The Smith Family

December is a busy month filled with holiday parties and dance recitals.  We always look forward to the Pearson family party.  Can you believe that my beautiful Grandma Pearson is going to be 99 years old next month?!  She is amazing!  Jeffrey and Hannah sure had fun running around with all of my cousins kids.  They were super excited to get these Bandaloom sets.  Seriously, the best gift that "Santa" has ever given them.  They have had so much fun with these.  Spent hours watching tutorials and making bracelets.  They actually went through all of the bands and begged us to order more.  Another successful party in the books!


Hannah got to perform at the Festival of Trees and had a Winter Dance recital in December.  My beautiful little girl is doing awesome at dance this year.  We just love watching her perform!



Christmas Eve was a little different this year.  This was the first time since I was born (or at least since I can remember) that we didn't go to Grandma and Grandpa Forsyth's house.  They spent the holidays with family in Colorado.  We gathered at my Mom and Dad's this year and had just as much fun!  We still ate yummy food, played games and got new pajamas.  Of course, we were happy that Heather, Andrew and Taven were here too!  We did miss Madi and Nick and baby Stella!  After a night full of fun we headed home to get ready for Santa!



Christmas morning!  Santa decided to leave all of the presents under the tree this year.  The kids had fun digging through them to find the ones that belonged to them.  Hannah was so happy that she got her American Girl doll, Caroline.  She got a bunch of clothes and a hair stylist set for her doll.  She got the Nerf Rebelle bow and arrow that she really wanted.  Jeffrey was most excited about his new soccer ball and goalie gloves.  He doesn't play goalie, he just thinks the gloves are cool!  He also got a cool soccer back pack and some fun books and games.  Gray was excited about his tool bench, potato head and ninja turtle toys.  Jeff spoiled me with a new lens for our camera, an iPhone, some perfume and a comfy robe.  Can't wait to get some close-up shots of the kids in action at soccer and dance!  We definitely had a fun morning!




We headed over to my parent's house to visit and open some more fun presents.  I think you can see that Jeffrey was thrilled about the Real jersey from Grandma and Grandpa.  He immediately put it on and wore it all day.  Hannah loved her hair stylist chair and carry case for her new doll.  Grayson got some Monster University toys and more cool tools.  They are lucky kids!  And so happy when they get to hang out with Taven too!


We got to spend the rest of the day with the Smith family.  We enjoyed a delicious dinner.  Leah planned a fun game.  We did Christmas crackers.  Opened some more presents.  Such a wonderful day spent with family!  Merry Christmas!!

My sweet Jeffrey turned 8 in November!  We invited his two best buds, Remington and Dawson, to go swimming at the rec center and then come back here for pizza and Minecraft.  They always have a great time together. He was excited to open some gifts from us and his friends.  He loved his FIFA game, skateboard and cool new hat!



Later that week we had the family over to celebrate.  He was spoiled with a lot of cool stuff.  I think everyone can agree that it's fun giving Jeffrey gifts because he is truly excited and thankful for everything! 


A few things about Jeffrey...

1. He LOVES soccer!  He will practice any chance he gets, even in the cold and snow.  He will spend hours watching soccer videos.  He loves playing FIFA on the Xbox and can name almost every player and where they are from. He is playing on an indoor team right now and doing awesome.  They just finished up the first session in 2nd place.  Jeffrey scored 4 goals during the last game.

2. He is an awesome student.  His teacher has nothing but good stuff to say about him.  She told me at parent teacher conference that she's worried he isn't being challenged enough.  He is in the top spelling group and cruising along on his math timings.  Plus, I think he keeps the class laughing on a daily basis.

3. His best friends are Dawson and Remington.  They love playing Minecraft and building Lego Hero Factory guys.

4. He is a good big brother.  Grayson is constantly breaking his stuff and bugging him and he usually just deals with it.  He is good to let Hannah play with him and his friends and he is the best at cheering her on at soccer games and dance. 

5. We just love this kid!  He is our smart, funny, talented, kind, long-haired, good-looking, soccer-playing boy who likes to stay up late and sleep in!

HAPPY 8TH BIRTHDAY!!

Not only did Hannah get to spend the week before her birthday at Disneyland, but she also got to celebrate with a few of her friends and family when we got home.  She invited her two BFF's to lunch and Build-A-Bear.  I think the girls had a lot of fun!  They all picked the same bear and a cute dress to put on their bear.


The next night we invited all of the family over to celebrate.  It was still warm enough that the kids could run around outside.  As you can see, I put them to work raking leaves!  Hannah sure enjoyed having everyone over and loved all of the wonderful gifts.



Oh, I forgot to mention that Hannah also got her ears pierced.  Jeff was a little hesitant to let her get it done, which may have been for a good reason.  They only lasted about a month!  I tried to clean them regularly but she hated me touching them and would complain every time.  I think one of them was a little infected.  Anyway, we finally just took them out.  It wasn't worth the fight.  Maybe we'll do it again some day!


A few things about Hannah...

1. She loves dance and soccer.  I've been really impressed with her at dance this year.  It's like she's a whole different dancer.  She's a lot more flexible and likes doing the splits and heel stretches.  She loves that Aunt Madi is her dance teacher.  She is also super excited for spring soccer to start.

2. She is very helpful!  She will usually stop what she's doing to help me clean up around the house.  She makes her bed really well.  Her preschool and Kindergarten teachers have both commented on how helpful she is in the classroom as well.

 3. She is a great student!  Her teacher is constantly telling me how well she is doing.  She told me the other day that she is a "10" in the class.  She is cruising through all of her take home books and will be well ahead of where she is suppose to be at the end of the year.

4. She is a great sister to Jeffrey and Grayson.  Her and Jeffrey are good buddies and can have fun together for hours.  Her and Grayson can drive me crazy together, but she is so good to help him and play with him.  He sure loves her!  She is also great with her little cousins.  She absolutely adores baby Stella and can't wait to meet Annie.

5. She lives to have her chocolate milk every night and morning while she watches the iPad.  A few of her favorite shows right now are Monster High, My Babysitter's a Vampire, Jesse, Lab Rats and the movie Frozen.  Her best friends are Vienna and Brielle.  She loves her new American Girl doll and is excited get together with her friends so they can all play with their dolls.

6. She gets herself ready for bed when she's tired and gets up early before Jeff goes to work.  She is our beautiful, smart, sassy, dancing, soccer-playing girl!  We just love her to pieces!

HAPPY 6th BIRTHDAY!

I feel like we had two Halloween's since we got to wear our costumes and trick-or-treat at Disneyland as well.  It's all good though because the kids were off-track and they didn't get to wear their costumes to school.  Halloween is a special day because it's Hannah's birthday too!  We decided to put on our costumes and go visit Great Grandma Pearson.  She loved seeing all of the kids in their costumes.  Grayson was so sweet with her.  He kept giving her hugs and kisses and high-fives.  I got some really cute pictures.  Then we rushed home to get ready to trick-or-treat.  Jeff was just finishing up the pumpkins.  He always does one for Hannah's birthday and he did a soccer ball for Jeffrey.  Grayson woke up from a nap just in time to do a little trick-or-treating too.  He loved it and still talks about often.  Happy Halloween!

In October, we took the kids to the Happiest Place on Earth.  I guess what they say is true because we sure had a lot of fun!  It was especially fun because we went with Jeff's sisters Leah and Erin and their families.  We got to California on Monday and spent the day swimming with cousins and gearing up for the parks.  The next three days were spent going back and forth from California Adventure to Disneyland.  One of the first rides we went on was Tower of Terror.  Let me tell you, Hannah had a true look of terror!  I thought for sure she would never go on that ride again.  I was wrong!  It turned out to be one of her favorite rides.  I think we went on it at least 10 times.  They also loved Ghost Galaxy (aka Space Mountain), Pirates of the Caribbean, California Screamin', Cars, Indiana Jones, and many more!  Grayson liked Buzz Lightyear and Peter Pan.  I was surprised that Hannah was able to go on everything including California Screamin', just by a hair!  I really liked Soarin' Over California and all of the others, of course. It was so much fun being there in October to see all of the Halloween decorations.  We went to Mickey's Halloween Party, so we got to wear our costumes, trick or treat and ride all of the rides.  Don't get me wrong, it was busy, but not as busy as I thought it would be. The longest we waited for any ride was maybe 25 min.  Those fast passes and parent swap passes are great!  Our last night there we watched the World of Color show at California Adventure.  I thought that was pretty cool!  The kids had so much fun.  I think their faces in these pictures say it all!









On Friday, we met up with one of Jeff's friends and his family for lunch.  Then we ended up at the Santa Monica beach and pier.  It was a bit chilly, but the kids still had fun splashing around and building sand castles.  It took us about 2 hours in the L.A. traffic to get back to our hotel that night.  Yikes!




On Saturday, we hit downtown Disney before we had to catch our flight.  The kids loved the Lego store.  We had some lunch and headed to the airport.  Such a fun trip!  We can't wait to go back.

Jeffrey's soccer team had an awesome fall season.  They were undefeated, including two tie games.  We love watching Jeffrey play!  He usually plays forward and is amazing.  The last several games he got in a little more defense and was equally amazing.  The whole energy of the game is just different when he's in.  Several parents have even made comments about it.  There is nothing like hearing everyone cheer for your child.  We are proud parents!







Hannah's team had a great season as well.  I think they only lost one game.  She scored at least one goal at every game and usually more!  She had so much fun playing on the same team as her best friend, Vienna.  Jeffrey loved to cheer her on!  It's so funny because she sticks her tongue out almost the whole time she is playing.  This girl is pretty intense!  She can't wait for soccer to start up again.  Maybe she will finally get her uniform.  Go White Eagles!