My baby girl is 5 years old!

Mom: "Nicole, how does it feel to be 5?"

Nicole: "Um... Pretty normal..."

brrrrr!!!

This week we have spent INDOORS! With record low temperatures for this time of the season (-29 degrees on Tues.), it has been MIGHTY cold outside! We did leave the house yesterday to go shopping, and I took the kids out to lunch. It felt nice to be out and about! I appreciate them being pretty well-behaved.

We all laughed earlier this week when we were watching the news and the weather man had the week's forcast chart up. The temperatures were in the teens and twenties. But on the weekend it reached above the thirties and there was the word WARMER across those days.... Who in the heck thinks that 30 degress is WARMER??? Anybody? Anybody? I bet if people from the south could see that, they'd be laughing, too. Steve talked to his brother Jarom last weekend, and he's in Arizona temporarily...he said it was in the 80's...? WHY DO I LIVE IN IDAHO???

BRRRRR!!!!

Well, my mom is headed out tomorrow on her 7-day cruise...While she's gone, I will be staying at her house with my little bros and sis. I really hope she brings back some warmer weather with her! Til then...I will be wearing socks and sweaters and slippers!

hot dog cake...?

My day yesterday...So it was my little brother's 8th birthday! I ussually make his cake and last year I made him a hamburger cake as he wanted.

This year his request was "A HOT DOG CAKE".

Odd as it sounds, I thought, hey, this may be possible. After contemplating it for some time, I knew how I was going to put it together, but I was still weary of how I was going to make a hot dog color with frosting. I got up and got the cake out of the freezer and cut it into thirds lengthwise. I turned each side and the middle upward and then squiched them together. Not hard AT all! Then was the fun part of frosting it... I made the hot dog color frosting with lots of red, some yellow, a drop of blue and a drop of green. Weird as it may seem, it worked. And I was quite excited with the finished product. So excited that I took a picture and will happily post it for everyone to see!

Jack with his cake

They love aunt Jordyn!

momma's boy

yep, he is! and that's okay.

Sometimes I do have to share him with Dad, but that's okay, too

many faces of Nicole

Here's a page I put together yesterday! YAY it's so much fun!

digital scrapping

I started digital scrapbooking today, and it is very exciting to finally put it on display for others to enjoy. I am just a beginner and have enjoyed exploring my new found software that let me create these fun pages.

Here's a sample of my first one...

merry christmas, indeed

Nicole was very happy with her Christmas presents! She wanted "FURR REAL PUPPY AND KITTY." These are her requests, and as you can see she loves them! She is a lover of animals. Too bad we don't have room for any. Not to mention that Nathan is allergic to dogs and cats and horses and who knows what else...

Nathan got just what he wanted for Christmas...

anytime, we'd ask him what he wanted,

the answer was always the same...

"HULK HANDS" Now you know

Her wish came true

Nicole loves wishbones, so she can share them with someone. Then when she wins, she knows she gets to make a wish. Lately, she has been making wishes for more snow. Both her and her brother love to bundle up and go play in the backyard. As soon as she saw this wet snow outside and heard that it was great snowman-making snow, she was ready! Turned out, it was EXTRA wet and not so easy to make a snowman with, but we did it anyway! And they each had to have their own snowman.

Nicole by her snowman.

Nathan by his snowman

family pictures

The Saurey Family
2008

Time flies!!

I love that my kids are growing and learning every day, but I don't like that it happens in the blink of an eye! Another year has flown by and we have been having so much fun together! I keep thinking it's almost time for another addition! But Steve doesn't like that idea...

These are a few pictures from a few months ago. I haven't posted for a while...

No more diapers!!

I am not sure why potty training my kids is so easy...but they both caught on very quickly. Nicole was fully potty-trained at 18 months. Nathan is now 25 months and fully potty-trained. Even through the night! So I guess everyone was right when they say boys take a little longer to potty-train. He is doing so great, and ussually goes potty by himself. I hear him going into the bathroom saying, "potty toilet, potty toilet" and so I ussually follow him to make sure he gets it okay. But sometimes I won't hear him until he comes to me and says, "pee toilet." This is him telling me he aleady went, wiped the seat, pulled up his underwear and pants, and flushed the toilet. What a GOOD BOY!!!

This is what happened once when I told him to get his underwear back on after going potty. He thought it was pretty funny...so did I...

HOORAY!

Happy Halloween!

Our Halloween festivities started out with our ward trunk-or-treat! Nicole and Nathan really enjoyed seeing all the different costumes. Nathan loved to show off his tiger GRRRRRR and Nicole shared her witch HEH HEH HEH with many!

Carving the jack-o-lantern with Dad! Nathan didn't want to touch the insides, but Nicole wasn't afraid to get her hands gooey!

We went to Dad's work (Melaleuca) the day before Halloween and went through their annual halloween-decorated building. Nicole's highlight of that was getting her picture taken with Darth Vader!

Trick-or-treating Halloween night. We just went to each next-door neighbor after going to Grandma Fransen's ward trunk-or-treat.

Uncle Jake is home!!!

We are so happy to have our missionary home! Nicole and Nathan missed uncle Jake while he was gone to St. Paul Minnesota for 2 whole years! We were happy to see him 2 weeks early because he broke his foot. Not that breaking his foot is a good thing, but we got to see him sooner than expected. This explains the crutches...

We went out to eat at Jalisco's with family that night. Since he wasn't home for his birthday, we had them give him ice cream and make him wear the sombrero so we could officially sing to him!