Emi's Birthday

Emi is now 3! What a horrible age. In my opinion I would take two 2's and move right into the 4's. But since that isn't really an option here we come horrendous 3's! Emi is already our little spit fire. She can be the sweetest little thing one minute and make you madder than mad the next.

Anyway, we had a great time celebrating her 3rd birthday. Ryan cooked up some yummy German pancakes for breakfast. He also make her 3 balloon flowers for a centerpiece. For lunch we all went out to Chick-fil-a on Riverdale which was a blast. We had lots of fun playing. The kids played for at least 2 hours. It was great to get out of the house. Then that evening Ryan took Emi on a date to Chuck-e-cheese where they shared a pizza and played lots of games.

It seems that everyone in our family has at least 3 parties. Emi next got to celebrate her birthday with her Jones aunts and grandparents and cousin Lucy. We celebrated on Jan. 1st. We all got together for lunch then opened presents for Lucy's birthday, Kevin's (Grandpa's) and Emi's. After we went to the movies where some of us went and saw the Princess and the Frog. Me and the girls loved it! I will definitely watch that one again! I loved the story in it. Emi's third party was at the Wachter house where we celebrated Emi's, her aunt Cathy's and cousin Padan's. The hardest part for Emi is sharing her new toys. Ali wants so badly to play with them but Emi doesn't want to share! That has made the last almost week difficult. One day I might know a little bit more about good parenting.

Christmas

What a happy time of year! I must admit at first I thought we were going to have a repeat of last year with a sick child. Bridger got his immunizations on the 23rd and on the 24th he had a fever. Luckily it didn't last long and with Tylenol he seemed to do just fine.

We were truly blessed this holiday season. We had lots of secret Santa's watching over us. In fact this was probably the biggest Christmas Ryan and I have had during our marriage. It started out before Thanksgiving with a knock on the door. When we opened the door their was a plate of cookies and an envelope. The envelope contained $50! What a blessing just in time to help us with some much needed bills. Next we got a phone call from our Bishop telling us he had a family that wanted to adopt us this Christmas. We filled out a questionnaire and promptly returned it to the Bishop. Then the week of Christmas we were blessed so much. We received checks from our grandparents and gift cards from cousins. We returned Sunday night from a family party to find 2 large presents and 2 small presents on our porch for our children. Then Monday night again a know on the door and this time a bowl filled with crumpled up bills totaling over $100. Then of course we had so many wonderful gifts delivered to us by our bishopric from our secret santa family. One other thing we got to do was to go to DI to pick out a few things we needed. I had no idea that at Christmas time the Bishops can send families in need to get any items that they need for free! It is amazing what they do. They have these kits to make doll houses that are amazing. They also have people take home various dolls and clean them up and package them so cutely! Next year I plan to give back and donate some of my talents and time to do the same for someone else.

So needless to say when our girls woke up Christmas morning the awoke to quite an array of wonderful Christmas gifts provided by the most special kinds of Santa's the true Santa's in this world.

Twas the night before Pre-school

Twas the night before pre-school and all through the house my kitchen was clean the living room too

It won't be long before 8 little kids will gather at the table to learn and be able

We will sing and learn letters eat food and color sweaters

Then after 2 1/2 hours we'll see if all is well

Okay so I am not a poet and we will do all but color sweaters. We will color though. I am hoping all goes well as I have an additional person to side track me. To think Bridger will be 4 1/2 months old. I will post pictures of all the fun we have!

The Pumpkin Patch

It is becoming a tradition for us to go to Cochran's and pick out our pumpkins. I think I will go back with the girls in their witch outfits and take some more pictures. We love this place! They have cute things to buy and great produce!

Bridgers Blessing

What a special day! It was so great having most of our family there to participate. I am very grateful for brothers and uncles and grandpa's and especially fathers who have set such a great example. To me there isn't a stronger power than the priesthood power these great men hold. We had a fun time trying to find a blessing outfit that would fit Bridger and that we liked. We finally started looking at suit options and found a suit for $30 bucks at Bliss in the Newgate mall. We got it home and tried the pants on him and his skinny legs drowned in them. So the day before we headed out with Diane to see what we could find. We tried Sassy babies in Bountiful and found tons of cute items and a cute suit but not one that fit. We then tried Brats and found an outfit and shoes that we all thought would work great. I will say it is more fun to shop for girls (sorry Bridge).

Girls Nights

We have had 2 really fun girl nights the last few weekends. We had one with the Wachters where we decorated witch hats and made tutu's . We then went to the General Relief Society meeting which I thought was amazing! It made me rethink my involvement in Relief Society, that it is not merely another meeting I go to but it is my weekly meeting for the Lord's club that I choose to be apart of. It makes me more excited to fulfill my responsibilities. After that we went to dinner at Mi Ranchito's.

Then during the priesthood session the Jones girls got together and we baked pizza's and made super cute beaded bracelets using safety pins.

Now I am getting ready for Super Saturday and Bridgers blessing which are both this weekend. Life is just crazy fun!

Update

Having a boy has been lots of fun. He is definitely my best sleeper, he only gets up once a night. He eats pretty well but super slow. He will usually take an hour to eat first 30 minutes or so nursing then another 3 or so eating 2 oz. of formula. He loves the sling and sleeps quite well when he is in it. We have been giving him a binki as needed (we learned with Emi that all babies need a way to console, and sucking is the best way). He is still a pretty long and skinny guy. Our most recent adventure with Bridger was to the urologist yesterday. He was never circumcised because his foreskin was not fully developed as well as the nurse saying he had hypospadia and the doctor saying it was chordee. Well yesterday we found out they were all right. When Bridger is 6 to 12 months he will have surgery to fix it all. We are just hoping we have insurance by then.

So as some of you know Ryan was laid off on Sept. 1st which is good and bad. Bad because now is not the ideal time to be unemployed, but good because it will give him the opportunity to look at other options he might enjoy. (I am voting for seminary teacher). That takes about 2 years so If you hear of other opportunities let us know!

Ali started pre-school this week. We are doing a rotating neighborhood one with 7 kids so I will teach only 4 times! sounds great to me and is lots cheaper than other options.

Emi is starting to potty train and has advanced from the toddler potty to the big potty! Now we just have to get her to use it all the time!

I am getting ready for super Saturday which I think will be a blast!