Dane's visit

I'm a little behind on my blogging, so before I can post about Christmas I need to cover the week of Dane's visit! Joel's brother got home from his mission in New Jersey in November. Unfortunately we weren't able to make it up to WY when he got home, so he very kindly came down to Mesa to visit us. Joel finished his second rotation on Dec. 7th, then had testing the 8th and 9th. Dane flew in on the 11th and the fun began. :)

The weather wasn't very cooperative; it rained more in the week that Dane was here than it has the entire time we've lived here. Or at least it felt that way. It wasn't easy to really get outside and do a lot, but we did show Dane Joel's school, eat at Giant Hamburger, drive by the building site of the new Gilbert temple, visit the temple lights at the Mesa temple, and eat at The Cheesecake factory. Joel and Dane also went golfing and hiked Camelback. We watched a lot of movies, and towards the end of the trip we watched a lot of the show 24 on Netflix. I didn't take many pictures at all, which I always intend to do but never do. Blast! 

It was so great seeing Dane again and spending time with him. Adam wasn't so sure about Dane at first; he didn't remember him at all. But by the end of the trip they were pretty good buds. We were sad to see Dane go and we hope we get to see him again soon.

Dane also got to enjoy Will's school concert with us. They had a Christmas themed concert with everybody in pajamas. I didn't bring the real camera so I had to use Joel's phone to snap a few. This was the best that I got. Will did a great job singing the songs and doing the actions!

Adam's Birthday!

Yesterday our little Adam turned FOUR! It's hard to believe that our baby is so old and big. Thankfully he was feeling better after a long Thanksgiving weekend of fevers and allergies. 

We went to Krispy Kreme for his free birthday doughnut! As soon as he saw that snowman he knew he wanted it. I'm sure it tasted pretty good, too. :)

After dinner (chocolate chip pancakes, at Adam's request) we opened presents. Here is Adam showing me how old he is. I love how his thumb is bent kind of funny.

He got a lot of fun presents!

He got a monster truck from Grandma and Grandpa K, and he couldn't wait to play with it!

 So, whenever we tell Adam to smile for a camera, this is the face we get. The only way to get a natural smile in a picture is to catch him off guard. But can you tell how excited be was about his new guns?!

We had rice crispy treats instead of cake. We've had a lot of cake and pie recently, so we decided to change it up.

I had to tickle him to get this smile out of him. Isn't he cute!!!

Happy Birthday, Adam! Thanks for being you!

Thanksgiving

I intended on taking a lot of picture this Thanksgiving so I'd have a lot of good stuff to put on the blog. Well, I started off okay, but I didn't get as many pictures as I'd hoped.

We had a pretty low-key Thanksgiving here in Mesa. We didn't travel because of Joel's work schedule, and most of my sisters eat dinner with their in-laws. So Joel and I did dinner at home this year. I got some of the cooking done Wednesday, which made Thursday a little easier.

Will made some Indian garb in school and showed it off to us Thursday morning. I think we all took a turn wearing that feathered headdress at some point during the day. :)

 We were lucky to have my sister, Amy, join us for Thanksgiving this year. We took a break in the morning when most of the food was done and the turkey was cooking. She was showing the kids some fun stuff on her ipod...

After all of the food was ready we stuffed ourselves absolutely full. Joel snapped this picture after us adults and finished up and the boys were still working on their food. I had my feet up because I was trying to stretch out my extremely full belly.

After dinner, which was really delicious if I do say so myself, us grown ups helped ourselves to a leisurely afternoon nap. And it was lovely. After that is was time to get serious about clean up because the Blaus and the Turleys came over in the evening for pie!

We had a lot of pie varieties and I didn't even get to try them all because I was still pretty full from dinner. But I powered through a few slices and I'm very glad I did.  It was a nice, relaxed, fun Thanksgiving. It will probably be our one and only Thanksgiving here in Mesa. Last year we went up to WY, and it's likely that we will have moved by next Thanksgiving. We really enjoyed it!!!

Happy Birthday to Joel!

Yesterday was yet another birthday in the Robertson house. Joel turned the big 2-8! :) He says it feels the same as the big 2-7, so I guess that's good. :)

He got done with work early, so I went and got some Subway for lunch that we both enjoyed. We just hung out in the afternoon and relaxed. After dinner (which Joel didn't eat because he was still too full from his huge Subway sandwich) we opened presents. Jenna made him a card, and I got him the Bourne movies and some new basketball shorts.

I'm really not sure what this face is about, but it was funny enough that I had to add it. I love how Will is looking at Joel.

After presents was singing and cake. Cherry cheesecake, to be exact.

He had a lot of help with the candles...  :)

Joel, we love you and are so happy that you were born 28 years ago! Happy Birthday!!!

Halloween, of course!

 Our ward trunk-or-treat was actually on Saturday the 29th, so that's when we did most of our Halloween celebrating. Unfortunately, Jenna had thrown up multiple times on Saturday, so it wasn't looking so good for her. Will, Adam and I ended up going to the first part of the party which was dinner and games. Joel brought Jenna over at the end of the games for the actual trunk-or-treat. Before we left I snapped these pictures.

Adam was, obviously, a cell phone. Will wanted to be a pumpkin, so we settled on a scary jack-o-lantern. I designed the face and put it on the shirt, then we stuffed him up so he could be nice and round. And of course his hair needed to be green for his stem. Jenna was a vampire. She wanted to be a scary vampire, so she had blood coming out of her mouth and black hair. She didn't wear the teeth much at all because they hurt her mouth. :)

Today both kids had parties at school. I helped out in Will's classroom, so Adam got to join in on the fun. I was also there for the parade. A lot of people tried to push Adam's "buttons". He pretended that he didn't like it, but I think he was actually loving the attention!

 Here's Jenna with her friend from class...

I'll admit that Halloween isn't my favorite holiday. I liked it when I was a kid because of the free candy, but now I can buy my own candy and I'm not crazy about costumes. But I'm glad that my kids enjoy it and have fun with it. Now we're done with it for another year! :) On to the good holidays like Thanksgiving and Christmas! :)

Birthday Boy!

Yesterday was another birthday in the Robertson house! William is seven! It's hard to believe he's getting so big and grown up. He requested pizza for his birthday dinner, so homemade cheese pizza it was. 

After dinner he got to video chat with Grandma R!

We invited all the cousins over for a party. After some playing we got right down to business opening presents. He got tons of cool, fun stuff, and I didn't even get pictures of most of it!

We were so happy that Joel got done at work (he's in his second rotation right now) in time for the party!

 After presents was cake, of course. He had a snicker-doodle cake with cinnamon butter cream frosting. It was delicious!

After the party was over and all the cousins left I wanted to make sure to get a picture with my growing up boy! Isn't he so handsome?

We love you, William!!!