We love our Lydia

Here are some cute pictures of our little Lydia and Courtney. As you can see by the pictures these two little girls are the best of friends. When they're together they're inseparable-joined at the hip. We love the time we get to spend with Lydia we just always wish it was more. We love you Lydia and we miss you! XOXOXO!!!

I know it's February so my sincerest apologies that I'm now just posting my Christmas Eve/Christmas Day pictures. I don't know about you other fellow bloggers but I go through spurts with my postings. Some weeks I love it and other weeks I find it the biggest pain in the butt. I've been procrastinating posting my Christmas pictures but here I am finally doing it. Yay!! But again, sorry for posting Christmas in February. My bad. Lol!!

Christmas Eve with the Cole Family

This year we spent Christmas Eve with Scott's family. We started off the day with our tradition of breakfast at Jeremiah's. Yummy. Later that day we met up with my family for our Christmas Eve day movie tradition. We saw The Muppets and we all loved it. Even the Muppet haters loved it. After the movie we headed to the Cole family where we ate a yummy meal, had our gingerbread house contest, played games and read scriptures. It was another fun Christmas Eve!

Jake really, really wanted to win this years Ginger Bread House contest. Amber and Tommy have won 2 times now so Jake was extra determined to win. Jake even came up with the idea of building Harry Potter's Hogwarts castle. Christmas day we had the rest of Scott's family all vote on which house they liked the most. It was a tie between ours and the cabin. In all honesty I think the cabin won by one vote but one of the Uncles knew how much Jake wanted to win so he changed his vote and we went home with the tropy. The tropy now sits proudly in Jake's room for two years until the next Gingy Christmas Eve contest!! Thank you uncle Steve :)

Christmas Eve Night - our house!!!

We arrived home late Christmas Eve night, kids were tired, we were tired and of course Court smashes her fingers in the car door. Poor little thing. Jake ended up setting out the cookies and milk for Santa all by himself.

Christmas Morning - Our House!!!

My parents arrived at 7am and by 7:15am we were in the full swing of opening presents. The kids loved having my parents watch them open presents, always fun to have extra people ooohh and ahh over your gifts. We also enjoyed my Mom's yummy Christmas Butterhornes and thank you to my Dad for taking over picture duty. I have to say, I loved having Christmas on Sunday. Our church was at 9am so the kids still had plenty of time to open presents and play with their presents before church. Church was only 45 minutes for us so that of course was extra nice. Lol! But in all honesty the entire day was so much less stressful than past Christmas's. I'm not sure if it's because we went to church and I was able to feel the spirit so it put me in a better mood? But what ever the reason was this Christmas for me was so much less stressful, less crazy, less busy. Everything felt more relaxed, more calm and in all honesty for me this Christmas was absolutely perfect!!! I wouldn't change a thing about it.

Do you see the Cinderella Castle in the picture above? This was one of Courts big gifts. When I was pregnant with Courtney (I knew I was having a girl) I found this castle at a garage sale and I just knew I had to have it. I've had it stored in my basement for the past 4 years waiting for Court to get old enough. It was well worth the wait. she loved it!!

Christmas Day with the Woolf Family

After church we headed to my parents home where we spent the majority of the day opening more presents, playing with our presents, visiting and of course eating.

My Mom and Dad surprised Jake with a brand new bike for Christmas. Look familiar? Yup, this is the exact bike that was stolen from Jake. We were all so excited to see Jake's face when he opened this gift - he definitely did not dissapoint us. He was sooooo excited!! Thanks Mom and Dad

Christmas Night with the Cole Family!!!

We spent Christmas Evening with Scott's family. Again, more present opening, more yummy food and more hanging out. It was a fabulous Christmas!!!

Thank you to our special friends - you know who you are. Thank you for making this Christmas extra special for us. From the bottom of our hearts. Thank you!!!!!!

12 Favorite Things of Christmas

My 12 Favorite Things That I love About Christmas

12. My Mother in-laws Advent Calendar she made for us many years ago.

11. The Elf - each night through the month of December, Jake and Court put a shoe under the Christmas tree and if they are good each day the elf will put a small treat in their shoe during the night.



10. Neighbor Gifts. This year I was kind of a scrooge and didn't want to do neighbor gifts. I thought it would be time consuming and kind of a pain as I had over 40 to give out but once I started putting them together I had a change of heart and realized how special it is to have one day a year to tell the people whom I live around that we care about them. (Don't laugh at my gift - I know it's corny)

9. Ogden Lights

8. Making Cookies for Santa

7. My Mom and Dad's Annual Caroling Party



6. Christmas Concert - each year my Mom and Dad take us to a Christmas Concert. This year we saw Savior of the World. We saw it eight years ago but no one could remember it. Jake learned so much, it truly was an amazing night.

5. Santa Clause

4. Decorating my House



3. Spending time with family. I love the month of December as it gives us lots of reasons to spend extra time with both sides of our family.

2. Teaching my kids the true meaning of Christmas.

1. The Magic - everything about Christmas is magic to me. Looking back as a little girl I can't remember what presents I received or what activities we did but what I can remember is the feeling of Christmas which the only word I feel describes it best is - magic. This year again, I felt the magic.

Merry Christmas!

Jake's Baptism

Other than having a hard time accepting that I have a child old enough to be baptised everything about Jake's Baptism was perfect.

(Sorry, my camera is slowly dying and my pictures are awful)

Jake's Grandparents, Uncles, Aunts, cousins and his friends from church all came to support him on his special day.

We let Jake plan his baptism. It was fun to see who he wanted to speak, sing etc... For journal purposes this was the program-

This is Skylee, one of Jake's good friends who happened to be wearing the same dress as Court. Too cute.

After the baptism we had our family over to our house for sandwiches and salad. Thank you to everyone for helping with all the yummy food. And a big thank you to everyone who participated in Jake's baptism. We're so lucky to be apart of two amazing families.

Grandma Margaret and Grandpa Cole

Nana & Granddad

Dear Jacob,

Dad and I are so proud of you. Words can not express how much we love you, since the minute you were born we knew you were special and that you were sent to us for a reason. Your strength and willingness to do what is right, learn the gospel and follow our Savior is truly an example to us and especially your sister. We hope you will always remember how you felt on this special day and we hope you will always know how many people love you. We love you Jake.

Love,
Mom & Dad