Christmas Celebrations

We celebrated with my dad and his family at our annual Cook Family Christmas Eve dinner at our house. It was fun to see everyone, open presents, and try fried turkey for the first time!
We surprised the boys, my sister, and my dad with a present from the baby. It was a DVD of her most recent ultrasound where it showed what that SHE is a SHE! Everyone was excited. The boys were a little indifferent though. Tanner just said, "I knew it was a girl, we needed a girl." And Hunter had no comment.

Our attempt at a family Christmas picture-Hunter fleeing the scene!

Tanner gave a little Christmas piano recital while we were waiting for the turkey to warm up!

Present Time!

Cute little Bridget!

In the morning, Santa came bearing Legos for all. Tanner was relieved that the big guy made it to our house this year, because he was on the naughty list most of December until he changed his ways on Dec. 24!

We did take a few moments throughout the morning to remember why we have Christmas and what the greatest gift of all is- our Savior Jesus Christ.

We opened more presents and had a delicious breakfast at my mom's house. The boys certainly showed some self restraint as they choose to eat breakfast before checking out their stockings at Grandma's house!

The boys really loved these giant boxes their Star Wars backpacks came in!

Then we headed over to Heidi's house for more food and presents. (Are we tired yet-because I sure was!) We surprised Mike and Heidi with a poem hidden in their gift about our baby being a girl. Heidi totally cried. Mother like daughter-in-law! It was a great Christmas!

I guess I really was tired at Heidi's- I only got one picture the whole afternoon. Here is Hunter and his identical (in looks and mannerisms!) cousin Regan.

Merry Christmas to all!

Our Christmas Surprise...

It's a GIRL!
And we are tickled PINK!

( I totally cried when I found out and was a little shocked!)

Create a little Christmas Cheer...

December is always so busy! We have been celebrating this joyous season a lot this week...
Tanner's friend, Sam, made a Gingerbread house and wanted share it with us! Thanks Sam!

We saw Inland Pacific Ballet's Nutcracker with Hunter's preschool. Ms. Kristine's daughter was a cute bon-bon! This is the same company my sister danced with in her early ballet career, so it always brings back memories! Hunter's favorite part was Clara dancing with the Nutcracker (he LOVES Nutcrackers) and Tanner liked the Chinese dragon. Hunter wouldn't get in the picture, so here is Tanner and Hunter's friend, Cameron, after the ballet. (Sorry, boys, for making you smile with the sun glaring in your eyes!)

Breakfast with Santa

Today we had Breakfast with Santa at church.

They played a game called "Wrap the Counselor". (Mormon lingo: every ward (congregation) has a "Bishopric", made up of a Bishop and two counselors. The Bishop is basically in charge of the ward and he has two counselors to help him. Ladd currently serves as first counselor to our Bishop.) So, Ladd and the other counselor, Tyler, were in a race to get wrapped up first.

Ladd won! Fun times.

The kids sang and did a little Nativity reanactment. Hunter was too busy running around with his favorite person, Carson, to sing. Oh well. It was a battle not worth fighting.
Here are a handful of the cute pregnant ladies in our ward. At any given time, you can find five or six pregnant people at church. We really like babies in the Summit ward. There were 17 babies born the year Hunter was born. They will never be without friends their age!

I hope you are feeling very cheery this time of year!

My little Moses

At the end of each school unit, we like to do a "closing day" to do some kind of a cumulative activity. Tanner needed to pick something he had learned about Egypt and write a report. He said he wanted to talk about Moses in Egypt. He wasn't sure if that would qualify because he said Moses was more like a scripture story than a school story. After talking about how the scriptures teach us a lot of history as well as about the gospel, he decided it would be appropriate to talk about Moses in a school setting. He wanted to dress up like Moses and do his presentation as if he were Moses. It was super cute and he remembered lots of details.
Hunter, Tanner, and I also made a diorama of the Red Sea parting for him to show during his presentation. I was very proud of my little Moses.

Wonders of the World

For the past three years we have gone to the Discovery Science Center in Santa Ana to see their annual Gingerbread display. This year, as a homeschool group, we decided to contribute! We thought it would be fun to make a few of the Wonders of the World, since we are learning about ancient history. Each family made a basic structure, or two, then we all got together to decorate it. We included the Taj Mahal, Chichen Itza, the Dome of the Rock, the Parthenon, the Great Wall of China, and Machu Picchu. We were also supposed to have a Pyramid, but that didn't quite work out. Guess which family was in charge of the Pyramid? The one whose mom is deficient in creativity, especially when it comes to doing anything in the kitchen. The rest of the display turned out beautiful! Here is proof that I work with some of the most amazing moms and kids on a daily basis:
The Discovery Center hosted a party for anyone whose creation was on display. They had all sorts of Christmas related activities and, of course, an awards presentation. We won best display by a youth group! We get to have a pizza party! So fun! The kids were really excited. It was a fun holiday tradition we started!


We also got in free to the museum that day. We hadn't been since last Christmas, so we had fun exploring all the new things they had to offer.

Hunter lasted one puck being thrown his way and was done being a hockey goalie! I can't blame him!

Baby Update

Yesterday I had an appointment with the ultra sound technician. This was with the real ultra sound machine-not just the wheel-in one at the doctors office. And... Only ONE baby! I felt relieved and slept better than I had all week last night. I think twins are as cute as can be and only very special people can be mothers of twins. But, I am glad I am not one of those mothers!
It was fun to see my little baby's profile and watch him/her squirm around. Now, I can't wait to find out if the baby is a him or a her!

What a day...

I usually don't use my blog to vent, but seriously today was a DAY! It made me ask myself, "Why in the world did I want to bring another sweet innocent baby into this crazy family?" Here are two reasons why:

1. We met Ladd at Costco today for lunch and while eating we realized Tanner had disappeared. As we looked for him, we see him at the soda fountain with a cup-that we had not purchased. Suddenly a worker comes around the corner and starts talking to him. Ladd rushed over to help manage the situation. Apparently Tanner was thirsty and thought it was a free for all on the drinks. The cups were just sitting on the counter and everyone was helping themselves to soda. So, he grabbed a cup from the cashier area. Luckily we got to him before he filled the cup so no harm was done. He thought it was crazy that you had to pay for the cup and then the drinks are free.

Later this afternoon, he hit a golf ball over the wall at our neighbors house. Lucky again, no damage done, but COME ON!

2. While making "Freckle Smoothies" for Tanner's Freckle Juice book club, Hunter managed to push the blender, which was on and FULL, over. It broke and smoothie went all over the kitchen! Sorry boys, no Freckle Juice smoothies today.

To top all this off, last week at my doctors appointment, my doctor stated in the middle of an ultrasound that she thought she saw another head and can't say for sure whether there are one or TWO babies in there. What? Oh, I don't think I could handle another Tanner and Hunter at the same time! If there are two, they have better be calm and less mischievous than the first two!!

Thanks!

We had a busy, busy Thanksgiving week. We are thankful that we were able to spend time with friends and family we don't always get to see! About mid week Tanner said, "We've got to stay up late every night lately playing with friends we don't get to play with very often!" I didn't get pictures from very many of our fun nights, but here are a few from this week...

Brenda and Roland renewing their vows at their tenth anniversary party

My beautiful cousins, sister, Grandma, and little Brigette

My mom and I took the boys to Balboa Park in San Diego. I wanted to check out the ancient Egypt exhibit at the Museum of Man. It was a beautiful day, but isn't it always in San Diego?
The boys loved the childrens area where they got to dress up as Egyptians, sail the Nile, and trade goods at the store.

Tanner worked hard at building this pyramid!

The tree is up and that means Christmas is just around the corner!

And we spent last night learning how Candy Canes are made at Logan's Candies! The boys got to "bend" their own candy cane.

Thanks for all the FUN last week!

Now, it's back to our regular bedtime!

2010 Family Pictures

Our super creative and talented friend, Sarah, took our family pictures a couple weeks ago. Here is a sampling of a few of our favorites:

Here is my favorite...

Thanks for putting up with my goofy family Sarah! We love our pictures!

Our Exciting News!

We are expecting a new little Hoyal! H/she will be here in mid June and we can't be more happy! We have waited awhile for this little one but now we realize this timing couldn't be better! The baby is obviously excited too, as h/she has popped out already and I can't button any of my pants. Here are some answers too frequently asked questions:

Are you hoping for a girl this time?
We would love a girl or a boy-both would be fun!

How are you feeling?
Off and on yucky and always tired.

What do the boys think?
They are excited. Hunter tells people, "when we have a baby, then I will be big." And Tanner has lots of concerned questions about what the baby is doing inside of me, whether it can see or not, if it is bored, etc. His first concern was that his Legos will be a choking hazard. I guess he will have to do a better job at picking them up.

How far along are you?
10 weeks

Do you feel the same as you did with the other pregnancies?
So far, this one is pretty similar to Hunter.

Do you feel either way that it might be a boy or a girl?
Nope, some days I refer to it as a "he" other days a "she" and they both seem right. (It is only one though-no twins, we already checked!)

Mummies of the World

We have been studying Ancient Egypt for school. So when we realized that the California Science Center has the "Mummies of the World" exhibit right now, we had to go! How often do you get to see real mummies when learning about Ancient Egypt? We spent a lot of time preparing the kids to see the Mummies, as it is not everyday you see dead bodies of people who lived thousands of years ago! The exhibit was amazing. I couldn't believe how well preserved some of these ancient people had been kept. Eyelashes, fingernails, and even some skin all in place! The further you went back in history, the smaller the people were. I would have been a giant compared to Ancient Egyptians! The kids did a great job and were totally enthralled, asking good questions and making appropriate comments. (Except for one little four year old who insisted the exhibit was "too long" and threw a total fit right next to the Egyptian priest. Really- I thought they were supposed to be out of the fit throwing stage by age 4! Ugh!)
Anyways, the museum was also showing a 3-D IMAX movie called "Secrets of the Pharaohs". I chose to skip that one and keep some of the younger ones (including my favorite 4 year old) entertained. 3-D movies give me a headache! But the kids loved it and it was a great hands-on learning experience for them.


While even with our group discount, the exhibit was a little pricey, but the rest of the museum is totally free and AWESOME! Everything is hands-on science and it covers every topic. It is great for all ages. We were there a good part of the day and probably still missed a third of the museum. If you are ever out near the USC Coliseum, check out the California Science Center. It is well worth your time and FREE!

Hooray for Science!