Six years old!

Lydia and Rachel just celebrated their sixth birthday! We had a lot of fun. We went to their kindergarten class to spotlight them on their birthday and we had some family over for cake and ice cream that day. Another day they had a party with friends and we enjoyed having a lot of girls over to our house. Just a note: Rachel has the black eye in the pictures. About a week and a half ago she had a bad fall on the playground at school. She was x-rayed at the doctor's for a possible broken nose or cheek bone. Luckily, nothing was broken. Her face actually looks a lot better now than it did a week ago!

They chose a ladybug cake for their birthday.

They wanted flower pot cupcakes for their party.

We love Rachel and Lydia so much and we're so glad they're part of our family. We're glad they had a fun birthday!

Time to baby-proof the house...

Because this little guy gets around!

It's the most wonderful time of the year!

We had a wonderful Christmas! I'm just slow at getting these pictures posted. We spent Christmas Eve as a family playing games, eating delicious food, and acting out the nativity. On Christmas morning we opened presents and later on we went to my parents' house for a delicious breakfast of Swedish pancakes. We were able to go visit Kenny's side of the family later that week and had a lot of fun there too!

Eating cookies at my parents' house on Christmas

Ready to open presents with cousins at Kenny's parents' house

The rest of the pictures were taken around Christmas so I thought I would include them in this post.

Hyrum has really learned how to get around. He is so close to crawling...but
in the meantime he rolls and scoots and lunges to explore the house.

Charity's preschool had a Christmas program and it was
a lot of fun to watch her participate.

We celebrated St. Lucia Day with my parents earlier in
December. It is a Swedish holiday that we celebrated as
I grew up because we have Swedish ancestors and
my dad served a mission in Sweden for our Church.

I always have a hard time seeing the Christmas season end. There is such a special spirit in the air as we commemorate the birth of our Savior Jesus Christ. I guess the key is to try to keep that feeling with us always as we remember our Savior and strive to follow His example. I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas!

Halloween time!

The kids had a fun Halloween! A few days before Halloween we went to a local pumpkin walk and enjoyed seeing the pumpkin displays. Lydia and Rachel had a kindergarten party and Charity had a preschool party and I was able to go and help with both of these. The kids managed to find a small amount of time when it wasn't pouring rain and they went out trick-or-treating for a little while. They didn't get too far before it started raining again, but they didn't mind. Soaking wet candy is better than no candy at all!

Pumpkin Walk

Trick-or-treating

Charity the Bee

Lydia the Princess (who was determined to be a
ghost until a few days before Halloween)

Rachel the Black Widow

Hyrum the Pumpkin

On a different note, as you can tell from the picture below, Hyrum needed a haircut...actually he needed one a long time ago but we just didn't get around to cutting it until a couple weeks ago.



We think he looks pretty handsome!

Think Pink

As I'm sure all of you have noticed, October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. I am so grateful for the advancements that have been made in cancer detection and treatment. My mom is a breast cancer survivor and has now been in remission for two years! I love her and I'm so grateful for all the help that she gives to my family and for the wonderful example that she has always been to me.

A Big Accomplishment!

Kenny completed his first full marathon on Saturday! His brother Cory was able to come up and run also. They both did great! I am so proud of Kenny and his dedication to accomplishing this goal.

The girls were so excited to see their Daddy run past, and
they watched intently to be sure we didn't miss him.
We weren't proud at all....not one bit!

Way to go Kenny and Cory!

School Days

It seems hard to believe that Rachel and Lydia are old enough to start Kindergarten! They are absolutely loving it and are excited each day to go to school. Charity started going to preschool as well and she is really enjoying it. She always wants to be like her big sisters so she loves that she goes to school too.

Lydia

Rachel

As you can see, they opted to go as "twins" for their first
day of school. After I took this picture they even decided
that they should wear the same shoes so that the teacher
couldn't distinguish between them by looking at their feet.

Charity

As for this little guy...he's growing up too. He surprised us this week and
slept through the night for the first time....TWICE! Let's just hope he can
turn this into a trend. None of his sisters consistently slept through the
night until they were between 9 and 12 months old. I would not mind
if Hyrum decided to pull this one off a few months earlier!