Bedtime

Sometimes when we put Nora Jane to bed, and she's just not ready, she'll throw a fit for a few hours. She throws dishes from her kitchen, all the furniture and people out of her doll house, knocks all the books off the shelves...and sometimes strips off her pajamas. By the time we go in to remedy the situation, she is an ice cube and cries that she's freezing and brings us her pajamas to put back on.

Well last night she didn't make a peep. Just went right to bed...so we thought. By the time we were heading upstairs to go to bed, I noticed her light was on in her bedroom. I went in to find this:













No pajamas, pillow and blankets on floor, and stethoscope around her neck. Sound asleep!

Shopping with Nora Jane

Shopping with this little girl is sometimes what I always dreamed shopping with a little girl would be like. Here's two recent examples of this.



On this particular day, we went shopping with my sister-in-law, Annalisa and her little girl Emme. As we were loading all the strollers and carseats into Annalisa's car, Nora Jane wanted to make sure I loaded her stroller for her dolly. At first I thought this was going to be disastrous, but it turned out to be so fun. She acted like she was just one of the mommies, pushing her stroller, and she acted so mature and stayed right with me.

At one point she went running clear across the mall, because she spotted a picture of Ariel. She was so excited! It was so cute I had to take a picture.



Here we were at Old Navy, and she found this hat, and came around the rack to show me, and posed just like this. I don't know where exactly all this personality comes from...but it makes life really fun!



After Old Navy, we headed to Target, wearing the hat of course! She came across this lovely nightgown. I knew we were headed for a meltdown at this point, when I wasn't going to buy it for her. Finally, I decided to try a little trick that works with Tucker. Whenever he wants something really bad, I tell him we can take a picture of it, to remember it when it's his birthday or Christmas. So I told Nora Jane we could take a picture, text it to grandma Pace and ask her to get it for her birthday. Worked like a charm! What she doesn't know is that my text said that if grandma bought this for her, she may not be invited to the birthday party. :)

Valentine's Day!

 We've sort of started a tradition with the Beck's and Goddard's to all go out for dinner together on Valentine's.  This was our second year, and we went to Flemings.  It was a perfect evening, good food, good friends, good conversation.

(Of course thanks to Brette and her trusty camera, I get to have something to blog about!)

Julie and Daniel

Sabrina and Mickey

Curt and Brette

Sabrina, Brette and Julie 

(34 weeks pregnant, since I don't have many pregnant pics of me, I should label it I guess.)

Mickey, Curt and Daniel

New Year's Day - Mark's (Grandpa's) Birthday

New Year's Day is Mark's (Daniel's Dad's) Birthday.  Last year they took the family to Fat Cats for bowling and pizza, and decided to do the same this year.  He invited his parents to come this year, and they were excited and nervous because they hadn't been bowling since they were dating.  Grandmother asked me if I knew how to score it, because she didn't know how...and I explained that they computer just does it for you now.  Later they shared with us how the last time they went bowling, there was actually a man behind the alley, that set the pins back up. :)

Grandpa (who Nora Jane just calls Mark), his Mother "Grandmother", and Anne Marie.

Grandfather Pace

New Year's Eve -- Sledding

In my attempt to be a fun mom, and pass the time on New Year's Eve, I took the kids sledding.  I was a little sore later that evening, but we all had fun!

Later that night we watched "How to Train Your Dragon" with Daniel, who hadn't seen it yet, and it was so fun to all sit on the couch together eating popcorn and watching the movie.  Then we put the kids to bed, and barely made it to Midnight.

Happy New Year!

Grandma and Grandpa Paces Christmas Card Photo Shoot

Grandma and Grandpa Pace decided to do a Christmas card picture with just their grandkids this year.  Here's a little sampling from the photo shoot.

Preschool Christmas Program

Here's the one picture I got of Tucker at his Christmas Program this year.  Poor kid couldn't ever see me, and was searching the crowd in between every song trying to find me.  Toward the end of the program, I overheard two moms in front of me talking, and I kept hearing "Tucker".  Well after my friend that was in front of them, turned around to tell me she got lots of pictures of Tucker for me, one of these other moms turned around and asked if I was Tucker's mom.  Apparently their two daughters talk about Tucker everyday when they get home from preschool.  They said they like him cause he plays house with them. :)

Temple Square Christmas Lights

We went to see the lights at Temple Square this year with some good friends, The Beck's and the Goddard's.  The only downside to the evening was that we went the same night as the rest of the State of Utah.  It was so crowded!!

 We went to Blue Lemon for dinner.  So Yummy!! Here's Tucker eating with the Goddard's, with a family of 4 super cute girls (they left the baby at home sleeping) of course he'd rather sit with them, instead of us. :)

The Beck's

Nora Jane wanted to be sitting with the Goddard girls too, I think.  But how bad would that be for us to just pawn all our kids off on to other people for dinner!

Tucker and Sadie....so cute!!!

Nora Jane being a stinker again!! What a cute picture that could have been!

Tucker and Nora Jane with the Goddard Girls!

Cute Bum shot!

Tucker and Sadie...who were "bumping tongues" that night.  I'm really not sure where he gets this stuff from, but he seems to be smitten! (I am too...she's soooooo cute!)

So fun to have good friends to do fun stuff with through the holidays!

Dinner at Ruth's Chris in Park City

We decided to treat ourselves to a nice dinner in Park City with our good friends, the Goddard's and the Beck's.  I like doing stuff with Brette (Goddard) because she always brings her camera and takes lots of pictures, then I just steal them from her blog and viola...I have something to blog about. :)  This was a nice kick-off to the Christmas season.  Let the craziness begin!!!

Sweeping Booty

Before Daniel left for work one day, he joked with Nora Jane about sleeping in the bathtub.  Well later that day, when I was doing my makeup, and she was playing in the bathroom, she remembered what he had said, and asked me to go get a pillow for her.  She then pretended to be asleep so I could take her picture.

(Sweeping Booty, is just how she says Sleeping Beauty)