Christmas in Utah Part I

We loaded up the gang on the 15th of December and made our way to Utah. Beth and Thomas drove with us to spend the holidays with the fam. Jason Herman flew from Illinois the next day to join us all. It was 3 weeks full of family, friends, and fun!

Bryan, Chelsey, and baby Archer were there for much of the celebrating. We LOVED getting to know Archie. He is absolutely adorable and so, so sweet. The kids rarely cries and is always smiling. I hate that it will be so long before I see him again. Bryan and Chelsey were okay, too.

We made a quick overnight trip up to Logan while were there to see the Grunig family. We always have a fabulous time with them. This was when we went bowling the next afternoon before we made our way back to Layton.

This is what our mornings look like and Grandma and Grandpa's house. Grandpa usually makes waffles for Graham every day and Benny gets to feel like a big kid sitting at the bar.

We spent an afternoon at the Wright house. I loved eating takeout with Jared and Kalleen and eating the candy while the kids decorated gingerbread houses.

We had our Ray family Christmas party a little early this year. Grandpa Lynn had a surgery later in the week, so we made the drive out to Eagle Mountain a few days before Christmas. Here's Lori, Sarah, Raegan, and Lucy in the adorable aprons that Nanna made for them.

Grandpa and Benny Boy

Graham and Daniel had a great time with Uncle Marty. He rough-housed with them and tolerated Graham's relentless climbing and jabbing.

I wish we lived closer to the Ballesteros girlies. Lucy has so much fun with them and giggles the whole time they are together.

We had pizza on more than one occasion during our stay. Benny preferred his pizza pie to go go.

Don't you even worry about it.....there's more Christmas journaling to come.

Merry Christmas!

I've said it many times and I'll say it again.....better late than never.

So, Christmas festivities began back during the first week in December. My sister, Beth and her 18 month old son, Thomas, flew in from Iowa on Dec. 1st.

That next week, we attended our ward Christmas party and it was a lot of fun!

Benny wasn't thrilled with the Santa idea.

Lucy asked for a Karaoke machine this year......he delivered. Santa rocks.

Graham had a couple of strange requests. A birdhouse, cowboy boots, and another remote control car. Santa delivered on the birdhouse and car.......somehow he forgot about the boots?

Survival mode is the default at our house since about October. The way I tame a crazy Ben-O is by giving him my I-phone and letting him watch Curious George. It works great for Doctor visits, car rides gone sour, and other stressful moments. There was one Sunday that I had to teach the Relief Society lesson and Benny had a runny nose and couldn't go to nursery. So, I found a spot on the carpet in the Relief Society room and he laid down and watched a movie while I taught. He stayed put the whole time I taught. He just looked up every once in a while to make sure I was still around.

Lucy sang a cute version of "Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer" all by herself. She was a hit!

Graham was a shepherd in the primary's rendition of the Nativity. He looks thrilled, doesn't he?

Halfway through the play, the Young Women from our ward came in dressed up as angels to sing a song. As they walked by Graham, Beth and I heard him say in his loud, hoarse, casual voice, "That's a lot of Marys."

A few days before Beth came, we decided to get out our Christmas decorations. I hadn't planned on putting the tree up. Lots of work without Jason and we were going to be in Utah for 3 weeks. The kids kept asking about it, so I caved. It ended up being a lot of work, as I anticipated it would be, but the fun outweighed the stress.

Ben paused for a picture. He knew he was getting away with something because his blanket and binky are only for bedtime. Although, my kids are not oblivious to the said "survival mode", so they get away with WAY too much these days.

Each year our kids get an ornament representing their interests or personalities for that particular year. The kids had such a great time pulling out the ornaments and talking about why Dad and I chose what we did.

We had some serious issues getting our battered tree to stay up. I may or may not have cursed a couple times, but hopefully those memories fade more quickly than the happy spirit that was in our home that evening.

Sporty Spice

Lucy's school has a great sports program and this year they let the 3rd graders take part in volleyball. Lucy loved it! I was very impressed with the coaches and was so happy with her progress.

Love that crooked grin. Notice the awesome braid in her hair. She was so proud of it that morning. I find myself biting my tongue many a morning as we begin the "I Don't Want Your Help with Anything Regarding Hair or Fashion" phase.

The "C" team (all of the 3rd graders).

Cousin Jaime was able to watch her last game. Lucy loves her some Jaime. As do I. Who doesn't, really?

Lucy was being a clown by this point. She was sick of pictures and refused to look at the camera.

It was so fun watching Lucy get better and better each week. She really enjoyed the time after school with her friends and learning something new.

A Few of My Favorite Things.....

Today is my b-day. 32 years old, peeps. Yikes. There's been a few little things I've wanted to record, so I thought today was a good day to focus on a few of my recent favorite things. Here it goes:

-Benny running towards me from across the room or the park. I love seeing his blond hair bobbing up and down and his short, little legs chugging fast.

-The smell of Lucy's hair when I'm tucking her in at night.

-Graham's husky/hoarse voice when he's telling me how many inches Emperor Penguins are.

-The sound of Jason's voice on the phone when I've been hoping he'd call soon.

-Seeing my kids smiling and playing on the tramp (as opposed to screaming and hitting one another)

-The opening music to "Say Yes to the Dress"

-Homemade lunchables (Triscuits, lunch meat, and slices of cheese)

-Benny's new fake laugh. It cracks me up every time. He does it when we're watching TV or driving in the car. Most of the time he has absolutely no idea why people are laughing, but he wants to join in.

-Lucy's attitude issues. Weird, I know, but it can be really funny to witness her trying "so hard" to be patient. "I try SO HARD to be nice to Graham, but then he is SO ANNOYING!" My favorite was this morning when she was "trying" to be nice because it's my birthday. She had been complaining about a few different things and then a little while later when we were getting in the car, she asked me something. I couldn't hear her very well, so I asked her a couple times to repeat herself. The third time she had to say it, she was ticked. She yelled, "I asked if I was being GROUCHY TODAY!!!" It was hilarious.

-The Selena Gomez song, "Love You Like a Love Song". Super catchy and I'm always happy when my spin instructor plays it.

-Benny's "High-YAH" sound effects. Imagine him doing karate moves as he says it or as he plays with his action figures. Last night, Beth handed him a breadstick at dinner and he grabbed it and swung it in the air a couple times while saying, "High-YAH! High-YAH!" Priceless.

-Playing games with Graham. Although, my favorite games is NOT Chutes and Ladders. Can you say boring? I love Jenga and I love SPOT IT.

-Graham's prayers and the help he gives me when I'm praying. I'll be in the middle of a prayer and he'll whisper, "Bless we don't have bad dreams" or my personal favorite, "In the name of Jesus Christ amen". I must have been a little wordy in my praying.

-Taylor Swifts Live Album. I love hearing Graham and Lucy sing along to it. My favorite song is "Ours".

-Candy. I love it. So, so, so very much.

-The sound my phone makes when I get a text message. It does a short little song. I just looked it up and the official sound on the phone is called "typewriters".

Daddy!!!

No, he's not home yet. But back in November, we were soooo blessed to be able to have him home for about 10 days. Jason's sweet Grandma past away and he was able to come home to speak at the funeral. I know that Grandma was thrilled to be a part of our short little reunion.

Don't worry, Jason is not on chemo, he just shaved his head while in Afghanistan. He knew the funeral may be coming soon, but continued to keep the new do. It was a little shocking at first (I had seen it on skype, but it was still a surprise), but I was surprised at how quickly I got used to it.

Jason flew in late on Friday night. He didn't get to the house until midnight. Lucy and I were able to greet him. Graham fell asleep on the couch around 10:30. It was absolutely amazing being able to hold him and see him face to face. He was hungry, so the three of us had a Digiorno pizza before bed.

We left the next morning around noon for Utah to attend the funeral. We stopped in St. George for the night and made our way to Salt Lake for the viewing that evening.

Raegan, Lucy, and Lori at the viewing.

Graham, Daniel, and Benny

The kids were all being super crazy after being at the viewing for a while. It was held at a mortuary, so the employees there were getting a little impatient with their volume. We gave Graham Jason's IPad and Ben my IPhone and they were quiet the rest of the time. We decided we'd worry about technology detox at a later date (they had spent the whole drive from Cali with their faces glued to one Apple device or another).

Crazy, crazy girls.

We only stayed in Utah for 3 days and then made our way back to Oxnard for some family time. It. Was. Amazing.

J took the kids swimming a couple different times. The pool is so much more fun with Dad. He does tricks and actually gets in the big pool instead of staying in the hot tub :) .

On the following Saturday, we got a babysitter for a while and had a wonderful date. We attended the temple. Oh yeah.....Jason shaved his head, did I mention that?

We met the Jarvis' for dinner in Santa Monica. I miss Laurie so much! They moved in November to Huntington Beach. After dinner, Jason and I went to see a movie.

Friday night is our family movie night. The kids were excited to have Daddy home for it. We started this tradition a month or so after he left. We took a chance and watched the first Harry Potter. We were worried they'd be too scared, but it was great!

And of course, there was lots and lots of trampoline time.

We were sooooo very sad to see Jason go after the 10 days were gone. The time went too quickly. Jason and I were both worried about how the kids and I would be when he went back. We had a little bit of a setback in behavior and I had a hard, emotional week, but we got through it and it was totally and completely worth it.

The time for his homecoming is getting closer, but it still seems so far away. I try not to think about it too much because the days seem to crawl by if I focus too much on it. It has been a long six months. I haven't blogged about it as much as I wanted to for a couple reasons. First, because I just haven't had the time or the energy. Once the kids are in bed I need to just sit and do nothing for a while before I crash. The main reason, though, is that it just makes me too sad to sit on the computer and think about it all. I miss him so much and I worry about the kids all the time. For other trials or periods in my life, journaling helped me through, but with this deployment, I have had a hard time putting it into words. I find myself getting really depressed when I try to sit down and focus on how I'm feeling. Especially at night when it's quiet and I'm lonely.

Even now......don't want to do it. We are less than 50 days away and I cannot wait. It is hard being without my other half. No matter how happy a moment is, there's always a part of me that's sad that Jason isn't here with me. Sometimes the feeling is overwhelming and feels too hard to bear, but on most routine days, it's just this little prick in my heart that always, always misses him and is ready for him to be home to stay.

Grandpa!

We love, love, love it when Grandpa comes to town. He flew in the weekend before Halloween and stayed a few days. We were sooooo glad to have him.

We hit the beach a couple different times.

Lucy and I were able to get our boogie board on while Grandpa watched Benny. It was so fun! Graham always joins in the fun to. He puts on his life jacket and jumps and rides the big waves with us.

Crazy Benn-O

Thanks for coming, Grandpa! We were so sad to see you go!

Halloween 2011

Better late than never, I say. We had a great Halloween this year. My little people were so excited to dress up and enjoy the festivities.

Our scary vampire. Lots of people thought he was Dracula. He was quick to correct them. Then, if someone said something about drinking blood, he usually gave them a confused look. He didn't really get into character too much.

Dr. Benn-O

He was supposed to be a bumble bee, but I didn't try on the old costume until Halloween morning and it was too small. Oops. So, we went through our dress-up bin and found this.

Lucy was a cowgirl. My talented friend made her this adorable dress.

I decided to get in on the fun, too.

My kiddos and I before the ward party.

Here's Benny gettin' his groove on at the party.

I love this picture! We were lucky to have Grandpa here for the celebration. He was here last year, too!

Grant and Graham before their preschool party.

Graham brought home a pumpkin cookies recipe that he really wanted to make at home. He said mine weren't as good, but they were okay. Awesome.

We had a Halloween dinner the Sunday before the big day. Lucy made these carrot sticks that look like fingers.

Isn't she the cutest thing? Love this girl. She helped me make the mummy-dogs.