January 12, 2014

First full week back to our normal schedule.  We all seemed to have a hard time getting up early again.  But it feels good to be back to our routine.  Lily was so happy to return to preschool and dance class.  Annie slept through gymnastics, so we'll have to do a make up lesson next week.  Tommy is back to waking once a night - we're pretty sure it's because of his teething.  Other than that, just a normal week at home.

We got a surprise box in the mail with an awesome late Christmas present for the kids.  It is a Jake and the Neverland (or as Annie likes to say "Lever-nand") Pirates play set.  It shoots, it has moving parts, it is totally awesome.  The best part is, all three kids can play it together.  They will play together for hours - even Tommy.  Thanks Puna.  They really love it.

Tommy's love affair with the dishwasher continues.  He bawls if we close it or don't allow him to play in it.  It must be all the shiny things and moving parts.  When he hears us open it, he comes crawling, and fast.  Silly little dude.

Lily and her buddy Nathan were happy to reunite this week.  They usually spend every afternoon playing together.  Nathan really missed us while we were gone.  He thought up a plan to keep Lily around all the time and asked her to marry him earlier this week.  Their conversation went like this:

Nathan: "Hey Lily, when we grow up I want to marry you."
Lily: "If you feel the Spirit of God when you grow up, then I can marry you."
Nathan: "I will! I feel the Spirit of God all the time!"
Lily: "Ok then, I guess we can get married, but not until we're bigger."
Nathan: "And we can name our kids Luke Skywalker Bezzant and Princess Leia Hall."

Lily still isn't convinced this is what she wants when she gets older, but she is thankful for his friendship right now.  And we're glad she recognizes the value of a man having the Spirit with him as a husband and father.

Annie loves being back home with all her dress up stuff.  She is our perpetual princess.  Always accessorized, always pretending, always making us laugh with silly stories and goofy faces.  She lives in her Princess Anna dress and is dying for us to take her to see Frozen in theaters again.  This week mommy made the mistake of calling Annie "Baby" during dinner.  

Annie:  "Mommy I am NOT a baby!  Don't call me baby!"
Mommy:  "I'm sorry honey, I was just calling you that because I love you and you'll always be my baby even when you grow up."
Annie:  "But I am not a baby now I am a big girl."
Mommy:  "OK, well what would you like me to call you?"
Annie:  "How about Babe? Just Babe."
Mommy:  "So you're a babe?"
Annie:  "Yup you can call me a babe."
Mommy:  "You got it Babe!"
Annie:  runs away laughing - she's a babe and she knows it

Check out the mess - a sure sign of playing with friends all day Saturday.  Thank you to Daddy for enforcing Saturday night clean up.

Lily wanted to make cookies for her Primary teachers to thank them for being great teachers to her last year.  She chose a recipe involving rolling peanut butter dough around a Reese's peanut butter cup.  She worked hard to make three dozen of these babies; unwrapping the candies, rolling them in the dough, and helping get them in the oven.  We sampled a few as a family.  They are peanut butter nirvana!

Tommy thinks he's big enough for sippy cups now.  If the girls leave them lying around he finds them and drinks as fast as he can.  I filled one with his formula the other day.  he took a big sip and gave us a big smile as if to say, "hey, this tastes like my drink!"  He still likes bottles too but we'll be trying the sippy cups more often now.

Daddy's feet seem much better.  He got new orthotics in December and can use them for exercise.  He's back to playing soccer twice a week and running about twice a week.

Mommy is doing Zumba three times a week and running three times a week in training for a half marathon in June.  Heaven help me!  It will be a tough training schedule as we get closer to the race, but this has been a goal for a couple of years now.  I am excited to work toward it.  If you want to come cheer me on, the race is Saturday June 14th. 

We're all healthy and happy and looking forward to what 2014 has in store.  See you next week!

January 5, 2014 Part Two

The trip back home was peaceful and uneventful.  We made it home on New Year's Day and had one last day together to relax and get settled before Daddy went back to work.  We're all still on vacation time.  It is hard to get the kids down to bed at night and Mommy and Daddy are struggling to get out of bed in the mornings, but we're sure we'll get back in the swing of things soon.

 Lily was growing tired of her long hair always getting tangled so she asked me to cut it.  We ended up taking off five inches.  She loves it.  Since I had the hair cutting stuff out I also clipped off Tommy's wispy baby hairs and trimmed Annie's bangs.  Aren't they all so cute? 

Another big hit from Christmas is the set of bath crayons from Grammy and Grampy.  We have lots of creative bathtime artwork every night now. It is also hard to get the girls to sleep at night because they love looking at the new glow in the dark stars on their ceiling.  The first night home we helped them stick all the stars up.  They giggled and talked in their beds for an hour and a half - finally quitting about 10 p.m.  And they have done that nearly every night this past week.

To help adjust back to normal life we did a family snuggle night.  We had popcorn and M&M's and watched Brave.

 On Saturday Lily, Annie, and their friend Hailey helped me take down our Christmas decorations.  It is sad to have the tree gone, but it feels good to have the house back to normal.

 Saturday night we got Tommy to eat something dry for the first time.  He spits out bread, crackers, cereal and cookies every time we try to offer them.  But on Saturday he had his first Nilla wafer and he devoured it!

I never got a picture of the kids in their Christmas church clothes.  Here they are this Sunday morning - it's not their Christmas clothes but they were so cute.  Lily was excited to wear her new outfit.  Tommy was obviously not excited to take this picture.  This Sunday, Lily moved into the CTR 5 class and Annie entered Primary as a Sunbeam.  They are going to have a great year in Primary.

Here's to 2014!

January 5, 2014 Part One

We finished off the year with the Wanners.  We went to church in McCall on Sunday, then had our Wanner family Christmas, and finished off the day with a Seahawks game.

 I think one of the girls' favorite gifts was a dress from the movie "Frozen".  It stars two sisters - one of them has red hair.  Lily loves to play Elsa and Annie wears her Anna dress every day.  I think she even looks a little like Anna in the movie.  They always want to play "Frozen".  We'll have to take them back to see the movie again with their dresses.

Tommy was such a good baby during this trip.  After weeks of teething, sickness, constant waking at night, he gave me twelve nights in a row of sleeping eight hours straight, sometimes more.  He ate constantly.  And he was loved constantly.  Probably the reason for his sleepiness - he was always being picked up, played with, and spoken to.

We brought our supplies for our tradition of Rice Krispy Christmas trains.  We have done these for a couple of years now.  So much easier than trying to construct a gingerbread house - and to be honest we like the taste of the rice krispies better too.

Lily's second favorite gift was her Merida bow.  Based on the Merida character from the movie "Brave".  Lily loves Merida's mess of red hair and adventurous spirit.  She has been practicing shooting her new bow.  She is determined to get a real bow for her sixth birthday in October.  We'll see.

Puna and Papa treated us to breakfast at one of our favorite McCall restaurants - The Pancake House.  It is a huge restaurant, great for family dining.  The kids enjoyed the huckleberry syrup and shopping with Puna in the neighboring store, The Christmas House.

 Puna offered to tend the girls and Tommy at the cabin so Mommy could get a turn on the snow mobiles.  We had some trouble with one of the machines and had to leave it on the lake until we returned.  I was terrified to ride on the frozen lake.  I was certain that I would crash through the ice.  Thankfully we were all safe and had a nice ride.  I managed to get stuck twice while trying to follow Jeremy and Brady up some steep mountains.  And Jeremy got stuck once going off the trail.  I think the guys didn't like having to wait for me - I don't like to go above 40 mph on the trail. But our ride was still fun and we liked spending the day together.

I was most especially happy to return home safely to these cute little faces!  That night we went to Gold Fork Hot Springs just a few miles away from the cabin.  It was so crowded, but really neat to be there at night with only the light of the stars and a few torches. Tommy was especially happy to swim there.  He splashed and smiled and played the whole time.  We stayed nearly two hours because the water was so warm and inviting - not too hot for the kids, and just warm enough for the adults.  Thanks Puna and Papa for that treat.  the kids are still talking about how fun it was to swim outside in the winter time.  After the hot springs we came home to eat pizza and watch "Wreck It Ralph".  Annie loves that movie and wanted to share it with Papa.  We don't think Puna and Papa were big fans of the movie, but they were good sports for Annie.

 On our last day together we went ice skating in McCall - at Lily's request - and had burgers at Lardo's before saying goodbye.  Lily was ready to skate this time.  She wasn't afraid and tried really hard to get a feel for the ice.  Annie's little skates were so tiny next to mine.  Her little size six skates fit in my hand.  They were too adorable!  Tommy was a pretty good boy for Puna.  They would give us big smiles and waves as we passed.  Lily was happy to skate with Papa and show him that she was learning.  Annie just wanted free rides around the ice again.

It was hard to leave the cabin after such a great week and a half.  We feel so blessed to have a close family.  Thank you Grammy and Grampy for providing a beautiful place for us to escape to.  And thank you Puna and Papa and Brady for always making trips so fun.