To sum up...

This summer we went to Jackson Hole with the Astle side of the family, 7 Peaks waterpark, Jared and I took a long trip down the California coast. That was really fun. that pretty much sums up our summer. I felt like making a sad attempt to catch up since the Holidays are just around the corner and a sad attempt it is. My pictures are being difficult so maybe one day I'll be caught up. Not today, though.

Happy Birthday Jackson

Jackson turned 7 this year and he chose to have a small friend party with 2 of his friends Wyatt and Addison. We went to Kangaroo Zoo and they all had a blast. I didn't take my camera but it was really fun. Annie was probably the most hilarious. I thought she'd hate it but she held her own and loved flopping around like crazy.

Schoooool's out for SumMa!!

I have no idea what Tanner's preschool teacher thought about him, but he LOVED preschool! Tanner IS an individual. I don't really know any other way to describe him other that that. He marches to the beat of his own drum and he couldn't care less what the rest of the band is doing. If I look away for a second I can not predict where I might find him. He keeps me entertained and not a day goes by that he doesn't say something sweet to me.



Jackson loved first grade! He gets SOO excited about learning and he focuses very hard when he wants to learn something or get good at something. I can trust that he does his best and he's proud of himself when he does well. That makes me happy. It's such a relief to know he motivates himself and homework and practicing things aren't too much of a task.


They love the summertime!!


Like I said, Tanner is an individual.


I hope they stay buds forever.

Last Minute Half

The night before the Ogden Half Marathon my friend called me and said her running partner for the race was sick and she offered me her bib. I actually made a promise to myself that I was not going to run any races again because I get too nervous and they aren't fun for me. BUT, this particular race is kind of hard to get a bib for and I heard it was a fun race. It was fun. It was by far the easiest half I've run and it was beautiful. I don't know if it was easy because I told myself not to worry about time or if it was because of the perfect weather or if it was because it was all down hill OR all of the above but I'm so glad I got to run it.

Crossing the finish line. My actual time was 1:46:06, my fastest half so far. Maybe not training is the trick for me.


People kept calling me Nicole. I felt like I was living a lie. It was kind of exciting.

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Our Garden

We planted a garden this year. It hasn't done as well as we had hoped but there is also hope that we'll keep learning and getting better

Jared worked really hard to put the garden box in. We've slowly been weeding and getting our lawn and things fixed up. We've come a long way from where it started but we still have a little work to do.


About 5 minutes after planting the last seed it hailed on our garden.


About 5 seconds after it hailed it was sunny again.



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Easter 2011

I have so many pictures from Easter but this is just a tid bit.

Kids definitely MAKE holidays for us! They are so much fun.


Annie LOVED her first Easter. She was equally surprised and equally excited with every egg she found like it was the first egg she found.

Shanthony

Jared's younger sister (the 2nd youngest sister 3rd youngest child) got married this year. She married Anthony Ford who is probably the only guy in the world we all deemed worthy of Shanna Banana.





Just a cutie pie I found in the mix of people.

Hey friends,

Our good friend and neighbor Todd White was just diagnosed with colon cancer just a couple of days after his wife Cassie delivered their 4th child. The surgeons removed a grapefruit sized tumor from his colon and he is at home now after a week long hospital stay. They are an amazing family who so many people admire and love. They are always so willing to help others and are so generous with their time and friendship so we want to be able to help them in any way possible. Right now their medical bills are through the roof already and he still has a long road to recovery. If anyone is willing to help out, even just a dollar, it would help them so much! Thanks!!

Love,

The Weavers

I'm Sooo behind!!

I just realized that I've missed 8, EIGHT posts that I need to catch up on!! Oh boy.

Alpine Wyoming!

Last year our friends from dental school Andy and Brooklyn invited us up to his parent's cabin up in Alpine Wyoming with our friends Ryan and Brinley. We were happy when they invited us again this year because we were hoping this would turn into an annual tradition! Andy happens to be a long lost cousin of mine. His mom is an Astle (I'm an Astle). This is probably why he is so like-able. Hee hee. Andy's parents co-own a ski resort in Idaho, not too far from the cabin, so he was able to get tickets for everyone to go skiing for free. I didn't get many pictures of all of us at the cabin but I got a couple of the boys and their first time skiing. They LOVED it!! Jared had fun too seeing the boys enjoy themselves but apparently teaching two kids how to ski isn't so easy.



This is mostly why it isn't so easy. I HATE the tow rope!!!! Glad I was cozy up in a cabin with Annie.



I'm so mad at myself because somehow I missed taking pictures of Jackson. Back at the cabin he spent an entire day outside sledding down the road. He had so much fun.


I thought Annie would cry being all squished up like this but she thought it was really funny. She also went sledding for the first time here.


Jared and the big boys also spent a lot of time snow mobiling and I also did a little snow mobiling by myself for the first time. We all loved the whole trip.

Seattle

One of Jared's dental suppliers (Patterson) had a convention up in Seattle and told Jared they'd fly us up there for it. We had such a great time!! It was sooo relaxing to be without any kids and just hang out around the city and eat lots of yummy food.

We didn't have a ton of time up there so we didn't do a lot but here are some of the highlights...

We headed to the Space Needle and had dinner at the top. It takes an hour to make a full rotation so we could see an ariel view of the city and the sound while we ate. It was really fun.


I don't even remember what kind of a car this is but Jared was totally jealous of the owner. I made him stand by it like he owned it but he got all nervous and didn't want to touch it or look weird. I thought that was funny that he cared so much.


This picture's kind of lame but we went on the underground tour. My dad said it's the dumbest thing ever but we actually really liked it. It gave a history of how Seattle was built and it's interesting to know that the streets and sidewalks you're walking on are on top of old streets. My grandpa said "it's nice if you like walking around in basements." I think he might not have like the tour much either.


Ohhhh, yumm yumm yummmmm!! This alone makes me want to live on the West Coast!


It's hard to see but there is a flying salmon in this picture. This is the famous fish market that we see on movies a lot. We stood around waiting for someone to buy a fish just for this picture.


Here's Jared debating whether it's worth $200 to pack some fresh fish home. We didn't come home with any :(


The famous sign. They were doing construction so we didn't get to touch the lucky pig.


This was really the highlight of our trip. Jared and I LOVE trying new foods and when a restaurant has great atmosphere along with yummy food we feel like we are the luckiest people in the world. This was a Moroccan restaurant we found in a newspaper we picked up off the ferry. They had 5 courses and they were all delicious.


They first washed our hand at the table then gave us a huge towel we kept throughout our meal (I suppose because a lot of the food was eaten by hand). There was a belly dancer, we sat on the floor, and this is our 3rd course. It was some crazy ground chicken filled filo dough piled high with powdered sugar and cinnamon. It was unique and delicious!


You can see it was not an easy thing to eat. This is why we had huge towels instead of normal sized napkins.


We also took a ferry across puget sound and got a couples massage. We ate some sushi, watched a movie, read some books, and hung out in a lot of coffee shops using their wifi and sipping herbal tea. Well, maybe I did those things while Jared was in conferences for a couple days.

Our trip was wrapped up in the airport watching the superbowl at Sbarros eating leftover cheesecake.

Tanner is 5!!

Like I've said before (not that long ago) the kids just keep growing up sooo fast!! Tanner had a great birthday planned. We were supposed to get cupcakes and take them to preschool and have a special poster board with pictures of him to show his class, Have a couple of neighbor friends over for a party, then have Grandma and Grandpa Astle over for some Pizza and cake and ice cream. Instead he woke up with sick.

Instead we went to Sam's club to pick up some food, Walmart to pick up his cake, then the doctors office to get some prescriptions. Grandma and Grandpa did end up coming anyway and Tanner decided he wanted "Crab, shrimp, and all the seafood" instead of pizza. Besides Jackson, we were all happy with his decision.

All he asked for was an easy bake oven. So he was happy when that's what he got. I also got him some roller skates and he absolutely loves them.


Before he went to bed I told him sorry that he had to miss all of his special birthday activities and he said "Mom, I'm still happy because I had a nice birthday." He has a great attitude! Jackson hurt his feelings while they were getting to bed and I told Jackson he needed to tell Tanner 3 things he loves about him before they fell asleep. The next morning Tanner got up and said "Jackson made my heart happy. He told me so many nice things about me."

Tanner really is one unique little kid. He always has something nice to say and finds the positive in most situations. He certainly can drive teachers and parents crazy with his lack of sitting still skills but it's also one of his more endearing characteristics.

Later the next week he did finally get to do his special birthday at school and had a small neighborhood friend party. I was a little worried how it would go since Jared wasn't going to be home but it turned out great and kids this age just love running around and playing together. No need for over planned activities!

He has been asking to have a costume birthday party since his last birthday. He finally got what he's been begging for.

Annie girl turns 1

Annabelle and my brother John's little boy Wells turned 1 just a day apart from each other. They celebrated their birthdays together and my sister-in-law MiaLisa bought THE cutest cakes for these two. Sadly, I had the camera on black and white the whole time so I didn't get any good pictures of anything.

The two birthday pals with their cute cakes.

Annabelle just wanted to play with the cake.

I couldn't get enough of Wells. He was inhaling that cake and just laughing the whole time. Annie was pretty cautious at first but here she figured out she can stuff her mouth full of cake.

The boys with their cousins. Jackson was especially sad to know they had to move back to Texas. He said "I'm really sad we don't ever get to see them again." We're hoping John gets into residency here at the U despite what he and Misa want :)

Annie after Jared figured out I was taking pics in black and white the whole time.


I don't care how cliche it sounds, I CAN'T BELIEVE HOW FAST TIME FLIES!!! It's so much fun to watch Annabelle go through different stages but I already miss having a teensy weensy baby in the house (this does not mean we are ready to add another one to the mix, though!!). She is such a sweet little girl and it seems we still fight over who gets to hold her and play with her. Last Sunday after Sunday school she was snatched up by one of our friends and we didn't see her until after church. Apparently people in Relief Society were fighting over her the whole time. As far as her growing, she finally made it onto the chart. At her 1 year appointment she was 18 pounds!! She seems to be chunking up nicely :)

Christmas in a nutshell...

We had my parents over a few weeks before Christmas to make "gingerbread" houses because Jared and I found out neither of my parents had ever made one before!! Here are the results.

My uncle and aunt Paul and Cindy held a little Nativity performance (put together by my cousin Jennifer) and it was really nice. We got to sing some Christmas songs, read about the Birth of our Savior and the kids got to dress up and have fun.

Christmas Eve the boys slept in our room so they wouldn't sneak out and find Santa's loot before us. Here are the boys waiting to see what Old St. Nick brought them.

This little girl is one who LOVES her sleep. Christmas morning did not come as a pleasant surprise to her.

Excited about Santa's gifts!

Jackson kept telling about this guitar and drum set that other kids had and it took me until Christmas Eve to figure out what the heck he was talking about. It's super thin and light and luckily pretty inexpensive!

All Tanner wanted was a cape from the Quilted Bear he saw several months ago. He was excited to see his superman cape along with his Ironman stuff.

You can see how Annie's feels.

It seemed like all the kids and their friends wanted for Christmas were pillow pets. I thought they were kind of silly at first but the kids have loved them and sleep with them every night!


We all had a very nice Christmas!! It was sad to see it come to an end. I think this was the first year in a long time I wanted to do it all over again.