Drake's 4 year Old Check Up

Drake is such a good boy when we take him to the doctor or dentist. He isn't afraid and he tries really hard to be super brave.  He loved it this year and thought it was really fun.

Dr. Brown said he is healthy! He is skinny and average in height.... just perfect :)

We went ahead and got Drake's Kindergarten shots while we were there. He did so good and didn't even cry!  He was so brave and we were so proud of him!

Drake is 4

I cannot believe that Drake is 4!  He has grown up so fast and it has been 4 wonderful years!  He makes us so happy and he makes us laugh every day.  I am proud of the sweet little boy that he is.  He is so kind and has such a tender heart.  He is an awesome big brother!  He will just randomly say, "I love you Mom!"  He does this a few times a day and it makes me so happy!  He says some of the funniest things.  He is so smart too! He is doing very good in preschool and loves to learn. He has a great memory and soaks up every bit of information he can.  We love you so much Drake and are so happy that you are our son!  Happy Birthday!

We started the festivities a few days before his birthday.  I took Drake and Hunter to the mall to play on the toys.  We first got some pretzel bites and juice and then I let them take some pictures together in the picture booth. They are adorable!

Then the day before his birthday he got to celebrate at preschool.  He took a treat to share with the kids and they sang happy birthday to him and he got to wear a birthday crown.

He wanted to have a Pancake and Pajama Party.  So that is what we did! Everyone wore their pj's and we ate pancakes. It was a lot of fun and Drake loved it!  We did the party the night before his birthday cause we had other plans the day of.

Drake has a lot of people that love him and were happy to be there to celebrate his 4 years!

Drake is pretty easy to please... all he wanted was some dot markers and a sports whistle.  I absolutely love his darling smile.

I also made Drake a quilt for his birthday.  It was the most fun quilt I have ever made and I loved the way it turned out. He was pretty excited too. He loves blankets and was happy to have a quilt of his very own.

After breakfast and opening up presents he said he just wanted to be lazy and play on the iPad :)

Then we went to lunch with Grandma Lisa, Lexi, and his friend Hunter to Chick Fil-A

Then we got his favorite treat, a cupcake!

Then we went to the fun park and let the boys play on the soft play and play arcade games!

That night we went to dinner at Firehouse.  Grandpa and Grandma Wood came down to celebrate with us.  What a fun birthday this kid had!

Drake And Grace's Wedding

We got together for an early Thanksgiving dinner at the Neil's house in November.  We were having dessert and the kids were upstairs playing and Lily came down stairs and informed us that Grace and Drake got married.  We laughed and didn't think anything of it until that night when Hayley found these pictures on her camera.  What the heck!!!  Lily performed the marriage and was the photographer... ha ha! These two kids are very spirited and quite the match.  Here's to the happy couple!

These are some other pictures of Drake and Grace. Hayley took Drake for a couple hours while Josh and I were in Mexico. They went and celebrated Grace's Half Birthday.  Drake loves Grace and who knows, maybe one day they really will be married! :)

While The Husbands Away The Wife Will Play

Josh had to go to St. George for work and my dad had to go to Vegas for work and it worked out that they had to go at the same time.  It also worked out that at the same time the Aggies had a football game in Las Vegas.  The two of them left and went down there and both worked and then they were able to go to the game on Saturday. My mom was also out of town, Lauren was still in Ecuador, and James and Lexi were both busy with school and work so it was just the kids and me for a few days.  

Even though it was early in November I set up all our Christmas stuff.  I love having it up but it always comes so fast and then you don't get to enjoy it for very long.  So I just did it all on my own while Josh was gone and the kids were asleep.

Putting up the tree is always the biggest pain! I don't know what we were thinking when we bought a tree that was NOT pre-lit? It took forever!! But with a lot of diet coke and Christmas music I finished and it was so fun to sit by and relax!!

That same weekend that Josh was gone, my friend Bug's husband was also gone.  So we met up during one of the days to let our kids play and then on Saturday night Bug invited us over to let the kids paint pinecones and decorate sugar cookies.  They had a great time!! We ended up staying there for dinner time and had pizza. The kids had a blast and so did Bug and I!!

I love that London wore this Christmas dog collar around her head the whole night!!

I was reedy for Josh to get home, but I had a great weekend with my kids and was happy that Josh had a good time with my dad!

The Red Sox Win The World Series

We were pretty happy at our house this year when the Red Sox won the World Series. It was the first time they had own it on their own field since 1918.  It was fun to watch and even more fun to see Josh so excited.  Go Sox!

Girls Weekend in Salt Lake City

I absolutely adore these three girls! I have become good friends with them in the last year.  We all live by each other and used to be in the same ward before it split. We have wanted to do a girls weekend and stay over night in Salt Lake for a while and finally the first part of November we made it happen.  It was such a great time!

We left on Friday in the afternoon and went straight to IKEA to get it out of the way.  Of course we had got some awesome things and just had a great time looking without kids.  It was so nice to just walk around and look without worrying about a kid knocking something over!  After IKEA we went and checked into our hotel. We stayed at the City Creek Marriott which was so fun to be close to restaurants and shopping.  That night we went to dinner at Market Street Grill and had some amazing seafood. Again, it was so much fun to sit and eat without kids. We were able to talk and enjoy our meal!

Later that night we went back to our hotel room and stayed up way too late talking and laughing!  It is always so fun to get a really good hard laugh in and that happened on this trip. We also did something so fun on this trip and had it be our Christmas gifts to eachother.  We did a favorite things bag for each person and then wrote a note to that person with a few reasons why we love that person. It was so fun to see what the others put in their favorite things bags and also so fun to tell them what I love about each of them, but also to hear why people love me.  It was a self esteem booster that is for sure!!

BEFORE

The next morning we slept in and then got ready and had some breakfast at the Starbucks in our hotel and then ranging to Nordstrom and all got our makeup done at the MAC counter.  It was so much fun because it was nothing that I would go do on my own and also it was fun to get all dolled up in makeup that I normally don't wear.

AFTER

After our make up was done we went shopping and had lunch at Blue Lemon. We shopped until we could no longer take it and went to dinner at Red Rock! We had some awesome food while we were down there!  We stopped at Target on our way home and then called it a weekend!! It was such a great weekend and I am grateful for such awesome friends!  I love all three of them so much!!