Retraction

It has been pointed out to us, by Alex, that his daughter's name is spelled, "AVA. with an A. Not Eva, like the dirty movie actress. AVA." Sorry, Alex. However, it has been duly noted that the Hanson's only comment on the blog when their daughter's name is spelled like that of a dirty movie actress.... Much love.

Christmas Letter 08

How cheap are the Ericksons?

They are so cheap that they are posting their Christmas letter online instead of sending it out. On top of that, it doesn't even rhyme this year and it uses contractions. Yeah, tacky, we know, but everybody kind of already knows that about us anyway. Given that Katie has a success rate of getting me to write a Christmas letter once every 4 years, this is actually pretty darn good.

January through April saw the end of my course work, the completion of my Master's degree, and the end of Katie's pregnancy with Andrew. In some ways it was the best pregnancy so far, and in other ways the worst. Just to make sure that we didn't get away with thinking it was the best, Andrew gave us a scare by contracting congenital pneumonia and spent his first week and a half of life in the NICU. If you want to know how that was, consider that the Doctor who delivered him told us that his own infant son died of congenital pneumonia because they didn't have the same medical equipment 20 years ago. The highlight of this period was showing up to visit Andrew and finding a neonatal ambulance outside the door and a team of specialists and nurses surrounding Andrew's bed in the NICU. Luckily, it happened to be a transfer from another hospital and they had moved Andrew to another part of the facility. How's that for starting off a Christmas letter on a merry note?

Needless to say the year really picked up from there. Just weeks after Andrew came home we found ourselves driving to New Mexico, the "land of enchantment". I think they call it that because it's just "fascinating" that people manage to live there. Truth be told, we really loved it and had a fun time. Throw in a visit from Grandma and Grandpa, and all of the national parks you can imagine along the way and it was one great summer. For a great national park story, by the way, you may want to check out the Petrified National Forrest story in this past post.We had just returned from being enchanted, unloaded the uHaul into our front entryway (very disenchanting), and turned around, when who should come walking through our door? Why, Katie's family about 3 days earlier than they were supposed to come and with no warning. The first thing they said (I think it was even before they said hello) was, "Ha, Ha, we caught Miss Molly Mormon off guard. Look at her house!" As if we always have a small uHaul's worth of stuff in our entryway except when they come visit. After a whirlwind of swimming pools, fashion shows, and the Ellsworth family reunion they were off again, too soon and too short.

Before we could turn around and clear out our entryway, however, we got invited to go spend some time in Yellowstone National Park with the Ericksons and a few Hiltons. It was gorgeous, and so much fun. That is until Katie mistook a fellow camper's dog for a coyote and we all had to sleep in the minivan. Note to self: if ever homeless, a cardboard box is more comfortable than a minivan. The highlight of the trip for me was french toasted homemade Grandma Erickson cinamon rolls. Oh baby. (Yeah, I know, we visited one of Nature's most amazing places and I remember what we had for breakfast....) Unfortunately, it wasn't until we were driving through the park to go home, that Katie realized there was ALL THIS COOL STUFF SHE DIDN'T HAVE A PICTURE OF YET. Longest drive through Yellowstone in history, look it up on Ripley's.

After that, we finally cleaned our entryway, Ben and Dad got to go canoeing down the Provo River, and Kallie had her 3rd birthday! She was so cute. Can anybody guess what the birthday theme was? Anybody? Princesses of course! If there was a gift that wasn't a princess, it had a picture of a princess on it. I wonder if real life princesses learn how to become princesses from Barbie training videos too....

This year was a big year for Kallie because she started dance lessons as well! She loves to dance and is always willing to bust a move for complete strangers and Walmart greeters alike. Unfortunately, we started her on lessons with a dance teacher who retired a couple months later due to arthritis. In the meantime she's picked up gymnastics, but she still dances around whenever we have music playing.For the first time this year we also visited the Utah State Fair, spent time with Mike and Brittany, managed to get one of the kids to only use ONE Halloween costume, spent time with Emily and Hailey, and went to Cornbelly's. That brings us to the next REALLY big event.... Ben's 5th Birthday. Talk about a kid who couldn't wait to be 5. He spent the whole day walking around on a cloud saying things like, "I can't believe I'm 5!" The theme for this birthday was definitely military, and included a matching hat and glove set with skulls and crossbones on them. The highlight was a motorcycle ride with Grandpa for a special lunch. Certainly he doesn't get these tendencies from his bearded, motorcycle-loving father. (By the way I've decided to shave and stop talking about motorcycles before Kallie becomes interested in boys... lest she think those are the boys to go for...)

The year started winding down (or up) with a trip to California for Thanksgiving and an early Christmas with Katie's family, 2 family and 2 ward Christmas parties, sick kids, blizzards, new church responsibilities, a special trip with Grandma and Grandpa (and not Mom and Dad!) to Las Vegas, and the realization that we can't possibly keep going at this rate without a complete meltdown (not to mention we're only half way through December). Needless to say, things promise to continue getting crazier as the year comes to a close.

We hope as much fun and joy comes your way. Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Let the Christmas Parties Begin!

Despite the fact that we missed the Gillen Family Christmas party to attend Nathan's guitar recital, we still got in two Christmas parties! Papa craftily planned the Erickson party so that everyboday could spend the night at Grandma's house and help out with their ward party early in the morning. The Erickson party was blast and we even had some people who we rarely see including Aunt Janet and Uncle Dale and Aunt Christine.

Here we find Kallie.... probably tasting the fruits of her nose. Here we find Ben... probably the person Kallie learned it from.

Everybody watching the nose picking contest.

Ben is in the lead by a nose hair.

The next day we had to get up bright and early to start heading over to the church at 7:30 am. Well, I accidentally set my alarm for 6:30 pm. At about 7:15 I heard Mom talking to someone and figured that she gets up at 5:00 am so I probably have another 1 1/2 hours of sleep. Ten minutes later Katie asked what time it was. That got us moving.

We made it there and started cracking eggs. Even though you can crack eggs a lot faster with the one handed method, Uncle Terr still had to do it with two because then the egg gets on his hand... ewwwww. He also made sure that plenty of eggshell made its was into the mix to up the calcium (and bacteria) content. I wonder how I got sick on Sunday....

Momma and her princess.

A picture of Megan and Terr.

All the boys.

Grandma and her sources of joy.

Mom and Andrew.

Eva about to APE if she doesn't get a bottle NOW!

Okay, so aside from Grandma making 1,000 crepes (about 650 crepes too many) and sending us home with 40 pounds of leftover food, we also found out what motivates the kids. When Ben and Kallie were invited to go sing with the primary they weren't very excited. Even though they knew the song, they just kind of stood there. After the chorister told the kids that if they didn't sing louder Santa wouldn't come, you could here our two over all the others. Hmmmmm, too bad this only works at Christmas time.

A picture of Santa.

Amy and Alex figure that by dressing Eva in puke green, they can get away with changing her outfit less often...

After Ben learned he was getting coal, only Kallie and Andrew were left.

A Pretty Princess

For those of you who don't know what a REAL princess is supposed to look like, I'll let you have a glimpse at mine...

Here Comes SANTA!!!!

Saturday started out by looking like a really fun day. Ben had been sick for a few days and not really eating, but on Saturday he woke up hungry and thirsty. So I very excitedly gave him some Kix and milk, then went to get Andrew in the tub. Next thing I know Ben is standing in the doorway looking green. He says, "Mom, I have something very sad to tell you." Thinking it was not that big of a deal, I ask he what was very sad. He then went on to explain how he had just thrown up all over my kitchen. FUN! :( I get Chris and ask if he wants the kitchen (crossing my fingers) or if he wanted to finish Andrew's bath. No surprise, he chose Andrew. So I get Ben started in a different bath, put his clothes (covered in vomit) in the wash, and head downstairs. I will spare you the yucky details....but all I have to say it GROSS!!!!

I decided to get Kallie and Andrew out of the house and go on a date. Andrew had other ideas, and quickly fell asleep, so I was down just to me and Kallie. We kissed the boys goodbye and headed up to my Aunt Jan's to see Santa!!!

Her neighborhood has been doing the for years apparently. They put Santa in a wagon, pulled by these beautiful, huge, Clydesdale's, and take him all around the neighborhoods. This year Jan and my cousin Krista were Santa's helper. Krista was in front in the car blaring music and honking her horn, and Jan brought up the rear on her adorable 3 year old horse named Parker. As soon as we got there Kallie wanted to get right on the horse with Jan. I asked her if she wanted to see Santa...and got a very definite answer NO! So she rode on the horse for a while, carefully watching the other kids get on Santa's lap. After a while I asked if she was ready, and surprisingly she said YES!

She waited very nervously next to Santa's other helper for her turn.
As soon as she got on Santa's lap I was sure she would hop right off and call it good. Man was I wrong! She talked....

And talked......

And talked.....

until I told her it was time to get off! She and Santa (who was amazing and didn't rush any of the kids) had a great chat. I'm not sure of everything they talked about, but I know Santa has a great knowledge of princesses....and that really impressed Kallie. She asked for a Princess. When he asked which one she looked up at him so innocently and said, "a REAL one!" So we will have to see what the elves can come up with for that one!

A little while later, Heather (my cousin) bought her cute little girl Ally to see Santa. Kallie and Ally had a blast playing together. Ally wasn't such a big fan of Santa, but lucky for her, her Mommy was and was able to sit by Santa for Ally. It was such a fun day!

This is my other cousin Krista. The horses decided right after this picture it would be fun to take off....so we got a fun little ride to boot!

And this is Uncle Robert and his favorite child Cutter. Need I say more about this?!!?

And this is how I judge how much fun Kallie had.....I'd say it was a very successful day!

And just in case you are wondering, Santa sent home some candy for Ben and just like magic he was better. Sunday we took him to church, but still wanted to milk how fun it is watching movies he told us he was sick at the end of Sacrament Meeting. Chris and I told him if he can't go to class because he is so sick he would have to stay home from dinner at Grandma and Papa's. He agreed. I think he quickly regretted that choice when Kallie and Andrew were getting ready to leave. He told me being home is not fun....i agreed and explained being sick is never fun. Today he feels GREAT!

We are DISCO Elves!

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Buzz Man

After spending a week with cousins who had buzz cuts, Ben's hair was looking a little long to me by the time we got home. While I was cutting his hair he asked for a cut like Ethan's (a number 1 on the clippers). I'm not that brave, so I went with a 3. Here are pictures of the finished hair cut....and all his beautiful hair that got cut off!

Beware...lots of posts!

Since I'm home alone tonight with a sick Benjamin I decided to get our blog updated from our Thankgiving Trip. We had a great week in Cali with the family. I'm not sure how it happened, but I didn't get any pictures at Thankgiving...arrr! So Chris...send me some!!!

Our Last Night

Sadly, and much too quickly, our trip had come to an end. On our last night there we decorated Gingerbread men, got re-adjusted and realigned (I guess those roller coasters were harder on us then we thought...Thanks Bro. Jacobson!), had family home evening, and opened cousin gifts. We had so much fun. Thank you mom and dad for such an amazing week. We love being home and being with the family. We miss everyone already and can't wait till next year! Love you guys!

Starting them young

My family is big on games. Our favorite game to play is a card game called Hand and Foot. Every night we were there after the kids were settled down with a movie we would bring out the cards. Andrew was feeling a little left out of this one night and wanted to join. Here he is so happy to finally be in the action!
Andrew was my partner

And Kallie was our entertainment. This cute little red dress played Jingle Bell Rock and she would dance right along with it. She loves it, and pretty much wears it everyday!