Closing Out 2021

 

The kids went to Barnes and Noble to spend their Christmas money from my Grandma

2021 was a year for the books for us! While the world was still grappling with stupid Covid and the pandemic unfortunately continued to rage on, we found so many blessings and so much peace in 2021. Our highlights were

Our individual trips with the big kids this past fall. Ben and Hudson in Seattle and Chase and me in Boston. We loved getting to explore beautiful places with the best boys, who have such a great sense of adventure and appreciation for the world around them.

Getting to start a mostly normal school year! The boys got such amazing teachers this year and after two years full of interruptions and craziness, a more normal (not totally normal) school schedule was very welcome!

Davis learning to swim! This memory brings the biggest smile to my face. Davis was so darling in the pool, so happy and confident. 

A really great spring break with our kids. We did a “staycation” and filled it full of activities right around our home and had the best time!

Ben landing an amazing new job at  Eccovia! This opportunity changed our lives for the better in so many ways. We enjoyed all the perks of a better work-life balance, less stress, more income, and zero commute! We will forever be thankful for the opportunity this brought to him, even if he did finish off the year by accepting a new position at another company! (More on that later)

This seems like an eternity ago, but right at the first of the year, Hudson got baptized! It was such a special day and we love this boy so much!

2021 was so good to us! I feel like our family got so much closer. We were blessed with good health. We all got vaccinated against Covid. We got to explore and adventure together. Our baby learned to walk and talk. Our boys grew so much and continued to be best friends, look out for each other, and serve each other. My heart is so full! 

Lila Fashion Show

 In a totally self-indulgent post, I may do every year, I'd like to recap my favorite of Lila's looks from the year. Dressing her has been way too fun, even though I have now have the battle of her opinion as a factor. As seen here, she loves accessories, and loves trying on shoes. Her absolute favorites are my heels and she wears them all over the house, all the time!

Also, this little lady bug outfit may be one of my very favorites from the whole year. I bought this for   her on a whim at Target. It looked pretty cute on the hanger. But when I first put it on her, it looked a million times cuter ON! This light blue color is darling on her, the fit was so cute, it was light and soft and she wore it all spring/summer/fall with either a pale blue bow or a red and white one.

The lemon print onesie! This was a gift from Heidi before Lila was even born. It's the same print as the lemon onesie we brought her home from the hospital in. I love a lemon print so much and it was very nostalgic to put her in this one around her first birthday!

This romper was a gift from my friend Lindsay and she looked so so cute in it! I kind of wished they made it in my size.

I loved this leopard print shirt. It was a Christmas gift from Nana and Lila looked so darling in it! And the black leggings that came with it fit her so well and stayed on!

I bought her these two outfits for her first birthday and she wore them for the next 7 months or so. They were both so darling! It was fun to mix up all the pink with some blues. 

Heidi got her this little denim dress and not only was it one of my favorites, it was also one of Lila's! She started picking what she wanted to wear to church and often reached for this one. I loved pairing it with a whole bunch of different bows too!

She had so many cute swim suits this summer, but this one takes the cake for me. It was actually Anna's years ago. I loved it when Anna wore it and I'm so glad Kate saved it for me!

This was the other dress Heidi got her and Lila could never wear it without someone commenting that light blue was absolutely stunning on her. I think it's "her color".

This romper was one of my very favorites. I bought it for her the Christmas before. It looked so cute with mint bows. 

We got a bag of hand-me-downs from our neighbor (Nikki Holje) and it was full of cute tops and jackets for the winter. This little jean jacket absolutely kills me. The cute top under it was also from there, as well as the green one below.

It's hard to tell in this photo, but the print is ballerinas. I die of cuteness every time she wears this! 

Of all the adorable things she wears, this little dress was bought by Aunt Heidi for her in PARIS. Makes it that much cuter. I think she looks just like a little Parisian girl when she wears it. 

Christmas!

 Our Christmas break was absolutely lovely! Two weeks of no school and so many fun things to do! We started with a wonderful ski day! I took Chase skiing for his first time! He picked it up fast, the weather was lovely (and a little too cold), the crowds were low and we had the best time together! I can’t wait to do it again. This was my first time back on the slopes in 12 years and I forgot just how fun it is.

 

We officially have a big enough family that we cover almost the whole Christmas tree!

Aunt Heidi made it from Boston! She spent a lovely afternoon frosting sugar cookies with the kids which was darling. Davis was mostly her little buddy the whole time and their interaction was just heart melting.

So many fun events went unphotographed- but we had a magical evening in Christmas village in Ogden with Ben’s parents and Nathan. It was so fun right up until Lila loved the little train too much, didn’t want to get off, and screamed all the way to car and most of the way home. But before that it was awesome! We also had a fun adult only dinner with my parents and siblings at Nino Viejo. We all laughed a lot and had a relaxing night out without the fun, crazy, young crew! And then Heidi and I met Kelly and Ella in Salt lake for dinner one night and had the best time- but once again I failed to take even one picture! Sometimes it’s too fun to stop and photograph!

Christmas Eve is always the most special day of the year. We had a fun party with the Smith family- full of games and the cutest talent show. Chase played his piano piece “What Child is This?” Which was beautiful. Hudson did karate forms. Davis did his “super spin”. Lila made animal sounds. Nora sang a song. Anna did “click singing” and I’m not sure Rosie ever decided to do something. We had a delicious dinner with the fanciest charcuterie board and then we did the nativity with puppets, which was chaotic as always. Presents were hilarious and so fun and cute to see. The kids were all so excited and thankful, but especially Davis! He always makes everyone’s holiday!

After so much excitement and the kids had all been spoiled, we headed home to get everyone to bed! Luckily, with the help of melatonin they all went to bed pretty quickly. The boys all wanted to sleep together in Davis’s room, so I read them stories and sang to them while they dropped off one by one! Pretty soon we had four peacefully sleeping kids and Ben and I got a minute to breathe and finish Christmas prep. I always feel so blessed and content on Christmas Eve.

Christmas morning came with four very excited kiddos! Lila went right past her stocking and ran to the kitchen we got her. She happily exclaimed “Daddy! A kitchen!” And played almost the whole time the rest of us opened presents. Chase and Hudson were delighted with the hoverboard and Davis loved his gauntlet and all his avengers themed gifts (duplos, clothes, underwear, ball, shoes, etc.). The kids were so excited to give the gifts they’d carefully selected for each other. There was just so much Christmas magic and I loved soaking it all in. Childhood is too fleeting.

Ben’s parents and Nathan came for breakfast, and my parents stopped by a little later with Heidi to see what the kids got. Then we settled in for much needed naps and then headed to Ray and Diane’s to do Christmas dinner with the rest of the Hugos. We had a delicious meal and the cousins all had a blast together. I went home tired and happy with a thankful heart for how blessed we are.

December

 It’s the most wonderful month of the year and truly one of my favorite times to be a mom. This month I really realized I needed to adjust a lot of my expectations. When Chase and Hudson were little we had so much TIME. We did all these extra crafts, made treats, watched Christmas movies and read Christmas books, and so much more. Now we are running to a million different lessons and activities, school obligations and friend stuff. So I realized that our Christmas fun had to be snuck in between all the other hoopla, which worked out great, once I adjusted my brain a little!

Here’s a few of the fun things we did this month. The reality is that some of the sweet memories went completely unphotographed, which I don’t feel bad about. Sometimes living in the moment and experiencing the joy of it means I don’t get a pretty picture. Hudson thought it was hilarious one day to swaddle Davis and Lila up in their quilts. Davis and Lila also thought it was hilarious.

I don’t even know why they did this, but suddenly I looked over and they were playing Minecraft while wearing Santa hats. I was super proud of the festive nature of their screen time!

We got some snow! It was actually wonderful because now our district will call a late start when we get lots of snow overnight. The kids start two hours later to give time for the roads to be cleared, and we don’t have to make up the snow day! The kids hurried through their jobs and headed out to play with the Joseph boys for a good 90 minutes before school started! It was Lila’s first time really playing in the snow and I think she liked it!

We took the kids to see Santa! Lila took one look at him and started shaking her little head and saying “No!” Over and over again. We didn’t even make her sit on his lap, but she screamed when we tried to get a picture. Davis told Santa he wanted a gauntlet and Chase and Hudson told him they wanted a hoverboard to share. 

We babysat Anna and Rose one morning and it was mostly hilarious. At one point, Lila and Rosie wanted to play “napping”. This lasted for about 3 minutes.

Hudson got his yellow belt! He is SO PROUD of himself. I’m proud of him too. Karate has been a good thing for this kid.

One Sunday we busted out some gingerbread houses. It would have been a better choice to wait until Lila was napping because she had zero self control about the candy. But the boys had a grand time!

Our ward party happened! We were in charge (the RS Presidency) but the Hickmans did the theme and all the decor, so we just had to do food. It was ELF themed and so darling. Just doing the food was a lot of work. Between that, and getting the gifts ready for the sisters in Relief Society, my calling took up a lot of time in December.

We did our traditional acts of service every day leading up to Christmas. I love this tradition so much. It really helps us all focus on service and much less on getting. It brings the sweetest spirit to our month. Some highlights this year were:

• Taking cookies to widows. The boys quickly came up with a list of four widows they wanted to serve. One was their sweet 2nd grade teacher who just lost her husband unexpectedly a few months ago. One was a  lady who lives nearby that we don’t really even know, but she bought a pumpkin from my boys in the fall. They always like to take them to our doctor, Neil. And then sweet Sister Walker in our ward. I loved that the boys knew exactly who they wanted to serve. Also, when I asked Davis if he knew what a widow was he responded with “Yes! An Avenger!” (Black widow).
• We took brownies and cards to Code Enforcement of Layton City. The chief of Code Enforcement came out to get them from us and we had a sweet little conversation with him. He remembered us from the past few years and asked about Halie and her family. We love doing this for Aunt Halie and to honor her mom.
• Davis and Lila painted cards for the missionaries in our ward and Chase and Hudson wrote on them. 
• Lots of love and service happened right around our house. One day they were supposed to make someone’s bed for them and never have all the beds in the house been made so quickly! Record time! Maybe that’s the secret to getting jobs done- do someone else’s!
• They did “virtual caroling” to the Aunts and uncle out of state. It was hilarious and darling. 
• We got a good amount of snow in December and any day it snowed the service immediately changed to helping shovel. We have some good snow shovelers!
• One day their service prompt was to “serve daddy” and the boys chose to play Xbox with him as their service :)

The economics fair happened for 5th grade! Chase figured out pretty quickly what he wanted to do. He used the extra felt I had in the basement to make little stockings that he cut out and sewed and then we embellished with hot glue and more felt. Then he stuffed them with mostly leftover Halloween candy. His cost per stocking was 8 cents! Then he was able to sell them for $1.25 each and sold out quickly! So much work went into this project, but I loved his resourcefulness and creativity! I took Davis and Lila to shop the fair that morning and Davis had so much fun buying things from the kids there.

Hudson had to do a book report and chose a super long book- The Baseball Box Prophecy, written by our friend Bruce Newbold! (Aunt Kate’s dad!). It was over 500 pages and he had to work super hard to get it done. And then he created a cute little character bag to present it. I was so proud of him and Bruce was SUPER proud of him. 

November

One of the most exciting things happening to us in November is that all four kids got vaccinated for COVID! Chase and Hudson became eligible mid-month and we did their first shots right away! Hudson majorly panicked at his first shot, but after thinking it through did much better with the second one! Happy day for us to have that done!

I don't have pictures of it, but Davis and Lila are in the vaccine trial for the moderna COVID vaccine. They got their first shot in October and their second one right before Thanksgiving. Those appointments have been long and kind of brutal (we are there for like 4 hours). The worst part is the kiddos get blood draws, which are truly an awful experience for all of us! But they have been champs. There is a 25% chance that they got a placebo, which I'm hoping they didn't! I put them in the trial because I was anxious to get us all vaccinated and be able to move on with life. Davis had a slight fever after his second shot, which makes me fairly confident he got the real deal. Lila has had zero side effects whatsoever, so we'll probably have to wait until the trial is over to find out if she got the shot or not. Either way, I'm so thankful for this technology and the blessing it is to us! 

Chase worked really hard on his stuff for the economics fair in December. They were supposed to make their goods to sell, 30 identical objects. I had a bunch of felt leftover from Festival of Trees crafts I've helped with for years. He decided to make these little stockings and fill them with candy. He cut them all, sewed most of them himself, helped me decorate them (I did the hot glue, but he did the cutting) and then he filled them with mostly leftover Halloween candy! We did buy candy canes to go in them. So his cost per stocking was 8 cents! He got to sell them at the Economics Fair in December (more about that later). I was so proud of him for working so hard on this project. It was one of those projects that is also kind of a lot of work for mom, to help, guide, teach, fix, rethread the sewing machine, etc. But truly, Chase did most of the work!

We went out to dinner with our dear BYU friends! We usually gather around the holidays with our families for a Christmas party. Ashley floated the idea of just meeting as couples for dinner and it was absolutely lovely! I love any time we get to spend with these awesome people!

Thanksgiving! We had a wonderful holiday this year. The week leading up to Thanksgiving was crazy busy with a million different things, but the actual day was much more relaxed. We had a nice breakfast at home together, played outside, watched a movie, and then headed over to Ben's parent's house for dinner! The kids loved playing with their cousins.

Hudson complained that our Thankful Tree this year was smaller than normal- but it turned out cute nonetheless. I love this little thing. Chase is so good at thinking of things he's grateful for! And Davis mostly kept telling me he was thankful for Avengers, gauntlets (ahem, what he's asking Santa for for Christmas) and preschool. And Lila is just so thankful for "bubbies" (stuffed animals) and "Bankees" (blankies).

I reworked our living room a bit. We still have a few more things to add- like a new couch! But I switched out the throw pillows, bought a new mirror and hung a totally new gallery wall. I love the way it worked out. I wanted a change and it turned out great. Hanging those nine pictures took Ben and I like 2.5 hours though!

November marked a real switch in Lila's opinions about clothes- meaning she started having a LOT of them. She mostly only wanted to wear jammies. Or nothing at all. And got real particular about her bows. A gave in a lot. 

I love my quiet mornings at home with these two! We really only spend Monday and Friday mornings at home together. Tuesday and Thursday Davis has his little preschool. On Wednesday they go to Ray and Diane's and I volunteer at the school. But I love seeing these two play and having time with just them.

She's just so cute sometimes I just can't handle her!

I love Hudson riding the peloton. He gets so into his workouts and always takes his shirt off.

We had a bunch of fun mornings playing in the leaves. These two were both big fans.

Hudson started karate back in August, but his Gi finally arrived at the first of November. He was so excited about it. He loves karate. It’s fun for him to have something totally different to do that Chase doesn’t do. I’m glad we found his thing!