Nick's birthday

kids love cake, what can I say?

Brenna was sure to let Nick know what her plan was for his birthday.

And then Jace was sure to show daddy how to use his new GoPro.....

Nick was totally surprised and excited for the new camera. I'll be sure to let you all know when we get a cool video of us doing...something....cool....whenever that happens ;)

oh, and I did my graduation walk

Even though I've been done with school since Aug and passed my  boards in Oct, I finally got to walk in my graduation ceremony. Deb and Don were able to come down for the ceremony, which was awesome (and I'm sure Nick deeply appreciated for the extra hands with the kids!) 

My friends from school, Kristin and Rocio

Christmas part 2

Here are some of our pics from Christmas..... Decorating the tree with their special ornaments.

Here is Bella trying to hide in my lap.....

The kids loved all their gifts. The seriously played with everything. Jace, ofcourse, loved each and every car/truck/train he received and studied each one individually. 

 Brenna felt very fancy in her new towel

Jace really enjoyed the truck book he got that made sounds. 

Thank you for all your gifts, we hope that you enjoyed all your gifts too! We love you very much and hope to see you in 2016!

Christmas part 1

The kids really got into Christmas this year. They helped decorate the tree and were really interested in Santa and all the Christmas stories, music and decorations.

Ft Sam brought in real snow...pretty much packed to ice by the time we saw it. But the kids got to walk the treacherous hills and feel the dirty icey slush. ahhh, memories...

We had a great visit with Mimi and Grandpa Rogers just before Christmas!

We did a small Christmas with them....the kids were really excited about the new kitchen!

We went to the zoo for a "fun" train ride. We did get some jingle bells out of it, though.  Oh and Jace was so excited, he pretty much levitated from the car to the train! This was were we met Santa, saw some 'snow' (bubbles?) that Brenna loved and Jace said "I don't love it."

 

 Jace was looking quite dapper in his suspenders.

Brenna cheesing it up for the camera.

We got to meet a friendly elf helping out at Santa's workshop.  The kids liked checking out his outfit and I think he enjoyed the attention ;)

The kids really enjoyed checking out Santa's workshop and had a nice visit with Santa himself. Brenna, of course, had lots to talk to him about. Jace was a little timid, but did walk up to him after Brenna was on his lap. 

motorcycle and other random fun

The kids are having a great time with the motorcycle. It does work, but goes very, very slow. Perfect for kids in drivers ed ;) It's just so funny to watch Jace give his 'thumbs up' (first finger) and honk the horn as he is gonna his a flattened can. 

Brenna was telling us her door was scary and requested the girl volcano for her room. So, mama got creative... Brenna was watching the progress and told me "It's a good start, mama. But I think she needs...(water, sky, eyelashes, etc)" I was just done with this project.  Luckily, she's been happy with it and i haven't needed to add anything. However, now she wants the boy volcano. Unless she's drawing it, it's not gonna happen!!

If you aren't familiar with the lava song.... here's a link.  Or you can google "lava song"

https://search.yahoo.com/search?fr=mcafee&type=B211US550D20140802&p=lava+song

Brenna was trying to plant a weed she pulled....she had the tiniest little mound of sand that she was trying to stand it in. And of course, she fancies herself quite the ballerina.  

 A little sibling love

Jace's new bed

He saw it in the garage, disassembled.....

Love at first sight!

Before bed.....

Pretty excited!

The next morning.....

reading his Big Truck book ;)

He was so excited and proud to be in his new Lightening McQueen bed.

potty training.....

Soooo, this has been our next big goal since returning to Texas.....

Jace has done surprisingly well with potty training. I've heard all about boys being more difficult, but (thus far) he has been even a little easier than Brenna was. The first week was a little tricky, mostly because we weren't able to stay home all day and really go for it...but by the end of the first week, he was consistently going in the potty with only about 1 accident a day! Completely to my surprise this has continued and has gone days without an accident.... We are so proud of him!  Bonus was that we were able to use the Halloween candy and 'rewards' :) 

All the bragging done now.... today was not an accident free day. In fact, he ran into Brenna's bed while I was helping Brenna on the potty.....and I hear 'I go poo-poo!'  (he calls both pee and poo 'poo-poo) So, I ran to grab him and put him on the potty....but I was too late. There was a lake in her bed. yuck. Of course it was nap time, so I put him on the potty and went to strip Brenna's bed. When I walked past the potty....there was Jace, sitting on the potty with the air freshener can in his mouth. Seriously. 

Anyway, this kid.... amazingly brilliant and amazingly big trouble all wrapped up into one very cute little man...