Baby Hannah

I know this blog post is a little out of order, but it is the most important and most anticipated.  We had our beautiful baby Hannah Noelle Keeler on December 26th at 11:00 pm.

Hannah's very first picture.

The nurses did all the proper measurements.  Hannah was 7 pounds 12 ounces and 21 inches long.  So that makes her my second biggest baby.  She was not too happy with all the procedures.

Hannah hating the bath.

And then tolerating the bath a little bit.  Doesn't it feel good to be clean?

Then I get a turn with my beautiful baby.  I already love her so much.

Will gets to hold Hannah.  I wonder who she will look more like.

The nurse took a family picture for us.

Hannah has moments of being very alert - mixed with her many many hours of sleeping.  I love holding Hannah when she is alert and so curious about our faces.

We finally got to bring Hannah home on Thursday morning.  She is a good little car traveler.

Hannah, we love you and are so grateful for the blessing of raising you.

Pre-Christmas Activities

We have been doing a few early Christmas things.  Here are a few pictures of us.

So this one isn't really us, obviously.  But we got out our elves on the shelf.  Our elves get into lots of trouble through the month - like playing Nintendo or stuffing each other into the cheese grater.  The kids enjoy finding them.

We made these Christmas trees using a pointy sugar cone, green frosting, and mnm's.

It started off as a preschool craft for Megan's group when it was my turn to be in charge.  Then all the kids wanted to make their own that evening.  So simple and tasty.

This picture comes from going to the Living Nativity.  It was outside of a church.  I think it was good for the kids to learn more about the time of Bethlehem.  We went last year and loved it.  It was good this year too.  Then we got cookies and hot cocoa afterwards.

We have made a couple of Christmas crafts.  Whitney shows off her gingerbread man tree ornament.

And Megan shows off her paper bag manger.

The ward Christmas dinner was delicious.  I think I ate too much ham.  But oh well.

Santa made an appearance after the dinner and music show.  Look at this cute family.

I wanted our children to remember why we really have Christmas.  So we decided to take a tour of the outside of the Columbia River Temple.  It was super cold that day.  But I am glad we went.  It was nice teaching the kids more about the temple and show them where mom and dad were married.  Next time we may come in the summer so we can stay longer.

So it has been a wonderful couple of weeks as we have prepared for Christmas.  I love this time of the year.

Someone Is Two!

So I know that I am a bit behind.  We have been busy getting Christmas things ready.  But we did celebrate Adam's 2nd birthday right after Thanksgiving.

We were still in Pasco.  Megan helped make the brownies while Adam mostly watched.

Two little candles for a cute little boy.  Adam did not know how to blow them out without a bit of dad assistance.

But he definitely knew how to feed himself brownies and ice cream.

And, of course, there were presents to open.

This car that lights up and makes noises seems to be the biggest hit.  But the whoppers came in a close second.

It is amazing how someone this small can change so much in two short years.

We love our Adam!  He is definitely a cute, mischievous two year old.

Happy Thanksgiving

We went up to Pasco for Thanksgiving.  Will had three days off and so did the girls from school.  So it was a really wonderful vacation.

Thanksgiving Day had the most beautiful weather.  So we decided that it was time to take a walk before the big meal.

We enjoyed hearing the birds singing and smelling barbecue smoke.  It felt more like late Spring time.  So nice.

I took Adam on the trampoline after getting home.  I don't let him on without an adult or with the other jumping girls.  He had fun playing on there for awhile.

Then it was time for our relish tray and snacks.  Everyone liked dipping - we had to prevent some double dipping or triple dipping action.

Yummy Thanksgiving food.  There were a couple of new items on the menu.  Chas made some deviled eggs that were tasty and my mom made a baked macaroni to practice for the upcoming wedding.  Both were nice additions. 

Later after playing some games and relaxing for awhile, it was time for pie.

More pie. 

I am glad that we got to spend the day all together.  I have a wonderful family and I am really thankful for them.  There is so much to be thankful for on this holiday.  I hope everyone else remembers their blessings on this special day.

Happy Halloween

So it is a little late posting Halloween pictures.  But the kids looked so cute in their costumes that I wanted to put up some pictures. 

We went to the pumpkin patch with Megan's preschool group.  There are five kids (one was sick) and the grown ups all take turns having the preschool group at their home.  We decided it would be fun to go on a field trip.

Adam was more interested in playing in the sand than in looking for a perfect pumpkin.  But Megan found one.

After you get a pumpkin you have to degunk and carve them.  The girls did pretty well with this.  Megan eventually got bored and I got to finish.  We ended up with yummy roasted seeds.

Whitney carved her own pumpkin into a vampire, Rachel's was an angel, and Megan picked a queen's crown.  They were all very excited about their pumpkins.

Another part of pre-Halloween activities is to decorate sugar cookies.  They were suppose to be pumpkins.  I had made them for a mutual activity and there were some extras.  The kids put on lots of decorations.

This is us at the ward Halloween party.  There was a good turnout.  We had some yummy soups and rolls.

Adam enjoying his spoils from the cupcake walk.  The young women were in charge of the cupcake walk so I got to bring cupcakes to the event.  The young women did a good job bringing cupcakes also.  Our kids were the first ones to be part of the cake walk.  It took awhile for some of our kids to win and there may have eventually been a little help for each child to win.

There were lots of decorations at the party. 

This is us on Halloween night.  The kids were super excited to get going right after Will got home from work.  Do you notice the similarities between the costumes and the pumpkins?

We were trick-or-treating for about two hours.  Then it got a bit too dark and cold and everyone was hungry.  It was a good evening.  And everyone got lots of candy.

I hope everyone else had a Happy Halloween also!