totally happy. Silly baby wants to walk at 9 months and he doesn't even know how to crawl yet. Jench tells me all the time how frustrating it is and I finally got a little taste of that. Ivy was a champion eater which helped Kelsey eat really well that day and was just overall super happy. Those three had such a fun time following each other around that nap time was a cinch. Everyone literally just fell asleep out of pure exhaustion. It was so much fun having these little kiddos around. 

Im so grateful that the Lord answered my prayers and allowed me to help out my friends this week. It was so rewarding to have something positive and helpful to do. I really felt like I was easing their burdens and I can't think of anything more appropriate for Christmas time.  They kept saying thank you for helping them but I really felt like I was the one who should have been saying thank you.

Side note: It was also great to see Jench and AJ. The next day we all got lunch and then later that week went to the BYU basketball game. I really miss the Hames. They are such great friends.

Happy 27th Cami

My birthday was great this year.
The Sunday before my birthday we got together for a Reo/Cami birthday party at the Wings house and I got the most adorable sweatshirt in the whole world. I can't try it on yet, but I'm so excited to wear it this summer.
 My actual birthday was on a Saturday this year so Ethan was home all day. He let me sleep in and then we headed to the ward Christmas party. After the party we cleaned the church (hooray right), spent the afternoon getting ready for our cookie and hot chocolate party in the evening including making dozens of cookies which I kind of hate doing, and then it was time for my birthday celebration! Andrea and Jed came over and babysat Kelsey while Ethan and I went to Tucanos for my birthday lunch!! I love that place so much. It did not disappoint.

I woke up to this sign  hanging in our front room. This is the sweetest present I have ever received I think.

After Tucanos we just hung out and then got ready for our cookie party with some MBA friends. Everyone brought their kids and so our apartment was pretty packed but my goodness it was fun. We moved the tvinto Kelsey's room and had Rudolph playing non-stop, we had oodles of cookies and decorations, and nothing planned but visiting. It was such a fun time for me. So many people were super sweet and remembered that it was my birthday so that made it even more special for me. We really have made some amazing friends that will be greatly missed next year.

The Sunday after my birthday my family got together and had a soup Christmas party, but Rich and I dubbed it as our birthday party. Shara made this awesome cake for us and I totally love it. I think I'm going to copy the sprinkle numbers thing every year.