Christmas Pics

Two weeks ago my friend Stephanie came over to my mom's and took some Christmas pictures of Max and Sadie. She was so good and so patient!! Max was a stinker that day and would have nothing to do with Sadie. She got some great shots of them alone though! The last 2 photos in this post I took in an attempt to try and get a photo of them together. This time Max was a bit more cooperative, but not a whole lot more!! Thanks again to Stephanie!!! :)



We were just standing and talking and looked over and saw Max sitting at the piano like this. He's a funny little guy!!

This was the one shot of them together that day. :) Little pills.

Max's Nativity

Max's version of the nativity scene....

The donkey and the amputated sheep
Two wiseman and a headless one...whose head makes a great ball to throw around the house.

But seriously...how do you teach a 1 1/2 year old who normally plays with little animal toys that he can't play with these...it's a battle I'm set up to fail.

I FINALLY DID IT!!!

After many failed attempts, I have finally made beautifully perfect cinnamon rolls!! I don't like to gloat, but I must pat myself on the back for this one. Thanks to My Kitchen Cafe for the recipe!! And now I have 24 cinnamon rolls to eat and a husband who is avoiding sweets...yikes!

What I am most thankful for!

At Thanksgiving dinner my mom has us write down 2 things that we were most grateful for. Here are my obvious choices!! :)

1. Aaron- He is a wonderful husband and a great father!! He works so hard for our family!

2. Two beautiful, healthy kids!! Max and Sadie make every day exciting and new!! Max loves to hug and kiss Sadie all the time, and calls her "Eeee". He runs to her all day saying "Hi Eee". I think his love for her is going to be reciprocated as she grows and they are going to be best friends!!!
( Max loves to have Sadie lay on his back. It's funny!!)

What we've been up too....

Not a whole lot is new with us. We are just busy with work, kids and everything in between!! :) We've been enjoying warm weather up to today, but are looking forward to the predicted rain this week! We are still watching Barney at least 4-5 times a day...which is kind of annoying, I'm not going to lie but at least Max is allowing us to watch more than just one episode. Max has had tonsilitis and two ear infections..poor guy. He weighs 32 lbs and Sadie weighs close to 13 lbs...and my back is killing me lately! :)

This is Max's favorite trick.
This boy is all about cars.
The kiddies.
Sadie loves to have us talk with her. :) Her she is talking with her Daddy.
Okay, I might be biased but she is the cutest little girl.
Sadie loves to try and suck her thumb.
Max was in HEAVEN helping Aaron the other night in the backyard.
Max and his buddy Samuel. They play so well together and we LOVE having Samuel over to play and take naps. It is fun having a relative so close in age to Max. Sadie will have a friend too when Matt and Tami's next little one arrives in March!
This was so cute because Sadie could not take her eyes off Aaron and was just smiling and cooing at him. I think we have a Daddy's girl on our hands. I don't care if she likes watching NASCAR and Football....as long as she wants to collect American Girl Dolls also since I am SOOO excited to buy her one some day!
When you have kids this close together, you have do sometimes do things you don't want to do, but that make your life easier...like letting Max feed himself when Sadie needs to be nursed. He is the messiest kid I know. For example, he can't just get a bag of gold fish crackers and eat them...first he has to smash them up, dump the bag over his head, soak them in water and then drink them.
This was Max going to town on chicken nuggets and applesauce.
It's becoming a tradition for me to make Tyler's birthday cake. I really enjoy it. This year it was a dinosaur, based off a picture I saw online, but changed according to Tyler's artistic direction.
I was pretty pleased with the results...even if I did go against everything I was taught and used canned frosting! :)
All the kids and Max's family playmates.
It's not a good shot, but I love this little sweater dress on her.
So...Max LOVES to wear Sadie's bows. He is always trying them on and running down the hall to show me. Now when you tell him we're going to do his hair, he runs and puts a bow on! Too cute!

The Newest Addition to our Family

As I write this post, I am sitting watching Barney for the 4th time today...and we were gone most of the morning. What is worse than watching Barney 4 times in one day? The answer: Watching the SAME episode of Barney 4 times today. Max is in LOVE with Barney lately and it keeps his attention for 25 minutes straight, which has never happened before with anything else I have tried. So while on one hand it has been a life saver, it is also driving me nuts!!! I recorded several episodes on our DVR, but he only likes one of them...and the songs are in my head ALL the time now. Today I tried to turn on a new episode, and after a few minutes he handed me the remote and said "Baa". I caught on to what he meant and when I turned on his favorite episode his whole face lit up and he started dancing and smiling. So here I sit, on this election day, dying to watch the news coverage, fighting with Max over watching Barney. And you know who the winner in this house is.

Sadie's Blessing Day

Yesterday Sadie was blessed, and she looked so BEAUTIFUL in her blessing dress. I might be a little biased because she's my daughter, but I really think Sadie is so adorable. Aaron gave her a very nice blessing and she was perfect and didn't cry!!! I think as mom's we all stress about that part! ;) Here are a few pictures of the beautiful little girl...




Our little Family
Four generations- My grandma Halvorson, Sadie, Me , and my Mom
Grandma Halvorson, Sadie, Me, my Grandma McLelland, and Sadie's Grandma McLelland :)
Almost all the family that was there. :) Thanks for coming everyone!

Halloween

We had a fun Halloween this year!! All the kids were out of school, so Sadie and I went to see High School Musical 3 with them, while Max stayed and played with Samuel. We had the traditional homemade chicken noodle soup...love it!! Thanks mom!! :) Then Max went trick or treating with Trayce to a few houses on my parents street. After 2 or 3 houses, he got on to the fact that people were giving him food, and then he was running as fast as his little legs would carry him to the next house, and calling back to me and waving good bye to me. It was cute. And Sadie just slept. :)
Our little candy corn.
Ninja Max
This sword Aaron picked out was HUGE!! It was taller than Max! Leave it to Dad to get Max a ginormous sword! ;)
His favorite new thing to do is jump of the fireplace, all though he chickens out half of the time.






And a plug for Proposition 8.....


I have to give a shout out to Desi, my wonderful missionary companion in Annemasse, who taught me to love pumpkin carving. I credit her for what Aaron calls my "one talent". :) Pumpkin carving. Now after a few years of carving, my brothers get really excited about what I will do this year. I have to admit, it wasn't my best one this year, but the most meaningful. We've been asked to give of our time and talents to help Prop 8 pass. Aaron and I were able to go out and do door hangings Saturday....many thanks to my mom for babysitting the kids so we could go. It was fun because it reminded me of being on my mission....cold, rainy, Saturday morning where everyone is in bed so no one is out on the streets to talk to...:) Ahh, the good 'ol days! Anyways, it was a way we were able to give of our time, and here is how I gave of my talents...
Like I said before, not my best, but it did look cool all lit up and many people commented on it!!! Don't forget, YES on 8 tomorrow!!

Sadie Rose

Max Thomas

Oh, precious children.

My brother McKay is famous for his comments.  Sometimes they are deep, sometimes they are off the wall, and sometimes they are just plain, factual observations...that social propriety would discourage from be spoken out loud.  McKay is also known for his concern regarding physical health and appearance of health.  He has especially been concerned about my weight gain during pregnancy.  It's very interesting to have your 11 year old brother be so concerned about your weight gain.  Now, even though we had been through this before when I had Max, he was still very surprised the day I came home with Sadie that I still had a good sized stomach.  Apparently when he heard we were about to pull up he rushed outside, not saying he was so excited to see the baby, but was "excited to see how skinny Kristen is."  What disappointment he was met with.  The next day when he asked me about post-pregnancy weight loss, I explained to him that it takes 9 months to put it on so it takes at least 9 months to take it off.  That seemed to satisfy him, and give me a good window of time to work on loosing the weight.

Flash forward to today.  I was at the park with 7 kids- 2 of my own, my 2 brothers, and 3 cousins.  I'm wearing some pre-Sadie jeans, not quite pre-Max, put feeling good that I'm making progress.  I had some cute shoes and a cute hat and I was feeling pretty good about myself, dare I even say I was feeling pretty trendy, which rarely happens these days.  Sadie was sleeping in her baby bjorn and it was such a beautiful day.  I snapped a picture on my phone to capture the beautiful moment I was having.  Then I went to throw the football around with McKay.  After a few throws he walked over to me, and said "Does it really take 9 months (then made the hand gesture for a large stomach) to get rid of that?"  Apparently I am not looking as good as I felt. :)  Sweet, sweet children.

Brother and Sister=Best Friends....one day!

For as rough and tumble as Max is, he is SO gentle with Sadie.  I always know when he's approaching her, because I hear "Ahhh, Baa."  Then he rubs her stomach or head and puts his cheek next to hers.  It is so cute.  Here are a few shots and a video of them together.

On the move...literally.

The lack of posts is due to the fact that we moved last weekend into a new apartment, Max is a maniac, Aaron working 67 hours a week and Sadie thinking we should spend time pacing the floors and bouncing from 8-12 everynight. I have managed to get some cute photos lately of my little adorable chunk Sadie, and of course Max climbing to the top of my mom's upright piano all alone...so I will try and post those soon! Stay tuned...

Crazy Hair, Trucks and Dress Up

I had both kids dressed up real cute last Sunday to take picutres, but when I went to take pictures, Sadie was crying too hard, so only Max was in them!!


Max loves to line up these trucks and Great Grandpa and Grandma Halvorson's house.
The mess on his face is chocolate chip cookies. :)

What is it with my kids and their crazy hair! :) Luckily it's not this bad every day. It had just been washed and we never know how it will dry!
Max LOVES to dress up lately. His favorite thing to wear is different kind of shoes. Here he is wearing a bike helmet, his snow boots for this winter, and Aaron's motorcycle gloves.