Catch-Up: One busy December

First of all before playing catch-up I will give a little update. The latest and greatest with our family is that Ben has a new job. After years of hating his job, working tons of hours, living with tons of pressure, Ben decided to leave Ernst & Young. He has started a new job as the IT security and Compliance Officer at a start-up company called Recondo here in Denver. He has only been at the job for one week but so far, so good. He likes it and is even home in time for dinner. I can't remember the last time that happened. We love it!

The boys are doing great. Danny absolutely loves kindergarten and is reading and doing really well. Caleb is talking more and more and has the cutest and most funny little personality. He has a speech therapist that comes once a week and is doing great.

We are counting down the days for our vacation to Orlando. We have 14 days until we go to sunny and warm Florida. About every day Danny tells me how he wants to move to Florida because winter is just too long and is lasting forever. Winter does seem to be going on way too long. It always seems like that this time of year. None of us have ever been to Florida but we all can't wait to be in the sunshine, go to Disney World, Sea World, etc. After having a rough year for multiple reasons including Ben's job, we decided we needed some time away as a family. We can't wait!

Now for playing catch-up about December. After lots of craziness getting ready for the holidays, we drove over to Utah on Christmas Eve. Luckily we made it without any problems, especially since there had been a huge snow storm in Denver on the 23rd. We spend the next few days at Ben's parents' houses and unfortunately had to cut our vacation short due to Caleb catching the flu, winter storms making the roads terrible, and of course MAJOR pressure from Ben's job to come home and work. It was a fast trip and definitely a busy one but it was good to see family. Fortunately because we came home earlier than we had planned we were able to see my brother's family who was in town.

These pictures are definitely not in chronological order- if anything, I think they are in reverse chronological order. So if you're confused, I don't blame you.

Me and my boys after decorating the tree.

Caleb and his cousin Sarah. He just adored her.


This is Danny and my sister's boys in Utah. We only were able to stay with her for 1 night and then had to leave the next day because of all the junk I mentioned before- sickness, weather, work, etc. I definitely need to fly out and have some sister time since it was seriously cut short.

This is actually at our ward party. Had to get the Santa pictures.

Caleb's grin makes me laugh every time I see this picture. He gets this cheesy grin every time I get the camera out.

Ben and his dad in Utah.

Ben's dad, step-mom and the boys in Utah.

3 generations.

Ben's dad was so great to do this car race track set that they had given the boys for hours and hours.

Ben's sister, Mimi, and Danny.

Mimi and Caleb.

Caleb sporting his latest battle wound that he got from falling off of the sled while going down the hill with Danny.

Sledding in Hoytsville with Grandma Mona.

Awestruck at the awesome present from Grandma Mona and Papa Ross. (Ben's mom and step-dad).

Here's Ben and his siblings doing what they love- watching funny You-Tube videos. Caleb's grin is just too funny.

Modeling their new Lightning McQueen and Wall-E jackets from Grandma and Grandpa Fellows.

Christmas Morning.

Chilling with Papa Ross.

Relaxing after opening Christmas presents at my parents house. He got up here all by himself, grabbed the remote and started pointing it at the TV. What a funny kid.

This was taken at a work Christmas party at our friends' house. It's the only family picture we've taken in forever.

If you look close enough you will see that Caleb's ear is big and swollen and all crusty. A couple days before this we had been to the Urgent Care cause he had fallen and split his ear open. They used that fancy skin glue stuff and all was well. =)

Helping Ben put up the Christmas lights

Waiting to watch the Parade of Lights. We went to the Spaghetti Factory and the balloon man came around and made this nice snake for him. Caleb loved it and would not let go of it even though it kept hitting everyone we passed. He of course liked to hit everyone on purpose with it too. Eventually we had to "pretend" that we dropped it and it popped on accident. The boys sure loved the Parade of Lights though. It was super cold but still a lot of fun.