A Little Craftiness

Here are the pics of the CD case calendars my activity girls made. I also took a picture of my other "projects". I painted and covered a picture frame and canvas to hang in our bedroom. I think they turned out pretty good, and they were really easy to do. (I'm all about things that are easy and still look good.)

New Words, Tricks, & More

Hew Words: Bye-bye, up, ant, and apple

Eli is really good at saying all of these words, but he especially likes to say bye-bye and wave. The other night I went to Target and as we were checking out and I put the bags into the cart, Eli waved at the cashier and said "bye-bye." She of course smiled and said bye.

New Tricks: We have now mastered climbing down the stairs. Eli learned to climb up them so long ago but no matter how many times we tried to teach him to come down, he just didn't want anything to do with it. But I guess he decided it was actually pretty fun. So now when he gets to the top of the stairs, instead of crying for us to come get him, he just turns around and comes on down. He also thinks it's so much fun to climb up into Kaelub's big club chair. The cushion isn't as high as the couches, so it's much easier. He even drags his toys with him onto the chair and when he wants down he just climbs back down.

More: I am the activity day leader for the 8-9 year old girls in our ward and we have 2 activities each month. Since it was the first of the year I decided to talk about setting goals/resolutions. To go along with this I had them make CD case calendars and I made one too. I think they turned out pretty great. (I will post pics.)

Perfect Day at the Park

Today I took Eli to a fun park about 15 min away from our house. Some of the girls in the ward were taking their kids and invited us to meet them there. It was such a great park--with a pond for fishing, lots of trails to ride bikes, some really big tunnel slides, swings, a smaller play area for little ones like Eli, and a splash pad. We stayed for a couple of hours and had a good time visiting. Eli really enjoyed his goldfish.

Locked Out

We decided to put our house up for sale since we will have to move when Kaelub goes to PA school. Last Saturday our realator asked if he could show our house around 3. We told him that was fine and left. Now, we have had people come through to look at it a few times and have never had any problems. So when we came home at 5 we were surprised to find ourselves locked out. The realator had even locked our inside garage door! We do have more than the one key that was in the lock box, but we brought Kaelub's set of keys with us and his is the one in the box. So our other house keys were stuck inside with us outside--brilliant! We tried to call our realator and he wouldn't answer his cell or office phone. We got his home number from the secretary at the office and his wife said she would call him. Still, no luck. So we went and did some errands, went to dinner, washed both vehicles, and still tried to get ahold of our realator so he could open the lock box and let us into our house. It was now 9 pm---4 hours later--and Eli was not happy. He had missed his afternoon nap because we had to leave at 3, and his bedtime is usually 8. We probably called the realator over 100 times and sent him text messages. Even his wife couldn't reach him---hate to be in her shoes if she had an emergency! Then I remembered that our bishop was a realator and he might be able to help us out. (Too bad it took me 4 hours to remember this fact.) Anyway, he was at our house in about 15 min. and we got in. Thank goodness for him! We are now thinking of finding a new realator.....he still has not called us back.

In Case You Missed It...Again

In Case You Missed It #2

In Case You Missed It....

So for those of you who I didn't get Christmas cards sent to, here are some of the pics we sent out. I should have been better about getting addresses after our computer crashed, but I put it off. And then it was too late, so sorry to all of you who we missed. It's so great to be back home. We had a great time in Idaho, but I can't take that snow, cold, & wind for more than a couple of weeks. (No offense to you all who live & love it there--I do love the summers.) We have almost put away everything--or at least I think I've put it away and then Eli comes around the corner with the items in his hands. I really think I will just stop buying toys and let him play in all the cabinets, drawers, etc. all he wants. Kaelub thinks he is going to have OCD, since he constantly "rearranges" everything in the drawers. Personally, I think he just does it because he knows I'll put everything back, and so it's a continuous cycle--like a game he can play every day. Such fun for me! He makes up for it though with his goofy faces and cute laugh. Eli seems to wave at people a lot more since we came home--I think we have Grandma J to thank for that.

A White Christmas

Hugs from Grandma J

Who needs toys when you can raid the tupperware drawer!

Great Grandma's house with all the snow

Christmas morning opening gifts

Sock monkey

Getting into the toy box at Grandma J's before we started opening gifts Christmas morning.

Christmas Eve--new PJ's and slippers

Playing with Grandma J Christmas Eve night

Blowing out candles on my birthday cake

We had a lot of fun opening gifts and spending time with family on Christmas Eve & Christmas. It was my birthday on the 24th, so we had the traditional brunch at Grandma M's house and then we went to a party with Kaelub's family in Idaho Falls. Eli was getting some more teeth on the bottom so he was a little grouchy and didn't really care much about his new Elmo PJ's. We always get new PJ's on Christmas Eve, but this year Aaron and Kaelub got ties. (They think they have enough PJ's to last them the next few years.) We were planning on going out to Kaelub's family's house Christmas morning, but it was snowing and blowing pretty bad so we hung out in Sugar until the wind died down. It was fun to see Eli try to open his gifts--he usually pulled off the bow and played more with the paper than the toy! He really liked the stacking cups from Santa and farm animals from Grandma J. It's been a fun vacation and I can't believe we are leaving to go home tomorrow! (I am looking forward to some warmer weather though.)