The Polar Express

Our Thanksgiving this year was spent at home and we feasted with friends from the ward.  Since we weren't driving far to see family, we took a little drip to Durango, CO to ride the Polar Express.

Durango is beautiful and only 3 1/2 hours away so it was the perfect little getaway.  The Polar Express is actually the Durango Silverton Railroad that is done up all cute for the holidays.  The best part of the ride (at least for Spencer and I) was seeing this cool old steam engine roll up.

The ride wasn't until night but we got there early enough to check out the train and museum before it got dark.  Ryan is sometimes too cool for pictures.

The boys loved the trip.  There was hot chocolate and cookies, Christmas carols, and the North Pole where....

This guy got on handing out bells to the kids to which Ryan replied, "This is just what I wanted for Christmas mom!!!"

Oh good, I'll take back all your presents and just buy some more bells. :)

and some more

cute kiddos.

family pics 2009

A friend took some pictures for us this weekend and she did a great job.  Here are just a few of my favorites...and these aren't even the best ones.  I am saving those to pick from for Christmas cards.  It's always a relief after taking pictures with little children to see that there was some success!

a day

My family has been requesting more pictures.  So here's a picture from a typical day at our house.  Ryan was being very sweet and teaching Andrew how to play Connect Four while Mabel just happily watched.  And yes, Andrew is wearing underwear and not peeing on the floor.  I was cooking dinner in our clean house and all was good.

I would love to pretend that this is how it is all the time.  Kids not fighting, baby not crying, little boys not peeing all over, and me happily going about my wifely duties...

ok, so it's hardly ever like this.  But it's nice when you get these little moments.  It tricks me into thinking that this is easy :)

8 months

At 8 months Mabel is impressing us by:

-climbing up into furniture

-growing 2 teeth

-deciding to finally eat solid food.  I had stopped trying for over a month and then one day I gave her some sweet potatoes and she gobbled up the whole jar and hasn't stopped since.

-giving us her sweet smiles and reacting very excited when she sees Mom and Dad...we love it.

Happy Halloween

Happy Halloween!  Max joined us again.

Aren't they cute?  Buzz, Bee, and Raphael.

A cute little candy corn.  The funny thing was, she loved wearing the hat and kept it on for hours.

I won this delicious cake at our ward party.  Sorry ladies, I guess I am awesome at musical chairs.  Thanks Audrey, it is DELICIOUS!

This was the first year Ryan designed his own  pumpkin face (and then Spencer carved it out).  Can you tell there is a booger coming out of it's nose?  Ryan was pretty proud when he won a prize at the ward pumpkin contest.  

A city so nice, i'll post about it twice

Mabel was really excited about the whole trip.  Except sleeping time (sorry again Dan and Anne!)

This is the great hall on Ellis Island where Immigrants would be brought before entrance to America.  Also a good place for punching your brother.

Times Square

Central park is so fun.  We could have probably walked around the park all day.

And one of the coolest things about going to Manhattan is seeing the beautiful temple right smack in the middle of downtown.  

Thanks again Dan and Anne for a great time.  And a big thanks to Grammy and Gramps who let us sneak away for a trip and leave the boys with them.  Our boys had so much fun, they hardly missed us.  You can check out all the fun they had here.