So, this is what two minutes of freedom looks like when you hide out in a dark pantry hoping no one will find you. That's right, she opened the door, found the Halloween candy, dumped it and grabbed her favorite...dum dum suckers! She knew she had little time so she didn't waste any of it and only started eating what she already knew she liked. The funny thing is her only taste of candy was when she stumbled across one a few weeks prior to this in her sister's backpack...other than that, she hasn't had any candy. Funny that she even remembered she liked it! Kids naturally love sugar...here's the proof! And what did I do next of course...yeah, I'm a softy...I let her eat one.

We went out to our friends' house and rode their horse, Cali. It was their first time on a horse and loved it! Well, Julia and Kaylee did...Sophie watched from afar. It was a cold, winters day...brrr!

Mia turned one in November. It has been a fast, busy, fun year. Mia is a sweet, smily, easy baby that has blessed our family tremendously. Her sisters love her and she thinks that she is "one of the girls." She shreaks at you if you try to slow her down or leave her out...She of course thought the tissue paper in her gifts were "the gifts." She laughed and played with the tissue all night. Her newest trick is to stand on her head...so Kaylee joined her. Silly girls!

We went to the coast with our friends the Shaffers. We could live at the beach...our kids love it!! Here Julia is playing football with her Dad. It was a perfect sunny day.

Kaylee of course was in the water immediately. She is never cold! She gets that from her Dad...definitely not me!

Sophie girl also is a little fish. She goes right along with whatever her sisters are doing. She never misses a beat.

Mia of course slept through it all...I just forgot to take a picture of the car seat covered up with beach towels! :)

This is the funniest picture I think I have taken of Sophie in her 2 1/2 years of life. I was folding clothes and she decided to try on whatever I folded...now you know why it takes me an entire day to get a load of laundry washed and put away. :) Anyhow, this is what she ended up with...a pair of pjs, "skating socks"-which are just fuzzy socks our girls wear to slide around the house in, a soccer arm-band, and Mia's hair bow that she came across in the process. All put on by herself..she thought she looked great...and so did I! Check out the pose...

Kaylee is playing softball for the first time. She is doing great! The best part of all is that she is on the same team of some of her friends...She is such a good sport at there! Here she is rounding first base...

She kept trying to get them to eat the hay but she didn't understand that yelling at them wouldn't convince them to come over to her.

We went to our friend's dairy so Sophie could have her first real encounter with the baby calfs. It was so sweet to see her get up close to them and check them out. We tried to get her to let them suck on her fingers but she wanted absolutely nothing to do with that! She just wanted to look...

Sean took the girls to the annual Daddy Daughter Dinner Dance. This was Sophie's first year and she hung with all the big girls! They love dressing up and feeling special. One more girl will be in the picture before we know it...Daddy is going to have his hands full for the rest of his life!

Mornings are a fun time because Mia is so generous with her smiles. She's sleepy-eyed and happy and makes our mornings start perfectly. What a sweet face to greet in the morning.

How cute is this..searching for "fishies" and hoping to even catch one!!

I babysat my nephew Kohen and went to the park with the Prices'. It was a glimpse at what Spring will bring...ahh, warm, sunny days.

Sophie loves to dance...she's following in her sister Kaylee's footsteps. This is actuallly Kaylee's dance outfit from when she did dance last year...yes, it fits Sophie already. She loves turning on Taylor Swift's Christmas CD and dancing to it...she has a dance she made up (with her sister's help of course) that she wants to perform for anyone daily. She definitely will be a performer when she gets older. She makes us laugh!!

Violet came over to visit. She and Mia are only a day apart so it was fun to see them together. Mia is so long compared to her even though they both are definitely little peanuts. They had so much fun together...okay, they probably didn't even know the other exsisted. :)

We will miss them if they move back to China...they could grow to be best friends!! Well, at least they'll have their infant years... :)

Kaylee always wants to take care of her sister Mia. Anytime she is crying in her bed it drives her crazy. This was the cutest moment. She was holding Mia and talking to her and Mia was talking right back. She was cooing and smiling and wouldn't take her eyes off of Kaylee. They were having their own conversation. Kaylee is such a sweet big sister!

Here were the finished products at the end of the evening. Sophie was a sticky mess but had a ball decorating them. Her cookies will definitely remain HERS since she licked the knife every time she scooped some icing out of the container. And a few shakes of sprinkles were never enough...the whole cookie had to be covered before she would move on to the NEXT color of sprinkles. Kaylee of course took her time making sure everything was drawn perfectly and not messed up and Julia just slapped some icing and sprinkles on as she chatted away with anyone and everyone. Crazy how they are all so different! It was a fun, SWEET night.

we baked valentines cookies for our annual cookie decorating night at church. julia was in charge of distributing the dough, kaylee flattened it out, and sophie got to push the cookie cutter. it was sophie's first time ever and she mastered it right away. she could cut them, peel away the extras, and actually end up with something that resembled a heart. they had fun working together and making a mess. mia of course slept through the entire process so she once again isn't in any photos... :)

We went to the snow with the Shaffer Family. It was right after all those storms so there was tons of snow. We couldn't even walk in it because we would sink up to our hips...yes our hips!! Our kids had fun for awhile and then began to fall apart because of how cold it was. It even started to snow on us! It was a fun family memory, even if we weren't successful on the sled runs!

Three months old already!! Mia is cooing and smiling constantly. She is such a blessing to our family. Not to mention a great baby. My how the time flies!!

Daddy is always fun to have around! And isn't Mia getting big? She is now three months old!

Sophie helped Daddy bake pizza. She wanted to do it all by herself but eventually gave in to the help. Oma and Papa T bought her this cute outfit for Christmas because every time she sees someone in the kitchen, she runs and says, "ELP!" We haven't quite mastered the "H" sound yet. Notice the neon green gymnastic outfit underneath... :)

Julia had a blast on New Year's Eve. Our driveway was a disaster by the end of the night. Here she is letting off a popper!

Christmas Eve, 2009. We went to church and then back to our house for a yummy dinner! Sean cooked it all...his second calling is to be a chef, I just know it.

Decorating the christmas tree...the girls did it almost by themselves. As Julia and Kaylee put ornaments on, Sophie would take them off. It took a little longer than usual but eventually we got it finished. What fun!!

Thanksgiving Visitors

Grandma Lorraine came to visit on Thanksgiving and got to see Mia for the first time.
Playing outside with cousin Kade and Grandma Diane.

For Halloween Julia was a baton twirler, Kaylee was a cheerleader, and Sophie was a pink poodle.

Our newest addition

On Sunday, November 8th, Mia Lorraine was born. She has already added so much to our family. The girls adore her and can't get enough. Sophie especially. She wants to hold and kiss on her constantly...needless to say there is constant monitoring going on.