Pots n Pans

This is likely not too entertaining to the average blogger...but it is a good snap shot of the cousins. I, for one, can watch it over and over. Ha! I love seeing these two together.

Go CU!

Here is our girl...singing her heart out for the Colorado Buffaloes! (For those of you who are out of state, this is the Univ. of Colorado fight song.) This just melts her dad's heart.

Court-side!!!

Our friends, Matt and Deanne from Seattle, are in town for the holiday. They have some seroius connections to free court-side tickets to sporting events, of which we have benefitted from several times. Tonight the four of us got babysitters and went and watched the Nuggets game...not only court side...but right at the hoop!! It was INCREDIBLE. I could hardly sleep last night, looking forward to this!!! THANK YOU CONRADS...and MR. COORS!






This is the only "picture" I have of us there...but it was on video mode! Ha!

Christmas in San Diego!

We just returned from a 9 day vacation with my (Jennie's family) in sunny San Diego, California! The week was filled with Christmas cheer, food, cousins playing, grandparents spoiling, Shamoo, pool time, and just hanging out around our beautiful accomdations on the golf course, thanks to Nana and Papa Dub! It was a great week...full of new memories!

This is the one entire family shot for the week...no blinks and all smiles!!!



Rylie and mom made a special birthday cake...for Jesus! Rylie new exactly what to do with the box of candles. She would place a candle on the cake and lick her fingers in between. And, as any smart person would discover...if you stick your hand in the frosting, you get to lick much more than a finger! (Notice the big whole in the frosting on the picture below!)






Of course Rylie liked running in the splash park and splashing in the pool...











Here we are riding the carousel at The Wild Animal Park...three times!!!!! Rylie spun around with glee...saying "wee" and waving as if on a float, every time she passed the family of on-lookers. Adorable!









One of the highlights of the entire vacation was feeding the dolphins at Sea World!




Another fun time was flying around with dad on this ride at Sea World...




Many hours were spent playing outside our condo on the golf green of the 17th hole! Rylie loved sitting on the bench watching the golfers tee off. In between golfers, she enjoyed collecting "treasures" (a.k.a. tees) as well as filling divots with sand...





One annual Christmas project is decorating a Gingerbread House. Rylie did the entire roof, again, one lick at a time! "Yummy to my tummy!"



Opening the Christmas stockings...





Chad and I spent the week also completing a 1000 piece puzzle of San Diego!




Thank you mom and dad for sponsoring this trip!!! Such a great week together as a family!

Just fun...

I am taking the end of the calendar year off, as I have unused vacation days!! This means lots of more fun with Rylie.

Is this a little R-rated? Rylie, all on her own volition, put on her drum and started marching around the house singing the CU Fight Song. Oh she makes her dad so proud!



Rylie "helping in the kitchen..."



Good times with cousin Mariah..."giddy-up!"



Each morning we have been doing our "Advent Adventure" count down. We wrote up 25 different things that are meaningful and fun to do each day...all building up the excitement for Jesus' Birthday. We made snowman pancakes yesterday and tonight, we make a frosty the snowman pizza. Ha! So fun.

Can you tell this pancake is in the shape of a snowman???

A Living Nativity...

We took Rylie to a neighborhood "Living Nativity" on Sunday night. A local church puts it on every year. She got up close with the sheep and goat and stared at the angels, baby Jesus, and Mary and Joseph. The wisemen and shepherds would come and go and interact with all of us watching, which was neat, too. With all the hype about meeting Santa, it is great for Rylie to "meet Jesus" in the heart of His birthday season!! This will become a tradition for sure.

It is just more fun messy...

It just seems to be so much more fun to do arts and crafts and baking...when you can get a little messy!

Here is Rylie and I making a bunch of Christmas Tree ornaments...which involved tossing sticks ALL over the house, chasing and throwing puff balls EVERYWHERE, and of course coloring your face (and clothes) with markers! (Thank goodness for washable markers!) But look at her masterpiece...now hanging, for a limited time only, in the art gallery called our Christmas Tree!






We baked some Christmas cookies today, too. Here is Rylie licking into the beater...a necessary part of the cookie baking process!

The Advent candle of Love...

Today was a special day at church for our family. We were invited to light the third Advent candle of Love, and read corresponding Scripture, at the service! What a meaningful moment to share. AND, the kids did well...no screaming, not too much wiggling and no crying. Rylie did grab the mic (of course) and attempt to say a word at the end. That provided everyone with a chuckle. So sweet.

Happy Ho, Ho Ho!!

Polar Express!!!

Rylie absolutely is obsessed with choo-choo trains, because of the movie Polar Express, and our many visits to play with the trains at the toy store. She talks about trains ALL DAY LONG.

Our Nanny, Kaitlin told us about this great exhibit at a Mall in Denver, where kids literally walk through the Polar Express movie. The scene is set in and around a snow globe. Here is a bird's eye view.



There are differnt scenes where you press big buttons to hear sounds. You get to go inside the engine room and pull levers and turn wheels, where Rylie was shouting "stop the train" and "all aboard". Kids also get to go to the North Pole where you get snowed on and see the big train coming out of the tunnel, where Rylie continually shouted "Train, train, train!" Santa of course, is at the end of the exhibit greeting kids with pictures and cheer. Needless to say, we stayed for an hour and she was COVERED in fake snow. Rylie thought she owned the place. We must return.