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

Missing Bike

This was officially the saddest day so far of Jacob's life. A few weeks ago Jake came home from school and went off to play with friends. He came rushing back into the house and said in a panicked voice "Mom, where's my bike"? I replied that it was in the garage and he said it wasn't. I went to see and he was right - it was gone. We quickly drove around the neighborhood hoping maybe he'd left it at a friends house??? No luck. I sent out a huge text to all my neighbors asking them to keep an eye out for it but by night fall we all pretty much knew -

Jake's bike had been stolen.

Jake was too angry to cry. He kept kicking the wall or punching his bed. He kept asking why someone would steal his bike? You see, Jake's bike was his most favorite thing he owned in the entire world. He rode his bike every day, he rode it to the bus stop, to his friends houses, practiced jumps etc.. He really loved his bike and now to have it gone was almost incomprehensible for him. It was heart breaking to see him so sad. I'll admit that Scott and I were pretty angry ourselves. I mean seriously, who steals an 8 year olds bike?

Jake insisted on putting up flyers in our neihborhood so we did. Scott also called the police, we knew there was nothing they could do but we thought they should at least be aware of what had happened. It's now been several weeks since the bike was stolen, Jake still really misses it but he's doing a lot better. Now we just have to hope that Santa or Santa's helpers will help Jake get a new bike soon.

Flag Football Star

This past Fall we signed Jake up to play Flag Football and he absolutely loved every second of it. Instead of growing up and wanting to be a Soccer Star he's now changed it to wanting to be a Football Star. lol!!! I'll admit I'm not a huge football fan but I really enjoyed watching his games. Jake caught on really fast and was one of the more aggresive players on his team. Jake especially loved learning all the different plays and putting them into action. We were sad when the season ended but at least we always have next year.

Jake's first football injury. He was so proud of it. lol!!!

November Randomness

Here are a few fun things we did this past November. Enjoy the randomness.

Jake and Court with the neighbors enjoying the first snow fall of the season.

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Veteran's day is a special day for me as it always reminds me of my Hero- My Grandpa Selman. Not only was my Grandpa one of my most favorite people in the world and the best Grandpa in the world but he was also a World War II Hero. He loved Remembrance Day (what Canadians call Veterans Day). I remember as a little girl going with him to special events on this day, meeting his friends who also fought in the War and listening to his extrodinary and amazing experience of surviving being a Prisoner of War for close to 4 years. One of my favorite memories as a little girl (I think I was around 10 years old) was meeting one of my Grandpa's friends who was in the same POW camp as him. He shook my hand and looked me in my eyes and said "Your Grandpa saved my life". (My Grandpa worked in the kitchen and would smuggle out Potato Peelings to his friends and these potato peelings kept this man alive). To this day, I'll never forget this mans eyes which were filled with so much love for my Grandpa. A day doens't go by that I don't think of my Grandpa as I miss him so much but Veteran's Day is an extra special day for me to honor my Hero.

My Parents invited us to the Ogden Veterans Parade, I'll admit my eyes became a little misty watching the soldiers and veterans march by. How blessed we are to have so many people who have sacrificed, fought and who are still fighting for our freedom. Saying thank you will never come close to what they sacrifice for us.

Having fun at Fat Cat's after the parade
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One random Sunday afternoon Jake decided to dress up as a football player (he found his football Halloween costume he wore when he was 4 years old). Surprisingly it kind of fit him, it was extra snug but he thought he looked really cool. Court then decided to dress up as a cheerleader. These two silly kids definitely crack us up.

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Every morning Courtney wakes up, climbs in my bed and we talk about what our plans are for the day. She loves scheduling out her day (or trying to schedule out what she would WANT to do that day).

Here's an example of a day that Courtney plans for herself; eat breakfast, watch a cartoon, get dressed, play with a friend, have a bath, watch a cartoon, read a book, play with a friend, eat lunch, play with a friend, color, eat a treat, play with a friend, eat dinner and go to bed. Lol!!!

Other than going to preshool and dance her all time favorite thing to do is- play with friends. Every second of the day she's asking if she can play with a friend. When she does get the chance to play with a friend and after playing with that friend for several hours and her friend has to go home, not even a second goes by until she's asking if she can play with another friend. She's definitely my little social bug but such a cute little social bug.