How can we possibly catch up?????

I don't even know how to catch up!! December was an incredibly busy month. I will probably have to post again but I am feeling inferior to Sharla (and everyone else whose blogs I read), so I needed to put SOMETHING in here. We very unexpectedly got to keep the kids for the whole Christmas break instead of missing the week of Christmas, so we were THRILLED but suddenly under a deadline we hadn't expected. SO, to everyone ELSE in our lives, sorry we didn't pay any attention to you but we were concentrating on our children. We had a lovely Christmas with them.
Our ward party was a no-Santa affair, and it was awesome! It was a Bethlehem theme and completely Christ-centered. Better bloggers than I have already commented and posted photos of the costumes, the marketplace, the booths, everything that made the night really magical, and not in a Frosty, Rudolph, or St. Nick kind of way either.

Don't worry though, our kids didn't miss seeing Santa! The Foothills Ward (Grandma and Grandpa Williams' ward) had him visit and the kids got to get this photo and tell their list and all that good stuff:

Okay. Christmas was great. Check. We just went and got our family photos for 2009 (yes, on the 30th of December. Leave me alone we've been busy). Here is a great one of the kids. Our profile photo is updated too. What handsome (and beautiful) kids we have!!! And we wouldn't want to leave out the youngest, now would we. On December 8 I had an ultrasound (at 16 weeks)-- "just to check" and see if we could tell the sex of the baby. Turns out that he is a boy. The photo that actually shows he is a boy is not posted here, because they labeled it and I don't want to get in trouble for posting graphic photos online or anything. Let's just say the technician doing the ultrasound was shocked how easily he was distinguishable as a little boy baby. So anyway, here's our newest, I think you are seeing him from the rear so enjoy. He's a very mobile little guy, I'm feeling him swish around in there a little but he practically breakdances when we do ultrasounds. Heeeeere's Simon!!

PS I'll post more........... the kids' Christmas program, Christmas eve, Christmas day, the 15 minutes we spent in the snow when we drove to Flagstaff (long and non-postable story)..... I just wanted to have one post for December before it was over. --L

More November--Tommy's birthday

I neglected to mention Tommy turning 6 in November!! It was a fabulous day! We had a little get-together to celebrate. I made a peanut butter cake with vanilla and peanut-butter chip frosting. For those who don't know, Tommy does not like chocolate. Yeah, people exist who don't like chocolate. The doctors can't find a cause for this strange disease :-) Anyway, he loves peanut butter. Here he is, contemplating those 6 candles in the shape of "T for Tommy!"

We have discovered that Tommy is going to be our resident artist. So this year, one of his presents was a box he can put his pens, pencils, crayons, and various implements into and lock it. He is very excited about that. There are other pictures of all the various art supplies we stocked him up with, but they all have this same beautiful smile...

And, lest it be thought that Thomas is not rough and tumble with his artistic sensitivities, here is that same big grin when he received a remote control 4x4 vehicle. He was stoked about that too.

These weren't all the presents, he was very happy about all of it but do you really want to see a picture of every present and card??? Needless to say, cake, ice cream, presents, party, it was a fun night for our Tommy. We are so grateful and happy to have Thomas in our family, he really brings so much joy to us. Tommy is also the baby's biggest cheerleader. Every time Tommy sees me, it's "how's the baby?" "are you taking your pills to make the baby strong?" "make sure you eat your vegetables so the baby can grow big and strong" One time I told Tommy when he asked how the baby was, that it was "Wild, just like you guys. Wouldn't let me sleep!!" (it was too small at the time to wreak that kind of havoc)... so now another question is "Mommy was the baby wild last night so you couldn't sleep?" :-) I love that kid!

News

This is old news to most, because I am SO behind on blogging.... but, we are expecting a little mini-Williams in May! That's partially why I'm so behind on blogging, and always saying "tired" when someone says "how are you?" I was going to post our 12 week ultrasound, but of course it won't upload. So imagine all those ultrasounds you've ever seen, and that's ours. Only cuter of course. We are excited and I'm glad to be mostly out of the sick phase and just in the tired phase. That's my big excuse for being so behind on blogging.

So, let's see, what else has happpened since Halloween?

My mom had her 78th birthday on November 5, so we had her over for a little celebration. Here's Mom and her cake. Only 4 candles because 78? I'm not that cruel.

Cake and ice cream. The kids were so excited. Can't you tell? Aaron and I were released as Cubmaster and his lovely Assistant. We had our last pack meeting at our house and had a bonfire. The theme was Native American lore, so we did a lot of those old campfire participation stories and such. Here's Aaron conducting in front of our bonfire.Brother Mason is our new Cubmaster. Here Aaron is turning over our "Talking Stick" to him. I was going to post a whole bunch of photos of all the boys and their parents participating, but sometimes Blogger doesn't let me do what I want. (I'm not really a "limits" kind of person, so I am more than a little annoyed that I get limited on how many pictures I can post....) Anyway, we had lots of audience participation in our skits and jokes and such this time around... here is Chad and his mom doing a joke for us. Our bonfire was a lot of fun and a good way to end our tenure as Cubmaster/Cubmasterette. We are now the Webelos leaders, so we are still in Cub Scouts (yeah!)

SO, I think that's all for November. Thanksgiving was different for us this year. Usually my family has a big reunion on Thanksgiving Day, but this year it was decided to have a campout the weekend after. We spent Thanksgiving Day with Aaron's family, which was nice. We then all were sick enough (Aaron with "walking" pneumonia, me with chest junk which may or may not turn into the same thing among other various complaints, the kids all coughing and hacking) that we couldn't go up to the cold for camping. We were disappointed about that.... so November is over and that's about all I've got for ya. Hopefully I'll get to post more soon.