Out of the Mouth of Kylee: Martin Luther King Jr.

I am totally impressed with Kylee's kindergarten teacher (Melissa Ireland) and the things she has taught Kylee over the last five months. Kylee came home a couple weeks ago from school and was able to tell us all about Martin Luther King, Jr. I took this small video of her and thought I'd post it here:

Big Als = Big Smiles

A couple weekends ago, we were lucky enough to have Kylee on a Saturday. What was even better is that Matt didn't have to work. We decided to take advantage of the opportunity and headed out to Big Als to play some games. Kylee immediately asked if she could ride a car simulator game (the kind where you sit in the chair and your chair moves as your cars go around the track). Knowing that would make me sick, I kindly let Matt do the ride with Kylee :-) I know, I'm so nice! Anyway, while Matt and Kylee were doing this game, a Big Als employee walked up to me. He asked if we were military. When I told him no, he said, "Oh, I thought maybe you were because of the haircut," referring to Matt's recently cut hair. I told him he was in law enforcement, to which the employee responded, "Same thing. I'd like to offer your family any game in the entire arcade for free as a thank you." Wow! How cool is that!? He went on to say, "The most expensive thing in the arcade is the photo booth ($4) if that's something you guys would like to do." So when Matt and Kylee finished up, we headed over to the photo booth and took some fun pictures :-) The photo booth prompted us on what kind of faces and looks to do! I was so thankful for that small gesture of kindness by that employee. It made our day!

We had lots of fun playing other games and collecting tickets... and then Kylee went shopping with her tickets! She chose a stuffed snake and a lollipop and was one happy girl :-)

Kylee played with that snake nonstop for the next few days, including using it as a jump rope. Of course, the snake is cheap, and didn't hold up to being a jump rope. That gave me the chance to teach Kylee how to sew up a hole ;-) She did awesome and was so proud of herself.

Christmas and New Years Recap

I don't know how I got so far behind in blogging! I realized the other day that I hadn't even blogged about Christmas which was OVER A MONTH AGO! Oh well, here I am catching up now (although this will just be more of a recap post!).

We had a lovely Christmas. We did the usual (bowling with Matt's family on Christmas Eve day, dinner with my family on Christmas Eve, Christmas morning with my family, Christmas afternoon with Matt's family). I love everything about our Christmas Eve and Christmas day traditions. The days are just perfect. Here is our traditional Christmas morning stair picture:

We were missing Kylee in this picture. She got to spend 9 days in DisneyWorld with her mom (lucky girl)! We picked her up Christmas evening and opened presents with her before she went to bed. I obviously didn't do a good job of taking pictures :-( But we had a really nice time with family - it's been a while since all four of us kids spent a Christmas together! We were also blessed to have my aunt Kathy join us for Christmas this year.

On New Years Day, we packed up the family and headed out to Inkom, Idaho for some time with Matt's extended family. We haven't been able to join in the fun the last couple years, so were extra excited to make the trip this year. We stayed in a HUGE cabin, ate lots of good food, enjoyed excellent company, had a talent show, played in the snow, took fun photo booth pictures, participated in a Mario Cart tournament (Matt), and more. Such a fun few days!

Tyler - 14 Months

Here's the latest on our little man:

• now has five teeth
• still loves yogurt and cinnamon toast (and even licks his hands after eating cinnamon toast!), but has added pizza, strawberries, cucumbers, and BBQ beef to his list of favorites
• is much better at feeding himself, rather than relying on us to feed him

• has walked a few times for us, but still prefers crawling

• is super cuddly these days, especially after he wakes up from his nap

• will climb anything and everything

• went sledding for the first time and loved playing in the snow

• jabbers a lot
• loves to clap and has just started to wave
• still loves his cars, but thinks Kylee's kitchen is pretty cool too

• has a new favorite book - a Tractor book with lift up flaps (thanks Grandma and Grandpa Nye!)
• is really good at shaking his head no when he doesn't want something (like when he has decided he's done eating) 
• understands when we tell him no, but still doesn't always obey us
• needs another haircut - I'm wondering if he's still too little to get away with something like this?

• is learning to "draw"

Goal Posters 2015

Several years ago, my friend Katrina invited me to make "goal posters" with her family for the new year. I had so much fun joining in on their family tradition that I've decided this should be a new tradition in my family! Last night, after a short lesson on setting goals, we searched through magazines and created these masterpieces. Can you tell who made each poster? :-) We will be hanging these up in our home as a reminder of the things we want to be working on this year.