VaLenTiNeS and PreSiDenTs

I had the girls fill out their Valentine's a week early.  At the time I thought "why am I doing this so early?," but it was a good thing because for some reason the preschool parties really drain me and I was exhausted the night before Valentine's Day.

 I was so proud of Mallory filling out her Valentine's all by herself...I loved to see her checking off each name.  She chose scented Valentines with Lik'em Sticks.

 Tessa chose Dress-Up Valentines (cute girl figures with clothing stickers) for the girls and split a box of spy decoders with Kylie for the boys.  She wanted to give everyone Valentine Fruit by the Foots.

 Kylie chose Valentines with Nail Stickers for the girls and gave everyone Gummi Bracelets.

 Their favorite Valentine Surprise came on the night of the 13th with a visit from Grandma and Grandpa. My Dad has a tradition of tricking people with his Valentine on a fishing line trick.  He used to take the girls to do it to my grandma and great aunt but this was the first year since they both passed on and so he did it to the girls and they LOVED it!

 And of course grandma brought TONS of gifts.  Valentine puzzles with special poems on them, candy, heart-shaped banana bread, and winter coats and hats for their American Girl dolls...they are ADORABLE!

 Aunt Becca sent a special Valentine Package from Pennsylvania!  It was so nice of her, especially since she is so busy!

Kody and I got the girls each a stuffed animal, necklace and earrings and some fun books.
 I was able to help Kylie with their class party this year!

 I loved helping with the Waffle Bar Table.  Heart-shaped waffles with ice cream and every kind of topping you could think of :)

Kody's parents sent an awesome box of winter hats, candy, lip gloss and earrings!    I didn't get a chance to take a picture since we headed up to Bear Lake with Kody's co-worker Paul and his family right after opening it.  That night the adults ate a Valentine Dinner at the Bear Trapper Steak House.  It was delicious food and a great couple hours getting to know the Archibald's better.
Saturday we spent the day sledding. These girls have it pretty cushy sledding down the hill and then having Kody pick them up in the sled behind the snow mobile and driving them back up the hill.

 Baylor was just so happy to be out that he crawled all over in the snow.

After getting chilled to the bone we headed back to the cabin for some hot tubbing.  With Monday off Dad got to do some skiing and we introduced the girls to the movie classic Napoleon Dynamite!  It was an awesome weekend for Valentine's and Presidents! I hope my girls will always remember how lucky they are to have so many people who love and care about them...parents, teachers, friends, aunts, and grandparents.

Dresses

Grandma Lori sent the girls these beautiful dresses for Christmas.  With a few illnesses and a weekend getaway it was a couple of weeks before we got a picture of them all together.

She also sent Baylor a cute outfit with a sweater vest but that boys is too crazy to sit still for a picture!

EARRINGS!

After Kylie got her ears pierced about a year ago Tessa has been throwing time frames of when she would get her pierced.  First it would be "when she was eight," or "maybe next year when she was seven." But then as Christmas got close she thought "maybe after Christmas." We told her she could get them whenever she wanted.  

You know when you loose your first tooth and you are so excited and scared at the same time, well I knew that's how she felt. So when I saw that Walmart did ear piercing I thought that was the perfect solution.  I know Walmart gets a bad rap but we go there for craft stuff a couple times a month and they had a better variety of earrings at a lower price. And if she decided to back out we wouldn't waste a trip to the mall.

As we got ready to head out, she started saying she didn't want to...so Mallory wanting to show up her sister said, "I'll get mine pierced."  Well Tessa didn't want to be outdone. So we took them both with us thinking Mallory would back out when she saw Tessa getting hers done. 

She was really brave and even though this next picture looks like she has been crying...but only a few tears sneaked out.

Well Mallory still wanted to go through with hers so we thought "what the heck..."

She loved that she was the only one of the girls that didn't cry. 

They both look so cute in their new earrings and couldn't stop looking at the themselves in the mirror.  Oh and when you see them they will probably tuck their hair behind their ears...the universal signal for you to compliment their new earring )

Hardware Ranch

We had been wanting to go see the Elk up at Hardware Ranch for a while, but the holidays got really busy.  So the last time we headed up to the cabin we decided to take a detour in Logan and check it out!

We couldn't have picked a better day....sunshine and no wind.  We didn't even have to wear hats or mittens.

There were no lines and we got to spend extra time riding around the herd.

The Elk were loving the weather as well and some let us get pretty close as they lay sleepily on the ground.

There were 500 head of Elk grazing that day.

We learned so many interesting facts...like the number of points on their antlers does not correlate to age, it's just genetic.

The girls loved seeing these "big deer" and Baylor did make a sound the entire ride!

New Years Eve

We spent made a quick trip up to Bear Lake to celebrate New Year's with my fam.  We had so much fun that I only snapped a few pictures.  But some of the highlights were:

The adults going to dinner at the Bear Trapper Steak House for Shrimp and Crab.

The kids getting in the hot tub and then in the bathtub to get warm.
New years resolutions with somersaults to seal the deal.
Lots of bubbly.
Lots of laughing.
Counting down...not once...not twice...but three times.
Watching the ball drop.

Poor Kody got very sick the day after Christmas and was still sick so he was home trying to fight off his sickness :(

Cousin Sledding Party

After Christmas we had our annual Cousin Sledding Party at my cousin Jason's house in Mountain Green.  We are a little chicken so we stick to the little hills. 

Baylor looked so cute in his shark hat but it was only for show and my mom was nice enough to watch him in the house the whole time while I took the girls sledding.