Christmas Morn 2010

"Did Santa Come?" Daddy went out to check while we waited to come out of mommy & daddy's room on Christmas Morning. We woke up around 7 a.m., so not too bad, but of course, much too early for mommy!! Mike's still like a kid, he wakes up around 4 a.m. and can't go back to sleep.

I guess Santa did come!!

Never mind she got a dream kitchen, the coolest present ever. All she cared about was the fact she got some Dora toothpaste and a Dora toothbrush in her stocking. She was amazed.

You can see Avery in the background trying to convince me to open her toothpaste so she can go brush her teeth. She spent a lot of time in the bathroom on Christmas. After the first 2 times, I had to pretend to put toothpaste on her brush, I was afraid she was going to stain her teeth! Is there such a thing as over-brushing?

Finally playing with her kitchen.

Santa is so smart, I wanted a water bottle just like this! I always love how the kids get excited about the big things but get just as excited about the little things, too.

Cutie in his Lego Head-Lamp.

She can sure open a present. She got good at tearing through that paper and FAST! She vacuumed for literally hours on Christmas with this little pink vacuum, in between brushing her teeth, of course.

Jengo-Fett's sleigh. Logan's proud Lego creation with Daddy this year.

Daven had fun playing with his new I-touch. On our way to Utah, we didn't hear from him for the first 4 hours until he said, "Mom, my I-touch is out of batteries." It was a big hit for both boys.

Christmas Eve 2010

Here are some family pictures from Christmas Eve. We had a great day! The kids were so excited all day long for Papa Pehrson to get here. We were glad he could make it. He was feeling under the weather earlier in the week, so we weren't sure. The kids kept praying he would get better.....it worked!

I think it is so fun to hear about everyone's Christmas Traditions. These are our Eve traditions:

1) Make cookies for Santa.

2) Play!

3) Home-ade Chicken Noodle Soup for dinner.

4) Open one present from mom & dad. (PJ's & Christmas Ornament)

5) Christmas Story: Luke Chapter 2

6) Leave cookies for Santa. We've heard Santa likes chocolate milk :)

With Papa here, we all had a giant sleep-over in our room. Well, except for Avery. We were a little worried she might get out of her bed and find the toys at 4 a.m. but she did really good. I think she came in our room around that time, but it was too dark for her to notice any presents in the living room. Phew! Oh, Papa slept in the boys room, we didn't subject him to the craziness of the giant sleepover in our room.

Favorite Christmas Memories from 2010

We had a wonderful Christmas season this year. I was so grateful that everyone stayed healthy during the holidays. I thought I would share some of my favorite memories from Christmas 2010.

1. Daven's Christmas Party:

Daven began talking about throwing a party for his friends in November. It started out as a Thanksgiving party, but we ran out of time for that. He kept persisting and his Thanksgiving party soon turned into a Christmas party. I thought it was really sweet but to be honest, I was mostly humoring him. "yeah, sure, that would be really fun....okay..." But, he kept bringing it up over and over. The kid would make a great lawyer someday :) I decided that he thought the party was really going to happen and he wasn't going to forget about it.

We set a date for December 18th. Well, it crept up on us really fast. I was thinking of ways to get out of the party. We were so busy. What a sad excuse, but that is what kept going through my head. A party was going to be a lot of work, how was I going to do that? Well, 5 days before the party, I woke up to take Daven to school. He had woken up early and hand-written invitations to ALL of his friends. They were very detailed. They even had our address and phone # on them. It was the cutest thing ever. I decided that we would throw the party together. How could I possibly tell him no?

Mike was a huge help. We pulled it off!! I think all the kids had lots of fun at our low-key party. Daven came up with some of the games. "Pin-the-Carrot on the Snowman." Then we played the m&m game, sherades, and decorated cookies. We did kill a little time by watching the "Polar Express."

Ten cute kiddos ended up coming!!

Paige

McKinley & Daven

Nathan James #1

Bailey

Logan & Annabelle

Nathan James #2

Little Sister even enjoyed the party!

2. Celebrating Our Anniversary

Mike and I decided to award ourselves with "coolest mom & dad" awards. We threw the party the morning of our 11th Anniversary. It makes us feel good about ourselves, we really aren't that cool anymore, but it is fun to talk ourselves up. We went out to dinner that night at BRIO. Oh-my..it is the most delicious Italian food I've had in a while. We had a great time that night. I can't believe it has been 11 years. It has gone by so fast & been filled with so many wonderful memories. But that is for another post, I'm sure.

3. Gingerbread Time

We found a "Gingerbread Train" at Target to decorate this year in lieu of our Gingerbread House tradition.

4. A Holiday Hay-Ride

Such a fun high-light for them. They absolutely loved and treasured it!!

5. Temple Christmas Lights

We invited our friends, the Staton's, to go to the Mesa Temple lights with us. They are so nice and were so sweet to go with us. We had a great time. They have the cutest family.

I'm hoping to get around to posting more pictures of Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. We had a good Christmas. I am so grateful for my kids, a wonderful husband and great friends. I am one lucky girl!

36 Seconds

Shun The Sun 2010

This is my "Shun The Sun 2010" Half-Marathon.

I was super excited when I crossed the finish line. As Mike put it, I beat my goal time with 36 seconds to spare!

I wanted to beat 2 hours. Well, let me back up, I wanted to beat my time from my last half-marathon in January. That was London's Run. My time was 2:07:32. This was a 9:45 pace. But, word was the race was mapped a little short. So I was probably around a 10-minute mile considering the course was short.

My friend Maddy suggested we do Shun The Sun and work on our speed. She found a training schedule to help you beat 2 hours. Although, she didn't really need it, she is already super fast and was well under 2 hours in January.

And we did it!!! My time was 1:59:24. It felt so good!

The race went really well. The course is all flat and paved most of the way. I drove up w/ my friends Maddy, Meredith, and Casey. Meredith and Casey did so awesome, this was their first half.

Maddy and I stayed together for the first 4 miles. Then, she took off.

At mile 7, I was feeling great! I think the Olive Garden pasta I ate the night before paid off. They had a clock at mile 7 & I knew I needed to step up my pace. I turned on my i-pod and off I went. I felt like I was cruising. The endorphins must have kicked in. I felt like I could run forever. I was passing people. It was invigorating.

Then came mile 10. I started to feel tired, but I knew mentally I could do 13 at my pace if I kept pushing. Mile 11 - 12 was the worst, it seemed to take forever. I think I went a little too fast because I couldn't sprint towards the finish. But, when I saw the clock, I knew I would beat my time and that was all I cared about.

I look forward to doing another one. I want to beat my time again. I get crazy ideas that I want to run a full marathon whenever I am at mile 8 in a run. But, then when mile 11 comes on, I realize it might be too much of a challenge!!

I have to say I feel like I am addicted to running. I am amazed at what my new "norm" feels like. The human body has such an amazing ability to adapt. But, I still can't decide if where I'm at is healthy or not????? I feel like I need 2 six-mile runs during the week and a long run on Saturday to feel good. It is like my body craves it. I know I say this all the time, but I think if I drank alcohol I would be an alcoholic based on how addicted to the endorphins I am.

Mike teases me because I am burning through running shoes like crazy.......Am I turning crazy??? I still love the feeling nonetheless.

Family Photo Shoot 2010

The pictures from our family photo shoot this year are in. It took me forever to get them up on the blog. I loved the way most of them turned out. It was so hard to get all the kids to smile at the same time - AHHH; hence why their aren't many family shots. Here are my favorites....

I just want to grab her tongue. This is my favorite picture of her from the shoot.

Love my little girl!

I think Daven is the photogenic one of our family. Mike is very photogenic, too. I love the way Daven's turned out, that is why I've posted so many of him. So if in 100 years, my kids are reading this, I love you all the same!!

My favorite family shot. Don't look too closely or you'll see Logan's red socks. I had everyone's outfits ready, just not enough clean black socks. oops..

I can't even tell you how in love I am with this picture of Mike and Aves. I think it should be sold in picture frames at the store. Just cut off the extra space on the side.