Christmas 2010

We spent Christmas eve at the Skaff's house.

I busted out the santa trucker hat that my roomates and I made many years ago.

Hanalei is so stinkin adorable in it!

Christmas this year was pretty great! We didn't spend a ton of money cause we are really trying to save our pennies. Plus with a new baby and moving in to a bigger place soon, we are going to be spending enough!

One of Hanalei's favorite gifts from grandma. She played with it all morning.

note the bananas in the background. Our neighbors gave us them because they knew Hanalei loves them.

Foam letters and numbers to nurture Hanalei's love of learning

Daddy and Hanalei playing catch with the wrapping paper balls. You can see her ball on the top of the picture. Good shot ehe?

She loved the shirt Grandma gave her, but she kept calling it a dress. WHenn I opened a shirt from my mom for myself Hanalei grabbed it and put it up to herself saying "dress".

The pants were a little big but she still wanted to wear them that day!

Not hte best Picture of me but you can see my belly a little.

Rusty and I got each other games. We have played both already and had a lot of fun!

Bowling

When we got back from our trip we were greeted with some pretty hairy weather. So Breanne and I were on the hunt for indoor activities. I wasn't sure how Hanalei would do. She really enjoyed it.

Breanne Jonny and baby bump

Hanalei and Jonny did pretty good taking turns

At the end Hanalei grabbed a heavier, pinker ball. Who's kid is this?

She knew the heavier ball would be an advantage in knocking over more pins

One game was sufficient for Hanalei. Jonny happily finished her game for her.

20 and 21 months...slacker

I know I am way behind. I blame the holidays, traveling and the two kids that suck the energy out of me. Hanalei is still growing and learning like crazy. She pretty much talks faster than I can keep up with. She still is signing which helps me interpret some of her unclear words. She loves the signing videos and requests them multiple times during the day.

Because of the signing videos she has shown interest in learning colors, numbers, and letters. She has somewhat mastered her basic colors and is now really soaking up numbers. I bought foam numbers for the bath and we practice every night. It is hillarious. She will sometimes skip a number then repeat the same number 4x. Every now and then she surprises me with a perfect count to ten, then she cheers for her self. Saying "job" for good job! Don't you just want to squeeze her!

As I was putting away dishes one day I discovered this little friend in our blender

Hanalei was in heaven

This was a rare find at the tide pools. I have never seen a sand doller in Hawaii. Infact Breanne picked it up thinking it was a rock. Pretty awesome.

We drove down to the zoo for a day of animals. Jonny and Hanalei were making all the noises for all the animals. They even made up noises for the giraffe. It sounded a lot like a lion. When we got there it was closed because a big water pipe broke. So we went to the aquarium.

It is no fun getting sick especially in your eye.

SHe had to get drops in her eyes every three hours for a week. Poor her and poor me.

A few pics I missed from the trip.

She had a lot of fun with her daddy, even in the coldy snow.

doesn't Rusty look handsome?!

Hanalei thought cutting cookies was fun, but Grandma's M&M dispenser was ever better.

The biggest change for Hanalei was getting rid of her baby crib and getting a big girl bed.

She always wants to help.

This needed a little tweaking...perfect!

Now for the real important work, putting together the toddler bed, and ripping this foam in to teeny tiny pieces.

The First night she took her time falling asleep. She didn't cry, but she was too excited to sleep. The next day for her nap I was really nervous. She cried and cried. I set a time limit for when I would go get her. 20 min later this is what I found. Success! Woo Hoo!

One of Hanalei's favorite words is silly. And one of her favorite people is daddy. Silly Daddy!

We sure do LOVE this Girl!

Coldy Utah

Everytime we go to Utah in the winter, we hope for a froze lake. We know going in early December our chances for ice were thin. Pun intended. But to our excitement we were lucky to have ice good enough for a few days of ice hockey. A real Christmas miracle.

Before the ice was sketchy, Hanalei and parker had some fun on the ice.

Hanalei is going to give those boys a run for their money.

The best way to get around on the ice, the Katie express.

After the ice party Parker was Caught purple handed, or gloved!

We got some sledding in.

Kendra always up for an adventure.

She plowe into a few bush at the bottom of this hill.

Hanalei went a few times but wasn't really in to it. I think she was ready for a nap. It was hard to know when she was ready, we had been in too many time zones by this point.

Parker was gung ho

The boots, gloves and hat lasted a few minutes.

Even though she hated the winter ware we were glad troy and katie found some for us.

We started this game with great conditions. But by evening it was getting pretty slushy in spots.

I went after the puck and started to sink. It was so scary. I naturally dropped to all fours and still was sinking. I then was on my "baby" belly, grabbed the puck and scooted back to safer ice. What a rush.

This snowman represents kendra,

who is always afraid that someone is going to fall in the lake.

Can you say, Calvin and Hobbes?
Rusty thought it would be funny to put these on the road for Mike when He got home from work. He got around them. Some neighbor kids nocked em down.

We went to Crown Burger and stuffed our faces full of yummy food

Then off to Temple Square to see the lights

It wasn't as crowded as I thought it would be, so we went up to the Christus Statue

Hanalei loved it. She keept pointing out the stars, the moon, and the sun. She was excited to show everyone Jesus.

It was a great trip. We had lots of fun playing. By the end of this trip we were pretty exhausted from raquetball, hockey, Snowboarding (i didn't go), sledding and just staying up late playing games. We will be rested in about one year, when the ice is frozen again.

Thanksgiving in Cali

Today I was catching up with my friend Breanne. She asked what we did in California and as I recalled some of the things we did, I realized we went to the duck park quite a bit.

We went with Aubrey Grandma and Aunt Sallie

You might notice in these pictures Hanalei feeds herself just as much as she feeds the ducks.

Aubrey threw her snack cup into the pond.

Grandma enjoyed feeding the ducks more than the girls, we had to ration the bread.

Due to complications in our flight, on our way back from Utah we had another day in Cali. Grandpa skipped rotary to have a picnic with us. It was a gorgeous day.

We found a nice shady spot under a tree.

Hanalei is totally starting to pose for pictures. I think its hillarious.

Feeding ducks perched on a tree is safer.

We did tons of other fun things while in California. Rusty played full contact golf with my dad and brothers. Followed by laser tag and of course turkey football. Some of the guys went to a car show, while the girls and kids went to the zoo. Mostly we visited with family, played games, and took a huge family photo. The most exciting thing we did was clean up throw up. It was a real barf-o-rama at Grandma's house. One by one kids and adults fell victim.I avoided it, thank goodness, but Hanalei and Rusty weren't so lucky. Despite the loads and loads of puke laundry that needed to be done, we had a blast. Good food and great family that I love! Much to be grateful for.