December 2012

 December In Cortez:
We were able to go back to Utah for Christmas but the beginning of December was filled with lots of learning and growing here at home.

Cora always amazes me with what will entertain her for hours :) This day it was making soup in the sink with water and bowl and the scrub brush.

This is on our way to Utah. Looks comfy huh?

Some friends, The Meahams,  invited us over to make gingerbread cookies and decorate their tree. Also notice this dress because it is worn almost everyday at our house since Halloween. It was her Cinderella costume but is now an everyday must wear Cinderella dress.

 Lucy continues to get cuter everyday. She is such a great baby rarely cries and is always happy when someone with play with her. This is her talking and just having a good time.

 A very exciting thing happened in December for our family... Chad finished is Masters of Human Resource Degree! Yahoo! This is him on his very last day of class. It is so great to have Friday nights and Saturday mornings back. I am so proud of him for finishing school for ever!

 Just looking cute on Sunday Morning

 This is Cora's most time consuming past time. Play dough. She gets all her tiny toys such as squinkies, animals, little pet shop, and people and they all have a great time in nests or homes or making scarfs for all of them.

 Cora has a great memory and often surprises me with telling me about something I had said eariler or what we had done a long time ago. But she knew all of Santa's Reindeer names.

Our house

This post is for my Aunt Kathy. She asked for pictures of our house a while ago so here they are very late :)

 This is Cora's room. And I am very glad to say that she now sleeps all night in her own bed. For about 2 months she was waking up often in the night and either going in the living room on the couch or just waking up sad and insisting on us laying with her until she fell asleep. But she now is a great sleeper again. And I couldn't be happier.

There is another room downstairs but Lucy was sleeping in it at the time I was taking pictures there is also a bathroom downstairs but it is bare and not very exciting. So if you want to see those two room you will just have to come visit us :) Cortez is a great place and All of you should come visit :)

November 2012

We had a great November and again not many pictures to document all that we did but we had a great month. For Thanks giving we went to a couple, Deloy and Anna May Tanner's house. They are in our ward and Deloy works with Chad. It was a great day with a good dinner and great company. We took the traditional Cranberry Ice and Rolls.
The day after Thanks giving we went and got our tree at the grocery store. It is the first time for me to not go and cut one down... it was a bit simpler and a much more pretty tree :)
The next few days we decorated it and our house for Christmas. I love Christmas time and the decorations.

Cora putting the star on top. She loved it and brought it up often the following weeks how she put the star on top

Every night Chad read Christmas stories to Cora. She could have sat there for hours listening to all the great stories. She loves book and loved Christmas books even more.

After playing in the first snow of the year.

We made cinnamon/applesauce ornaments this year, it is now a tradition because I loved it so much. It smelled so good

 This picture cracks me up. This is Cora going to her first Birthday Party of a friend. It was her friend Hadley's Party and she was so excited to go we had a great time. They are great friends.

And I just couldn't leave this picture out. Cora likes to take pictures with the camera and this is just one that she snapped :) We sure do love this girl

The Polar Express

The December 1st we started our Christmas Celebration by going on The Polar Express in Durango, a town near by.
We had a great time, we got the book from the library a few days before and read it lots with Cora so that she would be more excited. And she loved it! Although the actual train ride was focused more on the movie than the book, which I guess is a good thing cause the book isn't really that long. :)

They did a reenactment of the boy getting on the train then we all got on the train and got hot chocolate as thick and rich as melted chocolate bars :) and really good chocolate chip cookies. And rode to the North Pole and saw the little boy get on Santa's sleigh to receive the first gift of Christmas.  With lots of lights and elves all over, Cora's favorite part was a huge snowman cause she isn't such a fan of Santa.

On the way back everyone in our car sang Christmas songs and Santa came by and gave everyone a silver bell. It was a magical night.

Chad and Cora as waiting for the train... we ended up over dressing for the event it wasn't as cold as we expected so we ended up carrying a few coats, hats, mittens, and blankets :)

The Polar Express... This was the best part when the train pulled up all the chefs and conductors were hanging out side waving as it past by.

The conductor even punched a letter out on each ticket. And let the punched out ticket fall all over our face

The delicious cookies. They had really pretty green and red sparkles all over them. It was like eating magic

After the train ride we went out to eat with our friends the Patrick's.
And just so you know the bell still rings for all of us.