Tess is 11 months old!

Where has the time gone? Tess is still such a happy little baby! Although this has been a rough month because she has been teething. She has cut 4 teeth in 4 weeks. Poor baby! She's missing a flower in her hair here but I love her little smile!

She loves her big brother Talen!

After she learned to crawl she quickly took off and she is now into everything.... everywhere!

But how can we get mad.... look at her?

She is such a poser!

This picture is kinda freaky but it's the best one I have of her "vampire teeth." She cut her two I-teeth before her two front teeth. It was scary looking but her front teeth came in pretty quickly- thank goodness!

Each month I write a little about what is new with Tess for the month. It is amazing how babies learn and grow so quickly! She cruises all over the house and stands up to furniture now, except once she stands up she can't get back down! She has been teething like crazy!! She loves to blow kisses, wave hi and bye, clap, play peek-a-boo (she now covers her eyes instead of her ears) and dance. She loves, loves, loves music and dancing. Anytime she hears music she puts her hands in the air and moves. It is the cutest thing in the world. Her favorite song is Eye of the Tiger- not sure why! She will give kisses and say "ahhhh" when she kisses us. It's so cute! She still loves to eat everything and is starting to eat more and more table food. She isn't sleeping quite as much but still sleeps well at night and takes a couple of good naps a day. She is still such a precious little angel and we love her!!!

Talen turned SIX!

I can't believe that Talen is SIX already. He is such a fun little boy to have around our home. He is always posing for the camera.
For crazy hair day during spirit week at school we spray painted his hair red and black. There's not much else you can do with hair that is 1/4 of an inch long!

On his birthday the balloon fairy showered him with balloons!

We wake up every day at 6 in the morning so of course he couldn't wait until night to open his presents....

He got a scooter and a pogo stick...

If any of you have seen the cartoon Max and Ruby you will recognize this cake although Ruby's was pink. This was ALL he wanted- a blue round cake with star sprinkles on it...

He wanted to go to Leo's Place for dinner

Look at that smile!

Talen is such a happy kid most of the time. He is also SO friendly. He comes home from school every day and tells me stories about the kids in his class and they usually begin like this "My best friend so-and-so..." That's how he is- everyone is his best friend! He loves school and learning to read. He is the BEST big brother to his baby sister. He holds her every morning and plays with her while I get stuff done around the house. He absolutely LOVES her and she loves him too! He is pretty easy going until you make him mad and then watch out! He has a big temper when he gets mad. He recently learned to snowboard and it's his new favorite thing to do. He is playing basketball right now but he's not too sure what to think about it. He is such a fun little boy to have in our home and we love him to pieces!!! Happy Birthday T~

Tegen turned ELEVEN!

Wow! My big boy turned eleven on January 31st. He was such a sweet little baby and has turned into an outstanding boy and I am so grateful to be his mom. His day started with a visit from the balloon fairy. It's a tradition and it doesn't matter how old they are- they still love it! We woke him up bright and early at 6 a.m. for scriptures and prayers and I've never seen him move so fast on a Monday morning before!
He kept begging to open some of his presents....

The big one....

For breakfast he wanted pancakes and for dinner he wanted all of his favorites- homemade ribs, baked potatoes with chili and homemade bread. He was in heaven! And in honor of Tegen I didn't make a vegetable since he hates them all!

Tegen is so, so, so smart!!! Sometimes I can't believe how smart he is. Two assessments that he brought home the other day had him at an 11th and 12th grade levels for his math and reading. I hope he continues to love learning! He is funny, helpful, a friend to everyone he meets and loves football and dirt biking. He is a joy to have in our home- we love you Teg!

Thirty-Two.... What????

Yea- I'm officially old! My birthday was awesome though. My family took me to Red Robin for dinner where the kids got their faces painted- kinda freaky looking right? My darling kids are SO sweet- they secretly made a banner for my birthday and hung it up in the doorway and they wrote all kinds of nice things on it. Wow! They really do love me!
I got to spend my birthday with 4 of the most handsome men I know and one adorable little baby. Lucky me!!! Oh yea- I got spoiled as usual too. I got a new elliptical! I've been begging for one forever!

Tessa is TEN months old!

Tess turned 10 months old on Christmas day. I still think the best Christmas present we got as a family was having Tess join our family this year, although I can't believe that she is almost a year old already. She is getting more and more personality every day. She just keeps us smiling! This is her cute little Christmas dress that Nanny bought for her- I loved it!!!
Look at that little cheeser grin. She has started to recognize when we are going to take her picture and she will scrunch up her face like this to smile for the camera. It is so dang cute!!!

Her brothers are still as enchanted as ever with their baby sister.

The bath tub is one of Tessa's favorite places to be. She loves to splash and play in the tub!

This was her first official present on Christmas Eve that she opened. She wasn't sure what to think of Christmas. She loved the paper and the treats but she hated the tree. She never once made her way to the tree to touch it and in fact would pull her hand away if we tried to make her touch it. Silly girl!

She finally got the hang of things after a few minutes....

She wasn't quite sure what to make of Santa Clause, at least she didn't cry but she DID grab his beard.

It was SO fun to have some girly wrapping paper (and toys) at our house this year!

As I guessed she loved the paper and the wrapping "stuff" more than the actual presents :)

Yum... doesn't that paper look delicious?

Once again- her cheesy little grin as she poses for the camera

Tessa and Nanny checking out her new doll that laughs

I still can't believe that she is getting SO big! She is so much fun- every day she gets cuter and cuter because of her special little personality. She does the funniest things. I was telling Ed how it's so weird that every little thing that a baby does is so cute. We can sit and watch her for hours because of the silly little faces she makes or the cute noises or her movements. I don't think I stopped to enjoy my other children quite as much and it makes me kind of sad. I know how fast they grow up so I am desperately trying to hold onto each and every moment of her life. She still refuses to crawl! We have tried and tried to work with her but she still gets up on all fours, rocks back and fourth and then flops forward, rolls to her back and digs her heels in and scoots backwards. It works... I guess. We sure hope she figures it out soon so her bald spot in the back of her hair can finally fill in! She claps all the time when we say "yay", she blows us kisses (when she wants to), she waves hi and bye bye and she has recently started playing peek-a-boo but she covers her ears instead of her eyes. It is so cute!!! She also has started pointing to and touching everything with her middle finger on her right hand. I don't know why she has chosen that particular finger but it's pretty funny to watch her play with a toy or touch one of the boys with her middle finger. She still sleeps tons! I have never had a baby who likes to sleep quite as much as her. The other day she took a nap from 9:3o to 3:15 and she has days like that quite often. She also sleeps 12-14 hours at night. All the sleep may be what makes her such a happy baby. She is one of the happiest little babies I've ever met. There is no way that someone can be sad or angry around her because she will give you the biggest smile and it will melt your heart- seriously! She still LOVES food- all kinds of food but she is still eating mostly baby food not table food yet. I've tried and tried plain table food but she prefers baby food and I'm happy to feed her still so it's okay with me. She also has her two bottom teeth now- or as we like to refer to them as her little razor blades. It seriously hurts when she bites!!! Also, her hair is getting out-of-control crazy so the only thing I can do is put it up every day. She used to be able to wear cute headbands and flowers and bows but her hair is a little too crazy for that right now. It just sticks straight up around the headband... one day hopefully she can wear them again. I know it's crazy to keep track of every little thing that she does but I don't want to forget anything- sorry you all have to listen to me ramble, although I guess you can skip all this if you don't care!!

Christmas Day

This picture was actually on Christmas Eve. Our tradition is to open new pajamas on Christmas Eve. I just loved this picture of all my kids lined up ready to rip open a present. This was actually Tess's very first time opening anything!
The stockings on Christmas morning. There's always lots of fun surprises in our stockings.

I think Daddy looks tired!

A picture of the BOMB that went off in our family room! I think we were only about half-way through here... yikes!

I knew Tess's favorite thing would be the wrapping paper!

It's so cute... It's like Where is Waldo? but instead it's Where is Tess?

This was Christmas up at Nanny and Papa's house. We got spoiled as usual. I am so excited I got the Willow Tree Nativity set. I can't wait to put it up next year!

This is kind of a picture of some of the family. I could kick myself- we were actually ALL finally together as a family and I didn't get even one picture. I think we were having too much fun laughing and playing games.

Every year I stress myself out about Christmas; Did I buy enough for the kids? will everyone like what I got them? Then there's the parties and the wrapping and the shipping and the baking and then it's all over in an hour on Christmas morning. But I know that none of that stuff really matters. What really matters is why we celebrate Christmas. Christ is the real reason for Christmas and I am thankful to have a testimony of His birth and Atonement. Once I get past all the holiday stressers I enjoy the holidays and am so thankful to have an awesome family to spend time with! Merry Christmas~

Christmas Eve

Every year we spend Christmas Eve with Ed's family. We do white elephant gift exchanges, let the kids run and play, eat lots of food and Santa even comes for a visit! I think Tegen thinks he's too big to sit on Santa's lap... what do you think?
At least this year he didn't personally ask Santa for an I-pod touch (although it made his list again this year).

Talen LOVES it when Santa stops by for a visit. He gets SO excited!!!

This was Tessa's first experience with Santa and she didn't even cry. I was impressed. She pretty much just looked at him like what is on your face? And I'm pretty she grabbed the beard a couple of times.

There were several rounds of Lightening.

This was the kids White Elephant Gift Exchange....

The Adult White Elephant Gift Exchange gets funnier and cruder every year. This was a Red Neck Briefcase that Damon is sporting...

We got a lobster.... that was still ALIVE!!!

I think the funniest thing this year was the Mankini wheel. It was seriously hilarious. It had all the men in the family's faces so you could turn the wheel to see what each man would look like with a "mankini". There were even some famous faces on there- like Barack Obama. It was SO funny!!!

Ah.... the mullet and the spiked wig. LOVE it!

I didn't get pictures of every funny white elephant on here, although there were some good ones. The elephant mask made another appearance (don't ask), and there were tampon angel tree ornaments and more. It was another hilarious night. Can't wait to see what everyone comes up with next year! Next it was off to get the kiddo's to bed so Santa could come hide our presents.