DECEMBER 2006

Before preschool ended for Christmas Break, Joshua had a cute little Christmas Program.

 
At the beginning they sang lots of songs they learned throughout the year and then added in a few Christmas songs at the end.

They also acted out an adorable nativity scene.


Joshua was a wiseman (pictured here on the right side as the middle wiseman).



He did a great job and we really enjoyed watching his presentation. In all, there are 18 kids in his class. They are a busy bunch and Joshua is loving preschool!

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We spent the family night following Thanksgiving decorating our home for Christmas.



Joshua loves putting decorations on the tree. We are still buying new oranaments every year. I love the memories that come with each ornament.



Joshua... always our little helper is helping Lowell with the outside Christmas Lights. We opted to do it during the day this year instead of freezing at night and trying to do them. It went a lot quicker and we all had lots of fun.

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We took some time in between Joshua's program and our trip to Thatcher for Christmas to go and see the temple lights. It got really cold, really fast here, but it was still lots of fun.

 
This is my favorite Christmas scene at the temple. It just really touches my heart and helps me reflect on the sacrifices that were made. Pictured above is me showing Joshua Mary and Joseph. He's such a smart little boy and knew who they were. As usual, the temple lights were beautiful and we really enjoyed our time together on the temple grounds.

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Well, Christmas has come and gone. It was great to spend time with our family. Joshua spent lots of time at home during Christmas Break, but is excited to go back to school in January. I enjoyed having him home to help with all the Christmas festivities.

We announced some exciting news to our families at Christmas this year... we are expecting Baby #2. Here's how we announced it at Christmas... We bought a book called "I'm a Big Brother" and wrapped it up for Joshua. We read it to him a few times beforehand so he knew the title of it and then when he opened it he announced to everyone our good news!

Our little miracle is due to arrive in June and we are so excited about increasing our family. Because of all the problems I had after Joshua was born, getting pregnant again wasn't an easy thing for us! So, the doctors are keeping a close eye on our little bundle of joy. Below are pictures from the sonograms I have already had.

Here's the baby at 7 weeks. So tiny!

We got to see and hear the heartbeat at this appointment.



Joshua got to come in and see the baby at my 12 week ultrasound. He was so excited. We also got the hear the heartbeat again. You can't see the little legs in these two, but they are there... tucked underneath him/her. During the next ultrasound we will hopefully be able to tell what the baby's gender is.

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We celebrated Christmas with Lowell's family this year. It was so nice to see everyone. We celebrated on Christmas Eve since Lowell's Dad had to work on Christmas.


Joshua was a good little helper picking up all the wrapping paper in between opening his presents.

On Christmas morning Joshua discovered Santa had dropped off presents and filled stockings in our room. He got a new bike!

 

Once we got him on solid ground he took to it pretty quickly. We went and rode around over at the college near Lowell's parents house.



On Christmas Day an old family friend came by with his Christmas creation...

 

The kids absolutly LOVED it!!



They were lucky to go on two different rides during the day. We invited Joshua's other cousins (from my side of the family) to join us for the second ride and all the kids had lots of fun!! Joshua said it WASN'T a train. Ha Ha! When we asked him why, he said, "Because a train goes on tracks and THIS is NOT on tracks!" Little smarty!! He big into trains right now.

We hope you each had a Merry Christmas!! This is such a special time of year to share with family and friends. We love you all!


NOVEMBER 2006

Joshua is still loving preschool. This time of year is especially fun with all the creative activities his teachers have planned. The month of November was focused on Pilgrims and Indians. They even had a little Thanksgiving Feast of their own at school. Joshua recently came home dressed as a little Indian. His teacher dyed the costumes and helped the kids cut them and write on them with permanent marker. Joshua made his own Indian neclace (painted noodles and pottery beads) and little pottery bowl, as well as his feathered head-dress. So darn cute!!


His face... while it looked super cute... was very hard to get clean. After he took off his costume we realized they had used "washable" marker to do the little Indian markings on his face. Fun times trying to scrub it off in the tub. Ha Ha! By the way, he was "Chief Lightning Bolt".



Thanksgiving was spent with my family this year. It was great to be able to see everyone. We weren't able to make it down till the day after Thanksgiving so we had our feast on Friday instead of Thursday. It was great to see all the kids playing together and fun to get re-aquainted with siblings and their spouses. We took some fun pictures while we were there.



Here's Grandma and Grandpa with thier growing group of grandkids. I don't know who has more fun when they all get together...Grandma and Grandpa... or the grandkids. They sure love being grandparents!!



And here they are with their own children (all of my siblings)!

It was great to spend time with family for the Thanksgiving holiday. We are grateful for friends and family to share our special times with. We're looking forward to the upcoming Christmas Season.


OCTOBER 2006

At the beginning of October we made a trip to California to visit my older brother and to see the newest member of his family. Here's Lowell holding Carter.



Joshua had lots of fun playing with cousins. Somehow they all fit on one swing. It was pretty fun to watch! They all played really well together. It's neat to watch our families grow.



On the way to California we stopped and took a picture with the BIG windmills. Joshua loves this part of the trip. We haven't been to California too much during his lifetime, but he seems to remember these everytime.

After our trip to California we spent some time visiting my hometown. My mom and I started working on my blue jean quilt (whew... what a LOT of work!) and we spent some time clearing out some of the storage from the basement. We were also able to see my younger sister. Here she is with her little girl. Was sure nice to see you Trina!


Once we arrived home we decorated our house for Halloween. Joshua's favorite decoration is the blinking pumpkin lights that we put in the window. This year we didn't do very well remembering to take pictures, but here's Joshua in his Superman costume. Check out those muscles!!!

Joshua enjoyed a preschool Halloween Party during the day. He has made lots of new friends. In the evening we had lots of fun participating in our Ward Trunk or Treat. Joshua came home with a candy filled Halloween pumpkin. We had lots of fun. We hope you all enjoyed your Halloween. The weather here is finally cooling off. The sunny days are just beautiful and we are gearing up for the holiday season and some much anticipated cold weather.


AUGUST 2006

On August 29, 2006, Joshua began preschool. He's attending Shining Star Preschool with an LDS lady from our Stake as his teacher. I've been a little anxious, but happy to see Joshua becoming an independant little boy. Lowell seems to be handling it all rather well. Both of us have talked about this a lot with Joshua and he has shown nothing but pure excitement!! On Monday (August 28th) we went to an open house where we were able to meet Joshua's teacher and see his cute little classroom. The following day, school began...

We started with our morning routine of breakfast, followed by a bath. Joshua played for a bit (and kept asking if it was time to go to preschool yet) and Lowell called to wish him good luck on his first day. Then we had a little lunch.



Around noon we headed over to preschool. We're really lucky it's only about a block away so not too much driving! When we got there, I walked Joshua in and snapped a few pictures. I guess I imagined a tearful goodbye, but it seems I was the only tearful one. (sniff, sniff) Joshua was ready for me to leave so he could start getting to know the other kids and playing with the new toys! I did get to take a quick picture of Joshua in front of the huge tree mural on the wall and also one with Miss Jannie (his teacher!)




Then he was off to greet his new surroundings... I could barely squeeze in a hug and a kiss before he disappeared in all the excitement and I headed home.

Miss Jannie has been teaching Preschool for 15 years now. There are 18 children in Joshua's class this year!

A few hours later, I went and picked him up... excited to see how his first day went. He was waiting out front with his classmates. All the kids have matching preschool bags and t-shirts with their names on them. Inside the bags they have homework notebooks.



As soon as Joshua arrived home, he was excited to show me his new stuff. He had a cute little star stamped onto his hand that he was very proud of. Once he had shown me everything, he got out his homework notebook and began doing his very first homework page.



When he was done practicing the number one (top), he decided to color the picture as well (bottom).

 

Joshua says preschool is fun. Lowell and I are thrilled that he is already enjoying it so much and hope as the year progresses, Joshua's love for learning continues to increase. We look forward to watching him grow, learn and succeed!