Newest Game!

We received Nerf Dart Tag from Uncle Charley and the boys for Christmas. We just wanted to say that EVERYONE loves this newest game. Including Jane!

We'll be home for Christmas. . . . If Only in Our Dreams

Merry Christmas!

The Night Before Christmas

Joseph and Mary travel to Bethlehem to pay their taxes,

and behold the son of God is born and wrapped in swaddling clothes, and laid in a manger.

Shepherds abiding in the fields are visited by an angel and shown the way to the new born babe.

The shepherds go unto the stable and worship the Lord.

Wise men also come unto the Lord and bring gifts and worship him there.

Merry Christmas to all and to all a Good Night!

Emma's FIVE years old!

Our little girl turned a whopping 5 today. It was a fun day for the whole family.

She opened her presents before any thing else could be done, including breakfast. Note Philip's absence in the photos of her unwrapping her presents. He was in his high chair eating. We just couldn't take the screaming anymore.

Just getting started...

Thanks for the dress, Gramma!

The dollhouse. Fisher Price made a boatload off of us this year.

After the kids played for a while with all the new fun stuff, we went to Emma's pick for lunch, Sonic, then to "Princess and the Frog." We all enjoyed it and laughed a lot.

The Cinderella cake.

Birthday wishes (as Philip sneaks a peek at what's going on).

Thanks all for the birthday wishes. She had a memorable one.

It's Beginning To Look a Lot Like Christmas

Our tree is finally up and Christmas is upon us! Nato finished his semester of school and so we found time to get the tree up and the house ready. Even the kids look like Christmas. Everyone is getting excited and ready for the big day!

One of our family traditions is to make gingerbread houses. Nato and Robin used to make one large one together, but now we make mini houses for each child, at least those big enough to decorate. This year we had three houses. Our village seems to grow each year.

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Why We Miss Florida

We miss Florida for may reasons. There is the closeness of Disney World and the beautiful Orlando Temple. There is also the dear friends we made while we were there. But today I realized what else I miss about Florida

The WEATHER!

Yes is we have lows in the 30's and today we actually had snow flurries, but that is even a stretch to call them that. We could see them a little out the window, but by the time Jacob got his coat on and ran outside it was pretty much gone.

While in Florida it was a little hard to get into the Christmas spirit when it was just 80 every day, so that has been a nice change. The thing I forgot all about in Florida was the laundry.

I have never, until now, done a load of just denim! A whole load devoted to the pants we are wearing to keep us warm! I am a little bothered by the fact that I have now summer and winter close to rotate in and out of drawers, but the laundry is every week and I feel as though my load quantity has tripled since our move here.

Not only are pants bugging me but socks as well. Before we had a pair per person that had been worn on Sunday. That was easy to match and put away, but now I can't believe how annoying it is to deal with matching and sorting socks. No wonder my mother always got them in the wrong drawers when I was a kid! I definitely have a new appreciation for her and for Florida!

Thanksgiving Day

This Thanksgiving we found out that Nato is not the only fan of pumpkin pie around here. Philip decided that it too was his favorite! We only wish we would have known this BEFORE we left the pie within his reach.

Most of the pie actually made it into his mouth and his appetite was only sparked by this as he gobble his slice up quickly after dinner as well!

We asked each of the kids (all except Jane of course) what they are thankful for and here are their replies. Hope your Thanksgiving was great. Turkey! Turkey!

First Day of Nursery

Today was Philip's first day in Nursery! Boy how he has grown! He did well. He just became tired the last 30 minutes or so. Then he was grumpy for them. He has held onto his morning nap longer than any other child of ours. I am sure this is because he has so many siblings that wake him earlier in the morning than any other 18 month old in our family has woken.

Here he is! After church and he still seems fairly pleasant and Oh So Cute! I might be a little biased there!

Disney World

It is time once again for our family's annual Disney World trip. This tradition began over three years ago when Robin found the Disney Dinning plan for free and we met some of her family for a two week long trip. Ever since then we have met up with some portion of her family each fall to Disney it up.

This trip had a sad note attached to it. Robin's sister Becki and her family were to join us, but on the night before their departure tragedy hit their family and they were unable to come. Thankfully Disney completely refunded all of their money and they are looking hopeful to joining us on our 2010 trip! So we went along without them and had a pretty good time anyway, considering the loss.

We had scheduled two days to travel there as we were going by minivan. In the end we decided to drive the full 15 hours in just one day so that we would have a whole day to attend the Orlando Temple before our vacation actually started. Would I recommend this course of action? Well the temple was really nice and it feels like "our" temple still,

but Philip was really, really tired and the next day he was really, really grumpy, so I don't think we will attempt that route again.

I think next year we will try to break it up and just try to hit Orlando early enough the second day of driving to make it to the temple.

Philip did end up pleasant through the majority of the trip. We just had to make sure he got to nap enough in the stroller.

We even caught him doing some pretty cute things. Here he is hugging and kissing this display about Princess Tiana as a little girl from the new "Princess and The Frog" movie. But really can you blame him? She is a real cutie.

We found the crowds in November to be REALLY light. We were able to ride Toy Story Mania 3 times each day (All with fast passes). This is a real triumph after visiting in more crowded months when just getting a second set before they all run out is a miracle.

We honestly walked onto almost everything.

This year we had the older kids, Jacob and Emma, earn money to spend in the park. The littler kids were allowed one thing for Mom and Dad to buy them. Benjamin chose this Rex dinosaur from the Toy Story movies. He packed it everywhere although we had to stop letting them bring toys on the rides with them after Benjamin left Rex in the boat on the Pirates of the Caribbean. We did find him later that night and all ended well.

Emma was determined to buy this Jessie doll. She talked about it before we even got there. McKinley got one last December and Emma just adores McKinley. Plus with Benjamin's love for the movie and playing with Buzz and Woody at home she knew she wanted Jessie to play along with all the boys.

Recently the kids have watch singing in the rain a couple times. So naturally EVERY light post we saw at Disney world had some kid "singing in the rain."

I mean literally EVERY light post and there are quite a few in the park and near our hotel room. This made traveling down the street rather slow, but it was sure fun to watch.

The whole trip was full of fun.

Last year Jacob acquired a book on Vikings here in EPCOT and has since fallen in love with the history of Vikings and all things surrounding their history. He was so excited to return here and see MORE stuff about vikings.

Although it was a little early for us, they already had holiday lights and things up everywhere. We kept asking ourselves, "Did we already eat a turkey somewhere and just forgot about it?" It was hard to believe is was still just the beginning of November with so much holiday magic around us.

The best part of the experience was that we seemed to be an attraction ourselves. Walking down the street, or riding the bus it didn't seem to matter. "Five kids! You have five kids!" people would say to us. At first we were confused, then annoyed, then we realized that our children were also hearing these comments and we didn't want their spirits dampened by them. We decided to just be upbeat in our replies. "You sure have your hands full!'' was met with "Isn't it wonderful!" and "I don't envy you!" was given a "You should because these kids are great!" Not only did it help quiet the negativity our kids might have been feeling, it helped us feel much lighter in our burdens. Even the ones we had before the comments. It was very enlightening and we are determined to keep this attitude at home too.

We usually don't meet many characters on our trips. Mostly because we have met them before and our children honestly feel as though they know the characters and the characters know them. They don't feel the need to "meet" them all over again, but this year when we saw Jessie, Emma had to go show her the doll she had worked so hard to buy. Jessie was in love with both the doll and our children.

This year we tried a new restaurant called Beaches and Cream Soda Shop. The burgers and sandwiches we good but the ice cream was the draw here. We were told it was the best but we really didn't think that meant it was necessarily the BIGGEST! This is Nato's Sundae. The menu just called it No Way Jose, I think they meant no way could you eat the whole thing, but somehow Nato got it down. After all, it was peanut butter and chocolate, he can eat ANYTHING that is peanut butter and chocolate. Robin's sundae was just as big, but she ate only about half of it before her head began to swim.

The kids each had Mickey Mouse Sundaes

I think the cookies were their favorite parts. Though the strawberry ice cream was Sooooooo creamy!

They even had little tails on the mice made from cherry stems.

While we were there someone ordered the BIGGEST SUNDAE on the menu. They call it "The Kitchen Sink" because it has everything thing on it and in it you can even imagine. A total of a gallon of ice cream, tons of toppings and one whole can of whipped cream. All served up in, yep you guessed it, a bowl that looks like a kitchen sink! This picture doesn't show it, but the bowl had a little faucet and everything! As they served this to the customer they turned on music and flashing lights it was quite a display. Before we left we had all had so much ice cream we were ready to swear off ice cream for months!

Luckily this only lasted about 24 hours then we were ready to dive back into our favorite popsicles and ice cream bars.

Not to mention frozen lemonade!

There were tons of promotional things for the new movie, "The Princess and The Frog." It has all made us really excited to go see it when it comes out in December.

Our trip was full of many not so fun, but kind of funny to look back on, things. One night someone puked in bed. Two nights later that someone had a bloody nose all over the pillow and sheets, the next night the same bed was wetted. Our poor housekeeper must have just loved us! We won't name any names, because Emma gets embarrassed when we talk about her. But to her advantage, she had nice clean sheets each day to sleep on. Definitely a perk. To sum it all up our trip was fun and we look forward to the next when the Thompsons (and maybe some others) join us.

Jane's Blessing Day

This morning Benjamin came down stairs and saw Jane all dressed in white for her special day. "Mommy? " he asked, "Is Jane getting married today?"

Although Jane did not get married today she had a wonderful day anyhow.

Everyone was excited to hold our special girl.

Especially Papa and Grandma Taylor who are in town to visit. This made today and easy selection for Jane's blessing.

It seems our little family is growing a little too big for the small couch. Well maybe not, because squishing IS a lot of fun!

Philip seemed to be extra excited to take pictures with Papa.

Though he was a little standoffish in the beginning, Philip decided to just adore Papa. Who could resist such a great man anyway!