The McCullough Family

Christmas 2011

2011-12-30T12:58:00.000-08:00

We had a great Christmas this year. We were able to spend a lot of time with both of our families and we really enjoyed each and every moment!
Here are the kids dressed up as our live Nativity. Little Maverick made the perfect Baby Jesus this year.

Here we are all dressed up on Christmas Eve in our Christmas jammies.

Taggart and Maddie got Pillow Pets from Santa. They were soo excited!

Parker loved Christmas this year!! He even enjoyed opening the presents.

Here we are at my Parent's house on Christmas Day.

Taggart and Maddie were so happy to have Ada and Boston here from California so they could have someone to play with!

We even had some fun at the Fun Park and celebrated the December birthdays. Maddie was sooo sad to see Ada go back to California:(

We had to take advantage of all of my family being together, so we finally got a picture with the whole family!

Overall, we had a great Christmas break. We got lots of presents, ate a lot of good food, and spent some quality time with our loved ones. Merry Christmas to you all!!

You've Had a Birthday Shout HOORAY!!

2011-12-19T20:58:00.001-08:00

Taggart has been really looking forward to his birthday for months now! We were so happy that it finally came and he turned 7! He had his party at the Fun Park and he and his friends went bowling. It sure was crazy with all those boys!

Taggart loves bowling and all the kids had a ball!

He wanted a TRON cake this year. He got a ton of presents: legos, dagadar, beyblades and all the things a 7 yr old boy loves!

Here are just a few things about Tag Man at Age 7:

*He is such a smart boy! He is getting straight A's in school and does especially well in Math. He is a really good student and is great at following rules and listening to his teacher.
*He loves to build Legos and fix things. You can tell that he has his Dad's abilities when it comes to this and he can follow instructions and build almost anything, plus he loves it too!
*He is a pretty sweet boy (most of the time) He has been his entire life and still is pretty tender hearted and sensitive. We LOVE this about him! He is really sweet to comfort his brother and sister when they are sad... it is so cute!
*He talks with his hands a lot and is pretty animated when he does talk. I wonder where he gets this from?
*He is super skinny! Some people ask if he eats and he does, but again he just has his Dad's genes and bones poking out all over.
*He loves to play the Wii, ride his bike and scooter, swim, and is always happy to play with his buddies!

WE LOVE YOU TAGGART!!

This is Halloween....

2011-11-01T15:08:00.000-07:00

I think Halloween just gets better and better every year as my kids get older. They get so excited to get out all the decorations and Maddie especially loves that she can pretty much live in a costume for a month long and it is acceptable! Maddie had a few different costumes, since we borrowed some from Grammy and friend and re used some from previous years, so she was a ladybug, Rio girl, Dorothy, and a witch this year! Taggart was Mario and loved every minute of it! Parker was a cute little monkey and he was so cute every time we put his costume on, he would just grin and chuckle and thought he was pretty darn cool! I feel like we went to parties and celebrated Halloween for an entire week before Halloween, when the day actually came, we were ready to be done dressing up! We went to Maddie's school carnival and Taggart said, " Mom do I have to dress up? I'm just so exhausted of dressing up!" I thought it was hilarious because that was exactly how I felt and Halloween was still 5 days away! We did have a fun one this year though. It was the second year that we went house to house trick or treating and Taggart sure did race from house to house. Maddie was a little slower since she insisted on wearing her Princess dress up shoes which are NOT the best for trick or treating. Parker just sat in his stroller the whole night having the time of his life while sucking on his suckers. It sure was a Happy Halloween for us!

Fall fun!

2011-10-25T20:41:00.000-07:00

Autumn time in Logan is really one of my favorite things! It is beautiful and I just love to feel a little chill to the air! We always love to go out to American West Heritage Center and this year we had a lot of fun!
Parker loved the animals and the tractor. I just love these two boys!!

They had this huge slide set up and the kids loved it!

Taggart also played indoor Fall Soccer. He loved it and especially loved being the Goalie.

He had a great team with a couple of his good friends on it and he really loved every minute of it!

I Did It!

2011-08-30T19:58:00.000-07:00

I have been wanting to run a half marathon for awhile now, but just needed it to be warm enough here for me to train outside in Logan. So I signed up for the Top of Utah Half at the end of August so that I could train all summer long. At times it was frustrating to have to go train when I was on vacation or out of town, but I really did learn to love running outside and I felt pretty ready when it was time for the race. I finished in an hr and 56 min and I felt really good about this time. The kids and Cam and the Smiths were at the finish line with posters, cheering me on ..it was awesome! It felt great and I learned how much I really do enjoy running, maybe not enough to do a full marathon, but I will probably do another half someday.

School Starts!

2011-08-25T15:03:00.000-07:00

Well, Summer is officially over and it is time for school to start. I kinda have mixed feelings about it. On one hand, I am excited to have a little more structure and schedule to our life, but on the other hand, I'm sad to not be able to go play whenever we want to. Taggart is in first grade this year and Mrs. Jack is his teacher and Maddie is in her second year of Preschool. Here they are before their first day. Taggart is very excited about his lunchbox and that he gets to eat at school everyday. He was also very excited about his recesses after the first day. It sure is weird having him gone all day and Maddie sure misses him in the afternoon. She keeps saying, "Mom, when will Taggart be home?" It should be a fun year!!

Big Bear Ayotte Family Vacation

2011-08-20T14:59:00.000-07:00

This year we all got together in Big Bear California for our annual family vacation. It was so much for everyone to be there this year! We spent an entire week hiking, swimming, fishing, biking, playing games, and just having fun! Taggart and Maddie were just thrilled to have Ada and Boston there to play with them! Maddie and Ada would just dissapear into a room for what seemed like forever and we would find them in there just playing Barbies or coloring. Here are some fun pics of some of the good times...
Here we are along the walking/biking path around the lake. This is the actual bridge that I turfed it on while on my morning run and ended up bloody!

We went on a few hikes and even took Taggart on this amazing hike where we had to hike up these huge rocks and we got an amazing view of the entire lake. He did such a great job and was always trying to get to the highest point (just like his Dad! , but we made it!

We spent a TON of time swimming and Parker just loved scooting around everywhere!

We played a lot outside on the grass behind out condo and we even had our own Survivor Olympics with our buffs!

Taggart was obsessed with fishing and had the time of his life fishing with his Dad. Just look at that face!! Oh, and the fish he is catching too!

It was so great to have everyone there together! We made some fun memories and had a great time! Until next year...

Cabin in Bear Lake

2011-08-01T13:58:00.000-07:00

This summer we spent a few weekends up at the cabin in Bear Lake. We love the lake, the milk shakes, and the beautiful weather. We have a hard time getting the kids off the swings. Look at that silly face!

Of course we went out on the boat. The kids are all ready to go!

Parks thought the boat was pretty cool ,but got pretty sick of the life jackets squishing his chubby cheeks.

We spent the Fourth of July weekend up there and did fireworks. This was the first year that Taggart and Maddie got really into the fireworks. They loved them and weren't scared of how loud they were this year.

Maddie had so much fun playing with her cousin Isabelle. They could play for hours and would in their own world for most of the time.

What a crazy family!

This was Parker's favorite thing at the cabin, playing with the door stop. He loved it and it would echo through the entire cabin.

We even went up to Minnetonka cave. The older kids hiked through it and thought it was pretty cool.

Here is Maddie showing off her patriotism on our front porch.

We spent a weekend their with some friends also and didn't get many pics, but had a great time as usual. We are happy that we live so close to take advantage of it now. I am sure we will go up a few times in the winter, but it just isn't the same as it is in the Summer. Until next year!

Summer Hiking

2011-08-01T10:41:00.000-07:00

One day on our way home from the Cabin in Bear Lake, we stopped off and did a little hike. It was only about 1.3 miles so it was perfect for the kids and we all loved it. Here we are just starting out.

On the hike there were all these bent trees and they were really cool.

Every once in awhile we had to stop, rest, and enjoy the scenery.

Here are Taggart and Maddie posing at the top. It was a beautiful view!

We just got a hiking backpack to carry Parks around in, so we can't wait to do some more hiking this summer.

Parker's First Birthday

2011-07-25T14:43:00.000-07:00

I can't believe this littly guys is actually ONE! I was pretty much sad all day long because by baby is soo old! For his special day we had a big party and he was totally clueless as to why all of the celebrating was going on, but Taggart and Maddie sure were excited for it all. We got a big bounce house for our back yard and the kids had so much fun playing in it. Even Parks thought it was cool to sit and bounce in it.

Here are the kids at the bottom of the slide showing how old he is. Maddie was having a meltdown, so excuse the puffy, crying face/ forced smile.

We had dinner and cupcakes. Here he is, but hasn't quite noticed the cupcakes yet.

Now he noticed them and is going for my favorite, the coconut one.

I know it is weird, but he still doesn't put food in his mouth, he usually just throws it around, which is what he did with the cupcake. So I decided to show him what he was missing out on and put some into his mouth. He loved it and kept wanting more!

Me with my sweet boy! One year later and I still can't get enough of him!

He got some fun new clothes and toys for his birthday. Taggart was more excited about his gifts than he was, and T opened them all up for him. It was a great night and we all had fun celebrating Parks' first birthday.
Here are a few things about him at age 1:
* He weighs 24.1 lbs (69%) and is 30.25 inches long (64%). He still has plenty of rolls and we love them!
* He is still not crawling on all fours, but gets around quite well bu scooting on his bum and army crawling. He rocks back and forth on all fours, so it won't be long before he figures this out. I am not too excited for him to be fast at getting around.. it was much easier when I just sat him down and he stayed there. I guess those days are gone!
* He has 5 teeth and they are pretty big chompers! He got 5 teeth from 10 to 12 months and now he looks soo different with them. He was hardly fussy while he got these teeth and it was so nice.
* He is still such a sweet content boy. Every time we are with new people they comment on just how good he is. We are soo happy and lucky to have him!
* He still wants me to feed him. He doesn't want to pick up food and do it himself, but I know that he knows how because he seems to do it when I give him a rice krispie treat! He is allergic to cow's milk and eggs and had pretty bad allergic reactions to both of them so far. We hope he grows out of both of them sooner than later.
* He loves to clap, wave (although not very good on command), play peek a boo, and give loves and kisses. He can say mama and dada and babbles a lot of baby talk. It is so fun to hear his little voice.
* He loves balls and dogs or animals. Everytime he sees a ball/dog/animal he just oohs and ahhs and gets soo excited! Balls are his favorite toy.
We sure love our Parker and are soo happy that he came to us a year ago! Happy first Birthday Parks!!

Girls Trip to Europe

2011-07-24T13:56:00.000-07:00

A few years ago, Cam, his brother and his Dad went fishing in Alaska while the girls stayed home. We had been having a hard time finding the perfect time for a girl's trip since between babies and nursing it has seemed impossible. Several months ago , Katrina and Marion drove up to my house and asked if I was able to finally take our girl's trip to... EUROPE! I almost died! I thought for sure it was going to be to New York and was thrilled and amazed that Europe was the place Marion and Frank thought would be fun. I was like, HELLO? For sure I was in! We decided to see a few different spots and it was really hard to narrow it down since the only place I had been in Europe was Germany, so we decided on France, Switzerland, and Italy. Here is a quick peek at our trip. These are only a few pics, but I just don't have the patience to download more.
We started and ended our trip in Paris, France. it was amazing to see the Eiffel Tower. It was much larger at the bottom than I expected and the view from the viewing area is incredible. We saw it at night and it was beautiful to see the city with all the lights and bridges.

Here we are at Arc di Triomphe. It is a major roundabout that has a TON of traffic. It was pretty crazy! I would hate to drive in Paris!

We went to see the only church in Paris that is dedicated to Christ,Sacre Coeur. This is a the view of the city from the Church. It was beautiful!

Here we are in the Louvre with Mona Lisa herself. The painting was much smaller than I expected.

Here I am eating Escargot. It was surprisingly good and not at all slimey like I thought it would be. The sauce was delicious, but they sure are hard to eat!

We went to see the Versailles Castle and Gardens and it was all so incredible. The gardens were huge! If I lived there, I would just take the day and go hang out in those gardens!

Eating our french baquette sandwiches in the park. We did not really enjoy the food in Paris, but their bread is to die for!

Here we are in front of Notre Dame.

We climbed up all the way to the top of Notre Dame and is was one of my favorite things that we did the whole trip. We climbed up a bunch of tiny, circular staircases all the way to the top. It was an amazing view of the city below and it wasn't very crowded, so we just hung out up top and enjoyed..it was awesome!

We then flew to Switzerland, rented a car and drove to Bern, Switzerland. I don't have many of Bern, since we were so tired that we went to bed at 8 pm that night! The next morning we woke up to rainy skies and drover to Interlaken. We stopped in a little town called Thun and took this picture. Switzerland is one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen. It is so green and the mountains are amazing! So green and straight up and we couldn't even see the tops of them because of the clouds. We were a little disappointed that we couldn't go on the tram and see the view because of the crappy rain!

Interlaken, Switzerland means 'between 2 lakes' and it literally is a little town between 2 lakes. It was beautiful! Just look at the color of that water!

I loved all the Swiss architecture! All of the shops and houses are so quaint and charming. I opened our window in the morning and wondered how lucky the people are to live where everything is so beautiful!

We then took the train to Florence, Italy. It was such a drastic change from Switzerland and France and it was AMAZING!! Here we are standing by the Duomo, the famous church in Florence. Our hotel was just down the street from this and we had so much fun wandering the cobblestone streets, eating wonderful Italian food and gelato, and SHOPPING! We saw the statue of David, of course, but did a lot of shopping in their fun outdoor market.

We hiked up to the top of the city for the look out point. Isn't this an amazing view of the city?

On the way to the look out, we got lost, but didn't care much because everything that was saw was sooo beautiful! Can you believe people walk these streets everyday and call this place home?

After Florence, we took another train ride to Rome, Italy. It is such an incredible city with such history. Here we are at the Colosseum. It was one of the coolest things that I have ever seen.

We took a tour of the Colosseum and Palatine Hill and all of the ruins were truly amazing! Here Katrina and I are walking on the same exact street that Julius Caesar did ages ago.

Here we are at Trevi Fountain. I did toss a coin over my right shoulder into the fountain and I hope that I will return to Rome someday. It is such a spectacular city!

Here I am standing in front of the Pantheon. It was amazing to see something so old still standing.

Here were are at Piazza Navona, which was pretty close to our hotel. Every few blocks in Rome is a Piazza and they are all so pretty. We had some good times people watching and watching the street performers here.

That is basically our trip in a nutshell, but here are a few things that I will never forget about the tip:
* Mare and Katrina eating 'chicken chest' in Paris. We became a little leary of eating meat in Paris after this. If you go to Paris, don't try it!
* Lugging our luggage through the Metro system in Paris up and down stairs until we thought we would die. Took us 2 1/2 hours to get to our hotel due to problems with their Metro system that day. Not fun at all...so much for trying to save money! We didn't do that again!
* Acting like gargoyles and the hunchback of Notre Dame while we were in Notre Dame. Hilarious! We must have been exhausted because we were being way too silly!
* All the smoking in Europe! It did not stop and we hated it!!
* For some reason when I would try to speak the native language, it always came out Spanish.. Weird, I know.
* Pumping my life away! I was still nursing Parker and wanted to continue, so I lugged my pump through the whole trip and then got home to Parker not wanting to nurse anymore! I was soo mad! I pumped everywhere: dirty bathrooms, on the train, in the airplane, in the car, in the middle of a park in Paris, it was crazy!
* The train ride from Switzerland to Florence traveled through some amazingly beautiful scenery and tons of tunnels!
* Our flight on the way there was cancelled so we were bumped up to first class. It was incredible and completely ruined ruined flying in coach class from now on. Oh those seats reclined soo nicely, the warm nuts, the nice blankets and pillows, the food was fantastic! It was a great start to the trip!
* Our friend Tryan in Rome. He worked at our hotel and was hilarious! He told us his life story! Such a nice guy! oh, and our sweet housekeeper.
* Walking soo much and too fast for Marion. She told me to slow down several times.
* All the people in the Vatican. We thought we would go nuts! We saw the Sistine Chapel and bolted!
It was a wonderful girls trip and we saw some amazing countries! Hope our next trip will be as good as this was!

Tag's Summer Sports

2011-07-23T15:53:00.001-07:00

This Summer Taggart was pretty busy playing all kinds of different sports: T-ball, Golf, and tennis. He had a lot of fun doing all of them and is getting better each and every lesson. He was on his friend and neighbor, Patrick's, team for T ball and he really enjoyed having his best beddy with him. He really hit the ball pretty hard sometimes..it was awesome!

He loved going golfing with his Dad and never seems to get bored. He loves it!

He had his tennis lessons with 2 of his friends from school and they all had so much fun.

My Little Graduates

2011-05-25T20:19:00.000-07:00

Maddie had a great first year of Preschool. She started out being quite hesitant when it came to dropping her off at Preschool, but she has gotten quite a bit better. Still some days, when she is being rather dramatic, she acts like she doesn't want me to leave, but I think it is all an act. She has learned a lot this year and has gotten very good at writing her name, coloring, and drawing. Her graduation program was very cute and they sang several songs from the Magic Tree House books. Here she is with her diploma and they each got their very own Magic Tree House book.

She was very shy on the day of the program and would hardly even participate or sing the songs. Cam and I were so mad because we knew she was just doing it because we were there and she was giving us attitude...the drama queen! Needless to say, I didn't get any great pictures of her because all she would do was open her mouth and not smile...crazy girl!

Taggart graduated from Kindergarten. He has had such and amazing year and I can't believe how much he has learned! He is beginning to read and is doing 1st grade Math and getting the best grades. His teacher gives him a topic each day and he has to write about it and I love to see what he comes up with and how he figures out how to spell things..it is hilarious! He has behaved very well and has gotten outstanding or satisfactory every single day. I have been sooo impressed with how well he has done in Kindergarten and I have to say that I totally underestimated him! I glad that his amazing teachers didn't! Here he is with his teacher Mrs. Larsen. She is amazing! She is very sweet, but firm at the same time and I can't believe how well she gets those kids to behave. When I would go in to volunteer I was amazed at how quiet and obedient they were.

Here he is with his bed buds, Max and Daimen. We carpooled with them and they really have a lot of fun together.

For his Graduation program they sang some songs and recited some poems for us. Each child got an award and Taggart's was "Mr. Giggles" because he is always so happy and funny.
We did have a great year of school, but we are all ready for a break. Bring on SUMMER!!

My Little Performers

2011-05-22T13:09:00.000-07:00

May is the month of dance recitals and we sure have been busy the last couple of Saturdays. Maddie is taking dance at 2 different studios (I know. CRAZY, but only because we had so much trade) so therefore, she had 2 different recitals. Let's just say that we pretty much got worn out this year!

She did great for her first recital and danced very good and loved performing! She said that she wanted to do it again and I said..sure, next weekend you will! Here she is after her big show with flowers from Grammy. Doesn't she look soo grown up in this picture?

Anyway, the next recital came and let's just say it was major DRAMA! She hated the costume because it was soo itchy and made me put a T-shirt underneath it for the performance. Nice huh? She danced Ok, but wasn't very into it because of the stinking costume. Needless to say, we will FOR SURE only be doing dance at one place next year, that's enough dance for us!

Taggart did an amazing job at his recital for Tumbling Tigers. They did a Rocky theme and did a little dance and then showed off their cartwheels, backbends, somersaults, etc. He was sooo serious about this dance and poses and did everything to perfection! He is so good about following the rules and doing everything he should..it is so cute! He did a great job and hardly took his gloves off for the next couple days after his recital.

It was very fun to watch them both perform and they had a great time too!

Easter in Vegas

2011-05-04T14:19:00.001-07:00

This year for Easter we went to Las Vegas with my family. We met Jason and Claudia there and had a great weekend in the sun. The minute we got there the kids were ready to hit the pool.

Taggart loved when Uncle Brody threw him in the air!

This was Parker's first time swimming and he loved it! We dunked him a few times and he didn't even care.

We loved floating around the lazy river in the tubes. It was very relaxing and could have done it all day long! Maddie did great swimming and is getting more daring every day. She would put her head under the water and try to swim. It was good practice for this summer.

Daddy snuggling with Parks. He was such a good boy the entire vacation.

We hardly saw Taggart the entire time we were at the pool. He spent most of his time under the water... he is such a fish!

On Easter Sunday we went to church in Las Vegas.

Then we came home and the kids found their Easter baskets.

We colored Easter eggs and did a couple Easter crafts, thanks to Auntie Claudia. We also frosted sugar cookies and had a big Easter egg hunt. The kids loved it and found a ton of eggs filled with even more candy!

Parker is 9 months old now!! He weighs 21 lbs 8 oz (69%) and is 28.7 inches long (65%), so he is a healthy little boy!

He continues to be such a happy, content baby. He loves his siblings and is always laughing at them when they pay attention to him.

He loves the bath. He gets so excited everytime that he almost falls over because he is splashing so hard! Just look at all those rolls! How darling are they?

We just barely stopped swaddling him when he sleeps, but isn't this just the sweetest little bundle?

He loves to suck on anything and everything. Here he is chewing on his tag blanket.

When he wants something to eat or gets really excited, his wiggles his hands and feet and grabs with his little hands. It is hard to explain, but it really is the cutest thing to see. He also is very good at giving hugs and he loves pat-a-cake.
Everyone loves his beautiful blue eyes and I really hope that they stay this color.
We love him sooo much and can hardly get enough of him! Can't believe he is almost a year old!

March Madness

2011-04-12T09:25:00.000-07:00

We had a very fun month of March. Taggart had a lot of school off with Spring Break and Parent/Teacher conferences, so we took advantage of it and took 2 different trips to St. George. It was so much fun to be able to spend some time soaking up the sun! The kids spent a ton of time riding their scooters and bikes. Cam even took off Maddie's training wheels and she learned to ride without them! He basically helped her on and let her go and the rest was history. She took right off and hardly got off that bike the rest of the week.

We spent a lot of time with both of our families and all of our old friends. We miss all our friends sooo much, so it was great to be able to spend so much time with them. I was even lucky enough to have a GNO with all my friends. We had so much fun and it made me miss these girls even more than I did already!

We also visited some of our favorite restaraunts. Here we are at 25 Main and Parrothead.

We are mildly obsessed with Parker and he was the best baby as we schlepped him across the state twice! He did awesome and hardly made a peep on our road trips.

He didn't know what to think of the grass?? We loved seeing Parks in his short sleeved shirts and shorts while he showed off his major chubs!!

We also played in the snow! March is hardly a Spring month in Logan and we got several snow storms (much to our chagrin!) The kids had their friends over and they were eating snow, so I figured we would make it taste a little better and we made snow cones. The kids thought this was the greatest!

Grammy also invited us to her house for a Tea Party and a special guest arrived....Rapunzel!! Maddie was very shy and hardly cracked a smile until Pascal came out to play.
Baby Kate was terrified of Rapunzel!

We had a fun month and now we are home in Logan, praying for warmer temps and the sun to shine. If it doesn't come out soon we will just have to head south again!

A Busy February

2011-02-27T14:47:00.000-08:00

February was a busy month for us. First off, Taggart lost his first tooth! It has been loose for a while and he ended up pulling it out himself! He was very excited and is already wiggling his other bottom tooth so that he can earn another dollar from the Tooth Fairy.

Second, Maddie turned 4!

She had her birthday party at The Fun Park. Here is a picture of her and all the friends she invited.

She loved her Tangled Birthday cake.

The kids had a lot of fun playing in the soft play and eating pizza and cake and ice cream. She got a lot of fun gifts and ended up having a great 4th birthday!

Here are a few things about our sweet, little Maddie at age 4:

She has the cutest little accent in the world. Sometimes she sounds like a little New Yorker, especially when she says "Parker". She says some things very funny and we don't ever want her to start saying them the right way (stop sign/thop thign, sparkles/farkles, nevermind/neverfind, teasing/cheating) Her voice is one of the cutest I have ever heard and we will be sad when her baby voice is gone.

She is really into coloring, cutting, and drawing lately. She wants to cut things ALL day long these days! She also has been drawing the funnest pictures of people and I love to see the things that she comes up with, like earrings and ponytails! She is very good to play by herself and she is very imaginative. She plays with things forever and I love to hear what she has her little toys say to each other and hear the different voices she makes up.

She is such a GIRL! She still loves to dress up and is still really in love with pajamas, but she has finally started to mellow out and not change her clothes 20 times a day. At least now she doesn't go straight to her room when we get home and change her clothes. She is very observant and always notices if I have on something new or something she hasn't seen before and she will say, "Mom, that is a cute shirt (or watch, necklace, boots, etc.) When we go shopping she always wants clothes and LOVES to try them on and pose for me. She got some makeup from her aunt and uncle for her birthday and has been obsessed with it, can't you tell? It really is a lot of fun to have a girl!

She is a pretty friendly little girl, but she does become very shy when she gets put on the spot. Like for her dance recital or opening presents at her party, she gets VERY serious and it is crazy to see how she changes. She is very clingy to me sometimes when I drop her off at dance or preschool, but is fine the second I leave, but she does ask for me while I am gone and she says that she misses me. She never does this when Cam drops her off, so I think she just does it because she loves me so much.. ha ha! Obviously she is just putting on a show for me.
We love Maddie so much, even though she can be quite sassy and VERY dramatic at times. I guess that just makes her a true girl!
We also celebrated Cam's birthday a couple days after Maddie's. My Dad's birthday is the same day, so we all went out to dinner to celebrate their special day. Here are the 2 birthday boys.

Cam went skiing with his Dad and brother and rememberd how much he loved it, so we took the kids skiing for the first time the day after his birthday. Aren't those tiny boots and skis too cute?

Grandpy helped Cam teach the kids how to ski.

They had a great time and I think they really loved it. Parks and I spent most of the afternoon in the lodge, but it was a beautiful, warm sunny day. It couldn't have been a better day to learn to ski. Taggart keeps asking when he can go back. Maddie thought the ski lift was pretty cool when before she knew it, they were very high up in the air and she was a little surprised and scared at the same time! It turned out to be a fun 36th birthday for Cam.
Parker turned 7 motnhs old on the 21st. He continues to be such a happy baby and really brings such joy into our home. He is loving his exersaucer these days. We started him on solids and he pretty much likes everything but peaches. He will eat them, but always puckers his mouth at first. He finally rolled over and is getting soo close to sitting up. He can do it for awhile, but falls to the side if something catches his eye.

Here is my sweet little choir boy..he just loves to hold his hands like this and it is soo cute!

We also spent a fun weekend up at the cabin in Bear Lake with 2 other family friends, but we were so busy having fun that we didn't even take any pictures! The kids had so much fun playing with each other, sledding, and riding around on the Rhino. It really was a fun weekend! And that is pretty much our month of February in a nutshell!

Happy 6 months PARKS!

2011-01-30T15:10:00.000-08:00

It is a good thing that Parker keeps getting older, it is pretty much the only thing that gets me to post lately. Not much has been going on around our house lately. Just the same old routine of school, dance, tumbling, carpooling, and trying to survive this cold Logan winter. We did go ice skating the other day, which was a very fun Winter activity. This was the kids first time ice skating and they did great! Taggart just kept wanting to go faster and he really went pretty fast with the walker that they have for the kids. Maddie did well too, but got tired pretty fast. It was a lot of fun because they let you take your stroller out on the ice, so I had the perfect thing for balance too! Here are a few pics:

I can't believe that Parker is 6 MONTHS OLD! That is half of a year! It is really crazy how quickly time has flown by and I am sad that my baby is growing up. Parks continues to be such a happy and content baby. He started eating solids and caught on quickly. The first time I fed him, I feel like he actually ate the food.

He weighs 18 lbs. (60% percentile) and is 26.5 inches tall (51% percentile). So he really isn't nearly as big as he has been in the past. I feel like he is slowing down a little bit, but he still has plenty of rolls for us to squeeze! Aren't those chubby feet the cutest?

He has been doing this hilarious thing with his tongue and sticking it out all time...it is soo cute!

He continues to be such a joy in our home and the kids just love when they can get him laughing while they do random things.

He is getting closer to sitting up and rolling over too.

He still thinks his hands are the coolest thing ever. It so fun to see him looking at them like he just discovered the coolest toy ever!

Maddie started Sunbeams a few weeks ago and is LOVING it. Every week while we are in Sacrament meeting she asks me several times when she gets to go to Sunbeams. She also moved up to the Fours class at Preschool and is really enjoying it. She is very good at cutting and is ALWAYS cutting up shapes that I draw for her. She is also getting really good at drawing things and it is good to see her learning new things.

Merry Christmas

2011-01-04T13:29:00.000-08:00

We had a very Merry Christmas this year. As usual, we all got spoiled and we came home with many new things that I am still trying to find places for! We spent Christmas Eve with Cam's family and here are the kids dressed up while we told the Christmas story. Both Isabelle and Maddie were Mary this year!

Here we all are in our Christmas jammies.

On Christmas morning Taggart actually woke up around 5 and had a hard time going back to sleep, then he finally did around 6:30 and then we had to wake him up around 7:30. I asked him why he had a hard time sleeping and he said, "I was worried that Santa was going to give me a bunch of coal." I thought that was adorable and he was pretty happy when he didn't get any coal in his stocking.

Parker was just thrilled with everything...can't you tell? He was very chill and loved all his presents now that he actually plays with toys a little.

We had a lot of fun opening presents and exchanging gifts and the we headed to my parents' house for brunch. There were even more presents waiting for us there! Maddie was very excited when she opened up her Dolly.

Taggart and I were playing with a couple of his new toys.

My sister and I both got new coats for Christmas. It was so much fun having McKelle home from New York for the holidays. My kids adore their Auntie Kelle and we were all happy to be able to spend a lot of time with her.

Maddie was happy to help Parker open his gifts from Nana and Papi. In fact, I think she opened all of mine for most of the day too! She and Taggart did NOT get tired of opening gifts, they could have gone all day!

Taggart and Maddie performed The Twelve Days of Christmas for everyone and it was very cute to have them sing and do all the actions. They thought they were pretty special!

And I had to include a picture of the 3 little babies all together. It is so fun to all be together and see how fast these little ones are growing. They are all such good little babies!

A couple of days after Christmas, we headed up to the cabin in Bear Lake. The kids LOVED going on the snowmobiles, even though it was VERY cold! Maddie kept saying, "I want to go again." Cam even got a little frostbite on his face from being out all day.

How cute does she look in these huge goggles? She loved them...
We spent a lot of time relaxing and getting warm by the fire. Here we are snuggling up for a good story!

Crazy kids in their matching Christmas jammies.

Cutest kid in the world! What a sweetie playing with his new toy. He is watching his crazy brother and sister. They just love to make him laugh!

We did have a great holiday, but is sure is nice to be home in our own beds with a normal schedule now. We hope you all had a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!!

Parks at 5 Months

2011-01-02T12:48:00.000-08:00

I can't believe my little baby is already 5 months old! Just a quick little update about my favorite little man at 5 months.
He really is the best baby ever! I know I say this every month, but he truly is! He is just a very chill baby! He hasn't even rolled over yet because he is just too content to hardly move! He is in love with his hands and fingers and he is often found sucking on his two fingers.

He sleeps really good and is pretty good to fall asleep anywhere (crib, carseat, bed, floor..anywhere!) And he always wakes up so happy! Cam and I fight over who goes into his room to get him when he wakes up. A lot of times I just go into the room to check on him and he is awake and just chillin! Or he wakes up just talking and babbling.
He is such a smiley baby! He loves to give anyone a smile who will pay attention to him!

He has started reaching and grabbing for things with his hands and he is having fun playng with his toys now.

We just love those beautiful blue eyes!

I just can't get enough of him!

One Year Older and Wiser too...

2011-01-02T12:41:00.000-08:00

Yes, I also had a Birthday, although I am not quite as excited as Taggart is about getting older. But I did have a great birthday. My awesome Mom and MIL took our kiddos and we escaped for a night alone. We went to dinner and a movie and then stayed the night at the Anniverary Inn. We stayed in the room Juliet's balcony and it was awesome! It was a huge room with a giant tub and we had a great time!

The next morning we slept in, went to the gym together, went out to breakfast, and then got massages. It really was a great 33rd Birthday! Thanks to Cam and our families for making is such a special birthday!

Look who turned 6!

2011-01-02T11:07:00.000-08:00

I can't believe that Taggart is 6! It really just seems like yesterday that we were having our first little baby boy! Well, he isn't really little anymore and he was very excited about his birthday. He had a big birthday party at the Fun Park. Just look at that group! He was so happy to have all of his friends and family there to celebrate his special day!

They played in the soft play and also played games. Just look at all the tickets he won! He really was in 7th heaven!

He really got a TON of presents, but one of his most favorites was an extra $6 that Nana and Papi gave to him. Just look at the look on his face! He also loved his Beyblades that Grammy and Grandpy gave to him.

After the kids had pizza, Taggart blew out the candles on his Super Mario cake.

Later that evening we went to El Toro for dinner and they brought him out sopapillas with a candle and sang to him while he wore the sombrero. He was quite surprised and thought that was pretty special!

Just a few things about Taggart at age 6:

~He LOVES the Wii, but especially Super Mario Brothers, well actually any video game for that matter (on the iPad, iPhone, anything!). He really could play it all day long and he is actually VERy good at it. We have to monitor it a lot and this is usually the source of any tantrums or meltdowns when we make him turn it off, but it is also great motivator. I can get him to do just about anything if I bribe him with the Wii.
~ He is a very social, friendly little boy. He always wants to be playing with his friends and makes friends easily at school. We are happy to have such great neighbors with 2 little boys and he plays with them a lot!
~ He is doing so well in Kindergarten! He is doing 1st grade Math and already starting to read. I totally underestimated how well he would do in school and he is making us very proud! He is also a good, attentive student and always does very well on his behavior log.
~ He is pretty sweet to his brother and sister at times. When Maddie or Parker is crying, he will hold their hand and talk to them in the sweetest voice. There are a lot of times in the car where I see him holding Maddie's hand and he is always very concerned if Parks cries. He asks, "Is he hungry Mom?" It is very cute and I am glad that he is such a good big brother.
We just love our Mr. T and are so happy that he turned 6! Happy Birthday Taggart!

Showtime!

2011-01-02T10:26:00.000-08:00

This year the Holidays brought us a few special performances. First we had Taggart's Kindergarten Christmas Program. He sang songs, recited some poems and even did some sign language. He did a great job and we had so much fun watching him. Doesn't he look cute in his Christmas tree hat that he made himself?

We also went to Tag's Tumbling Tigers Christmas review.
They did a little dance at first and it was hilarious! Then he showed us all of his cool moves..like back bends. It is so funny to watch his skinny little arms try to hold himself up, but he is getting stronger.
He is a champ at crab walks. He also did dive rolls, toe touches, and some awesome cartwheels! He really has a lot of fun at tumbling. It is a great way to learn some coordination, get stronger, and just burn off some energy! At the end of class sometimes all the boys take their shirts off and it just cracks me up to see Tag and his skinny, little chest! He did a great job and we were so proud of him!

Finally, we went to Maddie's Christmas Dance Review. She is in love with dance and takes at 2 different places and this place she calls her 'doggie dance'. She calls it this because on the first day of class they did a doggie dance and I guess it just stuck. She looks forward to going every week and she was very excited for her performance. She is very good at first position and you should have seen her adjusting her feet so they would be turned out just perfect...it was soo cute!

Check out that pointed toe! She did a great job and was very serious for the whole performance. No messing around or anything. She just watched the teacher and did all of her steps very precisely.

I just love my little dancer! It was so much fun to watch her and see how much she has learned.

It sure was a lot of fun to watch the kids show off some of their new talents this Christmas season!

Thanksgiving and More Updates....

2010-12-02T10:24:00.000-08:00

Well I guess it is time for my monthly update! I can't seem to get around to posting more frequently, but when I get a month behind I start to panic! We had a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend. We spent Thanksgiving day with Cam's family and here we are all ready to eat our delicious turkey dinner!

Cam sacked out after dinner and Parks snuggled up to him with a big grin!

I am sooo thankful to have 3 wonderful and healthy children! (Even though Maddie would not smile or look at the camera ALL weekend long. I could not get a good picture of her for the life of me!)

Oh, this little boy is the sweetest thing in the whole wide world!! More about him in a few minutes, but how cute is his little half smile?

On Saturday we went to the Nutcracker in Logan. This is a Christmas tradition that I wanted to start and my kids really loved it. Taggart liked it even better than I expected, but when the guy comes out to dance his second solo in the end, he said, "Awww, not this guy again!" Maddie really loved seeing all the ballerinas and especially loved sitting by her cousin, Ada (with both of them on Poppy's lap for most of the time!)

Here are Ada and Maddie with Nana. Like the candy in Maddie's mouth?

Jason and Claudia and their kids were in town from California and Tag and Maddie had so much fun playing with their cousins. Maddie and Ada was VERY into dressing up and this is pretty much what they looked like the entire time they were at Nana's house. I just love to see them playing with all of our old toys! This is the one picture Maddie posed in and she did it well. Is she a Diva or what?

My parents gave all the grandkids pajamas and I only got a picture of the 3 babies. Seriously, how cute are they? Parker is almost the biggest, even though he isn't the oldest!

Since we won't see Jason and his family at Christmas, we decided to let the kids open their gift exchange presents. They were all very excited about opening Christmas gifts early.
We did have a great Thanksgiving weekend! We spent a lot of time with family, ate a TON of good food, and tried to stay warm since it was freezing cold and very snowy! Winter has arrived!

PARKER is now almost 4 1/2 months old. He really is the sweetest, best baby ever! He has been sleeping through the night for about a month and he naps like a champ during the day too! I feel like he is always asleep! When he is awake, he usually just chills under his play gym or his mobile or just watches us. He has been laughing a lot lately and the kids really think this is fun! The other day Maddie bent down in front of him to pick something up and he thought it was funny, so she kept doing it and he was giggling every time she did it! It was so funny!!! At his 4 month Dr. visit, he weighed 16 lbs. 7 ounces (84th % for age) and was 26 inches long (85th % for age). So he is pretty big boy!! Just look at all his rolls!!

He is just such a content, happy baby. He loves his hands and often times you can hear him sucking them really loudly! We are just soo in love with him!!

Halloween 2010

2010-11-02T12:32:00.000-07:00

This year for Halloween I feel like we celebrated it for a week straight! The kids dressed up for dance, tumbling, and even a birthday party! Here is Maddie dressed in her costume from last year for dance.

We carved our pumpkins and I have to admit that this is the first time we have ever done this with our kids...sad, I know! Anyway, they were totally grossed out by the stuff inside and Maddie made me wash her hands every time she would touch it! Cam busted out his saw and dremel tool to carve the pumpkins, it was hilarious! They turned out pretty cute though!

On Halloween day, Cam's parents came up and went to lunch with us. His Mom came in her costume from last year (since we didn't see it last year), but then changed into her costume for this year. Don't they look amazing?

Cousin Emma came over to see the kids in her darling Cow costume. She looked so cute and couldn't stop eating her hooves.

What little posers....

We went over to our friends', the Karen's, house and had pizza and went trick or treating in there neighborhood. We have always gone to a Trunk or Treat, so this was our first time actually going door to door trick or treating.

It was cold and rainy and the kids got tired of running from house to house. I think they were wondering where our warm, sunny Halloweens were in St. George. I was thinking about how we had never trick or treated in the rain and then I realized it is because we spent every Halloween since Taggart was born in St. G. We sure missed the nice weather!! Although we did see a beautiful rainbow all across the sky when the sun popped out for a minute.

This is how Parks spent his time trick or treating. All bundled up, dry, and cozy. I was sure wishing I was him!!

Here is Parker and his cousin Sophie. Don't they look so cute in their Halloween outfits? Parks is 8 weeks older than her and about double her size!

It was a fun Halloween and I am kinda glad that we didn't get as much candy as we usually do! Dealing with what we got is enough for me!!

It's Autumn Time!

2010-10-27T09:04:00.001-07:00

It most certainly is Autumn Time here in Cache Valley and I had forgotten how much I love Fall here! The leaves are amazing colors, the air is crisp, and there are a ton of fun things to do to celebrate the season. We went out to American West Heritage and had a lot of fun. They had a straw jump, corn maze, pony and train rides, animals and all kinds of fun things. We had a really great time!

We also went to the Pumpkin Walk in North Logan. I hadn't been for about 10 years and I was amazed at how good it was!! Here are the kids with their friends.

Maddie and Kennadi were so excited to see the Snow White display. It really was so fun to see everything made out of pumpkins. Some of them were really clever.

Taggart was very excited when he saw the Super Mario display and he actually sat down so I could take his picutre.

Taggart took this picture of Stephanie and me. He said, "Mom, got ya right in the middle," and handed me the camera. He is pretty good at taking pictures.

Another of Taggart's favorites right now, How to Train Your Dragon. He had to get his picture with Toothless.

We really had a great time and the kids wanted to go back and take Dad, so we braved the storm last night and went in the snow!! We decided to just embrace the cold!!
Parker is now 3 months old!! He has been such a happy little baby and is now grinning all the time. He has found his hands and we hear him sucking them and his thumb sometimes. Isn't it cute?

He really only cries when he is either tired or hungry and has even slept through the night a few times already...sooo nice!! He is really starting to enjoy his mobile and can watch it forever! He just sits and talks to it, moves his arms, and kicks his feet. He gets pretty excited!

It has gotten pretty cold and we love to get into our warm jammies! I am sooo happy to have these 3 little kids!!

I can't believe that he is already 3 months old! He is growing up faster than any of my other kids and it is really making me sad! I wish he could just stay this way forever!!

It is a good thing little Miss Maddie is so dang cute or I would have given her away by now! She is such a little tornado!! I cannot clean up after her fast enough! Her room is always a mess; with clothes and toys strewn about. We are STILL having issues with clothes and whenever we get home, she puts on her pajamas and it drives me crazy! She has all these cute clothes and hardly wears them! I thought it was just a phase, but it has been going on for about 9 months now. I am very tempted to take all of her clothes and hide them and only allow her 1 outfit a day! Is that too mean? I just don't know how much longer I can do this??? I am so sick of her looking like a ragamuffin all day when we are home!! Oh! What to do??

Where does time go?

2010-10-03T20:36:00.000-07:00

I can't believe another month has come and gone and it is already October! The weather has been so warm that it has still felt like summer and the month of September just flew right on by! We have been so busy with the kids being in school, dance, tumbling, etc. that I have been going crazy!! I forgot how hard it is to have a newborn baby when we have to be in several different places during the day at certain times. Parker is getting very used to napping in his carseat, that's for sure! Speaking of Parks, he is now 2 months old! At his doctor's visit he weighed 13 pounds, 11 ounces, which is the 89% for his age. He is quite a chubby little boy! He was 23 inches long, which is the 51% for his age. His cheeks just seem to be getting bigger by the minute!

He is still being a pretty good baby, but not as good as the first month. He has started smiling and cooing which is really sweet. He loves his carseat and his swing or bouncy seat, and of course, he loves being held! He has already outgrown his 0-3 month clothes and he is definately my chubbiest baby. We just can't stop kissing those cheeks!

Maddie had a very special tea party at her Grammy's house a couple weekends ago. Maddie and her cousin, Isabelle, got all dressed up with makeup and Princess dresses.

They ate strawberries, cupcakes, rolls and then a very special visitor came....Cinderella!! The girls were sooo excited to see her! She read them a story and taught them how to twirl, curtsy, and wave.

It was such a fun day and I am sure Maddie will remember it forever! We are so glad that Grammy is such good friends with Cinderella and Snow White so that we get to have special visits with them!
These peaches came from the peach tree in our back yard! We have been eating them for the last couple weeks and they are the most delicious peaches I have ever tasted!! Aren't they beautiful?!

My sister had her baby a couple weeks ago and Baby Sophie is the sweetest thing ever! She is tiny and has so much beautiful dark hair! We have had three babies born in 6 months in my family and here they are: Sophie 2 1/2 weeks, Parker 2 months, and Emma almost 6 months. Parker is catching up quickly to little Emma and I am sure he will be the biggest of all three here pretty soon. It will be so much fun to see them all grow up together!

Well that was basically our month is a nutshell. Cam and I did get a quick little weekend trip up to Park City with Parks and my parents watched Taggart and Maddie, but I didn't take any pics. We did some shopping, relaxed and ate at some great restaraunts. It was great to only have one kid and Parks was pretty good for us. I had a cold, though, so that was kinda a bummer. Anyway, I am sure this next month will fly by just as fast as the last one. I just don't know where the time goes??

Blessing Day

2010-09-14T09:37:00.000-07:00

On Sunday we blessed Parker and he looked like such a little gentlemen in his little white outfit! Cameron gave him such a wonderful blessing. He was awake the whole time of the blessing, but didn't make a peep! We had a lunch afterwards at our house with several of our family and friends. It was so much fun to have everyone together to celebrate such a special day for Baby Parks.

Our new, big family of 5!

I'm such a proud Mama!

All tuckered out after a long day of being held and cuddled by everyone!

Labor Day

2010-09-13T12:12:00.001-07:00

We were so sad that summer is almost over and we haven't even taken advantage of being so close to the cabin, so we headed up to Bear Lake over Labor Day weekend. We took up the Smith Family and the McMurdie Family and I don't think we saw Taggart all weekend. He is obsessed with Jaxton and calls him his 'cupcake friend' (since they own a cupcake bakery). Tag spent most of his time with Jaxton while Maddie spent her's with Kennadi. It was so nice for the kids to all play together while the adults had some fun of their own! We played games, talked A LOT, and ate a lot of really great food!
We spent Saturday on the Lake and Beach, until we got blown off the Lake. My parents came up to spend the day at the beach and it was really nice to have a babysitter for Parks while we headed out on the boat. Poppy had fun snuggling up to Parks on the beach.

We had a fun day playing in the sand and cruising around in the boat. How cute is my little flag girl?

Parks was great on the boat and the beach, even though it was very windy and he was covered in sand at times!

We all had a really fun time while we enjoyed the last few days of summer! I am soo sad to see it go...

6 Weeks Old...

2010-09-01T14:46:00.001-07:00

I can't believe that little Mister Parker is already 6 weeks old! He has really started to fill out and has gotten a lot bigger; I already feel like he isn't a little tiny newborn anymore..sniff sniff! Since he started to get those big chubby cheeks, I think he is starting to look more like Taggart now. He is still being a good baby, but not as good as he used to be. He is awake a little more now and we have acutally heard him cry a little, but he is still just as sweet as he could be and we love him! Taggart and Maddie don't really pay too much attention to him. Every so often when he cries or spits up, they tell me about it. Maddie was very excited the other day when we gave Parker his first bottle. She was soo excited to feed him and held the bottle for awhile. I am sure as he starts to do more, the will pay more attention to him, but for right now he is just pretty quiet.

Life with 3 kids has just started to get crazy for me! At first I was thinking it wasn't too hard, but then the kids started School, Preschool, Dance, and Tumbling and now we actually have to be somewhere at a specific time and this has made things harder. Driving the kids all around, feeding Parker in the car sometimes, getting the kids in and out of the car and Parker in and out of his car seat... it really is a lot of work! I am sure once we get into a routine it will be a little easier.

Maddie did start Preschool today and I think she is really going to like it! She was very excited that they had a playground. I am VERY sad that she isn't going to Preschool in St. George with all of her friends at Mrs. Lori's, but I guess this will just have to do. I am sure she will have a lot of fun this year!
We had a pretty busy last month of Summer. Here are a couple of the highlights:

~Spent a lot of time snuggling with Parks
~Cam and I went to Lion King in Salt Lake
~Went to Belmont Springs with my Family
~Went up to a cabin in Idaho for the weekend with the Smith's
~Ate lots of ice cream and cupcakes
~The Kids played outside all day with the neighbors
~Went to the Box Elder County Fair and Parade
~Spent lots of time at the park and pool
~Celebrated 4 birthdays (Marion, Carst, Claudia, Jocelyn)
~Got to bed late and slept in (crazy for my kids!)

Some Firsts...

2010-08-20T14:52:00.000-07:00

Taggart had his first day at Kindergarten on Wed. He has been very excited for this day and so have I! I can't believe he is big enough to go to school! I was kinda sad for a bit, but it has been very nice the last couple of days to have some time with just Maddie and Parks.

Look at how cute he is hanging up his backpack. Yes, I was the Mom snapping pictures of everything!

Then he picked where to sit and he chose the back of the class. I was thinking he must be a rebel, because I never used to pick the back of the class!

10 minutes into class and he leans over to me and asks, "Mom, when are we going to play on the playground?" It was so funny and I was wondering how he was actually going to get through the next day when he had to be there until 11:30! He did great the last couple of days and is so far loving it. Everyday I pick him up, he just runs out and gives me a big hug and he is so happy to see me! It is sweet!

Maddie also had her first day of dance. We went the other day and got her some tap and ballet shoes, a dance bag, and some dance outfits. She woke up the next morning and said, "Mom, I dreamed about my dance." She asked for two days straight when she was going to go to dance. She was so excited when it finally came. She loved her first class so much! I watched her for a bit when she was doing her tap dance and she was concentrating sooo hard and watching the teacher..it was hilarious! She was very excited that she got a cupcake too. Doesn't she look super cute with her dance bag?

Anyway, it was an exciting week of firsts for us!

Parker Cameron McCullough Has Arrived!

2010-08-10T11:55:00.000-07:00

This picture was taken a couple days before I went into labor. I had wanted to capture a picture of how huge I was getting and we had just gotten home from church and the kids were playing with the stuffed animals that were in the baby's room. I am 37 weeks in this picture and this was the longest I had ever carried a baby. I made it to Tuesday and went to the doctor where I was dialted to a 4 and 60% effaced, so I was wondering how long it would be until he finally came. The doctor stripped my membranes and I went home and just kept wondering when it would happen. Well, at 5am the next morning I woke up with a contraction. Then 5 minutes later had another one, then 5 minutes later another one and I was thinking...this is it..I think? I woke Cam up and said that we should probably go to the hospital and it was so weird this time to just be able to go and not worry that it was too early. We even had enough time to stop outside of the hospital and snap a pic. I have never been able to do that before!

We got to the hospital around 6:00 and I had my epidural by 7, so I really didn't even have to be in much pain, which was very nice! Cam and I just hung around and napped and watched tv and then by about 10 I was ready to push. Only a few pushes later and little Parker came into the world!

He weighed 7 pounds and was 20 inches long. He has hair that is much lighter than my other two kids and we still can't quite figure out who he looks like? His light hair kept throwing me off in the hospital and I kept thinking he wasn't mine. He has big hands and long arms and is just about the sweetest baby in the whole world! How cute is this when he found his fingers?

The kids weren't very interested in him at first, but they warmed up quickly. Taggart asked, "Why is our baby so red?" and "What is his name?" When we told him it was Parker, he said that he didn't like that name. I told him he could call him Parks for short and he LOVED that, so now that is what Tag calls him all the time.

Daddy is in love and already wanting #4! Can you believe my husband, who I had to talk into having a third child, now wants more? Crazy, I think, but I guess we will just have to see... Not much cuter than Daddy and his sweet new baby boy.

After we brought him home, his bilirubun levels kept going up, so we had to put him on the lights a few times. He was so good and I guess enjoyed his little tanning bed! After about a week of going to the hospital daily to get his blood drawn and worrying about him getting enough food and pooping all that jaundice out.. and it finally went down and we were free and clear! Yeah!

Taggart and Maddie have been pretty cute with him. Maddie is being a little Mother and they both like to hold him, but not for very long. I think they get inpatient when he doesn't really do much. He hardly even cries, so I think that they forget about him at times!

Today he is 3 weeks old and he is the best baby in the world! I usually have to wake him up during the day to eat and he only wakes up once in the middle of the night. I guess I forgot how much newborns sleep because basically that is all he does: sleep and eat. He did have a little episode the other day and we had to rush him to the doctor because he was crying, choking, and not really breathing, but it was reflux (just like Taggart had) and we got some meds for him and he hasn't had another episode since. Weird, I know, but I will take it. It is just so sad to see him in pain and I hope this medicine continues to work. I am sooo in love with him and I want him to stay at this age forever. I am so much more relaxed with this 3rd baby and am enjoying every minute of it, minus the 25 extra pounds that I'm carrying around! But I feel really good; I'm not tired and it is so nice to be able to bend over again, and not have sore feet!

We just want to welcome our sweet little Parks into our family and let him know that we all love him very much! It is amazing having a newborn in our home again and just realizing how incredible it is that we can create this beautiful new life. I can't believe that 3 weeks have already flown by and I kinda want to push pause on life and not let him grow any bigger! There is nothing better in the world than snuggling with him! Hopefully he will continue to be our little Angel baby! We love you Parks!!

Ayotte Family Vacation 2010

2010-07-18T14:17:00.000-07:00

We had our annual Ayotte family vacation over the 4th of July this year. We spent some time here in Logan, at my parent's house, and camping at Bear Lake. We started out by all going to the fireworks in Logan. The kids were all so excited for them that they asked all day long when we were going to the fireworks. Of course by the time we got there, Mr. Sensitive Ears (Taggart) wanted his ear plugs. It was a great show and it was so fun to all be together this year to watch them.

Maddie was so excited to have her cousin Ada over to her house and broke her in quickly by playing dress up. They played so cute together!

The next day we went to the Logan Aquatic Center to have to fun in the sun! Both Taggart and Maddie just got done with swimming lessons and we know Tag is already a fish, but Maddie learned so much and now she is loving the water more than ever! She spent most of her time in the water and only took a few short breaks for Cheetos...! Go figure!

After the pool we were all able to go to Baby Emma's Blessing. Isn't she the cutest!

It was great to have our entire family there for the Blessing.

My sister, who is 2 months behind me pregnant wise, and I are showing that we are pretty much handicap! Look at how huge my belly looks!!

The next day was the 4th of July and after church we headed over to my Mom's to hang out with everyone.

We had dinner and then we tie dyed T-shirts. They all turned out awesome too!

That night we had some fun with fireworks to celebrate the Holiday. We got good at making AYOTTE out of sparklers. Cam lit off some firecrackers and it scared Taggart so bad he yelled at him and screamed, "You scared my crap out of me!" It was hilarious! Once again, Mr. Sensitive Ears.

The next morning we met at Jamba Juice for a quick breakfast before heading to Bear Lake. Of course we all had to sport our new tie dyed shirts. Don't we look awesome!

We spent some time at the lake at the beach. Uncle Jason built these little pools and the kids had a ball playing in them.

Don't you just love how Patriotic my husband is? This is the way we rolled in Bear Lake (talk about W.T. huh?)

We had a lot of fun camping and we ate a ton of Smores!

We spent a lot of time around camp playing games and having fun. Here are the kids playing with Poppy and Maddie and Ada coloring in the trailer. Nana also got the kids squirt guns, so here they are playing Army with Uncle Jason.

And, what is a trip to Bear Lake with out a stop at La Beaus for some dinner and a milkshake?

Even though I came home with swollen ankles, we had a great time! The kids loved sleeping in the tent and trailer and I enjoyed escaping to a nice, comfy bed down the street at Frank and Marion's cabin. It was nice not to have to stumble to the bathroom in the dark 3 times a night! It was especially fun to have Jason and Claudia and their kids here from California. Maddie and Taggart had so much fun with their cousins and we wish we could see them more often. We had a great time, but then again, we ALWAYS do!

Fun with Friends!

2010-07-10T10:36:00.000-07:00

We have been pretty busy this past month and have been lucky enough to spend some time with some friends, which was really nice since we have been missing our St. George friends A LOT lately! First of all, we met up with the Algers at The Gateway for a wonderful night of catch up!
The girls were being models in the window. Nice poses, huh?

We went to dinner, did a little shopping, and had some ice cream. They were having this sidewalk chalk festival and the kids had fun drawing on the sidewalk.

The Chambers Family also came up to Logan to stay a night with us. We went to Willow Park Zoo and the kids loved seeing all of the animals.

Thanks so much for driving all the way up here to visit us! We had so much fun seeing you all again!
We were also lucky enough to be able to go up to Idaho Falls and spend the weekend with my best friend from High School, Allison and her family.

The kids had soo much fun together! Maddie made instant friends with Caroline and they would disappear for hours playing dress up. Taggart had no problem playing with all the girls and we are secretly planning a future marriage for him and Olivia. We went to Bear World and saw all the bears and then the kids had so much fun petting all the animals at the petting zoo. Tag found this chicken and just sat down by it forever! He cried when we left and said he was going to miss Speckles (which is what he named it!)

Then to top it all off, they had some kiddie carnival rides that the kids could ride. They all just ran around getting on and off the rides since there weren't any lines... it was great!

The adults even got away without the kids for some great Thai food and thanks to the sweet babysitter who watched our six crazy kids!! It was a great weekend of fun, friends, amazing food (I'm sure I gained a few pounds, but I'm prego remember?) Thanks again to Ali and Bradey for being the most gracious hostesses and we hope they will allow us back, since we all didn't want to leave! Maddie woke up the next few days asking where her friends were? We already miss our Idaho friends! Thanks again guys!
In the midst of all of this, we celebrated Father's Day also. I didn't really take any pictures that day when we saw both of our Dads, but Taggart was playing with my camera and shot this pic of the girls at my Mom's house. You can't even see my sister's belly (she is 2 months behind me), but as you can see, mine is getting HUGE!

I'm so grateful for the most wonderful husband in the world! He is the best Daddy ever and we are all sooo lucky to have him. I'm also grateful for my Dad and we had a lot of fun on Father's Day by taking this quiz to see who knew him the best. It was fun to see what we all knew and didn't! I hope all you Dads out there had a great day!!

Update

2010-05-23T14:23:00.000-07:00

I know that it has been forever since I blogged, but give me a break, a lot has been going on and we have been very busy! I'm sure most of you know, but we have moved back to Logan and we were very sad to leave St. George. Before we left, our wonderful friends threw all kinds of going away parties for us. Thanks so much to everyone; we are going to miss you like crazy! Here are some pics of the celebrations.

We are finally getting settled in our home here in Logan which we spent a ton of time working on after renting it out for 7 years. It doesn't quite feel like home yet, but we are getting there. It has been really cold and rainy here which is not helping at all! Before we moved from St. G we were lucky enough to take a quick trip to Disneyland with Cam's family. We all had so much fun as we always do at Disneyland!

As soon as we got home we started packing and moved up to Logan. On the 13th of May Cam and I celebrated our 10 year anniversary! We just did a low key dinner and movie, but it was nice since Cam's parents took the kids up to Bear Lake for the night and day. I can't believe it has been 10 years and I am sure there are many more to come! Happy Anniversary Babe! I love you!
Last week we headed down to St. George for Taggart's preschool graduation. They sang the cutest songs and he was happy to be able to see his preschool buddies again. He has loved Wee Wonders Preschool and has learned soooo much! He has done so well and surpassed even my expectations for him. He is already very excited for Kindergarten in the fall, but we are already missing Preschool!

He has been begging us for a pet for awhile now and he has really wanted a snake. When I told him he was NOT getting a snake, he said, "Fine..I'll just get a shark!" Seriously? So the day of his Preschool graduation his Grammy took him to the Pet store and bought him a Leopard Gecko. He first named him Max, then Alvin, then just this morning changed it to Chip, but basically we call him Max. He was so excited for his new pet and told me that he was never going to be sad again. He lets him crawl all over him and is loving every minute of it!

Easter Fun!

2010-04-08T13:49:00.000-07:00

This year I feel like we went to about a million different Easter Egg Hunts! Maddie ate so much Easter candy one day after an Easter Egg Hunt, that she threw it all up! We started it all off by going to our neighborhood egg hunt. Taggart and Maddie were both so excited before we left, that they were running and sprinting around our house, warming up for how fast they were going to go! Check it out...

Then Maddie had her final day of Joyschool where we had an Easter party and another Egg hunt. Maddie has had so much fun going to Joyschool this year and has even learned a lot too! She is such good friends with all of her little Joyschool buddies! We will miss it now that it is over.

Over Easter weekend Cam's family came and spent the weekend down here. On Saturday we went to the city Egg hunt and the kids totally cashed in! Maddie and Tag were so happy to have their cousins there with them.

After the hunt we went and did a little hiking and each of the kids found a caterpillar and they were loving it!

On Sunday we had our Easter Egg hunt and had to find our Easter Baskets. We also had our Egg fights and Taggart was soo sad when his egg cracked. Maddie seemed to have the champion egg for a long time.

It was a great Easter and we are still enjoying our Easter candy! Hope you all had a very Happy Easter as well!

We are having a BOY!

2010-03-30T19:30:00.000-07:00

We found out a few weeks ago that we are having another BOY! I had really thought it was a boy, so I was somewhat relieved since I was totally in Boy mode. Taggart and Cam were the most excited though. Tag just keeps saying how excited he is to have a brother! Maddie is just happy to have a baby and only sometimes says that she wishes it was a girl. It looks like Maddie will continue to be the Princess of our house as we get another boy. We are all very excited to meet him and see if he is just like his older brother.

I don't have many pictures of myself when I was pregnant with Tag and Maddie, so I vowed that I would try harder this time. So here is a picture of me and the kids before church on Sunday and I am 21 weeks. I feel like I have a HUGe belly already, but I know its just going to get bigger!

We have been loving the Spring weather here in St. George and have spent a lot of time outside lately. The kids and I have been living at the park and my kids already have little tans. You should see Taggart's neck, it looks dirty! We have been going on lots of bike rides, with Tag and I on our bikes and Cam pushing Maddie in the stroller while rollerblading. He gets a great workout and it is fun for all of us! I just love that he is bringing back old school while riding his blades! I laugh every time!

18 weeks and counting...

2010-03-07T14:09:00.000-08:00

I am sure that you have all heard by now, but we are expecting our 3rd baby on August 9th. I am pretty sure the baby will actually arrive sometime in July though. This pregnancy has been by far the easiest one so far. I wasn't nearly as sick and tired throughout the first trimester, and now I feel pretty good, except the getting fat part, of course! I have already gone in for my surgery to have my cervix sewn shut and this time I am also getting hormone shots that will help with preventing preterm labor. Cam has to give me these shots once a week and he just did his first one the other day. He was freaking out about it and I kinda was too, since it is NOT a small needle and they nickname them the 'peanut butter shot.' But he did a great job and it didn't really hurt too bad, so we will have to see how it goes. Hopefully with these 2 things we will keep the little one inside for a little longer. At 36 weeks they take the stitch out and stop the shots and then I will be ready for it to come. We will have an ultrasound next Monday (1 week) and even though Cam doesn't want to find out the sex, we are! Anyone who knows me, knows that I am a planner and I just think I would have anxiety not knowing what I was having! So, sorry Cam, but I am the one having the baby, so I get to make this decision! I think I am having a boy and so does Taggart. He has now convinced Maddie that we are having a 'brother', so we will have to see if we are right? So I will keep you posted. Maddie is very excited and already looks at my belly and says 'Oh, mommy your baby is getting bigger.' She always wants to hold it and she is becoming quite the little Mother to her baby dolls.
Anyway, on a another random subject... I straightened Maddie's hair! My mother in law did this once and she looks like a totally different little girl! Here she is before her dance class showing off some of her moves.
It has a ton of body and is so long and blond when it is straight! It was fun, but took a lot of work, so I don't know how often we will do that!

Busy Birthday Week

2010-02-15T08:46:00.000-08:00

We have had a pretty crazy week filled with 2 birthdays and Valentines Day! Maddie celebrated her third birthday on the 9th. Since she and Daxton share the same birthday, we had a combined party for them at Pirate Pizza with their Joyschool buddies.

That night her Grammy brought her a Princess cake and she opened her presents. She got a scooter, a Snow White dress up, a Princess nightgown, and another dress. Can you tell all she ever wants to wear are dresses?

Then as we were getting into bed for the night, Maddie had a very special surprise visitor..SNOW WHITE! She just walked into our living room and needless to say, Maddie and I were both Starstruck! Maddie quickly ran to her room to show Snow White her new dress up and put it on. They did twirls together and Snow White even tucked her in and read her a bedtime story. Maddie was soo funny and twitter painted, like she didn't know what to do, so she kinda has a funny face in these pics!

The next day she told EVERYONE that Snow White came to her house. We are just glad that Snow White could come visit Maddie on her special day. She told Tag and Maddie that she traveled here by Peter Pan's pixie dust and they were shocked! Snow White even told Taggart that she needed to tell him a secret and then when he went to let her whisper in his ear, she kissed his cheek! He kept telling me how he didn't really like the kiss and kept wipping his cheek, but I bet he secretly did! Overall, it was such a fun birthday and I hope Maddie enjoyed her day!
Cam's birthday is on the 11th which is two days after Maddie's, so we basically eat Birthday cake all week long! For Cam's birthday we went to breakfast at the Bear Paw with his parents. They gave him a Wii and I don't know who was more excited.. Cam or Tag?

Then we headed to Vegas to spend the night and I surprised Cam with tickets to LOVE. We ate great food, shopped a lot, and saw the amazing show! It was a fun quick getaway and I hope Cam enjoyed his birthday too!

We hope you all had a great Valentine's Day! We did and my kids ate lots of candy for it! My friend Teresa borrowed Maddie to take a couple pics the other day and here are a couple. They are so cute and you can check her out at Teresadunlopphotography.blogspot.com. Thanks for some sweet pics of Maddie!

Don't let this sweet smile fool you, this girl can turn quite sassy any second! Here are a few fun things about Madelyn at age 3:

She is such a GIRL! She loves princesses, her dance class, and being pretty. She has been really excited about how long and pretty her hair is getting. When it is wet and she can feel it on her back, so likes to toss it with her hands and says, "Mom, look at my pretty long hair.."

She is very independent when it comes to clothes. When we are just hanging out at home she is either wearing a dress up, nightgown, leotard, or bathing suit. She never has actual clothes on unless we are going out the door. She has to take a nap in either a nightgown or bathing suit and claims that anything else is 'scratchy.' This has been going on for several months and I am learning to deal with it, but it still drives me crazy! She is also very particular with clothes when she actually wears them. She prefers dresses (really long ones that she can twirl and curtsy in..) or skirts and will NOT wear jeans unless I really distract her while putting them on. I can't wait for the day when I put an outfit on her in the morning and take the same one off when she goes to bed at night! Maybe this will never happen though!

She loves her brother, Tag. Everyday when she takes a nap she says that she wants a kiss from Taggart. He comes into her room and she is hiding under her blanket and he says, "Where's my Maddie?" and jumps on her and gives her hugs and kisses. It melts my heart every time and I think it is soo sweet!

She is a pretty good talker, but a couple of the things she says, I don't really know where she got them. She says, Huddy for Woody from Toy Story. She calls Wizard of Oz "Liz a poz" (which, by the way, she watches every single day!) Lately she has been saying Poo Poo when she is mad and then she gets put in Time out for saying a bad word, but I think this must be the only bad word she knows, so she says it when she is mad at someone and sometimes it is accompanied with her tongue sticking out!

Sometimes she can transform into her own world. While she is playing with her dolls or tea set she just has conversations with herself and her dolls and it is hilarious to listen to. Also every night when she goes to bed she is a little chatterbox and just talks randomly to herself before she goes to sleep. We laugh pretty hard at the things she says!

She is sweet and cuddly at times and then other times she doesn't want anything to do with you. Whenever I get her a pancake for breakfast (which she has one every morning!) she says 'Go away Mom.' She says this a lot to me and I guess it just shows how independent she is!

We are so happy to have her even with her sassy attitude. She really brightens our home with her spunky personality and we love her so much! Happy 3rd Birthday Maddie!!

It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year!

2010-01-02T13:34:00.000-08:00

I do believe that Christmastime is "the most wonderful time of the year." And this year was no exception! Before I get to Christmas though, there are a couple things that I forgot to blog about.
We went to another Ugly Sweater Party this year and were very happy to bust out Cam's Mom's old sweaters. She has the greatest collection of Christmas sweaters and we love her for it!! Cam also decided to slick his hair into his old missionary do and pull this ugly face for the camera! Check out my earrings!!

We also went to Breakfast with Santa and I never posted the pics. This was the first time both kids ran up to Santa and gave him a big hug!

I celebrated my 21st birthday (ok...32nd!) and Cam and my good friend schemed up a plan to surprise me with a wonderful dinner at Anasazi Grill and bowling! Thanks so much to Cam and the Chambers for a fun night and making my day special!

On Christmas Eve, we took the Frontrunner Train to Salt Lake to see the lights at Temple Square. The kids loved it and thought it was the Polar Express.

We got hot chocolate to get warm since it was freezing outside! Here is Tag with his hot chocolate face and Maddie getting warm in Grammy's fur!

After we got home and ate dinner, we had the kids dress up and told the story of Christmas. Maddie was Mary, Tag was Joseph, Isabelle was an Angel, and Kate was Baby Jesus. They all got really into dressing up and playing their parts this year.

I told Tag to pretend that Mary was his wife and that she was having a baby and just look at how sweet he was!

We then got into our matching pajamas and headed to bed to wait for Santa!

The kids woke up nice and early and were very excited to see what Santa had brought for them. They got spoiled as usual by their relatives and had a blast opening all their presents! Here are Izzy and Maddie in their matching hats and nightgowns.

We spent time with both of our families and the kids had a lot of fun playing with their cousins. It was a great Christmas, but we are happy to be home now! And trying to figure out where we are going to put all of this stuff we got from Christmas!! AHHHH! Hope you all enjoyed your Holidays!

Happy 5th Birthday Taggart!

2009-12-16T14:14:00.000-08:00

On Monday Taggart had a very special Birthday and turned 5! I cannot believe that he is that old and I am sad at the same time. I just wish I could push pause and not let him get any older. A month or two ago Tag said to me, "Mom, Dad doesn't want me to go on a mission." And I realized that the reason he was saying this is because Cam had mentioned that he didn't want Tag to grow up and in Taggart's mind that meant not going on a mission! It was so cute, but I have to agree...No more growing up!
This was the first year that we had a friend party for him. He was very excited to have all of his buddies over (dudes, as he calls them!) He picked out his Army cake and we decided to have an ARMY themed birthday party. We painted the kids' faces, played Sergeant Says, did Army drills, and had a lot of crazy fun outside! There were 14 boys running around the backyard with their faces painted, waving weapons, and screaming..it was Hilarious!! We also had a Soldier pinata and the kids had a blast trying to hit it.

He got a lot of great presents and each little boy was so excited to give their present to him and do "Heavy, Heavy Hangover thy poor head..." He especially loved this gift from his Grandparents. Just look at that face!

Overall, I think our first birthday party was a success! Taggart had a great time with his friends and he said he had a great birthday! Thanks everyone for coming!

Crazy Weekend!

2009-12-08T10:21:00.000-08:00

Last Friday night Cam had a Christmas Party for the Board of Realtors. He got roped into participating in the 'Rock Band' competition and let's just say he went all out on his costume. His Band won for the best crowd participation. He had people walking up to him and asking to take a picture with him. His costume was the hit of the night. Maddie was scared to death when she saw him. She kept saying, "Daddy scary!"
Then on Saturday, we headed up north to go to sweet Baby Kate's blessing. Isn't she precious?
Tag and Maddie had so much fun playing with their cousin, Izzy.

It was a really quick trip and we are very happy to be home now!

Thanksgiving 2009

2009-12-07T17:33:00.000-08:00

We had such a great, relaxing Thanksgiving this year with my Family. Here are all the girls in their aprons after cooking in the kitchen. It was a delicious meal and we all did the cooking. I made the rolls, Kim made the stuffing, and Jocelyn made some apple pies. My Mom was so happy to have all of us help and it was fun, too.

Kim and Blair

Dad, Mom, and McKelle

Mandy and Cam

After cleaning up dinner we noticed that Grandma and Cathy were reading Kim's US Weekly magazines. Nothing better than catching up on celebrity gossip after a good meal! They were so into it, they didn't even know we took a picture!

Brody and Jocelyn with the guitar that her dad made her. It's pretty awesome!

Yummmmmmmmmmmmm turkey dinner!

Papi taking a power nap!!

We all know that Maddie is obsessed with dressing up. I was really looking forward to not being home, since I thought it might force Maddie to stay in her clothes. Boy was I wrong! She found old dance costumes, old cabbage patch kids clothes, my workout top, and about anything that half resembled a dress! She pretty much looked like a homeless child all weekend long!

Maddie and Nollie are getting acquainted. She loved playing with Brandon's dog, Nollie.

Cam reading bedtime stories!!

McKelle found a website that you could put pictures of our heads on these dancers and it was seriously the funniest thing ever!

Blair and Tag going for a ride on Cathy's 4 wheeler. A little chilly, but not too bad.

We got together with some of the Ayotte clan and played some games and ate yummy treats! Maddie and Tag were missing Ada and Boston the whole weekend and were excited to have some kids to play with. Thanks Aja for bringing Gage and Dallas!'And thanks Diana for planning the party!

We went to the Newgate Mall to see Santa. Maddie was so excited and asked for a duckie? I know, random? And Tag was afraid, but knew if he wanted some toys he'd better tell Santa. He accidently discovered his Christmas presents in my parents' storage room and was wanted them so bad, so my Mom told him that they were Boston's presents. So he told Santa, "you know the iron man, and ninja turtle thing that are for Boston, I want them." It was so funny!
We missed Jason and Claudia and the kids but they'll be here for Christmas, so we can't wait to see them then! I am so thankful for all that I have: 2 beautiful children, a wonderful husband, loving family and friends, and much more! Now, on to Christmas! I love this time of year so much!

This is Halloween...

2009-11-04T19:59:00.001-08:00

My kids have been loving the song "This is Halloween" and we have been singing and dancing to it for weeks now and we have absolutley loved it! We did have an awesome Halloween this year. My whole family, except 1 brother and his wife (Brodey and Joce we seriously missed you!) came to enjoy a warm, sunny St. George Halloween this year.
I feel like we went trick or treating about a million times this year and we also dressed up in several different costumes. First, we went to visit McKelle at the Trunk or Treat at the College and the kids were cowboys.

Then on Friday, Cam took the kids around with him in the afternoon to a few different offices while he was marketing. You should have seen their baskets. They were almost full just by going to a few offices.

On Halloween, Maddie was a lady bug like her cousin Ada and Claudia made them the cutest costumes. Taggart was Iron Man, which is what he picked out from the Halloween Store. The kids had a lot of fun at the Trunk or Treat and we are still eating all of the candy that we got!

I just love this picture of my parents and their grandkids. Notice how all the of kids are just chowing down on their candy!
Here we are at dinner the night before, where we all sang some awesome karaoke and had a blast! Check out Jason and the kids' scary faces!

It was great to have everyone come and celebrate Halloween with us! We had a great time. Thanks for coming!

Wtiches Night Out

2009-11-04T14:02:00.000-08:00

This year my good friend started the best tradtion ever: Witches Night Out. We all dressed up as the most amazing witches ever and went to dinner and then went to see Thriller at Tuacahn. It was a lot of fun to dress up and get a lot of crazy looks at the restaraunt. It was a really cold night and we were pretty chilly sitting outside watching Thriller, but it was well worth it! Just look at all of these crazy withces- My photographer friend, Dion (the punk rocker witch) took these first two pictures and they turned out amazing! Thanks for letting me steal them for my blog!

As we were trying to walk to our car, this scary, little creature was blocking our path, and we just had to have a picture with her!

Maddie's Joyschool

2009-10-20T14:15:00.000-07:00

Maddie is in a small little Joyschool that I do with a few of my friends and I have completely forgotten to post some cute pictures from their first day of Joyschool which was at my house. She loves to go every week and she has so much fun! She is always so sad when Taggart goes to Preschool, so I think this gives her something to do and makes her feel special. I think she is even learning a thing or two also, which is a great bonus
She loves to get her Dora Backpack on and go play with her friends. This is the first day and I had them all line up for the picture. Aren't they so cute! They were also very good at my house. It was a piece of cake!

Today we also went on her first Field Trip for Joyschool to the Pumpkin Patch. Here she is with two of her best buddies, Emma and Avery. They have so much fun together!

She could not get enough of touching and playing with all the animals. She was not scared of anything and wanted to go run around with the big horses. She loved it!

The kids had so much fun and the moms did too! It was a successful Field Trip.

Busy Boy

2009-09-14T12:28:00.000-07:00

Taggart started Preschool again a couple weeks ago. He is going to Wee Wonders Preschool this year and has been so excited about it all summer. There were lots of days this summer where he asked me if he was going to go to Miss Lori's Preschool today? We were both really excited when the day finally came. He has loved it and is learning a lot!
He also played his first soccer game last Saturday. He has also been looking forward to this all summer. I don't know if he was as enthused about it when their first game was at 12:20 and it was really hot! It was a pretty funny game and we all had a lot of laughs! He did pretty good and started getting the hang of it towards the end. Here he is kicking the ball.

Just relaxing on the sidelines.

After the game, just look at this hot, sweaty face! He kept telling us he wanted to take his jersey off!
Well, we are both excited that he has some things to do now. It is good for him to get his energy out and it makes us both happy!

Lake Powell 2009

2009-09-08T12:43:00.000-07:00

This year we just spent a few days at Lake Powell for our annual houseboat trip. I didn't take a lot of pictures since I feel like I have soooo many pictures of all of our years at the Lake and also my camera battery died, but here are a few. We took the boat exploring through a cool canyon.

The kids had fun playing in the sand and finding seashells and swimming, of course.
They could not stop playing with this trunk on the houseboat- they all climbed into it the very first second on the boat.
It was great for the kids to spend some time playing with their cousin, Isabelle. The weather was beautiful and not too hot, which was pretty nice. It was very relaxing and I finished an entire book! It was a very quick trip, but we still had a lot of fun!

No More Diapers!

2009-08-25T19:09:00.000-07:00

Maddie has been interested in the potty for several months now, but I have been lazy and not excited about potty training. I decided to wait until after our family vacation to actually do it. She has been going on the toilet on and off for a while, so I figured she was probably ready, and I was right! Last Monday we put her in panties and we haven't put a diaper on since. We even went and ran errands that first morning and she didn't even have an accident. Needless to say, she did great and is now officially potty trained. No more diapers at our house for the time being and I am totally enjoying it! Great Job little Miss Maddie!

Ayotte Family Vacation

2009-08-24T10:13:00.000-07:00

This year we spent our Ayotte Family vacation in sunny Southern California. Everyone came except for Kim and Blair and they were very missed. We spent the first part of our trip in Oceanside. We pretty much spent most of the days at the beach. The kids could have played all day long in the sand and it was very relaxing.

We also had some fun times at the condo playing games or tennis and swimming. Tag and Maddie had so much fun with their cousins, Ada and Boston.

We spent one day at Laguna Beach, which is one of our most favorite beaches. We buried Tag in the sand and gave him a great beach bod! He loved it!

After Laguna, we headed to Anaheim to stay the next few days. We stayed at a great condo that was so close to Disneyland. We had a little balcony and could watch the Disney fireworks every night! It was great! When we weren't at Disneyland we were hanging at the pool. Here we are in the hot tub, I couldn't get my kids out of it!

After all the relaxing on the beach, we headed to Disneyland. Maddie loved all the characters. She would just run up to them and give them the biggest hugs. Tag, on the other hand, wasn't such a fan of them. But he had just as much fun going on most of the bigger rides with us. He went on Matahorn, Splash Mountain, and Thunder Mountain Railroad. We were so surprised that he was so brave and loved them!

My Mom and Claudia were awesome to take the kids when we went on the bigger rides. Here is Nana with the kiddos while we went on Matahorn. Look at those happy faces!

Here we all are with our glasses on for the Toy Story ride, which is one of our favorites!

Heres another crazy glasses shot, this time from Bug's Life. This really scared Maddie to death!

Maddie is sooo obsessed with Snow White, so she was thrilled to see her. She talked about it for days and kept saying, "No White." We also went to see Tinkerbell or as Maddie calls her "Pinkibell." I think seeing these two made her day! Oh, and let's not forget about Minnie. You can just tell she is beaming in this picture!

Heres a picture of all the girls. This was Jocelyn's first time to Disneyland!

It was one of the most fun vacations we have ever had! We are missing Disney and the Beach so bad already. We are also already missing our family! Thanks so much for such a fun vacation and we really missed you Kim and Blair!

Fishing in Alaska

2009-08-03T18:48:00.000-07:00

I spent a week up in Alaska with his Dad, Grandpa, and Brother. We had a blast. Alaska is truly an untouched last frontier. From minute one, we fished our guts out. We started the week off fishing for King Salmon, hoping to land a big 60+lb fish. Grandpa caught the first, 43 inch, 40 lb fish and then it was the waiting game. I caught the next late in the day, small albeit, but caught. Carst caught one the next day and we were sick of trying to catch the Kings. So reds and Halibut was the focus.
We ended up bringing home just over 260 lbs of fresh, Alaska salmon and halibut. Saw a few black bear and went on a amazing float plane excursion. It was a trip of a lifetime and we all had a great time. Grandpa, at 84 kept up well and landed all the BIG ones. Thanks Dad for an awsome time.

My Week as a Single Mom

2009-08-02T18:23:00.000-07:00

Cam was gone to Alaska for a week (but got stuck there for a couple extra days) so we went up north and spent some time with our families. For the first part, we went up to Bear Lake to camp with my family. Taggart had so much fun helping Poppy put up the tent and he even slept in it all by himself!

Tag had Maddie has so much fun playing on the air mattress in the tent; just look at those faces!

They also could not get enough of playing the with door on my parents' trailer.

We had so much fun getting shakes at La Buea's and playing at the Beach; the typical Bear Lake stuff.

We also had a lot of fun playing games, relaxing on the hammock, and Maddie discovered her love for puzzles, just like her Nana! Poppy taught Tag how to play WAR and he didn't want to stop.

It was great to be able to relax by the fire and roast marshmallows. Maddie was scared to death of the fire, maybe because Jocelyn fell into it the night before? Luckily she didn't get hurt much, but provided some entertainment for us!

Maddie with her Auntie McKelle. She loves her Auntie when she isn't teasing her! They had so much fun playing. Isn't this such a cute picture?

My Mom and I sitting by the fire. It was the most beautiful night. Bear Lake is such a beautiful place and I have a lot of great memories from there.

I even had a surprise visitor stop by. One of my best friends from High School happened to be traveling through and stopped by our camp. We had never seen each others' kids so it was fun to catch up. We stuffed everyone in the trailer and had fun hanging out.

Then for the later end of the week, we went to Farmington to spend some time with Grammy, Izzy, and Auntie Katrina. We spent a day at Lagoon, which is always a favorite when we go to Grammy's house. It was the hottest day ever, but the kids didn't mind and loved all the rides.

Their Grammy made them these cute cowboy outfits for the 24th of July and they looked so cute! We went over and rode the horse at Marda's house and the kids thought it was the greatest!

We also celebrated Isabelle's birthday while we were up there. Taggart showed off his muscles by breaking the pinata open and Maddie loved all of Izzy's presents. She didn't want to take this bike helmet off!

We were so glad to see Cam when he finally got home, but we did have a fun-filled week. We all came home exhausted, but it was well worth it! Thanks everyone for the fun week! Pictures from Cam's trip will be here soon.

4th of July Weekend

2009-07-06T14:13:00.000-07:00

Carston, Katrina, and Isabelle came down to visit us for the Holiday weekend and look how much fun we had:

Happy Independence Day!

Maddie's Big Girl Bed

2009-06-22T12:49:00.001-07:00

We finally moved Maddie into her Big Girl Bed a couple weeks ago. She has been ready for a few months, but I haven't wanted to let her have the freedom! She was always contained in the crib and I was just being lazy. Anyway so we finally did it and for the first two weeks she didn't think she could get out of bed. It was awesome!! She would just lay there and call for me when she woke up in the morning and from her naps. I knew that it probably wouldn't last forever and it didn't, unfortunately! Now that she has discovered her freedom, she pretty much doesn't even sleep in her bed. Now I find her fast asleep under her table or somewhere on her floor.
The other day this is how I found her in Taggart's room. Yes that is her underneath the blanket!
Last night I went in to check on her and she was asleep on the floor with her blanket covering her entire body, and she had emptied out all of her drawers and there was a HUGE stack of all her clothes in the middle of the room. It is always so funny to go into her room and see where she fell asleep! I am beginning to wonder if we even needed to get her a bed at all! I guess our little Maddie is growing up and declaring her independence!

Memorial Weekend

2009-06-08T16:26:00.000-07:00

We had such a fun weekend over Memorial Day that I totally forgot to post it! We spent it up at Panguitch Lake at the Todd's cabin. It's was a cold and rainy weekend, but we still managed to get in some great rides. We saw a lot of dear and got attacked by the craziest bugs ever!! Don't these two look hilarious in their goggles??

We had a lot of fun relaxing on the hammock. The kids loved it! Doesn't Tag look all GQ in this picture? Almost like he is saying, "Yeah, I get all the ladies.." Too funny!

We spent a lot of time by the fire getting warm.

We went down to the little stream by the cabin and Cam caught several fish with this net; it was awesome! We also saw a few snakes and he caught one of those too! He was totally in his element in the wilderness, just like the good old days!
We ate at the Burger Barn, but this time it wasn't nearly as good as the last time. Maybe it was because it took so long and the fries and onion rings were soggy by the time we got back to the cabin. We won't ever get take out from the Burger Barn again!

On the flip side, Cam mastered the art of making smores and cooked us all up the best Smores we have ever eaten! Cam couldn't stop eating them and ended up being sick by eating six! Doesn't that look tasty?
It was such a great weekend and we ended it off with an amazing ride in Paguitch and got to the top of a huge Mountain where we could look all over 3 different Valleys. It was so amazing and we were running from a Storm the entire time... and we never got rained on. It was a lot of fun and I hope you all remember who ended up as the President in Scum... ME!! Thanks to all for a great weekend, hopefully we can do it again soon!

2009-05-20T19:28:00.000-07:00

So I know that I have been the worst slacker ever when it comes to blogging lately, and i have been trying to figure out why I haven't been able to find the time to blog. Well it seems that I have taken to another addiction: Couponing!! I know this is usually when people post pictures on their blogs of all of their amazing deals and free stuff, but I will spare you! Let's just say that I am becoming addicted to getting fantastic deals and I don't really think that this is a bad thing. But I guess it is finally time for me to play catch up and document some of the things that have been going on around our house.
We had an awesome Easter Vacation with my family in Las Vegas. Everyone was there, except Blair, and we had the best time. We did a lot of swimming and my kids loved it. Tag seriously jumped in the pool and swam this little route like 50 times. He is getting really good at swimming and this was the first time of the season and he loved every minute of it! Don't you just love Maddie's fro!!
We had some fun on the strip and did some shopping and basically just hung out and talked. Here we are being silly on the Strip.

We watched the fountains at Bellagio and Maddie loved them and Tag was a little scared of them. We also went and saw the gardens at Bellagio and they were so beautiful.
We went to church on Easter Sunday and these are the best shots we could get of us. My kids don't really like to pose for pics!

Here are the kids gearing up for yet another hunt.
Here are the boys and girls in their outfits from Nana and Poppy for Easter. Taggart loved sitting with Boston and he said that he wanted a brother just like Boston! Soo cute, I know!
It was an awesome, quick vacation and it was so much fun to spend time with my family. Taggart and Maddie has so much fun playing with their cousins, aunts, uncles, and Nana and Poppy!
We celebrated Mother's Day and I am just so happy that I am blessed to be a Mom to such wonderful children. And I am also so blessed to have such a great Mom and Mother in Law. It was a pretty regular day, but the kids did give me frames that they had painted with their pictures in it from the Primary activity. They are sooooo cute and pretty much the best gift ever!
Last Wednesday night Cam and I celebrated our 9 year Anniversary. I can't believe it was nine years ago that we got married... we are getting so old! We celebrated with a nice dinner and some ice cream pretty relaxed and laid back, which is what we both needed! It has been a wonderful nine years and I am excited for MANY more!
Last week was Taggart's Preschool Graduation Program. This was his first year at Preschool and he has loved it and so have I! He has learned so much and he showed us a few of the things that he has learned. They sang several songs and did sign language and he even showed off his Karate moves.

He loved his teacher, Mrs. Tracy, and talks about her all the time! We are both going to miss Preschool this summer!

Maddie is still her regular old self! I wish I could say that she has gotten better since the last post, but she hasn't. The other day she cut up a $10 bill with scissors and the next day she got into my fingernail polish and painted both of her feet and legs. Luckily it just got on my tile and I was able to get it off. She is totally a typical 2 year old and is becoming quite sassy, but she is still so cute and really sweet at times. She is mad that I am taking her picture and she is yelling at me; I had to put it on here to give you just a little taste of her attitude, notice that she has makeup all over her too!!
Well I am sorry for such a long post and I will try to not get so far behind next time!

Terrible Two's!

2009-03-22T17:34:00.000-07:00

She may look like a sweet little Angel in this picture, but don't let her fool you! She can be quite a little devil at times. I don't know if I have just forgotten all the bad things Taggart did when he was two, or if Maddie is just crazier than he was! Here are just a few of the crazy, horrible things she has been doing lately...
The other day I walked in the room and she had dumped half of the brand new bottle of lotion on the bench and was finger painting with it. Good thing I got to her before it was ALL over the house!
This is when she decided to open a box of muffin mix, dump it all over the floor, and dance around with it. Notice the happy look on her face, like she was so proud of herself!
This was the same day.. she got into my mascara and put it on. This has happened several times since then, apparently she hasn't learned her lesson. She hated getting it off!

In this picture she dumped a whole bottle of sprinkles on the counter and decided to eat them after making a huge mess! If you have ever cleaned up sprinkles, you know how big of a pain they are. I am sure I STILL have sprinkles hiding in my grout and carpet!
These are just a few of the crazy things she has been doing that I actually took pictures of. She is still hating clothes except for her tutus, bathing suits, and leotards. She is constantly still taking off her diaper and especially in bed if we don't duct tape it. When she takes it off, she often pees or poops in her crib and it is always so fun to clean up that mess up! Even though she is crazy and going through these terrible two's, we still love her to death! She makes us laugh all the time and we don't know what we would do without her!

Sunny California!

2009-03-09T12:55:00.000-07:00

We are home from our wonderful, quick trip to California. We went with 2 other families, The Todds and Algers, and stayed in Newport. We all have kids pretty much the same ages and they had so much fun together and so did the adults!!We spent Thursday at Laguna Beach. The kids had so much fun playing in the sand and at the park on the beach. It was a beautiful, sunny day, but too chilly for bathing suits. Maddie did, of course, fall down in the water, so she just ran around the beach in her diaper!
Here are Brooke, Jessica, and I on the beach. We ate lunch in the little Beach town and wandered around the shops for a bit too.
That night we went to Fashion Island and shopped around and had some dinner. Here I am with the kids while we were looking at the fish. The next day we went to Disneyland!! This was the first time for our kids and we haven't been for about 6 years, so we were super excited!! Here we are about to enter the main gate!
It was a beautiful day and we didn't have to wait in too many lines. Here is Jess, Avery, Maddie and I waiting in line for Pirates. Tag was afraid of the rides that were in the dark and he really had to warm up to them. Pirates was not his favorite, even though I thought he would love it. I guess he was just scared of the dark and most of the rides at Disney are in the dark. I was so surprised since he is not scared of many things!We were just standing there listening to the band and I looked back and Cruella was snuggling up to Cam, it was hilarious! Needless to say, Tag was not too fond of the characters either! He didn't want to go near some of them!
Jason, Claudia, Ada, and Boston joined us for the day and it was great to see them. Here wer are in line for Peter Pan.
Here we are getting on our first ride, Peter Pan. I was sooo excited and with Tag not loving the dark, he wasn't too excited! He got over it in a bit though, and was loving the rides. His favorite was Star Tours and Toy Story. Cam said he could have just sat on Toy Story all day and see how high of a score he could get!
For some crazy reason, Taggart loves the movie Sleeping Beauty, so when we saw her we snapped a shot with her.
This is Maddie and Cam on Small World. She waved her hands and danced to the music the whole time and LOVED it! I think she liked some of the rides more than Tag did! The kids were all soooo good though. They took naps and slept in their strollers like champs and the adults got in some fun rides! Tag crawled in the stroller no later than 9:00 and just sacked out. I was like, "You can't sleep yet, we haven't seen everything yet!" But we are going back in August, so we will just have to see the rest then.
On Saturday we went to the Santa Monica Peir. We walked around 3rd Street Promenade and had some lunch (Dang Birds!!) and then headed to the beach to play in the sand and fly kites. The kids loved it and it was nice to hang out and people watch.

Maddie could have played in the sand ALL day long!
Here are some the crazy girls and Taggart! The kids we so good and they all got along great! Here there are eating some peeps and posing!Here we are at dinner with the Algers. The Todd's were spending time with some friends, so they had left already and I never got a big group shot of all of us, Bummer!
Overall, it was a fabulous trip and I am missing California all ready! I can't wait to go to Disneyland again.. I must have Disney fever!!

Vegas Baby!

2009-02-24T12:32:00.000-08:00

We had a quick little overnight getaway to Las Vegas this past weekend. My sister, Kim, and her husband, Blair were going to be there, so we decided to take advantage of having them so close and spent a couple days with them.
Cam and Blair went golfing, while Kim and I took the kids shopping. Okay, well the kids didn't last too long and we ended up at this fun park that was in the Town Square Shopping Mall. They had this really cute little maze made out of fake grass; the kids loved it!
That night we took the kids to the Rainforest Cafe. I thought the kids would love it, but they were actually a little afraid of the animals when they would come alive. And they weren't to keen on the rain storms either, but we still had fun!

Taggart was not a fan of this snake, but Maddie loved it. She kept wanting to touch it and give it kisses!
The next morning we just hung out and went swimming in the hot tub. We finished off the weekend with lunch and took them to the airport. It was a quick trip, but lots of fun to see Kim and Blair! It is fun to live so close to Vegas!

It's Party Time!

2009-02-14T10:30:00.003-08:00

This week has been a constant party for us, with Maddie's birthday on the 9th Cam's on the 11th. I think we pretty much sang Happy Birthday and ate Birthday cake all week long!
This is the banner I made for Maddie's birthday. I know you can't see it all, but this is the best shot we could get with Taggart taking the picture! She loved the banner and kept pointing at it and wanting to touch it.
We went to dinner at Red Robin for a combined birthday dinner for Cam and Maddie with Cam's whole family. Maddie loved looking at the Robin and playing with all the balloons!
They sang to Cam and Maddie and brought them ice cream sundaes. Maddie just stared at them while they were singing. She may not have known what was going on, but she certainly didn't mind the sundae they brought her. She dug right in!
After a while she did give into her cousin Izzy and shared her sundae with her; although she insisted on feeding her every bite!
When we went to pick out a cake, Maddie insisted on the Dora cake. She had a really hard time keeping her fingers out of it, though. She kept sneaking fingers full of frosting. She must be just like her mom!
You would think by this time she would have been totally sick from all the sugar, but no way, she dug right into her cake and ice cream!
For Cam's birthday, his Mom made his favorite chocolate cake. Good thing he had Tag to help him blow out all 34 of those candles!
Overall, we had a fabulous week and had a lot of fun celebrating with good friends and family! Happy Birthday to the both of you!

Little Miss Maddie is 2!

2009-02-09T12:24:00.001-08:00

I can't believe that my baby girl is 2 today! She has turned into such a big girl, with a BIG attitude to go with it! Here are a few of Maddie's favorite things and funny quirks:

She has become quite independent recently and is obsessed with putting on her clothes, changing her clothes, and having an opinion about what she wants to wear. For me, this is the biggest nightmare ever! Often times the clothes she picks out totally don't match and on put on wrong! She is constantly emptying her drawers and putting on her favorite skirt and the other day she insisted on wearing it over her outfit while we ran some errands. She looked ridiculous, but it wasn't really worth the battle. She has a couple skirts that she is in love with and she always is finding them and putting them on over her clothes. She also is in LOVe with her swimsuit and wears it over her clothes and in the bathtub. She insists on putting her pants on by herself, she grabs them from me and says, "MINE!!" Tag was never this independent at this age and it is killing me!

She LOVES to get into my purse! If I don't have it up high, she will find it and rip the contents to shreds. She usually is looking for gum or lipstick. As you can see in this picture, she found and ruined my lipstick! She has eaten several things of chapstick and my friend's house too!

She is such a GIRL! She loves babies, purses, jewelry, shoes, and really anything girly! She loves to dress up and whenever she goes over to her friends' house, she always takes off her clothes and puts on some frilly dress. Isn't she so cute?

She is a snacker. She is always going to the pantry saying "nack". Even after she finished a meal, she just wants a baggie full of cereal or crackers to carry around with her. She doesn't one a couple crackers in her hand or a few pieces of cereal, NO, she wants the whole bloody box and package! It drives me insane! She is also in love with her sippy cup and wants to carry her "wa, wa" around with her at all times.
She loves to watch Elmo, Hi-5, and The Backyardigans. She loves to dance and sing too! Maddie really can shake all her little ghetto booty! She also can sit in your lap for hours while you read books to her.

Despite her attitude, we love this little girl to death! She makes us laugh and smile every day and she is still our little cuddler. Happy Birthday to our little girl... we LOVE you!

Our BIG Boy!

2009-02-02T13:42:00.000-08:00

The weather has been so nice here the last few days that we have been spending a lot of time outside. On Saturday I came home from running a few errands with Maddie, while Tag stayed at home to help Cam was the 4-wheeler, and when I got home they had something special to show me! Tag had learned to ride his bike without his training wheels!! He is still about an inch short for the bike and Cam has to help him get going, but once he is going, he can ride forever. We worked on turning, standing up, and other obstacles and I can't believe how great he did! He and Cam even went on a bike ride through our neighborhood and Cam rode his bike behind Tag. He struggles sometimes at getting off (since he is a little short) and sometimes he just falls, but every single time he fell down he would just say, "I'm okay!" and jump right back on the bike! He is so proud of himself and bragging about how good his balance is; it is so funny! Good job Mr. T! Now you just need to grow another inch and then you'll be able to totally do it on your own!

What we have been up to!!

2009-01-26T12:52:00.000-08:00

I don't really know what we have been up to, that is why I haven't really posted anything lately. Over Martin Luther Weekend, though, we did go up to Salt Lake to take Taggart to the Walking With the Dinasours at the Delta Center. It was an amazing production that told all about dinasours and they were so life-like. Tag thought this was awesome and so did we! One of the dinosaurs was 38 feet tall! They moved and sounded just like real dinosaurs and Taggart even got scared a few times.

Here he is with his Grammy and Grandpy playing with his new dinasour toy that was $18 at the event... Hello!! Thanks for bying it for him Grandpy!

While we were up there, we were lucky enough to get to see my sister McKelle perform in a cheerleading competition. They took state, yeah!!, and she did a great job. Maddie had fun watching the cheerleaders and dancing too!

The rest of the weekend we just hung out with mine and Cam's family and relaxed. It was great! Here are the kiddos with Uncle Blair. They are looking at some Dinosaur clips on the computer and having the time of their lives! It was a fun weekend and we were glad to have something to do in this long, wintry month of January!

Christmas 2008

2009-01-01T17:29:00.000-08:00

I know that Christmas was a week ago and I am just finally getting to this post, but I finally have just found the time! We had an awesome Christmas this year and we all didn't want it to end. I took down my Christmas decorations today and both Tag and Maddie were so sad. Tag kept asking to listen to Christmas songs and Maddie walked around to where all of the Santas used to be and pointed and said, "HO! HO!" We were able to spend time with both of our families which is busy, but a lot of fun! On Christmas Day is snowed over a foot and a half and the power was out for 4 1/2 hours! We finally decided to cook dinner, which consisted of canned soup and quesadillas, on their gas stove in the basement! What a Christmas feast!! It was very cold and snowy up there and Tag enjoyed sledding, playing in the snow, and riding the 4-wheeler. Maddie got another ear infection like last year, and she was somewhat tempermental at times. We were all very happy and surprised with all our gifts! We played a lot of games and ate a ton of good food! We were sad to leave everyone, but it is nice to be home and enjoying our beautiful St. George winter weather! I am not missing the snow one bit! I hope you all had a very Merry Christmas! Here are some of our photos.

Ugly Sweater and Karaoke Party!

2008-12-21T19:30:00.001-08:00

I have always wanted to go to an ugly sweater party and this year our friends had one. We borrowed Marion's (my mother in law) Christmas sweaters that she seriously used to wear, although, thankfully, not anytime recently! She also let me use some of her 'serious' Christmas earrings! These things were huge and they looked super crafty!
We also sang karaoke and had a blast! Once I got warmed up, I thought I would never leave the Todd's house! In this picture the guys are really getting their groove on! Believe me, they had some awesome moves and who knew they could sing so well to Britney Spears? We ate, exchanged some quality White Elephant gifts, and have one great night! Thanks everyone and let me know who is doing karaoke... I am SO there!

Tag is 4! and other festivities!

2008-12-15T13:10:00.000-08:00

Yesterday my little guy turned four! He has been looking forward to this for quite some time and we were happy when they day finally arrived. We didn't do a whole lot on his actual birthday, since it was on Sunday, but I felt like we celebrated it for over a week!
First of all, last weekend we went up north to spend some time with my family. We celebrated Christmas with Jason and Claudia and their kids, since we won't see them on Christmas. We went to see some Christmas lights with the kids and here they are all bundeled up. We are not used to the cold, so this was our first time breaking out the winter gear.

We celebrated all of the December birthdays while we were up there, Mine, Tag's, Grandma's, and Boston's.

It was fun to celebrate them all together and Tag was sooo excited with all his presents. We made a cake and split it into four spots for everyone to have their own little cake.

Then this weekend his Grammy and Grandpy came down from Salt Lake and celebrated with us. On Saturday we started the day off with Jumpin Jacks, which is one of Tag's favorite places. Then we had lunch at Del Taco, another of his favorite spots. Then we opened presents and had cake. Then finished the day off with a movie. He has such fun day and was so funny opening his presents. He was so excited opening each gift and he was just 'OOOh and aaaah' and kept saying, "are you kidding me?" It was hilarious!
He wanted a Batman cake, so that is what he got. He only eats the frosting (sounds like me huh?) and he loved blowing out his candles.
He finally got his car/dinasour which he has been asking for for a few months. He was so happy with his playdough, paint set, dragon/car set, gun, new clothes, and especially his new flight coat which his granpy bought for him. Thanks so much everyone for the gifts!
I can't believe he is four! He is such a big boy and has gotten to be so much fun! We love you Mr. T and are excited for many more birthdays!!

Family Pictures

2008-11-18T14:02:00.000-08:00

My awesome friend, Dion, is sooo talented. She just recently started photography as a hobby, but she is getting so good and has just started her little business. My kids were not very cooperative and we still got some great shots! What do you think? You can visit her website (she is under my friends and family) to see her work. She is great and I can't thank her enough! I know she is getting pretty booked, so hurry up!

Funny Things!

2008-11-14T14:11:00.000-08:00

I have been writing down some of the funny things that Tag has been saying and doing lately. Here it goes:

I asked Taggart to help Maddie clean up the blocks and he said, "That's not my problem, that sis's problem." He did have a point there, since he wasn't even the one playing with them.

He loves the color green, as you can see by the picture. Green blocks and green shirt? Everything he does revolves around the color green!

He is obsessed with the word 'actually' and uses it ALL the time. Sometimes every other or few words; it is a little out of control, actually!!

We were getting ready for our family pictures to be taken and he walked over to the mirror and said, "I'm so handsome.." while he sat and stared at himself in the mirror.

Maddie was crying in her room before she fell asleep and Tag yelled to me (I was in the other room) "Mom! Go sing her a song... I'm serious!" Okay, now look who is the parent!

One day he said to me, "Mom, next day sis is going to grow up into a big boy!" I then went on to tell him that she was going to be a big GIRL. He said, "Mom, listen to me... Next day when sis eats her lunch she is going to be a big boy!" I kept reminding him that she was a girl not a boy, but he just kept saying "Listen to me.." Obviously he was meaning something that I wasn't quite understanding!

Lately when he gets in trouble and gets sent to time out, he says before he can even get into his room, "I want to make the right choice!!" I am like, well sorry buddy.. you already made the wrong one!!

When we are driving in the car and he sees a stop sign or sign with a 'T' in it, he says, "Look Mom, 'T' for Taggart!" And believe me, there are a lot of stop signs and I never seem to get tired of hearing his cute voice say this with such excitement!

He also has been very particular with what he wears. I have been lucky up until now, with dressing him in whatever cute clothes I wanted.. it was soooo great, but those days are over! He is obsessed with these brown sweatpants (luckily they are pretty cute sweatpants, not the ones with elastic on the ankles, I would die!!) He wants to wear them every day and often digs them out of his hamper and tries to wear them dirty. He also always wants to wear his green dinasour shirt or a couple other shirts that are not really my favorites! He also does NOT want to wear two shirts (like a t-shirt with a long-sleeved under it, or long sleeved shirt under a hoodie) and he freaks out and yells, "I can't want to wear two shirts!!" But the worst is the last couple of weeks for church. He hates his church shirts and refuses to wear his tie, or a vest over a button up shirt- again back to the 2-shirt thing! He has thrown a fit the last couple of weeks and then goes to church so upset that he sleeps through sacrament meeting! Any tips that you have are welcome, but I don't really think they make dinasour shirts for church!! I guess Taggart has finally discovered his independence, and I don't like it one bit!!