Gingerbread houses from Utah...ta-da!

Here they are!!! Entries were constructed from approved kits from Mom, along with added candy, chips, bugles, graham crackers, peanuts, marshmallows and sweetened shortening glue! Daniel declared the candy to be good, even the 1 year old Halloween Dots! Event was held after a pizza dinner on Monday, December 20th, 2010! Thank you to the Wengels for joining the crew at our house here in W.J!

WENGEL STONEHENGE

JOHNSON BURG CANDYSTEIN

The Utah entries to 2010 Gingerbread House Contest

  



Andrew testing the building materials for us...



Nathan turned 5!

This is Nathan's 1st day of preschool. Isn't he looking so big? He is loving his new preschool, as am I. It is only a 10 min drive. He is making new friends and continues to learn so much!

Now onto September 12th. Welcome to his Star Wars party! Nathan had a blast with this party. He is obsessed with anything Star Wars and is constantly humming the theme music as he is playing. He loves the Wii game and pretty much only builds Stars Wars ships, guys and scenes out of his lego. For the party, Scott was the Jedi master and was training all the padawans (the kids). They fought Darth Vader (the pinata), did an obstacle course, and several other games. All I can say is that the internet is great in helping plan parties and get cake ideas! Nathan requested and X-wing ship for his cake. I wasn't so sure about it, but it actually turned out pretty good I think! Here are the party pics and a slideshow of pictures at the bottom:

 NATHAN, THE JEDI KNIGHT

 SCOTT- THE JEDI MASTER

A slideshow of pictures from Nathan's fifth year set to the music from, of course, Star Wars!

One more post- this is for Andrew!

Andrew is an amazing little baby! He is 4 months old, and is so happy and wonderful! THe best part is that he loves to sleep. He mastered falling asleep on his own, and sleeping thru the night- for him the night averages 12 hours! We love it! He figured that out about a month ago. I think the fact that he sucks his thumb really soothes him. He only does it at night, I am all for it at this point! He had his 4 month checkup this week, and weighs in at 18 lbs (95th percentile), 26.5 inches (90th percentile), and his head circumference was 16.7 inches(only the 50th percentile). So he his keeping up with his brothers! He has figured out how to roll tummy to back and back to tummny already. I think he is doing it sooner than either Nathan or Daniel did. We hearing his laugh and seeing him squirm when he is happy.

Nathan loves to make Andrew laugh. He is really good at it too. I think Andrew is going to have beautiful blue eyes like Nathan!

We blessed Andrew July 18th, the day that Scott's parents had their mission homecoming. It was neat to be able to have them there. We did it at their house, and it was a very special and loving blessing from Scott.

This blessing outfit is the one that all of our boys have worn. It was a little snug for Andrew- I think he is the oldest one that has worn it. Scott always humors me and lets the baby wear the cute bonnet for blessing day pictures.

Andrew is a wonderful part of our family!

Another cat... announcing Leia!

Are we crazy to get another cat? Maybe. But she is soo cute. We got her the beginning of August, she was about 2 months old. Our other cat, Bela, is not sure about the situation. She is sulking alot lately in our bedroom or closet, and hisses whenever the kitten comes close. Leia really just is trying to play with Bela, but its not recipricated. Nathan chose her name- she is named after Princess Leia from Star Wars, because she is mostly white. She is really playful and quite entertaining. And one of the best parts is that she came pretty much house-trained! Can't beat that! We did have a couple bad days when I think she didn't know where the litter box was and Daniel was peeing on the carpet too! Thank goodness at least one of them has it figured out. Why can't kids do it that fast???

Happy 30th to Scott!

My wonderful husband Scott turned the big 3-0 on August 2nd. He was able to blow out all his candles too! The boys had fun picking out presents for him( they thought he needed candy and a sprinkler!) and we had a date night out after putting the boys to bed. We found a Thai restaurant that was pretty good, but not quite as good as Thai-rama in Germany. Then we saw the movie "Inception." Wow, what a movie.  Go see it, it was good, very different and pretty clean.

Scott keeps very busy with work- and we always have a to-do list of projects to do around the house. We are finding it very fulfilling keeping up and making plans for things around the house. The boys keep us busy too.  (Actually, that is an understatement!) We find time for fun things though- we went to the Zoo in July for a family work party put on by WCF. It was a blast. The kids loved the animals, but especially the train ride and the carousel. Its great that we can ride unlimited during the party!

Can you guess which is which? We didn't mean to dress them so similarly, but we did get asked if they were twins! I wouldn't know how to explain the size difference!

Happy Birthday Daniel!

July 11, 2010

Danny Boy, DJ, "Daniel Richard", Sticky-clicky-climbing-Ricky, this is our little 2-year old! He is ALWAYS on the move- hence he loves balls, trucks, and eating to keep up his energy. He could literally be eating all day if we let him. He is talking like crazy, and Nathan really knows how to get him upset, he likes to call Daniel a "baby-man." Whatever that means! We celebrated his birthday with a basketball cake ( one of my favorite ones I have made!)

Here is Daniel in his favorite outfit almost- he would rather just be NAKED, which we don't like cause he pees everywhere! He is worse than a pet in that respect. Scott has duck taped his diapers on his bum on several nights. We don't like having to guess where he peed on the floor. I hope he grows out of this phase soon, it is stinky!

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Here are the boys on Daniel's birthday. The 2 big boys had just had their summer buzz cuts.  I love how Andrew doesn't look so sure about the situation!

Daniel opening one of his trucks. This year, he went shopping with Daddy to pick out birthday presents. It was great fun, he loved them in the store and then forgot about them until he unwrapped them a week later. I don't think it would work with Nathan. Nathan has been counting down to his big #5 birthday for 2 months and tells us everyday different ideas of presents he wants!

Andrew is 2 months old!

Today Andrew had his 2 month checkup- he did great, but what was I thinking taking all 3 of them?? Daniel was trying to escape from the exam room every chance he could get, Nathan was teasing him, and Andrew was quite the trooper grinning intermittently before his shots. Granted, I did want to take Nathan; he got 2 plantar warts frozen while we were there. So, next time I hope Daniel is a little easier because I scheduled his 2 year check up and Andrew's 4 month for the same morning!

Andrew stats:
height- 23.6 in. (75th percentile)
head- 15.9 in (6oth percentile)
weight- 14.6 lbs (95th percentile)

Nice and chubby- very cute and starting to smile for us. He really likes watching his little springy alligator we hung by his changing table. Its fun to see him learning and starting to react more to what is around him. Nathan and Daniel both like to give him lots of attention. He is doing better at night- only up once usually to eat. I think we are going to start working on training him to sleep for an 8 hr. stretch- he is officially big enough to be able to do it ! Yeah!

Daniel is really trying to keep us on his toes- he has figured out how to open our gate ( sanity really) and thinks he has free rein of the house. I am thinking about child locks everywhere, but also wonder how long before he figures out how to open those too? He is loving the basketball hoop out back and likes to go do "hoops." He is talking all the time now and is VERY curious. Any tips for getting a 2 year old to listen?? I just have to take lots of deep breaths and remember how much I love him and how quickly he will go through this stage!

Nathan is doing swimming lessons and is doing really well. He even jumped off the diving board- I will have to get pics of him. His cousin is in his class and he is always excited to go. He is getting to be such a good helper. I am enjoying afternoon nap time with him when the other 2 are sleeping. We get to have playmobile battles and play lego star wars- both things he loves to do when Daniel is sleeping!

Scott is a pro dad and wonderful husband- working hard at work and doing so much at home playing with the boys and helping me with projects in the evenings as we get settled in our new house. We are loving our house- it is fun to put things away and organize and decorate. The yard is all fenced in and is fun for the boys to run around in. We've got lots of ideas of what we want to plant eventually, trees mainly as there aren't any in the back. We don't understand why a house 10 years old never got trees planted in the back yard?

Here are some pictures- they are a little out of order, but enjoy!
Our kitchen- Scott put the cupboard handles on for us- I LOVE them and built a shelf on top of the cupboards so I could put cute stuff on top!

Afternoon picture session--

I love how happy Andrew is in this picture!

Our 3 boys- I think this might go in a frame we have that says, "Once in while, right in the middle of an ordinary life, Loves hands us a fairy tale." I love the happy smiles on their faces!

Andrew hanging out- he doesn't mind the bouncy chair, but the swing is definitely his favorite.

Helping dad with the installation of the cupboard handles. Daniel lost interest pretty quick, but Nathan hung around for awhile.

Andrew smiling while they were doing the handles!

Isn't he cute?

"Daniel, smile!" And this is what he does.

Nathan and Scott went mini-golfing on Memorial day. I think he had a fun time. He didn't want to keep score though. He came home and his card had stars next to the holes that he did under par or par I think it was.