New Years Day

New Years Day was a very nice relaxing day! We decided we would make it a tradition to get chinese food. So we ordered from Sticky to Go Go, Yummy! We picked it up and drove to Stoney Point to see the Magical Snow Show. Yes here in Richmond we don't get snow, so we have shows that try to bring snow to the holidays. The girls were asleep when we arrived so Josh and I had a little "date" in the car. We ate our dinner in peace and then woke the girls up when we finished. It was fun, a little different but a fun memory!

The girls were excited to see the snow! Especially Lilli, she regularly asks me why we don't have snow and wishes it would snow. I think the flakes were made of bubbles, at least that's what it looked like when they landed on me. Afterwards I also had a soapy taste in my mouth. Anyways we'll take it bubbles and all:)

Happy New Year 2009!!

New Years Eve

We went to Ashlee and Christians house for New Years Eve. Lots of people and kids and of course yummy food. We had a wonderful time playing games and bringing in the New Year with our wonderful friends. Thanks for the fun time!

The kids all cuddled on the air mattress to watch movies while the adults played games. It worked out really well and the all had a fun time!

I think the most fun part of the new year for the girls was wrestling on the air mattress. Happy New Year 2009!

Lewis Ginter Botanical Gardens

Our neighbors took us to Lewis Ginter Botanical Gardens to tour the lights. One of my favorite things there were these little fairy villages. They were so inctricately made, it was amazing! The girls loved the lights, villages, train villages, doll houses, all of it!

The theme was spiders, so they had these huge spiders all lit up.

They had a huge bon fire and make your own smores. The girls loved this! They got to roast their own marshmellows, they thought this was pretty neat.

Thank you to Larry and Linda for an amazing time at the Gardens! We had a blast!

Christmas Morning

I made matching nightgowns for the girls, they turned out really cute and fit the girls perfectly! Here they are Christmas morning. It was so cute when Lilli came down she looked over the couch and shouted "Santa came he really did come!! There are tons of presents under the tree, Yeah!!

Some very happy faces. The girls opened their presents pretty fast so Josh and I just waited until they were finished to open ours. It was fun to see how excited they were!

Izzy was so cute when she opened this present, she shouted "A baby doll.." she was very excited about this one:)

These are two of my favorite pictures of Izzy. She just had to be either wearing or holding EVERYTHING!

It was a wonderful Christmas. We missed our extended family but it was kinda nice to have our own little Christmas... it was a lot more relaxing! On Christmas Eve we went over to our neighbors and they spoiled the girls with presents, they are the girls surragote grandparents.  We then went to see the Tacky Christmas light tour, the girls were really tired so they fell asleep in the car after the first few houses, but it was fun. Christmas day we had a delicious breakfast of homemade cinnamon buns (they didn't really rise very well but so delicious). This is going to be our breakfast tradition so I guess I have some time to perfect it. We had the other set of surrogate grandparents over Sharon and Ned. They also spoiled the girls. We are so grateful for our families and friends and mostly for our Savior Jesus Christ and all he has done for each and everyone of us.

Gingerbread House Tradition

Our finished creation! The girls had a blast creating the gingerbread house. It was our first time doing it with the girls. My family always made gingerbread houses every Christmas, a tradition we plan on continuing!

Lilli and I finished the house and did a pretty good job if I say so myself:)

Daddy and the girls put the house together and made the roof with frosted wheats. Isabella's favorite thing to do was eat the candy. I don't think she's ever seen such a spread of candy within her reach. We finally had to take her up and put her to bed before she made herself sick. 

Christmas Sunday

Here is my beautiful family on the Sunday before Christmas. We got the girls new Christmas dresses and had them all wrapped up for them to open that morning.

Lilli loves her dress and wants to wear it everyday. Izzy and Lilli looked so beautiful!

Knee Surgery

Josh had knee surgery the day after his last class for the semester. He hurt his knee playing basketball and tore his ACL. The doctor told him that some people never get it fixed but that if he wanted to be active he probably should get it fixed.  So here are the battle wounds. Just before surgery he was asking a ton of questions right up to the time they put the mask on. They had to tell him to just breath, a polite way to say shut up so we can do your surgery. When the nurse came to get me to go see Josh in recovery she said, "He sure talks ALOT doesn't he. He was on some pretty strong drugs for the first week, so he said a lot of funny loopy things. The girls were such good helpers! It was a little hard for the first week as Josh didn't get out of bed.  I am so thankful to some good friends from the ward who brought in dinner for 5 days. It's amazing how much relief a simple dinner brought, it was so nice not to have to worry about dinner at the end of the day! We had one scary incidence when Josh got up out of bed, he hadn't been up out of bed for awhile and he got up to fast. All of the sudden I hear him calling for me. He said he was going to pass out. He was able to lean against the wall with his crutches but he started shaking and his eyes were going all weird. I called to Lilli and told her to go across the street to get our neighbors for help. She was the hero for the day. She ran over as quick as she could and even looked both ways before she crossed the street. Meanwhile Josh started to shake and breath really irregularly, while I am pleading him not to pass out. There was no way that I could catch him. Thank goodness for the wall and his crutches he stayed upright. Our neighbors arrived and there was one on each side and I picked up his leg as he was still out of it and was putting pressure on it. Anyways we got him to the bed no harm done. That was pretty scary for me but after that little episode he has done better everyday. He has had such a good attitude the whole time and never complained. He is doing physical therapy now and has made huge strides. I am really proud of him and thankful for this experience. Serving Josh really brought us closer together and helped me be less selfish. 

Happy Birthday Josh

Josh turned 31, WOW! I wanted to make him a special dinner but all he felt like was eggs. So we ended up having pumpkin pancakes and eggs. I turned out to be a delicious dinner. He had a scrumptious ice cream cake especially from Ben and Jerry's.

We got Josh a "Get Strong, Get Ripped Quick" machine. You just mount it in a doorway and you can do pull ups. Or use it on the ground for push ups, sit ups, etc. Here the girls are showing their muscles off. Every time Josh uses it the girls have to have a turn. Lilli really enjoys is, one time after using it she said to me, "I wish it was called Get strong, Get ripped SLOW. She would love to do it for a LONG time each time.