A wise, wise man once said:

"If you are still in the process of raising children, be aware that the tiny fingerprints that show up on almost every newly cleaned surface, the toys scattered around the house, the piles and piles of laundry to be tackled will disappear all too soon and that you will - to your surprise - miss them profoundly." -President Thomas S. Monsen

I really love this quote. It pretty much sums of my feelings on life. Sort of, I mean I don't really ever hate seeing fingerprints, or toys, or laundry..... it just means I am blessed. But I do for sure agree that my boys are growing up way to fast and that I already some of the little things of the past that they don't do anymore. I know for sure I am going to miss many things about them when they get older, but for now, I can just love every minute that I can spend with them, and every opportunity that I get to share with them. Just wanted to share this amazing quote with all my faithful readers out there.

He's Mobile....

This post is a little older. I just wanted to document it to show some of the family that lives farther away. He was about 7 months old when he started cruising around and he just didn't stop. He goes everywhere now and he is so fast. But honestly now his favorite way of getting around is cruising along the sides of the couches. Give him another month and he will be walking. Like I said in an earlier post, he is just trying to keep up with his brother.

I really do love this boy!

There is never dull moment with my boys. EVER..... I have to admit that I was really scared to have another child. To be totally honest with everybody and it may make me sound like a horrible person. But Eli was so perfect. Well tempered, easy baby, charmer through and through, and seriously just a really fun kid to be around. I was kind of worried that my next child may not be like this. Not that I would love him any less. I was just a little bit worried. What if he was a really fussy baby? What if something was wrong with him? What if he was just generally unpleasant? I don't know, i guess I just was a little shallow but also a little worried. Well needless to say, my fears of any of that are so gone. This kid..... Where do I begin? He is just as perfect as his brother. He is so easy going and has such a pleasant personality. And oh... his smile. It is just so big and happy. I could sit and tickle him all day long just to make him smile at me. It melts my heart and makes my day every time I see it. He also has this shy, little like, turn is head away from people and into my shoulder, like he is really bashful or something. It is the cutest thing ever. And I know it is really horrible, but when he is about to cry, you know, one of those, you really hurt my feelings cry, he just gets the saddest face in the world and you feel so sad, but at the same time he is so stinking cute. I just love it. I just love him. He has been an amazing addition to our family and it definitely would not be complete without him. Eli is so good to him and he starting to have such a personality of his own. He has opinions, he knows what he wants... OR DOESN'T WANT, depending on how you look at it. He tries so hard to keep up with his brother and this fact actually scares me because he is growing up so fast. He is only 8 months old and he cruises everywhere. He will pull himself up on anything that he can get to. He will walk all around the couches, move his way to the toy box and basically walk all around the living room, as long as he is holding onto something. I don't think it will be that much longer before he walks. Eli didn't start showing this much interest in getting around until he was like 10 or 11 months old. But like I said, Ethan tries so hard to keep up with his older brother. So here is just a very adorable cute picture of this little boy and his cricked smile. Love you Ethan.

Eli and Corbin... SNOW FUN

The boys playing in the snow. I just really love this picture. Eli and his really good friend Corbin. They have so much fun together.

My Little Charmer

This boy, ooooooo this boy. Is it possible to honestly enjoy and love hanging out with your three year old, cause I sure do. He is actually one of my favoritest people in the world to hang out with. And not just because I am his mom. The things he says, and the things that his little mind comes up with. WOW!!! He is super smart and definitely a thinker. He makes super crazy connections between things and he remembers EVERYTHING. Things that happens ages ago... yes.... he will remember them. And he is so sweet. The best personality in the world. Great manners, always thinks about others before or at least in addition to himself. He always remembers to say please and thank you. He is super good about thinking about others and making sure they are taken care of either before and at least in addition to himself. Ex: You go to a store to let him get something and he always makes sure to say that he also has to get one for his brother. Or just totally randomly out of the blue when we are out somewhere he will say something like to the effect of, I think that daddy needs this or that Daddy would like this. Something to the effect. He is just really good to think about others. He is quick to say he is sorry, and he is pretty good at sharing. Very easy tempered and just a pretty mellow kid. So Eli, just wanted to do a little post dedicated to one of my favorite people in the world. I love you so much and you are growing into such an amazing little person. Don't ever change, just get smarter and bigger, but your personality.... it can stay just how it is. Sure do love you.

Christmas Day

Merry Christmas to everybody, even if it is just a little bit late. Santa definitely found our house. We had an amazing Christmas and the boys were very spoiled, but their faces were well worth it. I love this holiday and I love the feeling that you have basically the whole month of December. It makes people more generous and nice and the whole atmosphere of life just seems nicer.

We did Christmas at Grandma and Grandpa Hatchs house. We always have such a fun time out there and this year was no exception to that. The boys had a great Christmas and so did Matt and I actually.

This is Eli and Lilly checking out the goods. Eli wasn't sure were to even begin. he got lots of learning things this year. If you didn't know us you would think that we were sponsors for leapfrog and vtech this year. I just am really big on the educational toys and they make so many that are so fun to play with.

Ethan was not sure what to think. he definitely hit the jack pot as well and crawled over to his stuff. He immediately went to his leapfrog ABC spin ball thing and started playing with it. He was so cute to watch. And he was so excited when the different toys made different sounds.

This is just a sight of how the living room looked sometime during the morning.

This is Eli playing with his new set of Treo's. He already has a set but when we go to build things we never ever have enough. So he asked Santa for some new ones and Santa was happy to oblige. Because he knows that Eli's parents actually have a blast with this particular toy as well. Give me Lego and I can do nothing, but give some Treo's and I can build you anything.

Ethan checking out his new Leapfrog activity table. He has started pulling himself up on everything lately so Santa thought this would be a great toy for him to work on standing up against. It has been a big success I am happy to say.

Ethan in some of his new Christmas clothes that he got from Grandma and Grandpa. He looked so cute in his new coat and his adorable hat. He even is quite the sport about keeping it on and it keeps his ears so warm.

Eli showing of his new Buzz drawing table thing. It is quite cool actually. It has a light that projects a picture onto paper and you trace the outline and then turn the light off and then you can color the picture that you just drew. He has started tracing things and outlining his pictures. This has been a huge success. He will sit in at his little table and just draw for like thirty minutes undisturbed. I love it and he loves it. And he is so proud of the pictures that he creates for all of us and colors.

Eli and all of his fun Christmas gifts.
Ethan and all of his Christmas gifts. I just love that face. I just want to kiss it all the time.

Eli holding some of his new hot wheels race track.

Just showing off some more clothes. He is such a stud.

And the last two pictures are just to show how fast they crashed at the end of the day. They were so tired and had had such a big day. I don't even think that we had made it five miles away from Grandma's house when I turned around to see this. That is how you can tell it was a great and very busy day.

Thank you to Grandma and Grandpa for letting us spend Christmas at your house and Thank you for all that you do for us. You are always so good to us and I don't know where we would be with out you. Thanks for everything. We sure love you lots.

Christmas Eve in Delta

I am only just a little bit behind on getting Christmas posted... what do you think? But it is definitely something worth documenting, so here you go. We always do the same thing every year. Christmas Eve in Delta and Christmas Morning at Grandma and Grandpa Hatch's. This year we talked long and hard about doing Christmas morning at our own house and then heading out, but last minute decision, once again, we ended up doing it at Grandmas. And it was great. It is always great. It really doesn't matter where we are, it is always all about the boys and that is the important part. So here are a few pictures to show just how much fun we had. This was Ethans first Christmas and he thought the festivities are just great.

As I said before, we were in Delta for Christmas Eve. There are always so many people there and we always have such a fun time. We start with some very tasty food, then we have a program with all the wonderful talents from all the kids, then we always act out the Nativity. This is always a favorite of the kids. This year, worst then most, there was a serious competition for who Mary was going to be. There was so many choices, at it actually had the children up bright and early bugging Grandma to get the part. I have never seen so many little girls get so worried about something. So after the Nativity, then all of the Grandkids get presents from Grandma and Grandpa Anderson. This year it was personal, hand made pillowcases made by Grandma Caren. And there was also some very cute Christmas ornaments included. Eli got a BUZZ pillowcase, of course. His all time favorite super hero. Ethan's was a very cute little pillowcase that had little penguins playing in the snow.

Our two Mary's Caitlyn and Shaylee holding baby Jesus, Baby Jesus James, and Tommy playing Joseph.

The whole crew. Eli played a wise man this year and he did such a good job. He thought it was pretty dang fun.

Eli with one of his favorite cousins, Elise.

Ethan being his ever so cute and adorable self. His smile still can just melt my heart. He is always just so happy, and he has the biggest smile.

I am always guaranteed to get a good picture of my boys with there Grandma and Grandpa Anderson each year. I don't know why I can't manage to get more through out the year. But I really do love these pictures. It is fun to see how much the boys grow from year to year.

This is all of the Grandkids that were there on Christmas Eve. Only about half the crew, but still a fun picture.

This is Grandma and Grandpa Anderson holding the three new grandbabies that were born this year. Ethan on the right is 8 months old, Danica is 4 months old, and James is about 1 week or so old. He was really new, but made a perfect Christmas gift for his cute little family.

Thanks to all my family for making it such a fun holiday this year. It always is and we love you all so very much. Thanks to Grandma and Grandpa Anderson for letting us crash there house each year and also for the amazing and generous gifts, not only for the grandkids, but also for us as the parents. You two are amazing. Thank you for all that you do for us.

Love you Ethan!

So I really don't normally torture my children to get a cute picture. But I just couldn't resist. The first time we put the glasses on them, he didn't mind them at all. But I couldn't find my camera. The second time we put them on, once I did find my camera, he hated them so much. and because I was trying to get him to keep them on, my picture turned out fuzzy. But I still think it is once stinking cute little picture.

The cutest Santa on the block if you ask me.

Ninja Ethan. Don't mess with the little man!

I love this totally perfect, totally cuddle, totally lovable smile. He is such a charmer. And his smile will melt your heart.

Once there was a snowman..... WELL, snow fort

Eli loves the snow and was super excited when we had a really good snow storm and we were actually around to go and play in it. Eli and definitely mastered making snow angels and he thinks they are so much fun to make. Also, they started to create a snow man, but the snow wasn't packing super well, so they decided to turn it into a snow fort instead, but then it actually turned into a snow wall instead of a fort. Needless to say they had a lot of fun and I got some really cute pictures out of it.

I don't know if Ethan was really sure what to think about all of this. But he was definitely a happy little boy just sitting out there watching his dad and brother work in the snow.





I love this picture of daddy and his boys. They were having such a good time out there. He is such a good dad and loves every minute that he gets to spend with his boys.

Cottle Christmas Party

The weekend before Christmas, we went to the Cottle Christmas party. This is Matt's Mom's side of the family. We had it in Centerville and Jason and Kristens house. It was very fun to see some of the family that we have not seen for a long time. Honestly, about once a year is when we seem to see them all. We had some really good food and way fun entertainment. We played a few games, and then we decorated some gingerbread houses. It was really fun to hang out with that side of the family.

This first picture is off all of the Great Grandchildren. From left to right, Eli, Ethan, Savannah holding Milee, Sophie, Max and Kade.

This picture is of all the grandkids. All of them were there except for Justin. I was impressed that everybody was there. I think this is the most that I have ever gotten a picture of at one time.
This is the girls. Heather, Kendra, Chelsey,and Amy.
This is all of the Cottle Children. Jason, Kevin, Gaye, Cheryl, and Lesa.
and this is all the children, their spouses, and Grandma and Grandpa Cottle.
And I love getting picture like this. I wish that Ethan had been being a little more corroborative, but I will take what I can get. This is the boys with their Great Grandpa and Grandma Cottle.

My little big man!

My little Green Monster!

This is what happens when you leave Aunt Heather alone for just 5 minutes with the imagination of Eli. Once there was one streak of green on his body, of course , much more needed to be added. And really, why not? It washes...... right? Needless to say, next time Eli and Aunt Heather pain, there will be a little more ADULT supervision.

JUST KIDDING HEATHER. Eli loves hanging out with his Aunt Heather. In fact, i'm pretty sure that he would make it a daily thing if that was possible.

Don't try this at home!

Should I really trust Uncle Justin.... OF COURSE. I have to say I was a little nervous when my three year old, batman mask included, son, goes flying across the living room. Literally ALL the way across the living room and even a little ways down the hall. But Eli thought it was the best thing ever. And once he had done it once, of course there were numerous more tries after. Each one going just a little farther down the hall. I'm really not sure what goes on in these boys heads but I suppose they were all having fun.