Firsts...

Jonah had his very first Birthday. It's amazes me how much he has grown in just one short year.
I am so blessed to have this little special man in my life. One year goes by in a blink of an eye!

Here he is now! He keeps me on my toes. He loves to climb every surface in our house. He finds it thrilling to be dangerous these days. Our little one year old!

On his Birthday Gary brought home a bunch of balloons. Jonah was captivated by them!
We had our very own celebration. His favorite part was most definitely being able to dig his little hands into his very own cake!

I love the cool whip beard in this picture that Jonah is sporting!
We also visited the aquarium for our little guy's Birthday.
He loved looking at all of the coloful fish!
This is too cute, he was doing a backbend trying to look at all of the fish!
We saw all sorts of amazing sea creatures including sharks, sea horses. an octopus, penguins, sting rays, and this sea turtle!
Ryker and Violet looking at the Jellyfish. We had an amazing time at the aquarium.
Happy Birthday to our sweet Jonah Gabriel!
Here was another first, Ryker lost his very first tooth on Jonah's birthday! It was super wriggly and bugging him. I gave him a little pep talk and told him to pull it out on his own. He did!
We also had an awesome time Ice skating for our very first time as a family!
Ryker was able to do it on his own after some practice with his Dad!

Violet loved Ice Skating. Luckily Aunt Summer was there to help me keep her from falling! She wanted to be on the ice the whole time!

Christmas Eve and Christmas Morning with us Abadians.

Christmas Eve.

I love the excitement in the air on Christmas eve. The kids get so excited for Santa to come and bring presents. It makes it fun that they believe in magic. Gary and I stayed up late talking about our most memorable Christmas morning's when we were kids. It was so fun hearing about what he loved, and remembering what I loved about Christmas as a kid. There is one thing that always came up and that was being together as a family. Although, I did get a pretty sweet pair of roller blades when I was a kid that I will never forget!

Our tradition is that the kids get to open one gift before they go to bed on Christmas eve.

It's always Jammie's!

It was funny to me because I expected Ryker mainly, to open his Jammie gift and be disappointed that it wasn't a shiny new toy. But I was pleasantly surprised that Ryker and Violet were pretty darn excited about their new jams. Jonah didn't really mind either way!
Christmas Morning
Most definitely my favorite morning of the entire year. I love watching my kids excitedly opening all of their gifts. They are at such fun ages.
Jonah
Loves Balls. He got plenty of balls and cars to play with.
His brother and sister helped him with opening his gifts. He was mainly so happy about these balls, and his bottle on Christmas morning!

Violet
Just adored all of the princess shoes Santa brought! She lined them all up in a row. Her favorite pair was the Ariel one. At first she didn't really love the idea of Old Saint Nick sneaking into our house in the middle of the night. But now ever since Christmas morning, she's always saying, "Is Santa coming back tonight?" I think she will be looking forward to Santa's visit to our house next year for certain.
Oh Ryker
What can I say? This boy was so fun to watch on Christmas morning. He was shaking with excitement, and shouting out every gift he opened, as if it weren't right in front of our very eyes. He was beyond happy about this B.B. gun Santa brought. He kept calling it a real red rider B.B. gun. He was a hoot!
Below are just some pictures of Christmas morning with us Abadian's.

The kids played in the wrapping paper mess afterwards. Such fun!

I am so thankful for my 3 adorable little children and my hard working husband! I will cherish every Christmas I have with them. They are my heart.

Christmas traditions and parties.

Traditions are awesome. I love getting together with family for the holidays. It's all about being with family and making memories for me. This year my mom started a new tradition. She read us a book about Pennies Christmas Jar. It's an adorable story about a little girl, whose family saves money in a jar all year long, and then each member of the family gets to take a turn choosing who to give it to on Christmas. It was Pennie's turn and she chose an elderly sick man in her neighborhood. My Mom gave us each a Christmas jar so we too, could save our pennies and give to someone less fortunate. I love this new traditon! I am looking forward to it.

My Mom's house on Christmas.
The kids got some pretty awesome stuff from their Grandma and Grandpa M.

Papa Tod & Grandma Fran's house on Christmas.
We had a yummy mexican lunch and the kids got some pretty awesome stuff again. We are so grateful for Grandparents!

So glad my brother was around for the holidays this year! I loved him and Shannin's matching Christmas sweaters!

Grandma Andi & Papa Bill's on Christmas eve. We had an amazing turkey dinner and some good times watching all of the kids perform songs for us. Ryker likes to wear this hat and strum the guitar and sing for us. He sings jingle bells, pirate songs, and whatever comes to mind. He's such a little character.

The kids are so lucky to have so many cousins to play with.

The kid table!

Looking back on all of these pictures just warms my heart. I am so thankful for my family, each and every member of it. I love spending the holidays with them and look forward for the years to come!

Getting into that Christmas spirit!

This is a letter Ryker wrote to Santa at school. Notice all of the skulls he drew on his paper. I bet his Teacher just loves that.Here we are reenacting the manger scene for FHE. It was Ryker's idea, he got out all of the stuff. He was a shepherd (notice the shepherd's crook in hand). Gary was the angel/ shepherd, Jonah was Joseph and Violet was Mary. I was the narrator and of course we have our baby Jesus lying in the hay.


We also made cookies that same night. My little princess "helped".

Next we headed for the Layton Park's lights!

Jonah was mesmerized by all of those sparkly lights.

Ryker's favorite was the snake and Violet's was the mermaid.

We had a family party with The Mitchell's and every year they have Santa come and bring an early Christmas present for the kids.

Ryker asked for a B.B. GUN.

We let him watch the Christmas story just so he knew what Gary and I meant when we said "you'll shoot your eye out"!

This was a breakthrough for Vi. She has been terrified of Santa this year. She has had a couple of opportunities to sit on his lap but she would always cry and scream NO! But this Santa was persistent, he bribed her with a shiny wrapped present and a candy cane. Violet conquered her fear of Santa! Yay!

I don't think Jonah was quite so sure of old Santy clause either!

But at least he didn't cry.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Happy 3rd Birthday Violet!

Here is the afternoon of your 3rd birthday! We bundled you all up to go ride a horsey. All you wanted for your birthday was a horse so this was the next best thing.You got to meet lightning the miniature pony. He was adorable!
Our whole family came to watch you ride the horse. We got to pet some of the other horses in the stables too.


Here is your horse you got to ride her name was Senora and she was blind in one eye. Here you are leading her with a rope!

You and your brother got to brush her for a long time.

You loved it you kept smiling the whole time and you kept complimenting the horse. You said "you're such a great horse". Senora loved being brushed and pet by you!

You and Ryker got to feed Senora peppermints.

When it came time to ride you were pretty nervous so Ryker went first and showed you that it's not so scary.

Once you got on that saddle you were hooked! You were laughing and smiling the whole time!

You rode for a long time.

and LOVED it.

Then we had to leave because Jonah's diaper leaked but you had a great time and we loved watching you on that Horse so happy!

We went home and Papa Reyza had brought you a new bike!

Dad and papa took you to cafe rio and the sweet tooth fairy for cupcakes.

When you got home we all sang Happy Birthday to you and you got to eat this amazing strawberry shortcake cupcake!

We also had a family party for you over the weekend! Lots of people came. Grandma and Papa Mitchell, Grandma and Papa Minson, and Grandma and Papa Smith all came. Plus aunts, uncles, and cousins made for one big birthday bash!

You opened lots of neat gifts and we sang Happy Birthday again.

I made you these horsey cupcakes. Toothpicks and scrapbook paper can do wonders!

I love you Vi, Vi. I can't believe your three already. I am so grateful to be your Mom!