Christmas 2010

What a fun (and interesting) Christmas we had this year. I will get to the interesting part later. Christmas Eve was spent at my dad's house and I was on the food planning committee. I thought it would be fun to do ALL appys for the food. I did a yummy chicken salad and lots of different dips. My sis in law made the yummiest shrimp appy. Man I love appys! My dad could not resist the temptation to buy and cook a "turducken". A "turducken" is a chicken stuffed inside a duck all stuffed inside a turkey. It was really good actually! We opened gifts and this picture was the highlight. Most of my family is obsessed with the Broncos. Why? Poor choice if you ask me. I thought this hat was hilarious. Then we came home and I became REALLY sick. It is hard being sick when you are preggo and cant take anything for it. So I didn't sleep and on Christmas I felt worse :-( It is sad being sick on your favorite day of the year but I still managed to have a good time.
Here is what Santa left little Austin man. He LOVES this thing. He goes upstairs and will play with his train table for hours....which allows me to get lots done...like blogging! Horray for Santa.

Austin Christmas morning opening his Santa gifts. Just as a side note: we let Austin pick out his pajamas for Christmas Eve and this is what he came up with.

We were making Austin some lunch and when I was done I came back to this. Opening presents is exhausting! So we were supposed to go over to my brother's early on Christmas day but I was sick, Austin was sleeping and I called to find out this: My brother had been in a car accident Christmas Eve!! He had gone in for an emergency patient and was driving home but had to swerve so he wouldn't hit a deer and drove into a ditch and hit his head on the steering wheel. He then passed out for an hour until someone finally stopped and let him use their cell phone to call AMA and his wife (who was panicked as you can imagine). He finally got home at 2am with a bloody car and face. Not fun! He is fine and the car is in the shop. Crazy!!!

After Christmas we headed up to the Chalets in B.C. for some snowshoeing fun. Austin likes being shirtless lately but is in love with his new toque. Looks cute to me!!

Hans pulling Austin and Michael on the sled outside the Chalets.

We went on the most beautiful hike through the mountains to a waterfall. What could be better than that?? The weather was perfect.

Mom and I before the hike

Breathtaking!

Here is the waterfall we hiked to.

They had this bench near the waterfall where we ate our lunch. It was sooooo much fun!

Leaving our mark.

I love Christmas!!!

I love Christmas! Seriously, what is not to love? We have had so much fun with all the festivities and parties. It is funny now that Hans is in the "family business" because all the work parties have my family in them. What a treat! This year we wanted to take Austin to see Santa Claus. We made a "big build up" for it because we wanted him to smile and not scream.....Austin is not that fond of strangers. To get him to smile, mommy and daddy had to be in the picture.
This is Austin and Maverick on Santa's lap. Maverick is my besties little boy. Isn't he adorable? Austin's face is priceless in this picture. This is the face I expected of him.

They have all these fun things for the kids to do while waiting in line to see Santa. Genious! They had cookie making, an ice skating rink that lit up and a tunnel through a tree. Austin was in heaven! He wants to go and see Santa everyday (but maybe not sit on his lap).

We went with our friends, the Low's, to zoolights this year. I thought Austin wouldn't last very long outside since I now live in the arctic tundra but it was actually a pretty nice night. We were there for about 2 hours and he didn't want to leave. They had this area where you could bowl for snowmen and Austin LOVED it! I guess all I need is some styrofoam and a ball and we are good to go!

Austin and Madeline in the reindeer hay pit. I am not sure who thought of this as an activity but it was a good one. He just climbed over, and jumped on hay bales for half an hour. I had to literally pry him away with bribes of hot chocolate. The lights were awesome but didn't really turn out in the pictures.

I let Austin help me make cookies for friends. We made a BIG mess but had sooooo much fun doing it. He also loved dropping off the cookies. "bye bye cookies" he would say "miss you"

Our ward party this year was "Christmas in the Tropics" spawned by a friend's recent trip to Hawaii. Notice the flowered shorts worn by Santa in the backround. Santa couldn't let all the kids in our ward sit on his lap because there are SO MANY kids in our ward. He gave out lifesavers which as you can tell by Austin's face, were a hit :-) We have had so much fun thus far this Christmas season and we are excited for lots more to come.

Crazy Update

This is going to be a full update since I have not posted in awhile. I guess the biggest news is that I am preggo! I am 20 weeks along and just found out I will be having another baby boy. We are so excited about having a baby brother for the Austy man. We have a name in mind but we are not sharing it because everyone has sooooo many opinions about names. I am due May 3rd but I am hoping the baby will be born in April (a girl can always hope). This will be the 7th grandchild for my parents and the 7th boy!! We are hoping for a full basketball team.

In November Hans had a dental conference in San Fran and I was able to go with him. His sister lives there and I thought it would be nice for Austin to get to see his cousins again. Jen had a baby in April and so I got to meet the little guy for the first time. Austin LOVED playing with Landry and Sadie. They were so good about playing with him....even though he is 2 and not always the best playmate. I love this picture of them holding hands.

Trying on hats in Gymboree.

Austin fell asleep in the cart at Target. What a lovely treat!! I got to shop at my favorite store, uninterrupted, for 2 hours.

We really enjoyed the great weather and the opportunity to spend time outside. We went to the park and played in the sandpit for hours.

Austin has never met Hans' grandparents and so we got to see them this trip. Love you Nana and Papa!

Okay I threw this random picture in. This is Sunday dinner at my place where there was impromtu moustache wearing. It just makes me laugh!

We had such a fun Halloween this year. The older Austin gets, the more fun all the holidays are. We let Austin pick out a pumpkin to carve and he was having so much fun until....

Daddy showed him the "guts" inside the pumpkin. He kept saying "yucky daddy! throw it away!!!". Not impressed.

Austin was a robot this year and I think trick or treating was the highlight of his life so far. He STILL talks about it. You cant really blame him though....get dressed up all silly and you go around to people's houses and they just GIVE you all the candy you want. He was one happy robot. I cant belive all the trick or treaters we had at our door this year. In Kentucky we were lucky to have 3 or 4 kids. Here I bought a 100 piece candy box and was out in 45 min!! Guess I'll have to get more for next year.

Sister Halloween picture at my dads party.

Group pic....minus me. We have had a great couple of months and now I am excited to start blogging about all the Christmas fun we've been having!!

Trip to the Wiggles

This trip was not really supposed to be a trip in the first place. Let me explain. The Wiggles were coming to Calgary on Friday but that was the day my sweet nephew Michael was going to get baptized. I talked with my frother (friend+brother) and we dicussed that we could make a trip out of going to see the Wiggles in Edmonton (3 hours away). Of couse we had to add a million other activites to the list :-) On the way up to Edmonton we stopped halfway in Red Deer and took the kids to a wave pool. They had a great time, then we hopped back in the car, chlorine and all, and headed to the concert. Here is Austin and Carter before the concert started. Austin was amazed by the Wiggles. He has been talking about it ever since!
Toot Toot chugga chugga big red car!

After the concert we headed over to West Edmonton Mall, which by the way is the biggest mall in North America. Sorry Mall of America you are not the biggest. This mall has a waterpark, ice skating rink, indoor theme park, submarine, sea lion show and the list goes on. We met the big boy cousins at the Theme Park and they all wanted to ride the carousel of all things. Silly boys! We went to the arcade, got a bite to eat and then played mini golf. After the kiddos went to bed the adults hung out in the hotel lobby and played games. The fun never seems to end when my brother is around.

The next day we headed over to Denny's. Needless to say we did not get much sleep. Hans gets a little delirious without sleep.

Not enough sleep didn't seem to affect these boys.

The group! We had such a great time. Horray for the Wiggles!

Life Lately

Ok this picture just makes me laugh
Austin loves building forts in the front room with daddy.

I had 16 people over at my house for Canadian Thanksgiving! It was fun though. I did the turkey this year and I was having paranoia about it. Thank goodness we have a chef in the family! I think I called Mark about 20 times to make sure I was doing the turkey right. It turned out really well...horray!

Austin and his cousin Carter are BFF. When they are together they do not leave eachother's side. They rarely fight....but they do cause a lot of mischief. Grandpa Mark gave them some fudge and they loved it :-)

I had everyone come early for dinner so the kids could make a Thanksgiving hat. Okay trying to take a picture of 6 little kids all looking at the camera is impossible!

I love this picture of Landon. What a cutie!

Austin has started preschool this year. I have gotten together with a bunch of girls in the ward and we switch off who's house preschool is at each week. We are doing the letters of the alphabet. Austin loves wearing his backpack to "school". I am amazed at how much he has already learned.

Preschool at our house.

A week in Waterton and Heritage Park

This really has been an awesome summer. I really love living back in Calgary with all my family and my BFF around. This summer my Aunt Kathy called and asked if I wanted to use our summer cabin for a week. Yes of course I said! So my bestie Mel and I decided to make it a girls week and we had such a good time. Melanie is someone that just "gets" me. We always have a great time when we are together. Here we are with are cute kiddos in front of Cameron Falls.
We decided we would be brave and hike our kids up a mountain. Austin did pretty good and hiked most of the way up. Then he slept ALL the way down and was like dead weight on my back. It was VERY tiring but it was worth the experience.

Here we are at the top. Isn't it beautiful? It looks like we are taking a picture in front of a backdrop. Waterton is one of the most beautiful places on earth.

When the kiddos were sleeping we would sit on the lawn and read, eat snacks and heckle the people who walked by.

We rented a surrey and drove around. Austin loved it!

Austin and Auntie Mel bonding time.

Another fun thing we did this summer was go to Heritage Park. I was surprised at how many rides Austin was able to go on. Here he is on a boat swing with my friend Janae's little boy Preston.

Austin LOVED his older (second) cousin Seth. Seth held Austin's hand the whole time and helped him on the rides. Too cute :-)

Here they are getting on the ferris wheel. I love Austin's face in this one. He is looking at the attendant like "are you really strapping me into this thing?"

Cute little Austin's face peering over the edge.

This was Austin's first experience on a real "choo choo". He was thrilled to say the least. We have had a great summer and are excited for the fall. Swim lessons, preschool and the list goes on. Never a dull moment around here.