Ten Months Old

And walking:

This kid wants to follow his sister and brother so badly that he is walking at the time that they both started crawling.

We took him to see Santa for the first time this year:

As you can see, he enjoyed sitting with Santa about as much as William enjoyed sitting with Santa last year:

We torture these poor kids.

Sorry, Jess

We don't have the same car anymore. We sold the white Camry and got a new car that seats eight. I was sick of seeing Rebecca and William constantly fighting in the back, and we found this car for a great deal. Those two still try to hit eachother while we're driving in the car, but now that we have room to separate them, they are too far away to land their swings.

Finding this car came at a great time, too. Back in November on our way home from Disneyland, some crazy old lady who has no business being on the road anymore side-swiped us.

The week after we got our new car, our insurance company called to inform us that on the police report this crazy lady stated that we drove into her. Don't you just love people who are honest? Or maybe she's so senile that she really believed as she was swerving into our lane that we were actually swerving into her. What I don't understand is how we could get that funny-looking tire swirl on the side of our car if her tires were driving straight ahead and we pulled into her. And of course no one stopped to be a witness, so the the policeman couldn't cite anyone because of conflicting accounts. So in the end we probably would have had to pay to get the damage fixed.

But instead of putting $500 into fixing a car that we did not damage, we got to keep our money and get a new car that we were desperately beginning to need. We were to the point that when Kevin wanted to travel with his snowboard and the kids were in the car, he had to hold it in his lap in the front seat.

I do miss the ghetto tint on that Camry, but the extra room in this car makes up for that.

Busy Nine-Month-Old Boy

Braden is nine months old today and crawling on his hands and knees, pulling himself up on anything around, standing by himself for about half a second, teething (two more came in on top), and my personal favorite - holding his own bottle. My sister Jodi actually taught him how to do this, and I love her for it. Now when I get up in the middle of the night to make him a bottle, I hand it to him in his crib and go right back to bed. I would prefer that he just start sleeping through the night, but I'll take this, for now.

Braden is definitely the busiest of all of my kids. He's all over the place! He goes nuts when I have to change his diaper. I have to hold him down so he won't roll away and move on to something else.

He loves William and Rebecca. He is really good in the car unless his brother and sister are not in the backseat with him. I had to take him to get shots without his siblings one day, and he cried the whole way there. I thought he was just having a bad day until my sister told me he did the same thing to her when she had just him in her car.

He's a sweet boy, even though he has turned into a bit of a screamer. Lately he wants what he wants the instant he wants it, or he starts screaming.

We've had lots of new babies born in our ward over the past couple of months, and they all make my baby seem so big. It's sad that they have to grow up so quickly. I love it when they are little and helpless, and only mama can give them what they need. But I do love seeing Braden's little personality start to emerge. And he still let's me cuddle him sometimes, which gives me my newborn baby fix.

Utah

I got to go see the New Moon movie with the Sutton sisters at midnight since Amy and Allison's sister Jennie bought out a whole theater and sold the tickets to whoever wanted to go. I've seen a few midnight movies, and this was the best way to see one - we didn't have to wait in line, and our theater didn't have a bunch of giggly, screaming little girls in it. Thanks, Allison, for advertising your extra tickets!

But I couldn't celebrate a Twilight event without my beautiful friend Ashley Bailey:

So on Friday, November 20th we drove up to Tremonton so I could see the movie with her on Saturday.

Before the movie we took a walk with the kids around the neighborhood. Then we decided to get pizza and let the kids bowl:

This was the first time my kids had been bowling, and they loved it.

We went home and rested for a bit before Ashley and I drove down to Ogden to see the movie. She chose the Ogden theater because it has assigned seating, which meant we didn't have to stand in line. Such a good idea! Las Vegas needs a theater like this.

It was so nice to see the Bailey's again. I wish they didn't move so far away. Thanks for the fun trip, Ashley. I'll see you next summer!

Birthday Trip

Rebecca turned five on November 22, so after our trip to Tremonton, Kevin and I packed up again, left the boys at home, and took Rebecca to Disneyland to celebrate her birthday.

I don't ever remember seeing Disneyland decorated for Christmas when I was younger. We finally got to see it this year, and I loved the decorations, especially at Small World.

We ate dinner at Ariel's Grotto where Rebecca got to meet all of her favorite princesses.

I'm pretty sure they have two or more people dress up as the same character. For instance we've seen two different Snow Whites. But the Jasmine Rebecca got to see at dinner was the same Jasmine she met back in June:

I think this girl is so perfect as Jasmine, and I love her cute picture poses.

It was nice to spend some time with just Rebecca since her younger, more high-maintenance brothers get most of the attention when they're around.

I love you, Baby Girl. I hope you had a fun birthday at Disneyland!

Utah Again

After Disneyland, we came home, did a lot of laundry, and packed up again to spend Thanksgiving in New Harmony, Utah. After a week of lots of driving, we took it easy for the first couple of days of this trip. We planned on doing early morning Black Friday in St. George again this year, but when the alarm went off, I told Kevin I didn't want to get up, and I'm pretty sure he was okay with that.

We did get up a little later that day to go snowboarding in Brian Head. It had been six years since the last time I was on a snowboard, so I had a few wrecks during this trip. I came home with two bruised knees, sore palms, and a shiner on my face. (I won't be posting any pictures of those injuries.) But I am grateful to have a hobby again, and I'm grateful to have babysitters an hour away from Brian Head so that I can really enjoy that hobby.

I didn't take any pictures on this trip because I was sitting on the couch most of the time, but we did get a video of Braden's favorite thing to do on this visit:

This kid loves attention from his cousins.

What a great week of trips!

No More He-Man

We love the new haircut, Bryan!