Utah Trip

I just have to say it...  we LOVED our trip to Utah.  We have fun every time that we go.  This was our first time visiting in winter and our first time driving from Waco. (We've driven several times from Lubbock)

We loved that people had more time off of school and work so we got to see everyone more.  We loved playing with all our cousins.  Our kids are blessed with 20 cousins.  They also all have cousins close to their ages.  Lucky kiddos!

We spent a day at the children's museum with some cousins.  What could be more fun that a wonderful place to play with wonderful people???

Kids love playing in water!

Grandma helping Claire "buy" her food.

Kaite's first sleepover with cousin Lincoln.

Dinner one night at Aunt Mel's.  It was our first time trying hot pot.  We loved it!  Super fun with family.

Watching movies with cousins.  Nothing like snuggling!

Santa Katie

These three kiddos are all within three months of each other in age.  Katie is the youngest and has no hopes of getting the cute chubby cheeks.  :)

On the drive to Utah I told Spencer that I really wanted to get a picture of Katie smiling.  She smiles at me a lot but the second I pull out the camera... smile gone.  So while we were there we got this cute picture.

And a picture with a little tongue.  :)

Decorating a candy gingerbread house with Grandpa.

The finished product.  You can tell Lily sampled the goods and they must have been orange.

Baby Zizzy found a new toy called Katie.

Sleepovers with cousins

Snuggle time

I'm not sure what they were doing in the top picture but it looks fun.  These three girls are sure good friends!

The girls danced downstairs and the boys played games upstairs.

Uncle Ben and Uncle Kendel loving on Katie.

Dinner out to celebrate Nate's graduation.  As a joke we all pitched in and bought him a LOT of deodorant.  He was moving to China and we knew he wouldn't be able to get it there.  He thought it was funny to open all these bags with deodorant.

More trip photos to come but now I'm needed by three little girls.  :)h

Drive to Utah

We drove to Utah for the holiday season.  We were so excited to go!  We hadn't been back for 1 1/2 years.  We sure missed everyone and were so excited to see them.  We loaded the kids into the car after Spencer got off work Friday night.  We put all three older kids in back together so they could see the movie players that we bought for the trip.  They thought it was fun to go on a night drive in their pajamas.  We drove five hours the first night.  Then stayed in some hotel somewhere.  :)  Six people, one hotel room...  enough said.

I planned lots of fun activities to do in the car.  We had one day that was pirate day.  I let them each have a little pirate set from the dollar store.  We also had some fun mustaches from Papa's work party.  We had a lot of fun with the mustaches!  We told pirate jokes.  Here's a good one...  How much did the pirate pay to get his ears pierced?  A Buck an ear.  We also practiced talking like pirates and we had to call the driver "Captain".  The kids really enjoyed this.  We also watched "Peter Pan".

I was driving and Spencer reached over and put a mustache on me and then took my picture.

Gotta love the uni brow.

Lily sporting a mustache.

Katie was awesome!  We were worried about traveling with a baby that young but she was young enough to still sleep a ton!  When she wanted to eat I would just climb over the seats to take care of her.  The second day we hit a snow storm.  I didn't take any pictures- I helped Spencer watch the road.  After three hours of going 20mph we finally decided to stop in Colorado.  The kids were excited to see snow.  Claire was amazed that it was cold.  :)

The next day we finally reached Utah.  Spencer laughed when I took a picture of the sign but I was so excited!  There is just something about the place where you grow up...  it always feels like home.  We like Texas and our life there but Utah is where our extended family lives and we miss them.

I just had to take a picture of the mountains.  There and not real mountains in Texas.

We stopped at my Grandma's house in a small town in Utah.  Ollie and Spencer lost no time playing in the snow and building a snowman.

Ollie wanted several pictures of his snowman.

Claire exploring Great Grandma's house.

Great Grandma Beck holding baby Katie.  I love this picture.  Katie was just studying Grandma.

I'm so glad that we were able to visit with my Grandma.  It was a little out of our way but so forth it to spend a few hours with her.  After the few hours we spent there we loaded back up in the car and finished the last two hours of our drive.  At this point we were all pretty restless and just ready to get to our destination.  More about the trip later.  :)

Claire's BirthdayI

I can't believe that my sweet crazy busy little girl is two already!

We woke her up by singing Happy Birthday to her.  She smiled all day when we sang to her.

We got her a basketball hoop in the hopes that it will help direct some of her energy.

She's also athletic so this should be a fun toy for her.  She is wearing her favorite skirt that she wears every time it is clean.

She saw this Minnie Mouse in the store one day and loved it!  She cried when we didn't buy it...  little did she know Mom can always go back to the store later.

She also got a shopping cart and enjoys giving Minnie a ride.

Claire loves Dora and Diego.  Her favorite color is pink.

We sure love our Claire Bear.  She is a funny little girl.  She never walks when she can run.  She loves to dance.  Her favorite color is pink.  She loves to wear skirts and swimming suits.  She loves to throw things.  She has more energy all our other kids combined.  She loves to be with Mommy and help with things.  She is smart and has no fear.  We are sure glad she is a part of our family!

Sisters

These photos are from December...  Katie is much bigger now.  I'm just behind (as usual) in my blogging and thought these were too cute to just pass up. 

I have noticed when one of my children is grumpy or angry or upset I can have them come to me and I tell them that Katie wants to give them a hug.  Then I help Katie hug them.  It just seems to make things better.  Nothing like a baby hug to cheer you up!

Beautiful little girls.