The newest member of our family

We have a new addition to our family. His name is Tank, We named him that since we know that he is going to be big. He is 9 weeks old and is a really sweet little lab puppy. If you are looking at his tail wondering why it looks a little funny, He was born that way. The only one who isn't excited for Tank is little Sidney, who cries everytime he looks at her. I thought I would post a few pictures of the kids. It seems like they change and grow so fast.
Kaleigh will be five in May and her interests are never the same each day, since the weather is slowely changing from cold to warm she spends a lot more time outside playing with her friends Kennedi and Olivia her cousin (since they are back in Orem). She has a new friend that she has play dates with named Amelyah, they are very cute together. I registered her for Kindergarten last week, so that makes me both sad and excited at the same time.

Hagen will be three next month. He no longer takes naps and loves diego, cars, trains, and dinosaurs. But lately he has been extremely interested in Spiderman. He just stays home with mom all day and every so often I can get him to cuddle, he does tell us that he loves us at least a hundred times a day so I guess that makes up for the lack of cuddling.
Little Sidny is 8 months old and is crawling everywhere. She is still my chunkiest baby but she is also a good eater as well. She puts everything in her mouth so we have to watch her really closely. Since she thinks she needs a taste of everything we eat I started giving her a little food everytime we eat, minus the meat. She is doing really well eating by her self, and hopefully soon I won't have to feed her jar food.
Mmmm, spaghetti!

She is crawling!!

She is crawling! I am so excited that I had to share this with everyone. The past month little Sidney has done nothing but scoot backwards, but today she actually went forward. Hagen, poor little guy, has done nothing but say, "no no Sidney". In the picture below Hagen was trying really hard to clean up his legos before she could get them, as you can see she was a little faster than he was.
I had to put this picture because of how sad Hagen's little face looked. Saturday morning Hagen swelled and broke out in hives. Not sure why, we think he may be allergic to coconut, I don't think he has ever had it before Saturday morning. Me being a paranoid mom and never seeing hives before rushed him to the doctor, my doctors are getting rich off of me this month! After a tablespoon of benadryl and thirty minutes later he looked a lot better.

Playing in the Snow

Ethan and I built a small sledding hill, pretty soon all the kids were playing on it.

Ethan-Riley-Hagen-Autumn-Kaleigh

Kaleigh and Autumn Hagen and Kaleigh

Uncle Sheldon came to visit

Sheldon and Julie came to visit after the new year. It was fun to be with them. Julie had to go home early, but Uncle shledon stayed a little longer Kaleigh and Hagen had a lot of fun playing with him and so did Sidney.

Busy Christmas Week

As always the week of Christmas is extremly busy filled with family activities, we love the holidays.

These are just a few pictures that had been taken the first of this crazy week.

The kids love playing mario kart.

Smith family Christmas eve party. We ate a very filling lunch. The kids hit a pinata and got lots and lots of candy (didn't get any pictures of that, however Jenny was very funny). Decorated Ginger Bread houses since the weather was too horrible for any one to travel during the week. We all played chimes and then Santa came. Hagen and Jared

Grandma Mikits and Sidney

Tallon and Melissa

Sarah and Melissa

Des and Olivia

Jacob and Kaleigh

Jenny and Sidney

Chimes

Aunt Jenny played Santa this year. She was a pro. Little Sidney fell asleep before she could go sit with Santa.

Before the kids went to bed on Christmas eve they got to open one present from Mom and Dad, pajamas of course, don't they look amazingly cute. Christmas morning! The kids slept in until 9:00 am. The funny thing was that Jared and I layed in bed wide a wake waiting for the kids to wake up.

Little Sidney would have been happy with just wrapping paper.

Hagen loves dinosaurs, if you couldn't tell.

Kaleigh was fun to watch. She has finally gotten Christmas morning down and kept asking for more presents.

The weekend after Christmas we always go to Vernal to spend a little time with my family. The kids had fun and definately enjoyed opening more presents. Grandma Carol with Hagen, Sidney, and kaleigh

Ginger Bread Houses 2008

Every year my kids are so excited to decorate ginger bread houses. Last night (Dec. 14th) we celebrated Des' birthday, opened gifts, and then let the kids decorate their houses. I think majority of the candy ended up in their bellies than on the houses. They all did a great job.

In memory of our father

Yesterday, unexpectedly, we lost a great man, a wonderful father and grandfather. This is one of the last pictures I have of my dad and I thought it was very fitting to show this picture of him and the grandkids. The grandkids really loved him and they were always excited to be with him. I miss him.

We put an obituary in the Lake Tribune and the Deseret News for Wednesday, 26th, of November. It was a short and simple but we created a blog in his memory for a little more of a personal note. If you would like to add any of your own memories to the blog, please do.

http://www.steenthecandyman.blogspot.com/