Long Distance

Isn't technology great! With Grandpa Saunders in Kurdistan and Grandma and Grandpa Kraczek on an LDS mission to Johannesburg South Africa it is so nice to be able to stay connected. Every week or so we get online for a video chat and catch up on each other's news.  I know that my kids will grow up thinking nothing of it but to me it is a modern miracle.

Happy Birthday Daddy

We had a very nice relaxing birthday for daddy this year. Daddy has been working very hard lately, so what he wanted most for his birthday was just to relax with his family and enjoy the day. Evan made sure Daddy felt loved by singing him happy birthday songs all day and making sure that there was a birthday cake with candles.

Every year mommy makes him a special birthday cake of his choosing. This year Daddy chose chocolate and cherries for the main ingredients, so we had a chocolate cherry upside down cake of Mommy's own invention.  It turned out a little gooey, but that did not detract from the yumminess.

In search of Snow

Evan has been dying to go sledding ever since Mommy bought him a sled this winter. Mommy even found Evan asleep in his sled one morning when the sled had been left in his room overnight.

Being from Utah, I have always taken for granted that there will be snow in the winter. So, after many promised snow stoms that turned out to be duds, the Kraczek family went out in search of some snow to sled in.

We headed up to a ski resort in Pennsylvania where we knew it would be "snowing" and got Evan a ticket for the kiddie tubing hill.

Evan was so excited that Daddy had found him a mountain for sledding. Mommy has as certain bias about what can be constituted a mountain, but we won't go into that. Never the less, the kiddie tubbing hill did not disappoint. Paul dragged Evan up the hill and pushed him down it for about an hour and a half till we were all sledded out and ready to go home.

It was a great day and hopefully next year we won't have to go so far to find some snow.

Evan is 3 years old

Evan turned 3 years old so we threw a great big party to celebrate. We invited about twice as many people as our little house could comfortably hold and had a wonderful time.

This is my first attempt at a shaped cake, and I am quite proud of the outcome if I do say so my self.

Evan has been into rockets lately so we went with a rocket ship theme complete with rocket ship party hats, a rocket ship cake,

And a rocket ship made out of cardboard boxes I brought home from work. I decorated the living room with construction paper planets and filled the place with streamers and balloons. Evan was so thrilled, he has been talking about his birthday for the past week telling Paul and I that we needed balloons, and party hats and a cake with candles on it for his birthday and being so disappointed that his birthday wasn't for a few more days.

After everyone left we opened presents and among the many cool presents was a new rocket ship from Grandma and Grandpa Saunders. It is the weirdest thing though after only a few launches the rocket ship was broken and needed repairs. It is a good thing that Mommy and Daddy got him tools for his birthday so he could fix it. It has needed several repairs since its first launch and it is just a good idea to keep your rocket ship well maintained so it doesn't break down while it is in space.

Decorating the Christmas Tree

Evan has been so exited about Christmas this year. He has been waiting all week to put the "jingle bells"(sparkly glass balls) on our Christmas tree.
















This was our first year having Evan decorate the tree with us. He was very good about making sure that all the ornaments we owned made it on to the tree.
We had a lot of fun decorating the tree as a family and we only broke one glass "jingle bell" in the process.








After we decorated the tree, we made yummy Christmas gingerbread cookies with daddy.

Evan was in charge of making sure they had lots of sprinkles and red hots.

A Visit to the Fire House

For playgroup this week we went to the McLean Fire House to see real firemen and real fire trucks. Evan and I had a lot of fun. They gave all the kids little fire hats and let them climb all over the fire engines.

Evan thought that ringing the bell on the old 70's engine was great fun.

It's a Baby Brother!

Even though ultrasound pictures are quite blurry I was surprised how much Evan looked like his ultrasound picture. I wonder how close this little one will look to his.

little fingers...

And little toes.