Christmas 2011

Christmas was crazy in the Ward house. It started off great, Kassi's parents visited for a week and we got to celebrate all week long! Christmas afternoon, however, the majority of us caught the 24 hour plus stomach bug that seems to be going around. We are all healed now and ready to start a new year! Hope you all had a great Christmas and stayed healthy!

Christmas Things

Video--double click to view

Oliver and his friend Dylan

Kissing buddies

Thanksgiving

What an awesome Thanksgiving we had this year! We hosted 9 for dinner and it was a blessing having the table filled with family and friends. Jeff's parents and sister visited for the week and were lucky to celebrate his dad turning 60 on Thanksgiving day! The day after Thanksgiving they helped us decorate for Christmas and then we had Christmas early by exchanging gifts with them on Saturday. Sunday we were off to Six Flags for their Holiday in the Park event and had a blast. So exciting that we get to spread Christmas out this year; I feel like we've done so much and it's not even December yet! Grandaddy arrived today so we will have more great photos to post of his visit I am sure!

Halloween 2011

Both of my poor kiddos (and husband) ended up being sick this Halloween, but they sure were troopers and we made the most of it and I think everyone had a good time. Here are some pictures of our festivities:

Oliver not wanting his picture taken as usual.

Helping Mommy make halloween cookies.

Cutting out the first one.

Taste test before we iced the pumpkins and bats.

Curious George and his friend the man in the yellow hat.

Mama and baby butterfly.

Excited about his ice cream.

Getting excited about the thought of filling up that bucket with candy.

Love this one!

Trick or Treat!

Harlan handing out candy.

My little punkins.

Our First Family Vacation!

We loaded up last Saturday and flew down to San Diego for a 5 night family vacation. What a fun time we had despite the chilly weather that set in part way through our stay. We rented a lovely beach house at Mission Beach, which was a perfect location. Oliver loved the sand (especially running in and out of the water) even though our time on the beach was short. We spent the first two days at LEGOLAND and Sea World, which was fun and exhausting all at the same time. For some reason Oliver's mouth was really bothering him starting the second day of our trip so he was a bit of a pill because he wasn't eating and therefore cranky and tired. It's a good thing it wasn't sunny and warm the whole trip because I think we would have many more trips to San Diego in our future! Enjoy the photos.

Dave's Pumpkin Patch

The kids and I head to the Midwest!

What a busy 2 weeks we had, but that's how it always goes. Jeff was working in Houston, TX for a while so the kids and I packed up and headed east! We flew into KC (were greeted by rain) spent the night there before continuing on to Springfield. Once there Oliver spent his first night away from his mama and stayed the weekend with Jeff's parents. My Mom, Harlan and I attended a friends bridal shower that I went to high school with. It was fun catching up with old friends that I hadn't seen in probably 8 years! We went to the lake, and were trapped indoors for all the rain Springfield was getting, but it was good family time anyway. Oliver got to go to the stockyards twice and see the cows, hear the auctioneer, and ride a horse. These were just a few of his favorite things. He also got to spend the afternoon at Grandaddy's ranch and ride on a combine, a gator and see new baby calves. We drove to Joplin one day to meet up with my Aunt and Grandma for shopping and lunch. It was good to see them and also the damage from the tornadoes back they had back in may. We headed up to Falls City, Nebraska to visit with my cousin and her kids for a few days before flying back to California. It was so nice for O. and H. to spend time with their twin cousins even though it was chaotic at times! All in all we had a great time and although we crammed in a lot, I think Oliver's favorite thing was hanging out at Grandaddy and MamaLu's house with all of the kitties!

Funderland

Lisa and I loaded up her new mini van to the max with 4 kiddos (all in car seats) and drove to Sacramento for a day at Funderland, a kiddie amusement park. The boys had a great time riding all of the rides and even got to end the day with a snow cone! Oliver has done AWESOME this week at going on the potty although it's a struggle for me to be persistent and consistent. Today I've got two kids with colds and Harlan was up many many times through the night then up early this morning. Both only took an hour nap today after going to story time at the library and running around at the park. You should have seen me trying to get OBW on the potty at the library, while holding Harlan and trying to be as sanitary as possible. (A day in the life of this mommy isn't at all glamorous.) It was a chore to say the least, but we managed. Harlan is just about to crawl. She is officially a scooter and can access about anything she wants. At story time she was a handful constantly trying to grab Oliver's name tag off his neck or dump out the bucket of trains that the kids play with afterwards. She'll be up on the move any day.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hill Fire

Here are photos of our poor hill that caught fire right behind our house. Luckily, our wonderful Cal Fire folks kept it contained and it didn't make it any closer. Now it's just a black burnt mess, but thankfully no one was injured!