Oh Christmas Tree Oh Christmas Tree

So we put up our Christmas tree this year on Thanksgiving day. Which I think will soon become our tradition, it gives us something to do during the day while we wait to go to our family gatherings. Anyway, that just means that I am a little, a lot, late in posting. (What can I say, what's new?)

Here are the boys on Thanksgiving morning, helping decorate the tree.

Square + Offset

I have been doing a lot of cakes off and on, but never seem to post them, or remember to take a picture. (It gets a little chaotic sometimes) This cake was done for a wedding two weeks ago. They wanted something simple with a red ribbon, and square. Those were the only requirements. So here it is. A 3 tier square, offset vanilla cake, with red ribbon, red and yellow roses, and a simple design.

Flowers, tutus, and other girly stuff!

Ok I have to admit something. Whenever Will and I meet someone for the first time and they see we have two boys, they usually ask "Are you guys pushing for a girl?" or "Boys, ugh, don't you wish you had a girl?". I usually respond, "nope, love boys, could have 10 more before I have a girl". I know that's really bad, but I really enjoy having boys in the house, I guess I can't compare, but I love the activeness, sports, rough housing with dad....etc. But back to my confession, there are few and certain times that I wish I had a little girl. Like I have said in the past, I love being creative or copying others creativeness and passing it off as my own. And there are sooooooooo many things for girls out there. I have come across soooooooo many things I would totally make if I had a girl to create for. And it would be a good excuse, because now I just create for my sisters or nieces, and Will just thinks it's a waste of money (I can see where he is coming from). I just wish there were more things for boys out there. Boys can't wear flowers in their hair, well Elam can (only inside the house, and because he has the cutest blonde curly locks), or tutus, or bandanna dresses. Ugh, I can go on for days. I guess I need to be more creative and think of some boys' stuff. In the meantime, back to flowers and tutus!!

Galatas 5:13

Like I mentioned in my last post, the theme for primary this year is Eternal Families. For those who don't know, they have a program towards the end of each year showing/show casing?? (I guess that's what you would call it) what they learned. Each child usually has a part or scripture to memorize, and a number of songs to sing, including Aiden. So many things were going through my head that could go wrong during this program, just involving my son. He could cry, he could mess around with the other kids, he could stand their with his finger in his nose(and yes that has happened before), but thankfully none of these occurred. He did so GOOD! He stood up and sang every song, he paid attention, he sat quietly waiting for his turn to get up to say his part. And when that time came he recited his part, in Spanish I might add, "Servios por amor, los unos a las otros", Galatas 5:13. And, BONUS, you could totally understand what he said. I was so proud!!!! That's my boy!!!!

Eternal Families

A few months ago the Primary Presidency in our Branch asked Will and I if we still had our suit and dress from our wedding. We said yes hesitantly, they responded asking if we would be willing to put them on to take a picture to help with their program. Well, their program for this year is all about Eternal Families. They had this idea to take all of the primary children to the temple and take a picture of them in front of it with a couple in their wedding wear. Honestly when they asked, she told us it would be in a month or so, so I kind of thought they would just forget and we were off the hook. A month came and just like I presumed they pushed it off for another month. Well I wasn't that lucky the second time around, they had already scheduled a time for all of the kids to meet. We sucked it up and squeezed into our gear.(I guess I was the only one squeezing because Will used his regular suit). Here is one of the shots from that day at the temple.

A little break

During my little blogging break, we had a chance to get away for a few days for a mini vacation. We decided to stay in town, for the sake of a long car trip with the kids, and got a room at a resort across town. We had a chance to visit some places, go shopping, and of course hang out by the pool. Here are a few shots of the kids enjoying themselves.

na na na na na na na na na na na na na na na na Batman

Oh my, it has been forever. Actually only a few weeks, but still! Anyway, as you all know, Halloween just passed, and Aiden was really excited about dressing up. The holidays have been really fun this year. As the kids get older, they understand what each holiday is about, and get super excited about them.(Them getting excited, makes me excited) Aiden has been into Batman for a while now, and was pretty set on being Batman for Halloween. Once we had his costume figured out, we still felt it was missing something..................................And then we figured it out.

What is Batman without Robin?

Batman and Robin at the church party before they went trick or treating.

Batman showing off some of the candy he won.

Robin

Batman and Robin escaping from the jail the bad guys threw them in.

A shot of Batman right before he broke the pinata!!

"Mooit Mooit"

The boys really love dancing to one of 'Madagascars' songs, 'I like to move it, move it'. I am sure most of you know the song. Elam really gets a kick out of it. Whenever we are on the computer he wants us to play what he calls "mooit mooit"(we usually YouTube it). Anyhow, one day a few weeks ago while we were out running errands, we stopped at the store and I ran in and left Will in the car with the kids. They were listening to songs on Radio Disney when "mooit mooit" came on. Aiden started dancing, he likes to shake his butt like the hippo from the YouTube video, and Will started recording. Here it is.

Feeding the Giraffes!

The Phoenix Zoo has a new area open where you can view the giraffes even closer than before. We got to check it out as a family not to long ago when Will took the day off. It was really cool to be so close and able to touch them. They also allow you to feed the giraffes for a small fee, so we asked Aiden if he wanted to do it, and he was really excited about it. That excitedness (if that's a word) quickly turned into nerves when it was time to perform. Daddy stepped in and helped. Here are a few pictures of our day at the zoo.

Love the Science Center!

My work is done! Last week was my last week of helping at Willbert's work. Sariah came back after having her baby and the other lady comes back tomorrow from vacation. Like I have posted in the past, we have been keeping busy, busy, busy! I was recently going through some photos that I have been meaning to play with, and came across some from the science center and the zoo. The kids really love the science center. We could probably hang out there all day, if I would let them. They have had a lego exhibit up for a few months now, and now are changing it to a 'Robots' exhibit (we are looking forward to checking that out this week). Here are a few shots of the lego exhibit where the kids enjoy being kings and queens.

By the way, check out Aidens mouth in the last shot. We were playing in the computer room and he climbed on the bench, got a little excited and

miscalculated or something. Long story short, slammed his face into the table! This knocked his front tooth pack just a hair, bruised his gums pretty bad, and gave him a mean fat lip! He handled it like a trooper though!!!

Crazy busy!

Why doesn't it seem that for a few days there's nothing really going on? There is the usual, errands and lunches and fun activities for the kids, but then when there is stuff that needs to be done, the list is endless and there is never any time. These past few weeks have felt like that!!! I have been helping Willbert's work out while the other girls are on vacation, so depending on the day, I have been doing between seven and eight hour days. Don't get me wrong, not a big deal. Been there done that, haven't had to do it for a while, but can handle it. But by the time I drive across town and take the kids to my moms and then turn back around and head to the office, repeating after work as well, it can make for a long day. I'm not complaining, I volunteered myself to help them, the driving and long days just get old fast. One thing positive about it, ok a few things positive about it, extra cash, it's just temporary, adult interaction as well as conversation, and it makes me appreciate it even more, the fact that I get to stay home everyday with kids (Last one makes it all worth it).
Like I was saying, there is a lot of stuff going on. My sister and I have been doing 2-3 cakes a week (pictures coming), we finally did our "virtue" night at church and almost everyone was there (turned out better than we had expected), baby shower gifts, cake, and games,......the list continues.....why do I always volunteer myself for so many things??

Dodgers Cake

As you can imagine I have not been really good about keeping up on this blog (like I mentioned before) let alone my CupsNCakes blog. My sister and I have done a lot of cakes over the past couple of months, but I have failed in posting them. Here is a recent one we did for the husband of my sisters boss. He is a chef to the Los Angeles Dodgers, and a big baseball fan, his wife wanted to surprise him for his birthday. She let us decide what to do, which is always hard, the possibilities are endless. We decided on this, wasn't exactly what we originally intended, but the results were still good! He really enjoyed it, and we are happy he did!

Both the home plate and the glove are made of red velvet cake with cream cheese frosting, topped with fondant. The "dirt" is brown sugar.

Walk, Walk, Walk

Elam has finally got this walking thing down. It took him a while, and a little of me telling him "stand up, stand up", to convince him that walking is just so much better than crawling. But I think he's got it. Here is a short video of him taking a few steps, and showing everyone he knows where his belly button is, pardon the camera angle.

I am such a slacker!! I don't blog for a week, thinking what do I have to blog about nothing is really going on that is REALLY important, and then start going through my camera and find all of these pictures of the kids from all of the activities they had done. Besides, deep down I am blogging for myself, (not many read this anyways), a journal of sorts, so that I can remember all of the many things I am blessed with and are able to do and have and enjoy!

Ok, just needed to get that out of me for a second, moving on! Elam is totally getting bigger and I have meant to post pictures of his first haircut and first steps, so on and so forth.(don't get me started again) So, I am going to have to just be on a roll here and bust out as many posts as I can!

We finally decided to cut Elam's hair. Well, actually I decided. Willbert did not want to, but I gradually convinced him. Here are a few pictures of the before Elam, just a little on the long side.

BEFORE:

See how long it was getting!!

Him deciding he was choosing his dads side and deciding he didn't want his haircut either!

AFTER:

Not to bad right? We still kept it a little shaggy, it gets curlier now that we have cut it.

Hamming it up for the camera!

Week 36 - Sept 14th - Contemplative

It's a new week which means another challenge from I ♥ Faces. This week the theme was "contemplative". After looking through a lot of my pictures, I decided to go with this one. I really love the different facial expressions each of my nieces and nephew are making. To me they all appear to be in different stages of the thought process, from deep to natural. They crack me up, I can sit here all day and just try to imagine what they were thinking at the time I took this. It will never get old!!

Make sure you head over to I ♥ Faces for some really cool "contemplative" photos!

Elams getting BIGGER!

It is just amazing to me how when kids get to a certain age, everything just starts clicking. I totally think its this walking thing, when they can start walking, they are all of a sudden smarter and aware of things. I know that sounds dumb, but I swear its true. Elam is discovering all of these new things, he is getting his own personality, and learning anything he can wrap his little brain around. He wants to walk everywhere now, he wants do be doing anything his big brother is doing, and he doesn't want you to hold him back. He is trying to say so many things, mom and dad are his favorite of course, but not far behind is 'caca'.(yes its what you think it is) It all started one day when I was changing his diaper after he had went (what we call in our house) 'caca'. He thought it was entertaining when I was making faces and telling him how smelly his 'caca' was. He then proceeded to repeat the word 'caca', I cracked up because it was hilarious, and he continues to say it because he sees it is getting a good reaction out of mom. Now his big thing is to say 'caca', laugh hysterically, and repeat over and over again. (I have to admit, I still crack up)

I just love this age though, he learns something new every day. That is precisely why I am going to get better at this blogging thing, I want remember all of these accomplishments of his. I want to remember how he points at everything he wants and smiles, how he likes to line up write behind brother to get his hair done too, or how he gets excited when brother lets him play with his game boy or dads PS3. I really love this age, kids really come into their own.

Here's a few pics of Elam enjoying his age just as much as we are. He loves to feed himself, we would probably let him more often if it weren't so messy. And like I said before, he will do anything his brother is doing, so here are a few pics from the AZ Science Center.

Week 33, Nostalgia Photo Challenge

This week at iheartfaces the challenge theme is "Nostalgia". I don't know about you guys but I was kinda like, 'what does that word mean again'? Yeah, I know, I'm a dork! I had a pretty good idea, but of course looked it up just to be sure. Once I got all that taken care of, I knew immediately which photo I wanted to enter. This is a picture I took of my niece in her daddy's duffle bag. For me this picture brings back memories of my Grandpa who was a marine, but for her and her family, this picture is both a happy memory and exciting reminder of their dad who should be coming home from Iraq in the next couple of months.


Make sure you clink on the link and head over to iheartfaces to check out some more really cool photos!

Dance Dance Dance

Usually when we are in the car for a long period of time the kids will watch a movie. About a week ago, I took the movie player out of the car to get some cleaning done. When there is no movie playing, we are usually listening to a kid song CD I had burnt or Radio Disney(all you moms out there know what I'm talking about). Well, we were flipping through the radio stations and Aiden heard this song and started dancing. I started recording it for Willbert to see, because I thought it was so funny. (I don't recommend doing this, as you can see I was driving) Any how, I thought I would share it with you guys. (I don't recommend the song choice either, at least for kids anyway) Here's his version of 'Poker Face'!!

Week 32 - “Bubbles” Photo Challenge!

It's another Monday photo challenge at iHeartFaces. (I love participating in these) The boys and I headed outside, bubbles in hand, to take some pictures. But because we live in Phoenix, it was a little too hot for the boys to wait around until I got a picture I liked. We didn't get much, but I really like the clarity of the bubbles on this picture, especially the one popping on his fingers. Hope you like!

Make sure you hop over to iheartfaces to check out some other really cool bubble shots.

The Girls

Like I posted last time, my little sister grew up and left for college last Saturday. It is just really weird, she should still be in 8th grade. I feel like the older I get, the younger the kids look when they graduate High School. I always tell myself, I wasn't that young looking or immature, I'm sure I probably was. I have begun editing some of the shots, but like usual, probably won't be finished with them for a few more weeks. I wanted to take some, "graduation" shots of both Sky and Morg because neither ever had any done this year. Yeah, I know, another weird thing, Morg is a freshman in High School this year! Even weirder!!!

The four girls!

Their tribute to High School Musical!

They are both so photogenic!