Christmas with the Palmers 2016

 We had the best Christmas this year. My kids were so much fun.  I always do this and tell myself I won't but I end up still working on getting presents bought and wrapped up until a week before Christmas and it isn't until I'm done I can finally enjoy the holiday. I need to quit doing that and get it all done early so I can enjoy December! Between all the parties we did at our house, class parties, teacher and neighbor gifts I feel like a freaking chicken with his head cut off.  Why does Christmas have to be so stressful! 

The kick off to the busy weekend was our annual Palmer Christmas party with santa! This year we had Joe and Heather and their family with us from Kentucky. I loved that because most of the other kids are all older so it was fun for my younger kids to have kids around their age for a change! Not only that but we had never met their baby Kate so it was fun to met my newest niece. 

The kids of course loved seeing Santa and getting their gifts.  Sannette was again the most excited to see Santa.  I love seeing her talk to Santa. Easton did pretty good with Santa.  At least he didn't cry! But he was a little worried about it. 

The next day was Christmas eve. We didn't do much that day besides going out to lunch and just getting things around the house ready. We had dinner at my home again this year and had got to host my Grandma Jenkins again.  In the last year I've lost my Grandpa Jenkins and last fall I lost my Grandma Pack.  It's not lost on me how lucky I am to still have my Grandma around.  I love her to pieces and felt super blessed my family got to have her two years in a row.  She told us a lot of people offered but she loved being with my kids for Christmas! We have a nice dinner (I luck out Bryan is a good cook and will help me!) and watched our favorite Christmas movie "It's a wonderful life" and a movie on the nativity. It was a awesome evening.  And Blake got his Christmas wish and it snowed like crazy christmas eve.  Like a foot of snow. 

 I noticed late Christmas eve my Easton started with a fever out of nowhere.  I'm still not sure what it was! But when the older boys got us up before 6 I wasn't about to make him get up if he wasn't feeling good.  This is the second year he missed most of Christmas morning and it honestly bothers me but it's ok. 

 Santa brought my older boys guns! tysons back was to me or I would have photos of him opening his present too. They were excited to say the least. 

 Stockton got a batman set- Brett a Paw patrol set from Santa.  Ty got a kindle from me. 

 "you'll shoot your eye out!" 

 After Blake had opened a few presents I noticed he was laying down... he had the same dumb bug Easton had! He was sick for Christmas. At least he felt well enough to be apart of everything. 

 Easton didn't really care about anything- not even the wrapping paper.  He just wanted the candy the kids got in their stockings. 

 Brett had picked out a knife he wanted to give Bryan (we draw names and Brett got Bryan) I loved this moment when Bryan opened his present. 

I stayed home with the sickies while Bryan took the other boys to church. He sent me a picture of Brett asleep in his chair... but they were there at least!

We ended the day with Stockton loosing his first tooth! Grandpa Palmer had come over to say hi and helped us pull it out.  A little too helpful though because the tooth went flying and we still haven't found it yet! 

Birthdays! Blake and Stockton

I know I'm jumping around all over the place on my blog but I had to write something about my boys birthdays! First is Blake- he turned 9 in October. The day of his birthday we were leaving to my parents house before our trip to disneyland. So to say I was busy that day was a understatement! My main goal of the day was to not let his birthday be forgotten with our big trip coming up. Sadly my camera was broken (and I didn't know it) so my photos aren't the very best... but you can still get the idea. Blake really wanted a bike- his old one was way too small.  He was so pumped when he went outside to find it! He also got a Curry jersey (his favorite basketball player) a john wayne poster and some john wayne movies. He was going through a huge John Wayne phase at the time so he was so excited about them.  I also gave him a skateboard that he loved.  He loved it so much he took it on our trip to California- without me knowing about it until it was too late. We went to lunch with Grandma and Grandpa Palmer, Cory and his family at Chuck or Rama where Blake wanted to go.  Blake was way happy to see his cousin Luke. At my parents house later that day my mom gave him a mini drone that he loved! We also had some cheese cake (Blakes request) and had some hot tub time before our Disney trip. I sure hope he felt like it was a good birthday- I tried really hard to make him feel special with all the craziness with our trip! 

Stockton turned 6 in November.  He is such a funny kid it totally breaks my heart he is growing up.  I know all the funny little boy things he does are starting to go away with age and it makes me so sad! He really wanted to decorate the house for his birthday so he stayed up the night before to help me.  He did the purple around the stairs all by himself. Stockton got some batman toys, a nerf gun and star wars toys too. We dropped Brett off at preschool and went to visit Grandpa Pack at Grandma Jenkins house in the morning then took Stockton to kindergarten to share his "about me" book! He was so excited to wear his crown and tell his friends about the things he likes. 

 We also took his friend Brody to the jump zone to play. There wasn't a lot of people there and it was perfect! Stockton showed me how he does flips and how to go off the rope swing.

I love this little boys- they are such a joy to me. So lucky to be their mom!

December 2016

I love the month of December.  I with Christmas wasn't so much work so I could enjoy it more! I really need to get all my shopping done way early so I'm not so stressed out! We started it out by going to SLC with the Palmers to stay in a hotel and see the Christmas lights. Blake got to go to the Utah Jazz vs Golden State basketball game with the neighbor boys and he absolutely loved it. We had our friend Christmas party and Palmer Christmas party at our home too. Christmas was a huge hit and I'll post more on that later. What a fun month! I also finished my first 365! I'm so proud of myself that I finished it! 

Hunt 2016

Bryan spent most of the fall hunting.  He would say otherwise but many a weekend was spent hunting. He only really had one tag and that was for the general hunt in our area.  He spent opening morning on the mountain top only to not really see anything worth shooting. He decided to take my boys on a easier hunt and they saw a few big deer but there were also some people there so he didn't dare shoot. They went to a little different spot the next day and took Bryan's dad with them.  Not 200 yards from the road they saw this deer and Bryan got it! My boys and father in law were so excited! Bryan especially loved having all of them with him.  Bad news for me he is having the stupid thing mounted to put him my house.  Insert eye roll here.  I'm not too thrilled about having a dead animal stare at me everyday but it's his house too. 

November 2016

November was the warmest November I can ever remember and I loved it. As much as I love living in cache valley I'm not a huge fan of being super cold. We had Stocktons birthday and Blake was in Jr. River hawk basketball.  Bryan was his assistant coach this year. We had warm weather- then a snow storm- then warm weather again.  It was all over the place! We had Thanksgiving at my parents house in Pleasant Grove.  It's always fun to see their other cousins. 

It was super warm one day and Brett kept begging me to put the sprinkler under the tramp. I was like no way it's the middle of November! I finally let in and he had a total ball for about a hour. Only like a week later it snowed.