Sick of being sick!

December has been very rough for our family! We all were sick in one form or another, but Dallin, Callie, and Ava fared the worse! We all had the nasty cold/cough/fever thing, and I think we have yet to have a full nights sleep this month:( Poor Callie and Dallin had coughs so bad at night, and it seemed to take several day to figure out what meds would help them the best. Dallin recovered after a week and a half, and Callie hung on to hers for three and a half weeks! She missed most of her preschool in December, and missed her Christmas party too. She was so sick at night, that she napped a lot in the day. On this particular day, she was so exhausted that she just fell asleep on the floor with her "duckie blankie" on top of books, video game controllers and all!


And my poor Ava caught the same thing, but ended up with a high fever, diarrhea so bad it caused a chemical burn bleeding diaper rash, and a terrible ear infection! After we got home from the clinic, I put her in the high chair so I could fix lunch. She sat there and whimpered and cried, and pulled at her ear, and looked so sad and pathetic. I wanted to take a picture of her sad little sick face, and as soon as I took the camera out she smiled!!! I tried to get another shot, and she smiled again!!! I wonder if she is trained to preform the camera is out or what!! I'm just so grateful everyone was healthy by Christmas!

O' Christmas Tree!

The past several years we have driven up north to a great tree farm to cut down our own Christmas tree. The kids love the fact that they have a petting zoo, free hot cider, horse drawn sleigh rides, and Santa of course! We love the fact that we get an amazing tree for $35, and a great activity with the kids, that is well, quickly becoming our family Christmas tradition!







We did a coin toss this year, and the kids won. We ended up with an enormous 10 foot tall tree that was almost as wide as it was tall. I wanted a tall narrow tree, that would take up less space in our living room, but I guess I'll have to wait until next year! I was trying to take a picture of Callie in front of the tree while Chuck was cutting it down, when it quickly fell to the ground, ruining my shot, and dang near taking out my daughter! I was starting to regret the fact that I agreed to the coin toss after we got home. Not only was it a total pain to get in the house and in the stand, but a few hours later while I was hanging the lights, it came crashing down flooding my living room with a gallon of water!


Chuck happened to only be a few minutes away from home, and came home to help me mop up and reset our tree. We had to weigh it down with sand bags all around the base so it wouldn't fall again! I'm just grateful Ava wasn't crawling around, and that I hadn't decorated it yet! I have to say it's been a great tree after all that, and has helped fill our home with the magic of Christmas!

Break The Daddy's Back!

The kid's evening wrestling matches with Dad have turned a bit into hog pile piggy back rides! It all started with Dallin and Grant jumping onto Chuck's back at the same time. Chuck of course had to prove his strength by standing up and walking around with them on his back, and then Callie wanted to join in the fun too. With a lot of tries and retries, we finally got all three on his back (Poor Dad!)!

I love that I have a husband who loves to play with his kids...it brings back a lot of very vivid memories of my dad giving me piggie and horsie rides as a child. I know that these little playful moments with dad will be something our children will treasure.