Sam's Shenanigans

Oh our Sam. Mom has been wondering if she finally noticed the difference between boy and girl babies. Sam seems to pull EVERYTHING out of drawers. EVERYTHING. He also just kind of toddles around and just wants to look at stuff. She didn't remember any of us doing that and then Facebook memories came to the rescue. She had posted that Iva was constantly undoing all of her things. She also apologized because it meant our house would be covered in towels, shoes, crayons, boxes and whatever else. WHICH IS EXACTLY HOW SAM IS BEHAVING. Hahaha! It turns out it's just more of a 12-15 month old thing.

One of Sam's favorite things to get out (probably because it's in a cupboard we can't lock!) is our Magic Bullet blender cups and our shaker cups. He also begs for "more" when he gets them. He genuinely wants our shakes that we make for breakfast!

I think Mom constantly uses SnapChat filters to try and distract Sam.

It's a hard habit for Mom to break, but she loves sleeping with her kids. I'm jealous actually. She says I'm too big now! I actually think this picture was of a rainy day when she got both of the littles to nap at the same time!

Sam loves his bath. Bubbles tend to freak him out at first, but then he figures it out and he doesn't want to get out. He also loves to shower with Mom or Dad. If he hears the water running, he will go running to whichever bathroom it is and try and get in. He even tugs at his clothes because he knows he should be naked. Which made us think of one thing that Mom think is a boy thing or just unique to Sam. He loves to play in the toilet. Us girls never did that. We have to be careful to close bathroom doors and make sure toilet lids are down because of it. (We also have to make sure bathroom doors are closed if we want to shower!)

It's a bummer that this picture got twisted, but this was a funny three way face swap Mom did with Sam and Iva. What's most funny is that Iva almost doesn't look different!!

Ice Cream Party!

We earned an ice cream party at school by reading enough minutes. Mom is on the PTA board so she's normally at all the extra activities which meant Iva got to eat some too!

It was a good chance for Mom to get some pictures of us with our friends too! This is Cara with her best friend for the year, Chloe. They have birthdays one day a part...which is actually one day and a YEAR a part because Cara didn't go to kindergarten completely on time. (Mom still feels good about that decision though!)

Here is Iva and her friend, Josie.

And this is Amelia. We were best friends in first grade, but then we weren't in the same class in second grade. Luckily, we are back in the same class and we are best friends again!

The Gingerbread House

We won't talk about what the actual posting date of this blog is, but we intend to post date it so that it falls in 2016 nicely if we ever get around to catching up on our blog books.

We have an Elf on the Shelf who comes to our house and he was pretty uneventful this year, BUT he did move every single night. Which might have been a first. One day he even brought in a giant box from the garage and asked us to make a life size gingerbread house! It sat in our living room for awhile and then Mom moved it as a door to our room. This ended up being the only gingerbread house making our family did!

We went to Grandma's neighborhood Christmas party as per usual. And as you can see from the group, we managed once again to spill hot chocolate on Grandma. It was nice this year though that it wasn't FREEZING. I think Sam and Iva were probably a little cold without jackets though.

Three toothed Snaggle Face

I feel like this deserves a post of its own because Sam's smile has been so awesome. We do teeth really slowly in this fam and he has two bottom teeth for a couple months and FINALLY a front tooth broke through. In fact, it broke all the way through and kept going before the other tooth even threatened to come in!

Which gave him this awesome look:

When he was smiley or even just looking at you, you couldn't help but giggle and smile and laugh because it was so funny. Three teeth! 

He finally has a four tooth smile but I'm glad we capture some of the cuteness before it was gone! (And can you see why we have so many bibs. Look at the drool!)

Frosty the Snowman

So Mom's work out at Red Mountain had this awesome party for their families. Red Mountain is a resort that doesn't normally allow guests under the age of 12 so it was a real treat to go see where Mom works!

They were playing the movie Frosty the Snowman and having yummy cookies. We even got to meet Frosty!

They had blankets and pillows on the ground and they even had made funny jib jab movies of us! Mom had sent them our photos and we watched ourselves! It was a fun surprise!

And then...we got to meet Santa!

Iva was very consistent...she asked every Santa for a candy cane!

I always asked for a Nintendo 2DS which perplexed most Santa's!

Cara's wish for the last THREE years I swear has been a Wii U

Sam didn't ask for anything, but he tolerated a photo!

Mom's work also had a gingerbread house competition and they were REALLY neat. There was a church with stained glass windows and a workshop with what looked like a conveyor belt and they all had lights of some kind! We took time to vote!

And then since we were so close to Tuacahn, we went to their live nativity for the first time. It was neat and not too cold since it was early in December. Mom and Dad even got us tickets to ride the train which was fun because they had some of the scenery props from their plays on display.

It was a very full evening and only the second weekend in December. We felt like we had checked so much off of a Christmas must do list!

Grown ups only!

In what seemed like a slightly unfair turn of events, my mom had a Christmas party at Grandma's house with just the grown ups. No kids! Not even a baby! And guess who had to babysit? ME! I was in charge of all the kids. It was STRESSFUL. I had done it before, but still. Sam can be so hard!

I don't think my mom had fun at all. They played pounce and six papers and the silly game with the mouthpieces again. I think they even got in the jacuzzi. How could they enjoy it when nobody was splashing? The only sibling missing was Uncle E because he had a scheduling conflict and went up north (to FREEZING weather so his loss!) I'm hoping they don't make it a regular thing, but based on how Mom was smiling...I think they might.

This is how Mom and Dad found us. Uncle Steve and Aunt Becca had checked on us earlier so Mom wasn't super worried, but she thought it was hilarious how I managed to get everyone asleep!

Big steps for this big sister. Babysitting is getting a little easier each time!

Small children

Guest post by Mom:

We all know it's exhausting having small children. You know this. I know this. Yet somehow it can sometimes just take you by complete surprise.

Sam and Iva are putting us through the ringer. They are both kind of crummy sleepers and I will be forever grateful that I have a supportive husband who does his share of night time duties. But for all their hard, they are so CUTE.

Here is an example. Sam just GETS things. He knows that every kid wants to talk in the microphone and he tries really hard to do it to. He always looks so handsome at church too.

And then (in what might have been an allergic reaction to our pine tree... we still aren't sure). Sam started having issues with hives. He would freak out at night and then just be covered. It was crazy. Then they would go away with some Benadryl. It kind of stopped out of nowhere and it might have also had to do with laundry detergent or his general sickness, but whatever it is, I'm glad it's gone.

I took this picture of his little freckle on his hand just because it's kind of unusual!

This is our life. Sam honestly should have a bib on at all times. He's a drooler and a VERY messy eater. I swear all his tops are ruined anyway.

See? Look at their cute. They try really hard to butter me up.

And yet, that bath was a lot of work with slippery babies trying to stand and move and splash and kill themselves. (I'm tired just thinking about it again.)

Iva's hair can be SO curly. I love it

I'm not a huge park mom, but these two love it when someone convinces me to go!

I yell much more than I should at these precious kiddos, but in the end we cuddle and love on each other so I'm going to call it a win!