Abby's Two

With all that has been going on this past week, we decided to have just a small celebration for Abby's second birthday.  We went to my moms for dinner and then had cake and ice cream.  Abby didn't seem to mind that it wasn't a huge thing. She was just looking forward to cake and presents!  For the whole week leading up to her birthday, she kept asking "Abby's birthday", and was hoping that we would say yes, it is your birthday today =).
Abby has tons of personality and her little smile just lights up a room. She can also be a huge stinker and we can already see the terrible two's coming!  Abby loves Chloe and wants to do whatever Chloe is doing.  It is so much fun to watch them play together. We are so grateful for Abby and that she is a part of our family!

Christmas

I'm sure that most of you who have kids were woken up super early on Christmas morning by your children anxiously awaiting to see what Santa had brought them.  Not us, we had to wake Chloe and Abby up at 8:30 and remind them that it was Christmas!  When we took them down stairs  their little eyes lit up when they saw all the presents and they were ready to dive in.

 Abby would have been perfectly content just eating all the candy from her stocking because that was all she wanted from Santa. When we would ask her what she wanted from Santa she would quickly reply "treats".  If we asked her if she wanted presents to she would say "no... treats".  Chloe was excited to find new lip gloss and jewelry in her stocking.

 After we opened up the stockings, we got down to business.  The girls wanted to open up their gifts from Santa first and so that's what we did.  Abby got her own pillow pet and a xylophone and Chloe got a Barbie pool and a new doll.  Santa also brought the girls a new sled.

 Another one of Chloe's favorite gifts was a pair of new boots.  She is such a girl and loves shoes.  Chloe also gave Abby a new doll and Abby loved it. Aaron surprised me with some new shoes and the girls surprised him by getting him a new Car's scooter. Now daddy won't have to steal Chloe's Barbie scooter anymore!

 After we finished opening up presents, we headed over to my mom's house for brunch and more presents.  Chloe was so excited to get her new bunk bed for her doll and loved all the new doll clothes she got from Grandma. Abby got some adorable outfits and some cute hand puppets.  My parents also got Aaron and new air compressor and I got some wonderful gifts as well.  Thanks Mom and Dad for all the great gifts!

Christmas Eve Eve

Every year on the 23rd of December, we get together with my Dad for our family Christmas celebration. This tradition started when Aaron and I got married and we had to start dividing our holiday time between three families and so far, it has worked out great.  This year was no exception.  We had a great dinner, played some fun new games and exchanged our presents.  My dad got Aaron and I a 50 gallon water container for our food storage and we couldn't have been happier. However, we still haven't found a way to get it to our house =).  Chloe and Abby love all their gifts as well. I think the biggest hit was a huge coloring sheet with markers.  They opened that up as soon as they could and spent the rest of the night coloring.  Thanks Dad and Kelly for a great Christmas!

Aunt Tawna and Chloe

Abby showing off her new bib from Grandpa

 Grandpa Ron and Grandma Kelly

 The girls coloring their new present

 Aaron and I 

 We sure are cute =)

 Chloe

Snow Fun

Aaron took the girls sledding the other day with Grandpa Ron, Tawna and the Dollahites.  They had a great time and came back rosy cheeked and had frozen hands.  Our camera was running out of batteries but we got a few cute shots of the girls all bundled up.

Jungle Jim's

The McKinlay family came into town for the holidays a few weeks back and one of the days they were here, we took all the kids to Jungle Jim's. It is a mini amusement park filled with rides specially designed for young kids.  After following the kids for the first few rides to make sure they knew what to do ( and of course get some photos) we set them loose and were able to just sit and watch them go from ride to ride.  We were there for over four hours and the kids could have kept playing for another four.

Chloe, Ashley, and Maddie 

 Maddie and Chloe

 Camryn and Chloe

 Abby and Ashley

 Luke and Owen

 Chloe and Abby

 Chloe and Camryn

 Abby (she was so proud that she could ride this all by herself)

 Paula and a very 'happy' Connor

 Heather and Abby (Heather was a lifesaver and helped me put Abby on all the rides)

 All the cousins

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas! 

Rice Krispy Houses

I had read on Pinterest that someone made their gingerbread houses out of rice krispy treats and I thought that it was a brilliant idea.  So, for family home evening on Monday night, we went over to my mom's house and made our rice krispy houses.
We wanted to make them kinda sticky so that they would stick together while forming the house shape and in that aspect it worked perfectly. However, since we didn't wait for them to harden up, by the end of the night our houses were starting to droop.

 After showing Abby how to put frosting on the house and then stick the candy on, she needed no further instructions either. She would get her knife, put the frosting on her house, lick the remaining frosting off the knife, eat a bite off of her candy and then stick the other part on her house.

 Chloe killed me with her creativity.  She knew just what she wanted to put where and needed no prompting from mom or dad. Her house by far had the most candy. By the end, I don't think you could tell  that there was a rice krispy treat under all that candy and frosting.

We all had a good time and the best part was getting to eat the houses right after we finished. I mean, come on, who wants to just stare at all that yummyness when you can eat it!