Merry Christmas! December 2009

Ty, Bryce, and I had a wonderful Christmas! We are on the every-other-year schedule with grandparents and so this year we spent the holiday in Fairfield. Jared, his fam., and Emily came, with Joel's family joining us on Christmas day. It's is so nice to have family together. I know that not too many years from now, Ty and I will be wanting to have Christmas at home, the way we loved having it when we were kids. But for now, while the critter (someday critters) is young, we'll enjoy spending it at Grandma and Grandpa's.Aunt Emily came in on the 22nd, so my mom and I were really motivated to get all the busy Christmas stuff done so the 23rd and 24th were fun and relaxing.... that's not exactly how things worked out, but we had good intentions.

Backtracking a bit, Monday night we had our annual Biggs Family Christmas party. I love this picture with Uncle Chip and Aunt Lanea... Aren't candid shots great!

Earlier that day, I spent the afternoon with Lindsay,my old roommate from USU whose parent's live in Davis. I am sad I don't have a picture of us together, but it was a really nice visit. She visits from Utah often, so hopefully we can get together again soon.

... And as you can see, Bryce was quite fascinated with the train that graced their Christmas tree.

Christmas Day got a little busy, so we saved the nativity for the 26th... which was actually really nice, bringing us all back to the reason we celebrate!

Doesn't Ty make a great Donkey? Or as Sammie says it: "Gonkie"!!

The second time around, Rylie and I were wise men. The goggles were Ty's idea.

The cast (from left to right):

Gonkie Ty, Spring, Sammie, Rylie, Jesus, Mary. Joshua, Thomas, Uncle Jared, Colt.

We had Christmas Olympics on Saturday also. Countries in attendance:

USA

Purple Hutch

Hong.Arm.Moore.Tario

The Olympians!

Bryce in his new sweater from Aunt Em!

Bear Bread... is it just me, or does Emily look twelve in this picture?!

If anyone is familiar with the stale Nilla Wafer story, Bryce gave Grandpa a

bag of pre-sucked-on-stale wafers... something Uncle Jared

treated him (my dad) with when he was a baby.

Colty letting Bryce try-out his new dump truck.

Ty finally got his mini cooper!

Gifts from Santa... bibs, slippers, and toothpaste. Bryce made sure to taste every gift first.

Bryce loves giving Rylie kisses.

She had to wipe this on off though, she said it was really slobbery.

I know these pictures are out of order... but this is a picture of Colt, Bryce, and Rylie waiting to go downstairs to see what Santa brought.

Caroling on Christmas Eve... Our last stop at the Walkers.

We discovered we are really rusty at the whole caroling thing. Right before that we went to the Collins' and began singing at the door, then they invited us in but it felt awkward singing and walking for some reason... and basically, we left half the dong outside and never even finished... whoops.

On our way to carol... wow, these pictures really are out of order. I guess that's what happens when I post in segments... pictures chosen one day, downloaded another... and two days later I am finally getting to typing...

Look at all those presents! Bryce had so much fun... he mostly liked the gifts that were already unwrapped, he didn't quite have the paper thing down, but he'll be a pro by next Christmas!

We are so grateful for the Christmas season when we have time set aside to celebrate the birth of our Savior, and all He has done for us. This year has been one filled with tender mercies and blessings we feel undeserving of. We hope and pray for our loved ones that they will feel the love and peace from our Savior and Father in Heaven, as we have felt this year.

Merry Christmas and a wonderful New Year!

Christmas Festivities!

I love the holidays and Christmas traditions... and I love starting new ones with my wonderful little family. I can't believe we're already half-way through the month (nearly) and Christmas is almost here. So far Bryce has made his first Christmas ornament, helped deliver Christmas goodies to our neighbors, and let me dress him up (or dress him down, that seems more appropriate) in a little santa hat and blanket I got for $2.74.

Next week Bryce will officially be 7 months old, he has one tooth and another just itchin' to come through, and the kid crawls everywhere. He got a present under Grandma Biggs' Christmas tree the other day, didn't quite rip into it, but he would have sucked the paper right off if we would have let him! The holidays are great!

There were so many pictures I wanted to include for this trip, so I just put them all in a slide show. We really had a great time with family and are so glad we could make the trip. In the slide show there are pictures of Disneyland, bath time, balloon time, cousin time, all kinds of fun time! We feel richly blessed for our little family and the families we are a part of.

Our Thanksgiving Vacation...

We took the rest of our vacation days and spent the Thanksgiving holiday down with our Carlson Family. Weather was perfect, and it was so fun to spend time with family and all our cute nieces and nephews. We stopped via Grandma and Grandpa Miller's house on our way, then hurried down to Anaheim to celebrate Dad Carlson's 50th birthday. It was suppose to be a surprise, but everything was way too obvious and the old man saw right through it. Mom Carlson's special touch on "Pin the tale on the Donkey".

Soccer balls and baseball bats...

Bryce loves his Grandmama and Grandpapa!

6 months!

This picture was taken yesterday, and since it's a new favorite, I thought I'd work out nicely to document our little boy's 1/2 year birthday! Bryce is growing so fast. We cannot believe he is six months old today. It really does feel like he's been with us for much longer though. His smiles

make so many people happy. A couple weeks ago I was at the doctors office and there was a woman there who just seemed sad. You could see it in her face that she was having a rough day. I know the power this little boys smile has on me, so I turned him around to see her. He studied her for a few moments then gave a sweet, always genuine, smile. She seemed happier after that. Sometimes I wonder if Bryce knows how great his smile is. How much a smile can help someone. I think he might know, and therefore does it with the intent to make someone happy. He is a wonderful example of service to me. He can't do much, but he is helpful in every way he knows how. In addition to his smiles, he laughs and makes all sorts of funny noises, he now eats like a growing boy, and his favorite toys are the ones that are made for holding things. i.e. the diaper carrier, diaper bags, and toy basket. He'll scoot himself to anything he wants, reach... reach... reach... until he can finally pull it over and get a look inside. And whether or not he is interested in his new found booty, he'll content himself for a while to suck on it for a while, marking and claiming his path. He also has a new game where he'll wake up from a nap, or be crying from not wanting a nap. Then when we walk in to get him or to see what's wrong, he laughs. Really. He laughs, and it's way too funny to not laugh right back.

Well, he is one fun kid, and we are so excited for more fun kid memories to come .

We love you Bryce.

Grass... finally!

We bought our home because of the back yard. We kept planning on seeding the yard for grass... but timing is so critical it just wasn't working out. We looked into sod and found a good price and what did we get?... instant gratification! Now we don't have to worry about all the potential problems that accompany seeding, and we can look out and see a beautiful green, no longer brown, backyard.
Next up... more fruit trees and bark. Lots and lots of bark. I think we'll wait until spring for that though.

Apple Hill!

More-or-less a tradition (except we haven't made it in a couple years ;o) We love driving up to apple hill. The fritters are perhaps our main motivation... but the trees, delicious apples, and crisp autumn air are just as great!

Standing, almost crawling... and eating a ton!

Bryce finally found his appetite and loves to eat now. He's chunking up quite nicely and it's so fun to see all his funny expressions when trying something new! He is also incredibly close to crawling, and though he's not quite crawling yet, still manages to get where ever he wants to go. It's so fun to see the proud look on his face when he accomplished his goal!

Happy Halloween!

Bryce was a skeleton for his first Halloween. Grandma Biggs and I made his costume on our way home from Disneyland and he looked sooooo cute! The festivities started with a ward party on the eve of Halloween, then ward party with Grandma and Grandpa Biggs on Saturday, pumpkins at Gillespie's, then a party with friends, lots to do, and always a fabulous holiday!

Disneyland!

Here comes a lot of pictures... I have a really difficult time leaving them out. We had a great time at Disneyland. I had a season pass that'd expire in December, Bryce was free, we were already down there, so heck, why wouldn't we go to Disneyland?!? Bryce was a trooper... Happy all day... every few ours we'd recline his chair and he'd easily fall asleep... I did find it tricky to find a quiet place where his sleep would be uninterrupted... but he managed wonderfully, and we're excited to go back later this month with Grandma and Grandpa Carlson.

That's our big boy in an ant whole while we were waiting for the Bugs Life show.

I know it's gross I let him suck on this, I can't even imagine the germs, so I tried to not even think about it. Ty saw the pictures later and asked, "How long did you let him suck on that thing?"... It didn't help that complete strangers were coming up wanting to take pictures too. No joke... this funny little kid attracted a lot of cameras.. It sure is fun having a cute baby!

Here we are waiting for the Pirates ride... the only ride Bryce cried. He cried the whole ride. I felt really bad. He did great on the drops... but after that, he was done.

This was the very last thing we did and we found it to be his favorite. If any of you Disney fans have not experienced all the fun to be had at the animation place in the California park... you've got to go. They have a sea turtle (Crush for the 'Finding Nemo' fans) that talks and interacts with the kids... Bryce was mesmerized... he was even trying to talk to him. It was adorable!

Peter Pan... the best kid ride, tying with Dumbo,

and always worth the long wait if you have a kid.

I love it that Bryce will still keep things on his face and head... hats and glasses are no problem.

Lucky for us, the ladies at the store didn't make us buy them even though he sucked on them...

"C" is for Carlson!

Halloween at Disneyland is a wonderful time to go... we highly recommend it!

Yeah Dumbo! We love this ride! All Bryce wanted to do was suck on the feather... go figure.

Bryce also loved the Jungle Cruise... the piranhas startled him a bit,

but it's always a fun ride with kids.

We got to see Mickey! Bryce was so cute with him. He kept wanting to grab his face and whoever was Mickey that day was great with him too. Mickey played with him and had a hard time looking at the camera because he had such a cute kid to look at. I know, I am a mom and I sound ridiculous right now, but it's all true!

My favorite part about Toontown is the fun picture spots.

Bugs Life, also a must if you've never been.

As you can see, we had a great time. I wish Ty could have been there, but he'll be there next time. I feel so blessed to have wonderful parents who helped me love Disneyland... and for a wonderful baby who is so good-natured and happy. I love Bryce... so very, very much!