2014 out with a bang!!

Guest post by Mom:

I think for the last five years probably I have done an end of year sum up of what the last 12 months has brought us individually. Well guess what. I'm too tired. That third kid must have knocked me for a loop. (Actually I think it's because that third kid is a 13 month old bent on suicide or self injury and has been sick FOREVER.) So instead I will just do a small reflection on the year and post some of our final photos of the year.

The weekend after Christmas was totally chill. The stupid stomach bug took it's run through the ENTIRE family and it was special. Aunt Becca came up on Christmas day though and we enjoyed lots of time with her because she stayed at the house with us and the girls loved it!

My grandparents came down for a little Larsen party and Cara had fun singing while Grandma played the piano.

Here my darling husband has chosen to model all of the girls knew bows! Hahaha!

I didn't seem to get many pictures of the party. It was probably because I was slightly down with the yucks.

We finally delivered our neighborhood presents with two days left in the year! The girls dressed up very festive!

And this monkey decided to get tricky! Actually, she's done this since she laid eyes on this horse, but now she's adding the tongue out and it's hilarious.

We snuggled up and watched It's A Wonderful Life..well the kids watched part of it and Pete's head exploded from trying to explain the economics of the film to them.

We decided to ring in the actual New Year up in SLC with Pete's family. We held a little hot cocoa party and exchanged some presents. This is quite possibly one of the best photos of Iva's belly ever. She was playing with her new toy. I love that I captured some of the Preslars' tree in the background.

We played games with their friends up at the church and made in home just in time to ring in a central time zone New Year's.

And this was the temps in and outside the house at midnight. I laughed. We drove up to where it never reached above freezing for more than an hour (and on our last day) and missed the snow fall in St. George. Oh well.

2014 was a good year to our little crew. Our extended families had some hiccups (mostly my mom and her THREE surgeries for three different injuries) but we feel really blessed. Pete's mom is continuing to decline with her Alzheimer's but she still recognizes us and loves us and that's what counts right now. We could have spent less and saved more, but we still came out on top. And I think we were all healthier at the end of the year. Our eating habits have improved and my girls are active. We are going to call it a win!

Christmas Morning Finally Came!!!

You would think with how excited we were that Mommy wouldn't have to wake us up. Well that wasn't true. She did. She came crawling into our igloo at 8 am! We asked her if Santa came, which of course he had, and then rolled over and told her we would wait until Daddy is awake! She was flabbergasted.

Look...Mom put on all her presents at once. A dress, a shirt, a bag, a jacket, a bracelet and new workout pants!

Our loot!

Family movie time.

We hung out at Grandma and Grandpa's house again with Uncle CJ and played games.

Somehow Mommy didn't get a picture of Iva and her presents but Iva enjoyed them we promise. It was a great Christmas.

Christmas Eve Festivities

Yay! Christmas Eve finally came! I celebrated Christmas Eve Eve Eve and Christmas Eve Eve. We were so happy. We ate pizza at Grandma and Grandpa's. Followed by hot tubbing and presents!!!

I got awesome presents!

So did Cara even though she was having the worst Christmas Eve ever. (She and daddy had the yucks!)

Iva loved her presents from the boys!

Grandpa thought he was being funny and wrapped up a bunch of climbing gear for everyone to open up!

It was a very FROZEN Christmas. We got lots of Frozen loot!

Pajama time!

Mommy surprised me with the jammies she said they didn't have anymore!!!!

Winter Break Activities

We finally made it back to the Children's Museum and played at their new Winter Wonderland! 

I was also thrilled with their new vet station. I LOVED it. It's exactly what I want to be when I grow up!

We went and tried out the trampoline park! It was fun, but it turned out that I was sick. I spent the rest of the night trying not to make it the worst Christmas ever to match my worst Thanksgiving ever.

We played around on the red rocks with Grandpa!

And we went to the Polar Express activity at the library in our jammies!

I'm a Big Girl

So apparently Iva thinks she's a lot bigger than she is. She loves to follow us around and play with us and try to do whatever we are doing.

Case in point:

She's adorable. She toddles around the house constantly pulling everything out of cupboards and drawers. She tries to climb the pillars in Grandma and Grandpa's house. She currently thinks the stairs are her personal jungle gym and likes to keep Daddy trapped there as she practices going up and down. She screams and babbles, but really only says "Daddy" "Mommy" and "Doggy". She signs doggy and more and eat.

Cara's Christmas Program

Guest post by Mom:

On the last day of school before break, Cara's preschool put on a little program for us. They sang adorable Christmas songs and recited our favorite "Snowball" poem. Each child also got to meet Santa.

My favorite moment happened after the program was done. Cara was lucky enough to have not only Iva and me there, but her Dad, Grandma, Aunt Angie and Lexi came! She had quite the cheering section, but in several of the songs it became obvious that she was trying really hard not to cry. She was even wiping away tears and I was worried! Was she sick? What made her sad? Does she have stage fright? I asked her about it after the program as we were on our way to a quick lunch date and this is what she said to me.

"I ALMOST cried because I was just too happy that my Daddy was there."

I about died. Those were tears of happiness and she loves her Dad so much. Of course, it also can make it sound like her dad is never around, but since he works from our home and we see him all the time it clearly is about her love for her Daddy.

We had to run from our lunch date to help with Siena's class party and Cara was pretty happy to have gotten to make her own Christmas tree!

Sister Time

Man this Christmas season has been so delightful, but Mom hasn't sat down on the computer long enough to blog! As per our tradition, we are trying to get 100 posts in. This means between now and Wednesday night we will be posting SEVEN times. That's okay. There has been a lot to post about.

It's a lot of fun being three sisters. We really are each other's best friends. I started sleeping in Cara's bed just before Christmas Break (Mom thinks it is so I didn't have to make my own bed!)

But the Friday of Christmas Break, we also built our igloo fort that we do every Christmas so that we can sleep side by side!

Cara and Iva have started really loving their alone time together when she isn't in preschool. Cara has been very helpful to Mom in keeping Iva entertained.

Iva wants to be just like her sisters.

And look at the three of us...that's a lot of happy in our house!

Daddy's Phone

It's amazing what happens when Dad gets around to giving Mom the photos that have been on his phone! Back a few months ago, Daddy got to upgrade to iPhone 6 which means we have been using his phone for pictures, but not a lot because he never downloads them and it gets on Mommy's nerves!

So here you go. Three months worth of photos from Dad. Just kidding, it was probably only two months.

Our trip to Disneyland for one! Here is what he captured! This was Iva's race!

Indiana Jones, Siena's new favorite ride!

Baymax and Hiro!

Oh look a picture of Chase right after his birthday! He loves playing with Iva.

Dad even took us to the Jubilee of Trees when Mom went off on a girls trip!

He built us a giant bed in the living room

And let us get our faces painted!

Suddenly we are back in SLC at Thanksgiving. Mom had run off to Target for Black Friday shopping.

Uncle Troy and Iva. She tends to put adults to sleep.