Family Temple Trip for Jon's Birthday

Today was Jon's 32nd birthday. He surprised me and took the day off of work yesterday. Caleb had a "Dad's and Donuts" activity for his kindergarten class, so he was able to go to that with him. Then he took Leah on a date to get ice cream at the BYU creamery. I made Jon's birthday cake ... cheeseburger cupcakes. They turned out so cute. He thought they were pretty awesome too.
My parents were flying in from Las Vegas today and we were going to SLC to pick them up. We stayed most of the day at Oma and Opa's house. After we picked up my mom and dad we went to the Chinese Gourmet buffet to eat dinner. We had tickets to go to the open house for the Draper Temple. It was fun to be able to take our kids to the temple and show them the inside. We also went with Jon's Oma and Opa, my parents, and Jon's dad. It was a really neat experience. It was dark when we went, so the picture of the temple (from inside of our bus) didn't turn out all that great.

Our family

Oma and Opa with Leah

My parents with Leah (she had to sneak into each picture)

Lanier Men, Jon, Bill, Alex and Caleb
Waiting for our bus

Still waiting

Silence...

When we're all home together as a family things can get pretty loud. Well, when one kid hasn't been heard from for a while I start to wonder. Leah had been in the bathroom for a LONG time, so I went to check on her. She had locked the door. By the time I unlocked it and opened the door she was shoving a pair of scissors into her pocket.

Mom: "What have you been cutting?"

Leah: "I don't remember."

Mom: "Well, you can sit in time out until you remember" (looking around at her dolls, the towels, the washcloths, etc and finding nothing out of the ordinary.)

Leah goes to time out.

Caleb: "I know what she's been cutting. She's been cutting her hair."

Leah: "NO! Don't tell!"

Mom: Looking at her chunks of hair missing, "It looks like you're going to have to get a hair cut and it's going to be pretty short."

Leah: "I don't want a boy haircut!"

I do admit that it could have been worse. The shortest section is underneath the majority of her new bangs that she cut. Even the hair stylist said that she did a pretty good job. (Shhh!! Don't let Leah know that!)

Right after I found out about her haircut.
She was crying because she didn't want a haircut (go figure)

After Cherise trimmed her hair

Leah's new look

I did overhear Leah saying how she wanted to borrow Caleb's clothes so that no one would know that she was really a girl with a boy hair cut. I had to explain to her that even though it was going to be shorter in the front it still would look like a girl hair cut. And she is a beautiful little girl. Let's just hope that she's learned from this experience.

Pinewood Derby Month

Alex has been to scouts one time, but he's hooked. He loves it. He was especially excited to be able to make a pinewood derby car with dad today. Since Jon had the day off of work he took Alex and Caleb to his shop at work to make the cars. They were gone for about 4 hours. Their cars look amazing. They are so excited to race them.

Caleb's is #5

Alex's is #8

Alex's Baptism

Alex's Baptism
into
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints

Alex was baptized by his dad, Jon.

Our family

Alex with Nanny and Papa

Alex with Uncle Shane, Aunt Katie, and Braydon

Alex with Grandma and Grandpa Holt

Alex with Brighton, Joseph, Jon, Grandma Hosie, Grandpa Hosie,
Mai, Sophia, and Christopher

Alex with Grandfather Lanier

Alex with Jeanette Jensen (his primary president),
and his two friends Emily and Byron

The Krueger's and Angela (with baby Kayla Krueger)

Aunt Christel, Ezra, and Brighton.

Uncle Alan, Eve, Eden, Sister Mayo, Brother Ririe (our home teacher), Jacque Holloway (his primary teacher), Joan Christensen, and Lily Stuart were there also

After the baptism we had a yummy breakfast at our house. Alex picked the menu. We had biscuits and gravy, watermelon, oranges, cantaloupe, grapes, orange juice, milk, chocolate milk, and cold cereal!

After most of the guests were gone Alex finished playing with cousins and friends and stated, "Ok, I'm ready to eat now!" All the food was practically gone! We had no idea he hadn't eaten yet. Poor kid. I cooked up some more gravy and there was enough of everything else for him to make a plate of food.

It was such a great day. I'm so proud of him. He knows so much about the gospel. He has a great testimony and I know that it will continue to become stronger.

Alex's 8th Birthday

My baby boy is 8 years old! I can't believe how fast time has gone by. Alex has grown into such a great boy. He has always been a very loving and caring child. We have loved (almost) every minute of the 8 years we've had with him. But even when there were difficult times we have never stopped loving our sweet Alex. Happy Birthday!

For Alex's birthday he started out with a pancake breakfast. I had to make him a pancake in the shape of an "8". He took treats to school for his class too. When he got home he was SO anxious for his birthday party to start. It was so stressful for him to wait the hour and a half until people started showing up. Alex had 4 of his friends over for a party. The theme was...of course...Star Wars. They played "Pin Darth Vader's Buttons on His Costume", opened gifts, ate dinner (Alex's choice was hot ham and cheese sandwiches with corn chips, carrots, and cucumbers), ate cake and ice cream, and then watched part of The Clone Wars movie. They had a good time.
Alejo and Alex

Alex and Byron
Rowen and Alex
Caleb and Alex (with the toys from Erick)
The 8 Year Old Birthday Boy!

Scout uniform from Nanny, Papa, Mom and DadAlex also had his baptismal interview tonight right after his party. Everything is set for his big day on Saturday. We are so proud of him and can't wait to see him be baptized.

Happy Birthday, Alex!

Our 9th Wedding Anniversary

Today Jon and I celebrated our 9th wedding anniversary. We didn't do much celebrating today since it was a weekday and Family Home Evening. We celebrated on Friday by going to the temple to do sealings, then we went out to dinner at Sizzler and went to the movies (thanks for the tickets Grandma Holt!). It was a fun date. Happy Anniversary, Jon! I love you!

New Years Eve

Thanks to a neighbor we were able to get all of these Galactic Hero Star Wars sets for a great deal! The kids have been saving up their money and they were so excited to get so many toys with it. Jon and I were just as excited. They love collecting Star Wars toys, and I think we've become addicted to it too. Our neighbor had a lot of sets that we hadn't been able to find. Even Leah got excited about having a Princess Leia and a Padame Amadalia toy to play with.

We bought these on New years eve and spent the whole night opening the packages and playing with the new toys. The kids finally went to bed at 11:30pm. Jon and I stayed up a little later and we could see the fireworks display a little from our window.

Happy New Year to everyone!

2009!!!