Happy Valentines Day!

We started our Valentines yesterday by having friends over and making treats.  We did not get around to making Christmas goodie plates for our friends and so we decided to do it for Valentines Day instead.   Then for Family Home Evening we delivered them to our friends.  Kenya LOVES to give presents to others.  When I asked her yesterday what we should get Daddy for Valentines she told me she was going to wrap me up and that I could be Daddy's present. 

She is holding a heart shaped PB&J and can you see the heart in her hair?

 So today I tried to make it a little special for the girls.  Kenya got some jewelry for her Valentines gift first thing in the morning.  When she opened her gift she told me, "When I grow up and am a caramel mommy I want to get you a Valentine."  She is so sweet.  I fixed Kenya's hair with a heart in it.  Then after nap we had heart shaped PB & J sandwich.  We then went to a kids Valentines party and decorated a cookie.  Then we headed to get Daddy a Valentine and then delivered it to him at work.  Then more fun at a friends house making cookies.  I got a heart shaped pizza for dinner and we ate that and watched Charlie Brown Valentine.   It was a nice Valentines.  Kenya really enjoyed the heart theme through out the day.  When I asked her if she knew why we celebrated Valentines she told me because of Jesus.  I told her yeah, that is right because Jesus is love and that is what we are celebrating today, LOVE!  She told me, "Yeah, and Jesus is real."  Yep, he sure is!  Later she told Robert that we were Valentines is celebrating Jesus because he loves us and he IS love!  Children truly do know Jesus and understand so much more than I ever will!

These other pictures are from the other day when Kenya and Daddy were playing with the bubbles in the bath.  Thanks, aunt Christine for the giant thing of bubbles at Christmas time.  Kenya truly loves them. 

Weekend in Utah

So on the last weekend in January we went to Utah and visited family and some friends. We really had a great time!  We are bummed because we didn't get a picture of us with the Loera's.  Next time we will. 

My wonderful Aunt Chih!

I love you!

Part of Josh spoiling us was going to the circus.  Kenya and Aly loved it!  They had so much fun! I am sure Kenya would have done much better if we would have gotten in a nap before the show.  During the intermission Kenya almost fell asleep on Daddy while they were down walking around and looking at all of the animals.  Jasmin however could not stay awake.  She fell asleep shortly after it began and took over an hour nap.  She did wake up to see most of the second half. 
Here are some of the acts. 

Tight rope walkers.  One of the guys fell a couple of times, but still amazing!

People had their picture taken with this bear and there was a plastic wall between the people and the bear.  Oh the things people will spend their money on. 

Balancing a sword on  a knife his is holding with is mouth.  Oh yeah and the fire on top.

We loved it!  Thanks again Josh! 

January Pictures

 I took the pictures off of my new camera and there they are.

This is at the beginning of the year.  Kenya put these scraps of fabric on everyone and said they were hats. 

 This is a project that Kenya made for her room.  I hot glued the crayons to the canvas and then she melted them.  We hung it up in her room.

 These are the quilts my mom made the girls for Christmas.  I love the colors that she chose!  Both of the girls love the quilts.   Kenya uses hers almost every night and I set Jasmin on her to play.  Jasmin loves all the colors and patterns to look at.  Great job, Mom!

Kenya's

Jasmin's

 Last weekend we went to visit family and friends in Utah.  We had a blast.  We got to visit so much family  and my brother Josh spoiled us while we were down there!

Kenya, Alyxana, and Jasmin

 Josh took us to Golden Coral and the girls played with the chocolate from the chocolate fountain.  They were "painting' with it.

Kenya and her painted face.

More to come on our weekend. 

Ambitious Jasmin

So tonight Jasmin has been showing a lot of ambition for standing and walking! She's already attempted it 5 times! She will totally let go of either Lois or I, steady herself for a good second or two and take a step! She even went from a sitting position while Lois was sitting cross legged on the floor. Jasmin's legs were bent at 90 degree angles and she stood straight up without leaning or pushing on anything and balanced herself for 2 full seconds at least. I couldn't believe it and totally had time to get a camera, but was too amazed!

Well we will keep you posted on her progress. No we are not trying to get her to walk so blasted early, but just like Kenya we are letting Jasmin go at her own pace.  (Oh, We'll try to have a camera nearby for these stunts!)

Jasmin's Dr apt

So at Jasmin's Dr apt last week she was 14 lbs 14.5 oz and 25.5 inches long.
She has also started waving hello. I cannot believe she is over 6 months old now!

Other Odds and Ends of the hoildays.

So, we are almost caught up and it is only a month late.
Here are some more Christmas time activities.   These next few pictures are of the girls as we were trying to decorate after getting back from Montana.

 

\We made a gingerbread house on Wednesday evening.  It was fun, Kenya and I made the cookies and ahead of time and then Kira and Daddy helped build it.  Kenya loved eating making the house.  Wednesday day was filled with 4 hours of wrapping presents too!

Before we even began Kenya had frosting on her face!  Isn't that the way it should be when you are a kids.

This is what Mom did was we decorated the gingerbread house.

Jasmin hung around and watched.  She really enjoyed it.

The masterpiece.  The snowman was Robert's creations.

By Wednesday our house was empty and Kenya and I were a sad and quite bored.  There was lots of cleaning to do, so we kept busy.  We played games with our friends the Reids one night and enjoyed some good old fashion fun!

Our New Year's eve was fun.  We actually ended up having quite the busy day.  We went to the Idaho Museum which had a display of Christmas stuff.  That was quite fun.  (We just never got there before Christmas and we really wanted to see it.)  They had nativity sets from all over the world there.  Truly it was great to see!

Then we played games with the Reids again for a few hours. Then off to Rexburg for a party at our friends the Hunts.  It was just us and there family, but still plenty of fun!  We played Wii games, watched This Is It (Micheal Jasckson's last dvd) and drank bacon soda for our New Year's toast.  (Yeah, drinking that soda is still the worst decision I have made this year.  GROSS!)  Then we were all off to bed and asleep before 1:00am.  I know lame married people, but at least we stayed up and brought in the new year.  Kenya woke up about 15 minutes till and so we just let her stay up and bring it in with us.  She did the same thing last year.  It was a great New Year!

I was kind of strange that we did not have an extended amount of time off or go anyway for a Christmas break.  Pretty much all of my life has revolved around school and there was always a break to Christmas and most often traveling.

Holiday blogging done!

Christmas Day with the Drapers 2011

We did a pretty good job of covering the tree!  With a little help.

I love having Christmas day on the Sabbath! Having Christmas on Sunday seems to make that day so much more spiritual. It was also very convenient because our church was at 11am so we had time to do gifts, breakfast, showers, and get dressed before church. And then we only held Sacrament meeting where we heard great Christmas music and hymns and were able to commune with Heavenly Father as we remember The Savior. The following pictures are of Christmas day in our home.

Kenya and Lois were the first ones up at around 6:30am.  They showered as everyone else slowly got up. It was about 7:00am when everyone started digging through their stockings and sorting presents to open.

 

These are new stockings we got this year.  We loved them!

We actually put the turkey in the oven the night before, before midnight.  This was Tom.  One of the turkeys my mom raised this summer.  It would not fit on our roaster and just barley fit in the oven. 

Wholey turkey!  This sucker was huge!!!

Here are the pictures of the 2-3 hour present process!

Sam sorting presents.

Cheri and AJ

This got her stocking as usual.  She had a treat and some mice in it.

This enjoying her treat while we opened presents.

My mom made quilts for gifts this year.  Cheri and her 2 girls got one and so did Jasmin and Kenya. I will have to take pictures of the quilts and post them a different time.  She did a great job on all of them!   

These next pictures are of a check that Amy sent and we wrapped in the biggest present under the tree. We filled the box with newspapers for weight.

Kenya got these scissors in her Dr kit and tried to use them to open her gifts.  So cute!

More from the Dr kit.

Thanks uncle James!  She loves the dress up stuff!

Jasmin joined us at about 9:00ish.  She had fun opening her gifts and playing with new toys!

Oh how she LOVES her backpack.  She was going to school. 

The aftermath. 

  Our girls after church.  Not the greatest pictures, but still so cute!

This video is of Kenya when she saw her awesome gift from Grandma Carla.  We waited until after church and her nap to give her this one.  There was no room to set it out before.  I guess we should have let her wake up a little more.  Kenya LOVES it and has had hours of playing with it since.  This video does not really show her excitement though. 

What a wonderful Christmas.  The rest of the day was filled with a yummy dinner and family time.  It was not all the gifts that made this year great it was the spirit of Christ that we felt in our home, the memories we made, and the time spent with family!  We hope that all of our Christmas' will be this rich in love and blessings!  We are still striving to keep the Spirit in our house.