I looked at the calendar since the beginning of October and between Colton's speech therapy, Max's physical therapy and doctor appointments, Colton's teeth issues, and my never ending dental problems, we've had 29 appointments. I am really hoping that now that Christmas is over and my teeth are fixed that that will end. Anyway, that's why I have been really bad at blogging lately so I have a lot of catching up to do.

Before Max was born we knew we'd need to buy a new car. We had a little Toyota Matrix, which is less than desirable for a family of 5. So we put it up for sale and finally sold it. Jonathan spent hours looking for a new car. He had many deals fall through, and since there was not a single used Toyota Highlander within 300 miles of our house we had to widen our search. We were hoping to find something in Dallas, but that didn't happen. After weeks of sharing one car, which is really not fun when you have to wake up to take your husband to work after staying up all night with a newborn. Jonathan got so sick of it that he up and flew to Baltimore and drove all the way back barely missing a snowstorm. He has an adventurous streak that scares me to death but in some cases it pays off.

While he was gone Kirsten and I had to have a girls night! So we got cupcakes from Gigi's, painted our nails, and stayed up until midnight watching a movie and talking in bed.







Kirsten also made this picture for Daddy while he was gone.

The Nutcracker

We finally reaped the rewards of Kirsten being gone every Saturday morning for the last few months and every night for the last week. She had a dress rehearsal on Friday night and Saturday morning and finally did her actual performance last night. She was so nervous that she wasn't going to be able to remember everything, but she did so great! It was so much fun to watch her we could not wipe the smiles off of our faces.

I have had to do Kirsten's makeup, for what seems like, a thousand times this week! I am so not good at doing eyeliner. The first time I attempted I had to redo her eyeliner at least 5 times before it looked decent. When I finally got it right Kirsten squeezed her eyes together and smeered it all over her eyelids. I was so frustrated that I snapped at her. My sweet, sensitive little girl tried so hard to hold back the tears but couldn't which sent her makeup running down her face, which completely served me right that I had to do it again. So we fixed it and then Colton hit her in the head and she started crying again. It was an emotional day for both of us.











Jonathan got to take some pictures of dress rehearsal.










Kirsten had a lot of fun playing with the flowers she got from us and from her sweet teacher Mrs. Miller.





Grammie also got to come down and watch the performance (and play with Max).




Kirsten has been a little tired of going to ballet for the last couple of months so I figured by the time the Nutcracker was over she wouldn't want anything to do with ballet for the rest of her life. So when I was driving her home from her performance today I asked if she was done with the Nutcracker forever or just until next year. She started telling me about all the parts she wants to play (after she's a soldier next year).
We are so proud of our adorable little mouse!

Gingerbread Village and Decorating the Tree

Kirsten was so excited to make this little village. She did the 2 in the back and the one in the front right all by herself. We had a lot of fun making these together.


Decorating the tree.




Colton mostly took candy canes off the tree and came over to us saying "opp peas".

Memories

I just wanted to record some things for my own memory's sake.
This picture is blurry but he's just so cute in it. Colton loves to get his picture taken as soon as he sees the camera he says "Cheese". Colton has been paying much more attention to Max lately. At first he wouldn't even look at him but now he'll snuggle his head up to his, today he tried to pick him up even (which means now I really have to watch him).
Colton doesn't talk very much. This morning we were reading the Polar Express and Colton ran around saying "All Aboard" and then trying to say "the choo, choo, train" after. He's such a sweetie. He's been doing speech therapy so hopefully we'll know what he's actually saying soon.


Jonathan got the fire going the other day, which is one of his favorite past times.


Max is now 6 weeks and has started smiling, cooing, and all kinds of other cute baby things, well really that's it. He pretty much still sleeps and eats. But he's been a great little baby. When we took him to his 1 month check up he was in the 75th percentile for weight and height and 50th percentile for his head size. So he has Kirsten's head and Colton's girth.







Kirsten made this turkey at school and she learned a song to go with it.
"Timothy Turkey why do you cry? Boo, hoo, hoo.
Timothy Turkey why do you cry? Boo, hoo, hoo.
Thanksgiving is coming I'll lose my head, tell all your mom's to buy Chicken instead.
Timothy Turkey I see why you cry. Boo, hoo, hoo."
One day we went to pick Jonathan up from work. We had to wait for a little while so Kirsten wanted to stand by his office door to wait. While she was out there she was singing this song at the top of her lungs while doing the very animated actions like pretending to cut off a turkeys head. It was pretty funny.


Some friends of ours came over the other day. We looked over at the kids while they were watching a movie and noticed Kirsten holding Porter. Porter is 2 so he may be a little old to be held by a 5 year old, he's just so tiny she likes to pretend he's her little baby and I guess he was okay with it.


Kirsten loves science so we did some experiments a couple weeks ago. We learned about absorption.


And did some spice art.

Happy Thanksgiving!

We had such a great Thanksgiving. My mom came down last Saturday and then my dad and Emily came on Wednesday. We cooked all day Wednesday and Thursday and enjoyed the fruits of our labors.


Kirsten enjoying her "pie". We stole this idea from Family Fun for the kids.


And I was so proud that my pie actually looked like the picture (because usually when I try to copy something I see in a magazine or a blog it looks nothing like it and I get really frustrated and want to cry because I've wasted all my time making something that's supposed to look cute and just looks ridiculous...).


Colton has been waking up lately at like 2 o'clock in the morning and playing in his room for a couple of hours. So he fell asleep during Thanksgiving dinner.


And here's an updated picture of Max. He has gotten so big and chubby.


We loved being able to spend Thanksgiving with family and wished they all could have been there with us.

Catch Up

Before Max came along we had a really busy week that I didn't have the chance to blog about.
The Saturday before Max was born my friends, Danie and Michelle, threw a baby shower for me. I didn't get any pictures of the actual event, but it was so much fun and so nice of them to do it for me!
Here is a picture of the M for Max Michelle made for me, the baby clothes "bouquet", and the adorable diaper cake Danie made.


We decided we better go to at least one West Texas football game so we went to the Midland Lee vs. Abilene game which was on ESPN2 because Abilene is ranked in the top 10 in the nation. While that was fun, it also meant that by halftime Midland Lee was losing 49 to 7. At least we can say we've been.






The next night we went over to some of Jonathan's coworker's house for dinner. They are Venezuelan so they made us an authentic Venezuelan meal. It was delicious and so fun.


The next night Jonathan's work had an event at the race track in town.
We ate dinner.


And then tried to watch the racing...


but it was so loud we didn't last very long.


until we were sitting in the car watching.


The primary president in our ward (i'm the secretary so we talk often) is from Ohio. She moved here about 30 years ago and has never left. One day when I was complaining about how ugly it is here she told me you learn to find different kinds of beauty here in West Texas. I will say this is one thing I have come to appreciate, the West Texas sky.


That night I went into labor. So I guess it's a good thing we fit that all in before he came.

Halloween

We carved pumpkins...




Napped


Ate candy




And tried to scare our friends

Some friends came over on Halloween night and so Jonathan was going to run around the house and scare them when they got here. Kirsten's response to that was, "They're already going to be scared because I put boo on the door."