Christmas at Our House

Here are a few pics from Christmas at our house! Sammy's dreams came true and she got a night dress as she put it! Andrea loved her slide and candy! And, Josh slept through most of the excitement!! We had a really good day and the kids loved every minute of it. I am so glad that I have kids who will get excited about everything they open, even the underwear! The kids all got a slide from Santa. Sammy also got a Leapster from Santa and Andrea got a few purple presents (shoes, shirt, hat, and a toy car). They also loved their doll clothes, princess scooters, pillows, prince barbies, and Barbie phones! They loved it all!

Sammy helping Josh open his presents.

This is Andrea on the slide with her new purple hat. The hat really has princesses on it but she puts it on backwards so you can see the purple!

Here is a picture of Josh with his Hug-Me Doll from Granny!

You can't have Christmas without a stairs picture!! We have to take a picture at the top of the stairs because once you tell them they can start down the stairs, there is no stopping them!!

My Amazing Deals!

I got some money for Christmas to buy new clothes so I had to go shopping today!! I went to Kohl's because it is close to our house and I don't have a lot of time when I leave Josh. I got 13 shirts/sweaters, 1 pair of khakis, and 1 necklace for $87.58!!! The most amazing part is that 12 of the shirts/sweaters totaled $38.80!! They normally would have cost $258!!! I was really excited but it made me have a hard time paying sale price for the one sweater, khakis and necklace that I bought. I LOVE the clearance at our Kohl's. I just had to share my great deals on clothes today. I basically have a new wardrobe and it feels great because I haven't had new clothes (other than my $5 t-shirts from Target!) for a really long time.

Uncle Kevin

Ever since Thanksgiving Andrea has been obsessed with her Uncle Kevin. She calls him on the phone and won't get off! She asks constantly where is he (we finally had to make his picture with the kids the wallpaper on the computer so she can always find Kevin). Sammy and Andrea love having Kevin come visit. He stopped in briefly last week and you would have thought it was Christmas! Andrea had to follow him everywhere. Yesterday Kevin called her and made her day!! She LOVED it!! Of course, when she got off the phone she went to the window and said she was watching for Kevin. I have a feeling she is going to be waiting for awhile. I hope that Kevin knows how much he is loved by my two girls!

Meeting Santa

We had a ward Christmas Brunch this morning and Santa came to visit! My girls were slightly better than last year in that they weren't screaming and crying!!! You can tell that they still don't like the whole sitting on Santa's lap! At least Josh didn't cry!!

Reindeer Cookies

We made our reindeer cookies tonight. I saw this in Family Fun Magazine a couple weeks ago so I thought we would try it. The girls loved it!! I put the little dabs of frosting on and they did the rest. Surprisingly Andrea did it faster than Sammy and she didn't try to eat the candy (just the pretzels)!! This is amazing for her because she has a big sweet tooth.

To make these you use a Nutter Butter for the face, chocolate chips for the eyes, a red M&M for the nose, and a pretzel for the antlers. Super easy and lots of fun!!

Snow in Las Vegas

I had to laugh yesterday afternoon as I turned on the news to see what the weather was doing. There was Breaking News about our winter weather or snow storm as they call it everywhere else!! I watched the news for 2 HOURS with NO commercial breaks before I finally turned it off. Then when I was watching Criminal Minds last night they came on during every commercial break to give an update on the weather!! Only in Vegas would they make such a big deal out of snow. Seriously, when you only have a few reporters out how many times do you need to repeat the same thing over and over and over!! We actually didn't get any snow! We had a little snow blow through but nothing stuck to the ground. We did get a bunch of rain though. They also canceled school last night so everyone around my house loved it because they got a snow day with no snow on the ground!! You have to love the way they do things in Las Vegas!

Motivation

I think for most women it is no secret that you are not happy with the way you look after you have a baby. I wasn't happy with my image before the baby so you can imagine how I feel now!! The worst part is I am 3 pounds away from the weight I was before I got pregnant with Joshua but I am still two pants sizes away. How does that happen?? All my weight is in the pooch I still have and HATE! Well, I have found a little motivation. There is nothing like watching The Biggest Loser and seeing all these really fat people and realizing that you aren't that much smaller than them. I am watching the finale tonight and seeing the amazing transformations these people have made is awesome. I want to look like that. I have decided that in the next year I want to loose 30-40 pounds. It might seem unrealistic but I really want to get back to my pre-Samantha weight. My biggest obstacle is food. I have a VERY picky family and so I have a hard time finding lots of recipes that everyone will like. This is where I need help. If any of you reading this have really good simple recipes that are healthy please email them to me (honeybee85@juno.com). I think I need to have a recipe swap with my friends to find lots of recipes that are really good and then make them even healthier. To all of my friends in Las Vegas that want to do this with me, let me know and I will find a night to swap recipes!! Maggie, I know you are reading this so I am just letting you know that you have no option here...you will be loosing the weight with me and finding recipes with me!! It is time to put my new elliptical to work!


Our life the last week has been a little crappy. We have all been sick the last week. I think we made the mistake of taking Josh to church a week ago and he picked something up and then gave it to all of us!! Samantha had to miss her field trip to the Shark Reef today because she is still sick. We explained to her that she didn't want to make her friends sick so she wouldn't be able to go and her response was, "But Josh got me sick." Jeff promised that we would go to the Shark Reef as a family so she would still be able to see it. We'll see if he keeps his promise. I think we are almost 100% healthy now! Hopefully we will stay that way for a long time!

Josh had a little competition today. He almost lost his status as the biggest baby in the Mabey family. My sister had her little girl, Denali, today. She weighed in at 9 lb 5 oz and was 21.25 inches long!! Michelle sounded very tired! Congratulations Brooks family!

Christmas Tree Pictures

Here are a few pictures we took the first Sunday in December around our Christmas tree. You can see how much fun it is to take pictures with three kids!!!

Can you tell they like to say "cheese"

Their true personalities...Sammy is in her own world and Andrea is a tease!

I know these pictures are small and the picture quality isn't that great but I haven't been able to convince my husband to upgrade from dial-up so this is the best I can do!!