My Baby is 5!!

So, Spencer's birthday is actually tomorrow...but since Saturday is a better day to celebrate...we partied today! We decided to make this a family party and take him bowling! We bowled, had pizza and cupcakes and opened presents...I think the best present of all was letting him believe that he beat us all at bowling! Actually, he was pretty stoked about the Hot Wheels scooter he got, he said,"I've wanted this my whole life!" It was a ton of fun...one of the funniest things is that they celebrated his birthday at preschool earlier this week and he has been wearing his crown ever since...he loves that thing, ha ha! Also, on Thursday Jake and I took him out for a birthday lunch at the mall and while we were walking in to the restaurant he asked us, "Can you have the chefs sing to me?"...we laughed so hard and we asked the waitress if the chefs would come sing to him!! He seemed satisfied when the waitresses did it instead! So funny! We are simply smitten with this boy and couldn't be prouder of how he's growing up! Happy Birthday, Bubba!

One Great Saturday!

December is so full of fun...sometimes it's overwhelming! This last Saturday we had plans to go to Karlee's cheer competition, but it would be done at 2:00 in the afternoon and we actually had the whole evening free! So, we decided to meet up after the competition and go see the lights at the temple! I am so glad we did!

Karlee's competition went great! She performed magnificently (nope, I'm not biased!). Her team took 2nd place and it was a blast to spend some time with Kars and watch her team! I am so impressed with how well she handles the pressure and she performs with grace and a professional attitude...what a kid!

Jake and the kiddos met us at the South Towne Expo Center and we headed up to SLC. We shopped around (we all loved checking out the cool gadgets at Brookstone) and got dinner at Applebees. Then we took Trax over to temple square...the lights were fabulous and we braved the 24 degree weather to check them all out. It was actually a relaxing and fun evening together.

Thanksgiving in California!!

We made our annual trek out to California for Thanksgiving and it was a great time!! We stayed busy having fun with all the Nemrow clan...dinners, photo shoots, bowling (although it turned out to be "League Night", so we just played at the arcade), a night at the beach, swimming in the hot tub, a turkey-trot race in Long Beach (we even got interviewed and ended up on a webcast about the event!) and a great turkey dinner at Aunt Nancy's. We had a fabulous time coming up with our matching outfits for the turkey-trot (leopard headbands and stiped knee-high socks for the girls!) too. It was relaxing and fun to be out there and when we came home...Christmas time was upon us! I don't have many pictures from the trip because I really wanted to relax (not be the photographer!)...but here are a couple shots!

Sean and Jenny's Weddings!

November was so jam-packed and part of the reason was that both Jenny and Sean got married within 2 weeks of eachother! It was so fun to be a part of both of their Big Days! I was lucky enough to be the photographer for both days!!

Sean's wedding at the Draper Temple was beautiful and we all enjoyed the dancing at the reception...some (Rylee) more than others (Jake)...but it was a great evening! Rylee and Karlee were finalists in the big "game" at the dinner and Rylee won the jackpot (money for the bride and groom!)...she was pretty stoked when Sean and Megan let her keep a dollar! It was great to spend time with the extended family and get to know Megan's family too!








For Jenny and Jordan's wedding, Spencer got to come to the Salt Lake Temple with us! It was a chilly day, but everything went smoothly and I think Spencer liked being there!! Jenny's reception was beautiful and completely different...no dancing this time...but enough yummy food to make us all sick!! We took advantage and enjoyed a great dinner, crepes, cupcakes and Magleby's chocolate cake!! It was another great day to spend time with family...especially Casey & her girls and Candice & Landon (only 10 days old at the time!). It's so great to have Jordan finally be official around here!

Dinosaur Museum Field Trip

Rylee's 3rd grade class was going on a field trip to the Dinosaur Museum and I got invited to come along!! It's so much fun to go on these trips and see my kids with their classmates and friends...this was another fun opportunity! We got to see the
3-D Imax movie about dinosaur fossils and then explored all the exhibits. Good times! Rylee was really excited on this day too because she was voted the class "vice-president" the day before!! The class selected candidates and then voted and she was pretty stoked to be vice-president...you go girl! Anyways, I love this girl!!

Hooray for Halloween!

Unlike last year...the weather has totally cooperated for Halloween this year...Hooray! The kids did their school parade and parties, I went and read Halloween stories to Karlee's class, Spencer had a pre-school party...it has just been a super fun day! Karlee and Rylee have been really excited because we told them that this year they could go with a group of friends instead of Dad. We set some strict ground rules, and since we know all of our neighbors we feel pretty safe(if there are any we don't know...they can't go there!). Anyways, it should be an exciting night!

Karlee wanted to be something beautiful...of course...so she is Miss America! Rylee wanted to be something spooky, of course...so she's a zombie. Audree wanted to be something sweet ...of course, so she's a bunny! Spencer just wanted to be a Monster Truck...so boyish! We had fun creating all of their costumes and I think they were all happy! Jake and I went with the "Jersey Shore" theme and transformed ourselves into Snooki and "The Situation"...we've never even seen the show they are on, but we have seen them on Late Night shows and felt inspired! Happy Halloween!

Pumpkin Carving

Jake and I are like big kids when it comes to carving pumpkins...we love it and get right down into the thick of it with the kiddos! Rylee was the trooper who got the messiest this time around and Audree was the one who wouldn't get near the goopey stuff...anyone surprised??? Nope...sounds just about right! Rylee just kept saying," Halloween is my favorite holiday!" while she scooped out the goop! Anyways, Karlee and Spencer helped out too and we think we have a pretty spooky set of pumpkins to greet our trick-or-treaters this year!

Pumpkinland- part 3

So, this is the 3rd and last time that I have gone to "Pumpkinland" with Mrs. Wall's preschool(I can't believe Spencer will be in kindergarten next year!). It's always good times and somehow we always manage to have great weather! Spencer, his buddy Caleb and I had a great time with his class exploring the corn maze, playing at the playground, seeing the animals and visiting the spooky alley (not so spooky, really). Anyways, I feel so blessed that I can do these things with the kids and I just love seeing them with their little school-mates!

Octoberish!

October is ALWAYS a crazy month for us...photography business is busting at the seams! I have 6 weddings in 6 weeks...including bridals and engagements for most of them, plus 5 family sessions and 1 corporate event! That's just on top of Booster Club meetings, PTA meetings (I'm the PR rep for the school this year!), gymnastics for all the kids, Audree's choir class, Young Women's activities (I'm the Beehive advisor), helping at school in the kid's classes, and I currently have 5 little boys over at my house for Spencer's weekly playgroup (I can hear them having a blast on the trampoline as I type!). Laundry, dishes, cooking, decorating for Halloween, making Halloween costumes and actual mothering activities happen somewhere in there too. Did Jake want me to be a wife too??! Anyways, now that I have verbally vomited my calendar to you...I feel much better!

What I really wanted to share was our trip to the pumpkin patch! It's an annual visit to the pumpkin patch here in Springville and the kids watch the pumpkins grow all summer and look forward to picking their's in the fall! We got some great ones this year and had a fabulous time hanging out...what you can't see in the pictures is the giant booger on Spencer's shirt...yep, as soon as we got there he did a huge sneeze and apparently thought his shirt would double as a tissue. It was pretty gross...so we just zipped up the hoodie and continued on! When we were done at the pumpkin patch we headed out to go ice skating for the evening (we've gone like 3 times since Karlee's birthday because we had so much fun there and our Pass-of-All-Passes gets us in free!). It was a nice evening to just hang out together as a family!