Tyler is 7!

The thing about ages is that it always feels old, because it is older than you have ever been before.  But goodness, Tyler is 7?  Wow!  I am just amazed at how big he is getting.  I think it creeps up on me a bit because he doesn't quite act his age, but I really have to remind myself what size to get at the store for that kiddo.

To celebrate, we followed tradition and had a party with Christopher's family.  And when we asked Tyler what he wanted to do, he requested an exact repeat of last year.  Skating!

Well, he prefers scootering, but that's not really a word.  And I really want to go back some time and try to skate with him, but when you are hosting a party isn't the best time to walk around the rink holding him up.  Which is why we brought both scooters and Kaitlyn's skates.  But instead, Kaitlyn never used her scooter.  She had me hold her hand for a half a loop, and then spent basically the next three hours skating all by herself.

I am just amazed by what that girl does when she decides to put her mind to it.  At one point she fell down, and I said "oh, are you okay?"  She smiled and told me she was fine, "because I am a Fireside Girl and Fireside Girls never give up!"  Life lessons from cartoons!

Kaitlyn did steal the show, though.  She even tried jumping over the blue line every time she crossed it, and today while she was "practicing" on our kitchen floor she was trying to skate the splits and skate backwards. I took a video of her and posted it here.

Jasmine liked the breeze through her hair a bit too.

But she likes crawling more.  I call this girl my tortoise (like the tortoise and the hare) because she never seems to move very fast, but if you underestimate her she will find mischief when you turn your back.  And she already has her first word down pat: MAMA!  Whenever she wants me, her cry turns to "ma-ma-ma-ma-ma!" in a pitiful, tragic voice.

Anyway, back to the birthday boy!

He loves everything about this activity.  And he really was so much more into a birthday than ever before.  It used to be that he had no idea what was going on, and that we would have to work for months to teach him that he was now another year older.  But this time, he got it right away!  We told him once, and then the next time we asked him he knew that "first I am six years old, and then I will be seven years old!"  And while Kaitlyn was a bit frustrated at how long it took him to open his presents, he quite enjoyed that part too.  At home later, he loved his new car track Grandma got him, and he loved the blank floor puzzle that I got for him to color.  Not a bad self portrait!

And speaking of little kid drawings, he came home from school with a birthday card from each of his classmates and aides today.  They are so cute!  Some of them are more on topic than others - one kid drew a robot shooting something, and one called him Mommy - but they are all wonderful.  A mountain of sweet and innocent "I love you"s!

Tonight, for his actual birthday, we went out for pizza, because that is Tyler's all time favorite food.  Of course, he fell in love with a new particular food at Christmas, so Daddy decided we should hook him up for his birthday. He was pretty excited about that one!

And Kaitlyn was pretty excited about her bread on a stick.

But my favorite part was that our server saw his hat and brought out a "7" pizza for him and a cookie and two suckers for us to take home.  It was a wonderful, low-key family party!

My annual snapshot:

*Tyler continues to be an absolute sweetheart to his core.  He has yet to do anything with the intention of being devious: when he does pull tricks on his sister or sneak candy when I'm not looking, he will fully admit what he did and laugh the same way Daddy laughs when he tickles Tyler or steals his pillow.  It's all a fun game!
*My favorite thing about Tyler is watching him with his "Baby Miss".  He ADORES Jasmine, and spends all the time he can talking to her and trying to pick her up and letting her pull on his hair.  He also loves my mother-in-law's new puppy, and chases him all over whenever we see them.  I think he just loves the little critters in his life, and just comes over to them with an "awww!" and a hug whenever he can.
*Tyler is FULLY potty trained!  He sometimes uses too much paper, but other than that he is taking care of it all by himself now.  Of course, he also knows which bathroom he should go in, and isn't too happy if I try to force him to come to the ladies' room with me.
*Tyler can write his own name very well, but isn't too good at any other reading or writing right now.  He is working on adding and subtracting at school though, and I think he is making some headway there.
*Tyler makes us laugh every day.  Just this Sunday, I was distracted taking care of a tired baby at a friend's house while we were waiting to eat lunch with a crowd.  But Daddy points out that Tyler hadn't waited for the food - he had helped himself to a plate and a sandwich.  When I rushed over there, fully embarrassed, I noticed that instead of lunch meat and cheese, that kid put a chocolate chip cookie in his sandwich!

And a good time was had by all . . . except Jasmine

Our children still haven't figured out waking up early on Christmas.  Sure, we were a bit late getting out of Grandma's house the night before, but I guess the whole thing wore them out because Daddy gave up and woke them up at 9am.

Kaitlyn laid there, answering Daddy's questions about what day it was and who came last night until a light bulb went off and she dashed out of bed.  Tyler wasn't quite awake yet, but came along anyway.

Jackpot!

And then Daddy explained that they would go nice and fast . . . outside, when it isn't snowing.  So Tyler tried the gas pedal anyway.  And Kaitlyn got rather scared of it and promptly got off.  On to less frightening toys!

Those silly pez dispensers were a huge hit.  Tyler went through all three packs before breakfast.

And by the way, in this picture you can see that Kaitlyn has opened her Santa present and is halfway through her stocking.  She isn't as fast as I was as a kid.  I seem to remember ripping things open in one minute flat, but she checks each object out for a minute first.  Tyler, however, is holding the first object he got from his stocking.  We could give that child one dollar store item for Christmas and he would be happy all morning.

Each object had to be inspected for 20 minutes.  When he found his (green is for Tyler) piggy bank, he refused to move on until he got coins in there, because an empty bank was just wrong.  This year we prodded him along to the next present, mainly because we were excited to see his reaction to everything.  But I think next year we might just let him go at his pace and see how many days it takes for him to unwrap it all.

The "Santa table" where Santa brings yummy food to share is always a hit.  This morning they even got chocolate cereal with marshmallows in it, instead of the regular cheerios mommy forces on them.

And Daddy loved the present I gave him.  He mentioned earlier in the year how much he loved pogo sticks as a kid, so I got him a big kid version.

You can't tell, since I am standing up the front stairs from him, but he was getting some good air on it!

And Kaitlyn liked the Rapunzel hair I made her.

Jasmine slept in until the kids were mostly done unwrapping.  But that poor girl was still miserable.  In fact, of my three children, this is my second "baby's 1st Christmas" that started off with puking in bed.  Tyler got the stomach flu his first Christmas.

But hey, the packaging was tasty, so she figured life was okay.

And she even liked the Princess castle she got from Santa.  She would bob her head along with the music for the dance floor.

And the kids loved Tyler's hot wheels track.  Which turned Daddy into a big kid at heart.  "I can see why I always wanted one of these as a kid!  This thing in awesome!"  Oh, and you'll notice that Tyler put on all of his candy jewelry from his stocking.  I think he just about emptied them by the end of the day!

I didn't take pictures of everything - the kids got a piano/microphone thing they love, I can't wait to break out my new serger, and the kids had a blast on their new wii game that night, too.  And we had another turkey dinner that night, where Grandma Skarda even came to relax and eat with us instead of hosting at her house. I was enjoying the day too much to break out the camera that much though!

But I did get a video of Tyler trying out his power wheels for the first time.  Daddy figured he cleared off enough snow for him to give it a shot, though obviously he still got stuck on the ice a few times. I think we were expecting a bigger reaction from Tyler, but he was all business about this.  Important stuff.

Almost Christmas . . .

I should be sleeping right now.  But I'm too excited for Christmas, and so instead I'm going to write this blog post because I love looking at all these pictures of the last few days so much.

One of the fun things this year is that Christopher had a lot of vacation days in the "use it or lose it" category, so we've had him ever since the kids got off school!  Hooray!  One of the first ways we took advantage of that was to sleep in and have a killer breakfast.  Christopher got this recipe from a co-worker and forwarded it to me a while back.  Hostess cupcake pancakes.  I'm not a chocolate fan myself, but the rest of my family sure is.

The white swirls melted, but my husband had three helpings, so it was a success anyway.

The next night, a friend invited us to come on the "Polar Express" with her family.  She made awesome tickets for each of my kids too, and we tried out the new Frontrunner trains that go up to Salt Lake City.

It was so much fun!  The kids loved hanging out on the train.  And once we got up there, we bundled up for the cold and headed to a toy store first.

"Look, Mom!  There's a dinosaur head on the wall!"

Jasmine didn't care for the snowsuit, unfortunately, but it did keep her warm.  She sat just like that, zoned out, almost all night.

The water fountain show was pretty cool.  But the kids probably were more impressed by the hot chocolate we brought along.

And then we walked to our favorite part - the lights at Temple Square!  They really are just gorgeous.

And a wonderful way to bring meaning back to the holiday adventure.

I love Tyler's face in that shot.  Silly kid.

The next day, I decided to try out an idea from Pinterest.  I cut some green felt into Christmas trees, and let the kids go to town with my felt stash making "ornaments".

The original person said that she made the kids their own trees "so they can play with their own ornaments and they won't touch the real tree!"  I laugh at the naivete every time I think of that.  Clearly that person had never seen a toddler in action.

So while this would never stop the kids from playing with the regular tree, I think I'll do this one again.  They thought it was great to cut whatever they wanted and stick it on there.

Sunday morning they looked so cute for Church that I told them I wanted a picture first.  And when I told them to stand by the tree, they went into this hug.

Which Kaitlyn declared was "just like we are getting married!"  Which is sorta creepy - and true.

Unfortunately, baby Jasmine and I did not get to go to church that day.  That poor girl woke up in the middle of the night with a solid fever and a raspy cough.  She has been better during the day the last two days, but still rather miserable each night.

Thankfully, the bug hasn't affected anyone else as much.  So the bigger kids got to make some Gingerbread houses.

You might be able to tell that Kaitlyn had almost no help with hers.  I put the house up, made a door,  and let her go.  Tyler never did get the hang of the icing though, so he just directed Daddy on what to do.

And then today was the annual Skarda family bonanza.  Poor Jasmine was still sick, but she soldiered on anyway.

Kaitlyn got to be Mary in the nativity play this year, which she was pretty excited about.  This is her acting out her part - "surprised" when she found out she was going to have baby Jesus.

Daddy got to play his plastic trombone in the annual "Tuba Christmas" event.

And Tyler was SO excited when Santa came to see everyone!  I wish I had a better picture, because he went a little crazy happy for a minute there.

And for the first time, he actually said something when Santa asked what he wanted for Christmas!  I couldn't hear him, because baby Jasmine was sobbing at the moment, and Santa couldn't understand what he said, so here's hoping it is something he is getting.

Though, honestly, the kids have no idea what this Christmas has in store for them.  Daddy has been giddy for weeks about these presents.  Amazingly, they have been just stashed under a tarp in the garage, and neither kid has questions that huge elephant in the room.  And of course, now that we need clear sidewalks to test them out, we have a beautiful white Christmas outside.

Time to head to bed until my little ones come get me!

Snow!

Our first snowy visit to the cabin!  We were able to drive our Pilot up, but it snowed 6 inches or so overnight once we got there, so that is the last trip up by car I think.  Next time we will have to maneuver a baby on a snowmobile.  But for this trip, it was all just fun stuff!

Kaitlyn's favorite was the snowman that was "SO big!"  I love the little tiny arms that Tyler wandered off to find all on his own.

And of course, we have to make snow angels too.

But Daddy and I loved the sledding the most.

I got this pretend snowboard at a garage sale a while back, and it probably wasn't worth the 50 cents I paid for it.  Though watching him try was kinda fun, in a way!

One of Daddy's jokes with Tyler is that "you are my favorite pillow!"  So whenever he tries to wake up Tyler in the morning he just lays down to sleep himself, and Tyler just laughs and laughs.  "I'm stuck, Daddy!"