The 100th Day...

Isn't that the cutest/ugliest shirt you've ever seen? :) We love our Kate and this past week in school, they celebrated the 100th day of school- it was a holiday of sorts. The students were asked to decorate a t-shirt with 100 items and we (Kate) chose an assortment of craft pieces that we had around the house...add a glue gun to the mix and this is what you get. She got up Wednesday with Christmas-morning-excitement, barely swallowed a few bites of cereal, and was off for the day.

She wore the shirt again today, after we got home from church. And, yes, I've explained to her the importance of not getting the shirt dirty- there is no way that thing would make it through the wash intact.

Lauren is One ...



Our sweet little lady turned one on January 5th. And, she earned herself about 3 teeth during the week of her birthday. That morning we got Lauren's favorite for breakfast- doughnut holes. Obviously, she devoured them. She might be a petite little one, but she can hang with the best in a doughnut-hole-eating-contest, usually topping off around six. Impressive, I know.

That night we had pizza and cake with our family here at home. We tried to get her to dig into the huge piece of cake we put in front of her, but like her sisters at this age, her affinity for frosting hasn't developed quite yet- we'll give it another six months.

We sure love our little Lauren...she's started to super-crawl (crawling at a quicker pace than most people are able to walk) and standing up on her own, all the time. She even takes a few steps by herself here and there. But, she falls down when she starts to mimick everyone's congratulatory applause. We'll have to keep working on that. But, for now, I'm content with her staying a baby and quite possibly never growing up...please? This year has gone by way too fast.

Christmas 2009!


To see more pictures, click HERE.

Where to start...we had such a busy, fun, awesome Christmas here.

Brian's sister, Nicole, and her family were in town from California so we all spent almost every night together during the week of Christmas. On Wednesday, Santa paid us a visit at Nana and Papa's and he even brought each of the kids a small gift...pre-Christmas spoiler! :) They all sat on his lap and told the big man what they wanted. It was really cute- the kids were so excited...except for Lauren, who gave her sweet little lungs a nice workout after being placed on Santa's knee.

I worked with the girls a little during the week to learn an easy (silly) dance to Feliz Navidad and Jingle Bells, which they wanted to perform for everyone that night so we sort of had an impromptu talent show before the night ended. It was really cute and the girls loved having all of the attention for a minute. Later, Brian and I (but mostly Brian!) spent 5 1/2 hours putting together the Ikea furniture we got for the girls craft room, their gift from Santa (see last picture).

On Christmas Eve we woke up to snow! It was so exciting because that just doesn't happen here. It was magical- a real "white Christmas". That night, the cousins re-enacted the Nativity story and sang some Christmas songs and then each of them received a pair of new pajamas for Christmas. We came back to our home later and the girls decorated sugar cookies for Santa, watched a Christmas movie, and ate popcorn and cookies. They stayed up way too late! Brian and I then wrapped their gifts and set everything up for the next morning. The kids woke up around 7:30 AM and were so excited to see if Santa had come. We took them upstairs first after leaving a note downstairs explaining that their gift was too big to fit under the tree (from Santa, of course!). They didn't really get it at first...Kate saw the craft room and said "Oh, my gosh its a new...kitchen?". So funny. Afterwards, they were so excited to open their presents...every gift they opened, they would say, "Its just what I wanted". Halfway through the gifts, they got all decked out in their snow gear and went outside to play in the snow. The all-time favorite gift might be their LeapFrog train (which was given to Lauren, mind you) which they spend no less than 6 of their waking hours on during the day. Lauren kept getting into the kids paint and biting/chewing/licking it- hence the green paint all over her face in the picture. Brian and I laughed so hard when we saw her covered in paint because she was acting all nonchalant and had no idea that she had been goobed. We ate dinner as a big family that night at the Crofts.

What a perfect Christmas...why can't it just last longer?? :)

Thanksgiving '09

We spent Thanksgiving at my parent's house in Atlanta this year. And, yes, we did drive. (I know, I must be crazy). But, it was worth it. We left early Saturday morning and drove the 17 hours to Florida to stay at my parent's beach house near St. Augustine. We got there around 12 AM, which obviously means we spent the entire day in the car. We just relaxed on Sunday and mentally prepared ourselves for the trip we had planned to Disney World on Monday.

Disney World (see last picture) was SOOOO much fun. Kate and Taylor were in heaven the entire day. The park was ridiculously packed, but we still managed to ride a ton of rides and see all of the parades. Brian even took the girls on Splash Mountain after someone handed him their three fast passes, which helped avoid an 80-minute wait time. You might hear a different story from Kate and Taylor now (they claim it was their "favorite ride"), but they were so terrified. We even squeezed in a princess dinner at 1900 Park Fare where we dined with Cinderella, Prince Charming, the wicked stepmother and her two wicked step daughters. You can't go to Disney World without seeing the fireworks show at the end of the night, so we stuck it out until 10 PM to watch that...again, totally worth it. You could not fake their level of excitement. It might have been my favorite part of the day as well- totally magical.

On Wednesday morning, we drove seven hours to south Atlanta, where my parents live. We played some serious volleyball on Thursday morning and then had a delicious Thanksgiving dinner later that day. Most of these pictures are from Friday morning, when my Dad organized a surprisingly willing group of volunteers into raking part of his 52-acre spread. Because I have already gone above and beyond my quota of hours worked on Hickory Hill, I went on a run instead. My family always has a good time together and this was no exception, so I'm glad we were able to be there for the festivities.


To see more pictures from Atlanta, click HERE.

Lauren ... Growing up too fast!




Lauren is 10 months old! It really does seem like just yesterday that she was born...I cannot believe how much faster time flies with each additional child. We could not enjoy Lauren anymore though...she is the happiest, most content child- always ready with a smile and a cuddle. Sometimes I wish I could just take a little nibble out of her cute cheeks- they're so irresistable to me.

While I am definitely Lauren's favorite person (I better be! :)), Taylor is her best friend and her #1 mode of transportation. At any given moment of Lauren's awake time, you will find her being carried to and fro around our house by none other than Taylor. Lauren will even attempt to pronounce her name, although it only goes as far as "Tay", but we're counting it anyway. They both get equally excited to see each other after naps- jumping up and down and screaming. So cute.

P.S.- We just loaded the last of our Spain pictures/stories HERE so if you're not sick of hearing about it yet, check out our day in Toledo and Cordoba/Madrid.

Halloween '09







Kate and Taylor were both Madeline this year for Halloween. They've loved watching those movies and reading the books. They even knew some of the Madeline vernacular like saying "Poo poo" when you're not scared of something...and trust me, they use that one whenever possible.

Taylor had a costume parade at her preschool on Wednesday, we had our ward trunk-or-treat on Friday, and then we went to Nana & Papa's ward trunk-or-treat on Saturday night after which we met up with some good friends and went trick or treating in our neighborhood. The girls got a TON of candy and I might have even heard Brian giving them tips on how to get as much loot as possible (ie- if someone leaves a bowl of candy on their doorstep there are no rules as to how much you can take).

I froze all of the chocolate as suggested by my sister, Rebecca. So, we made candy-covered chocolate cookies this past weekend with that and then in a momentary feat of self-control, I threw the remaining candy away. I know, I know...I'm crazy. Or that's what I've been thinking every day around 4 pm since.

At the Pumpkin Patch

A few days before Halloween, we took the family to the Big Orange Pumpkin Farm. The weather was great and the girls had so much fun. They rode the barrel ride, fed the goats, watched Mom feed the cows, rode the hayride, and picked out their very own pumpkin from the patch. The hayride was especially eventful due to the tractor getting stuck in the knee-deep mud. I love FALL!