Havens 1st Birthday!

It doesn't seem like it has been a year since this little sweetheart entered the world. She is such a happy baby and loved by her siblings so much. What a miracle each little person is.
We tried to make it a special day for her, even took her to Carls Jr for lunch. She has been teething like crazy lately with a runny nose to go along with it as well. Plus a huge mommas girl, but I think that she managed to have a good day! After having 3 other kids and 2 of which are girls, we definetly didn't need anything else in this house. But I couldn't not get her anything, so I managed to find a couple things that we didn't have already. I've wanted to get this cute car with my other kids so I did it this time. I thought it would be a great idea for Haven and for the other kids to entertain her outdoors this summer. Well, they all love it and push her all over the house. I can already tell that it was a great purchase, no regrets!
As you can see from this picture, Haven is pretty excited about her gifts and being the center of attention.

Sorry this picture is a little blurry. Jason had to help her blow the candle out as she was reaching for it.

I've never made a big deal of a cake smashing, so I decided to go all out and try to make it memorable. The other kids were way too excited to watch Haven. She actually dug into it, Morgan wouldn't even touch hers when she was 1.

She was very proud of herself! It really was a yummy cake! I was surprised that she didn't get more on herself.

We are sure glad to have Haven be in our family. She has always been curious about everything, like most kids her age are. She is walking along things, but doesn't really care to try and walk anytime soon. I think that I'm just fine with that for now, slow things down. She is only 17.5lbs, but she eats like a horse. She finally gets to sleep in her crib and new bedroom(we put Katelyn and Morgan in the same room).

Happy Birthday Baby Girl!

Yellow Belt!

I know that I just recently blogged about Karate, but we are so proud of this little guy. He earned his 'Yellow Belt' and was so excited about it. This has been such a fun thing for him. They did a belt testing where the kids show off all the different skills that they have learned and how much they have improved. It was very entertaining! Good job Henry!

Winter wonders!

Sometimes having to stay indoors can be fun and entertaining. When Katelyn gets home from school, she loves to play and entertain her siblings. She dresses up Morgan and Henry, does Morgans makeup and had a little photo shoot with them. They play along so well(Henry some of the time, after he tells me he needs a brother so that he can do boy things).

My kids had a day off of school and happened to hear the ice cream truck, so they all ran to their piggy banks for money and we missed the truck, so 'me' being the great mom that I am, decided to get in the car and chase after it. We found it not too far away and my children were very happy, so I was happy as well. :) Yes, I am meaning to sound cheesy. I couldn't believe how nice of a day it was in the middle of January.

Katelyn has the best teacher this year. She is seriously so fun and cute with her class. They earned a party and got to choose what the theme was, so they decided on a 'sports' party. They all came dressed as their favorite sports team. Katelyn was sooo excited about this and wanted to make sure that everything was just perfect. She even had Grandma Tatro bring over her 'BYU' earrings, we painted 'Y's on her fingers and cheeks. Plus she even had me make a tutu for her. Go BYU!!!

*Notice the wall behind Katelyn, I needed a change, so we painted it from red to green!

Jason has been really busy at work lately, and I've been so busy trying to get baby gifts made for my sisters, so I feel like I've been neglecting my kids. I got this cute idea to spice dinner time up and have a picnic under the table. Katelyn was so excited to help out with it, the kids LOVED every minute of it. We only had a few bumps on the head afterwards. We'll have to do it again sometime.

10th Anniversary!

We just celebrated our 10th Anniversary, and what better way then to go to the Anniversary Inn. Jason had arranged it all and since they had one in Logan, it worked great. Brianne watched the kids for the evening so that we could go out to dinner and the Inn. It was such a cheesy room, but a fun way to spend the evening. The waterfall going into the jaquzzi was hilarious(bottom picture).
We had to get up early for skiing the next day, but we did manage to get an early breakfast delivered.

I can't believe that it has already been 10 years. We haven't even had our first fight yet, maybe by 20 years we'll have done that! :) It's been an amazing ten years. I couldn't have chosen a better partner to share it with. When we met we hit it off right away, there was just this spark. We knew very soon that it was meant to be and were engaged within 2 months.

We have so much in common as far as we both love to be outdoors, play sports, be with our children, and so many other meaningful things to us. It is really great being married to your best friend. I love him so much and am so greatful that we have each other. He is a great dad and I'm looking forward to many more years to come.

Christmas in Logan!

We went up to Logan for Christmas this year to stay with my sister and her family. Jason had to work for a few days during the holidays, so this made it convenient for him to commute and we just stayed up there. It was weird not going to Canada, but I have to admit that I really didn't miss the drive, plus we didn't have to pack all of our crap into one vehicle. Very nice!

We had a great time and lots of pictures to prove it, sorry about the overload on this post, but I couldn't get the slideshow to work. We were able to go skiing and took Katelyn and Henry, so we put them in a class and they did really well. I on the other hand saw a patch of dirt and couldn't turn in time and fell pretty hard. I ended up straining my rotater cuff. It killed. Brianne watched the little ones for me, so nice to have sisters.

Here is a run through of our 10 days in Logan! In no particular order!

These cute girls were pretty much in dressup clothes the whole entire time. They looked adorable!


Morgan is thinking, "Where is my food Aunt Brianne?" She is waiting patiently though, as I'm not helping, just taking pictures of her working! That's what I like to do best!


The kids loved playing outside, one day they went over this little hill behind the house and came back with this sign. They had to flip it over and over to get it down. They wanted to give it to Santa when he came. What a nice gift.




Our cute and entertaining nativity!

Leaving a plate out for Santa. They thought Santa would be pretty hungry, so they kept on putting more and more treats on the plate. No wonder Santa is so big!

The kids in their new P.J's!

This little girl was the very last one to wake up and open her presents. She wasn't even very excited to do it. Although she is checking them out while she is drinking! The kids had to help her unwrap all 3 of her presents to speed the process up.

These two boys played soooo good the whole time. They both got 'Beyblades' and loved playing with them together.

Haven has been trying to go up the stairs for a while, but we usually catch her before she gets too far so that she won't fall. Well, my sisters stairs are quite a bit longer than ours, and one day Haven had made it all the way to the playroom upstairs without being noticed. She was very proud of herself, and continued to do it the whole time we were there.

I'm not a puzzle person, I'm usually busy doing random crafts or projects, but I kind of got addicted to it and put a few pieces together to help out. We did end up finishing it! Yeah!

Katelyn and Dylan both got rollerblades for Christmas, and Cassie got rollerskates. They were so excited to try them out, and since it was pretty nice out(and they had a huge garage), they were able to use them a few times. I decided to go rollerblading with them and was helping Henry(who was wearing rollerskates) down the driveway, and let's just say I can't multi task while on the blades. I fell and hurt my shoulder again. Wow, I'm getting old. :)

This picture is my favorite, I had noticed some deer out the window and told the kids to come and check it out. Then I thought it would be fun for them to shoot their new cap guns(long rifle looking ones) at them. Well next thing we know, they have their coats and boots with rifle in tow and they are off on a hunt. They were being quiet and sneaky, it was so funny to watch because there kept on being more deer appearing as they were getting closer. They went pretty far and the deer were always in view. When they got back they were so so excited to share their adventures with us, I think that Henry really thought his gun was real.

It may be hard to see, but you can see two little boys and then 3 deer off in the distance.

We were at Hobby Lobby and they had some material that were already cut into the patterns, so we purchased it and made these adorable pants for the girls. They were so cute and excited to model them for us.

I had to run a few errands, so Brianne watched the kids for a bit and this is what I came home to. As soon as I walked in the bathroom the sink was completely full and Morgan and Claire were having a bath in their swimsuits. Their was soap and water EVERYWHERE! At least it wasn't my house or on my watch, he he!!!

Dylan got a cotton candy machine, but I think that the parents were more excited to try it out then they were. Katelyn got a Dipping Dots maker, but I didn't get any pictures of Jason making them for the kids.

The funniest thing about this trip was Christmas Eve when Dylan slept in our room with Henry and I got woken up at 3:30am. Henry said that they had gone upstairs to see what Santa had brought them. These two little boys were sooo excited that they took it upon themselves to sneak upstairs to check things out. Actually it was Dylan that woke Henry up and drug him up there, he is just like his mom was when we were younger, she was ALWAYS the first one awake. So Brianne if we are together for Christmas again, remind me to not have your children in my room. :) I was pretty tired the next day!

We did have a great time up in Logan, I'm glad that my sister was all right with us staying for 10 whole days with her. She was 8 months pregnant at the time and such a good sport to have us around. You are the best, thanks for a great vacation. The kids had a lot of fun with their cousins and we got to relax a bit. It was really fun!

December craziness!

I always try to get ahead of things before December arrives, like getting Christmas pictures/cards, shopping, sewing, and more shopping done. But then December hits and wow, the time flys and it seems like there is never a dull moment. We had dance performances at 'Festival of Trees,' work parties, family parties, school parties, teething babies, crazy kids, funerals, and more craziness going on!

Just like the rest of you, it is a busy time of year, but very fun and enjoyable. Here is all of us in our Christmas attire. I usually try to have the kids coordinate and then Jason and I decided to find something in our closets to do the same. We got together with some of Jasons family to make our traditional gingerbread houses. The kids all got their very own this year. Oh how I love the cute little ones that don't take up as much space.

Another tradition with Jasons family is to go down to Temple square and see all the amazing lights and nativity. It was a pretty night that ended with a gorgeous snowfall. We ran into a few friends from law school that actually took this picture. So thanks to them!

I don't know if I'm the only parent that gets so sick of all the paper that comes home from school every single day. I guess that it is great that they are actually working on things, but you know what I mean. Well, one day both Morgan and Henry brought home these cute deer hats and then went right into pretend play with them on. It was very entertaining to watch them with one another. A proud parent moment for sure!

Henrys tooth!

Henry is growing up, and with that means losing a few teeth. He lost his first tooth thanks to some help from his dad. He was so trusting and calm throughout the whole process. It was cute, he loves to think of himself being a big boy like his big cousins.