My Baby Turned 3!!!

Colton turned three this month....December is a party month in our family, we celebrate Josh's brother Joel's bday, Josh's bday, both of our mom's bday's, and of course, COLTON's birthday!!! This year Colton wanted to have a Mickey Mouse birthday party, since we went to Disneyland in November. This is Colton on the actual day of his birthday showing me how old he is.

Colton's actual birthday was on a Friday and his party was on the following Saturday, so we let him open his gifts from us on Friday. Here he is opening his Lightning McQueen rollerskates and he also got a Mickey Mouse and friends digital camera.

We had Colton's birthday party at Classic Skating. Alot has changed there since I was growing up. They have alot more than just the skating rink. There are a bunch of bounce houses, (which are Colton's favorite things) there's also a jungle gym climbing area, a miniture rink for scooters and rollerskating and arcades. Colton loves it there! Here is my friend Salina with her baby Raine. Colton is best buds with her other son Ethan.

Mitch and Emily enjoyed the bounce toys themselves.

Colton had fun bouncing with his cousins Emrie, Keaton and Owen.

Keaton with his daddy, Quin.

Once inside of Classic, Colton did not stop. In fact he didn't want to eat pizza, cake or even open presents, he had too much playing to do.

Livy with the birthday grandmas, Robin's was the same day as Colton's and my mom's was the day of the party, the thirteenth. HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!

Olivia with grandma Ann, Livy's latest trick is puckering her lips.

My friend Jami with her cute daughter Ava.

Colton trying to sit and eat his pizza with Ethan. See it was a fight to get him to stop playing. Such a stinker!! At least Ethan's happy!!

Salina and Ethan.

Colton and Dad playing on the bouncies!

Cute little Presley having fun.

"That slide was AWESOME mom!"

Colton's Mickey Mouse birthday cake from Harmons. It was delicious!

Make a wish!

We finally got Colton to sit down and open some presents.

Our little Liv!

Thanks to everyone for celebrating this special day with us. It would not have been near as fun without our friends and family there. I'm sorry I didn't get near enough pictures of everyone that came. I was just so busy with everything. Here's a shot of Colton with all his new treasures. Thanks so much!!! It was a fun day!

Happy Birthday Josh!!

I can't believe you're 28, two more years and you'll be 30!! Josh's b-day was on the 15th, however, we celebrated it on the Friday night before. I surprised him with dinner at his favorite restaurant, Ruth's Chris. Then I thought it would be fun to do something different that he would never expect, so we took a horse drawn carriage ride around Temple Square. It was a beautiful night, the moon looked huge and we were surprisingly warm in our carriage. Josh had a good time although I don't think he would admit that to anyone. It's not very manly.:) The lights downtown were so pretty and it was fun seeing them from a carriage, with the temple as the backdrop. It's hard to believe we've known and loved eachother for over ten years. That seems like along time and yet it seems just like yesterday. The driver of the carriage asked how long we'd been married and how many kids we have, it was crazy to tell him 6 1/2 years and two kids. Time is flying by, but there is no other way I would want to spend it then with you, Josh. I love you more today than I did when I married you. I love the life we've built and I can't wait for the rest of our lives. I love you so much, you are the best husband and father. HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!

This is the carriage we rode in. Our driver was pretty proud of his carriage. It was the coolest one, it was decorated with flowers, christmas lights and garland. There was also hot cocoa for sale at the corner near the carriage rides. It is such a fun time of year to be downtown.

Gingerbread Houses

Last Thursday my friends and I attempted to make gingerbread houses with our kids, but it was quite time consuming. I didn't finish it until late that night. The one on the right is the gingerbread house Colton made with is grandpa and grandpa. The one on the left is the one Colton and I made. Well mainly I made and Colton ate the candy. Just in case you are wondering, the S on the door stands for Stephens.

Colton was making me laugh. I was trying to get a picture of the gingerbread house, without him in it. But he just kept getting closer and closer to the house.

K Britt and Mandy, I want to see how yours turned out now.

A night out with my friends

I get together often with my girlfriends and our kids for playdates and movie nights, but we decided to have a date night with no kids for Christmas. We had soooo much fun!! We all agreed that we felt like we were in high school once again with no worries or responsibilities. We went downtown to have dinner at The Red Rock Brewing Comp. then afterwards we went bowling.......here are the girls, Jami, Britt, Mandy and Me. (We missed Jen :() We have been friends for sooo long. It's weird to think that between us we have 6 kids and 2 on the way. (Not me, I DO NOT have one on the way.:) )


We split up into teams...Here is team Britt, Josh, Jami and Doug. Losing team had to take winning team out for ice cream afterwards. (You would think they were the losing team because of their tight rolled up jeans, but that must have helped them out. :) )

Notice Britt and Jami's rolled up tight pants....HOT!!

Myranda and I.......

I thought this was a funny picture. It looks like I know what I'm doing. (But I don't)

Here's team Josh, Marissa, Mandy and Shaun and yes we were the losers. That could have been partly because the first game I bowled a whoppin' 63 points, but I made up for it in the second game with 114 points. It still wasn't enough to save us overall. So we swallowed our pride and bought the other team ice cream at Maggie Moo's after bowling. It was a great night. Hope Jen can make it next time, we missed her.

Thanks for such a fun night, we laughed a lot. I love you guys!!

Polar Express

So many fun things to do this time of year. We've been wanting to take our kids to the Polar Express, so we went with one of Josh's friends from work and his family last Tuesday night. I was very fun. Here's Livy all bundled up, she is always puckering up her lips.

Mommy and Livy, before the train took off.

Daddy and Livy

The story of the Polar Express was read while we took our ride to the North Pole.

Here is one of the Elves handing out the words to some christmas carols, the Elves also brought us cookies and hot cocoa.

Dad and Colton being spiderman, Colton is always ready to jump into some superhero character no matter where we are.

It was very exciting, when we got to the North Pole Santa and Mrs. Claus got on our train and came to visit each of us. This is a picture of Mrs. Claus saying hi to the kids and handing out her special recipe for chocolate chip cookies.

Santa took the time to visit each little girl and boy. He also gave them each a little jingle bell, which represents every time you ring it that you BELIEVE!

It was pretty funny, when Santa walked through the door to our train cart, Colton said "that is a different Santa then the last one I saw." whoops!!"

Hi mom!

Colton looks tiny next to The Polar Express

It was a fun night of christmas stories, caroling, treats, lights and Santa.

After the Polar Express we went to dinner at The Claim Jumper in Heber City. It was good food, however, I didn't bother taking any pictures. Colton had a melt down and basically spent most of our time there in time out. While Sam and Heather's six boys sat nicely at the dinner table and ate their dinner. Oh well, it happens, overall it was a fun night.

Moab Winter Sun Run

We did it!!! Me and my friend Jocelyn, took our families to Moab on the first weekend in December, so we could run the Moab 10k. It was a lot of fun! The weather was COLD, but beautiful! We decreased our last time by 4 min. and what's most shocking to me was that we ran an 8 minute mile, which is good for us. It did kind of help that it was mostly down hill, but still I'm proud of us. Here we are bright and early before the race at Jocelyn's aunt and uncle's home in Moab. They were such nice people, they made us a huge breakfast for our families that morning.

Sportin' our numbers.........


Colton had fun playing with his buddy Ani while we were running the race. They wait for us to cross the finish line so they can cheer us on......but what I think they are really waiting for are all the treats we bring to them afterwards. Whomever is sponsering the race always has fruit, bagels, cookies, etc. for the joggers.

Here we are in action, waving to our husbands and kids as they are comfortably watching us from the car.

We made it! In 54 minutes time.....Notice I crossed the finish line first??? This is only because Jocelyn let me, she is always a couple steps ahead of me so she let me cross this one first.

It feels much better when you're done. I even won a hat and water bottle in the raffle after the race.

Here's Josh and Colton at lunch. We went to the Moab Brewing Company. Colton loved looking at all the boats and kites that were hanging from the ceiling.

This is at lunch just before we left for home. Thanks for such a fun little road trip Allens, we had a blast! I'm so glad I have a running buddy, who likes exercise as much as I do. Now I'm feeling kind of sick, because I just found out this weekend that we made the lottery for the Moab half marathon. I can't imagine doubling the length of the 10k. I better get training!!!!! I'm EXCITED!

Annual Santa pictures

I love this time of year. It's soooo much fun! There are so many fun things to do. Let's face it, it's much more fun with kids, so you can be a kid again vicariously through them.:) One of our many traditions we are trying to keep is pictures with Santa Claus. We love Joanne who takes them, she does excellent work. One thing that is really great is she takes the best face off of the pictures, especially the kids, and can apply it to any picture. So she swaps their heads if that makes sense. They turned out pretty cute this year, except Livy is not so sure about the big man in red. I thought about just doing the kids this year, but I knew Livy would not sit on Santa's lap for sure. So Josh and I are in them again. Colton had fun telling Santa what he wants for Christmas this year. He was such a good sport too, trying to teach Livy how to smile for the camera. As you can see she wouldn't budge.

This is the only one we got of just Liv with Santa. See I told you it wouldn't be pretty. What I don't understand is why she didn't swap her head on this one???? Oh well it's pretty funny anyway.

I hope everyone is enjoying this holiday season!!!