March

After not being able to find my camera charger for the last month I finally ordered a new one. I'm sure the old one will show up any day now that I don't need it! But at least I can take pictures again.

The beginning of March Kaleb came home with a sign-up sheet for wrestling and begged us to let him do it. Out of all of the sports out there I never imagined Kaleb would want to wrestle. He's pretty sensitive and I wasn't sure how he would handle it since sometimes you do get hurt. Matt wrestled in high school and so Matt showed him a little of how to do it and what you do and Kaleb was ready to start. 

Matt took Kaleb and Ashton to sign-up since we figured Ashton would love to wrestle and they allowed preschoolers to sign-up. Surprisingly, the kid who loves to beat up and wrestle with his dad and brother said he was too scared so Matt didn't sign him up. Why spend the money if he doesn't want to do it.

Kaleb has really improved and his last matches at the tournament yesterday were his best. He does great getting out of holds and is learning how to move quicker. We only had tears at one practice when the kid smacked him across the face pretty hard but other than that he's been handling it pretty good knowing that sometimes you get hurt but that's the nature of the sport.

It's been a crazy month with wrestling 3 times a week and in between we're helping my dad remodel a condo. Actually, I haven't been much help but Matt's tried to help where he can. Tonight we'll go pick-up the kitchen cabinets from Ikea and hopefully get them all installed tomorrow.

Ashton's Birthday

 Ashton had a great 4th birthday in January. He wanted a Star War's cake and my aunt and uncle picked up an awesome Clone Wars cake for him. He still talks about how cool the cake was. 

 

On his birthday Ashton took his birthday money and gift card and picked out some toys at the store. Then on Sunday with family we had cake and ice cream and he opened more presents. He was so excited and kept squealing when he opened a new Star Wars ship.

I can't believe he's 4! Lately Ashton has been wanting to be carried around and before his birthday I told him when he turned 4 he was too big to be carried. He was kind of sad that we wouldn't pick him up anymore. He asked Matt to hold him on his birthday and Matt said he couldn't because he was too big. Later he came to me and asked me and not thinking about it I picked him and he said, "Look, you can hold me, I'm not too big anymore. But daddy can't carry me anymore." 

Monday our whole family went to the Jazz game for my mom's 50th birthday. Ashton wasn't a fan of the noise but he wouldn't keep his ear plugs in. Kaleb loved the game and would scream, cheer, and dance. We were glad they pulled out a win after being behind for most of the game.

We did finish remodeling my parents basement rental last week and it was nice to finally finish. It has a small kitchen but it was still alot of work. It made me think twice about ever wanting to remodel my own kitchen.

Christmas did happen at our house...

It's been a crazy month for us with the holiday's and helping my parents with their basement. We should be done in a day or two and life will get back to normal.


This is a scanned picture from our ward Christmas Brunch.

We had Christmas Eve at our house and the turkey was the best I've ever had. No wonder this turkey recipe is the #1 recipe on food networks web-site, it's awesome. We had yummy food and great company. My uncle Glenn made Kaleb this frame with a sharks mouth and also a box with a skeleton from a mouse that he preserved/prepared himself. Kaleb loves stuff like this and thought it was pretty cool. (Not sure what my dad and Glenn are talking about in the background :)

I took a peek after Santa came to take a picture of the presents.

Santa left a note in our advent calendar for the boys that said he had left one more surprise for them downstairs by their tree.

 

Our church didn't start until 11am and so the boys had plenty of time to open their presents.

  

There were plenty of Lego's!

 

After presents we were off to church. My family came to our sacrament meeting since I was singing in the choir and then my sister spoke in her ward which is also in our building at 1pm so my parents and I went to her sacrament meeting too. The boys wouldn't have made it through 2 sacrament meetings so Matt volunteered to stay home with them. Then we were off to my aunt and uncles for dinner. This was the best picture I could get with the boys and I. Don't ask me what Ashton's hair is doing?

The boys wanted to take a picture of Matt and I and after many failed attempts Matt took one. We didn't really get presents for each other this year since there wasn't anything we needed and we love spoiling the boys more than ourselves but I guess it's a good thing because we ended up buying a new car shortly after Christmas. And not because we wanted to, it's a long story but we love our Chevy Traverse and we hope (cross fingers) that it will last longer than our last car!

December

It's a busy time of year with all of the parties and family gatherings and it's all too much for Ashton!

I think being tired and eating too much is pretty accurate of how I feel through much of December. Ashton fell asleep eating a roll on the way home from Sunday dinner.

Matt is a trooper, he helped me make/dip 6 batches of Almond Toffee along with Peanut Butter Balls and Caramel Popcorn. Rather than spreading chocolate on top of the toffee I like to dip the pieces in chocolate and then crushed up almonds. If you've ever had toffee from Garden Gate Candy this is how they do their toffee and I love it. It's more work but I think it's worth it; after 6 batches I don't think Matt thought it was worth it.

Almond Toffee

1 lb. butter (4 sticks)

2 c. sugar

1/3 c. + 1 T. water

Almonds 

(approx. 1 c. coarsely chopped for pan and 2-3 c.ground for coating)

Add everything to a saucepan and cook on high heat stirring constantly with a wooden spoon until it reaches 310 degrees. Spread coarsely chopped almonds on a silpat (on a sheet pan) and pour the toffee over the almonds. After it cools, break up the toffee and dip into chocolate and then finely ground up almonds and let set.

Last week we had our Scherzinger Christmas Party and since we were planning on playing Christmas Minute To Win It games on Christmas with the Jorgensen's we brought the games along to play at this party. I think the videos I have of people trying to get rudolph's red nose to stick to their nose was the best part. The games were really fun to play and even more fun to watch.

 

On Sunday Kaleb's primary class for sharing time put on a shadow puppet play of the nativity. Kaleb was a narrator and also held the angel and star. The kids sent out invitations to come and watch and since I teach the 12-13 yr. old's for Sunday School my whole class came to watch and my dad and sister came to. His teachers did a great job putting it together and it was a great way of teaching about Christ's birth. It was one of the highlights for this month for me.

 Picture stolen from this blog, thanks Angie!

Christmas Eve dinner is at our house and I'm going to try to brine the turkey first. I've never done it before but I hear that it should stay more moist that way so we'll see. The boys are beyond excited at this point with only 3 DAYS LEFT before Christmas. Anytime Kaleb is mean to Ashton, Ashton reminds him he's on the naughty list and he's getting a big rock from Santa but of course Ashton is always on the nice list (in his mind anyways). With only 3 days left I better get busy, anyone want to come and wrap for me?

No More Long Locks...

November was a busy month with another session of swimming lesson. Kaleb loves being able swim around with his goggles on. Ashton does really well in the water and is working on his coordination with the different swimming strokes.

The biggest thing to note is that Ashton has a short haircut now! I was making rolls on Thanksgiving Day and Matt was trimming Ashton's hair which I usually do. I went to check on things and the bangs were too short and the sides were also to short to do a shaggy, longer haircut like he had so I had no choice but to cut it. This picture was right after we finished cutting his hair. Everyone can't believe how different he looks but he looks more like Kaleb did at that age. I miss the longer hair but he does look like a stud when his hair is spiked.

The Saturday after Thanksgiving we put up the Christmas decorations. The boys were so excited. They have their own tree in the basement that they put their ornaments that they collect on. They even built a train track to go around the tree downstairs. This is the tree in the living room. We have a skinnier tree and I have so many ornaments not all of them fit on the tree. The boys put most of the ornaments on the tree and surprisingly I only had to move a couple of them. Ashton thought the metal reindeer had to be with a friend but 2 to a branch was a little too heavy.

 Whenever we go on a trip for our souvenir we try to find an ornament to match our tree. This white gold leaf is from Yellowstone.

We've collected a couple from Disneyland too. It's fun because every time we put up the tree we remember where each ornament came from and the trip's we've taken.

Over the last couple of years we've been collecting the Jim Shore figurines of Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer but this year we added to the collection with some of the Disney figurines.

Matt bought  me this nativity set a couple of years ago and the stable was made by someone in our ward. I love the rustic wood stable.

Matt put the lights up on Veteran's Day (we didn't turn them on) since he was off and it was still warm outside. The "trees" are tomato cages I picked up at Home Depot and wrapped lights around. Another Pinterest idea I had to try and I'm glad I did.

We had our ward Christmas party last Saturday and the festivities keep going with family parties and lots of baking to get done. I'm just glad we had our Christmas shopping done before December started, one less thing to worry about!