Oh, is it February already?

As usual, it should come to no one as a surprise that I'm not keeping up with updates. So, here's some Christmas fun we had in California with John's parents...

Victoria's Birthday

Victoria is 4!! This year we held a celebration for her at Jungle Jim's Playland. We invited about 15 kids and 10 showed up so it was quite busy. It was a Tinkerbell party so she had Tinkerbell cake and received some Tinkerbell related gifts. It was so nice to have it somewhere besides our house because we couldn't have had such a big party if that were the case. This way, all the other kids were able to have a great time too and I didn't have to clean up afterwards. :)

Victoria on one of the many rides at Jungle Jim's.

Later on that evening Victoria had her first dance performance at the Festival of Trees. She did incredible! We are so proud of her. I would post the video of her performance but it would take too long to upload. Just take my word for it. She's a good dancer. Here she is with some of her dance friends (Kennady and Kennedy, lol).

Top 10 Reasons why Winter is the best season

10. It's beautiful outside. The snow really brightens up outside. In fact, the other day I thought our front porch light was still on bc the snow just brightened everything up! There's nothing like snow, especially because of...

9. Snowball fights! For some reason, even though it's extremely cold and all you can think about when you're outside is getting back inside you simply cannot resist when a ball of powdered ice comes flinging at you. Who wouldn't want revenge?! Not to mention, once you get started you forget all about being cold. No other season can you play with the weather...ever heard of a rain ball fight? Or a sunshine fight? Not gonna happen.

8. No Yardwork. It might not seem like such a big deal to you, but I hate doing yardwork out in a blazing sun. So when the ground is covered with snow and everything else is died off and I don't have to go outside to make my yard look nice (because it already does due to snow), I am one happy camper. Though, not literally a camper...camping in the snow is just insane.

7. Hot Chocolate. There is nothing like waking up and realizing your cold and then realizing you have the perfect drink to warm and wake you up. Hot chocolate. Speaks for itself.

6. Food. Not just food in general...but you know food you normally eat around the holidays. I'm talking about cookies, breads, hams, and all those other baked goods we put together. Makes a good excuse for heating up the house with your oven too...and you get a treat for doing it. :)

5. Hot Tubs. Yet another way to warm up and relax.

4. Snowboarding. Ok, I've only been twice, but I really do enjoy it. And I've learned to appreciate the fact that Utah really does have the best snow on earth. I used to play with snow (that was really just packed ice) and it is nothing like the snow here. And riding it down a mountain is incredible.

3. Christmas is coming. Once the snow hits I immediately start thinking of my preparations for Christmas, which is the best holiday as we celebrate the birth of our Savior. People are kinder and you can feel the spirit. People really stop thinking so much about themselves and start to realize the needs of others around them. It's a great feeling.

2. Football! I just love it when football season comes around. As if we needed an excuse to stay inside from the cold it just encourages us even more. Football is so fun to watch. And once February arrives, it's time for the Super Bowl, which means, even more good food and comforts of friends and family hooting and hollering.

1. And finally, the number one reason why Winter is the best season... Snuggling! I anxiously look forward to Winter every year for this very reason. Sitting with family around and big blankets covering us. It's just...WARM! And comforting. And great!

Well, I hope you enjoyed my list. And even if you don't like Winter (did you not read my list?), have a good one. :)
P.S. Don't eat yellow snow.

What happens when your kids no longer nap...

Creativity begins.

A Ghoulish Halloween and a Puppy Birthday

For Halloween this year Victoria was a witch (shown here with my vampire teeth): and Mikayla was a puppy. John and I were vampires (not shown) Our batteries died so we couldn't get a pic. Anyway, for breakfast I made them "ghost," which is what we call French toast in my house. It only seemed fitting to cut them into ghost shapes as well. :)
In today's news: Mikayla is two! My puppy is all grown up and actually has taken it upon herself to be potty trained! That's right! One day she just hopped up on the toilet and starting going and has been doing so ever since. She's great! Easiest potty training EVER! We held a birthday celebration for her at our place. She received lots of awesome fun gifts that she is enjoying very much. It's hard to keep Victoria away from them actually. We got her a puppy...which she loves! (Fake of course). But don't worry...she's spending lots of time with her other gifts too. Thanks everyone!

"Every dog has his day."

Spontaneous Combustion Excursion

As Friday night rolled around we came to ask ourselves what we would be doing for labor day weekend. Generally, we work...not fun. But we decided to do something fun this time. So we decided we would go to Antelope Island for some good old fashioned camping. We didn't have our tent or sleeping bags, but we decided we'd sleep in John's new truck...in the back...with a blow up mattress. So that's what we did.Turns out there was a festival going on the same weekend. So we went there for a little bit.
Cute camping fun.
We also spent some time at the Great Salt Lake which was...salty and smelly. We mostly sat on the beach and ate lunch. We intended on staying Sunday night also, but around 5pm it started being ridiculously windy outside. We thought we would freeze if we slept outside overnight and thought it would be much nicer to just go home to our warm beds instead. So we left. Turns out a good idea because there were record lows for last night in September. Go team inspiration!

Slap on the Wrist

Yep, I suppose I deserve a slap on the wrist for not updating my blog more. "Life is just too busy" isn't exactly accurate...more like "anytime I do get a free minute I don't have updating my blog at the top of my list". So here goes, the important big things...

John's white truck died again. This time we opted to not get it fixed and instead John bought himself a "new" old truck. It's a 2005 Ford F150 King Ranch. He's in love with it. He spends lots of time cleaning it and "getting it up to snuff" as he would say. It's a four door so we can put our kids in there and as an extra perk...it came with a dvd player! The dvd player will not really to be used for driving around town, but we plan on using it a lot with an upcoming road trip that we have planned. As a side note...I LOVE road trips!

We still have all of our properties and we still hate being landlords. Once John gets a chance (he's extremely busy at work this month due to production of new drugs) he'll be getting all the paperwork done to have his realtor's license again and we can get some of them on the MLS. Hopefully that will get us some offers despite the bad market. We are really just at the point that we'd like to move forward with something else even if it means getting less money than we originally thought we would. If we are going to have another child (don't freak I'm not pregnant) then we will need a bigger place and so we'd really like to save up for the house that we truly want our kids to grow up in. Right now, things are just too crazy for us. It's time to tone down. Pray for us! Here's the Provo duplex that's still for sale...we are now asking $189,000 instead of our starting which was $225,000. A big drop in price, but still no offers. We had a realtor for a while, but he didn't help much.

The kids are still doing awesome. We love them to death and wish we had more time with them...a problem that would be helped if we got rid of some of our properties.... Mikayla is talking quite a bit. Half the time I don't know what she's saying but I listen anyway. She can be really funny. We're hoping to get her potty trained soon...just have to start. lol.
Victoria will be 4 this year. Crazy! She's going to be doing a combined preschool and dance school in a few weeks. I know she'll have loads of fun as she loves to dance and ALWAYS asks about school. She's very intellectual visually. She'll take random things and make letters or shapes out of them.
Ok so, I'm good for another few months right? Ha ha. I'll try to update more...if my schedule ever gets "uncrazy". :)