It's Christmastime Charlie Brown!

Taking the kids to see the MACY'S SANTA downtown.

This Macy's really is so magical at Christmas.

Peter's form of protest while waiting in line for 1 hour and 45 minutes. Throwing himself repeatedly on the gross floor.

The waiting pays off once you get inside the Winter Wonderland. So many magical things to look at. Unfortunately the "elves," who might be considered a little cheerless, were constantly rushing everyone along once you got there.

And Santa didn't want to hear what the kids wanted. Oh well:)

Playing in the snow on Christmas Eve.

Right after this shot was taken, Jillian moved about a foot forward, and one of those large rocks positioned to be a button fell right where she had been standing.

Just for perspective on how massive this snowman is, my dad is 6'2".

The annual reading of The Grinch

Grandma's glasses

The stockings were hung by the chair with care...

Kevin just getting home from call Christmas morning - Thanks for working so hard for us Dad!

You always need ample "waiting on the staircase" shoots.

We've been holding on to this toy for some time until Jillian was old enough for it. Someone came up to me at the park and asked if I wanted to come and take it off of their hands.

Go Tarheels!

Peter loves animals!

And has a new found love of reading

Just need some private time with my Baby Doll.

Cheese Ball

"I love my new truck. Please don't touch it."

Winner, Winner, Ham Dinner

Union Station in D.C. to see the model trains and holiday decorations. Thought this display was pretty cool.

And had big people fun at the art museum in D.C.

A great Christmas! We especially loved talking to our missionaries!

Off to a great start

Well, judging from my birthday, I think this next year is gonna be a good one. Friday night Kevin said I needed to be home between four and six to receive a package. I asked if I could shake it and he just chuckled. 4:30 rolls around and turns out the package is my mom. She had driven up to surprise me, keep me company while Kevin was on call that night and watch the kids the next day while we went on a mystery date. Kevin got home from work and told me what to wear but not where we were going. When we got in the car he gave me a fun list of choices for the day.

1) Would I rather a) go home and sleep, b) go home and work on some projects, or c) ride the train into NYC?

Poor Kevin was exhausted after working all night. I wrote the man across from us a note to see if he would take a picture for me.

2) Would you rather a) play in central park, b) find a stream and through rocks in it, c) go to the MET, or d) go to the MoMA?

This one we decided to postpone when we found out it would be $40 for 1 hour, the amount of time we had to spend at the MoMA. We are really excited to check it out some day soon though.

3) Would you rather go shopping at a) The Gap, b) a hot dog stand, c) Banana Republic or d) The MoMA Design Store?

I love this store and all the fun designer innovations they have for your house. At Thanksgiving we found a fun shelf here that makes it look like your books are floating.

I forgot to take a picture but I got to pick from several fun restaurants and chose Max Brenner's Chocolate by the Bald Man. Delicious for any course! Thanks for introducing it to us, Emily and Grandma G.

The next choice was to 1) go home and watch Monk reruns, 2) throw rocks off of bridges or 3) Go see In the Heights at the Richard Rogers Theatre.

A face I'd love to run into, even on late night, underground.
Thanks, Hon!
And thanks Mom for babysitting.

Richmond and New Years

A few days after Christmas we headed down to Richmond to visit "the cousins," Grandma, everybody. (They really are our cousins. I just put it in quotes because that's what we always say when we are going to see them.) I wish I'd pulled out my camera more but here we are at Maymount (on a freezing cold day:) and then being gamers on New Years. It was a different, mellow type of year. We just took the holidays a little bit slower than we usually do. We missed our missionaries but it was nice to slow down a bit.

Peter cracks me up. He is always on the go and always wanting to be outside, no matter how chilly it is. The other day we went to the park and he was screaming as we left, partly because his hands were popsicles but mostly because he wanted to stay and play!
Concerned Tessa, or maybe she was just freezing?

Lauren, Jaime and I

Wish I'd gotten a picture of Meggie, the birthday girl

In the bird's nest

Five Crowns

The only revenge I could get on Mom when she was kicking my trash, more blackmail photos in the archive where this came from.

A Typical Morning

Don't you dare smile!

Peter's still in the reading-books-upside-down phase.
Mom thinks it's super cute.

He's liking books more and will sit a tiny bit longer to listen.

Mostly he just likes "reading" on his own, beside his big sister.

Love how that little body is experimenting with its movements.

Playing with the "moo-moos" (aka sheep from the Nativity)

Some days we just laze around in our jam-jams if we don't have anywhere to be. Sometimes I feel lazy and work on our "morning routine" but then I think about the years that lie ahead. There will be plenty of time for structure and "hurry, hurry, hurry" out the door. I'm trying harder to let them enjoy waking up slowly, well usually they wake me up, but allowing them to take their time getting dressed and explore whatever they run into around the house.

Watch this. It's hilarious. I put my paci in my boot.

Wanna see it again?

Farewell to Uncle Josh

We had such a great time seeing Josh off on his mission, the Utah Ogden mission. He was pretty nervous to give his talk, I mean, as a young man in the church you look forward to this day your WHOLE LIFE! - Hadley told him to just not pass out like he had one time passing the sacrament:) He gave a heartfelt talk on the Savior. He shared the story about slicing his leg on a piece of glass and how Katie was there to help him and then he talked about the parallel of always having the Savior with him. Grandma and Grandpa Zimmerman were there, as was Grandma Powers, Amy and Ovala, Lincoln, Jaime and Josh. We're so lucky to have amazing grandparents who support us and have given us wonderful examples to follow.

I think the Toiaivao's were being good and going to Sunday School:)

We can't wait, well, we can but we will be excited one day, to take a picture of this little guy in front of this sign. Ah, some day. Sigh.

We're so, so, so excited and proud of Josh. We love hearing about his excitement and love for missionary work and it was a real treat talking to him when he hadn't even been out a month on Christmas day. When I get my act together, I'm going to start posting his letters in a blog as well. The blog address is elderpowersinutah.blogspot.com. I just haven't posted anything to it yet.