Saturday, December 31, 2016

Oh yeah, we moved

It's official: we're renting a house in Northern California!


At the end of BYU-Idaho's fall semester we decided the best place for our family is back home with family and friends that we grew up with (along with some better sunshine-y weather and access to better medical care.) So we hurried up and moved!


The kids (and Jon... and my mom... and Jon's mom...) all got MISERABLE colds the week that we moved :( It kept us indoors for a little bit, but thankfully everyone is on the mend and we've been able to get a lot of boxes unpacked. :) The drive itself was as good as it could have been, with only some spots of snow.


We felt very blessed to make it safely, and miss out on the crazy blizzard that hit Rexburg on graduation day!

For the time being we are living with Jon's parents and my mom. :) We had a beautiful Christmas all together and were able to visit Jon's brother Mike, his wife Amanda, and their daughter AnnMarie, as well as my dad, and sister, Michelle.


new illustrated Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone to read together as a family!

By far the most beautiful gift I received this year was a hand painted watercolor portrait of me with the kids. Jon ordered it from one of my favorite artists. I absolutely LOVE it!


Kate and Edwin were totally spoiled (of course) and received new big kid beds! They are loving their twin sized mattresses and we love the bunk bed giving everyone lots of space in their new room. :D




Margo pup is still alive and well, but is staying with my dad and sister at their house in Loomis until we find a permanent dog-friendly place to live. She seems to be enjoying the yard to play in and having some kid-free space for a while ;)


Horse the goldfish is alive and well in Rexburg. We felt like the traveling would probably kill him (too much change in elevation and temperature) so our friend Paige adopted him:


Along with the new fun space in our house, I redecorated mine and Jon's bedroom! It definitely needed it.

BEFORE:

AFTER:

(fantastic sign above the bed credit goes to my friend Sloane at Indigo Rose Restoration!)

Clutter free art display space = #AllTheHeartEyes


This was SO needed! Now I feel like we have a grown-up retreat space all to ourselves :D

Meanwhile, we've been able to catch up with lots of great friends:




We've been out to sushi, had breakfast burritos, gone caroling to surprise people, tried Korean food, went to breakfast with friends, had play-dates, exchanged Christmas presents, and went go-carting! The end of 2016 has definitely gone off with a BANG.

There's lots of new stuff happening soon, and lots more from this past year to catch you up on. But for now I'm realizing that I haven't done a good job of documenting our recent friend time, HAHA

Goal for 2017: TAKE MORE PICTURES ;)

We hope we get to visit all of you that we haven't seen yet really soon!!

Here's to new fun and new #AlstonAdventures



HAPPY NEW YEAR 2017!!

Saturday, December 10, 2016

Updates on the Kids

Normally I'm pretty good with regular updates on the kids. But this year I haven't reported on their milestones since March!


Thankfully, I keep track of things I want to remember on my phone. Here are some of my favorite memories of Kate and Wynn over the past 8 months :)

Kate turned 4 in August and has been a sassy whirlwind of independence! She weighed 30 lbs and was 38.25 inches tall at her 4 year check up.


Kate has lots of cute quirks and "Kate-isms". For instance, she says "thank you" to automatic soap dispensers when she is washing her hands in public bathrooms. ;)
She is very loving toward our family (well, as long as she is getting her way) and gives us all hugs and kisses often. One of my favorite things she says is, "Daddy is MY friend! He’s my little boy.”


In the fall our ward at church had their annual Primary Program which Kate got to be part of as a Sunbeam! (the 3-4 year old class) She was the only one in her class to not say her part in the microphone (even though we had practiced it all week) and she even turned off the sound from the main microphone control switch during another kid's part! To top it all off, she laid on the floor instead of sitting in her chair, and she spit over the front of the stand onto the carpet in front of the whole congregation. I was so glad that we invited all our friends to come see her ;) hahaha - we really got a good laugh out of the whole thing! I guess it's all you can do, right? ;) Manners in public are something we're working on...

During our road trip in August a lady came into the public restroom where I was helping Kate. The lady laughingly described Kate as precocious. ;) I think that sums her up well.

***

Edwin is growing up so fast! He is 3 months away from his 3rd birthday, and definitely does not feel like much of a baby anymore. (Aside from the fact that he still sucks his thumb and takes his blankie with him everywhere.) Edwin calls bedtime “dark time”, and even when we put him down for naps during the day he says, “but it isn’t dark time yet!”

He loves giving Margo bones and treats. Edwin speaks extremely well for his age. It’s nice to hear his thoughts. I think his mind processes the same way any 2.5 year old’s would, but he is able to articulate it so well. It’s really nice to hear his thoughts out loud.


Edwin loves to climb up on rocks and ask me to take his picture! Oh, and that shiner under his right eye in the picture above? Is from when he walked into the corner of our kitchen table. :'( ouch!

Wynn is very creative and loves to sing and work on art projects. For Halloween we decorated pumpkins and ghosts for our living room window. He took his glitter glue application very seriously!


Edwin constantly cracks me up with his imagination. The other night he walked down the hall into the living room where I was writing in my journal, and he was using his little lion toy like a telescope. He looked at me and I said, “Hi, Edwin!” Then he turned and ran down the hall yelling, “Kate! I think mommy is not a monster! She didn’t growl at me!” ;)

Kate and Edwin are great little buddies and get into all sorts of mischief together. 


They are also great friends to others. When the Bakers came from California to visit us in September, Kate took Cole by the hand to show him around the Rexburg Temple grounds :)


She also wanted to push Cole in the stroller around BYUI campus as much as possible!


One of my MOST favorite things about having a 2 and 4 year old is hearing their conversations together:
Kate: “Do you want to touch my little fuzzies on my arm? They’re so cute!”
Edwin: “I have little fuzzies on my arm too!”
K: "Mommy has big fuzzies! But she doesn’t want to have fuzzies. Daddy has fuzzies. His fuzzies are SO big.”
K: "Hey Edwin, do you want to touch my ears? My ears are SO cute!"
K: "Daddy, why doesn’t Edwin want to touch my ears? Maybe he thinks they’re beesgusting." (She means disgusting, HAHA!)

**To wrap things up, I'll leave you with these quiz questions I asked the kids in October:

Me: Edwin, what is your name?
E: I don’t want you to tell me something! (he means I don’t want you to ask me questions, mom.) ;)
E: Can I make funny faces on snapchat?
Me: How old are you?
E: But I want to do funny faces on snapchat!!
*I decided to give up and try again after breakfast*

Me: What is your name?
E: uh, peanut butter . . . 
Me: How old are you?
E: 2 like this (trying to hold his fingers up)
Me: When is your birthday?
E: uh, a big strawberry like this! (holding his arms out wide)
Me: how old is mommy?
E: uh, 2 like I am.
Me: what is your favorite color?
E: Purple
Me: What is your favorite food?
E: mac and cheese
Me: Who is your best friend?
E: Reese
Me: What is your favorite show?
E: Dragon Tales
Me: What is your favorite song?
E: temple song (I love to See the Temple) and Dragon Tales
Me: What is your favorite animal?
E: cows
Me: What are you scared of?
E: I’m scared of BIG strawberries!
E: *running away screaming because now he and Kate are playing that a big strawberry monster is going to eat them. They pretend Margo is the strawberry monster*…*I followed them and they ran back to the living room. They see Margo and start squealing. I finally asked Edwin what makes him happy, and he answered: Margo.* J
Me: Where is your favorite place to go?
E: I like parks!
Me: What do you want to be when you grow up?
E: I want to ride on trains! (Me: you want to be a train driver?) E: NO! I want to RIDE on a train. *hahahaha, touche.*

Same questions to Kate:
What is your name?
K: Kate
How old are you?
K: 4!
When is your birthday?
K: August
How old is mommy?
K: 6!
What is your fav color?
K: Red!
What is your fav food?
K: pisghety (spaghetti) with meatballs! 
Who is your best friend?
K: Olivia!
What is your favorite show?
K: Dragon Tales!
What is your favorite song?
K: Snoopy the snoop snoopy. He’s the puppy. *they had been watching a lot of “It’s the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown”*
What is your fav animal?
K: Elephant! What the grief! I LOVE elephants!
*hears Uptown Funk playing on the radio and starts dancing…* “hey! This is a great song!”
What are you afraid of?
K: monsters! (said with a growl)
Where is your favorite place to go?
K: Parks J
What do you want to be when you grown up?
K: an arf! (Me: what is that?) K: a costume. For Halloween. (well. There you have it.)