Thanksgiving 2012

I've been so busy lately Ive fallen way behind on my blog! I'll try to post what I can rememebr from that way fun week!

Dena offered to have Thanksgiving at her house this year. I know she loves having so much family live so close, as do I! To be honest I remember Thanksgiving morning/ afternoon being kinda rough with the boys, they were both off and by the time we got to Grandma Dena's house they were crazy pants! So right after eating, Darren and I had to leave to put our kids down for naps, which they did oh so willingly! Poor tired boys! And we ventured out later that night with 2 much happier boys, had some Thanksgiving leftovers and desserts and played some fun family games!! The dinner was amazing, and the leftovers, as always, were even better! I'm so grateful she did all the work for us!

(Looks like these boys need a haircut!!!!! And Kaiden possibly needs a smile! lol)

Well, my mother had flown in with her sister to Des Moines to spend Christmas with my Grandma Nonie and Grandpa Jerry the week prior, and on Friday my lil family drove up to get our Grammy Carrie!

 It's less than a 2 hour drive and we spent about 3 hours visiting before we grabbed my mom and drove on home! We got home and put the kiddos to bed and then my mom suggested Darren and I go Black Friday shopping! How awesome!!! We didnt expect to find much but, surprisingly we did and it also turned into a really fun date night!!!

We were lucky to have my mom for about 5 days!! We took her to the Gingerbread Display at the Tabernacle, we baked lots of sweet goodies, we shopped our hearts out, my mom gave us a second date night (yay movies!!), she cut our hairs, and we spent lots of time just hanging out! lol. I'm pretty sure she had a great time and the boys really love it when their grandparents come to visit!!!

We are so beyond blessed and so very thankful for everything in our lives. It seems like everything has just fallen into place and we are so happy and comfortable where we are at. Family, Friends, our beautiful Home, our Crazy Happy Kids, Darren who works so hard in Law School, our Ward, our Health, just so much to think about! And although times can get stressful with our wonderfully busy/ messy kids, at least I can say we are all HAPPY! And that's definitley something to be thankful for!

(Blurry pics courtesy of a camera phone!!!)

Our first Omaha Halloween!!

Yes, this post is a little late, but better late than never!!!!
Other than all the fun trunk or treats, we also had a way fun time at the Cousin's Halloween Party Dena threw!! She planned fun games and had such cute treats for the kids, the cousins sure had a fun time! Later we went out to a a corn maze which was unfortunatley closed, but we had fun on the  hay ride and the jungle gym that was there!!! And as if Dena hadn't done enough, she planned her famous Halloween Dinner! We all got a babysitter and it was so nice to have a little date night with my hubby!!!

The night before Halloween, Darren's Law Professors planned a special trick or treating event for families, but more importantly for the kids! Although it wasnt a big turn out the kids got a bit more practice at the whole trick or treating game and Darren got to introduce his amazing and simply charming family to his teachers! Everyone loved our boys costumes!!!
On Halloween Day, we went down to the Botanical Gardens and trick or treated a bit. It was cute and fun but probably not worth going next year, note to self!!
As it turns out, Village Green is one HAPPENING place to be on Halloween! I stayed behind to pass out candy while Darren took the boys. We got our first trick or treaters around 6 pm and were out of candy by 7 pm and I got ALOT of candy because I was told to prepare! lol. Kaiden had only been out 1 hour, filled his bucket to the brim, and only been through half of Village Green before telling his daddy he was tired and ready to go home. With the loot Kaiden and Jaxton scored we were able to completley refill our big bowl of candy that we had emptied for the trick or treaters!!! Had Kaiden made it through all of Village Green, we would have doubled the candy that we bought! So crazy to think! =D
The kids had a great time this Halloween season and still, in the middle of November have been askingif they can go trick or treating again! lol. My boys are so great!!

Vala's Pumpkin Patch

I dont know if I have mentioned how much we love Omaha yet or not. Anyways, here's another reason! (As if we need more!) Vala's Pumpkin Patch! I love our ward they are always making sure we know all the fun things to do in the area and since Sepetember when Vala's opened for the season, its all they've been talking about! It seemed like the perfec tweekend to go since the weather was so nice and my dad was here, so away we went! We literally waited in traffic for an hour and a half but it was all so worth it!!!

Jaxton in some pumpkins!

Kaiden in some Pumpkins!

At Vala's they had lots of livestock around the park to pet and feed!

Vala's also has lots of large familar characters around the park for the kids to climb on and pose with! Kaiden got so excited to see Mickey!!

Vala's also has lots of these cardboard cut outs! Which for some reason Kaiden in obsessed with! I can barely get him to smile for pics but when he's in one of these he screams and begs for me to take a million pics of his sweet face! lol

Jaxton's first time in a cardboard cut out!

I thought these were the COOLEST! THey had animatronic characters all throughout the park! This one is a goblin, but they also had skeletons, pirates, draculas, etc! The boys were really into these!

The stocks for "Troublemakers, Malcontents and Lollygagers!"

These were singing pirate/ skeleton animatronics! They were also Jaxton's favorite!!

And of course we couldn't sneek past the "Balloon Lady" without the boys begging us for one! Kaiden begged for a Spiderman and Jaxton got a little Pumpkin Man! The boys got VERY attached to their balloon men!

Vala's also had lots of old Tractors to play on! I'm telling ya, we barley hit up half the park in the 3 hours we were there, but it was so much fun! They also had hay pits to jump in, Pony Rides, Fudge Shops, Candy Shops, ALL kinds of delicious foods (Darrens favorite being smore sandwhiched between 2 warm chocolate chip cookies,) Corn Mazes, Haunted Houses, a Pumpkin Cannon, lots of games, a Large Pumpkin Patch, lots of kids cars for them to ride around in and MORE! They even sell season passes, and now I can see why! Everything we ate was delicious, everything the kids got made them happy, and all the games/ activities kept our boys very busy! Such a fun experience! I think we need to go again to finish the other side of the park!!

The first Trunk or Treat of the Season!

Yay for Halloween!!!! I absolutley LOVE this fun holiday!! This year Dena invited us to go to her ward's Trunk or Treat! I was telling my dad how excited I was for Halloween this year and last minute he decided to join us for the weekend!!! Yay!

 

This year I thought it would be fun to have Kaiden go as a Knight! And he was a mighty cute one at that!

He also yields a sword like a pro! lol Must be  from his practice with a sword last year with his Pirate costume!!!

And Jaxton went as an adorable Baby Dragon!

Everyone loved his costume!!! He was such a doll!!!

Darren and I dont usually dress up, but I had my preggo skeleton shirt from 2 years ago when we announced Jaxton's pregnancy and I thought I'd better make some use of it!

My cute Baby Dragon and my Adorable Baby Girl Skeleton! Adding the bow was the perfect touch!

My crazy, wild Knight boy!

Our adorable little family!!!

And of course, Grandpa!!!!! Lovin his grand boys!

At the Trunk or Treat. I finally caught him standing still!

Jaxton is really getting into balls! He lvoes playing catch and toting them around. He had no problem keeping his dragon head on, but the weather was too hot for him to wear it! I love Omaha's fall!!!!!!!

At the party they had all kinds of food to eat, but my fave, and I think Jaxton's fave too, was roasting marshmallows!!!!

He is such a pro! lol

Grampa Farrell had a really good pirate costume this year complete with beard. I dont think Kaiden recognized him and to be honest I think grampa scared him a bit! And to our surprise he asked to fight his fears, literally, he wanted to fight the pirate! lol

Gah, I wish this action shot wasnt so blurry!!!! This pic was so perfect!

Kaiden and his best bud, cousin Addy! (Lovin the purple icing lips!)

Of course later in the night it did chill down a bit and Jaxton was able to wear his adorable Dragon head again! YAY! The boys had a blast playing and grabbing some candy! I can't wait to take them a few times this year!!! (And it's not just because I think my boys are so adorable in their costumes that I can't get enogh of it! lol)

 

Let the Halloween Season BEGIN!!!

Uncle Derek!

The past year Derek has been taking a break from the Air Force to spend time with family in Salt Lake City. He's had a great time being close to his daughter, mom, sister Ashlea, cousin Hannah, and Aunt Stacie and Uncle John! Well he got right back into the Air Force last month and they quickly decided to locate him to North Carolina! This meant he would be driving right through Omaha! Yay for living in the middle of the USA! And to our wonderful surprise he decided to spend  a whole day with us! The boys LOVE guests so it was long before they were jumping and wrestling Uncle Derek! I knew Derek would definitley need a break from the rough house so I suggested we spend a few hours at our magical zoo! It was so fun to see how impressed Derek was of our zoo! I think he was more excited than the boys to go and we got to waste about 4 hours!
So, my family really likes food and we really LOVE eating out so we are a little obsessed with the show Man Vs. Food! So Derek's request to go to Starsky's featured on Man Vs Food was no surprise! In fact the only thing surprising was that Darren and I had never gone there before! As soon as Darren got home we headed over to Starsky's, which it turns out is just up the street, and we ordered us some Pig Wings and Corn Nuggets.

 And no we didn't attempt the Pig Wing Challenge which is 5lbs of Pig Wings and 3lbs of Corn Nuggets! lol (fyi Pig Wings look just like chicken wings but at least 4x bigger and they taste just like ribs! yum! Also corn nuggets taste like deep fried cream of corn! Double yum!) It was so great to have him drive by for a day! And I must have been having a lot of fun because I totally forgot to take any pictures! OOPS!

A name, a name! We've got a name!

Our Baby Girl/ Princess/ Baby Cakes/ Valentine's Baby/ Little Sissy has a name! Well, a first name! So its no lie that Darren and I had a feeling it was a girl and for some reason I was completley drawn to "E" names right from the beginning. Well Darren REFUSES to talk names until he knows the gender so I said NOTHING to him! Well, one night, when I was about 10 weeks along, he had a dream that we were having a girl and that her name would start with an "E". Crazy, no!? Well the day we found out it was a girl, I went out shopping while Darren watched the boys, and the name just STRUCK me! I had seen it before but that night it was like, this IS her name! And its a good thing Darren and I have such similar taste in names, because when I got home I told him that our baby girl  has a name! After he heard it, he said he loved it! In case you're following, we've had her name picked out since 16 weeks, we ROCK!! We still can't decide on a middle name but her beautiful name, which is number 272 on the girl's name list, is Emery! Yup, Lil Miss Emery has such a sweet ring to it! And it means "Ruler" (not the measuring tool! lol) which is perfect for a lil princess! =D We just can't wait to meet her!! Grow Baby Grow!!!!!

Half Way There!!!

Well Im a little late, but 2 weeks ago, our baby girl hit 20 weeks!!! So of course we got another ultrasound, this would make our 6th! This one was the BIG one, where they check to make sure she's growing okay and that everything looks healthy. And thank heavens everything checked out! And that she's STILL a girl! lol Which is good, because when we found out at 16 weeks we bought ALOT of stuff within 2 weeks! I mean baby girl shopping is F-U-N!!!

Kaiden is sooooooo excited for his baby sister that he tells EVERYONE that will listen that he has a "baby sissy" on the way! The other day he was literally trying to drag our neighbor girl into our house to see his momma's belly! lol. The boys also like to steal the ultrasound pictures of her off of our fridge, hide somehwere and just look at them! So now all of her pics are a crinkled mess. lol. But her brothers are so excited, how could ya blame them!?
 Since the boys will be rooming together in a few months, and Kaiden had easily outgrown his toddler bed months ago, we figured we better buckle down and buy the boys some bunk beds! lol

 Kaiden loves it and since he has the room to himself, each night he switches from sleeping on the top or the bottom! lol. He aslo requests his baby sister sleep in the bunk bed with him. He is such a cutie! I just cant get over how sweet he is to my baby belly! Whenever we cuddle to watch a movie he HAS to "cuddle his sister" which really means "use mom's belly as a pillow!" He will even fall asleep like that! So cute!
Jaxton has been talking up a storm and it came completley off guard! One week he was babbling, the next week he dropped like 20 words and 3 whole sentences!!! NO exaggeration!

 The funniest thing was when I put him in the sink to get him cleaned off real fast and he said "ooooh thats cold!" And let me tell ya, when you've only heard like 2 words from the kid, and then have him spit out a sentence like that, well, it's quite shocking! lol He is 18 months this month and it is by far my favorite stage! I love that he can tell me when he's ready for bed "nuh night," wants milk, is ready to eat, wants to play outside, etc! He is a little parrot and will repeat anything you say! I love hearing his sweet little voice! He really is the sweetest boy ever and wants to do EVERYTHING Kaiden does! The other day he saw Kaiden dance/ skip/ walk down our cement stairs outside, and thought he could do the same! It ended up badly! (notice picture above with scraped nose!) Latley they've been giving each other hugs and kisses and it seriously just melts my heart! I love that they are so close in age and can keep each other entertained! This will be especially helpful when Baby Cakes makes her arrival this winter!