I have a five year old!

My sweet little Carter turned five years old this Christmas. I can't believe I'm old enough to have a five year old. Oh how time flies. He's been talking about his birthday for months now and I do feel some of the birthday excitement gets overlooked by Christmas. I'll admit he gets a little jipped of the attention being on him. Plus there's so many presents they don't mean as much. However, he did get two parties this year and when I told him we would have one with the Westergard's on Christmas Eve and then another on Christmas with the Slater's he said, "so I turn five and then six?" He wishes ;D

Carter is such a good little boy and has a very sweet spirit about him. He tries to please and is pretty obedient. He is very observant and watches and hears everything. His preschool teacher says he'll just quietly listen to the song during music time while they are learning it for a couple days and then all the sudden he'll just belt out the whole thing. He's very smart and it's a complete miracle he is so smart and healthy for being born so early and tiny. Carter is very tall and skinny because he won't eat hardly anything. He just isn't interested in food and is very picky. Carter is a good big brother and watches out for Garrett, he's kind of motherly at times and wants to protect him. Carter loves to play golf with his dad, he's getting better at soccer, and loves being outside playing in dirt. Carter loves trucks, trains, and tech gadgets. His favorite movie is Toy Story 3 and favorite food is mac & cheese. He likes the color green and learning new things at preschool, and being around other kids. He is finally telling me about what he does at school and talking a lot. Carter is very loud when he plays and has very loud sound effects when playing with his trucks. I love this little guy more than anything and his sweet smile can melt my heart.

Happy Birthday my big five year old!

We had a Toy Story birthday party

Christmas Eve Birthday at Grandma Westergard's

A second party at Grandma Slater's on Christmas

Look at the big present

Carter and Mom

Merry Christmas 2010

We had a really nice Christmas this year. It was busy and I still need to work on simplifying it, but at least I wasn't doing last minute shopping this year which was a big relief. Carter is old enough to know all about Christmas now and he was super excited. I would ask him what he wanted from Santa and his answer always changed. His funniest answer one day was that he told me he wanted a garbage can. "I want a little one mom for my garbage and things."He was very serious about it and I had to laugh. He got a garbage truck instead. He would also get all the toy book magazines out of the newspaper and read them like they were a novel. He carried them around constantly saying, "I want this mom." I tried to chuck them but it about broke his heart. Garrett doesn't get the whole Christmas thing yet but loved ripping into presents and opened many that weren't his.

We started our celebration Christmas Eve at Grandpa/ma Westergard's house. We had a nice dinner and then read the Christmas story together. We also celebrated Carter's birthday with that side of the family that evening. After coming home we opened our Christmas pajamas and headed to bed.

Christmas morning brought all kinds of excitement. Carter and Garrett got spoiled again. Mark got a Droid cell phone which he won't put down and I got a new camera that takes HD video.

Later that morning we went to Grandpa/ma Westergard's again for a delicious breakfast and to open gifts with them. We then went to my Mom's to open gifts with all my family and eat a Christmas lunch. A full day of craziness! We then celebrated Carter's birthday with my family and stopped by to visit my Grandma Slater on the way home. Whew what a day!

The kiddie table at Grandpa/ma Westergard's Christmas Eve

Susan always makes the table look so nice for dinner

Opening Christmas pajamas

Looks like Santa came!

Carter got his big red firetruck

Garrett got Woody complete with a hat (he loves the hat)

Mark so excited to get new clothes

The disaster zone

Mark with his Droid phone

Can you picture him rubbing his hands together in excitement?

Opening presents from Grandpa/ma Westergard

More craziness at my Mom's house

My lovely mother

Jordan and his cute boys

Ty and Carter checking out his new toy

Merry Christmas Everyone!

Getaway to St. George

For our seventh anniversary we took a fun little trip to St. George with the kids. I know... so romantic... kids on our anniversary. But we were gone for 5 days and 4 nights and I admit I just can't stay away from them that long without worrying a ton. I'm pretty attached to my little sweeties. We had a great time, and St. George had awesome weather while we were there. We got our Christmas shopping finished up and went to the movie "Tangled," and ate at yummy restaurants.

The boys loved sharing a big bed at the hotel and didn't want to leave. We went swimming in the pool in the mornings, shopped and ate in the day, and did some special activity each day. I enjoyed our evening at the Tuacahn Ampitheater. They had a live nativity, dancing performances, the boys saw Santa, and then they had a train ride. They are both into trains right now, and Garrett squealed with delight when he saw it. Choo Choo!

I also loved our visit to Snow Canyon. The red rock is beautiful, and we played in the sand dunes. The weather was around 62 degrees and the boys thought they were in heaven! Surrounded by piles and piles of sand. I really wish I could talk our families into moving down there with us. I love St. George!

Carter so excited to get away

Garrett's first time in a big bed. He fell out about 5 times each night. He thought he was pretty cool though sleeping with Carter.

More time was spent in the hot tub than the chilly pool

Our night at Tuacahn

Cheese!

The live Nativity

The lit up Choo Choo train

Sitting on Santa's lap. Carter asked for a big firetruck and Garrett wasn't so sure about the big guy.

Playing in the Sand Dunes

It's so nice to get outside in the winter.

Family Pictures~Fall 2010

Family pictures are one of my least favorite things to do. They take a lot of work. First, I had to find outfits for everyone to wear, and they had to be in the same color tones so we didn't look funny. Then, everyone needs to get a haircut and look well groomed. Finally, comes the mad dash out the door. For some reason it just never works out smoothly for me. We can't find a shoe or a belt; or someone gets toothpaste on their clothes. I'm usually running around the house ironing this, looking for that, and then my makeup won't go on because I'm sweating. It always ends up being a bad hair day on the only day I really care to have a good one. After all that my children refuse to smile for their pictures. This makes for a mother who is about to lose it. So I avoid getting pictures for as long as possible.

This year I was crazy and did it twice. We desperately needed some family pictures since we didn't have any with Garrett in them who is now two. Our first photo shoot was with the Westergard family. One of Susan's cousins took our pictures. My boys refused to smile and only wanted to play with their cousins. It was rather entertaining as all the little ones bawled through their photos. I didn't love them. The color was very pale and we all looked liked ghosts, but oh well, at least they're pictures. So I then had my good friend Aubree take some of our family on a different day. That meant getting ready all over again eek!

Aubree was very patient with my boys who again refused to smile. Actually, Carter did pretty good, but my little attitude Garrett would bawl whenever the camera focused on him. Frustrating! However, we got some good ones and between both photo shoots we are set. Thanks for your patients Aubree! She has a photography blog here if you're looking for someone to take your pictures. She's awesome!

These first pictures were done by one of Susans' cousins, I believe her name is Shari.

The following pictures were done by Aubree.

This is how Garrett acted for both photo shoots.

Carter can make a perfect frown.

Attitude!