"I heard a noise!"

On Christmas morning, Karter told me that he woke up in the night because he had heard a noise. I asked him what noise and he said, "I heard, 'Ho! Ho! Ho! There's nobody watching me, so they must all be asleep.'"
This year was our first time having Christmas by ourselves. Even last year we were here in Cheyenne (Ty had just been born) but we had family visiting. We did really miss our families, but still had a great time. We did a lot of playing. And we look forward to a short visit from mom and dad Arritt.
I just love Christmas and am so sad it's over. I love Karter's excitement. Some of my favorite things about this year:
*Decorating the house while singing and dancing to Christmas music.
*Seeing Karter's Christmas program
*Ty discovering our singing Christmas puppy
*Helping Karter with his letter to Santa
*Making Christmas cookies on Christmas Eve
*Karter being excited for and very attentive when we talked about the Birth of Baby Jesus.
*Although I know it's not the most important part of Christmas, I feel grateful for all the gifts given and received.
The Spirit of Love and Giving is everywhere and I love it!

Cardboard Crafts!

I thought I'd pass along (to everyone with preschool-aged children) how fun it is to make something fun out of cardboard. Because we can't play outside, Karter and I decided to make something and looked on sproutonline for ideas, where we saw an airplane made from a cardboard box. Anyway, here are some of the reasons I'm recommending this to you:
1. It was something fun for Karter and I to do together.
2. It was free! We used stuff we already had.
3. We used our creativity, and it was exciting. I would say, "Oh, and we should paint it!" Then Karter would say, "Let's add autopilot!" Then I wanted the propellor and steering wheel to really turn, and switches inside that he could also turn, and Karter had the very great and practical idea of making a door. So fun.
4. Not only did we use creativity, but now that it's finished and Karter is playing with it, he's using his imagination. He has flown to Florida many times (he knows where to go to get warm).

Please pass on back any inside activities that you think are fun! Happy Holidays!

Happy Birthday Buggy!

Our little Ty-Ty isn't so little anymore. He had his first birthday yesterday, and the entire day was so much fun. It started out watching Karter's preschool Christmas program which was adorable- Kollan even got some time off of work to see the program, and then to go to lunch!
Later on, we had some friends over for cake and ice cream (we even had Papa and Namnam Arritt and Grandma Bell on webcam)! I made a Baby Einstein caterpillar cake because Ty LOVES Baby Einstein and gets especially excited when he sees the caterpillar crawl onto the screen each time. The drawing of Ty next to the cake was a gift from my Dad who is the most talented artist in the world. After the party, Ty opened some fun new toys! It was a very fun night.
And I am happy to report that the fun night continued when Ty slept through the whole night! He has done that a few new times now! Yea!
We feel so thankful to have Ty in our family. He is extremely happy and funny. He is very active and hates to sit with us, but would rather be walking ALL THE TIME. That makes a few things, like church, a challenge, but we're glad that he has energy and loves to enjoy life. We love his great smile and cute laugh and he really brings so much happiness to our family. I wish I could keep him this age for a really long time.

Two cute boys and Jingle Bell Rock.

This coming Thursday is a big day for us. It will be Ty's first birthday and also Karter's preschool Christmas program which he is very excited about. This small video clip is a bit of Jingle Bell Rock which has got to be his favorite Christmas song.
And as a side note, I would like to say how excited I am to soon be able to sleep through the night. Yes, my baby is turning one and I'm still feeding him in the middle of the night. It's a terrible habit that we got into when I decided it was easier to feed him and put him back asleep then listen to his terribly loud night-time scream. Two nights ago I decided enough is enough and gave him a cup of water when he woke up screaming. So, we have had a couple long nights, but last night was better than the first, and I'm very optimistic and excited that he will soon sleep the whole night. I never had this issue with Karter who was a great sleeper, and I know I've learned a few things for the next time around. First, I will force my baby to take a binky. And second, I just won't keep up the night-time feedings this long. Anyway, that was a lot of rambling, but the point is HOORAY! I'm so excited for yummy, continous, SLEEP!

I am Thankful!

This post is a bit late, but I do hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving holiday. We sure did. I do have to admit that I was the tiniest bit concerned when our power went out in the middle of cooking the feast. Actually I was very frustrated and kept thinking "of all days- why today?" But it worked out fine. After 20 or 30 minutes without power, my wonderful husband took our turkey out to our wonderful BBQ grill which worked wonderfully. Then, in another 20 or 30 minutes, the power came back on and I definitly realized how thankful I am for electricity! Sometimes I need a reminder of all the things that are so great in my life which I sometimes take for granted. I loved that my mom could come for Thanksgiving, and we also had our friend Maria come over. She has lived in the states only a short time (she's from Puerto Rico) and she is the sweetest girl, who got a kick out of listening to my mom and I attempt speaking Spanish.
Most of all, I feel so grateful for all of my family. I love my husband and two wonderful boys. I feel like I was born into (and married into) the best families ever. I was so glad my mom could come for Thanksgiving. It's always so fun to have her stay, and I was especially glad to have someone to go to the movie Twilight with and to brave Black Friday shopping with me. (I couldn't have paid Kollan to do either!)
With Mom here, we put up the Christmas decorations and made cookies- I just love the holiday season!!

Genesis according to a 4 yr old

Yesterday I was doing my own thing when I overheard Karter "reading" from the scriptures. Luckily, I was conviently near a pen and paper, so I listened to him and wrote down what he said because it made me laugh.
"Chapter 11. God is a great guy. He watch-ed over us, and everybody we know and even strangers- everybody! So, God was a Dad and he got really a lot of babies. God is in heaven now and I want him to come down. So, they sent everybody in the world, and everybody sings, and everybody had a great time in their house. The End."

Hooray for Ty!

Our little determined adventurer took his first steps on Monday! Since then, all he wants to do is walk. He loves to pull himself up to standing and then make his way over to one of us- right before he gets to us, he'll squeal and laugh as he falls forward into our arms. It's so cute! He just turned 11 months and I can't believe how fast he's learning and growing. Before we know it, he'll be a year!

Soccer!!!

Karter really enjoyed his soccer class that he took on base. He worked on the basics- stopping the ball, passing, shooting, and dribbling and he did really well. They scrimmiged the last few weeks and he had a lot of fun. I'm excited to get him on a team. He's been enjoying sports a lot more (just like his Daddy) and he loves to cheer for BYU. It made me laugh when we were driving one day and he saw the word "buy" on a sign. He said, "Mom, they mixed up those letters- it's supposed to be B-Y-U." That's right Karter. Go Cougars!

Happy Halloween!

I love Halloween! I was especially excited that Karter and Ty could be Batman and Robin. And don't you love that Kollan is a "military guy" for the second year in a row? Trick-or-treating kicked off last Saturday at the Candy Corn Carnival at our church. Then today we went to the Med Clinic (along with all the kids on base) for trick-or-treating to all of the different clinics. Karter especially loved handing out candy at the Optometry clinic with Daddy. He said it was better than the trick-or-treating. And to finish off the night we went out in our neighborhood and it was perfect weather!! I was so happy- the last few days have been surprisingly warm, and last year we froze when we went out on Halloween. So, excepting Karter being a bit sick with a cold, it was a perfect day!

Scarecrow Festival!!