SLEDDING!

Carter's 2nd Birthday!

On December 27, my little baby turned two years old! Doesn't his cute face just make your heart melt??

We started the celebrating with his cousins in WY a week or so before his birthday. When everyone asks me what Carter likes or what is he into... I could easily say "Cars and Puppies!" So, I made cupcakes with little cars on top. Brilliant idea if I do say so myself! I was originally looking for cupcake toppers from the movie Cars, but couldn't find any. I found these little cars at Walgreens in case your wondering. It was a hit with the kids because they all wanted to choose what car they wanted and to play with it right away. And I loved it because it was super easy.

Since Carter is only two, I don't think he fully understood what was going on. All he knew was that he was getting lots of cars, puppies, and eating cupcakes and icecream! Probably the hit of this party was the puppy that Ninny gave to him (brown and white one). It barks, pants, moves its front legs, whines, and makes chewing noises. Carter held onto that thing all day long. His little cousin Megan kept trying to play with it and he would get so mad and defensive! He just love puppies!

Then we celebrated Carter's birthday in Billings the day after his birthday. We had to wait for all his Aunts and Uncles to arrive! We bought Carter slippers and pajamas from the movie Cars. He loved them! He also got lots of books because he LOVES to read.

I made the same cupcakes for his party in Billings. I searched high and low for a cupcake tower in Gillette, but the two good stores we have were sold out :) So I got one in Billings and it worked perfectly.

I think he had a GREAT birthday!

What else do I want to remember about Carter at this age??

• He loves eating more than ANY kid I know


• He will try and eat almost ANY food you give him


• He loves reading, puppies, and cars


• He loves wrestling and is very tough


• He copies everything his big brother does


• He loves playing and doing anything with his big brother


• He calls his big brother Carter


• He has to sleep with his green blanky


• He loves Jordyn and gives her binky to her


• He likes pushing Jordyn in her wheelchair


• He still runs away if we're outside and he has the chance


• He is very smart and talks really well


• He weighs 33lb. and is 90th percentile for his weight (told ya he likes to eat)
  
  

Christmas in Montana

Tom had to work Christmas Eve this year so we decided to leave for Billings Christmas afternoon. This year was our FIRST year having Christmas as our own little family! For eight years we've been traveling to see family! I was worried it would be boring or sad not being with others, but it was actually REALLY nice and fun! Christmas Eve Tom made awesome steak fajitas. Then we drove around looking at Christmas lights. Gillette has a park where they set up lights and it's set up to music... it was pretty cool! We came home and had hot chocolate and ice cream floats. We helped the boys decide on leaving popcorn and hot chocolate for Santa.(I was too lazy to make cookies) This was also the first year that the kids understood anything about Santa/reindeer/Baby Jesus/etc. Evan had a lot of questions about Santa and a lot of questions about Jesus' Birthday too.... he kept insisting that Jesus wanted cake for his birthday and kept asking when Jesus was coming to his party! hahaha Also, earlier in the day, Evan was "inspecting" our fireplace and saying,"Santa can't fit in there, he get stuck!"

Writing Santa a letter and leaving a snack. Check out Carter EATING the popcorn! LOL!

Playing with a few of their new toys Christmas morning.

We attempted a new tradition of eating a breakfast of waffles, vanilla ice cream, and warm syrup on top (Crazy, I know! we got the idea from some old friends in Boise) It's really good, but you can really only eat one before you feel sick! Then we packed up and headed for Billings.

It seems like I only get to see some of my family one or two times a year, since everyone is so spread out, so we were super excited. One of the biggest highlights of the trip was meeting our newest nephew Ryde!!! It made me realize how much I miss being around and holding little babies! What a perfect little cutie!

I love when it's so easy to make them smile!

Susan and Sarah.

Grandma and Ryde

Uncle Todd home from BYU

Mel and Dave

ANDERSEN COUSINS!

Just the girls!

Evan, Nathan, Liam

Carter wrestling Eli

Beautiful Jordyn

happy Sarah

After tripping on a stair, my dad broke his foot while we were all there!

What a great week in Billings. What else did we do? I met up with some old friends for lunch (pictured above), went and saw Avatar in 3-D, played games, watched a couple movies, lots of shopping (I miss great shopping!), went out to breakfast, spinning class and working out at the Y, New Years Eve party, and of course lots of talking and catching up!

Christmas in Wyoming

We celebrated Christmas with Tom's family a few weeks before Christmas. We all met at his parent's house in Buffalo, on a Saturday, for Ninny's annual prime rib dinner. It's to die for! Everyone just played during the day and we had a little birthday party for Carter (pics to come later). We had the delicious prime rib dinner, nativity scene with the kids, and guitar playing later that night. Sunday we all went to church together, it was great!

This was the best pic. I could get of the kids getting ready for the Nativity scene!

Pa and Krystal

Carter playing with his new puppies.

Pa playing his guitar.

Tom playing the guitar.

We found out that there is a guy in Gillette that dresses up as Santa and you can "hire" him to come to your home and visit your kids. So the week before Christmas we teamed up with Travis and Linda to surprise the kids. I think they liked it! Santa did a great job too.

Clay

Cole

Carter

Jordyn

Evan (and Belle)