Christmas in January

This year since we went out of town we

During Christmas Break

During the break we had some sick kids but we still managed to have a good time.

It snowed! Wendy came from California and we actually saw her several times!
Here the kids are playing in our backyard.

She even took Ruby and Squish ice skating one night while I was working!

We saw Katie and her kids for the tiniest amount of time possible, like 30 minutes-not long enough!!

Lots and lots of Basketball. And sometimes in a horse head mask.
Sonic has been wanting one for forever and finally got it. I know. Why? But it is actually pretty funny.

Gracie turned 8! Here she is with her sidekick.

Nina with her buddy Kiki-especially when Kiki let's her watch Frozen videos!

Nina finally expressed interest in what Santa brought her-a slide!!

We went to Build a Bear to redeem gift cards from Christmas. That was a fun outing!

Look at Nina's colorful Panda!

We had a fun New Years Eve celebration with family. We ate at the Training Table and then went back to cousin's to hang out and wait for midnight.

And Wendy did my hair that day. She cut about 5 inches and have me "peekaboo" color streaks.

Christmas Eve and Day

Christmas Eve we spent at cousins as usual. We had a nice back to Bethlehem dinner. 

The kids performed a beautiful program. I love this picture of Squish and Gracie singing.

And for Christmas Day our tradition is that we are in charge. This year we had Shrimp Etoufee and it was delicious. Then we went to see Annie again then came back to open presents and have a hot cocoa bar. 

Christmas morning was full of excitement and cheer. Here is what Santa brought! Sadly Nina got sick and woke up throwing up in the middle of the night!

Here are the excited kids ready to see what Santa brought them:

Sonic got an Assassin's Creed Jacket. Yes, I know.

Squish got a basketball hoop!

Santa brought Ruby a real live hamster!
Nina finally woke up long after presents were opened and had no desire whatsoever to touch hers.

Thanksgiving 2014

These are the only pictures I could find from Thanksgiving weekend. And I give full credit to my sister's blog.

We had a delicious turkey dinner and lot's of guests from Wyoming. Then we rested for 5 minutes and went shopping for Black Friday, because that's what we do. Then we woke up early for more black shopping. And then we had pizza that night where we took a picture with the Statue of Liberty because that is as close to NYC as we were going to get. We had some unexpected expenses come up like our second car breaking down again, so we weren't able to make our annual trip to NYC this December. Big frowny face.

Why was Sonic all alone?

Leah's Visit for Conference Weekend

Leah had planned to go to Washington to see her family this weekend but the flights were too full so she ended up staying with us. I was sad she didn't get a chance to see her family but secretly happy that I got to spend time with her. She came with us for our traditional trip to Leatherby's and DI while the men were at the Priesthood Session of Conference. Leah might as well be a part of our family!

Then the next day we celebrated both Kiki and Alex's birthday! Here are most of the cousins with a few extras, Andre and Courtney.

Trip to Louisana

We've been needing to go to Louisiana for some time to see Jonas' family. They still had not met Nina and Mom Rose has been having many health problems.
It took us sooo long to get there because we had to: drive to Las Vegas, fly to New York, fly to New Orleans and then drive two hours to Lafayette. It was a LOT of traveling and it sure felt good to be there when we finally arrived.

We stayed with Shawndricka, Papa Duck's sister. They took great care of us.
Here's a few of the beautiful pictures that Jonas took while we were there.

Uncle Trey, Chasity and KayKay

Jalana (Aunt Tuttie) with her 4 children

Papa Duck with his mom Grandma Dorothy with almost all of his siblings. 

The ones missing are Brock and Dexter.

This one does have Dexter (next to Papa Duck)

Grandma Dorothy

Lavar (Uncle Dano) with his boys

We got so many relatives together at the park for a big bbq. Everyone kept saying how long it had been since everyone had gotten together. One thing was for sure, it was HOT!!

On the last day we left early so we could spend a few hours in New Orleans. We drove to the area (Ninth Ward) that had been hit the hardest by Hurricane Katrina and then walked around the French Quarter and had beignets at Cafe Dumond.

Labor Day

For Labor Day we went to Red Butte Gardens because they were having a free entrance day. After that we had a picnic and spent 30 minutes looking for parking at Hogle Zoo only to find out that we were wrongfully told it was a free day there too. Ah, memories! Then most of the family went to see a movie and I took Ruby to go get her hair done!

Look at this cute picture! Nina does love her aunt!

Fourth of July Holiday

We spent the 4th of July holiday the way we have for the past few years--in Layton face painting at the huge Liberty Days event! I don't have any pictures of my painting because I was busier than a one armed paper hanger, but Papa Duck was my line manager and Sidney and Kailee painted too, as needed. The rest of the family helped with the kids and were a huge help.

Summer Fun!

Papa Duck made these cute little mushrooms for the Princess Festival. He made them! 

Doesn't Nina look adorable?

And here she is in the cute dress my parents brought back from Guatemala!

Taking advantage of the pass of all passes we had this year. We went to Raging Waters about 4 times, not too bad although we would have liked to go more.

Jenny did West Fest this year and she did a great job face painting! In the evening I met her and helped and Ruby did balloons!

A night out at Taylorsville dayzz!

We had such a fun time until Ruby realized that she had dropped her envelope of hard earned cash ($23!)

We spent a long time looking for it with no luck. :(

Another sad thing this summer was that the Princess Festivals were not as successful as previous years. A lot of things did not go in our favor, including the weather-it even snowed in June! In the end we learned a lot from the mistakes that were made and hopefully next year will be much better.

Of all of the festivals, the West Jordan one was the most successful. Because there was a lot more traffic, Ruby decided to try to sell balloons and she made over $60 in one day! She recruited some help from her friend but even so she was super busy!