Merry Christmas!

Hope everyone has a very Merry Christmas!

Thanks Abby for snapping this picture for us before you guys took off! I think it's fun to see how the kids grow from year to year.

2008...

2007...

2006...

We sent out cards without any picture in 2005 when it was the two of us. I just kept one from each year. So, there we go. If I lose them (or ella finds and rips them up), we'll have them on here to compare with future Christmas photos :)

5 Years!

5 years of marriage today and I'm still crazy about my hubby.

Happy Anniversary Jake! I love you!!

I was looking through some pictures and it was fun remembering our wedding day. How CRAZY the weather was, how excited we were, advice we were given, and promises we made.

Thanks for being you. I'm lucky to be your wife!

Pictures are kind of blurry since I had to scan them. Oh well.
Also, some fun random trivia... This is the Devereaux Mansion the night of our reception...
Anyone know what movie it was in? Anyone?
Hint: Harry and Loyd had a sword fight in their blue and orange tuxedos
as they walked into this place.
If you guessed Dumb and Dumber, nice work! Haha.
Some of our siblings actually are the ones that pointed that trivia
out to us a couple years after our wedding. Kind of funny!

Random December Fun

I have too much to do today to blog, but here we go anyway! We have been busy around here, and Christmas is coming way too fast! So if I don't blog these pictures now I'm afraid they will never make it on. It's all for the sake of the blog book! haha. Anyhow, we set up the Christmas tree before Thanksgiving this year! Luke begged and begged Jake to "surprise mom" and set it up and eventually Jake obliged. It sat undecorated for about a week, and then we decided it needed decorations. The kids and I had fun making cinnamon ornaments, and they have made our house smell like Christmas. Well, I think they smell like Christmas. When we were hanging them on the tree Luke kept saying, "Eew mom, what is that smell!??" That smell is Christmas dude. And, it smells GOOD.

We made an "L" ornament for Mr. Luke and an "E" for Ella. The rest were snowflakes, snow men, and Christmas trees. Ella has been undecorating the tree since we decorated it, so more and more ornaments are making their way to the top so she can't reach them. That little girl is Queen Destructive. She's always into everything just for the fun of messing with things. We love her anyway :)

A few pictures before church one morning. Nope, the whole box of crackers didn't make it to church. They wish.

Yay for hair that's long enough for piggies!!! (barely) Here's our first attempt.

In the last post I mentioned Ella's love for her baby. This isn't the greatest picture, but I love her expression in it because it's such an Ella face when she's asking me something. And, she's got her baby under one arm like she usually does.

We've been invaded by crickets!! Aaaaa!! The little stinkers find their way into our house to get out of the cold. The kids like catching them and letting them go back "to live with their families." If I find them first, they get sucked into the vacuum.

Luke kept asking how much longer until Christmas, so we made a chain. We're all excited that it's getting shorter! He made a gingerbread house again this year too.

I'm off to do chores and play with kids!

A little too much info on a shoe obsession. I Love Kid Stuff. And Being Santa.

If I have a few minutes to sit and relax, my favorite thing to do is browse kid stuff. Toys, clothes, and over the last few months, it has been SHOES. I mean come on, nothing is cuter then a fun pair of kids shoes right? I would rather shop for my kids shoes then my own shoes. And I love it when their feet grow bigger because, well, that would mean that they need new shoes. I think the only person that might be more obsessed with kids shoes is my mom. We sit and talk on the phone while we look at them online. Fun times! I manage to control my little shoe affair and my kids actually don't have that many pairs. Actually, I think Luke has a pair for church and a pair for play right now. It's just fun looking and planning which pair will be next. Here are some cutie shoes I have been eyeing for Ella lately!

(By the way mom, I forgot the name of that website/brand you were talking about so you will have to get it to me again)

Santa brought her the black and white ones as an early gift a few weeks ago since I couldn't squish her feet into her little silver ones anymore, and shhhh... don't tell Ella, but I've heard the pink and brown ones might be a Christmas surprise from grandma and grandpa.

When I got pregnant with Ella, everyone was telling me how much I'd love shopping for a baby girl. And yeah, it has been fun! But, I have always loved shopping for little boy things too! There are so many cute boy shoes and things out there! Luke's feet have been growing lots lately and he had worn his last pair to the max! Anyway, it had been a long time since I got to help him pick out a new pair, so the two of us had a date night a few weeks ago at the mall. He picked out these white and red Nikes and we ended up getting SIZE 10s. No wonder his little toes were getting sore. He totally skipped wearing 9s. Anyway, here are the ones he picked along with some other fun boy shoes to look at. Err... um... maybe they are just fun for me to look at, feel free to click out of my blog! :)

On to other things, I really love this whole Santa business. I've been trying to think of something Ella would really like, but have yet to figure it out. It would be much easier if she could carry on a conversation! Lately she has been loving her baby. She will carry this doll around with her (usually poor baby is upside down) and will love and kiss her. So funny! I love that little girls love babies.

Luke, on the other hand, has told me exactly what he wants from Santa. A red bike, a gun, and a marble toy. Checking out all the bikes out there for little guys has been almost as fun as shoe shopping! Almost.


And, one more fun kid thing!! Luke has been excited to go and visit Arizona because grandpa Paul built a club house. My dad is amazing because he can build or make anything. My parents love kid things too, so I come by it honestly. Anyway, he built the cutest club house I have ever seen and I haven't even seen it in person yet. Check out the club house! Luke whines that he wants to play in it every time he sees this picture.

Luke requested an orange club house with lots of buttons inside. Still obsessed with buttons. So, dad put a panel of buttons and switches in there along with other fun things to do! I'm wanting to play with the switches and buttons myself.

So, it's out there. I'm obsessed with kid things! What are you obsessed with?

Thanksgiving!

We've been having fun with family over the past week! The kids and I don't really know what to do with ourselves today since Jake is at work and the last of the guests went home yesterday. Boo... Back to life! Haha. Mom and dad, Todd, Jenny, baby Amy, Abby, Chris, Dak, and Daniel all stayed at our house to play for Thanksgiving. Fun times! Here are some highlights of their stay.

* We ate way too much food and I think a diet is in order now. Well, for me anyway! Todd brought these ridiculously good chocolate treats that were sitting out the whole time for people to munch on, mom brought yummy brownies and rice crispy treats, Abby and Chris stuffed us with their Dutch pancakes, we made a trip to Cafe Rio, I had a few too many creamies, and I have yet to mention Turkey day food. Yum!! Everyone helped out and we had fun cooking, baking, and roasting together. Here's everyone hard at work... Girls and the pies, boys making the turkey, and my dad really knows how to make tasty mashed potatoes.

Oh, and I cut my hand ON A CAN LID really badly making caramel apple pie. Ouch! Jake and I had a date night in the ER, where they stitched me back up. Such an Erin move to make. Pretty sure I'm the most accident/injury prone person ever. I'm thinking next year I'll buy the pies instead.

* Luke and Ella couldn't get enough of baby Amy. They had fun checking this baby girl out! I did too. She has grown so much since we saw her last!

Luke even said that he would trade Ella for her. Haha. Because "she has blue eyes like me."

Ella takes a long time to warm up to new faces lately, but she loves my mom!

*We all went down to walk around on the strip one night. I think this is the coolest picture from that little outing! If you've ever been to a casino on the strip you may have noticed that in the parking garages, there are footprints all over the ceiling. We were trying to figure out how people get them there and Daniel decided he'd jump to leave a mark of his own. He came close! We think people must just take off their shoe and slam it up there to make footprints because dang... that's a high jump! Here's his good try!

*Other pics from that night...

*One morning some of us went for a hike.

Grandpa Paul let Luke ride on his shoulders when his legs got tired. I got a kick out of these pics. Love that crack! :)

*Todd, Jenny, Abby, and I made a black Friday shopping attempt. We took off to Toys R Us before midnight to get some good deals. When we got there the line was wrapped around the building and people were already arguing, so we left. I'd rather pay a few more dollars then fight the crazies! The girls went to target and did some shopping on Friday. Fun to get out for a bit!

*The boys got their game on. And watched lots of football (Go BYU!!).. *Luke LOVES his uncles. This time he followed Chris around a lot. Chris was working on a Doctrine and Covenants class and Luke sat by him to read his scriptures too. * One afternoon we took pictures. Here are a few. Grandmas, I think my mom is sending some your way. I love my sis and brothers!

Daniel took the pictures for us... Thank you!

Kiddos...



Thanks everybody for making the trip! We love you all!

Our Ride on the Polar Express

One of Luke's most favorite movies/books is The Polar Express. So, this weekend we decided to take a little trip to Williams, AZ to kick off the holiday season with a ride! We loved it. Abby and Chris watched Ella for us and we took off with Luke.

My little buddy was soo excited! Here he is waiting for the train to pull up to the station!

Can't lose the ticket!

Yay!! It finally arrived.

The three of us starting on our journey to the North Pole...

Everything is a lot like the movie on the real Polar Express.

Including awesome dancing chefs who serve hot cocoa and chocolate chip cookies. After about half an hour of music, story time, eating and fun, we went through a magic tunnel. They say it speeds the train up to the North Pole. Pretty awesome. Then, we arrived at the North Pole! We saw Santa, his reindeer, sleigh, and a few elves. Everything was lit up in lights.

Santa hopped aboard the train!

He gave all the kids a bell... first gifts of Christmas!

Luke had to make sure his worked.

On the way back from the North Pole everyone sang Christmas carols. The men on the train had to stand and sing solo when the "five golden rings" line came around in the Twelve Days of Christmas. Check out Jake and his moves.

Once we were back at the train station, Luke got to sit on Santa's lap. He says he asked Santa for a big boy bike, a marble toy, and a marshmallow shooter. He thought that we would go home with what he asked for and was a little annoyed to find out that he has to wait for the elves to make the toys... (They don't let parents use flash on cameras because they want people to purchase $20 clear photos. Bah! Hence the blurry Santa picture)

And that's the way they do it on the Polar Express!

If we're living somewhere relatively close next year, we want to go again!