10th memory of Christmas

The 10th memory of Christmas was new hot chocolate mugs. We love to drink hot chocolate at night so I decided that new mugs would be something that the girls would like. That night we made French Vanilla hot chocolate and added some junior mints to it as well. It was very tasty!!!

9th memory of Christmas

The 9th memory of Christmas, the girls each got a dollar. We took them to the dollar store and let them buy gifts for each other. Brilynn kept showing things to Maycie and saying "Oh, I hope this is what you get me!" After a LONG time trying to make a decision, we were finally able to check out and the girls gave the clerk their money. They loved being able to do this for each other and we hope they felt the joy of giving to each other.

6th memory of Christmas

The 6th memory of Christmas was a brand new box of crayons and new Christmas coloring books. John and I sat and colored pictures with them and then we cut them out as well. It was a very simple gift but something that we all were able to do together.

7th memory of Christmas

The 7th memory of Christmas was making Chocolate Christmas Suckers. Making the suckers was a little tricky and we had to do help the girls quite a bit. I think next year we will try to do the hard suckers instead of the chocolate. The girls had a great time anyway.

8th Memory of Christmas

The 8th memory of Chrismtas was a trip to see the Christmas lights. We did one night at Temple Square and one night at Layton park. The night we went to Temple square, it was an absolute blizzard. We parked at the Gateway and then took Trax down to Temple Square. Brilynn is very sensitive to the cold and needless to say she did not last very long. Before I knew it, she was wearing my coat, my gloves, and I was carrying her. We went into the Visitors Center to warm up and she just sat there frozen. We finally got warmed up enough to make the trek back to the car. This might not have been their favorite memory but it is one we won't forget. The next night we just went do to Layton park. Brilynn's first reaction when we told them where we were going was "Noooooooooooooo!!!!!!" I told her that it would only be a few minutes and it wasn't near as cold. This was a much better experience of seeing the Christmas lights.

5th memory of christmas

The 5th memory of Christmas was new Christmas books. They each got a book with fun Christmas things to make and then the other book was a puzzle book. They liked their puzzle books, but the project books were their favorite. I started to question myself about giving them the activity books because they begged and begged to make everything in the book. We finally setteled on 1 project from each book.

I don't like my hat!!!

Preslee wasn't to keen on having a red Santa cap placed on her head. After playing with it for a few minutes we tried once again and were able to get a quick shot of them together. My aunt Linda is always bringing things to the kids when she comes to visit. She has the famous treasure box that she keeps in her car and everytime she visits the first thing the kids say is "Where is the treasure box." I used to get upset at them for being rude and I tried to teach them that it is rude to ask what people brought, but I have learned that Linda loves for them to be excited about the treasure box and they get so excited when they are able to rumage through the box to find their own treasure!

Bluffridge Elementry Christmas Concert

Besides it being very crowded and lots and lots of little kids, we really enjoyed listening to the kids perform their Christmas songs that they had learned. At the end they brought out all of the children to do the finale. The boys behind Brilynn told her that she needed to sit down (but she was really supposed to be standing) so she sat down and so we weren't able to see her at all. Oh we.. It was fun to see them perform on stage. I only took a picture before we left for the school because I wasn't able to get any other pictures due to trying to video and manage the twins.

4th memory of Christmas

The 4th memory of Christmas was a Christmas blanket for the girls to use while watching one of our favorite Christmas movies, "Home Alone." We popped popcorn and drank Sparkiling cider (applejuice and squirt soda). So far our Memories of Chrismtas has been a huge success and has helped us spend quality time together as a family.

John' First Outdoor Christmas Lights

I must admit, John did a fabulous job hanging the lights outside. He was pretty proud himself:)

3rd Memory of Christmas

The 3rd memory of Chrismtas was a trip to the mall to see Santa Claus. The funny thing was the girl who was taking pictures came over to me and said, you may want to bring them back later because this Santa isn't very good. Most of the kids cry when they see him. I thought that was pretty random that she would just out of the blue walk over and tell me that. Anyway, while the girls were telling Santa what they wanted, I had John snap a picture. The girl then looked at him and said, "Sir, no pictures!!!!) I had to laugh that I got John in trouble. Needless to say, we didn't get very good pictures of this memory.

The 2nd memory of Christmas

The 2nd memory of christmas were pillow cases and things to decorate them with including bells, christmas pom poms, fabric markers, and Christmas stencils. Brilynn and Maycie loved using the stencils to decorate their very own Christmas pillow case. The best part about this memory was that they didn't even complain when it was time to go to bed! So far this has been a wonderful tradition for our family and hopefully it will be something the girls remember.

Yeah!!! Payge is finally sitting up.

Preslee was sitting up 4 weeks earlier than Payge. We were very excited once Payge was able to sit on her own and play with toys. I can't believe how different they are. When they were born they weighed exactly the same. Now Preslee weighs about 2 lbs more than Payge. Payge is lucky enough to have olive skin where as Preslee is pastey white. Payge is very laid back and it takes her a little bit longer to hit her milestones. Preslee is doing the actual crawl and Payge is still steam rolling to get around. John and I really love to watch how they interact with each other. The other day Payge was playing with a little worm that was attached to a book. Preslee crawled over and took it away from her. As soon as Payge started crying Preslee gave it back for a few seconds and then took it away again. We are both really excited that they are now holding their own bottles instead of propping it up for them.

Doesn anyone have a pen????

Preslee is now doing the actual crawl and is getting into EVERYTHING. The other day I was getting ready in the bathroom while Preslee crawled around a played. When I glanced back at her in the mirror I saw that she was chewing on a pen. Heaven knows where that pen came from, but leave it to Preslee to find it. She had left pen marks all over her face. I know this is only the begining of "DOUBLE TROUBLE"

Christmas Lights

Brilynn and Maycie were so disappointed last year that we didn't have christmas lights outside. They complained about it every time we left the house and every time we would come home. So this year John agreed to put lights on the house. It was our first time doing it and he actually did an awesome job. They look very professional and I was very pleased. However, the thing I was most excited about is that he didn't fall off the roof. I had to run and grab more lights while he was doing it and I was so worried that I was going to find him laying on the ground when I got home. Thank goodness that wasn't the case. I will post a picture of the the finished product later but here is a picture of the work in progress.

12 Memories of Chrismtas

I went to and Enrichment a few weeks ago and was really excited about the guest speaker Betty Van Orden who has written a book and shared her ideas with us about how she has made Christmas more meaningful to her family. So I tweeked her ideas just a little bit and I have decided to do the 12 memories of Christmas. So tonight for FHE I told the girls about what we will be doing and explained that we are doing this to help us create new traditions and to help us remember the true meaning of Christmas. We opened the first memory of christmas. This was the note that was included

The girls weren't to sure about it at first. I had my dad make us pipe chimes so that we could play christmas music together. The girls caught on very very fast and we spent an hour playing music. Before we knew it, it was well past their bed time. However, I think that John enjoyed this more than anyone. Here is a video of him playing Silent night all by himself.

Happy Turkey Day

I can't believe that Thanksgiving has come and gone. Where did November go???? We really enjoyed our Thanksgiving this year. My mom, dad, brother, and his wife came to stay with us. We also had my aunt Linda, cousin Joey, and my cousins friend over for dinner. Nikki, my sister in law, also invited her Mom, Dad, and brother. So we had a hodge podge of family and friends for dinner and loved every minute of it. My mom and I cooked all night on Wednsday and continued early Thursday morning as well. The highlight for me was sitting down after dinner and going through the black friday adds. However, I was so tired that I fell asleep halfway through and had to continue looking at them later that night. John stayed home with the twins while we took Brilynn and Maycie to the movie on Thanksgiving night to see "Bolt." It was very cute and we all really enjoyed it. Now we are on to "CRAZY" December. Only 24 days till Christmas. Our girls our already counting down every minute!!!