nickelcade

Kyle's idea to take the boys to the Nickelcade was genius. They haven't stopped talking about it since.  We went a couple weeks ago for family night and the boys had a blast!

 This was Porter's favorite game, stomping on the spiders.

 And he was pretty good at it too... just look at that score.

 Bridger liked to shoot things... anything. Especially the "robots" (this was not that game, Kyle took him over to the Terminator game and Bridger was fascinated.)

He also liked a game where you would shoot at all kinds of big scary bugs, spiders and bees and other yucky things. At home, he now has to "pew" them all the time. We play many of game of "pew" the bee.

 Porter also liked some of the shooting games. He was really good at some of them. Even the ones where he wasn't able to put the gun directly on the screen to shoot!

The boys keep asking to go back and I'm sure we will.

pinterest... how I love thee.

 Got this idea a while ago off of pinterest. The boys loved it. I started out with some leftover blue yarn and then had to switch to yellow... now looking at the pictures I wish I had used something with more contrast to it so you could see a little better.

 Both boys were intrigued. Porter was positive that he could crawl under all the strings, while Bridger tried very hard to climb through them all.

 It entertained them for a good 45 minutes or so.

It entertained their Momma for a good 45 minutes too!
(Bridger, while almost completely potty-trained during the day (Yay!!!)  still requires diapers at night and for naps...hence the diaper. And that little boy would rather walk around in underwear or a diaper and nothing else, hence the nakedness)

good times

Amy and I have been friends since Jr. High. The best of friends throughout our awkward high school years, and we've continued to have contact ever since. However, I realized that it had been almost 6 years since we had seen each other, 8 years since we had seen each other before that and about 10 years since we had hung out.
We were way overdue for a little reunion.
We decided to meet up at the Gateway Children's museum, and it was the perfect place to meet... the boys were so entertained and we had time to catch up.

 Plus, her little boys are absolutely adorable.

 Porter was thoroughly entertained by the cranes.

 The kitchen... oh, the kitchen. The boys had so much fun with all the fake food.

 And Bridger spent most of his time emptying the cabinets... mostly because he's not allowed to do this at home.

 Oh yeah, on the other side of the kitchen window was a little play area for the very little kids. Bridger was passing food to the little kids on the other side of the window. I believe this was a cabbage.

 Here he's passing a little boy a watermelon. I headed inside and told him that the food needed to stay in the kitchen. His response, "He's hungry, I give him some food, Mom!"
How do you say no to that?

 Then we headed up to the helicopter. I believe this was the favorite of the day.

 This kid has so much personality... I love the look of, "I got this" while he pretends to fly the chopper.

Cute kids, good friends, good food, good times.
Thanks Amy... lets not wait 10 years to get together again.

 It finally snowed. These pictures are from our first snowfall a couple of weeks ago. I love the big trees in our yard covered in snow. Love having our own yard.

 The boys were so excited to go out in the snow that Bridger headed out wearing only this...

 He came running back in the house shortly after, and ran straight to the wood stove saying that he needed to warm up his thumbs... really those are the last things I would have been complaining about being cold if I was wearing the same outfit... but we pulled out their new snow coats and pants and sent them out to build a fort.

 I remember when I was little using food coloring in water to color the snow, so I loaded a couple of spray bottles with hot water (to keep their hands warm) and let them paint their fort.

 It kept them entertained for hours. Porter is in love with the snow. He would play outside in it all day, every day if we let him. Bridger is a little less than impressed. He gets excited for a little while and then wants to come inside and get warm... although he is a big fan of eating the snow. He picks up big handfuls and stuffs them in his mouth.

Christmas in Moab

Our Christmas was supposed to be here. With my new job I was supposed to work Christmas Eve. But, a very sweet friend offered to work Christmas Eve for me, which freed me from a week of work and allowed us all to head to Moab for Christmas! It was so fun to be together with Kyle's family. We haven't been to Moab in quite a while and we haven't been able to be there when Kyle's siblings were there. This holiday season was no different from the others in that I took very few pictures and really wished that I had taken more. But here are the few that I did take.

We started Christmas Eve out with some very fun games, I don't know what this one was called, but Jill was pretty awesome at it. (Drawing pictures on the plate on the top of your head.)

We played round the world ping-pong, which really should become a yearly tradition, and the white elephant exchange.

 Dave sitting on his pocket chair from the white elephant.

 Christmas morning we came out to find the presents that Santa left for us.

 We couldn't pull Bridger away from the train set from Santa. He played with it for 2 1/2 hours straight, and even though other gifts were opened, if it didn't involve a train he didn't give it a second glance.

 Porter was thrilled to open presents. He was also in love with the train set, but he was more than happy to open present after present.

 It was a beautiful Christmas morning. 

Later on Christmas day we decided to go hiking. It seemed so warm during the day while we were out in the sun... but hiking in the snow and in the shade turned out to be pretty cold.

Bridger wanted to be carried most of the way. Porter, however, ran up and down the snow-packed hills. He thoroughly enjoys being outside in the snow.

 It was a perfect Christmas.

the sleepover

or under, if you want to be correct.
I tried to come up with many new traditions this year, ones to test out and see if they would stick and become permanent holiday traditions. This one was a keeper.

We had a big family camp out under the tree. We took our bean bag chair and all our couch cushions, all of our blankets and pillows and made the biggest softest bed under our tree. We sat and watched The Grinch and fell asleep under the twinkle lights. The boys didn't want to sleep in their beds again. I can't say that I blame them... there's something magical about the twinkle lights.

the one where we visit Santa

Tonight we headed out for a little bit of shopping. We stumbled into a very short line at the mall to see Santa and decided to jump in line. The boys wanted to see him so bad.

Both boys hopped on his lap, they were so excited to see him and talk to him. I didn't know if Bridger would take to him, but he was so thrilled to sit on his lap. When a mistake at the photo place allowed for a second sitting, the boys were more than thrilled, and Porter gave Santa a minute by minute run-down of what we had done since he had last seen him 15 minutes earlier. These boys could not be more excited about Christmas.

one for each

No photo today.
But in it's place I will give you 4 bits of info on what is new with our little family. One tidbit for each of us.


Bridger fights gukes. He hears them at the front door and when he knocks on the door he scares them away.
Confused?
Example:
"I hear a guke Mom!  I scare him and knock him out! I get da guke, Mom! I got da guke!"
"Bridger, what's a guke?"
"I knock em out Mom, I got da guke 'n I knocked him out!"
"Bridger, where did you hear about a guke? Did you watch a show about a guke? Read a book about a guke?"
"No Mom, da gukes at da door, and I knock him and scare him into the sky!"
It took me many weeks before I remembered that there was a Halloween book about a ghoul that knocked on the door... I'm guessing that it comes from that.

Porter is currently obsessed with yellow straws in all of his drinks.
The other day he asked me for one and I was trying to get him to say please after he asked for a straw... it didn't go so well.
"Mom, I want a yellow straw."
"You want a yellow straw, what...."
"I want a yellow straw in my apple juice, Mom."
"A yellow straw in your apple juice, what?"
"Um, a yellow straw in my apple juice, in my cup."
"How do you ask for it Porter?"
"I want a yellow straw in my apple juice in my cup, Mom"
"You want a yellow straw in your apple juice in your cup... what?"
"Yes."
"If you want a yellow straw in your apple juice in your cup.... what do you say?"
"Yes."
"No, Porter, what do you say if you want something?"
"Oh! Please!"

I am currently obsessed with pistachios. I won a Costco sized bag from Kyle's work Christmas party and I can't get enough of them. I've always like pistachios, but didn't realize how much I love them until now.  Plus it's pretty cute when Bridger calls them pistachews.

Kyle is loving his new job; and he is slowly, but surely, finishing up the projects around the house that he started before the job came along. The sad thing is that before he can finish up one thing, more pop up on the list. He has spent this past week fixing our 4runner, fixing a broken sprinkler line and putting lights up on the house. We're pretty lucky to have him around here, the three of us just wish we could see him more.

Graham Cracker Trains

My boys like trains. So it only made sense to make gingerbread trains instead of houses. And since I didn't want to make any gingerbread, it made sense to make them out of graham crackers.

 (Bridger's finished product)

(Porter's finished product)

This had to be the most successful Christmas activity we have done yet. It kept Porter and Bridger entertained for over an hour.  And the engineer in the house had a lot of fun with the design of Bridger's train. It was great entertainment for all of us.