Lucy and Sophie's 1st Birthday Party!

It's fun that Lucy has a cousin so close in age! This year we celebrated their first birthdays together and it was so fun! Stephanie always does an AMAZING job with parties and this was no exception. It was also fun to see their house decorated in pink and fairies for once :).

We had family dinner together and the kiddos played for a while, while the adults talked. Then we had the babies dig into their smash cakes...oh, wait....they wouldn't TOUCH them :). Neither baby wanted anything to do with their cute pink cakes. Steph wasn't used to that. I was! Only Nora has eaten cake on her first birthday. No one else has wanted anything to do with it!

Then they opened a few gifts. It was great!

Of course the most exciting things were the wrappers and plastic :).

Nora Boo Turns 3!

Our sweet Nora is the big 3 years old!!! She still as so sweet and we love having her in our family. She checked out all healthy at her 3 year old check-up. Here are some things about Nora:

- Nora LOVES playing pretend and could do it all day. Sometimes she wants to play by herself and sometimes with her best friend, Reese. The best thing though is that she will play pretend with EVERYTHING- crayons, utensils, etc. But when she is in her car seat and doesn't have anything in her hands to play pretend with, she will use her fingers or her feet :). It's the best!
- She is a very sensitive thing- sensitive to others feelings, sensitive to me being upset at her or hurting others on accident. She cries often but also turns it off quickly!
- Nora is a HUGE peacemaker and always the first one to say sorry. She hates when I am upset about something and always will say "I'm sorry Mommy!" in her sweet, sweet little voice. It melts my heart and I can't EVER stay mad at her about anything!
- She loves making things with me in the kitchen. Cookies are her favorite thing to make but she also loves to help with dinner (which is awesome unless I'm needing to do it quickly :)).
- Her best friends are her sisters and Sarah Thatcher that lives just around the corner from us. She doesn't have many friends her age in our ward and neighborhood, but hopefully more will come with time??

We LOVE our Nora Boo!!!

Nora chose to go to the "Carousel" (AKA Provo Beach Resort). The girls rode the carousel, ate ice cream, played arcade games, and played on the play area. It was a great family time!

Arizona Christmas!

This Christmas was the best Christmas we have ever had in Arizona. It was so much fun, low-key, relaxing, and very very enjoyable!  A huge factor playing into it's awesomeness was that Grandma Close retired in November!!! For as long as I'VE known her she always has to work the holidays. Christmas Day was the only day she would ever get off. But this year we got her all to ourselves!

It was also super fun because it was one of the first white Christmas's we've had in AZ! The kiddos had so much fun (even though we weren't quite prepared for snow gear). They didn't care though. We put socks on their hands and they went out and built a snowman! It was so great!

One of my favorite traditions growing up is Gift from the Heart. And this year we started it with our girls. It made my heart very happy. Each girl chose a name of a sister and had to make something for that sister. Emma made a clay unicorn for Reese (because Reese LOVES unicorns). Reese made Nora princess sock puppets and Nora made Emma cracker candy. I loved talking with each one about what ideas they had that they could make. They thought hard about that sister and what she likes and came up with their own ideas. It was such a special thing to do.

One of the best parts of Christmas 2016 was a gift Cade and I gave to Tammy and Great-Grandpa. We took all of their film/video from many many years ago and got it all transferred to DVD's for them so we could actually view it. It was so fun to watch Tammy's parents when they were young and then see Tammy and her siblings as kids as well as Cade and Tara as babies and children. It was really special. There isn't anything better than wonderful family moments!

It's so much fun to see Emma and Ashur and especially Reese and Taft this time around play with each other. They are all best buds and it's so fun they each have someone their own age to play with. They still are young enough that they are into similar things. They love to make up their own music band, ride on the quads outside (when it's warm), do arts and crafts, play with legos, and make up lots of new games.

Unfortunately this was not Lucy's favorite trip. She had a very high fever for 5 days in a row :(. So the day after Christmas we were supposed to go see Dale's side of the family and Lucy and I had to stay back. I was going to leave her with Grandma but she wasn't doing well that morning. So she and I had a very quiet house all to ourselves. The rest of the family had a great time seeing everyone!

We went to Target together and made a train to keep track of everyone. It looked awesome with me and 7 children 7 and under :)

Emma: always ready for her picture to be taken :)...

Bleak Family Christmas & Other Activities

Every Christmas the cousins all rotate names of who they give a gift to. So then of course we need to get together and have a party to exchange! This year we held it at our house. We usually do at Nathan and Steph's house because they like to throw parties and are really good at it! But with Stephanie having surgery recently we said we wouldn't mind doing it. We had dinner, played a game with the kiddos, exchanged gifts, then put on a movie for the kids so us adults could have fun! It was a great night!

Miss Emma had a Christmas program at school. It was fun to watch. Just in one year they went from screaming every single song in Kindergarten to singing pretty well in 1st grade :). 

We love our annual Gingerbread houses, Christmas crafts, and Christmas fun!

I also was VERY excited to take Reese on a date to the Nutcracker ballet. Reese is a naturally graceful dancer and wants to be a ballerina someday. She absolutely loved it and was a very fun date! I hope someday I get to sit in the audience and watch her in it!

New Years Sledding at Grandma and Grandpa Bleak's in Bountiful. Bountiful seriously has the BEST hills for sledding. Smaller ones for small kids and huge steep ones for bigger kids. The girls loved going and we loved having Gpa there with us!