Maricopa Steamers

There is this big hobby train station (area? park?) near my in-laws house by Wet N Wild and they do a big light display every year. Since J is now old enough to enjoy it, we went to check it out (It's free with a toy donation, and we all know how much I like free).

J enjoyed the friendly snowman.

Then we went through the tunnel to get on the train

And then most of my pictures started to look like this

 Then I learned that kids are supposed to at least be able to walk in order to ride the train. So I figured Husband, his brother Justin, and J would ride and I'd go again with J after. So I snuck this one handed picture of them on the train. My apologies for the less than glamorous picture, but I wanted to give some sort of scale for the train. The trains are about 2 feet tall and you straddle the car, not baby juggling friendly since you could tip it with great big lunge.

Then one of the hobbists running the place told me he had a seat just for me and the kiddo up front. Since M was being rather sweet, I decided to go for it. There should be perks for wearing 12 month clothes when you are only 7 month. The kid fell asleep on the 20 minute ride. My kid. The one who hates sleeping! It was a Christmas miracle.

J then went to meet Santa after the ride.

They had a conversation that went something like this.

Santa: Hello! Did you ride the train?
J: Yep.
Santa: Did you have fun?
J: Yep.
Santa: Is that your brother?
J: Yep.
Santa: Did he ride the train?
J: Yep.
Santa: Have you been good this year?
J: Yep
Santa: Is yep the only thing you say?
J: Yeah

(cue laugh from onlookers)

Santa: What do you want for Christmas?
J: Purple.

More crochet fun

I missed a bday party for some first cousins once removed and wanted to make them a couple hats. This is a dino hat for K.

And this is the owl hat with rainbow yarn for M.

They are cuter than the impromptu picture turned out. I made a dino hat for J as well.

And my newest crochet piece de resistance is a Lala Loopsie character called Candy Broomsticks. I actually bought an etsy pattern because I was so impressed with these and this is the design yet another cousin once removed requested.

All the Lala Loopsies are slightly creepy looking, but this one in particular, when carried into an IHOP to meet your cousins at 9:00pm looks particularly odd.

Ball squats

I've been doing some workouts at my house with a friend a couple mornings a week. J thought ball squats looked like a good idea and started doing her own "essersizes"

Def: Magazine

mag·a·zine  (mg-zn, mg-zn)

n.

1. A periodical containing a collection of articles, stories, pictures, or other features. 

2. An excellent source of ripping entertainment

3. A good source of fiber

Right as he was caught

No remorse

Playing

This girl loves her brother

She even gave him a drink from her "water back"

I love when I hear them giggling together in the other room, although it does make me nervous. This time, she was just making him laugh with her puppy dog.

Sealings and Wings

So once upon a time my father-in-law challenged us to do some genealogy and take a family name to do temple ordinances. (Check out here for a quick run down on what that means. The family history and temple videos sum it up well). Ends up my Great Grandpa's third wife wanted to be found and through some small miracles, we were able to get all of her work done.  My cousin Matt had made a lot of progress on our line and we did a last minute meet up to do sealings. We invited some family to join us but since the invite was the day before it was just us.

 Then my sweet and pregnant sister-in-law had a craving for chicken wings and did a facebook shout out asking for the best place to find them.

(I told her to work the belly)

My amazing cousin said she had a friend that catered the best chicken wings ever. I said we should all meet up and do some sealings and then have a big chicken wing party afterwards. So Shane went to town and made the whole thing happen. She also was involuntarily bitten by the genealogy bug and made some big strides with our Creek Indian line. One great grandpa had written "roasting ear time" as a birthday. For reals. I can only hope it was ears of corn. 

 Matt dove in as well and they were able to have enough names prepared for us to do a special session with all of the available Maidennames

We're a good looking bunch!

Afterwards we had a big 'ol party hosted generously by Cheryl and Scott. Wings, pizza, tamales, ice cream sundaes, squeeze- its, pretty much paradise. My cousin Julie was kind enough to recruit friends to babysit the tons of posterity with her while we were at the temple. So many sacrifices were made by so many to make it happen and it was a truly beautiful experience.

Teddy Grahams

The other day I went down the cracker aisle for the first time in months. I had J pick out a box of Teddy Grahams at the grocery store since there are 6(!) flavors these days and they sounded good. Somehow the shape or the coating or something just makes them taste better. She was excited since we hadn't had them in a really long time. She put them in the cart and asked if she could have them in her yellow cup. I said sure and didn't really think about it.

Then we get home and I pour them in a bowl. She is upset and insists they go in a yellow cup. I look in our cup cupboard and can't find any yellow cups, but she is again insistent. I ask her to show me and she directs me to the tupperware cupboard and a light bulb hits.

This yellow cup was from our trip to Seattle last October, an impulse by to make the airplane ride more enjoyable. It has not been used since, but I'm a pack rat and didn't want to throw it away so I put it on the very top shelf with the unusual shape, recycled containers. And my 2 year old impressively remembered it, where it was, and what it is supposed to hold. 

She blows my mind.

It's a boy!

Big Sis is pregnant. The funny thing is she didn't find out until she felt a kick. She had no idea how far along she was until she had an ultrasound. Comes to find out she's 22 weeks pregnant! That's over half way friends. Best. Pregnancy. Ever.

Of course she noticed some stuff was up, but was able to write it off as something else each time since she had her youngest last December. And lest you think that is just ridiculous, remember they made a whole tv show around it happening to other people. (But it is still a little ridiculous)

She had a fun little gender reveal party where we all put on some colored washi tape with our votes. She cut the mystery cake my aunt made and...

It's a boy!