New Years

We went to safford to visit Ryan's dad and his wife Tasha. We mostly hung out. The kids love going to Pooh Pa's house.

Tasha took the big kids to the park to play with some friends.






For New Years Eve Pooh pa & the kids went to bed. But we stayed up and played Wii and toasted in the New Year



Don't worry it's only sparkaling Cider. =)

Temple lights

We try to make it to the Temple lights every year. A few years back we had explained to Hailey that what we are really celebrating at Christmas is the birth of Jesus Christ so she started calling the Temple lights "Baby Jesus Birthday Party"

In the visitors center they also had a display of Nativity Scenes from all over the world I took pictures of all of them but I'm just going to include a couple of my favorites.

Christmas Day

Jacob has this funny habit, when he comes out of his bedroom door before he starts down the hall to our room he shuts his bedroom door, so we always know when he's coming. We heard the bedroom door shut and waited to see what would happen. Next we here Hailey scream "We got Sock Monkeys, we got sock monkeys" Santa had brought them Sock Monkeys, and she was very excited about it. My sweet boy is so cute. I jokingly said "Where's my sock monkey" and Jacob said to me "I'm sorry Mommy Santa didn't bring you a Monkey, but you can have mine". We waited for Grandma Jammie, Aunt Ashley,and Aunt Mammy to come over, and then we let the kids rip into there presents and stockings.

Hailey's favorite Present was the color copy machine she got from Santa,

Jacob's favorite present was the cowboy dress up outfit he got from Hailey and Ben

and Ben's favorite present was the dog Bones Bear got from Santa.

Then we went over to Grandma Jammie's to exchange presents with Jammie and the girls good times were had by all. We got Ben to open a few presents but mostly he wanted to steal things other people had already opened.

We had a great dinner. We all pitched in and made part of the meal and then hung out. Ryan's cousin Melanie and and her husband Toni came over and we visited with them for a while.

The boys were both really tuckered out by the end of the night.

I love Christmas it's my favorite holiday and my favorite time of year. I use to really stress about everything being perfect and just right but I decided this year I wasn't going to let anyone ruin my Christmas especially myself. So I was just going to go with the flow and enjoy my kids, so that's what I did and we had a great 2 days.

Christmas Eve.

We celebrated Christmas with Ryan's family this year. So we had Christmas Eve at our house and Christmas Day at Jammie's. When we lived in Safford when we were first married Ryan's dad's cousin would host a Mexican food party at her house and everyone in the family would go. It was great to visit and see everyone. And then we would go to back to the house and all read the story of Jesus birth and out act it out with this cloth nativity Jammie made years ago. So we did our own rendition. We Made green chili, and Mandy made her home made salsa, and we tried to read the story and act it out with our little people nativity scene. But with 3 little kids trying to help it didn't work out to well but oh well it's the thought that counts.



I like to get the kids special Christmas Eve PJ's and this year I was lucky enough to find 3 pair that match.



So we got them in there PJ's and they played a quick game of attack the Daddy, that's one of there favorites and then I helped them get Santa's plate ready. I'm not sure where they got it put they decided Santa's reindeer needed goodies too. So we made 2 plates and my sweet little Hailey decided she needed to label them so there would be no confusion.






Aunt Mammy read them their bed time story and off they went to bed.


As my little Angels were falling asleep and I was preparing for "Christmas Morning" I wondered what must be running through there minds. As a child we opened our presents on Christmas Eve, so I never went to bed as a child wondering about what was to come the next morning. It occurred to me that my children were experiencing something I had never experienced before. I don't know how any child could fall asleep with that kind of anticipation, but they did, when I went to check on them they were all sound asleep.

At some point in the evening we watched the movie "the Christmas story" i know it's un American but I hate that movie. It annoys me. I watch it to make my husband happy.

Mandy, me, Jammie

Gateway Dental Care Christmas Party

I started working for Dr. Barber when Jacob was a baby. This is my 4th Christmas Party with him. It's always a nice adult night away from the kids. Our office has grown quite a bit. It started as me,him and his sister and it has now blossomed into 2 dentist, 2 Hygienist, 2 front office girls and 4 back office girls. We are really growing.

This is our first Christmas party in 2005 Dr. B, Joyce, Kim, Ryan, Me, & Jodi.

This is all of us now, we don't fit in one picture anymore. We went to Cheesecake factory. (Yummy)
Joyce, Dr. B., Eileen and her hubby, Eileen, Dr. Erskine & His wife Sheri,

Lindsey & her husband Bill, Sam, Marci & Her hubby Craig, Amanda, Joyce

A horrible picture of me and Ryan. Myrna & Sarah weren't able to come.

After stuffing our faces we went back to Dr. B's house and gave the Dr.'s there gifts from us girls and had one of those gift exchanges where you can steal someon else's gifts. It was fun I got Itunes Gift card which I used right away. After the gifts we watched Batman in There Home theater it was great.