New Year's Eve

We decided this year that we wanted to have a party, but we wanted it to be low key. So we invited my dad and all of the hub's family over. The kiddos had a blast as you can tell by this picture. They love having parties, and I love giving them.The activities were easy, since the kiddos got an arcade basketball game and an air hockey table from grandpa for Christmas. And we also had the Wii, which everyone loves. I had purchased a gingerbread house kit after Christmas which was only a couple of dollars, knowing the kids would love to decorate it, and boy did they ever LOVE it.

Even Bella was loving it, however, I think it was the eating the candy she really loved.

We had good eats, lots of things we knew the kiddos would all love, since they almost outnumbered the adults-almost.

Cute little Josh with his daddy.

Bella loves sitting with Grandpa Renga, and he loves her to death. He's been smitten with her since he first held her after she was born.

We had noise makers and horns for the kiddos, but Bella couldn't blow the horn, so I gave her pots and pans to beat. She loved making the noise.

This was Bella's first time sitting at the big table in the morning. She quickly returned to her high chair the next day, because she wasn't quite ready to sit in the booster seat. This is fine with me, I'd like to keep her little a little longer. I'm not quite ready to see my baby not a baby any more.

Here's one more pic of the kiddos decorating that house. They really enjoyed this activity. We all had fun and it was a very calm, relaxed, fun party. I love throwing parties, especially when they are simple.

Catch Up!

Day 24

Activity

Tradition as follows, mom bakes cookies the night of the 23rd and as a family we decorate them the morning of the 24th for Santa's arrival. The kiddos have grown up doing this and about the 2nd day of December they started counting down the days until this activity was upon us. It wasn't a surprise for the kiddos when Alexis pulled down the sock and it said activity. They all shouted, "Cookie Day!"

Kaleigh showing off her frosting covered fingers.

Some of the finished masterpieces.

Day 23

Present

The kiddos opened up a new book. It's frosty the snowman and when you open it, it plays the song. We were constantly hearing it due to Mr. Noah's love of that song.

Day 22

It was an activity. We delivered our neighbor gifts that we made the day before.

Day 21

We made our neighbor gifts, and I forgot to take pics. We made chocolate popcorn munch-popcorn, toffee bits, and green/red m&ms. We made a cute tag with the hub's tagline, "Seasons Eatings," and bagged them up. The kiddos love being in the kitchen, they must be mine!


Day 20

Activity

It was the hub's and my anniversary, so in stepped grandpa to get pizza and a movie for the kiddos. I love when my work is done for me. And the kids love pizza and a movie night!

Day 19

Activity

We had a family party with the hub's family. The kids ate, laughed, and performed to their hearts' extent! Fun was had by all!

Day 18

Activity

My dad took us all out for a movie. We don't all go out to the movies very often, so this was a real treat. I was afraid the kiddos would be bored by the movie(they had never seen/heard of yogi bear), but they were laughing and loving the entire movie. Kuddos to grandpa for picking another winner!

Day 17

Present

The kids got a new book for Christmas, Jingle Bells, which plays when you open it. These kiddos LOVE their books, hence why we have boxes of books because we have no more space in our 6 bookcases!

Day 16

Activity

We saw the 3 older girls in their play, The Best Christmas Pageant Ever. It was a blast and we loved it!


Day 15

Present

We gave the kiddos Toy Story 3 on Bluray. Man, is bluray ever so clear. It is so sharp and bright. They were really happy to get this. They had been begging us to get it ever since it came out, but we told them we couldn't because we didn't have any extra moola to buy it. Little did they know, mom scored with a sale and coupon! How sweet it was!

Day 14

Present

The kiddos got a new game, and although it's advertised as a little kiddo game, all the kiddos had a blast, including this one. Scatterpillar Scramble is HIlarious! It's a challenge even for me, but oh so much fun.

Day 13

Activity

We finally got to go see Santa, and even better, NO WAIT! The kiddos got to sit right on his lap, mom got to take as many pics with her own camera as she wanted, and Bella didn't cry at the sight of the Jolly Ol' Elf! Good times and the kiddos walked away with a fun new book. Gotta love Fashion Place Mall for leaving Santa alone and not demanding to make a buck off of him.

Don't they all look so HAPPY! They all enjoyed this last year's advent calendar and so did we. They all kept telling their friends and their church leaders and now some of our neighbors are wanting to do this fun way of counting down the days too. If you're not having fun along the journey, what is the point of the destination, right? And man, are we ever having fun along our Hansen Family journey!

Advent Calendar and cute Bella!

This lit'l gal is growing SO fast! I can't catch my breath!

She had her 18 month check up and man, she shot up through the roof on her height. She is now in the 80th percentile and still 48th percentile in weight. She's growin' like a weed, but doesn't she look so cute in her Christmas dress.

She loves this little Santa ornament. She gets it out everyday and plays with it. So cute!

We also started our family countdown to Christmas. Last year we started doing 12 days of activities and 12 days of family presents. It worked out so well, I thought I'd continue it so here's what we've done so far. I'm gonna do it backwards because I'm a tad bit behind in my blogging.

Day 12- Present
This is what they got...



Day 11-Present, they got Pictureka Flipper and had a blast! My camera was down so no pics of them playing it, but they had fun searching all over for the items.

Day 10- Present

This is a huge floor book that's just like the Where's Waldo books, only it's where's Santa?

Day 9-Activity

We went down to see the lights at Thanksgiving Point and we met some new friends!

Oohing and ahhing over our new friends

Bella screaming and pointing, and at one point trying to climb out of daddy's arms to touch this...

An adorable reindeer all nestled in hay. It was so cute and so fun to see the kids so excited to see some of Santa's reindeer.

One of the light displays Logan yelled at because it was an elf fixing a house. He's very excited about Christmas and just loves the elves.

Day 8-Present

Christmas t-shirts that everyone just loved. So much that they had to wear them right then eventhough it was almost bedtime.

Day 7-Activity

We went and did our annual trip to Christmas Street, Bible Street and the Christmas Utah house in Murray. The kids had a blast and there was much laughter and cheer had all around.

Day 6-Present

We got the kids a new Wii game and they love it! It's just like the ride at Disneyland and now they can hardly wait to go and check out the ride. The great thing about this game is that EVERYONE can play it, even Noah and yes, sometimes Bella too!

Day 5-Activity

We made some ornaments. We did some fun paint ones and the artist of the family really enjoyed herself.

Kaleigh chose the colors of Tinkerbell and it actually does remind me of that cute lit'l pixie.

Here are all 8 of them done and we all had fun. We also made some memory ones with everyone's initials on them. We then each wrote 5 things we liked about this year and placed the strips of paper inside the ornaments. I thought it would be nice for the kids when they are older to open them and see what they wrote about the year 2010.

Day 4-Present

We added a new family game, Sorry Sliders. It is so much fun. The hubs and I played it that night with the two older girls and we were laughing the whole time as we each knocked eachother's pieces out of the scoring rings. Good times!

Day 3-Present

The kids got a new tent with a tunnel. They all love playing in it and they can all sit inside and play a game together. I really like items that all the kids can use at the same time. It cuts out all the fighting and we can have a fun time without the screams and tears.

Day 2-Activity

We made friend presents and Bella screamed until we finally gave her one. They are snowmen on sticks. They turned out really cute and it was an easy thing for the kids to make their friends. They got to take them to school and hand them out. They all loved helping in the kitchen. I think I might need a bigger kitchen to let us all have more room when we are all in there.

Here's Alexis trying her hand at dipping her snowman. She had a hard time at first, but once I showed her how to hold it at an angle, it was a piece of cake-or marshmallow if you will.

I made some for the younger ones to eat right then because they were drooling at the bits. I mean, who wouldn't, when there's chocolate, marshmallow and candy around.

Logan could hardly wait to eat his. He almost couldn't wait while I was trying to take a picture of him. I just love those gorgeous, big green eyes!

Here's what they all looked like when we packaged them all up. These ones were Kaleigh's. She liked the Christmas colors and went for that color scheme on all her snowmen.

Day 1-Present

The kids could hardly wait to open a present. Noah was singing and dancing until he realized that the presents weren't under the tree, they were over on the other side of the room.

And this is what the kids got to kick off our countdown-Gator Golf! They played all day and night, even Bella was whacking the golf balls all over the place. She thinks that she is one of the big kids.

All and all, we've had fun so far with our countdown and can hardly wait to finish it up. We hope you all have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Halloween 2010

I just love the holidays! I can do so much with each and every one. We had our traditional Halloween spooky dinner before we left for our tricks and treats. I made bats and guts as our appetizer. The kids really get into my creepy names. Even when my dad asked for something if he didn't call it by its spooky name they didn't pass it to him. Haha, funny kids!
Then we have our bumps on a log with worms. Yummy!!!

Our bone breadsticks, again, those creepy worms kept crawling all over our food.

Edible eyeballs, yummy stuff.

Our table with our annual putrid punch. We actually lucked out and have had this drink twice this year-since Noah wanted it at his b-day party too.

And our main course, mummy pizzas. I like them this way better. They are on sliced french bread, and ooh, were they yummy.

The kittys from the bunch.

Miss A as a penguin. She was so loving her costume. I just can't decide which one I like best out of the four that I made.

Miss B as the cutest lit'l giraffe you ever laid eyes on. She worked this costume during the 3 days of celebrating.

Of course Noah had to be Thomas. He wouldn't let me make him any other costume, so he chose this one that we already had.

Logan decided to bring out his true nature and request a monkey costume. I loved seeing him in it. Too bad I didn't get a close up of his tail. He loved his tail and banana the most. His tail curls around and is furry.

And she's at it again, strike a pose Kaleigh. You go girl. She saw this sweat suit at target and fell in love. So did I, cause making her into a cheetah would be a piece of cake with this outfit. Now she can just wear the sweat suit all winter. Love when costumes do double duty.

Miss Laney Banes as her all-time favorite animal. Can you guess? I hope so, she's an elephant. I had a lot of fun making this one, and again her costume does double duty as well. All the costumes that I made do. They can now wear their outfits throughout winter. I either safety pinned parts or used elastic. All removable parts, love it!

Smiley Noah so happy to be at the girls' school parade.

Just another cute pic of Bella. She's so adorable!

My favorite group picture of the kids being silly right before we headed out into the rainy night. I love them all and as you can probably tell by this picture, they are a funny, fun-loving bunch of kids. Is it any wonder why I love them and being their mommy so much!