Snow Day 2019

We're always pretty excited when we get a little bit of snow!!!

Happy Birthday Hazel

I wonder how many other little girls pick goats as their birthday party theme?  I'm guessing not that many because our little Hazelnut is truly one of a kind.   We tease that she runs this house and I won't tell you how many times over this past year we've sat down at the end of the day and reflected on the fact that we'd just had our butts handed to us by a 3 year old.  She's most definitely our biggest personality, she lives on bean burritos, and goats are her FAVORITE!  We sure do love our little NUT!

We had to get bean burritos for lunch at Hazel's favorite Mexican restaurant in Jefferson.  Carter surprised her with some little gifts as did Uncle Robert!

 We LOVE Goats!!!

 And Rapunzel!

Happy Birthday Little Nut!  Never Grow Up!

Twin Gender Reveal

Uncle Robert volunteered to throw our gender reveal and he did such a great job!  He really went all out and I felt so celebrated and loved.  I especially loved the cake which he had custom made for us, the notes he collected from family and friends to encourage and celebrate with us, and the way he involved all the kids.  It's always been fun to find out what were we're having but this was a whole new level of excitement and anticipation! 

The theme was "Two Peas in a Pod!" 

When people arrived Sadie made sure that they recorded their boy or girl guess.  At this point we knew that the twins were identical so it was either going to be 2 boys or 2 girls.  I was guessing boys because when they did the gender part of the ultrasound they were pretty quick to say they knew what they were.  In the past I always felt like they double checked a little more when it was girl versus a boy.  I also thought boy just because our last 2, Hazel and Evie, were girls.  I guess it just felt like time for a boy.  Brandon was hoping for boys too, just to even the score a bit, but he also kept saying that because of how sick I'd been he thought that they could be girls.  I am always way sicker with girls, but this time I just chalked that part up to being pregnant with twins. 

Gender was revealed through a game.  Robert and Grammy made 3 poster boards with numbered pea pods on them.  Then they blew up a balloon for each pea and inside was a rolled up piece of paper which said either boy or girl and a corresponding number.  So the kids took turns popping balloons with a Nerf gun and then reading the clue.  So for example if the clue said #3 girl, they would put a pink face over the #3 pea.  Once an entire pod was filled with either 3 girls or 3 boys we would know what we were having.  It ended up taking a LONG time to find our answer as pod after pod filled up with a combination of girl and boy faces.  You can probably image the anticipation in the room as we got down to the last few balloons.......

Sadie ended up popping the balloon that finally announced that it was GIRLS!!!!  I was so shocked!  I would have truly been happy with either as it had been awhile since we'd had a boy but I love love love my girls too!  Sadie as you can see from the video was super excited and my poor boys were a little heart broken which was sad.  They will no doubt warm up but as the game progressed it got pretty lively between the cousins chanting Girl, Girl, Girl, Boy, Boy, Boy!!!!  I think they were truly disappointed that they weren't getting a brother and also sad because they felt like they had somehow lost the competition.  Wyatt just crumpled over with a noooo!  and Cooper walked away.   Poor boys were already outnumbered and this definitely isn't fix that.

This may have sat on my kitchen counter for a month.  It was just too cute to throw away and it made me happy whenever I saw it!

Wyatt's 8th Birthday

Recently we introduced the boys to Star Wars and they are big fans.  Actually even Hazel likes it.  Her favorite character is Darth Maul.  Go figure!!

We may have purchase 6 Nerf guns for Wyatt's birthday.  We figured he needed some to share with his siblings and then of course we had to hide a few in our room so that we could defend ourselves against their inevitable attack. 

Happy Birthday Wyatt!  We love you and your constantly expanding love for life and knowledge!

Anniversary Trip

We celebrated our anniversary with a trip to Waldport, Oregon.  Waldport is a cute little town just down the road from Lincoln City where we typically go.  We found this little a-frame on VRBO.  It had a view of the water and it was a welcome break from our day to day.  I've still been pretty sick with these babies so that was a bit of a bummer but it didn't get in the way too much.  We found a yummy pizza place, enjoyed more conversation than we can typically fit into a week, and took our yearly shopping to the Lincoln City Outlets.  I'm kinda glad I don't know what we are having yet or things may have gotten out of hand.

Christmas 2018

Christmas break is always a lot of fun and this year was great because Christmas was at the beginning of break and then we had more than a week off afterwards just to enjoy being home.

A friend from Sadie's class Zac has a Christmas tree farm and we tried their place this year.  It was awesome!

Christmas Program at Church

Christmas Eve Service

We enjoyed seeing the new Marry Poppins movie with Grammy and Auntie Kendra while Daddy helped Uncle Andy put in some hardwood floors at their house.

We also spent some time reorganizing to get ready for the twins.  I'm a big time planner and since I have no idea how this pregnancy will go I was anxious to start checking things off the already growing list.  So one of the things we did over break was move the boys downstairs into what was our office/craft room.  We also moved Evie into the big girls room upstairs and got some new shelves and cubbies for their room so that we can get some of the smaller toys out of the family room.

I've also started adding twin gear to my collection of baby things.  You can never be too prepared right???

Another big addition to our family over Christmas break was our new Suburban.  Brandon got a company truck a few weeks ago and so though it feels weird to have two new vehicles in our driveway we decided the end of the year was as good a time as ever to trade our van for this bigger rig that will hold all 7 of our soon to be munchkins.

And that basically wraps up 2018.

2019 should be quite an adventure!!!!