Christmas 2009

The whole month of December was full of Christmas activities and celebrations. What a great to way to constantly remind the kids of the birth of our Savior. Here are some photos:

Decorating the tree is always fun, especially with some good Christmas music and yummy hot chocolate.

Here's the family in front of the tree.

Allie was an angel in her school Christmas program. She did a great job and said her line perfectly. She is in this photo with two of her best friends, Emma and Bethany. It was an adorable program!

There was one gift for the kids that Mommy and Daddy were not going to be able to assemble and deliver on Christmas morning. So it arrived 5 days early. First they had to figure out the puzzle. They realized that they had to go look in the backyard.

It was a "new" swingset!!! It was new to us anyway!

First time down the slide!

All four kids love the trapeze bar.

This was the first of five different family gatherings that we were blessed with. And I truly mean blessed. Here are the 15 great-grandkids of my Grandma and Grandpa McInturf. I don't think a perfect picture is even possible with this many kids, and if it is, we didn't get it. The kids all have a great time together despite only seeing each other once a year.


The second gathering was at Steve's parent's house on Christmas eve. First, we all went to church together and then we came back for the Weber Christmas Eve traditional meal of oyster stew, followed by swedish meatballs. Allie especially enjoyed the oysters this year - she just chewed them right up, and asked for seconds!

The kids are ready on Christmas morning.

Santa always seems to leave a piece of fruit in each of the stockings.

The kids each went shopping with their Grandparents (at the dollar store) to buy gifts for each of their siblings and parents. Here you can see how happy Macy is to receive the light-up heart, but you can also see how happy Allie is because she gave it to her. That's the best part of it all - to see the kids enjoy giving gifts, not just receiving them.

I missed photos of the next Christmas gathering: lunch with the McInturf/Pulsipher clan. I came down with a pretty bad cold on Christmas day. Nonetheless, we all had a great time celebrating with all the aunts, uncles, grandparents and cousins.

This photo just shows a glimpse of the craziness that ensues when so many children are excited to open gifts. This was yet another great gathering at the Webers'.

The fifth and final Christmas gathering was back at my parents house on December 26th. Again, lots of fun!


The Millenum Falcon is so cool. Tommy loves it.

Thank you to all of our family for making Christmas extra special. And most of all, thank you God for sending your son to earth for our sake. We have every reason to celebrate! We wish you a Merry (late) Christmas!

So much to be thankful for...

Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays! Other than food, it doesn't take a lot of busy preparations, but it makes me reflect, and put things in the right perspective, and truly thank God for innumerable blessings. The kids have ample activities and reminders to be thankful too. It's absolutely wonderful!

Here are the kiddos with 2 first cousins and 2 second cousins. They are a couch-full!

The kids table at Grandma and Grandpa McInturf's.

Daddy and Allie at Grandma and Grandpa Weber's.

I am thankful for a bazillion things, but one that I have to mention here is my parents and Steve's parents. They are all amazing hosts - both our moms and dads. They put so much care into their preparations, and make their tables so festive. I hope that someday, I would be capable of hosting lots of family over with such a loving and giving spirit.

Happy 5th Birthday, Allie!!!

The 5th birthday is very special in our house. That's when we get to have a "friend party"! Allie chose to have her princess party at Tumbleweed Park, with a bounce house and a pinata. It was the pinata that she dreamed of most - we had never had a pinata at any of our parties before. So I found all the necessary party supplies, booked the bounce house, ordered the pizza, and purchased the largest, pinkest, sturdiest pinata I could find. Here are some photos:

Here's the birthday girl taking a leap onto the slide.


Macy and Jack (along with like 30 other kids) had fun in the bounce house too!

Time for cake!

I just love watching my nephews eat cake - they are so cute!

Pinata time! Allie got to go first.

Allie and Hailey are wearing pieces of the pinata as birthday hats. What good recyclers they are!

Allie got to have a special birthday lunch with Grandma and Grandpa on her real birthay. Joe's Real BBQ is free on your birthday!


Here's our big 5-year-old with her new scooter and helmet. She is growing up so fast. I thank God for her every day. She is so precious to us. Happy birthday, Allie! We love you!

Happy Halloween!

Our kids LOVE halloween. They love to plan out who they want to be, and they love the neighborhood potluck, and they love trick-or-treating, and they love to eat candy! Since the kids love it so much, it is easy for me to love it too.


We have a family tradition of carving a pumpkin a night or two before halloween. This year, each kid got to design one facial feature of the jack-o-lantern. This is obviously not the final product - this is the pumpkin with the design taped to the front - ready to be carved.


You might notice that we have one sweet girl who is not a star wars fan - and she is an adorable cheerleader. And hopefully, you recognize Yoda, Obiwan, and Princess Leia - they are all practically indistinguishable from the real thing.

A fun time was had by all! And all were in bed by 8:30 - very tired out from trick-or-treating. Steve and I did take note, however, that our kids must have grown in the past year - they all walked on their own two feet for the entire trick-or-treating adventure. No strollers, no shoulder-rides - just good plain exercise!

Fall break San Diego trip

During fall break, we got to go to San Diego for four days. The kids had a great time playing on the beach, they have never had so much fun in the ocean before.

Macy and Jack were being so cute!

These are my boys!

We also went to Sea World for one whole day and 2 partial days. We all loved it!

I think the kids rode Shipwreck rapids 3 times. It gets you totally soaked. The panchos help a little bit, but you still get plenty wet. Tommy is still working on growing 3 inches so he can ride the Rapids.

We all loved petting the sting rays. We hung out here for a long time.


For a family that wakes up around 6:00, we have a long wait until 10:00, when Sea World opens. Therefore, we had the perfect opportunity to go for a walk on the boardwalk. Why don't we have a boardwalk in Chandler? We should really get one!

These dolphins were awesome! They loved coming over to the window to see the kids, like they just wanted to play. Too cute!


We played on the huge playground at Sea World alot. Here's Daddy helping Tommy with climbing on the nets.

Another beach day. The kids loved jumping when the waves came. This was one of those moments that I would just like to stay in forever.

These are the toes of my favorite people!

Happy 6th Birthday, Jack!!!

Jack turned 6 years old on October 5th. Happy Birthday!!!


He loves the challenge of a good set of monkey bars. Usually after a few attempts, he can master them. As a mom, I totally love watching my kids accomplish these feats.


We had cupcakes with neighbors on his special day.

And, of course, no birthday would be complete without a light saber battle.

Since Star Wars was the chosen birthday theme, we had to break out the halloween costumes a few weeks early.

First, we lit up the death star with some candles, and then Jack blew it up and shared it with all the cousins. Thank you, family, for celebrating with us!

Jack is such a great boy. I thank God for giving me the privelege to be his mom. I love you, Jack!!!

Time flies...

Yet another month has flown by since I last posted to the blog. Here's a photo summary of what we've been up to.
This is me and my four kiddos on my birthday. Steve and the kids all made the day very special.

All the boys in my house have really taken to football season. They enjoy watching and playing. Both Jack and Tommy plan to play for the Cardinals some day, so we should really be practicing more often.

We spent a great evening in Scottsdale. First we had a picnic on the lawn at the Scottsale Civic Center.

Then we played around on the LOVE artwork and the fountains.

Then we had fun rolling down a grassy hill. The kids really loved it. They had probably done it before, but never on such a big hill. It is impossible to get a great photo of people rolling down a hill, but this is the best that I got.

Finally, we had to enjoy some sundaes at the Sugar Bowl. Here I am with one of my sweetie pies.

Macy and Zoe are enjoying the last swim in the pool. It was a little chilly, but not too bad.

For three Friday nights in a row, our home group has met up at the park for some family fun. Here's Jack and a bunch of kids listening carefully to Coach Brian. We had a great game of kickball that week.

On another Friday, we played a good game of baseball. This was Tommy's first attempt at hitting a ball that was not sitting on a tee. It looks as if he got a great hit, but I would be misleading you if I didn't mention that he had already made his super-fast, tough-guy swing before the ball had even gotten to him. Therefore, this is a great photo of a strike.

My awesome hubby flew to Wisconsin to go hunting with his dad. They had a great time, and we all survived here at home, but we are so happy to have him home!


This handsome 3-year-old boy was very proud of his ability to hold himself up on the water feature at the park.

I am sure that someday I will miss all of my trips to the grocery store with four kiddos in tow. Sometimes these trips can be very challenging, but on this particular night, we all had a great time. I really don't want these kids to grow up. Or at least I would like them to grow up slower. Is that too much to ask?


We had a great family trip to the Children's Museum of Phoenix. It included my parents and Aunt Lisa, Eli and Grant. In this photo, Tommy tried on an enormous pair of shoes, and he couldn't even begin to walk in them.

It is now absolutely beautiful here. We had a great picnic outside, and played on the hay maze with our cousins. Thanks Mom and Dad and Lisa for joining us!

We are so thankful for Fall Break. The kids have 2 weeks off of school, and we are loving it!