2009 Year in Review

What a year 2009 was. There were a lot of celebrities pass away this year, Obama had his first year of his Presidency, the war is still going, and celebrities are getting into trouble left and right. (shame on you Tiger Woods)

Here in Logan, we had an interesting 2009 year as well. The year started out a bit rocky. Brian's job wasn't working a full week and we started struggling with bills and what not (like many people this past year). Luckily by July, Brian's work went from 3 days a week to 7 straight days for the rest of the year.

Birthdays came and went and we enjoyed them all.

The spring brought sadness to our family. My grandmother (Mere-Mere) was told she only had less than 3 months to live due to cancer in March and passed away in May. We were lucky enough to spend some time with her before she got really ill. We will miss her terribly but we also know she is in a beautiful place waiting for us to return.

The summer was a lot of fun for the kids. Matthew tried hard all summer learning how to pedal his bike. Kimberly learned how to ride her bike without training wheels and we were so proud. She did it all by herself too. She was determined to learn to ride on her own and she did great.

This fall marked a big deal at our house. Kimberly started Kindergarten at Bridger Elementary. She seemed so big going to school. I am still amazed she is old enough for school but loving every minute of it.The holidays came and went and we stuffed ourselves silly at Thanksgiving and Christmas. We had a great Christmas and we all feel spoiled.

2010 is on our doorstep (the kids are ready with their hats and horns even though they will probably celebrate around 9:00 p.m. because they will not make it up past that time). We are looking forward to another year of blessings and many exciting adventures. We know there will be some surprises and I am sure some tears here and there. We take whatever comes our way with our heads held high.

Blessing to all for the new year. :-)

Christmas Pictures 2009

Christmas Morning

Silly dog looking over the couch.

This year's Christmas outifts.

Beautiful girl.

Handsome boy.

Christmas 2009

Christmas 2009 has come and gone and boy what a fun one it was. The month of December has been insane and so glad that it is almost over. Between Christmas, school, and church; we have been running.

The weekend before Christmas is always set for Grammie's house. We go up to Soda to take presents to my grandparents and visit with my parents. My mom loves to have us come up to show off her house at Christmas time and this year didn't disappoint. Their favorite new addition to the house, a Jimmie Johnson blowup. haha. Funny dad. One major thing that happens during this weekend is Santa Elves. See my mom has a deal with Santa's elves that they will come and fill up the stockings while we are sleeping. That is pretty fun for the kids to see what Santa's elves bring in their stockings. As usual, Santa's elves overdid themselves and spoiled us rotten.

Christmas Eve was a family day. We spent a few hours at my in-laws visiting with Brian's family. It is a lot of fun for the kids to play with their cousins and everyone is so excited for Christmas.

We have a few traditions during the Christmas season and I think we got them all done this year. One is to see Christmas lights around town. There are a few Griswold houses that always seem to grow each year that we never miss. We didn't make the entire town this year but did get to see some nicely decorated houses. I have to say though, Woodside Drive looked pretty sharp this year all decked out. Another tradition is to watch Christmas shows all December. I think we watched them all this year. Some of my favorites: White Christmas, National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation, and Christmas Story. This year we got to burn a candle every night and read a Christmas story (my in-laws made us a folder of stories). Then on Christmas Eve we write letters to Santa Claus, put out our cookies and milk, read the scripture story, and get to bed early. All was accomplished.

Christmas morning was probably one of the best we have had. Matthew was just at the right age to realize Christmas was fun and exciting. Of course Kimberly was all ready for what she knew would be exciting. Kimberly was told not to come out of her room till 6 and she listened and didn't wake us up till 6:15a.m. (only for mom and dad's purpose). We finally woke up Matthew at 7 a.m. cause Kimberly couldn't wait any longer. After checking the cookies and milk (they were gone but noticed that Santa left a lot of crumbs), they ran around the corner to see what Santa brought. Matthew started grabbing things so excited and Kimberly just had her mouth wide open with a huge smile on her face. They were so happy! We tore through all the presents we had pretty quickly and then the kids played with things for a bit. Not long after we finished opening presents, my parents came to join us. It is tradition on Christmas Day for me to play host while my parents get to enjoy the kids and the food. So after my parents were bombarded by kids showing off what they got, we opened presents from them. Like always, they spoiled us rotten (oh I mean they showed their love). Thank you mom and dad for everything! Then it was time for Christmas lunch. This is one of my favorite parts of Christmas. I get to make everything I want to eat and love to try new things. I think I made many bellies full this year. My in-laws stopped by and gobbled up some food as well and then we got to open more presents. I think we had everything open by 2:30 p.m. The living room was full. Our garage was full of boxes and wrapping paper. And we were exhausted. But it was all worth it.

Christmas night was full of Rockband (thanks to Santa) and Wii games. Good thing the kids crashed by 8 p.m. cause Brian and I were ready for some Wii competition! haha.

We hope everyone had just as enjoyable Christmas as we did. Good thing we have 1 whole year to do it all again!

Love and blessings to all!

Merry Christmas to all

Great what?!

I am pleased to announce Brian and I are great uncle Brian and great aunt Tammy. Boy do I feel too old now to have a Great before my name. haha. We have been waiting patiently all year for our niece Rebecca to give birth to a baby girl. She was due on Dec. 19th and her hubby is deployed in Korea right now. She is living with her mom here in Logan. We have enjoyed watching her get bigger and bigger. Well a couple of weeks ago she went to the dr to find out she is already dialating. Instant bedrest for her. Unfortunately things kept progressing and she was getting pretty close. We were hoping for 38 weeks but this weekend the baby finally had enough and decided to come. But we had a huge surprise... what was supposed to be a girl (95% sure by the dr in California) turned out to be a sweet little boy! Mr. Caidon Ryan made his entrance to the world on Nov. 29th at 12:42 p.m. weiging 6lbs 8oz and about 18 1/2 inches long. He had a rough time coming into the world (vacuum was used) and so he looks a little beat up right now. He was able to come off oxygen after 8 hrs and hopefully things are looking up for the little guy. We are so happy to have him in our family and can't wait for the day to hold him and love him up. Hopefully I get to see him thru the window this afternoon.

Happy days for us!

Happy Thanksgiving 2009

Happy Thanksgiving to all. We started the day with the yearly Macy's parade. It is fun to watch the parade route now that Brian and I have visited New York and have walked most of those streets. Matthew really found a love for the parade this year. My favorite part was watching Kimberly and Matthew kicking with the Rockettes. hehe After the parade we headed out to have dinner at my in-laws. About 30 of us gathered together to eat the usual turkey and stuffing and enjoy all the company. Lots of kids running around and laughter. Most of the focus for us adults was on our sweet niece Rebecca. She is due to have a baby any day now and so we had a lot to talk about. Poor thing... she is ready to have this baby. I am so grateful to have such wonderful in-laws. So loving and we have a great time together. Much to be thankful for this year.

Now it is on to my parents house for the weekend. YEAH! 3 days of us and they will be ready to send us home. The only downside is Brian has to work. We will miss you sweetheart. Much love to you.

Aren't they precious

My two beautiful children were showing off their singing voices.

Matthew's turn.

This made me laugh.

We had to chuckle at this. Kimberly started singing during Matthew's performance and he got mad at her and had to act like he was going to flip her. hehe. Sorry for the shaking but I couldn't help but laugh.

I love having these things on video for when our children are older and can appreciate this. It is so much fun watching them grow.

Gotta love your children.

The dreaded Swine Flu

Well the dreaded swine flu hit our house and unfortunately it hit the mom. It isn't good when mom gets sick. Daddy does all he can and did a great job but he just isn't mom. So a week ago Monday, I started coming down with something. I figured a little flu bug but that was all. I had the chills and aches that come with the flu. By the afternoon I had a fever. That night I started feeling better but when I woke up the next day, nothing had changed. I went thru the day feeling like crap even though I was really trying to feel better. That night Brian went to work and I thought I would be okay. Boy I was wrong. I started throwing up around 9:30 p.m. and couldn't stop. At 12:30, I tried to called Brian at work cause I knew something was seriously wrong. I couldn't even keep down a sip of water without puking my guts out. It took me until 1 a.m. to get a hold of Brian and luckily for me, he was just getting ready to head home. I told him I wasn't feeling well and would like to go to the hospital. Brian got a hold of his brother, who only lives a few blocks away, and Todd come over to stay with the children while we went to the hospital. We got there and they asked a few questions but then let me know I had the swine flu. For some reason, that never crossed my mind that I might have the swine flu. So I spent the next 3 hours in the hospital bed while 2 L of fluid ran thru me to get me hydrated again. Then they sent us home with strict instructions that I had to be in my room with no visitors for the next 48 hrs. That was probably the hardest part. My poor children weren't very happy they couldn't come see mommy. So the first day I slept a lot and tried to feel better. That night my fever broke for good which was nice. By the second day, I hated my room. I was so tired of seeing it and sitting in the bed. So Brian brought in a chair for me to sit on and I got the computer to play with. That helped. The hardest part was the children. That day the kids had a really hard time with the fact they couldn't see mommy. I had to listen to Matthew be upset all day. That tore me up. But the next day I could come out and see the world again. The only thing was I wasn't allowed to go out of the house for a couple more days. But at least I could hold my children again. I was no longer contagious. I wish I could say I was feeling great but I wasn't. I didn't have a lot of strength and was trying really hard to feel better.

Here it is... a week later and I am finally starting to feel up to par. After I got over the swine flu, I ended up with a nasty sinus infection. My dr gave me some heavy duty drugs and so I am getting over that one now. I wish my taste buds would come back though. Food still doesn't taste good. Oh well.

After what I went through, Brian and I decided to let Kimberly have the swine flu shot at school this week. We were hestitate until my illness. We don't want the kids to go thru that.

Hopefully we are over the sickness for a long time.

Halloween 2009

Happy Halloween! We sure have had a fun Halloween this year. We have been extremely busy. Kimberly had a Halloween parade and party at her school. Matthew and I went and helped with the party in her classroom. We had lots of fun. Then on Halloween day we started our day at the Mall for their trick-or-treat, had lunch at Texas Roadhouse with Grammie and Grampie, then we trick-or-treated at Lee's grocery store (they had a fun spook house that Kimberly would not go thru), and then it was around the neighborhood trick-or-treating. Lots of fun this year.
Here are our 5 pumpkins. Duke's, Brian's, mine, Kimberly's, and Matthew's.

They were pretty cute this year.

This was a couple days before Halloween. We got a couple of inches but we were dying to try out our new toy. This is going to be a fun winter!

This was during Kimberly's Halloween parade at school. That day we just sprayed her hair black. That stuff was a pain in the bum. We had black everywhere. ugh!

Matthew was a golfer this year (little lewie). Tell me he isn't the cutest!

Kimberly was Snow White this year. We used a black wig for Halloween day and it was much better than that black hairspray. It did itch but it was nice to be able to just take it off when we were done.

Happy Halloween everyone!

Fun Pictures

Every year North Logan has a pumpkin walk where they have great pumpkin creations. This years theme was commercials and they had some really cute creations. The kids really liked the cutouts where they could stick their head through pictures. I even got in the action as Harry Potter. Lots of fun.

Crafty!

At the first of October, Kimberly and I attended a Relief Society Mother/Daughter night at the church. It was a lot of fun and they had many things to do. You could make bracelets, make hair accessories, frost cookies, and paint nails. It was a lot of fun and Kimberly had a blast. Her favorite part of the entire night was making her own hair clip. My neighbor Amy was in charge and showed me all the ones she made. She said it was really easy. I am not that crafty so I had my doubts but I ended up making a cute hair clip. Kimberly was so excited so she insisted we go out and get the stuff to make more. So we did and I finally got around to making some today. I had an hour and hoped I could get at least one done before she got home from school. Well in that hour I made these 4 hair clips. They were so easy and Kimberly loved them. So I had to show off how crafty I can be! haha

The only thing is Kimberly is wanting more. haha. Oh if I could just find the time to make more. Maybe I will be able to do 4 every day until we have used up all our flowers and buttons.

Lots of fun

Fall Soccer

Another season of soccer has come and gone. (not too sad about it) Kimberly decided she really wanted to play again this year even though she didn't really like it last year. So we let her play this year and she did improve from last year. No holding hands with other girls and skipping but Kimberly is just not a soccer player. She is too nice and not aggressive enough. Quite a few times she had the ball come to her and she would just let it go past or not try to get it. My favorite moment was when it was two boys on the other team and her by the ball. We told her to kick it away from them and she gave us the look that said, why... they have the ball so I shouldn't take it from them. haha. Brian and I came to the conclusion that she will be a great dancer/cheerleader but not a sports girl. So next year we will let Matthew play soccer and she can attend cheer camps and what not.

Matthew loved to be on the field with sissy. This was before the game started so he could run around.

This is Matthew's after game ritual. He loves to run around.

In the middle of game... at least she is running toward the ball but as you can see her attention is elsewhere.

Kimberly's team the Cosmos. Her friend Dallin is by her in the black/white pants. We think most of her team were 6 year olds because Kimberly and Dallin were quite small compared to the other kids.

All in fun.

Leaves changing

A Day at the Zoo

We finally had a day off from running around town and doing things, so we took the day to go to Salt Lake and take the kids to Hogle Zoo and then visit Cabela's for Daddy. It was such a beautiful day and warm...almost too warm for a walk around the zoo. Definitely burned a few calories there. The kids were excited to see all the animals but mostly they wanted to see the baby elephant.

Isn't she precious! She was playing with this ball and fell down.
Then she struggled getting back on her feet. It is hard to be an elephant. Kimberly was very concerned why her mommy wasn't helping her back up. We had to explain that animal mommies need to teach their kids early how to survive on their own. But she was sure cute. She walked around and was showing herself off to everyone. I think it was a huge attraction at the zoo because the place was packed.

More animals we saw and had to stop to have a snack. It was hot and we needed some fluid to keep us moving. After our snack we stopped to watch the cute penquins swim. The kids were enjoying that. They swim pretty fast and then pop their heads up and watch everyone. Pretty entertaining.

Cute chessy picture during the penquin show.

After the penquins, we had to see the baby giraffe. We heard about him and so that was our next stop. Cute as a button but the stinker walked outside while we were inside watching him. Then he teased us by coming just to the door. But we still got to oh and ah over him.

This picture doesn't do him justice but he is pretty tall already.

One of my favorite attractions... tigers. I love tigers and they had some cute ones.

My little poser. Matthew didn't want to have anything to do with the tigers.

As you can see in the picture, he wouldn't leave his stroller and wouldn't even touch the tigers. Kimberly is trying to tell him it is okay but he still wouldn't have anything to do with it.

After the kids and daddy visited the snake house (I sacrificed seeing to guard the strollers... without hestitation), we found the carousel. Normally one of us rides with the children while the other takes pictures. This time we both got to ride but Brian insisted I get on one of the animals by the kids. It was entertaining.

Kimberly loves to ride the carousel but she is scared when it starts moving. Matthew thinks it is fun and got a kick out of mommy right by him. Of course Brian didn't get on an animal and only wanted to take pictures.

Next species were the gorilla/orangutan group. The kids were impressed with this cute little guy.

Too cute huh. He was way below us but he kept looking up at all the people. Great photo op for me!

Once again Matthew didn't want to have anything to do with this photo either. Kimmy was cute though and she was impressed at how big she was compared to the mommy.

How did Grampie sneak in this photo? hahahaha. Just kidding dad.

We did ride the choo choo train and after 3 hours, we were tired and hot. Spent a little money but had a ball. The zoo was totally worth it.

Afterwards we joked that we just saw the live animals and now we were going to see all the dead ones at Cabela's. haha. The kids had a fun time at Cabela's but that store was mostly for daddy to find his birthday presents. Hunting starts soon!

Blessings to all!