We have a walker everyone!

Today is the day Kenya decided that she was going to walk. It started a while ago really. She has been getting braver and braver each day. A few times in the last two weeks or so she would take a step or two away from or to someone, but that was all. Last night she stood up and walked on her own and it was quite a few steps. I knew it was all over! Today she did the same thing at least 10 times. She just stands up and walks. She is still crawling about 75% of the time, but I am sure it wont be long now. What a girl.
So these videos are of her over the last few days. The first one is her using the walker that Amy got her for Christmas. She got comfortable with it quick. This is only the first day she used it.



Next is of her using the walker Grandma and Grandpa Draper got her. She plays with it all the time. (We left one walker at Grandma and Grandpa's house and brought the other one into Kalispell, told you we got spoiled!) She loves the music and the walker.


The last one is of her today walking. This was unprovoked and typical of what I saw randomly through out the day. I guess I am off to get her some shoes tomorrow.

A Merry Christmas Indeed!

This year we had Christmas at the Evans's household. It was a blast! There were 17 people crammed into a home made for two, but has had some modifications to help fit some more people. Six out of the seven Evans children were present for the holiday. It is understandable that Aaron & Kelsey did not make it because they just had a baby 9 days before. (Congrats again) Their absence was missed, but having a white Christmas helped us deal with it! It was great to spend time with so much family. For Christmas dinner there were 22 people total, crammed into the home!

It was so fun to see Kenya and her first Christmas! We want to thank the Evans & Drapers for helping to spoil us this year! We got way more gifts than expected or necessary, but we are sooooo grateful! Kenya already loves the many toys she got!

Here some pictures of my Christmas present from Don! He really is Santa because I never told him and Lois never told him how much I have been wanting a good quality Samurai sword. (Thank you so much!) It is quite sharp too! Santa is just that good!

Santa was definitely sharp this year...in addition to the sword he delivered a barrel load of knives this year! You heard it right...knives. I am pretty sure everyone that anyone over 5 yrs old that set foot in that house on Christmas got a knife!


Kenya loved her cousin Matt! Here's a video that shows how much!


He was getting her to laugh like this quite a bit over the holiday. I love his last closing comment!
I was laughing so hard that I accidentally stopped recording, but I got the goods!

The most important thing about Christmas this year was feeling the love of Christ as we all spent time together and received gifts from others. It wasn't the gifts that impressed us but the efforts, thoughts, feelings, and intentions that were put into giving the gifts this year. The gifts of togetherness. The gifts of love and peace. The gifts of the Spirit. It was an amazing Christmas! We hope you all had a memorable Christmas too! We wish you all a Happy New Year as well!

Christmas letter 2009.

Sorry, its late but better than never.
Here is a short update on us. We welcomed our beautiful baby girl Kenya Irene to our family on March 7, 2009. Wow! She sure has grown. She is almost walking and is started to talk a little bit. It truly is amazing what a baby can learn in less than a year. I think about what I learned in the last year and I sure as lagged behind Kenya on that one. She started so small and is now in the 50 percentile. We love her and now know why God made us wait 5 years for her. What a blessing and joy she is our lives.
Robert graduated in July from BYU-Idaho. He is now working in a call center in Kalispell. Its a job to get by and has full benefits, so he took it. I am living my dream and am able to stay at home with Kenya! Thank you, Robert, for allowing me to do so! What a man!
Life is great! We have our family and friends enjoying the ride with us. We want to thank all of you!
Remember the feelings you felt this Christmas season and recognize that it is the spirit of Christ! He lives and died for us. If we live the best we can and use the atonement to make up what we lack we will return to our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ to live with our families forever and live in true happiness. We love Him and thank Him for all of our blessings.

Christmas Fun.

Dad and Kenya decorating the tree.

Look how big she is. Kenya is almost walking. She stands by herself often now and has even taken a few steps toward something she wants. Most of the time it is kitty! This is another way she worn the dress I made her for Christmas.



So, this past weekend we made cookies and trimmed the tree. It was a lot of fun! The tree turned out really nice this year. We thought it looked great! Hope you enjoyed the pictures.
I am so excited to have so much family home! 6 of 7 kids and their families will be there! Aaron and Kelsey have less than 2 week old baby, so obviously they will not be coming. The house will be very crowded, but well worth it! I will be posting a Christmas letter hopefully in the next few days, so keep a look out for that. Merry Christmas! I hope all of our Christmas's turn out just wonderfully!

Newest member of the Evans clan.

Makhail Xavier Evans 8lbs 5 oz 21 1/2 inches

Mikhail Xavier Evans was born on Thursday December 17, 2009. Chris and Christine are proud parents. I just love how our family is growing so quickly.
Christine was amazing and such a trooper. She did three kinds of labor for just one birth. She started natural, then went to being induced because her progress had stopped and then when Mikhail became distressed it ended in a c-sections. What a women! Congratulations guys! Parenthood is amazing!

Now, I am sad to say that is the last of the family news for awhile. At least all that I know of. What a great 18 months it has been in my family!

Just Fun

This is the only Christmas tree that we had. Robert put together some of Kenya's toys to make it the other day. Yesterday we did go to visit Great Grandpa Stevens and there was Christmas tree there with lights and decorations. She LOVED it! She kept walking over to it and just looking at it. Can't wait to decorate one at mom and dad's house this weekend. I am so excited to see all the family coming into town next week.





So, Kenya and I had some fun yesterday. We played with our cat, This. For those of you who don't know This' favorite game to play is fetch with my hair ties. For the past month or so Kenya has tried to play too. She will crawl over to the hair tie and pick it up. She then dangles it in front of the kitty and then This will actually bat at it. It is so fun to watch them play together.

This video is of Kenya dancing. She really likes music and understands when we tell her to dance. What a girl! It is really short, but you get the idea.

Welcome Sammy!

This morning my new niece come into this world. My brave sister-in-law gave birth to a beautiful baby girl who they named Samantha Jane Evans. She is about 8 lbs 10 oz and 21 inches long. Boy, Kelsey sure can grow long babies! Congrats to Aaron and Kelsey. You are truly a trooper Kelsey. This is her second baby in just over 13 months and both were all natural, what an amazing woman.


I am expecting another nephew any day now too. My sister-in-law Christine is a few days over due and I am impatiently waiting to hear news about their little one.

Finished Christmas Dress

So, I tried to do all the sewing by myself, but I ran out of time. I was trying to finish the dress by today so that Kenya could wear it at least a few times. So, my mom came to the rescue and sewed the hard parts. The collar was harder than I was expecting. I tried it a few times and then just asked my mom to do it because she could get it done in just a few minutes and I had already spent more the half an hour on it. So, with mom's help I finished yesterday afternoon and Kenya was able to wear it today. It turned out beautiful!! I love it!! I made the "1/2" size from the pattern and it was still quite big on Kenya. Oh, well she stilled looked stunning.
I was trying to she how little money I could spend on the dress and ended up spending more that I wanted to, $9. The lace was a LOT more expensive than I thought it would be. Anyway... The fabric and thread mom had left over from other Christmas projects and the zipper I got from my aunt. So, the dress was still cheaper than buying one at the store and I love it!! Look at my cutie!!



Yeah, it is pretty long! Each Sunday she wears it, I am going to add something a little different, like changing the hair bow or adding a ribbon around the waste. I will post pictures of all the different ones if I get a chance. Mostly because she will look so darn adorable in the dress every time she wears it.




Kenya is doing a raspberry in the picture. She really enjoys that lately, it is a funny, but a cute face!

Domesticated

So, I am going to attempt to be domesticated over the next week or so and try to sew Kenya a Christmas dress. I want her to have one, but I could not see $20+ on a dress for my 9 month old. I was talking to my mom about it and she told me she had plenty of Christmas fabric and patterns that I could use. So, I looked through a it and picked a pattern and will try to make a dress. It will all depend on how independent Kenya wants to be and how much she can get into, if I when, I will get it done. I have very little sewing experience, but have always wanted to do more. I took a child's clothing class at BYU-I and really like it. So, I will hopefully, be posted pictures of that in the next couple weeks.
Sorry, there have not been many updates, but really we don't have much to share. I am waiting for my new niece and nephew to come into this world in the next couple of weeks. That will be fun too!

Christmas is on the way!

An annual tradition that Lois uses to kick off the Christmas season is watching White Christmas on Thanksgiving! It is such a good movie to start this great season of love, service, and selflessness. It also has really good music. So if you want a good way to get into the Christmas spirit early; we recommend watching White Christmas!

Some Thanksgiving food for thought

This is a video from the Mormon Messages videos. I find it quite appropriate for the upcoming week! Happy Thanksgiving!

50 FREE greeting cards!

FREE 50 photo greeting cards. This is awesome. I found this deal on coupongal.net ! So, what it is is SeeHere.com is running a promotion where you get 50 free greeting cards AND free shipping! I think this is wonderful and thought I should tell EVERYONE! It is quick and easy. Create an account with SeeHere.com and the click on "order now: under the card section. Chose the 4x8 and then design a card. When you are done, SAVE it and then put 50 of them in your basket and the use the promo code "newbaby" when checking out. I just did it and they didn't even ask for a credit card # or anything! How wonderful. If you don't have cards yet for Christmas or need them for anything else (maybe baby announcements or something), definitely go there. Awesome deal!!

Words Kenya can say.

Here are some words that Kenya says and has meanings for:
Kitty (itty)- she began saying it just shortly after we got to MT. She was just shy of 5 months old and I think we are calling it her first official word. She still using to call This and the other cats here.
eat (ea)- without the "t". this word came shortly after kitty and occasionally still uses it.
dada- she calls for her daddy
mama-calling for mom
grandma (gma)- Yes she calls for her grandma!
grandpa (gpapa)- she has said it a few times before, but just tonight she was playing with grandpa and calling his name after he "beeped" her nose.
bye-bye (bye-bye)- so cute! She will wave and say it at the same time.
all done (da)- at the end of a meal, I tell her all done. Now when every I say all done, whether after eating or anytime, she will she da da.

There are often times when we say something she will mimic the sounds that we just made and they are very close. I think she has a gift of speech or communicating.

Other updates.
She is finally in the right side of clothing for her age. She is in 6-9 month size, but she is just over 8 months. She has done a lot of growing!
She crawls reguarlly!
Today she stood up by just holding onto my shirt and then stood there for a few moments. She then let of my shirt and still just stood there. This was witnessed by Chris, I am not making it up. I was impressed!
She loves to play with the kitty! She is getting good at being gently when petting her too.

I am sure there was more I wanted to say, but I am tired now and going to bed.
Please, if you have any memories or comments about Kenya up to this point in her life please leave a comment for us. I want to keep these posts and share them with her when she is older. Thanks!

Goodbye Halloween, til next year!

Halloween this year was good. We went to a party at some friends house on Friday and then enjoyed a mellow Halloween on Saturday. For it being Kenya's first Halloween we felt it went good. We dressed her up again and took her to the local grocery story. There they had 6 stations where they handed out snack items and had hot food to eat throughout the story. (No, not the food on the shelves, but pizza and hot dogs for us to eat. It was perfect because we didn't want Kenya's first Halloween to just pass, but she couldn't really do any trick or treating.

Next are some the latest pictures of her in her. They were take last Sunday. What a big girl she is now! She is in her 6 month clothing. What a cute outfit! She was all dressed up and ready for church.

Halloween Fun

These are pictures of our pumpkin carving we did last night for family home evening. These pumpkins were grown in the garden we had here over the summer. The one Kenya was standing on was 71.7 lbs when we weighed it yesterday. We had a lot of fun and Kenya really enjoyed it. We just had Kenya draw on her pumpkin this year. She wasn't too interested in it. Oh and of course, we watched It's The Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown. There are a few videos of the fun too.






Here's Kenya kissing the Great Pumpkin!
This picture is proof of how much the Great Pumpkin weighed. It is hard to read, but it says 71.7lbs. It used to be heavier, but it has dehydrated some since it was harvested!






This video is of Kenya "riding" the pumpkin. We placed her on it to get a picture and she started to wave her hand as if riding a bull. She did it several times and we all loved it!



This video has Kenya making a funny face! I wonder why? (Bwahahahahahaha!)

This video is of our pumpkins glowing. Robert's has a flame coming out of the top and mine was haunted or something. The flame would dim and almost go out and then light up again all on its own. Spooky!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY LOIS!!

Today is Lois's 26th birthday! It is also her first birthday as a mommy!


Lois got to eat two birthday gifts from Red Robin! And of course endless fries! Red Robin Rocks! We had a good time with Kelsey and Aaron and Harmon who actually shares his birthday with Lois!

She also got birthday gifts from Baskin Robbins, Cold Stone Creamery, & Dairy Queen!

And she got a birthday gift from Disney Rewards!


Thank you to anyone who may have gotten a gift for Lois. We truly appreciate it!

We All Love Fall!

Why do we love Fall time? Well it's because of all the foliage that creates an amazing spectacle of color, motion and nature! These are pictures of our time at Snoqualmie Falls. The kids loved it too! They were able to enjoy the abundance of color and texture offered by the surrounding trees.