The Cutest Kids!!! Nope, I'm not biased.

Hey, I know everyone thinks their kids are the cutest...but look how cute these two God sent me are!

Mason got the Cowboy outfit from Grandpa John and Grandma Patty-who else but Grandpa the cowboy. Mas LOVED it and wore it a couple of times every week in December. Mommie and Daddy gave him the extra stuff like the guns (I know, I know they're noisy and we swore we wouldn't buy noisy toys, but they were too cute with the outfit).

And Grandma Patty got the idea for Lissy's hat and glasses-total glam baby. Elise was SO funny, at first she didn't want to sit there and have her picture taken, but after putting her back three times she just sat there with this look on her face that said, "Fine, I'll sit here, but I don't have to be happy about it!" She sat in this pose for a couple of minutes...silly girl.

Elise has the Best Glare-I have Never seen a baby glare like she does.

The Magic Forest-Winter Wonderland

Yes! to all you Utahns...it was cold...not freezing, but it did merit coats, gloves, hats, etc etc....and no we're not just Vegasites now. We even got Snow in Vegas a couple of times in December-now it's in the 60's and 70's which is awesome-a dream come true.

We went to the local Christmas Magic Forest Park with our friends Ben, Emily and Kate. We had a GREAT time.

Mason was So cute as soon as he saw the Polar Bear he ran over and gave him a hug-I LOVE that he's not afraid of stuff, though the immense independence makes me sad sometimes.

There was a little train that Mason LOVED! He's obsessed with trains still, and all of us getting to ride one was one of the highlites of the Season. (I can't believe it, but I can't find any pictures of it....I KNOW I TOOK SOME....SORRY if i find them I'll post later)

We thought if we bundled up Elise enough and put her in the stroller she'd go to sleep....Ya, right! I don't know what we were thinking!

I love that little face! Our little sunshine.

Mason liked the Carosel, he thought the best part was going around and finding Mommie and Sis watching him. (If you noticed his socks....he picked them out himself and grandma gave them to him....so I HAD NOTHING to do with them)

Christmas Party!

We had a fun Christmas Party with a lot of our good friends-we are SO grateful for our friends here in Vegas since we have no family close.






This is the Winner of the Gingerbread House Contest-Congratulations Ben (the architect) and Emily.









Thanks everyone for coming...hope you had as much fun as we did!

So Joe...was it like a 50's Christmas Party???

Dave and Beverly made the Best gingerbread outhouse. So Creative.

My Funny Kids! Where did they come from!?

We all got new toothbrushes...Mason is showing his off...and Lissy wants them all!!

If you can't tell she has two in one hand, one in the other, and one in her mouth. She rarely doesn't have a toothbrush when we're home. Silly girl.

Mindy, the RS President wanted to visit & give a homemade treat to every sister in our ward for Christmas. So the presidency split up the names, which left us with 34 sisters each. Mason helped me make six dozen batches of sugar cookies-I even gave him his own little ball to roll out, cut, bake and eat. We had SO much fun. Daddy even helped put on the sprinkles that night.

Mason and Elise's new favorate thing is to play on the piano. They will even drag their little chairs over so they can both play. I hope this means they will practice when they get older.

Mason LOVES his harmonica and plays it incessantly...I think that should have been one of the gifts that stayed at Grandma's house...Oh well, maybe it will help him learn music because currently he has Grandma's lack of musically ability.

Halloween,

Halloween was fun. Mason was Tigger and Elise was Eyore.

They were SO cute!

I LOVED Elise's costume, the tail even came off-Mason is putting it back on for her.

Mason's friend, Landon was Pooh Bear, so we had to get a picture with the whole gang.

Our ward had a trunk-o-treat, which was the our first one. Everyone was so original in their costumes!

October & November

So what have we been up to for the last two months you ask....Well A LOT Actually....where do I start??

I'll start with the kids....Lissy went from all this adorable strawberry blond hair (that I could curl with a curling iron)

TO THIS......

Yes, that's right almost completely bald!!!

She pulls it out at night when she's going to sleep...anyone got any suggestions on how to make her stop????

She also sleeps in the car and bends herself in half....I can't image how she sleeps like that??!!!

But Mason use to do it, just not so extreme....does everyone else's kids do this?

Lissy has a shoe fedish...yes, girlie all the way. She loves just carrying shoes around with her all the time....and not just her's but brother's, mommie's, and daddy's. However, she always takes one shoe off that she's wearing to carry it around, which mommie doesn't like so much when we are running errands!

Elise has a best friend now, Kate, who is only six weeks younger. We hang out with Kate & her parents Ben & Emily at LEAST once a week if not five times. (this was us girls shopping at the outlets for four hours, notice the missing shoe's on Elise...she's holding one)

Mason & Elise adore each other. I love how good they are to each other, how Mas takes care of his sister and how she looks up to him completely. I'm so grateful and blessed to have such wonderful children...I couldn't ask for more.

Mason is riding the train at the Outlet Mall because he was Superman and was such a good boy for four hours while the girls shopped! (When he's wanting to be good he says he's Superman)

When Mas is not trying as hard to be good he is Capt. Jack Sparrow....(Yes Steph that is YOUR fault!!)

This is Mason's Christmas present from Steph and Travis.

In October:

We had a fun Conference Party with our friends the Ashtons (Ben, Emily & Kate) and the Stevensons where we played Conference Bingo-which was SO much fun. I love the Prophet and the Apostles! They give such great words of love, comfort, and peace. I know that life is hard right now for a lot of people and I expect them to get harder, but honestly I am excited for the growth, the changes, the unity! These are great times to be alive!!

John's parents gave us their timeshare's at the Wyndam here in Vegas for a weekend, so we invited the Ashtons to come with us. We had a great time splashing in the pool and playing spades til 1am-it was SO nice and relaxing. THANKS MOM & DAD HILL!!

We bought a forclosure House and fixed it up!! We closed on Oct 20th and moved in Oct 31st! How could we fix it up in 11 days you ask-we had AMAZING HELP!!! Our wonderful hometeacher, Riley Booth got his guys from work to paint our entire house in three days (including my accent walls, two tone throughout, etc) and he did it for their cost--lets just say we LOVE RILEY AND WOULD DO ANYTHING FOR HIM!!! Then the amazing sisters in the Ward: Robin, Amanda, Rosie and her husband Dave, all came to help clean; they cleaned the bathrooms, scrubbed my stove, changed our air filters, etc. They were WONDERFUL! Even our friend/morgage guy/counciler in the bishopric Jacob cleaned one of our bathrooms with a toothbrush! I spend every afternoon I could cleaning while the kids played in the back yard or Mason pushed Elise around and around in her stroller (the carpets were too gross to let her touch).(PICTURES TO COME....i PROMISE!)

So that brings us to Halloween. We had a good time at the Ward trunk o treat (our first one). and unfortuantly that's all we did. We moved half our stuff on Halloween (Thanks Peter!). Well, it sounded like a great idea it didn't work out so great that night. We tried to make a nice dinner....but we had to run back over to the other house five times! We had to get butter, potatos, salt & peper, etc, etc. Needless to say it took three hours to make dinner-by which time we were exhausted. The kids were tired and they didn't need any more candy, so I let John talk me into putting the kids to bed without trick o treating (Yes to all you mothers out there-I still feel guilty about that one and we won't do it again). Pictures to come....they are on John's camera.

We haven't hardly celebrated holidays since we moved here-I guess I'm use to letting my mom do it and the family are too far away now to do all the holiday stuff with. Does anyone have holiday suggestion so that I can make them important/fun????

We celebrated Thanksgiving in Utah...Park City at the timeshare with the Hills (all but John's brothers...which was 23 people...but it actually went very smoothly). The teenagers texted most the day...Our nephew Kyle says he textes 3k a month!! Crazy!

On Saturday we went to Vernal to celebrate Thanksgiving and Christmas with my family. (This is going to be the first Christmas that we don't all celebrate Christmas day together-sleeping at my parents house, getting up at 5am...etc). Again we had a great time with NO problems (expect for me being sick) My wonderful mom tried very hard to do a mock Christmas with the awesome dinner-with pinacolatas!!, decorating the Christmas Tree (THAT'S ELISE HANGING SOME DECORATIONS), a spiritual Family Home Evening, everyone spending the night, getting up early for presents and a good breakfast after.

THANKS TO MY WONDERFUL FAMILY FOR ALL THEY DO FOR US IT WAS A WONDERFUL WEEKEND!!

Elise and Mason LOVED hanging out with their cousins, Shaun and Gracie...and the pictures of them were adorable! Lissy actually put her arm around Gracie and smiled at the camera (you don't think we take too many pictures or anything-since both our kids know how and when to pose for the camera). It was the CUTIEST!

No we didn't fall off the face of the Earth, just cyerspace!

We'll we are alive...if you were wondering (though the last three days we wondered if we wanted to be). One or all of us have been sick for almost a month now. Mason & Elise each took a turn having the 24hr flu and a head cold the middle of Nov. Two weeks ago Sunday I got the flu but mine lasted two days...without getting better....it changed to a head cold for a couple of days....then it changed to a deep horrible cough (self diagnoses' would be bronchitis) for the entire Thanksgiving weekend in Utah....the cough gradually eased into a horrible burning sore throat and high fever....Saturday John and Elise started getting really sick too (Elise has a HIGH pain tolerance like me so when she starts getting fussing and clingy we KNOW she's really sick) and Mason got little fevers...by Sunday we were all SO miserable (self-diagnosed with Strep throat because of a ton of huge white sores all over my throat and tonsils) we finally decided we had to go to Urgent Care...four hours later John and the kids we diagnosed with laryngitis (infection of the throat) and I have tonsillitis (infection of the throat & tonsils)....Sunday and Monday both John and I found NO relief...we took turns watching and feeding the kids so the other could get some rest.....