10 Days old

Just some pictures I took of Madison yesterday. She was 10 days old!!! They grow and change so much the first little while. We are sure enjoying her!

She is here!!!

Madison Kay joined our family this week on the 10th. She was 6 pounds 7 ounces and 19 inches long. She was born at 6:56 p.m., and everything went well.

I still can't believe I am the mother of 5 kids, but we are so excited to have her here! She has lots of dark hair, which reminds me of Andrea as a baby, but she looks the most like Tyler to me. The kids couldn't come to the hospital because of the flu season, so these pictures are the first time they saw her and held her. She is 2 days old today!

Here she is with Ashley (who just became a giant to me).

Tyler was happy to see her. When I called and talked to him from the hospital, he asked me, "So mom, are you having a good time?" I wasn't sure how to answer that (who has a good time at the hospital?), so I told him I was enjoying baby Madison.

Kara and Andrea are already fighting about holding her.

I think she is still like a new toy to them.

Just showing her dark hair.

Right after she was born.

She is one day old here:

Santa

So we got these for free at our snow event. I know they aren't the greatest, but when you are almost 9 months pregnant, honestly, you don't care!

Ashley wasn't interested in sitting on his lap, but she did want the candy!

Snow!!!

So it was homemade snow, but my kids sure didn't care!!!
Here is Tyler throwing a snow ball at dad!

Ashley showing me her gloves.

Notice the palm trees in the background.

Digging in the snow to make snowballs.

Missing Denver all over again!

Thanksgiving weekend

So now that the weather has cooled, we FINALLY took Kara out to learn to ride a 2 wheeler. She was very excited and picked it up very quickly. Jason was outside with the kids Thanksgiving morning, so I could make the few things I was bringing to Thanksgiving dinner. We had a great meal at Jason's brothers house, and we were so glad to spend some time with their family! (Thanks, Melissa!!!)

Thanksgiving evening the three older kids drove up and stayed with Grandpa Judd in Tuba City. Then Friday morning they went and picked out a Christmas tree. Tyler got pricked by a jumping cactus. While Jason and grandpa took out the needles, he looked up and said between tears, "You know what, Grandpa? It sure is tough being a cowboy." They laughed out loud at that (not sure where he got that in his head). This is the tree they picked. Yes, it doesn't look very big. But when Jason got home he read the little pamphlet they got with the tags which stated "remember that trees look smaller in the forest than they do in your home." As a result, this is the biggest tree we have ever had!

Here is Ashley playing with the kids nativity set (Fisher Price). She LOVES Christmas already and she hasn't even figured out the present part of it yet!

Here is the end result of the tree! Since I was no help, it took Jason a few hours to get it up. We had to switch corners, since it was too tall for the first one we put it in. You may notice there are a lot more ornaments on the bottom--the kids did most the decorating and dad could barely reach the top! But it is done and it is beautiful!

Here are our stockings hanging in a row. Ashley is looking up at hers. Yes, we do have one for baby this year since she will come before Christmas. The hardest part to believe is that we have SEVEN stockings...when did we have that many kids???

Now we are ready for baby and for Christmas. I finished up shopping and wrapping (except a few online orders) while the kids were gone with dad. Now I just need to pack my hospital bag....I'm not due for 2 1/2 weeks--I have time, right?

Gingerbread houses

Jason's family tradition is to decorate gingerbread houses together. So we made them FROM SCRATCH (dough Monday, baked and cut Wednesday, and decorated Saturday). Andrea designed all o fit. I just put the frosting on and helped "glue" it all together. For our first time, I thought it turned out just great!

Almost done with the roof:

Finishing up the back, front and sides:
(Yes, I am 8 months pregnant and still smiling for the picture!)

Getting ready to glue gun it together (MUCH faster than using frosting):

Our end result!!!!

This was a week long, but really fun, project for Andrea and me to do together. We had a great time with the girls in Jason's family too and I learned A LOT from all of them! Thanks to the Judd's for a very memorable day!!

Andrea is 8!!!

Here are my kids with Andrea's Oreo Fudge Brownie cake!

Andrea wanted scriptures SO MUCH. She just finished the Book of Mormon a few weeks ago (she wanted to be done before her birthday) and as of right now she is just about done with the Pearl of Great Price as well. (She loves to read.)

She went to her best friend's birthday party on her birthday, which she was pretty excited about it, since she got sparkling fingers and toes from it--including a flower on her big toe. It was a great day for her!

Our October

Kara lost her two front teeth within days of each other. Now she is singing the song "All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth..." nearly every day. Andrea was singing that same song last year! I can't believe how quickly they are growing up!

Since dad was out of town for Halloween, we painted pumpkins instead of carving, and the kids had a blast with that. Kara said that hers was "created"--it was cute to watch her try all different colors and things to get her own special pumpkin.

Once we convinced Ashley that Halloween is fun (she was very afraid of pumpkins a month ago), she decided to be Cinderella. Halloween is a HUGE event here in Arizona--it's like a big neighborhood block party! There was a haunted house, a movie playing on the garage, and everyone sits out front in lawn chairs to hand out candy. My kids loved it!

So Ashley turned two last month, and of course, we gave her a baby doll. She still loves it nearly a month later, and I love that she has "Ashley's baby" who she named Baby Dora. (No surprises there.) Maybe it will make mommy having a baby ok???

This is Ashley with her cake. I wish I had a good messy cake picture, but she wanted every bite to make it into her mouth. She is my best eater, but aren't kids at two supposed to still be messy with their birthday cakes?? (Kara was still messy at 6!)

Tyler's first day of preschool

Tyler was so excited to finally start preschool! This is Miss Tracy, his teacher. This was his first day. He wore his T-shirt from Niagara Falls because he wanted to show everyone.

This bottom picture is outside of the house where he has preschool. My little boy is growing up!

Fun with the kids

Just some fun moments we have had with each of our kids the past few weeks:
Andrea:
We enjoyed watching the BYU game on Saturday, probably more so because they won. But Andrea watched with us and learned a lot about football! There were a few moments that got intense so we told her she had to be quiet and not ask questions, but other than that, it was an enjoyable time. I guess we are breeding future BYU graduates early!
Kara:
I forgot to take first day of school pictures of my girls! I know, I am terrible! But Jason picked them up from school. When Kara came out, Jason picked her up and gave her a big hug. She said, "Put me down now, dad!" She looked mortified and checked all around her to make sure now one saw. "Don't ever do that again, dad." She was so embarrassed! She is only in 1st grade--don't we get a little more time than that?!?!
Tyler:
So we were driving to Jason's sister's house Sunday night to see her son open his mission call (he is going to Brazil). She lives about an hour away. Here is the conversation as we leave our house.
Tyler: "Do you have the map to get to her house?"
Jason: "It's all in my head."
Tyler: "What if you lose it?"
Mom: "Then we are all in trouble."
Dad didn't look very happy with mom's response, but we did get a laugh out of it. I love the things that kids say, especially when they don't even know they say it!
Ashley:
Finally, with Ashley, the other night at dinner, the other kids had finished and eaten everything on their plates. Ashley looked at them and then watched them clear their plates. She then tried to hand Jason a piece of her food. He didn't take it, so she put it on his plate. We watched her after that, and she put the remaining three pieces left on her plate onto Jason's plate. When she had successfully cleaned off her plate, she looked at us with a big smile and said, "All done!" Then went and put her plate in the sink too. I'm not sure we will let her get away with that again, but it sure struck us as funny. She is growing up so fast, and really just wants to be like her siblings.

Jason's Stitches

So last night Jason gets ready to go mountain biking after the kids get in bed, but he gashes open the side of his leg. It was really deep (I will spare you the gross details of that). It is obvious that it needs stitches, since it is 1 1/2 inch wide and 1/2 inch deep. So he decides to stitch them up himself!!!! And he did. He was so proud he took a picture and I told him I would post a picture on the blog! My favorite thing that he said was "It is harder putting stitches in skin than in the mouth. Or maybe it was just because I was doing it on myself." I think it was because he didn't have anything to numb it with!

Our trip

So my pictures aren't in order, but here are some different things that we did before, during, and after my family reunion in Ohio.

OUR FAMILY IN FRONT OF PALMYRA TEMPLE
(outside of Joseph Smith's family farm)

SUNSET AT LAKE ERIE

My kids all got pretty wet, but we were flying home the next day and didn't want to deal with wet swim suits. Ashley's shorts were dripping so she ended up just in her diaper.

The waves were really big because of the wind, but the kids thought it was awesome.

PALMYRA
Here is the monument at the Hill Cumorah.

This is where the first copy of the Book of Mormon was published. We loved this site and my kids liked walking on the same floor that Joseph Smith walked.

This is in the sacred grove. Even though we don't know exactly where, it was a very neat experience for my kids.

NIAGARA FALLS

This is the American Falls behind us. We LOVED the boat ride.

This is before we went on the boat.

We only really got good pictures of the American Falls. There was too much water getting on us at Horseshoe Falls--but they were spectacular!

HORSEBACK RIDING

REUNION

My girls are modeling the tutus Aunt Becky made with the scarfs that Grandma Heath made.

The beach at the house we stayed at. They are swimming with dad and their cousins.

KIRTLAND
Our family in front of the temple.

Side view of the temple.

On the steps with cousins at the Johnson Farm. These are the steps Joseph was dragged down when he was tarred and feathered.

We had a great time!!! We were so glad to get to see so many meaningful and fascinating sites. We also enjoyed the chance to be with family for a lot of the trip as well.