Christmas Activities Around Town

Chase watches the Christmas Parade with the babes.

Caleb decorates cookies at a local gas station.

James, Caleb and Lizzy pet Prancer the reindeer .

The little ladies take in the parade.

Jayden and Caleb discuss who gets the red or yellow 'vette.

Thank you Liberty Accounting for the awesome hats. We ended up with a lot of useful things from the parade that I've enjoyed carrying around in the car and finding under beds and couches.

WOW! Caleb wins big in the Reflections contest

Caleb receives notification that he won!

Here he is with 3 ribbons.

Caleb's artwork entry.

Caleb's Photography entry.

Caleb's literature entry-a haiku about flag football.

I signed up to be on the Reflections committee at the Elementary school this year. With our school being pretty new, it is the first year they have done the contest. I was assigned the publicity task as a committee member and with one week left until the entry deadline discovered we only had 6 entries. I called my nephew Jayden (who attends the same elementary) to come over and create entries with Corbin and Caleb in an effort to boost the totals. The 3 of them worked hard and came up with some very nice art projects. The following day I further encouraged Caleb to enter the Photography and Literature categories. Luckily when the deadline day arrived we had close to 100 entries turned in! The projects were collected, sorted and shipped off to the 3 different judging groups.

About 2 weeks later Caleb came home with 3 very nice announcements. We were quite surprised to find out Caleb had won in all 3 categories. At first I was a little embarrassed, not wanting to come across as a 'stage mom' type who makes their kindergartner enter all 3 categories of a contest and also at people thinking the judging process was tainted.

Caleb was so pleased about his wins and insisted on meeting his brothers at their bus stops to tell them the good news. He also made phone calls to Grandpa & Grandma Hawkes to announce the big news! With big brothers winning trophies and ribbons and getting to participate in a variety of activities, this has been a very big deal for Caleb.

Wrestling with my acceptance of this sport

Carter celebrates victory with his teammates that also placed at the district tournament.

Carter stands on the award podium accepting the 3rd place medal.

I never understood Wrestling. First of all, the uniforms are the ugliest things I have ever seen. Brad Pitt would look nerdy in one. I can remember guys in high school wearing sweatsuits around with the hoods on trying not to eat so they could 'make weight'. Why would they torture themselves so they could put on that unitard (I know, singlet) and roll around with another guy in a singlet and then end up with cauliflower ear when they're older? Weird.

You can only imagine my reaction when my sons came home and asked me to fill out the permission forms for wrestling. Ugggh.

I must admit I have gained an appreciation for wrestling. I have faithfully gone and cheered my boys on at every one of their matches. I've washed and air dried their singlets. While I still don't understand the scoring system and admit I cringe a little every time I see them walk onto the mat in their singlet, I am very proud of all the hard work they put in and the positive effects they've experienced being on a team, learning to be a good sport in defeat and victory, and feeling the satisfaction that comes from giving something your all.

Now I'm looking forward to next year's wrestling season.

What a day!

What do these 4 pictures have in common?

Unfortunately, me. (Except my Suburban is older and the police cars said Caldwell and not Port Angeles).

The other day I took Chloe and Caleb out to Cost Plus to do a quick errand. Chloe fell asleep in the car so when I got there I decide to get her stroller out so she can stay sleeping while we walk through the store. I leave the car running (it's cold) and hop out to get the stroller. When I get around back the back door is locked. I go back to my driver side to push the unlock button and almost trip over Caleb who has hopped out without his coat. Guess what? My drivers door is locked as are all the other doors. Somehow Caleb locked them when he hopped out. My cell phone, purse, Caleb's coat and everything are locked in my running car along with sleeping little Chloe. Caleb and I run into Cost Plus and tell them our predicament. They call 911 and within minutes two police cars show up and tell me they no longer carry slim-jim equipment but the firefighters do and they will be arriving soon. The firefighters then show up in their giant, red, not so inconspicuous truck and go to work on the passenger side and drivers side locks simultaneously. Caleb who has no coat and is too afraid to sit in a warm Police car watches the action from a dining set display inside Cost Plus. I run back and forth between Cost Plus to check on him and the Suburban to make sure Chloe is still okay. The Cost Plus manager was nice enough to give him a gourmet imported root beer (that Caleb later told me tasted like barf). Luckily Chloe never woke up and after 45 minutes of trying to unlock the doors with their expensive 'kit tools', one of the firemen was able to go through the very back window with a coat hanger and hit the unlock button. Oh,what a day.

Christmas is coming

And this proves it -- my sisters-in-law, Karin & Melinda, my sister Haley, and I worked on advent calendars over Thanksgiving break. Thanks to my mom for coming up with the idea and having the supplies for us. It was so much fun.

Love, Lori Designs

Let me start this post by saying that Chloe is not an only child. I apologize upfront for posting all of these pictures. It's just that I bought this amazingly cute outfit that has tons of pieces to mix and match and I had to take pictures to show it off. My friend Emily's mom designs and makes these outfits. It has a reversible skirt, a top/dress, flare pants with ruffles, a reversible belt, a flower pin with bling, a hair bow, and a coordinating shirt.
FYI, I will be posting about my other sons wrestling matches. I must admit I do not find much joy in the singlets they wear. Who thought of those?!!


Here are the pants, shirt, and floral pin.


This is the shirt, belt, pin, and one side of the skirt
This is the other side of the skirt, and the other side of the belt.

This is the pants, shirt, belt and bow.



Here we have the top/dress, pants, shirt, and floral pin.

This is the top/dress, shirt, and the polka dot side of the skirt.


Needless to say the combinations are endless. Isn't Lori creative? She will be blogging about her things at www.loveloridesigns.blogspot.com. The other fabric combinations are to die for. However, I am partial to anything black and white.

Piggy Tails

Now that Chloe is on the move and can't sit still for 5 seconds, I've decided to try putting her hair in piggy tails. I have dreamed of this day for years and have luckily had little nieces let me do their hair in the meantime. Thank you Elizabeth, Emma and Ada. Watching Chloe run around opening cupboards & drawers, pull down books, and try to get in the toilet and dishwasher is all the cuter because she has piggy tails.

Townhome Grand Opening

The first 5 units are built and had a grand opening this weekend! Check out more pics at my Interiors Redefined blog.

Girls just wanna have fun!

Tonight we went and celebrated Bridger's birthday. Chloe and Hazel misunderstood when they overheard Elizabeth say, "Bwidga's potty is weally fun."



We sure hope nobody was a party pooper.

Daddy's Girl

Chloe is so happy when her Daddy walks in the door. She gets a big smile on her face and says, "Da-Da". It melts his heart.
She is growing up so quickly. For the past several months she would walk around quite steadily but mentally could not make it happen unless she had hold of someone's finger. That has ended and she has turned into a walker. It's so cute watching her toddle around. Yesterday we took her to look at some townhomes I've been working on and as she went from room to room she would walk in and say, "Wow". It was adorable.

Let's get it right

Halloween Show

Make a Smilebox slideshow

I am a Child of God

Caleb is the official music conductor of Family Home Evening. He rotates between 2 songs, Book of Mormon Stories and I am a Child of God. Chloe has started copying him and every time we start to sing, she starts to wave her arm. This last Monday I listened closely as Caleb was singing and noticed that he sings, "I am a child of God with parents kind of dear."

Anybody who calls our home on a regular basis knows that we have a hard time locating a handset before the answering machine picks up. Yesterday a call came in and the machine beat me to it. A recorded voice starts coming across the machine that Caleb recognizes as Mitt Romney. It is a call where a recording of Mitt Romney is endorsing a local candidate and encouraging our support. Anyhow, Caleb starts getting all worked up, running around and yelling at me, "MOM aren't you even going to look for the phone? IT'S MITT ROMNEY! ARE YOU LISTENING? MITT ROMNEY!" Apparently our fondness for Mitt didn't go unnoticed.

Holiday Photos

We just had our annual family portraits done for our Christmas card. I don't want to post any of the ones that will make their debut on the card, although here are a few we also really like. Dawn Yorgason took them and did such a great job. We are so pleased with how they turned out and Caleb even said getting our pictures taken was "so much fun". This is pretty amazing considering it is usually like pulling teeth to get the kids to take family pictures.

Are you ready for FOOTBALL...to be over?

How is it that something so dominant in our lives has been pretty much neglected on our family blog? Is it that I am in denial? Most likely.
Our 2 oldest sons have had football practice every night. Carter's games on Wednesday and Chase's on Saturday. The second two sons practiced twice a week, luckily at about the same times and at the same school field, and also had Saturday games. All of their practices have overlapped at some point. Add to that snack assignments, uniform washing, keeping game socks and cleats found, mouthguards clean and at games, folding chairs and blankets ready to go, schedules straight and hopefully on occasion remembering the camera. All of this made for some serious brain fuzz for me. Our final team party is on Saturday and Corbin's team has one more day of "playoff" games in a week. I would be neglecting a huge part of our lives not to post something about this football season.
Last night I actually went through Carter and Chase's closet with them pointing out that they have other clothes to wear besides just team jerseys. I am getting so sick of jerseys!
Carter scored a touchdown at the last game after being put in as a tight end. This was a game where the camera didn't make it.
Chase was the QB for his team, the Colts, and did a phenomenal job. It was his first year playing full contact in full pads and even got to play a game at BSU.
Corbin named himself MVP of the decade (any of you who know Corbin know this is all too true). He is looking forward to showing off his skills at the playoffs and recording his personal stats in the notebook he has been keeping.
Caleb played on the Packers with his cousin Jayden and loved every minute of it. Jayden was a lethal QB and Caleb was his skilled Wide Receiver. They had some SWEET plays.
Chloe is the fan of the season for going to all of the games, sitting in her stroller and clapping and cheering for her brothers. Also, for willingly let them dress her up in their jerseys, and other football gear.

Caleb admires his big brother Carter #75
Chase #12 is ready to start the game
Colts #1 Fan (or 1 year old fan)
QB & Receiver
Spectators
Concentration
Carter #75