Be careful when playing in the rain, it's dangerous

I had been promising Emily that when it rained again I would take her down to the park and jump in the puddles and make a slip-n-slide with the slides at the park. And Emily with her wonderful memory reminded me as soon as it started raining again so we were off to the park that afternoon. I decided to grab 2 plastic trash bags to go down the slides. While we were walking to the park, I realized that a plastic bag would probably not work on a plastic slide. Me being the genius that I am, decided to use my 2 year old as a test and put him on that bag and slide him right down. He flew and I do mean FLEW so far off that slide and landed right on his head. So I quickly got down the play equipment to comfort my poor little guy who's crying and I hear right behind me Emily screaming down the slide with her plastic bag and then she proceeds to FLY and smack right down on her bottom. So now I have both kids really crying and giving me this look like 'I can't believe you did this to me.' I seriously felt horrible. But despite the few moments of pain, we did have a really fun time getting soaking wet, jumping in puddles, and building some good sandcastles with the wet sand. So let this be a warning for you...... be careful when playing in the rain, it's dangerous.

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow....... in Placentia

Yesterday our public library had a snow day. So we bundled our kids up in their snow gear and headed for the snow.... I mean the library. After 2 straight weeks of rain, it was finally a gorgeous, sunny afternoon. It started at 12:30 with storytime and a craft inside the library and then we headed outside for snow cones, sledding, and snowball fights. And the best part was it was all FREE.

Monster Trucks

We made our annual trip to the Monster Trucks a couple of weekends ago. This tradition started when my sister and I were young and we've pretty much been doing it every year since. It used to be my dad, sister and I and a friend of our choice. Now the group has grown to almost the entire family. Jack and my mom didn't come this year (because we don't get home until after 11pm) but I'm sure next year Jack will be ready to go. We all had a fantastic night. Every year the kids get more and more into it. Thank you dad for a great night out with the family. It's always a great time!

Family Hikes

January has finally slowed down a little bit, which is a nice change. We've just been keeping up with daily life and trying to throw in a few fun activities here and there.
In the last month we've done a few family hikes. Matt LOVES hiking and would do it every weekend if I let him. His kids love it too. So, we've been trying to take them out on Saturday mornings that we are free. Jack especially likes it. He's constantly asking me to go hike with daddy, which I find really adorable.
Here are some pics of our last two hikes together.

Santiago Oaks




Carbon Canyon

Merry Christmas

Christmas was a blast! The holidays are always a little crazy and filled with so many stops but I actually like it. It's the one holiday where all the family comes down from all over (from Matt's side and my side). So even though it gets a little chaotic, it's worth it because my heart is always filled with so much joy getting to be together with everyone.

Christmas Eve we went over to my aunt and uncles house (on my dad's side) for our traditional Norwegian dinner. The Nordstrom side is all over there as well as my aunts side of the family. We started off the day with going to visit my cousin at the stables where she keeps her horse. She took all the kids on a ride and of course they loved it. Jack kept asking me where his cowboy hat was because he IS a cowboy.



All the kids at my Uncle Ralph's house


My uncle Ralph

My uncle Roger



Christmas morning we woke up to Emily almost walking out into the family room by herself because she was so excited to see what Santa brought. This was so much fun this year because she actually got it. She was so excited about Santa coming and was so happy that Santa left her a note (she asks me to read it all of the time). They were a little overwhelmed by all of the presents they got that day but we've taken some old toys out and it cleared up some space for the new ones.


Stocking stuffers

New tools

Putting his power tools to work on me!

We spent the first half of the day at my mom and dads house. Roger, Scot, Sue-Sue, Zack, Kacy, the Hansen's, my parents, and us all spent the day together.
My dad handing out Monster trucks to all the kids. He gets us tickets every year to go see them at Angles stadium. That's coming up in a couple of weeks :-)

Present madness

Uncle Scot and the usual fam

The last half of the day was spent at Matt parents house. They always have a bunch of family from out of town so it's always really good to see them. The whole Sanderson clan was down- Ed and Alyce, Ed jr and Kristen and all their kids, Dave, Michelle and Charlie, Daniel and Katy as well as Royce and Kelly Mealin and all the Doerrs. Emily and Jack were ecstatic to play with their "new cousins" as Emily called them. Ed and Kris have 4 kids- Drew who's 8, Quincy 7, Cole 4, Chase 3. All of them are really good kids. Quincy was so sweet with Emily and played with her all day.

The kids spent a good amount of time on Stan and Ivys balcony. Emily got a marshmellow shooter from her aunt Rachel. They had SO much fun shooting an entire bag of marshellows all over the place.


Chase and Jack, the paci heads- so cute....

Quincy and Em

Ivy and Aunt Alyce


Quincy painted Emily's finger and toe nails (and she actually let Emily do hers, it was pretty scary)

A Very Busy December

I've been getting a lot of flack lately about my blog, so here's a little update. December was a very busy month. It seems like we haven't stopped moving since Thanksgiving but it looks like life is settling down a little bit this week (which has been real nice). I hope that everyone had a great Christmas and New Years!
Here are some pictures of a few of the events that took place last month.

We went to Irvine Park Railroad to see Santa this year. There was lots of crafts, cookie decorating, a bouncer, storytelling with Mrs. Claus, and a train ride to go see Santa. The kids had an awesome time.






Annual Lefse Making party. Every year my dads brother and his family come over to my parents and we all spend hours making lefse for Christmas eve/ day yumminess! We all enjoy making it and it's really a fun tradition to carry on.
My guys in their aprons....


My cousin Kirsten




Do I miss Jenny and her family? YES. Jenny packed her bags and moved to Northern California this past month. The day before she left, we got to spend all day with her kids and we had a great time. My kids really miss Maggie, Joe and Delaney. They talk about them all the time, mention them in their prayers at night, and ask when we can start going to their church. :-( Despite being sad that they are gone, we are actually really happy for them and can't wait to go up and visit them real soon. Here are some pictures of the kids last day with us.
Watching Polar Express

Making gingerbread cookies



Emily's Christmas party at school went very smooth. Sometimes class parties overwhelm her and she ends up having a really bad day. Luckily this Christmas party/ performance went really well. She sang 3 songs in front of everyone. She seemed a little embarrassed but she did it and smiled the whole time. She loved having Stan, Ivy, Rachel, my mom, my sister, and Bryan all there to watch her.

Singing Frosty the snowman


Emily and Taylor

Jack and Lauren- I love this picture because this is how these 2 always are. They just love each other.


My kids finally played in SNOW! And they LOVED it! Matt took a lot of time off this holiday season so we had some extra time to do things together as a family. We went up to Wrightwood and there no only was a ton of snow to play in but it was actually snowing for a little bit. The first thing Emily did when she got out of the car was hit the ground and make a snow angel. They both loved sledding and throwing snow balls at daddy. They last a couple of hours and then they were wet and cold.






Two days before Christmas we went to see Disney on Ice. We went about 6 or 8 months ago and saw another Disney on Ice (that was all about The Incredibles). This one was so much better. It was about Cars, Lion King, The Little Mermaid, and The Fairies with Tinker belle. I would totally recommend this show, SO GOOD and Emily really liked it.





This post is getting way too long. I'll follow up with Christmas in my next one.