Love the eyes

Casey took these two shots and I liked how Brody's eyes looked so here they are. Casey was also proud of himself for taking a good picture and has proclaimed what a great photographer he is. :)

Christmas Clothes

Each year the kids new Church clothes. here they are in their new ones this year. Last year I got some of them to small so this I went bigger...at least they grow into bigger :)
Brody got this cute onsie from his Aunt Christy, which worked out great since I could find him a new Church outfit that I liked.

Playing with our new toys

As soon as Chad got all the scooters put together the kids had to try them out.

Trying to do some jumps with them. Chad kept taking them from the kids and trying them out himself. Casey's and Tyler's are pretty fun!

Court loves sing into her new Hello Kitty microphone. She is sad though that she didn't get a scooter too, i reminded her she didn't ask Santa for a scooter...maybe she can get one some time down the road.

christmas morn

Christmas morning rang bright and early. Brody still slept and we let him join us later. I didn't want to wake him or make the other kids wait for him to wake on his own.

as always mom went down first and the kids followed in order of youngest to oldest.

Santa came through with a Buzz Light Year scooter for Aiden.....

Brody got a great little play table that he loves and plays with often. Funny how singing toys don't annoy me quite as much as they did with my first. Now the noise just blends in with all the other noise of the house.....

Kandi Beads for Courtney, she is planing on getting in on the cuff and bracelet making action of her brothers.......

A "Road Cutter" scooter for Tyler.......

and a Power wing for Casey.

I had to get this shot of T wearing shutter glass (a gift from Aiden, Casey got him a red pair also) purchased at the holiday shop at school. This was the first thing we sold out of at Holiday shop. He is also sporting his new hat with the "Fox racing" symbol and "Rock star" energy drink symbol. The second Chad saw it he knew T would love it. Hats...like father like son

Brody would hold a present and then try to eat it, so the kids enjoyed "helping" him open his gifts.

We had a great morning and I think we stretched it to about an hour and a half. Courtney got to be Santa and hand out the gifts this year, so she loved that.

ginger bread....

While I was in California Chad took the kids to his families for dinner on Sunday. They were decorating ginger bread houses and such. Here are some pictures I got from his sister.
Aiden and his cousins Trevor and either Chelsey or Charity (they are twins and I'm not sure which one this is)

Casey and Tyler with Justin. Aunt Terri Anne kindly let the boys stay at her house for a couple of days to help Chad out with the kids. His other sister Pauette took Aiden and Court for a day while he ran some errands. What great sisters to help him out with some full time dad time.

PTO stuff

PTO has been crazy busy this year. We hope the rest of year (now that the holidays are done) slow down a bit. The biggest mess up this year was not even our fault, but that of Yankee Candle. Once we sent on our orders they gave us a date that the candles would be delivered. That date began to approach and the delivery date started getting pushed back. The delivery date came and went and we were continually told later and later dates until it became apparent that the candles would not arrive before the kids went on winter brake and it was questionable whether they would even be delivered before Christmas! Unfortunate since many people had purchased thing for gift or holiday decorations. We spent many hours on the phone calling parents to let know how things were coming along and give them a heads up in case any gifts needed to be purchased in replace of the candles.
I went off to California to attend Grandpas funeral and left the other ladies at home to continue to track the candles and field any calls that continued to come in from parents who we had left messages for. As I was coming back into Arizona on Dec 22nd i got a call from Tammi our PTO president that the candles would arrive in Phoenix that night at 9 pm...yea then they should be delivered to us the next day...right? NO. the trucking company was closing the next morning at 6 am for the Christmas holiday. Would sit on the warehouse and be delivered on Mon. What!!! they are that close and we still cant get them before Christmas!?!?!? Well Tami talked to the manager and told him about the mess we were in with the parent and how upset everyone was about the candles not being here by Christmas and he said if we could be at the warehouse with a truck, he would let us take the candles as long as we were gone by 6am so they didn't go into holiday pay. So after I pulled in from our 12 hours drive Chad and I went to u-haul to pick up a truck and Tammi and her husband went at 4am to pick up the candles. she called me at 5am...We had the candles!!! Finally. She picked me up at about 5:30 and we went directly to the school to unload 2 pallets of candles and with the help of one of our other PTO board members we organized the candles and started verifying the orders and at 8:30 started calling parent to come pick them up.

In the end we moved the ones that were not picked up to my house and I had people coming to get them on Christmas eve and even delivered one on Christmas day. I went down to the Yankee candle store in the mall half an hour away to try to replace messed up items that the warehouse was out of, but the stores had. (great reminder as to why I did my Christmas shopping a month ago) It was such a mess and such a hassle, we would never use Yankee Candle again, we are almost done getting things squared away with them...hopefully by next month I can wash my hands of them. In the mean time I need to go find the number to the cookie dough company we are hoping to use for our next fundraiser. This company ships the dough directly to to customers...yea!!

Casey's band concert

Casey is in band this year and he is playing the Trombone. He had his fist concert at Christmas and sadly I forgot my camera. I had a friend take some pictures for me. He was so great! He wasn't sure he wanted to do band, but I talk him onto just tying out before he decided against it. He has really taken to the trombone and he has a great band teacher, Mr Brenemen, who is very serious about what he does. He expects a lot out of the kids and Casey is stepping up to those expectations. Casey is always telling us about how he could get music scholarships. He has even expanded his plans for future jobs to include Playing in the band, possibly a parade at Disneyland along with plans to be an artist there. He figures he will be super rich since he will have two jobs !! :)